Dear Friends,
We are so lucky. We are lucky to live in this world and in this life. It is hard, it is tough, it is often frustrating, and…it is a gift.
I believe (should I even use those two words?) the world is established in a way of spiritual challenge and growth and imagination. The world is established in the way of overwhelming abundance, and it is our challenge to live as if this is true.
Can we see the possibilities even when we think there is no way? As we approach Advent (from a distance), I have found those words echoing in my head: “a way…where there is no way.”
In a sermon a couple of weeks ago, challenged by the memory of a friend talking in a despairing moment over 20 years ago when the Afghan war started, in the face of a lot of attention to forces being sent to Chicago, I asked a question.
What if Chicago would do what I call “pulling a gospel?”
What if Chicago said we WANT our half a million immigrants, and we want to know how each one can share their gifts with the city. And if you, President Trump, want to send us people to join in listening to and identifying the gifts of people and then connecting those gifts to social capital, then they would be more than welcome – I mean, c’mon!
We can use all the help we can get!
What if instead of having them round-up immigrants and “law-breakers,” the troops would join Chicago officials in sitting and talking with people who are afraid and lonely and reminding them they are good neighbors?
With Robert Redford’s death a week and a half ago, I thought of my favorite line from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Butch has what he thinks is a great idea.
Sundance responds, “It’s your great ideas that got us into this mess. I never want to hear one of your great ideas. Ever.”
I understand the sentiment. I understand why you, dear reader, might think I have gone off my rocker. Yet, I think days like these, when there are massive disruptions, can be opportunities to find a way where there is no way.
We follow a God who is always making a way.
Keep tellin’ the Story,
Mike
I have an old recording of Louis Armstrong singing “What a Wonderful World,” but I love this version of 2000 folks in Ottawa singing it also. I hope you will as well.
This week’s takeaway: Now God is God and I (and we) are not. God is a God of imagination and finding a way where there is no way. Let’s look around at the world in the same way – after all, we are made in the image and likeness of God!