Tuesday 21 July 2009

I'm taking quite a bit of time with William Willimon but it keeps me thinking. Today we will begin a section on Divine Abundance.

I have a friend, a lawyer, who is something of a theologian. he finds it a salubrious spiritual exercise to sit in an airport waiting lounge and to focus on people - as they walk by or sit across from him - and ask, " Did Jesus Christ die for this person?" He attempts to expand his gaze, focusing on the oddest person in the lounge and ask, "Jesus Christ died for him?"
He explains, "It's my little discipline to see just how much I can swallow about Jesus Christ without choking."

What a exercise. Although I don't even think you have to go someplace special to start asking these questions. Much of what we must be willing to do is to ask this kind of question in, with, and under all the places in which we find ourselves. That for me is what I have been calling "urban spirituality." We need not go on any journey or retreat away from everyday life in order to be grasp by our God and shaken - yes, shaken and awakened - to the abundance of God's love and the real life impact it has on us. Each step and each path we take is an adventure that shows us time and time again how life comes into shape under the loving Reign of God. Too often though, this is not what we ask. We have enough ways to stay at arms length from this "divine abundance" as we attempt to build whatever it is we often call the church - something about God the way we want God to be...or the one way God has been taught to us.

Connection: How much about Jesus are you able to swallow without choking?

We come to you again and again, O God, to question and to try to come to grips with your love. And yet, it is too easy for us to run to other measures of the world of people and ourselves. Teach us again to be a peace under the grand umbrella of you gracious Reign. Inspire us to be open to your abundant and never-failing love. Amen.