March 17, 2024

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“Therefore, each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor… follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children, and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” (Ephesians 4.25a, 5.1-2)

REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD

Whenever we hear the hint of Jesus extending the opportunity to “walk” it is with the call to “take up your cross and follow me.” It is a call to discipleship where the follower who believes that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God and thus the only “way, truth and life which leads to dwell in the presence of the Father in His Kingdom” becomes a part of the “faith learning community.” It is a community where faith is learned by being immersed in the Word of God from the beginning word of creation to the incarnation of the word in Jesus born of Mary at God’s promise and command. But, it doesn’t end there. It is being immersed in the resurrection community commissioned to take this Word of God in spirit and in truth and spread it to every eye, ear, heart, mind, body and soul beginning in the very court of the Temple in Jerusalem where Jesus (and God) was mocked, blasphemed and rejected to the courts of the women and children and Gentiles and to the market places where Jerusalem was the center of trade and commerce as a crossroads of nations and peoples. From there the Word would spread throughout Judea and into Samaria (symbolic of both Jew and Gentile) as well as to the furthest corners of the world (symbolic of all nations and kingdoms on earth as created by humankind in their effort to control and subdue the earth and her people). That community might bear the names of each city in which a house church was established but its one integral mark of identity, its birthmark, we the sign of the cross and the anointing of baptism as well as the mark of service to the community of faith (first) and then to all people.

We must also include in our thinking about discipleship that it wasn’t just “head talk” and philosophizing. It was about building up the community of faith utilizing all the resources (gifts, talents, abilities, properties and monies) that were available to support and nurture all members to be “in one accord.” This meant there was a tremendous challenge presented to those who would be disciples. The challenge was to be the servant of all imagining that in doing so, they were serving as Christ served loving all people. Why did Jesus serve all He served because all people need grace and forgiveness whether they were willing to confess it or not. In truth, Jesus brought those who were unwilling to confess the need for grace and to the point of recognition that they were then against God. Paul would speak “…for all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory.” This discipleship impact intertwined the spiritual and the physical body as being in need which extended beyond the person’s ability to satisfy that need and their thinking on what they truly wanted. Discipleship takes the burden of life and shares it with others who are doing the same for themselves to others. In this meeting of the heart, mind body and soul the community found itself walking out the gospel.

Mighty ones of God, this is what we are supposed to be doing even today. The fault in the modern “Church” is apparent that it has siloed the physical and spiritual and kept them separate. One of the faults is apparent in the “social gospel” of the late nineteenth century and well into the twentieth century. In the late twentieth century we see the struggle which the “prosperity gospel” presented. Its impact continues into the twenty-first century with a most unexpected dilemma being born. That dilemma is the “gospel of entitlement.” That gospel was fostered by the integration of “State as Church,” that is, the politization of structuring ideologies and policies to become morality statements and paradigms for lifestyles which break down families, communities and cultures. We have allowed the “State Church,” the very thing which the same people had fought to emphasize as “the separation of Church and State,” to have a greater voice and influence than the Gospel of Jesus Christ Church.” It is not that the “Church” is not speaking. It is that the “Church” is not speaking the truth in love where it “walks the talk and talks the walk” of true discipleship aligned with the Gospel of Jesus Christ literally. That literal walk becomes a figurative example of doing what is right and good in the eyes of God. This is what I believe Paul meant as “walking in the way of love just as Christ loved us.“

TODAY’S PRAYER IN RESPONSE TO GOD’S WORD:

Father, before we were conceived in the womb, You had already formed us in Your love and by Your Spirit spoke us into being. Each one of us is blessed with the opportunity of doing right, being good and producing the fruit of the Spirit so that others may be fed the truth of that same love so that the two will become one. It is our soul’s sincere desire to embrace the oneness You have in mind that we would know that we are Your people and that You are our God. Lead us in that discovery of the truth and the manifestation of that love for us all. In Jesus’ name, we pray. AMEN.