October 30, 2022
Beyond Rev. Patricia Wagner Scripture: Luke 19:1-10 Luke 19: 1-10 Jesus came to Jericho and was passing through it, and many people went to see him walk by. A man was there named Zacchaeus, a chief tax collector and wealthy, who was trying to get a glimpse of him, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was short in stature. 4So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because Jesus was going to pass that way. 5When Jesus came to that place, he looked up and said to him “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” 6So Zacchaeus came down at once and welcomed him gladly. 7All who saw it began to grumble and said, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.” 8Zacchaeus stood there and said to Jesus: “Look, Lord, half of my possessions, I will give to the poor; and if I have cheated anyone out of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” 9Then Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.” Before we hear this anthem, I was reading and a pastor, in the midst of COVID, and wrote, when we have a choir again, this is the song I will ask them to sing: In it you will hear the themes of this stewardship season. Belonging to one another, Good travelers move in company. we travel together as one Becoming we know not where the road will lead but we move in faith making love our creed And Beyond Sharing bread with those in need giving help to those who fall. Yet far beyond the setting sun, there shines a light of a victory won; Now, the Chancel Choir, accompanied by Adrielle Van Bibber and directed by Greg White with, “The Journey is Our Home” The Journey Is Our Home by Allen Pote Awake, arise, the journey’s begun. We travel on together as one. We know not where the road will lead, but we move in faith, making love our creed as we follow; The journey is our home. Good trav’lers walk with company, sharing bread with those in need. Giving help along the way to those who fall, who wander astray as we follow; The journey is our home. Join with us in jubilee. Celebrate God’s family. Sing together joyfully. Alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia. Praise for evermore! God moves with us as we go. He hears our cry, our pain He knows. Yet far beyond the setting sun, there shines a light of a victory won; The journey, the journey is our home. Join with us in jubilee. Celebrate God’s family. Sing together joyfully. Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia, Praise for evermore. ------------------------------------------ Jesus is journeying, and passes through Jericho Stories of his healing powers and the power of his words have proceeded him and people come out just to see him walk by. Zacchaeus is the chief tax collector, he has bought that position, paid Rome up front, and now collects more tax than is due and pockets it, and he is despised for it. He is curious about Jesus perhaps he has always felt small inside, no matter how great his wealth we can understand that, Mister Rogers used to tell children how grown ups often feel small, insignificant on the inside, too Perhaps there is within Zaccheaus a longing for something he can’t even describe beyond anything he could buy. And we understand that, too. Perhaps he is lonely, Dag Hammerskjold’s the great Swedish leader and head of the United Nations who wrote of his own loneliness: “ pray your loneliness is spurring you into finding something to live for, something great enough to die for.” and he wants to see this man who is inviting people into community and growth and more, into belonging, becoming and beyond so Zacchaeus climbs up a sycamore tree to see the holy man walk by. But, surprisingly, it is Jesus who sees him, and calls him out, miraculously, by name, Zacchaeus, come down to me. for I must stay at your house Jesus, the holy one, insists, for perhaps he is like Mister Rogers in a crowd of children he could always seem to find the most vulnerable ones Jesus Zacchaeus, recognizes the longing, the searching heart behind his eyes, and so, to the dismay of the crowd, invites himself into the home of the most unholy and despised of men. This happens over and over in Luke’s account Women, men and children, whom others see as without merit, Jesus leans in with them. in this story, as Frederick Buechner says: The mob points out that the man Jesus is talking to is a public disaster. Jesus' silence is deafening. The people watching him do not realize that Jesus is the Christ God’s grace, God’s love made known in creation, and that love and grace moves beyond any line we might think can’t be crossed, for there is nothing and no one outside of God. God’s affection is constantly, continuously coming toward us: in the light of every star and birdsong and leaf bright with glory, God is ever and always present and waiting for the opening of our heart of our mind, of our eyes. Jesus sees that Zacchaeus is looking for him, and he invites himself to his home, and, Luke says, Zacchaeus gladly receives him. Accepting, as