Living in the Spirit
October 11, 2015

Scripture Reading: Mark 10:17-31

Jesus looked at them and said, ‘For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.’

 Peter began to say to him, ‘Look, we have left everything and followed you.’ Jesus said, ‘Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.’ –Mark 10:27-31

Do we worship a god whom we truly believe is capable of all things when we have wars abounding throughout the world, children starving, sex trafficking, the rich getting richer and the incomes of the middle class shrinking? I fear what we may give lip service to is not demonstrated in our ways of being. As we open our hearts and minds to the leadership of God, we will live into God’s omnipotence. When we see all people as our family—brothers and sisters—when we know they are all safe and nourished, we will begin to have a glimmer of God’s perspective.

It is hard to ferret out what is culture and what is theology. We have lots of examples of that in the gospels where ritually washed hands was a sign of piety and plucking and eating wheat while walking through a field on the Sabbath was a sin. Paul struggled mightily with the issues of cultural differences when he introduced the gentiles to Christ crucified. How do we reflect Christ in our lives?

I first supervised social workers in the early 1970’s when the miniskirt was popular. The state eventually issued a dress code which did not set well with some of my staff. I, frankly, did not care if they wore miniskirts or not but what I did care about was how what they wore impacted their relationship with the person they were serving. Wearing a miniskirt to an elderly person’s home was probably a major distraction as was wearing a miniskirt to work with a teenaged boy. I doubt that most of our young mothers on public assistance paid any attention to it.

There are thousands of refugees pouring out of the Middle East and Africa bringing with them rich traditions passed to them from earlier generations that are different from ours. They are our brothers and sisters whom we are called to love.

Prayer: God of all, as we meld together the ways differing among our culture and other cultures, let sources of diversity become opportunities for understanding and growth for all of us on the road to the Kingdom of God. Amen.

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of American. Used by permission. All rights reserved.