Mtr Taylor Devine

Good morning,

 In the Acts of the Apostles, Chapter 7, we jump with the Daily Office into the middle of Stephen’s retelling of the birth and life of Moses, in the middle of his quick summary of salvation history.  The early followers of Jesus were retelling what they knew, and sharing about how Christ had changed the world.  They had just experienced the Pentecost and the descent of the Holy Spirit, and were learning to walk the Way of Jesus after he ascended.  They were confronted with hardship, martyrdom, and trouble, but were buoyed by their shared commitment to the Way.

 How do we share the faith, hope and love that we know in Christ?  How do we share what we know of the salvation story?  In the Women’s Bible Study we started by talking about our favorite Bible story or Book of the Bible, and we all jump in at different parts of the story of God.  That’s one of the incredible things about the Living Word, as we approach it over the years, that we encounter God in Christ in different ways at different times, and yet God remains the same.  

 As a little child I remember looking at my “tiny hands” Bible, which also happened to have tiny print, which I could hardly decipher.  Every 50 pages or so, though, there would be a picture, helping the stories to come alive.  The people around me shared their experiences, I learned from my Godparents the centrality of their faith in their life, and I saw the fruits of the Spirit in them, where the lived faith’s rubber hit the road.  A family friend gave me a hand-sewn gift of cloth pages with prayers on each page.  I was probably too old for a soft-book but it helped to teach me to pray.  The way we comport ourselves, the things we pass on, the stories we share, matter.  I pray that we might have the courage to share our story-the way we have seen and known God in Christ through our stories, in our lives, in gifts, in the way we treat each other.

 In Christ,

Mtr. Taylor