It’s harvest time in Kansas again. Even with all the technological advances, harvest time is still hard work for farmers. They pour their sweat, their backs into 14+ hour long days in the warm summer weather to gather the harvest. Have you ever seen a harvest? Have you ever had to work really hard to get everything just right?
Read Galatians 6:1-6 & Luke 10:1-11,16-20.
In addition to sending out the Twelve, Jesus is now sending out seventy more disciples, to gather in the harvest. The way of life that he describes for them is not an easy road; the harvest they need to bring in requires hard work. It requires shaking off the dust, being peaceable in the face of struggles and hardship. It requires teamwork to prepare people for their encounter with Jesus, to reach the high bar of relationship that God holds.
It is important to note that those sent out are not the creators of the harvest – that’s God’s job. It is important to see that those sent out aren’t bringing Jesus to the people – that’s God’s time. Instead, they are called and equipped to prepare the way – to spread the Good News, to speak peace in the face of trouble, to be vulnerable, to trust that their eternal relationship with God will sustain them.
Jesus calls the seventy and calls us to the high bar of relationship – to resting in our relationship with God and working on relationship with those in our community.
We are called to trust in God’s promise that the harvest is abundant – that people still care about God, even as churches close and the surveys say that people don’t care. We are called to trust that there is still work for us to do, to build relationships with people at school and at work and at workout classes and even in our families. We are called to rely on our relationship with God – that our faith and our peace will prepare the way for the encounter with Jesus. We don’t have to be great speakers or deep thinkers or seminary-educated in order to tell our story, in order to tell about our lives.
So reach for the high bar of relationship that God holds – the relationship with God and with people that requires not incredible strength, but incredible vulnerability. And thanks be to God for allowing us to be partners in the abundant harvest
Grace and peace,
Pastor Kate
Showing posts with label abundance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label abundance. Show all posts
Friday, July 5, 2013
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Temptations in the Desert: Scarcity or Abundance
When describing your worldview and your sense of available resources, where would you put yourself on a continuum that stretches from: Scarcity - to - Not enough - to - Just barely enough - to - Enough - to - Plenty - to - Abundance - to - Extravagance?
If Jesus came to reveal what God looks like, then the story of Mary of Bethany anointing him in preparation for his death and burial with the most extravagant perfume is a story of Jesus praising her for her extravagant devotion. John 12: 1-8. To emphasize this extravagant love that Mary pours out upon his feet, Jesus chastizes Judas Iscariot (who is about to betray Jesus) when Judas demands that the perfume should be sold to provide for the poor. Jesus realizes that Judas doesn't care so much for the poor, as he cares about keeping the common purse for his own purposes of stealing from it. Jesus rebukes Judas: "Leave her alone." (v 7). In light of Jesus' impending death, Mary "wastes" perfume on her beloved Master and Jesus receives it with gratitude.
How often do we "count" the value of various resources (especially money), giving into the temptation that there won't be enough - that our resources are finite and must be carefully controlled? Whether we're hoarders or cheapscapes or just reasonable folk who give of ourselves according to the time/energy/means that make practical sense in a world overwhelmed with "not-enough-ness," we operate out of the worldview that tempts us to value our efforts and our things by their usefulness or practicality or cost effectiveness.
Is the cross a symbol of our temptation or do we trust in the God of resurrection? Father Richard Rohr writes: "The cross is a statement of what we do to one another and to ourselves. The resurrection is a standing statement of what God does to us in return." (Richard Rohr, Easter 2012)
Both in the extravagance and love poured out by Mary and in the promises God makes in Isaiah 43: 16-21, we are drawn toward a God of extravagant abundance, whose love and providence have no end. Isaiah, using powerful water imagery, reminds us that God will make a way through the waters (Red Sea) just as he did for the Israelites fleeing the Egyptians. And when we wander in the desert of our temptations, we can trust that God will provide rivers in the desert & water in the wilderness - drink for God's chosen people.