we all must, that he is accepted by that great love which calls him down from the tree and away from the ways he has sinned against others, to rest and be at home in his deepest self to be at home with the one who has made his home in him. it is our work too, to realize that the divine is calling our name that, as much as the mob within us says that we are alone, and unremarkable and small. That we can know belonging, and becoming and beyond. To accept, as Zacchaeus does, that God cannot not love us; cannot not forgive us. To finally put down this burden of proving ourselves, and know salvation, that is, wholeness, A wholeness that allows Zaccheus not only to truly love himself, but to move beyond that to love his neighbor as himself. I will make it right by those I have injured, he says, I will give away half of what I own I will repay them 4 times what I took from them. He receives grace, then offers it, and so is restored to his community as Jesus says, this is a child of Abraham he belongs. We, the church, this Christ’s church seeks to offer the gift of community, of belonging. That is the heart of a reconciling congregation that all may know they belong. We, this Church, this Christ’s church seek to acknowledge the work that God is doing in you, companion you in this process of interior formation support you in your becoming. And in the midst of all that distracts and hurts and terrifies and upsets, of elections, and wars, and floods, in the midst of life and death, we climb the tree together to see that which is both beyond us and beside us, and so to rest in that love to be at home in this holy universe, to be at home in the One who makes his home in us. A that moves us, beyond our immediate cares, to the cares of our neighbors, for the poor to share our time, our talents, our treasures as Zacchaeus has. to love our enemy and our neighbor as ourselves to do unto others to give our lives for our friends. and so, with all our hearts, cry out For all that has been, Thank you. For all that is to come, Yes!
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October 23, 2022
Becoming Jace Belz This morning I want to explore how we are shaped in becoming as unique individuals, in how we are becoming with God, and in how we see ourselves becoming in community. We are complex human beings. When I think of the word “being”, though, I think of words like static, stationary, or non-moving. Wouldn’t it make more sense if we were human becomings? Becoming makes me think of motion, fluidity, activity, and change. You see, you are a product of everything that surrounds you. Most of what you experience as you go about your daily life is barely in your conscious awareness. And yet, you are changing all the time by these interactions. You are influenced by nature, animals, community, socioeconomic status, the culture in which you were born and in which live, educational opportunities, and so forth. You are also becoming who you are through viewing the internet and television. We are more connected, interconnected, than ever before in our history. Although, I would like to think that what shapes us the most is our everyday connections with each other. Most likely, you entered church the same way I did today, walking in off the parking lot through the main doors. Perhaps you were greeted by David before you entered the sanctuary, as I was. His greeting and smile warm my heart and make me feel welcomed. It sets the tone of our worship experience. Once you walk past the threshold of the sanctuary, the greeting becomes a part of your past. It is no longer something in your immediate present, however, you carry that forward with you. After that experience you look the same on the outside but in the inside of you, you are ever so slightly different than you were when you first entered the church. As you cross the threshold into the sanctuary, I’m pretty sure you were greeted with smiles of recognition and friendship, maybe even a few hugs – today I got the most wonderful smile from Ellen Wharrey and I could not help but exchange that smile. When you take your seat, those exchanges also become part of your past. Sitting in the pew, you listen to the reading of the gospel, the sermon, the wonderful choir, and more. But, when you leave the service, it too becomes your past. You carry it with you. Well, you might forget some particulars but not the sermon, right? If you could take a picture of all the moments just from this one morning, I bet you would be surprised at all the moments that made up your morning. You have probably seen those picture books where you flip through the pages and the scene develops. Each page has a slightly different picture. When you flip through it, it makes up a movie or you could say it makes up a lifetime. The individual pages stand alone as an event but each one before it is slightly different and each page is a new moment, where new decisions are made to go forward with the next event. You need the previous pages to lead