More of the Story: New Way
Now there was a disciple in Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, “Ananias.” He answered, “Here I am, Lord.” The Lord said to him, “Get up and go to the street called Straight, and at the house of Judas look for a man of Tarsus named Saul. At this moment he is praying, and he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he might regain his sight.” But Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints in Jerusalem; and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who invoke your name.” But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel; I myself will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.” So Ananias went and entered the house. He laid his hands on Saul and said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and his sight was restored. Then he got up and was baptized, and after taking some food, he regained his strength. ~ Acts 9:10-19a
When we reach a point where things simply make no sense; when our thinking about God and life no longer line up; when any sense of certainty is gone; and when we can find no reason to trust God, but we still do, that is what trust looks like at its brightest - when all else is dark. ~ Pete Enns, The Sin of Certainty
It wasn't just Saul who had to change his way of thinking.
Ananias knew Saul as a bad man. A man who did evil against God's people. To be called to bring sight back to such a man? What must that have felt like?
And Saul - asked to trust that a man unknown to him would heal him from this precarious position he found himself in. He was already blinded, weakened. He had to be confused and worried.
These two men are brought together by the simple act of trust.
There was no reason they should trust each other. They came from the most opposite of spectrums.
Can you think of two people who might like to trust each other less than these two? A Republican and a Democrat?
A Pro-Life activist and a member of the National Organization of Women?
An NRA member and the parent of a shooting victim?
A lesbian single mother and a someone who lobbies against gay rights?
A black, urban teen and a white farmer in the Midwest?
Or simply a man and a woman, or Catholic and Jew, or teen boyfriend and his girlfriend's father!
How many ways can we come up with to not trust someone because they are so completely different from us?
How much easier is it to trust what we are sure we know; what we've grown up hearing; what our confirmation bias tells us; what our Sunday school teacher told us growing up? What our friends tell us?
And when we have such a hard time trusting each other, how hard is it to trust God?
Eventually our histories, our teachers, our TV newscasters, our political parties, our gender, our race, our religions...eventually they'll get us just so far.
Eventually we'll feel like we've reached the end of some rope where everything we thought we trusted just isn't giving us the answers we need.
Eventually we'll be confronted with something or someone that tells us something new not just about ourselves, but about God.
And that something or someone may come from the least expected place.
And when that comes, the only thing that can bridge the gap from where we were to where we need to be is trust.
Prayer: Holy one, help me to trust you - even when that means trusting someone whom I normally wouldn't trust at all. Amen.
When we reach a point where things simply make no sense; when our thinking about God and life no longer line up; when any sense of certainty is gone; and when we can find no reason to trust God, but we still do, that is what trust looks like at its brightest - when all else is dark. ~ Pete Enns, The Sin of Certainty
It wasn't just Saul who had to change his way of thinking.
Ananias knew Saul as a bad man. A man who did evil against God's people. To be called to bring sight back to such a man? What must that have felt like?
And Saul - asked to trust that a man unknown to him would heal him from this precarious position he found himself in. He was already blinded, weakened. He had to be confused and worried.
These two men are brought together by the simple act of trust.
There was no reason they should trust each other. They came from the most opposite of spectrums.
Can you think of two people who might like to trust each other less than these two? A Republican and a Democrat?
A Pro-Life activist and a member of the National Organization of Women?
An NRA member and the parent of a shooting victim?
A lesbian single mother and a someone who lobbies against gay rights?
A black, urban teen and a white farmer in the Midwest?
Or simply a man and a woman, or Catholic and Jew, or teen boyfriend and his girlfriend's father!
How many ways can we come up with to not trust someone because they are so completely different from us?
How much easier is it to trust what we are sure we know; what we've grown up hearing; what our confirmation bias tells us; what our Sunday school teacher told us growing up? What our friends tell us?
And when we have such a hard time trusting each other, how hard is it to trust God?
Eventually our histories, our teachers, our TV newscasters, our political parties, our gender, our race, our religions...eventually they'll get us just so far.
Eventually we'll feel like we've reached the end of some rope where everything we thought we trusted just isn't giving us the answers we need.
Eventually we'll be confronted with something or someone that tells us something new not just about ourselves, but about God.
And that something or someone may come from the least expected place.
And when that comes, the only thing that can bridge the gap from where we were to where we need to be is trust.
Prayer: Holy one, help me to trust you - even when that means trusting someone whom I normally wouldn't trust at all. Amen.