Preach!

Daily Devotion - April 22

I will send a brief message each day (except Mondays)
while we are pausing gathering in person.
- Kara

Our deck door is open. OUR DECK DOOR IS OPEN. Minnesota friends, the near 70 degree temps are leaking into the house and we are leaking out into the yard, and it is glorious. Ok, I just asked Alexa, and she says it's only 61, but wow, does it feel great!  

This morning a far-away friend thanked me for my daily messages, and said so many folks had become "preachy" lately and she was glad I was "keeping it real."  

"Preachy" is a word that has come to mean, I think, a kind of sanctimonious safely removed, telling other people what to feel and think sort of thing. Which is too bad. Because, as an actual preacher, I crave good preaching and I appreciate it to my bones.  

Good preaching watches for what God is doing in scripture and the world and shares about it. And a big part of that is looking right where we are, in our own lives, for the activity of God.

This means, by default, keeping it real. Because it's hard to see the real God doing real things in our real lives if we are striving beyond whatever we are in for some perceived perfection.  Here's how we should be coping....  Here's what you should be believing...

Here's what you should be doing... 

How about instead, What in the world is God up to now??

Good preaching is really just asking these questions of the text - and when I say "text" I mean whatever is in front of us - Who is God and what is God up to?

And the question we are all, already asking much of the time, What is a good life, and how do I live it?

Who is God here? In this moment of exhaustion when I want to open my mouth wide and scream swears into the face of this one I know I love more than my own life, but cannot stand at the moment?

Who is God, with us and for us, right now?

What is God up to now? When I am feeling so isolated and alone, and even jealous of the people talking about how they want to scream swears into the faces of their loved ones because I am not near anyone I love?

What is God doing in my life right here?

Who is this God and what is God up to when I wake up inexplicably cheerful, when the day feels bright and I feel grateful for life and my chance to be living it and the little things are bringing me big joy?

And what is a good life in the midst of all this chaos and standstill? What's the purpose of my life, my day, my existence now?  And how do I let myself find the good right now, right here, and not just postpone it for when this is "over" - whatever that means?

What is God up to when the sickness comes, and things feel scary and precarious, and my mortality is front and freaking center?

Who is God right now for this one I love whose dementia means they can't remember what's going on or why nobody is allowed to visit, and every day feels strange and awful? 

What is God up to when the babies are coming and the grandpas are dying and they might miss each other on the way in and out?

In my life, in my world, with the people I love, in my community, in this whole situation, in the global human drama, who is God? What is God up to?

God meets us in the questions. We keep thinking it's our job to get ourselves to some zen place of arrival, to find some spiritual lessons in this, or to come out the other side a better person. Fine, that would all be wonderful. And KUDOS, seriously!, to those people who are doing that all on their own. For a lot of us, though, that's just not possible, or even, I'll admit it, desirable.

What I mean is, I suspect that the gift of this time isn't that we can do a terrific self-improvement project.  Instead, I suspect the gift of this time is the awareness that all our self-improvement projects have gotten us nowhere.  

We need someone from outside of this, to meet us within.

We need resurrection.  That's not something we do. It's something done to us, in us, through us.

The best sermons being preached to me these days are by kids, because they are the best at keeping it real.  Like Robbie in worship a few weeks ago, echoing the Psalmist, reminding us with breathless wonder, that God made SO MUCH, the whole world, and even YOU and ME!   Or like my friend's 14 year old who, echoing the author of Ecclesiastes, pontificated for several days that all is pointless and our toiling is for nothing. He LIVED in that place for days, like an Old Testament prophet, refusing to shower or eat, (forget about schoolwork or chores). Grieving on behalf of us all, perhaps. He showed me, at least, a little something about the importance of all-out, no holes barred, not to be deterred, mourning, aka. keeping it real.

So, preach to me, Church.  

Don't tell me about having a good attitude or a cheerful heart, or being better, doing better, making it all better. Tell me about your loneliness and your sorrow, and the waiting for God to bring resurrection into the death of you. 

Tell me how you're struggling, and let's watch together for where God is coming into that. I want to hear the sermons about suffering and redemption, about brokenness and healing, about sorrow and joy, (or just sorrow, if that's what they are), about not knowing the answers and learning how to live with the questions.  Tell me how you are seeing God in ways you didn't know to even be watching for. Or tell me how you're learning to watch.  I want the little nuggets that get overlooked. The gentle surprises and the time-stopping moments, both.  

Give me the real stuff.

Thankfully, that's what basically everyone in scripture does.  Just lives along their way having their messy lives invaded by God, and then telling people about it.  

I need your sermons. Keep preaching to me. And I will keep preaching to you.  Let's keep keeping it real.

CONNECTING RITUAL:

Perhaps, sometime today, whatever time that is in each of our homes, we might extend a blessing in this way, and so join our hearts:

Why not write an actual paper note of thanks to someone who has preached to you this week.  If that's just too much in your current state, an email then, or a text.  Or pick up the phone.

Think of one person you can say, Thank you for...

Here's how it preached to me:

(aka, Here's how it revealed to me something of who God is and what God is up to).

(It can be a small thing they'd consider "no big deal" - those are the most fun thanks to receive, when you didn't even realize the Spirit was preaching through you).