Deeply Deeply

I have wandered far this Lenten season.  I have shed more tears in the last 40 days than in the last 4 years. Probably not true, but close.  I have been taken by the spiritual shoulders and spun around to take a closer look at the heart in the mirror.  I am trying really hard not to blink and look down, but the light hurts my eyes and I just don't want to look anymore.

Luke preached a moving resurrection sermon this morning that churned my thoughts up even more.  How can we "serve a risen Savior" without acting anything like him.  I don't think that Jesus went through the agony of the cross for us to be saved but to serve.  When we deny the immediacy of sanctifying grace and focus on the someday of heaven, we refuse to serve--demanding to be served.  Jesus's grace that is so freely offered breaks sin's hold on us so that we may be free to serve and to love and to dance and to weep.  O, Church, refuse to let Jesus be a means to avoiding hell and embrace his call to love the ugly, smelly, lonely ones.

And I puzzle...how do I serve when I can't see beyond the horrendous pile of laundry in my "guest room" (laundry graveyard) or my own children are beating on each other?

Jesus suffered and died and overcame death to give us freedom.

Let's use these 50 joyful days of Easter to explore how those of us who spend actual time and energy thinking about socks can embrace this call to go wash each other's feet (do baths and diaper changes count?).

Jesus's kingdom was first proclaimed by such as us...