Good News

05-13-2020Weekly ReflectionDeacon Ed Wendt

My Dear Family,

How great it is that our God loves us. Not only does God continue to love us, God chooses to abide within us. This is the Good News!

It's not only good news – we're also given some helpful direction in how to share this news with others. Paul helps us with that most difficult of all church concepts, evangelization.

Paul treats the Athenians with courtesy and seriousness. "I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship." He didn't rush into their temple and begin by tearing down what was sacred to them. Paul took the time to walk around, to see who they were and how they prayed. He noticed the altar to an unknown god, and he built on this. His thoughtfulness allowed the Athenians to hear him with open minds. What a lesson for us all.

This is the way of love. Take the time to investigate the history of a place or a people. Learn about the things that are sacred. Appreciate the things that others hold dear, even if these things need to be dusted off and fixed. Remember, God has chosen to abide within us – everyone of us. This demands that we treat each other thoughtfully and, as Peter says, with gentleness and reverence.

Peter continues offering to his listeners and to us a look at what our life might be as we follow Jesus. Peter reminds us that good news doesn't automatically mean an easy life. Human nature will always be, well, human, with faults and sinfulness, joys and sadness, sickness and health, death and life that living in the natural world brings. No matter how hard we try to do good, we have our weaknesses and we all sin.

The thing that might seem most odd to us is that when we do right we often suffer for it. It's not terribly reassuring to hear that when we suffer for doing good, it's a blessing. Suffering is not pleasant, whether it's as simple as having our feelings hurt or it's the ultimate price of losing our lives.

What keeps us from just giving up and caring only for ourselves? It has to be the focus of our readings today: love. It has to be the understanding that God loves us. God's love is our strength in suffering as well as in joy. So often we're tempted to wonder where God is when disaster strikes. We hear people ask where is God in this pandemic? How could God let something like this happen? Did God make it happen?

The heart of God suffers with us. The abiding, strengthening heart of God wraps us in love and compassion when very human things or natural things threaten to overwhelm us, and that is Good News!

Keep the Faith and Sing on,
Deacon Ed

BACK TO LIST