In January our church held its annual congregational fast. For 21 days we prayed together, fasted together and meditated on 1 John . Here are my thoughts from those times of devotion in 1 John.
Beloved, I am not writing to you a new commandment, but an old one, which you have had from the beginning. This commandment is the message you have heard.8Then again, I am also writing to you a new commandment, which is true in Him and also in you. For the darkness is fading and the true light is already shining.
9If anyone claims to be in the light but hates his brother, he is still in the darkness.10Whoever loves his brother remains in the light, and there is no cause of stumbling in him.11But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness. He does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
MEDITATIONAL THOUGHT: The commandment to love one another is both old (from the beginning) and new (embodied in Christ).
MY THOUGHTS: St. Augustine of Hippo said, The New is in the Old concealed; the Old is in the New revealed.”
Here in John 2 we see that love and restoration has been God’s point all along. From the Old Testament to and through the New Testament love is thread that runs and hems everything together. Restoration of a whole is the point. There can be no salvation without love and there can be no salvation without restoration.
Hate is a separator and so it has no place in the body of Christ because it has no place in God where people are concerned. The only thing God hates is sin itself because it has the potential to separate God from the ones He loves.
In a post, last week, I mentioned that the Lord had been impressing on me that it was time to find another pathway of life ( a third pathway) through the increasingly complicated maze of our culture here in America. I sensed, during that time, that if Christians were to remain Christian, in the days ahead, we were going to have to withdraw from the world’s way of doing things and embrace a new way…which I guess is really an old way we have neglected for a bit.
So let’s begin at the beginning. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO STAND WITH SOMEBODY?
Well, here is what AI suggested as a definition of “stand with”- To “stand with” somebody means to publicly support, align with, or show solidarity with a person, group, or cause, often during times of conflict, difficulty, or in a shared, unified effort.
We’ll get to what it means to be underserved tomorrow but let’s talk about:
Public support– For me this means to love people unashamedly and to publicly build relationships with people… By love I mean….Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Align with- To me this means finding the spaces of community cooperation with people I do not see eye to eye with. Alignment is not, in my mind, perfect agreement but cooperation on values we do agree with.
Show solidarity– I had to look up a definition here. Solidarity is unity or agreement of feeling or action, especially among individuals with a common interest; mutual support within a group.
Again this is not about perfect agreement but about finding those things we can agree on to build our communities together. I hate to keep talking about the absence of perfect agreement, but I realize that in our Christian communities we have embraced an unwillingness to work with people unless they agree with every one of our doctrines and ideals of personal holiness. This has to change if we are to become effective parts of our communities again and if we are to gain a voice at the community table. This is not about compromising what we believe or our identity in Christ. It is about us learning how to live out our identities peacefully in a world that does not understand or agree with them.
This does not mean I am going to join in every project our community puts forth. It means I am going to be an active part of my diverse community and work with the underserved just like Jesus did. He wasn’t in perfect agreement with the people of his community. He still worked within the community. He attended weddings and parties and synagogues. He went to the Temple as required. He walked among the underserved of His day with love. He conversed with zealots and tax collectors and Pharisees and Saducees and Essenes and Centurions and prostitutes alike. He helped. He healed. He argued sometimes. He taught gently at others. Sometimes he flipped tables, but he stayed. He worked.
I love this little town in Northern Massachusetts and the community it is practicing Our church had the opportunity to participate in The Taste of Winchendon festival. We played a part in the tie-dye table, the face painting table, the welcome table and a few other spots as volunteers. Above Lisa Johnson and Pastor Amanda are setting up the face painting tables.
Below Debby Parker is setting up chairs in the auditorium. She and her husband Ray, who is one of our new deacons helped set up and break down the tie-dye room. Debby stayed all day to help people tie-dye.
Heavy rain drove us inside to the Winchendon Senior Center for this event. What a wonderful venue. It was not lost on any of us that this building is one of the buildings that will be shuttered by June 30th if the town budget is not ratified to include the override.
Below is tie-dying team number one: Sandy Freeman, Debby Parker, Sean Taylor and Shaun Brierly.
The face painting crew. Herb Scott, Wendy Brouillet and Lisa Johnson.
More of our face painter Dani Taylor and Dawn Sandoval.
Pastor Amanda frying empanadas for the town luncheon.
Paul Hackett started the day manning the welcome center.
Our church DLT and outreach coordinator, Carrie Hackett posing with Morton Converse AKA David Alexander.
Below is my daughter-in-law Kristine with her friend Athena who is visiting from Australia.
My son Joe is buying some raffle tickets.
Deacon Michelle Ramos and friend Jessica Walker came into help with tie-dying too.
Later in the day Paul put on another of his hats and helped man the transportation table along with Walter Lahood and Walter’s wife Natalia.
My daughters share a moment over the uncommonly good cupcakes.
Sam and Mandi pictured below came in to have their faces painted and then stayed to help us clean up.
Here is the yearly community picture of the taste of Winchendon crew.
What kind of events does your community have coming up?
Lillie-Put 