Discovering who we are called to be is an ever-evolving journey as we follow Jesus in changing circumstances.
Though we are to strive for righteousness and justice now, what we achieve now is a mere shadow of what will be fulfilled in the day of the Lord.
The author of Hebrews is concerned that the first-century believers will become distracted and discouraged, so he wrote the letter of Hebrews to exhort and encourage them. This passage also speaks to us today and tells us an important message so that we can stay on course in our spiritual journey and finish the race of life that God has set for us.
Jesus calls us to a new world in which the lives of nations revolve around bringing the previously marginalised to the centre of our national way of being. Nations that fail to do that collapse into self-destruction.
While many have a passive-aggressive relationship with God, the gospel gives us a vision of God that liberates us to live freely, expansively and joyously.
Many parts of the Bible can be and often are weaponised as tools of oppression, but when we read it critically, with and through the teachings and example of Jesus, it calls us to liberation and life.
We we allow God’s word to work in us, it lifts the burden of oppressive teaching from us.
Living the beatitudes is tough and dangerous, and we will need the inspiration and company of the saints, before us and beside us, if we are going to make it.
If we keep imitating one another, paying back violence with vengeance, the world will be consumed in an escalating fury, but Jesus rescues us and gives us a life-giving example to follow.
Even in the midst of our worst troubles, uniting with God brings purpose and joy (which is not the same as mere happiness), and joy is an antidote to fear.
In times of rupture, we, like Isaiah, can pour out our words, images and even anguished songs as we try to gather up the pieces and make some sense.
There is life and nourishment hidden in the depths, and through Jesus the rock it is accessible to us.
In order to recognise and cooperate with what God is doing, we often need to recognise and see past the assumptions that come with our own privilege.
God’s offer of unlimited forgiveness creates a new world in which we are free to stop judging one another and turning on one another and spiralling into violence and hatred.
When we approach everyone with meet with the conviction that the one thing we owe them is love, Christianity will again be experienced as good news.
Our true identity is only found when we discover that it is not about us, but that we are only truly anyone in relation to the God who is everything, and who is not the opposite of anything.
We respond to Jesus in different ways at different times, because we are not fully integrated in ourselves, but God loves us in all our fragmented parts.
Looking for emerging patterns can help us (and Jesus?) recognise the ways that God is opening new pathways of grace and inclusion.
Jesus never stops crossing the menacing water to come to where we are, saying: “Take courage. It is I. Don’t be afraid.”
God’s Providence usually works by people, moved by the Spirit of God, sharing when they have more above their own needs.