you up to the new moment. I propose that this is how becoming happens. Each encounter, each person you connect with, or maybe it’s a walk-in nature, or a greeting by your dog or cat, it changes you into a slightly different person. There is movement, action inside of you. I can’t look at you and see what changed, but inside, you are becoming an ever so slightly different you from these experiences. You are becoming. Constantly. Fast forward though the day, and let’s say you go to lunch with a friend and they ask you how your day was. You tell them about the greetings, the choir, and how meaningful it was to you. And why would your friend believe you? Because they have known you and they trust your perception to tell them the truth of how this affected you. You invite them to this experience. And in exchanging this with them, they too become part of your becoming experience. And you are a part of theirs. This is what is happening in the Gospel reading today. In First John it says: 1 We announce to you what existed from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have seen and our hands handled, about the word of life. 3 What we have seen and heard, we also announce it to you so that you can have fellowship with us. Our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We are writing these things so that our joy can be complete. The person writing 1 John is explaining his experience to friends and strangers about God and Jesus Christ. He is saying “Friends, I have seen him, walked with him, broke bread with him. And by knowing me and by knowing my personal experience, you too can begin to know Jesus. I bring my becoming experience with me to share with you.” I would guess that you too have experiences of who Jesus is and has been in your life. You too have built a relationship with God. Rabbi Shapiro says that we think about ourselves as too limited. He says we should open our minds and our experiences to expand how we think. We carry so much more than the experience of our current life. Think of how much you carry of the moments with your parents. They carry moments of their experiences with their parents, your grandparents, and so on. All of the past is carried in some form in you. Rabbi Shapiro says we carry with us experiences in some form going all the way back to the beginning of the universe! You carry the spark of God. You are becoming in and with your relationship with God as you return to prayer. Every time we return to God in thoughts or prayer, we are becoming more – slightly changing in that relationship. Some of these moments are not easy and some moments are heartbreaking. That too is part of our becoming with God. Not every becoming moment is progress or positive. These moments are precious moments to take to God, to involve God in how our next moment will begin. God walks with us. God delights to hear from you. You build a past with God that stays with you and you also carry the next possibility of how you and God will move forward. God is the ultimate knowing of all and God holds all memory, nothing is lost in the Divine. You each bring such richness with you to share as we gather here at Maple Grove in this community. Yes, this spiritual/religious community is also always becoming. We are shaped by each other through sharing our daily individual experiences and our life of experiences with God. We share a history of 100 years. All those moments of the past are carried with us and they have shaped our experiences up to this present moment whether we lived them or not. Think of all the events and moments that have been shared here. It’s more than we can comprehend. This community is just beginning a new century of events. I wonder what future generations will say about our “becoming”? What history do we want to leave? What experiences of becoming will influence the direction we travel together? Each moment from this one is a new chance to participate in change or staying the same. God sees us as a potential for doing good but, we are the ones who must act on that. I want to leave you with a few words from Diana Butler Bass. Her vision is one I share and maybe you do too? She said she longs for “a community where there is an intentionality, a dream, a disposition of the universe toward a table of openness and joy and equality and justice. A place where all are welcome and where every person is loved for exactly who they are and as they are. Where everyone is fed and everyone has a place at that table. Diana says “it is real, it is happening, we can participate in it and we can do this. Faith is to live in complete conviction that the healing, saving, making whole, loving, accepting, compassionate work of God is at hand and, she says, “we have a part in it”. So, I invite you to think of your wildest imagination of a loving community, and to think about it becoming real. Remember that each moment is a moment we make decisions with God to a new becoming for the future. What will your part be in the next moments to come?
