One Year Bible - March 19
Scriptures to read:
Matthew 18:21-35; Numbers 7-8; Ecclesiastes 6
Today marks one year since we started this “Daily Devotional.” There are over 80 people in our church who have written this year, and I have found it fascinating to read different perspectives and voices from the diversity of people in our church family. And what a year it has been! So much has changed since March 19 of last year, and yet so much remains the same. I still write this from my kitchen table, wondering when I will be able to see my community group and my friends in my living room again. I still feel the gloominess from the rain clouds that make our world feel small and sometimes scary. I still write this with an ache in my bones that I want Jesus to come and right the wrongs I see blaring at me from my computer screen. Just this week, the US has seen another horrible massacre happen on our soil, bearing the marks of sexism and xenophobia against women and the Asian American community. I feel in my body both disgust and rage that yet another man who called himself a Christian saw women as a temptation to be eliminated rather than entirely human like him. The monologue of my flesh sounds a lot like the author of Ecclesiastes, who we will all come to know as Kohelet, when we start our next sermon series. Chapter 6 of Ecclesiastes marks the depths of his pessimism:
Whatever exists has already been named,
and what humanity is has been known;
no one can contend
with someone who is stronger.
The more the words,
the less the meaning,
and how does that profit anyone?
Like Kohelet, it is tempting to believe nothing we do will change anything and we are subject to the world’s quaking.
A few months ago (very soon after January 6), I had a dream that put things into perspective for me. I was standing with a man looking through a camera at a vast desert. And the man said, “Watch.” I looked through the camera lense and everything within the frame began to shake. I couldn’t focus and I didn’t know what I was watching. It was blurry and frustrating and dizzying. Then the shaking stopped. And the man said, “Watch the rock.” I hesitantly looked back through the lens of the camera and noticed a rock in the distance. Again the world began to shake. But I stared at the rock, and this time, it didn’t matter that nothing else was in focus, because my eyes were glued where they needed to be. I don’t know how, but I physically felt peace and understanding. I said in my dream, rather simply, “Oh! I get it!”
Jesus is the rock. He is the One with the power to persist in stability through all of the shaking. The One who sees the truth, beyond the limited frame through which I see the world. The One who knows the end, though I can barely distinguish the next step through the muck of human depravity. The One who dares me to love those who hate and are different and hurt me not because they deserve it, but because I didn’t either. The One who calls me to humility rather than pride, the One who tenderly asks me to lay down my indignation in favor of His justice, and the One who defines holiness as the good life rather than fulfillment of pleasure. HE is the rock.
For those of you struggling as I am to wrap my mind around what is going on, I would encourage you, watch the rock. It’s only by watching and learning from his gentle, merciful hand that we can even attempt to right the wrongs we see in the world without being overwhelmed by them.
Love,
McKenna
Memory Verse: Enjoy what you have rather than desiring what you don’t have. - Ecclesiastes 6:9a
Prayer: Lord Jesus, This all is too much without you. We are yearning for you, Lord. We pray that you would poke holes in the world views that we hold that have left you out, and Lord, we ask you to flood them. Where we see everything under the sun as meaningless, will you bless us the ability to see you even in the mundane. Give us the ability to love well – especially our Asian American brothers and sisters who are mourning and scared. Cast out fear. Heal. Fill us to overflowing. We know you are faithful to do these things gracious God. Amen
