BEN : The words of Christ . . . .

The words of Christ are strangely absent from the practice of our faith. Growing up on my end of the pew, so many were willing to talk about Paul that Jesus seemed largely ignored. It’s as if we determined that knowing Jesus by proxy was just as good as knowing Jesus himself.

The beginning of this new liturgical season brought a new challenge to mind. Instead of reading the Old Testament and Epistle readings associated with each Daily Office schedule, I have chosen to only read and meditate on the Gospel reading. I have spent the Year so far following the events of our savior’s life, following him from promise to Pentecost, yet it occurred to me that I had heard him speak very little during that time.

If I am to possess any level of sincerity in my claim to be a follower of Christ, I ought wrestle with the Jesus of the Gospels, the One who is strangely silent in my Sunday School education.

Nearly every Sunday, I hear about his death and resurrection. Every Sunday I hear the message captured in John 3:16 in one fashion or another. Not that there is anything wrong with those moments and thoughts. Christ’s death and resurrection was the fulfillment of God’s plan of redemption. But if this is the only part of his life we are going to recount, does that mean the balance of his life after birth and until death was inconsequential? Was it time wasted just being human?

And if these final moments are so important, why do the Gospels and Jesus himself spend so little time on his death and resurrection?

Now, there are some questions worth wrestling with, I think.

BEN : I remember a phrase. . . .

I remember a phrase that I read in college written by a really smart guy named Lawrence Stookey that captured my imagination: "the intersection of time and eternity." For some, following things like the lectionary or the daily office is rigid and void of "the Spirit." But for me it is a relief. I don't have to rely on my own familiarity with Scripture to see the larger story unfolding. As I follow the lectionary or the daily office, it's as if someone takes my hand and leads me through each moment in time. 
      As a Christian, I believe we balance two worlds: the world that is and the world to come. We live with a knowledge that this world is our present kingdom and the next world is the eternal kingdom. I also am aware that in our doings, both worlds collide at times. And we are left with very little language and practice to assimilate that experience into our paradigm — the lens through which we observe and interpret the world around us.
      The ancient practices of the church provide for us a treasure chest of tools that exist outside of our own feelings, intuitions, assumptions and hunches. They became for me a reliable vehicle to the holy. And I discovered them through my wanderings in the desert — not my home church or the faith tradition I was handed. I found it in my own search for something sustainable.
      I stumbled onto these ancient practices from a few people brave enough to open that world for me and give me permission to play around until things became familiar. I incorporated them into my worship by choosing to attend a small gathering each week of people who knew each other's faces but rarely names. A group that met inside a building that was surely built by holy people because I was overwhelmed with the holy every time I set foot inside this structure.
      And the practice was the same each time. It became a form that I could depend on when nothing in me knew what to do. There was a part of me that's angry that I wasn't told about it earlier. It was as if I was living with it but never knew it existed. But now that I do, I'm not sure what I did without it. And I fear ever losing it.
      The ancient people celebrated the Eucharist because the presence of Jesus — the guy they had traveled with, cried with, celebrated with, listened to and believed in — seemed to be with them again in its practice. I think it was a way for them to deal with their sense of loss and to resurrect the determination needed in their faith practice which they knew — even if they didn't want to admit it — would eventually lead to their death politically, socially, economically, and ultimately physically.
      Why do we think we're any different?
      The history of the church did not begin with Jonathan Edwards or John Wesley. It didn't even begin with St. Paul or the Jesus of history. The history of the church began with "In the beginning was God." The ancient tools held in secret from so many refuse to allow us to forget that the story begins before humanity was ever introduced. This invalidates our often anthropomorphic faith and returns to us the mystery of living at "the intersection of time and eternity."