TOWARD A NEW EARTH: GOD AND GOD’S PEOPLE

Brothers and sisters:
Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus
were baptized into his death?
We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death,
so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead
by the glory of the Father,
we too might live in newness of life.  Romans 6:3-4,  Easter Vigil

I remember as a young child gazing at a picture of God walking with Adam and Eve before the Fall, just strolling through the Garden of Eden, and I remember wishing that this could still be so. Fast forward to the time of Christ and we see that, even though God made us capable of such an up-close-and-personal relationship with our God and creator, as long as evil is in our world, such an overt appearance of God in our midst ends in Crucifixion.  But even with that, God remains with us. And that’s what we “see” in the Resurrected Jesus!

Perhaps that is why, in those post-Resurrection days, the only ones who saw the Resurrected Jesus were those who believed in Jesus. And perhaps the lesson in this is that we, who believe, have the God-instilled ability to remove all of the evil from our earth so that, once again, it is safe for God to stroll freely among us.

Let us ponder these Easter mysteries in such a way that we understand more clearly our glorious ministry of continuing Jesus’ work of transforming this world back to the way it was before we brought sin into it.

Let us join Christ and the Spirit, along with the whole community of believers, especially those who are with us here at St. Michael’s, knowing we can do this ministry together in every minute of our everyday lives. It is only through our minds and hearts overflowing with gratitude for Jesus, that grace can flow freely here on earth so that, once again, our God can walk among us.

Is that what God intends for us now? Not a world that is unsafe, but one where we use our intellects and free will to motivate, and discipline, ourselves, uniting as brothers and sisters, listening and helping everyone, so that together we can find the right way, God’s first and only plan for us, so that God once again can walk with us in our world.  Oh, the joy that this would bring!

EXPLORATIONS ON FAITH AND SPIRITUALITY
In April, 2021, we explored a video lecture series, Surprised by the God of Hope in which English New Testament scholar, Pauline theologian and Anglican Bishop NT Wright walks us through Scripture pointing out that too many of us see God’s plan for us from the perspective of “If we hang out here and behave ourselves reasonably well and say our prayers, then one day, we’ll go to heaven and live with God.” Rather, Wright explains that God wants heaven, God walking with us, to be a new earth, a restored earth. Use the link below to listen to Bishop Wright’s introduction to the series.

What are we doing about that? What should we, as St. Michael’s Community – Alive as the Body of the Risen Christ –  be doing about this?

“In our present life, particularly, as together, as a united family, we are praising the God who we know in Jesus and, by the Spirit, we ourselves are not only to experience that hope but we are to be signs of that hope to one another and to the world around us.”  NT Wright, Surprised by the God of Hope

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May you, your family and friends have a glorious and blessed Easter Season.

Sister Loretta