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Walking by the Sea
If I were Jesus’ therapist, there is one moment in particular that I’d love to process Read More
Andrew Wilkes | Read Psalm 37:10-11, 39-40
Black church traditions have long argued that trouble doesn’t last (Rev. Timothy Write wrote a song about it). Some Buddhist traditions teach a similar truth, contending that our embodied reflections on the impermanence of evil are potential sources of peace and avenues toward being at ease with life and at...
Ancient of Days, ready our hearts and steady our minds in the mood and spirit of prayer. With fatigued imagination that yet holds inner determination, may we believe that you are hard at work, employing the good that we cannot see, using the beauty that has escaped our notice, and instilling the truths we have not yet come to affirm to defeat all manner of interpersonal, social, and ecological evil. In the name of Christ. Amen.
The passage from Genesis and the psalm challenge us to resist the understandable yet self-destructive road of fretting and choosing revenge in our relationships. They also comfort us with the assurance that once-wounded relationships can be healed and stitched back together. The New Testament passages, interpreted together, call us to consider two topics in relation to one another: the nature and feel of the Resurrection and the identity of our enemies. Both passages suggest that embodiment matters, that our earthen vessels are neither opponents nor enemies of spiritual development. Nor are they automatic allies in spiritual growth. Instead, our embodied lives are always potential vistas for experiencing resurrection, for self-identifying our bodies as blessed, not cursed; beloved, not burdensome, through the presence of the lynched yet living Christ.
• Read Genesis 45:3-11, 15. What does repair and reconciliation look like in your current family context?
• Read Psalm 37:1-11, 39-40. What kind of faith practices—and what kind of God—could help you and your loved ones to pivot from fretting to trusting and relying on the Divine?
• Read 1 Corinthians 15:35-38, 42-50. Where do you envision resurrection occurring? What difference might it make to consider where and when resurrection happens among human beings?
• Read Luke 6:27-38. How might you love the “enemy” with renewed determination—including those portions of yourself that you may have been socialized to curse and despise?
Respond by posting a prayer.