October 16, 2022
Rev. Patricia Wagner Belonging Scripture: Luke 18: 9-14 9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven but was beating his breast and saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other, for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.” I officiated a wedding yesterday. and sensed their joy and relief in their profound sense of belonging, one to the other. We all belong from the beginning, We take shape inside the body of another human being. we are flesh of our mother’s flesh, bone of her bone Once we are born we hope that that sense of belonging continues for it forms our sense of self, our trust in the world, and in a loving creator. We grow, seek autonomy, identity our own sense of belonging, to our own people, our own person. and we find and connection and disconnection and love and loneliness and we wonder if we belong anywhere, if we are just here, or if we really belong to God. I got a text on Tuesday. Hi Mike, how about lunch. I text back, sorry not Mike. I’m so sorry, Its alright, I’ve got lunch plans anyway. Enjoy! She says, you are kind, I’m MIdoro from Japan, I sell exercise equipment and clothing, what do you do. I’m a pastor from Ohio and then brace for the quite get away. Oh, dear pastor, she texts. I have been told I am one of the sealed. Here’s my Whats App number, let’s talk. Midoro means she is one of the 144,000 we hear about in a vision found in the 7th Chapter of the Book of Revelations: Angels place a seal of protection around 144,000 servants of God Jehovah’s witnesses interpret this to mean that just 144,000 of all those who have lived since Jesus’ death, will be resurrected as immortal spirit, to spend eternity with God and Christ. The ultimate in belonging, to God and Christ. And I say, Good for her! she has been told this good news, and she accepts that she is fully accepted by God and so lives with a profound sense of belonging now and forever. But the dilemma for Midoro, as Jesus sees it, is when such an awareness, sense of belonging to God, can breed a sense of self-righteousness, and contempt for others’ relative lowliness. a contempt which we logically assume God somehow shares. Thank you, God, that I am not like this other person, says the Pharisee. Jesus may be talking about the elite religious class, but don’t we all say that or a version of that? I do. When we see someone who, is obviously going the wrong way. someone whom we most vehemently disagree on matters most important. and we mutter, in so many words Thank you, God, that I am not that person. We think this politically, with the dictators and flawed leaders and their followers, past and present. And is there a convinced Republican or Democrat who does not utter this prayer Thank you, God, that I am not like those on the other side. Our denomination is in the process of splintering, in a month, we will have a special session of conference to vote on allowing as many as 85 churches and pastors to leave the denomination with their property. Either side of may be tempted in to repeat the words of the pharisee, thank God I am not like them And yet, if we believe, as scripture clearly tells us, that everything that is comes from God’s own being. that creation, all creation, all that is every life, as well as every rock and scrap of metal, every bee, flower, cloud, star, as well as you and the person you are glad you are not, are born out of God’ own being, created from divine love and live in that love. And that God who is love is not standing outside of creation Where would that be=? and if God is love, then surely this universe is the material manifestation of love, is the body of love, of God in whom we, all of us, everything, dwells. If we allow ourselves to believe that, as Jesus tells us as Paul tells us in his letter to the Romans, that nothing is separated from the God perhaps we would be less inclined to see others outside the fold. Neither the Pharisee who is grateful for who he is nor the tax collector who is penitent for who he is not. They both belong, says Jesus one needs to know it, the other needs the humility to see it in others. Which is what church is about. I was in youth group growing up, and even though I wasn’t among the pretty or athletic or smart or popular ones in school, I belonged, everyone did. That’s what made youth group special, we belonged to youth group, and we belonged to each other. And when I moved just before my Junior year of High school and went to another church in another denomination, and joined another youth group Almost immediately, I belonged there, too. Everyone who comes belongs, isn’t that the most important rule of youth group? Doesn’t everything else flow from that?: respect, cooperation, community? and isn’t that the most important rule for church as a whole, this group of people called out to be the body of Christ in this life and, for us, on this corner, a community that we allow ourselves to belong to, and be shaped by. You have chosen this body, this church, for a variety of reasons. Some of you grew up here. Some found your way decades ago, and some have just arrived. and you all sense a belonging. or a yearning to belong. There is a sense of reliability, here, a financial grounding due to faithful stewardship across generations, and a maturity of spirit, a willingness to stay and love one another across our differences even when it’s hard. Which means we believe what Jesus is saying in this story that we all belong, we belong to God we are truly all part of the body of Christ. an d when we walk out under the night sky, and gaze upon the stars or look upon the trees in their firely colors, or upon stranger or friend, there is no need to feel estranged for the love that formed each and all abides and each and all, knowingly or unknowingly abide in God. From the beginning you have belonged, you, me, Midoro, and her 144,000, and the Pharisee, and the tax collector, and that belonging never ends. What good news. Amen.
