The chapters in our lives

So lately I have been thinking a lot about the different chapters in our lives.  As our baby becomes a big girl, our first house gets sold and our summer has been filled with funerals I can't help but think about the seasons of our lives and the doors that close. 

I was recently preaching on the Road to Emmaus and was once again struck by the fact that here were two men on Easter morning spreading the message and story of Christ when you gather that the 12 disciples were themselves in the upper room.  Some part of me is always a bit upset with the 12 disciples who aren't out shouting and spreading the message but the reality is we have to be patient with them...they are not only grieving the lost of Jesus as a friend and mentor but they are processing and beginning a new chapter in our lives.  No matter how long we prepare ourselves for a death of a loved one, there is still something shocking about it when it comes and a process of grief that we must go through.

No matter how much we expect and anticipate the changes that happen in our lives and the events that mark those changes, we can never be completely prepared for them nor how they will effect us. 

If we are in tune with the Holy then we seek out the Divine presence during this time - some of us to find hope, some to find consistency and others to seek reassurance.  Whichever it is that we seek, the Spirit can help fulfill our need.  And we can find in the Holy Bible a lot of references to transitional time periods.  In fact, many of the experiences of the Divine within the Holy text are times of transition or when people are worried of the unknown future.   

stepping up to the plate of Change ...

I am struck by the number of churches and other institutions that are literally holding themselves back from the future.  I recently read in a churches information packet that although they feel they need to change for their own good, most of them are unwilling to because they feel most comfortable in what they do now.  I hear that / see that a lot with churches. 

The big thing for churches right now is the need for young people and young families...this is so badly needed in some churches that when a young family visits they are surrounded in piranha style in hopes that will stay and in fear that they will leave. 

But what about this change that is needed?  Is it structural?   Well of course it is a bit of that as our denominations do need to take a hard look at themselves but mostly it is just the need for people within the churches to step up to the plate.

As Christians, we should be living our lives everyday - not just on Sunday for Christ.  And by doing so, exploring and finding a new way to live with Christ.  As our lives change so to does a good relationship with the Divine and yet, we live as if our relationship needs to be unchanging and worse we look to leadership for change and when they begin to produce, we blame leadership for our own dis-like.

The real change that needs to come from the churches, needs to come from the individuals and us as Christians.  No longer can we look at our life with the Holy as a constant unchanging relationship - we need to realize that we are forever to be growing and being challenged.  We also need to realize that although we are free from our sins and by grace God has offered us new life - we are still suppose to act and live into that new life.  We as churches are failing if the majority of the people around us are unchurched or even distrustful of church.  We are failing as churches if we continue to enable the poverty around us instead of thinking outside the mission box to do something for that poverty.

No more can we just sit pretty and wait for someone else to come along and change things - heck we have been waiting close to 2000 years for Christ and that return hasn't happened yet!  Are we going to just waste away, letting our churches die as we sit in standing water?  I sure hope not!