Wednesday, December 17, 2014

He has come

If you have a chance, and you have a moment and you have Eugene Peterson's version of the Message, his interpretation of the holy scriptures, please read the wonderful work.

In that work, in the telling of the birth of Christ, we read this: There were sheepherders camping in the neighborhood. They had set night watches over their sheep. Suddenly, God's angel stood among them and God's glory blazed around them. They were terrified. The angel said, "Don't be afraid. I'm here to announce and great and joyful event that is meant for everybody, worldwide. A Savior had just been born in David's town, a Savior who is Messiah and Master. This is what you're to look for: a baby wrapped in a blanket and lying in a manger."

I can't get past the idea, as I prepare a monologue for Sunday's worship service, that He came to us. Us spread out on hills, looking up on lonely nights, waiting so impatiently for, uh, something. Something that we can't put our fingers on. Something that we can't see. Something we can't feel. Something that will displace the generally haunting idea that we've come and we'll go and no impact will have been had.

Plain us.
Poor us.
Sinning us.
Desperate us.
Heartbroken us.
Messy us.
Miserable us.
Vacant us.
Us.

Sheepherders us is us wrapped in robes and plain us. Us who have nothing to give, nothing to offer, nothing to promote, nothing to cherish, nothing but nothing. That's us. That's who we are.

We living in a society today that believes in rewriting scripture to eliminate what it describes as sin. Tell someone that what they are doing is sin and you risk a quite unholy response. The irony there is that whomever is doing the telling is just as sinful as the person they are telling. Some get that, and acknowledge how far from holy they are, and some quite unfortunately do not. It seems to me that churches that are growing are doing so not so much from a great strategy but from a great realization that they've been saved from their plainness, their sin, their desperation, their heartbroken-ness, their messiness by a great Messiah, not a great business plan.

We are embraced by a Christ who came to love us on the hills of our loneliness, and says, "I have come to lessen your burden, which wasn't ever as large as you thought it was. I've come for you, and you, and of course for you."

For the 99 percent, and, yes, for the 1. For the rich man who won't give up what he loves most, and for the prodigal who has hand it taken away. For the lonely and for the life of the party.

Plain, old, miserable us.

He came. One night in the life of the world, into darkness He didn't create, so that the gentle wisps of moonlight could turn into the power of the Son.

Messy. Heartbroken. Desperate.

All turned into one word of hope.

Free.

That's us, too. And what the Son has made free is free indeed.

Let go this morning and let God shape, mold, hold and love. He has come. He will come again.

1 comment:

kevin h said...

I don' know nuthin' 'bout buildin' no chrches, but this makes sense:
"Churches that are growing are doing so not so much from a great strategy but from a great realization that they've been saved from their plainness, their sin, their desperation, their heartbroken-ness, their messiness by a great Messiah, not a great business plan."