Dear Covenant Family,
It’s been fun to listen to the Carillon each day at noon from outside the church building walls. Sometimes people stop by, tilting their heads toward the tower, amazed by unique composition of sound ringing over the urban landscape. Today I met a woman from Athens, Ohio, a visual artist who traveled to Cleveland to enjoy the FRONT International Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art. She spoke of the joy she felt in hearing today’s piece and commented that the traffic and sirens became integrated into the soundscape created by the Carillonneur. George Leggiero, who had just popped into the narthex from his lofty perch in the tower, affirmed that the Carillon is in fact a community instrument, one that is directed outside the church walls instead of inside the sanctuary. Day after day, no matter what happens on campus, at the hospital, in the city streets, the bells play over the beauty and the chaos, the rainbows and the dust.
Our faith too is meant to be directed outwards toward others as we share the love of Jesus of Nazareth. Everyone is beloved, shaped from the dust of the earth and the breath of God. Everyone has a story to tell. Our stories are messy and beautiful, painful, and hopeful—being written and rewritten over time. When we ask someone- where are you from, are we prepared to accept the answers in all their complexity? Are we ready to lay down our assumptions and preconceived notions and be opened to really seeing the person in front of us free from implicit bias or fear? Are we willing to see Jesus? And can we invite others, like Phillip did in the Gospel of John- to “come and see”?
Those of us who follow the One from Nazareth have much to learn from Philip, who reminds us that our calling is to bear witness with grace to the light that shines on our lives through the Son of God. The ability of others to see that light does not rest on our powers of theological persuasion, our skills of rhetoric or technology, or even our sheer persistence. Rather, the ability to see Jesus comes as a gift from God through the graceful and mysterious movements of the Holy Spirit.
Where are you from? What’s your story? Where’s home? How has the particularity of place shaped who you are? Whose are you? Who are your people? What assumptions do you need to disrupt? Where is God calling you to “come and see”?
Let’s make sure that our lives are pointed toward the light and then live in the daring trust that the light shines and the darkness will not overcome it. Father Richard Rohr said, Prayer is sitting in the silence until it silences us, choosing gratitude until we are grateful, and praising God until we ourselves are an act of praise.
Peace,
Pastor Jessie
