I just finished reading today’s chapter. Which, if you’ve read it, means you understand how my head is swimming in NAMES! And all after yesterday’s reflection on my daughter’s name. Boy, there are a lot of names in there that I suspect few kids born this year in the US will be getting!
Seems like this has become a pattern for me, but yet again today, two main things seem to be catching me from this chapter.
First, is the sense that there is a right time. Even when we’re dealing with God coming to us in Jesus, we are given this picture of preparation, anchor in scripture, etc. Surely if any being could do anything at any time, it would be God. But God chose to work in a certain way, deliberatively. We use the word KAIROS to talk about God’s time. I won’t spend a ton of time defining kairos here, if you want to learn more, check out kairos on Wikipedia.
For me, I think it’s pretty clear when you’re right in the midst of God’s kairos. I think Jesus’ coming must have been a pretty incredible instance—the most incredible. But we find kairos all over the place even today.
One of the big projects I’ve been working on almost since arriving at Calvary is starting a new, contemporary (though we’ve had lots of discussions about if that’s even the appropriate word to use) worship service. It was one of the first areas that Ken asked me to work on, and we’ve had lots of ups and downs. In spring 2010, we started Koinonia (we like Greek words). The continuation of conversations that had been happening for a while at Calvary, we took what had been done so far and tried to mold it into a service…including lots of new input from some, like myself, newer to the conversations.
Our experience with Koinonia could fill a whole month of blogs itself. I’m happy to share our experience if you’re interested, but I’ll save the space here. Suffice it to say, we learned a lot. I, for sure, learned a lot. And earlier this year, we decided to “pause it.” I think we knew it would never come back as it was, but we wanted to make it clear we had not given up on a new service. We just needed to be able to come back at it without that baggage of trying to keep adjusting what we already had.
This past Sunday, then, we had our first service of “The Sanctuary.” And boy, can I feel God’s kairos on our side. For me, I sense I’m in God’s kairos with a big task seems to go smoothly. I can sense a major difference between the start of Koinonia and that start of The Sanctuary. Some of it, no doubt is experience, but even that is part of kairos.
The Sanctuary meets Sundays (right now just the 2nd and 4th Sundays of the month) in our chancel. Though, with 19 people at our first service (and a few of those were babies) it won’t be long before we’ll be overflowing the chancel seats and needing to push out into other areas of the sanctuary. We start with music (we need musicians, so let me know if you’re interested on a regular or occasional basis), then have fellowship (right there in the sanctuary) and then our message. For the summer we’re looking at secular songs and relating them to life lessons and to scripture. Starting in the fall, we’ll be inviting different people to come be interviewed then I’ll tie things together in a brief message. We’re going to call it “Conversations in the Sanctuary.” It’s hard to describe kairos, sometimes. But you know it when you’re in the midst of it.
The second thing that jumps out at me from Luke 3 is the story of John. During my college junior year, I spent my fall semester studying at College Year in Athens—in Athens, Greece. It was one of the most incredible experience of my life. I STRONGLY recommend that every college student take advantage of study abroad experiences if they can—especially to a place they may never get to visit otherwise.
While in Greece, I got to take several trips, both with our program and on my own. One of the trips I took on my own was along with a tour group to Meteora. Meteora is a really interesting place geologically.
Over many years, monasteries have been built here, so our trip was to visit them, including the largest, The Great Meteoron. In the narthex of that monastery are the images of martyrs of the faith. This is, I was told, to serve as an encouragement to Christians facing persecution. One of those images was of John the Baptist. I guess the image itself isn’t that novel—of him holding his own head on a platter (not headless horseman style, he HAD his head AND his head on a platter). Aside from it seeming a bit Halloween-ish, the image was one of my favorites I saw in Greece. I got a copy of it for my dad. Sure, it seems kind of ridiculous, but it brings to mind the entire story of John the Baptist, a story that is continued here (remember, we heard about John’s parents earlier in Luke).
The gospels seem to indicate that some thought John might be the Messiah. And that he clearly refuted that. John seems to have lived an odd life, owing at least in part to the vows made on his behalf earlier in Luke. John doesn’t seem to have had a “normal” life at all. And all for the sole purpose of preparing people for Jesus’ arrival on the scene.
It seems a bit thankless, doesn’t it? In many ways, a less than glamorous, and indeed quite a way to just sacrifice all the bits of life that are so important to many of us—family, romantic love, a respectable place in society. John had none of that…not so that he could BE the Messiah, but just to PREPARE people FOR the Messiah.
In a lot of ways, though, that’s what we’re called to do. To prepare people for God’s presence in their lives (“prepare” being a bit theologically inappropriate to say, but you get my gist). To help people see God. To help people recognize God with God is at work. To truly do this work, we may have to think long and hard about whether we’re holding on to things, to parts of our lives, out of our own will, rather than God’s.
All of this brings to mind what we call the Covenant Prayer in the Wesleyan Tradition. It may be at best CLOSE to a prayer that Wesley used, but it does indeed capture his approach to discipleship, and, I think, discipleship as it is presented in the Gospel of Luke for sure.
I am no longer my own, but thine.
Put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt.
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
Let me be employed by thee or laid aside for thee,
Exalted for thee or brought low for thee.
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
I freely and heartily yield all things
To thy pleasure and disposal.
And now, O glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Thou art mine, and I am thine. So be it.
And the covenant which I have made on earth,
Let it be ratified in heaven.
Amen.
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