04-27-24

ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGS
April 27, 2024
Today is the Assembly of the Disciple Churches in the Greater Houston area. We have five people (maybe a sixth) from Cypress Creek Christian Church headed to Taylor Lake Christian Church for this gathering, and last I heard, there were well over 120 registered. I am looking forward to hearing Rev. Dawn Weaks speak on her book, Break Through: Trusting God For Big Change in Your Church. Dawn and her husband, Joe, are the Co-Pastors of Connection Christian Church in Odessa, a church that made the difficult decision to do something dramatically different. On the back of the book, there is a line:

“This is the story of what happened when a little Texas church’s ministers and lay leaders dared to place their desperate, dying selves into the radically loving hands of God.”

Maybe it’s not a church community, but I wonder how often we as individuals dare to place our desperate, dying selves into the radically loving hands of God. There are a couple of challenges in doing so. First, there is the relinquishing of control, suggesting that maybe God can see something that we cannot. Second, and somewhat related, is trusting God to walk with us even when that journey is uncomfortable and not where we would have chosen to go. And third, when we offer some dying part of ourselves to the radically loving hands of God, there is usually resurrection, but resurrection often challenges us to love with the same kind of love that gave us new life.

Where in your individual life or where in our collective life is there something dying that might need to be placed in the tomb and declared dead? Are we willing to trust God to do what God does in those moments? 

Though it causes great discomfort to face what is dying, O Merciful God, we pray for the capacity to trust the story of Jesus. There, we find new and unexpected life emerging from despair and hopelessness. Give us the courage to trust you and the gift of new life. Amen.