The gospel today is at the heart of God’s truth for me. The Gospel teaches us today about so many important truths. Gracious hospitality is the 1st important lesson. How do we welcome the stranger and the guest? How do people get treated in a place called Good Shepherd? Do they sit at the head of the table or fight for a place where one is left? Are we so caught up in our own chaos that we don’t notice or have energy for the one we don’t know next to us? How do we treat each other? Whose church is this anyway? It better be Jesus’ church or we are all in trouble. The second big point from the gospel is impact. What impact are we having? Is what we’re doing making a difference?
I heard this quote 3 weeks ago at my friends Lutheran Church. It struck my heart. The quote is a bit thick so I’ll read it twice.
From: Rainer Rilke a letter to a young poet
Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer. Perhaps you do carry within you the possibility of creating and forming, as an especially blessed and pure way of living; train yourself for that – but take whatever comes, with great trust, and as long as it comes out of your will, out of some need of your innermost self, then take it upon yourself, and don’t hate anything
I want to challenge us to intentional living. I think very often we sit at the seat closest to the host not because we are trying to be rude but because we just haven’t thought about where we are and what the significance of our decision will be. As we start this walk together you, the people of Good Shepherd, and I, your priest, let’s be intentional. Lets not get caught up in who has the right answer, let’s live into the questions and together God will reveal the answers. The 1st couple of questions for me are who does God want us to be? And are we ready to see Christ when He is in our midst? I challenge all of us to pray over those questions and tell me what you think the 1st couple of questions we try to live into should be. Together with God will be a powerful weapon of the light. We sent the smith family to Springfield Missouri feeling claimed, loved and connected in two short weeks that’s what is all about for me. Great job. In the name of God
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