Time to eat

Happy New Year from Kenya! School has begun--we went back Wednesday for three days of remembering students' names, rejoining the company of our fellow teachers, sharing stories about holidays, and even a little teaching. But now we are back in Nairobi, preparing to leave in the morning for Zanzibar! Tomorrow is our first retreat as a YAV group. We go to Zanzibar in conjunction with ITC, the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, GA. They seem like a cool bunch so far--we worshiped with them this morning and had dinner with them Friday. They will be good resources on this retreat as we discuss how God is working and study the structures that we have seen. I heard two of them preach this morning, and wish to commend to you some of the things I heard (but I cannot reproduce all the magnificent alliteration of both speakers. props to them).

Today we remember Jesus' baptism, and ours too, hopefully. Baptism is an inauguration into a new way of being. We are anointed into the presence, the purpose, and the power of God--the indwelling of the Holy Spirit through a path Christ walked, with the approval of God the Father. Not merely to heavenly peace, but to power through the indwelling of the divine. As in, the God of the universe, holy and mighty, who has come to us as a person, comes in us wandering people to make us new and air out our dank spaces. The purpose of baptism is not merely to enrich a single person, but the whole body of Christ. Growth is no isolated incident. It must be systemic.

The second message encouraged us, like Naaman, to humble ourselves to God's transformative power. It comes to us through simple means of grace that can seem simultaneously too easy and too mystical, and obedience is the way to healing. Pride will keep us unclean, as we refuse the gracious gift of God for our well-being.

Both sermons pointed me to a Gospel that was vital and relevant. Encouraged by Pastor Edward Furi of PCEA St. Andrews (among others), the Gospel's immediate importance has been on my mind recently. Obviously, the promise of God is not merely for the life to come. It is life here, too, but in FULL. It is prosperous by God's sanctified definition--not necessarily by your own or your boss's or professor's incomplete longings. It is for peace and joy and justice in God's good world, not just in heaven or in the new earth. The Gospel is now. God gives peace today. And all we have to do is jump in.

Take the plunge. Seek the light. Be anointed again in Spirit and Truth this New Year. Take up wholeheartedly the means God gives you to know and to love God and neighbor. May the one by whose help we have come empower you for his life-giving mission. Today.