When have you have grown the most in your faith, in your search for something holy and sacred? When have you discovered that pearly ache for something beyond your own simple desires? Was it at a time when everything was perfect and wonderful and there was nothing to worry about or did you grow the most when you were challenged at the very fiber of your soul?
I am embarrassed to admit how many times I have been humbled and brought down low by my own foolish actions or silly mistakes only to recognize that in the humbling, in the falling apart, something new and stronger was being put in place. In these moments I find that the simplest and most basic needs, love and forgiveness, peace and well-being, are the finest gifts.
Have you been in worship when we dedicate infants? I hold the child in my arms and walk through the sanctuary with the little one and remind everyone of Jesus words: “Unless you change and become like children you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
That is not a word about who gets into heaven and who does not. It is a word about how we can experience heaven in the here and now.
As Bono sings in one of U2’s best songs: “The more you see the less you know.”
Richard Rohr reminds us, in his book Falling Upward, “The human ego prefers anything, just about anything, to falling, or changing, or dying. The ego is that part of you that loves the status quo – even when it’s not working. It attaches to past and present and fears the future.”
Jesus understood this better than any others. He said, “Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”
Here is the good news for the day: If you feel like your life is falling apart and you have no idea what to do next, maybe it is a sign that God is about to do something new and wonderful within your very life. The God of all creation is more than creative enough to turn your failure into a gracious reboot.
Grace and peace to you,
