Mtr Taylor Devine

Dear Friend,

In November I participated in a continuing education conference that would have been lovely in person, but was really just fine on zoom! The planners plotted the days out well so that we didn’t have too much eye or brain strain, and they facilitated the group of clergy and lay ministry leaders in a way that helped us stay engaged and build a little bit of camaraderie over our four Mondays together. One of the days’ conversations in particular stuck with me. The overarching theme was about missional leadership, and projects and patterns that emerge out of that approach to following the Spirit into ministry. But this particular day we talked about the question that comes up in preliminary conversations about a new ministry or a new project - 

Who do you say that I am?

The Gospels give us multiple layered portraits of Jesus, and the disciples got to see him in action. Still, he had to ask them, “Who do you say that I am?” As an exercise we had to describe who Jesus is as if we were explaining him to someone who had no experience with Jesus, and then do the same thing with the Church. The gathered people hadn’t had to start from scratch about how Jesus is in a long time, if ever. There’s typically a starting place in these conversations! We talked about what might feel like the boldest answer when speaking with a stranger, “we believe he is the Messiah who brings salvation to the broken world through his sacrifice in our place,” and then go from there. “Who do you say that I am?” may not be the literal question we ask when embarking new ministries or renewing our commitment to ministries, but it does underlie our approach. Is God in Christ playful? Serious or severe? Relational? 

In Jesus’ final week he is teaching quickly and we are still learning from his teaching that tells us “who we say he is.” Luke’s telling of “the Widow’s mite” in our office gospel today shows us one abiding layer of who Jesus is and how he sees:

He looked up and saw rich people putting their gifts into the treasury; he also saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. He said, ‘Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them; for all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in all she had to live on.’

This hope, that Jesus can work with what we have to offer is particularly poignant in the season of Advent. Fleming Rutledge writes in her fantastic collection of Advent sermons and reflections “Advent: The Once and Future Coming of Jesus Christ,” that this kind of bold trust is something we can't get around, particularly in Advent. In reflecting on Christian hope she writes “Optimism often arises out of a denial of the real facts; hope however, persists in spite of the clearly recognized facts because it is anchored in something beyond. This time of the church year is about hope.” Writing in 1999, right before the new millennium with all the drama and expectation that moment brought up, she says “this is the most serious matter that biblical faith confronts. Where is the evidence for the truth of our creeds in view of the senseless violence, arbitrary cruelty, and meaningless suffering of the world? ... Jesus was not sheltered from the storm. He did not it on a throne high above the cyclones of this world in his divine finery. The only begotten Son of God came down himself, and the storm broke over his head and swept him away, crying, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” There is a unique paradox at the center of our Christian narrative. God submitted himself to the very worst that human sin could do; as our representative, he comes under his own judgment. And on the third day he was raised victorious over evil and death. This really happened. No one made it up. That is the only thing that keeps me believing...But now listen. If all we do is tell the story over and over and talk about how superior it is to other stories, that will convince no one. The one thing that impresses nonbelievers, the only thing that testifies to the truth of our narrative, is a Christlike life. The only thing that truly glorifies Jesus in this world is costly action in his name on behalf of those for whom he died. There is a sense of crisis at this time of year because the coming of Jesus calls every mortal arrangement into question. Where should our loyalties be? Where is our ultimate security? What sort of witness do we want to make to our children and grandchildren?

Christian hope does not build a foundation on a new millennium (or a new year in this case). Christian hope builds its foundation on the promise of the living God that the random chaos of the world will be revealed one day to have been led and shaped by the same hand that reached out to heal the sick and make to blind to see, to raise the dead and to “call into existence the things that do not exist.”...This is what the church “whispers in darkness”: Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again.”  

Who do we say that Jesus is in the midst of the pain and hope we know?

In Christ,
Mtr Taylor 

 The Rev. Fleming Rutledge, Advent: The Once and Future Coming of Jesus Christ, p. 92-94