A Loving and Living God

Today my heart is sad.  You see...I didn't get my way yesterday.  And I often have a hard time with not getting my way.  But I prayed - and hard, too.  Maybe I didn't pray hard enough, or long enough, or loud enough.  I was convinced with all my heart that what I was praying for would be the best thing for the world that I know - Hickory and the state of NC.  And I even did research so that I would make a wise and well-informed decision.  So with research in my back pocket and prayers being sent forth, I awaited the outcome.  Ugh.  Not the answer I was hoping for.  Now what?

So I take the focus off of myself, and turn it to the One who is greater than "the given categories of our experience and is capable of opening our eyes to see a new world not constrained by our prejudices and agendas" (Anthony B. Robinson, Changing the Conversation: A Third Way For Congregations (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2008), 67.) 

Agendas.  Yes, even mine.  Obviously yesterday my prayers included my agenda, because I was convinced I was right.  Just like everyone who thought I was wrong, but who got their way.  In a nutshell, what I'm saying is this: whether I get my way or not, it will never change the fact that God is both a loving and a living God.  It means that God loves through the difficult situations in which we might find ourselves.  It also means that God is living through the difficult situations in which we might find ourselves.

So if I focus upon the One who is bigger than all of us and seek God's love and presence, it means that I can still hold on to hope.  It means that I can still offer that hope.  It means that I can still be part of that hope. 

And if I focus upon the One who is bigger than all of us, it means that I won't always 'get my way.'  It means I will be disappointed.  It means that my heart will hurt.  It means that my family and friends will be hurt at times.  It means that there will be times I must come to the throne of grace and cry out in anguish, "I don't understand!"  It means that I can cry out at the throne of grace and be comforted...and challenged...and called...and forgiven...just like all of us are. 

God calls us to abandon our old thoughts, our old ways, and embrace the radical love of Jesus Christ.  No matter what side we stand on, we are God's and God is a loving and living God in all of us.  This is hard to understand when we don't all believe the same things, when our right and wrongs don't always align, and when we break each others' hearts. 

But God is above our experiences, labels, thoughts, etc.  And yet, God is in them.  Let us all search for the loving and living God that is in the midst of Creation, whether we understand or even agree.

If your heart hurts too, may you suffer in dignity...like Christ.