Peace be with you!
May 2009
We continue in the season of Easter for the month of May. The stories are about Jesus appearing to the disciples and sending them forth with power from on high. It was for the followers of Jesus a time of confusion, doubt, fear and amazement. They had to reevaluate their understanding of the world and come up with new ways of being and new ways of believing. As they experienced Jesus Christ in a new and different way, they became bolder and acted more and more with faith.;
We too live in a confusing and difficult time. Our economy is collapsing. Retirement funds have been wiped out. This week we are gripped with fear of the swine flu. Our community continues to change with new and different people moving into the area, and violent deaths rising in the county. Finally, lest we forget, we are still stuck in two wars which we thought were over years ago.
Our congregation is not immune to this time of fears, doubt, confusion and amazement. As we listen to grumbling, look at empty seats on Sunday and wonder what is going wrong, our fears and doubts about the church and each other grow.
Hey! It’s Easter! The Church’s first response then and now is fear. Yet the first word given the Church is “Do not be afraid” or “Peace be with you.” It is found in the last chapter of every Gospel; Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The option in these times of fear is to withdraw in doubt or move out in faith. The faith option takes practice. It has no guarantees. It can’t be proven successful in advance. But the Easter message is “fear not”, “go and tell others” in faith. It applied to those at the tomb (Matt 28:5-10) (Mark 16:6&7), to the fisherman who caught nothing (John 21:4-6), and to
Peter as a leader (John 21:15-19).
Among those who didn’t act by faith are the guards at the tomb, who had to live a lie for the rest of their lives (Matt 28:11-15) and Judas, who chose death over faith (Matt 27:3-5, Acts 1:18-19).
The Gospel challenges us to live our lives and be the Church that is built on faith in those things we can’t prove or see; to live in the belief that Christ is alive and working in our lives. This is the source of our hope and faith. DO YOU BELIEVE?
Yours through the power of Christ,
Pastor Dave
