The unfolding of the work of being Jesus … 
First a friend, then a teacher, then a healer, then as the charisms grow, the crowds increase.  The miracles are amazing and the stories wonderfully deep and engaging. The work Jesus suggests is often hard and frequently at odds with a lifetime of temple teaching. The disciples are stretched by what they hear and the consequences of their witness continue to push them toward a dangerous outcome.
 
Now this … now these words, the prediction of the predictable outcome of the ministry among the Roman occupation.  The predicted outcome that doesn’t sound like the kingdom they waited, hoped and wished for.  And if even not about the outcome maybe it was just that feeling of ‘we like this as it is, so let’s keep this thing going.
 
Nope. And on further reflection, it’s clear that this little band is going to take over the work, the ministry.  Things are not going back to the way they were before. Does any of this sound familiar? Any of it?

It sure does for me, unfortunately even the gentlest of revelations, comes as a crash. Jesus is shaking it up, again. Giving the power and authority over to me, to us.

Where are you in this? How does the church support these transitions, these fissures, these changes?  How are ideas of Jesus changing, how are our notions of the role of church, our ideas of worship, of outreach, of governance changing? How do we hear and interpret these changes or even the hint of change?  Our expectations of how we thought things would happen and how they do happen. So often very far apart.

This is how change occurs in our spiritual lives are as well. The gentle unfolding of who we are and whose we are. The gentle unfolding, the gradually opening, of service to God. A lifetime of promise and possibility never finished and always becoming. And generally we are left standing around with our mouths open wondering what comes next, pushing back hard at the revealed truth.


+Rev. Alison
1060 Chandler Road, PO Box 447, Lake Oswego, OR 97034
503-636-5618