October 2, 2022
Rev. Patricia Wagner Christ for the World Scripture: Luke 17: 11-19 11 On the way to Jerusalem Jesus[a] was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. 12 As he entered a village, ten men with a skin disease approached him. Keeping their distance, 13 they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” 14 When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were made clean. 15 Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. 16 He prostrated himself at Jesus’s[b] feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. 17 Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? So where are the other nine? 18 Did none of them return to give glory to God except this foreigner?” 19 Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.” We have spent several Sundays considering the idea of Metanoia: the changing of one’s mind or way of thinking and being. Today, we focus on how Jesus himself undergoes such a change. In the 7th chapter of Luke, he is approached by a Centurion, A commander of the occupying army, who believes Jesus can heal his servant from afar and begs him to do so. Never have I seen this faith in all Israel, says Jesus. In our story today, in Luke 17, Jesus has healed a group of persons with leprosy, from different backgrounds, and he is amazed that a Samaritan, whom even Jesus knows as a social and religious outcast is the only one of the healed who turns back to thank Jesus and praise God. In the next verses, a woman, from Syrophoenicia therefore an outsider, a foreigner, begs for healing for her daughter, and when Jesus initially rejects her plea saying he is called to the children of Israel not to the “dogs,” but she persists, Jesus is moved by her faith, and heals her child. Jesus lived his whole life between Nazareth and Galilee, Bethlehem and Jerusalem, a region of about 100 miles. And we see in these stories how startling it is for him that those who were different from his tribe: different language, religion, experience, have more faith than his own. Jesus himself is undergoing metanoia a change of mind, right in front of us. This is evident a chapter later, When he is asked, who does the Torah say is our neighbor, And he describes how the faithful of Israel pass by a beaten man, and it is a Samaritan who shows compassion. Jesus sees the signs of God’s loving power present in the world, the culture outside his own, present in those who aren’t within the fold. and he invites those who follow him into the same awareness, opening to what God is revealing to them within them, to a journey of metanoia. I traveling in China , decades ago, just a few years after the country was opened up after decades of isolation. I was on my own, and grateful when two young men befriended me when I got off the train in Guiling, I was the first American they’d ever met. they knew some English and walked with me through the town, and they helped me find lodging. One of them shared his story of his family’s struggles under the new cultural revolution, They wanted to show me the sights, particularly an ancient holy shrine, which they had never visited, and we walked up the steep steps together One of my companions was particularly curious about the place, He’s never been taught about any faith of any kind. We were in the gardens near the top, and he said, in almost a whisper. Sometimes, when I see poor people I say “Oh God, help those poor people.” and sometimes when I see something beautiful like a flower, I say; “Oh God…” Do you think that is prayer? He asked me? This young man, with no religious training was responding to something from within and from outside of him, right in the midst of life, awakening him to a deeper life. I heard this week the voice of a young Russian man, who was called up two weeks ago to fight in Ukraine. He’d argued with his mother recently She supports their president, He told her, No, mother, it is all untrue, We are bringing harm to these people. She told him she was ashamed of him, and he left for the nearest border 20 hours away. The Russian soldiers at the borders called him a coward one who would leave his own mother. he said, I am not afraid to die in war, but I would rather die than kill an innocent person. This young man, of no evident religious faith, was responding to a call of God, the call of the Christ, awakening him to a wholeness of being and a deeper life. Jesus, who lived his years, in constant growth, in completely openness to the Work of God in him, would undergo the greatest of metanoia, When those who killed him rather than themselves change, Jesus of Nazareth died but rose in death in Christ. Christ who, John says, was in the beginning with God. Christ who is available and accessible to all, regardless of creed or country or sect, or any religiosity at all. Christ, the way, truth and life. by which we can all know God For did we not see Christ carrying strangers to safety this past week in the typhoon? Do we not see the hurting Christ in that young man refusing to kill his sisters and brothers and leaving all behind to follow the call within? And as those who go by the name of Christian, surely it we who must learn to recognize Christ’s face all around us, to see Christ in the face of love no matter who is offering it, and in the face of suffering no matter who is weeping. This World Communion Sunday let us remember that Christ is in communion with the whole world. Let us turn