And life goes on . . .

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the world (outside of Israel) the Olympics are being held, Syria is a mess, people continue to struggle with their finances, family members die.  As amazing as my pilgrimage to the Holy Land was (and trust me, you will be hearing about it for years to come), the reality is we don’t live in Jerusalem 2000 years ago, and neither does Jesus.  He is alive today in you, me, our church, our community and our world. 

Coming back to St. Barnabas only reaffirmed my belief in our need for Christ in our lives and commitment to sharing his love even more than before.   Reflecting on the past helps us understand how it shapes our present and what that can do to our future.  Can we willingly be like those olive trees in the Garden of Gethsemane and be graphed onto old roots to sprout a new future?  I think we have already begun to do this at St. Barnabas, and there is more we can do, with God’s help.  Nothing is more powerful than our desire to be transformed by God’s love, to do what God needs us to do to establish God’s kingdom in God creation here and now.

I do recognize the irony of that statement as I head off for a couple weeks of vacation, but that doesn’t deny God working in and on all of us during this time (remember, God doesn’t take summers off).  In these last few weeks of summer, my prayer is that we all recharge and discern more clearly what God is calling St. Barnabas to do in the coming year.  The process of a graft seems fairly easy, but at some point a cut has to be made before new growth can happen.  May Christ guide those pruning shears and make us flourish for his honor and glory.

In Christ,
Rev. Valerie+

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