I’m a good Canadian. Here I sit on the day the election was called with a copy of “The Testaments” by Margaret Atwood in one hand and a Timmies in the other. I can’t actually start reading of course as I have work to do and a sermon to write but tonight after prayer group I can snuggle up with my cat and begin reading what is my own personal version of a thriller. For some people thrillers involve a serial killer and two heroes racing against time to stop the attacks. This is terrifying of course but I find books like “The Testament” and “The Handmaid’s Tale” to be equal parts engrossing and terrorizing. Terrorizing because I seems like something that could actually happen. Maybe not here, or maybe. Maybe somewhere else, or perhaps not. Regardless, it seems real. It feels real as you read it. And that feeling, it’s altogether frightening.
As this election descends and the world continues to turn, as bombs are dropped and children go hungry, as life unfolds in my own little world I am reminded of the call to break free from that world. Of the call to expand my thinking and see beyond that which is immediately around me. I am reminded of Jesus saying in Matthew 16:24-26:
“…“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?”
I guess for me the question is am I willing to lose myself. Will I deny my comforts, my own cozy life and push past it to see beyond. I hope I will. I will work towards doing that but it is work, is it not? It is the constant work of a practice in faith. It is the determined focus we must have on the Way, His Way.
How will you practice your faith this day. How will you work towards living in His Way?