around, and give thanks for the Christ who lives and lives in us, healing us, changing us, Blessed be the name of the Lord. Amen. Surely the Christ is In communion with him. He all who died, and all who are traumatized by the devastation of the hurricane. So, what if we aren’t special. I like what Etty Hillesum says: “I don’t want to be anything special. I only want to try to be true to that in me which seeks to fulfill its promise.” Is not that it. When we can see the Christ in others in a perfect day, in a service, as imperfect as this one is, in the bread that we’ve baked, in the neighbor helping neighbor regardless of creed. Just as the Samaritan man was invited, by his healing, Just as those residents of Ft. Meyer helping one another, Just as Etty Hillesum Etty Hillesum was a Jew living in the Netherlands when she was forced into a transit camp awaiting deportation to Auschwitz, She has been rather less engaged with the world but then was surrounded by barbed wire, illness, hunger, children weeping for their mothers. But rather than anger toward the perpetrators she felt called to go deeper, “All disaster stems from us. Why is there a war? Perhaps because now and then I might be inclined to snap at my neighbor. Because I and my neighbor and everyone else do not have enough love. Yet we could fight war by releasing, each day, the love that is shackled inside us, and giving it a chance to live “I know and share the many sorrows a human being can experience, but I do not cling to them; they pass through me, like life itself, as a broad eternal stream...and life continues...” My life is one long, harkening unto myself unto others, and unto God. A Samaritan of all people—the foreigner, the social and religious outcast, one who would not be counted under the elected but judged a heretic by most people in his time—epitomizes this kind of godly life and attitude. He demonstrates a faith that lays hold on God, that cannot and will not remain silent in response to what God has done in his life, that publicly, spontaneously, and joyfully directs its thanksgiving to God. Being grateful is not a precondition for being healed by Jesus; all the lepers find themselves cleaned as they show themselves to the priests. However, the Samaritan turns around and comes back. In Luke, as in the New Testament in general, “turning around” as a description for the believer’s reaction to Jesus’ work is certainly no accidental action, but filled with deep theological meaning. It describes a movement of the whole person, initiated by God’s graceful work, a redirection of orientation toward God. Jesus’ words, “Your faith has made you well” (v. 19), refer, therefore, not just to the medical healing the Samaritan has experienced, but to the holistic healing of this human being. Margit Ernst-Habib, “Theological Perspective,” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, ed. David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, vol. 4 (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 166. It is difficult to know what tone Jesus uses as he questions the whereabouts of the other nine. Is he sad? angry? flabbergasted? What he does make clear is that this most unlikely one, this double outcast, has been embraced by grace. “Get up and go,” he says, “your faith has made you well.” To practice gratitude intentionally changes an individual life, to be sure. It also changes the character of a congregation Jesus and company are walking to Jerusalem in “the region between Samaria and Galilee” (v. 11). The word “Samaria” is itself a red flag, of course. Observant Jews did not go anywhere near Samaria or Samaritans. Samaritans were a despised group, culturally inferior, theological and liturgical heretics Jesus and company are walking to Jerusalem in “the region between Samaria and Galilee” (v. 11). The word “Samaria” is itself a red flag, of course. Observant Jews did not go anywhere near Samaria or Samaritans. Samaritans were a despised group, culturally inferior, theological and liturgical heretics John M. Buchanan, “Homiletical Perspective,” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, ed. David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, vol. 4 (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 165. Kimberly Bracken Long, “Pastoral Perspective,” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, ed. David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, vol. 4 (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 168. I was listening to stories of folks who tried to save others family, strangers, neighbors in this terrible storm that hit the gulf coast of Florida. I was listening to stories of folks who tried to save others family, strangers, neighbors in this terrible storm that hit the gulf coast of Florida. I heard the story of a Russian man, who was called up two weeks ago to fight in Ukraine. he’d been arguing with his mother, She supports their president, He told her, No, mother, it is all untrue, We are bringing harm to these people. She told him she was ashamed of him, and he left for the nearest border 20 hours away. The Russian soldiers at the borders ridiculed him, he said, I am not afraid to die in war, but I would rather die than kill an innocent person. This young man, not of any faith, was responding to something from within and from outside of him, right in the midst of life, awakening him to a change, a wholeness of being and a deeper life. |