Take nothing for the journey (Luke 9:3)
Every time we move house, we are reminded how much stuff we have accumulated. It’s tempting to imagine that we could just shed it all and live a simpler life. But soon, the needs of the our life in our new dwelling assert themselves, and we start to accumulate things again.
How can we hear the call to the apostles, to take nothing with them, to waste no time on meaningless greetings, to follow the command to preach the gospel with single-minded focus? Do we need to put it in a category of things that Jesus says that clearly don’t apply to us? Or should we feel guilty if we are unable to come up with any other response than to sell everything and set off, proclaiming the glad tidings?
In the end, for most of us, the idea that we will set out on a life of pilgrimage with no possessions is just fantasy. What is more challenging is to ask ourselves, what part of the instruction might apply to us? First and foremost is a sense of calling, the feeling that our life has a purpose. Without falling into the trap of writing wordy mission statements that gather dust as soon as they are finished, it is good to survey our lives and ask how we can serve a higher purpose by the way we live our lives and the values that we embody.
Along with this, the apostles are asked to encounter other human beings in their need. They are to deliver a message that those listening did not know they needed to hear – to proclaim the coming of the Kingdom of God. The enormity of this task, once we have decided that we will not be setting off to missionize in foreign lands, is huge, not least because all the old vocabulary – God, kingdom, sin and salvation – will probably be more of a hindrance than a help. And yet when we find the right words, or the right silences, how often do we discover that our fellow human beings yearn to hear the message that there is hope in the darkness; that life is meaningful; that prayer can be effective. Setting out on a journey to meet our contemporaries means leaving the treasures that we have gained behind, growing empty enough to hear them in their need, and finding the words that can speak to their hearts.
– Tom Ravetz
Open Forum, Sunday, 11th August at 11.30am
Along with Victoria’s questions, there will be space to gather suggestions. I have also been asked to share something from the presentation I gave at the Summer Conference at Emerson last weekend.
Nataliia Shatna is on annual leave from 1st-31st August.
Tom Ravetz
Diary
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