Missio Mesa,
As a church family we are learning to lament. This is a new way to come before God for many of us. We feel awkward here. I get it. I can too. But embrace it. Press into it. God is present with us. He will not leave us.
I've been so encouraged by the spaces we've worked so hard to create together. Spaces to humbly welcome and be with children, women, and men who are sad, who are hurt, who are angry, who are confused, and who wonder if things could ever really change. Spaces that lead to healing and renewed hope.
Family, We know that power is often abused. Today we mourn the death of George Floyd. I know newsfeeds will be inundated for a few days. We will be overloaded with images and opinions. Some of them helpful. Many of them not. I know we will wonder can we really engage with one more area of suffering in a world currently confused, crippled, and constrained by responses to a disease. That the invitation to participation at this table, at this time, is one we may rather not accept. But I want to lovingly urge us to still take our seat at the table, but it may be a different seat than you expect.
I invite us to a seat that rejects the desire to put our heads in the sand of shallow doctrine AND the compulsion to self soothe by anxiously acting. I invite us to sit in the seat of consideration in the presence of God for a while.
As a pastor my invitation to our church is to...
Pause to consider. How do we marginalize others? How are complicit in the suffering of others? Friends, let's not deceive ourselves, none of us have waded in the waters of our idolatrous and racially divided American culture and not gotten wet in the process.
My invitation is to...
Let the Spirit of the living God meet us in that space- don't rush through it. Let us find ourselves moved to repentance and reoriented with a hunger and thirst for justice. Let him bind up the wounds, apply His healing salve, and give renewed energy. That may not be a quick process, but we must linger as long as it takes.
And then, dear God, let us act with an enduring hope that has one foot firmly planted on the death and resurrection of Jesus and another on the reality of new creation that is sure to come. Our hope is in Jesus and our hand is to the plow of justice in Mesa and beyond.
With you as your Friend, Pastor, & Fellow Repenter-
Here's a prayer from the book of common prayer that I urge you to pray with your roommates, families, and friends.
O God, who created all people in your image: We thank you for the diversity of races and cultures in this world. Show us your presence in those who differ from us, and enrich our lives with their fellowship, until our knowledge of your love is made perfect in our love for all your children; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
(Book of Common Prayer 2019)