Mtr Mary Trainor
Dear friend,
Being the “new person” is a problem for almost everyone. From childhood to older age, no one wants to stand out as a beginner, a stranger, an uninitiated one. This distinction is only made worse by certain traditions laid out for beginners to endure.
We all know about college fraternity initiations. If you survive--literally--you may be granted the status you seek. But there’s something about high school that makes that transition even more excruciating.
The high school I attended was a four-year program, from freshman to senior. It was tradition that the freshmen had to wear a colorful beanie with a plastic propeller on top. And not just at school, but also coming and going to school. It was tough enough to be new, but the beanie was the ultimate degradation to sensitive high school freshmen.
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The Gospel text today from Luke involves another confrontation with the Pharisees, who have a couple of issues with Jesus: eating with tax collectors and sinners; and the failure of his disciples to fast. After dealing with those, Jesus tells a parable about the incompatibility of new wine and old skins. All of this took place at a great banquet at the home of tax collector Levi.
I don’t believe it is a stretch to think of new wine as the new understanding that Jesus taught his disciples, and old skins as the historic commandments as practiced by the Jews. New believers, new people to faith, don’t have the same background as the “cradles.” Different vocabularies. Different worldviews. So new believers should be free of requirements. How refreshing to just be welcomed. There’s plenty of time for teaching, modeling, and encouragement in love.
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Love is the important takeaway, which is why Jesus said that loving God is paramount and second to that, is loving one’s neighbor.
Let’s not forget that the foundation of the love equation is that God loves us from beginning to end. With or without the right vocabulary. Absent perfection. With all our bad habits, sins, or afflictions. God loves us long before any of those are, or never are, resolved. What happens for us, however, is when we become aware of God’s love, we strive to reflect God’s being in our own. God’s love may be the driving force behind walking through the doors of church for the very first time. While we may be consumed by the need to be perfect, it is not part of God’s equation.
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Being new to church--like being new anywhere--can be challenging. And growing in faith is a lifelong process. We’re never done. Some call it “ongoing conversion.”
But here’s the very good news. God loves us before our hand first grasps the church door handle, and loves us all the way through until life is changed and our earthly pilgrimage concludes. We are no more loved at the end than we are at the beginning.
Bishop Jennifer A. Reddall spoke to this idea in her sermon at the 8:00am service on April 18. In speaking about the 12 Steps of Recovery, the bishop said God loves us when we’re only on Step 1, every step between, and when we reach Step 12. We learn, we grow through process and attention. But we are loved without doing anything.
Mtr Mary