Our challenge is to move through, around, past the barriers of temptations that there will not be enough. Our challenge is to trust God's promises of abundant healing, enough water for all, and an abundant love that sustain us through droughts. If we remember what God has done in the past, we are able to trust in the new things God is about to do in our future. We can trust in the love that shapes whatever new thing lies ahead.
Grace and Peace,
Pastor Shelley
If Jesus came to reveal what God looks like, then the story of Mary of Bethany anointing him in preparation for his death and burial with the most extravagant perfume is a story of Jesus praising her for her extravagant devotion. John 12: 1-8. To emphasize this extravagant love that Mary pours out upon his feet, Jesus chastizes Judas Iscariot (who is about to betray Jesus) when Judas demands that the perfume should be sold to provide for the poor. Jesus realizes that Judas doesn't care so much for the poor, as he cares about keeping the common purse for his own purposes of stealing from it. Jesus rebukes Judas: "Leave her alone." (v 7). In light of Jesus' impending death, Mary "wastes" perfume on her beloved Master and Jesus receives it with gratitude.
How often do we "count" the value of various resources (especially money), giving into the temptation that there won't be enough - that our resources are finite and must be carefully controlled? Whether we're hoarders or cheapscapes or just reasonable folk who give of ourselves according to the time/energy/means that make practical sense in a world overwhelmed with "not-enough-ness," we operate out of the worldview that tempts us to value our efforts and our things by their usefulness or practicality or cost effectiveness.
Is the cross a symbol of our temptation or do we trust in the God of resurrection? Father Richard Rohr writes: "The cross is a statement of what we do to one another and to ourselves. The resurrection is a standing statement of what God does to us in return." (Richard Rohr, Easter 2012)
Both in the extravagance and love poured out by Mary and in the promises God makes in Isaiah 43: 16-21, we are drawn toward a God of extravagant abundance, whose love and providence have no end. Isaiah, using powerful water imagery, reminds us that God will make a way through the waters (Red Sea) just as he did for the Israelites fleeing the Egyptians. And when we wander in the desert of our temptations, we can trust that God will provide rivers in the desert & water in the wilderness - drink for God's chosen people.
Our challenge is to move through, around, past the barriers of temptations that there will not be enough. Our challenge is to trust God's promises of abundant healing, enough water for all, and an abundant love that sustain us through droughts. If we remember what God has done in the past, we are able to trust in the new things God is about to do in our future. We can trust in the love that shapes whatever new thing lies ahead.
Grace and Peace,
Pastor Shelley
Saturday, April 21, 2012
Growing in Abundance
God-of-the-Angel Armies, Israel's God says in Jeremiah 29: 4-14: Build – Live – Plant – Eat. We
build that others may live. We plant
that others may eat. Trinity has built an Education Wing, remodeled and updated our building, and added two playgrounds and new landscaping. We have built on faith that we are following God's plans for us - plans for our wellbeing and our shalom. We follow Jeremiah's truthtelling that when we build and plant on behalf of others, we will find our wellbeing. Our shalom in tied together with the shalom of the Topeka community in which we live. As our community thrives, so will we thrive.
With Little Explorers living in our building and playing on the colorful playgrounds, we see the abundance of seedlings who will someday be bright, stable, contributing sunflowers in our city. As we see our children and youth thriving in the enriched environment our building and planting provides, we can envision their future as Son-seeking sunflowers.
Having built and planted in faith that God intended this service to our community, it is now our responsibility to eliminate the indebtedness so that we can follow the sun/Son into an even more abundant future. We raise our alleluias for this continued act of faith that we give so that others may live. Thanks be to God.
Grace and Peace,
Pastor Shelley
With Little Explorers living in our building and playing on the colorful playgrounds, we see the abundance of seedlings who will someday be bright, stable, contributing sunflowers in our city. As we see our children and youth thriving in the enriched environment our building and planting provides, we can envision their future as Son-seeking sunflowers.
Having built and planted in faith that God intended this service to our community, it is now our responsibility to eliminate the indebtedness so that we can follow the sun/Son into an even more abundant future. We raise our alleluias for this continued act of faith that we give so that others may live. Thanks be to God.
Grace and Peace,
Pastor Shelley
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