Wednesday 15 July 2009

We turn to the Creed to continue out look at God's love in which we are shaped and held.

We say in the Apostles' Creed that Christ "sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty." It is a statement about rule, authority. But it's also a statement about the nature of God and what God is up to, not only in heaven but on earth. Seated there, at the right hand of the Father, it's hard for me to believe that Christ sits there in serene complacency. The son who sits next to the Father is none other than the one who sought the sheep, intruded among the sinners, reached toward the unloved, the one who stooped to the wounded in the ditch. Now this one sits at the right hand of the Father, now in the power of the Holy Spirit works with the Father as embodiment of the Father's full eros. This is great comfort.

It is so good to be reminded that the Christ, Jesus, we hear about in Scripture is not about taking a vacation. Rather, we continue to be approached by the one who will not let any of us go. We now use language about the Holy Spirit to show how God's power to work among us is still as alive as it have ever been. The Spirit of our Lord is still the Spirit of the Church and that means we are a people who can expect to see the saving acts of God continue to wash through our lives and refresh us so that we will be the followers of the one who is now in the position of power that makes resurrection a reality for each of us. This "Lord" of ours is eternally for us and eternally becoming us as we take on the image of the God whose love we have seen in Jesus and within the Church when it is free to walk in the way of Jesus. Thirty years ago today I was ordained in Detroit, Michigan, at St. Olaf Lutheran Church. I am a person of limited skills. I am quite ordinary when I see some of my colleagues. I am also regularly comforted by the eternal presence of Christ who will not let me go and will not let me let go of this gift of mercy and love. That is what has sustained me. Sometimes It is not a pleasant journey and many times I am quite sure I am not up to what will come. Then again, it is a journey that never ends...it never stops asking questions of me...it makes me re-view everything with an eye that is brought into focus by the absurdity of grace and the open spaces of mercy.

Connection: Today needs to be a day in which we are turned over by God's love for us and within the same breath that can turn us over....we are comforted so that we can continue along this way.

When you inspire us, O God, it is within the vision of our Lord, Jesus. We are transformed not into angels, we are transformed into saints who are more and more fully human and blessed by you. Help us to embrace the individuality of our humanity so that we too can lovingly give our lives away to others. Amen.