Looking for a New Day (Part 1)
At the beginning of Lent, as a church family, we chose to pray each day for Renewal, we called it a Walk to Easter. At the same time, we were studying Jesus’ life and particularly the sense of urgency he experienced knowing that his ministry would end shortly. That was the basis of our series, “The surprising, awkward, winding path of grace.” We saw it in Jesus’ life and it resonated with my own.
God has reminded me of certain things and I want to share with you some of the things that God’s Spirit has refreshed me with these past two months.
The people of God have been depleted. The pandemic has forced us to use spiritual muscles we had not used before. We were exposed. In our affluence, we have been accustomed to disappointment being short-term and redemptive lessons quickly learned. We burned through a lot of faith, and when faith was spent, like running a car without oil, we damaged some of our engines. 18 months without regular church is like an athlete not working out. From the explosion of mental heath struggles, isolation, political obsessiveness and increasing racial and financial tensions, we came back together, worn, tired, torn and frayed.
Knowing this gives me patience and compassion for my friends who struggle to respond to me. It gives me compassion for that person who is angry with me because I don’t agree with him. It gives me patience with myself and for my ambitions for 938 Church. God is at work in our church regardless if it is in accordance with my plans or ambitions.We lack nothing. Lent coincided with the end of the Omicron variant which seemed like a sucker punch. It tested our sense of calling and budget to fulfill it. We communicated these challenges to one another and 938 Church came through. Many solidified their regular giving, caught up on their giving or just gave extra. Though we still need to live by faith to accomplish our goals, we have some flexibility in the near term to focus on our mission thanks to our growing team of regular givers.
God goes where he is wanted. Personally, I was reminded of the verse that teaches, “our father gives the Holy Spirit to those who ask for him.” (Luke 11:13). As a dad, dude and pastor, spending two years trying to react to crisis after crisis left me spiritually depleted. Lent reminded me and afforded me the focus to freshly rearrange my life and appetites around asking God for what I need more than anything else–God. I have made that a regular practice and I can saying, “I am feeling it.” I too have been depleted more than I realized. What I have known has helped through what I couldn’t feel, but sometimes you go a little numb. Seeking God in a new way has me starting to taste the freshness of His grace and renewing work of His Spirit in my heart. I am simply asking for more of God
As a church, our goal is just that. We want our kids to have God. We want our neighbors to experience God. We want for our communities to have God’s order, goodness, and will. As Jesus prayed “on earth (our community) as it is in heaven.”
-Marc
