Dear Caldwell,
As I write, the City of Boston is on lockdown. SWAT officers in battle armor are going house to house in a scene borrowed from what we are used to from Iraq, not from within our own borders. We have had no shortage of other images this week – entire neighborhoods leveled in an earthquake-caliber explosion and blood-soaked sidewalks and maimed innocents earlier this week there in Boston. Am I the only one that feels like it’s all a dream, a horrific nightmare sequence that can’t really be real life?
After a week like this, where do we turn? What kind of leader do we seek to shepherd us through such terror? Who can lead us back to “living waters?” Our on-time God gives us the answer in this week’s lectionary readings, Psalm 23 and Revelation 7:9-17. Both remind us that we have a shepherd who has walked through the valley of the shadow – Christ Jesus, the Lamb who now reigns over whatever evil presents itself in this broken world.
Come Sunday and join with others as we explore how this unlikely image is indeed God’s final answer to the questions that rear in weeks like this one. Meanwhile, we wish Godspeed to about 35 Caldwell women as they retreat in Montreat, where they will engage in Godly Play and reflection on how we can all claim the wonder of children in God’s stories with us.
Finally, several wanted to know when Ellison’s meditation from Youth Sunday was posted. It is on our church website here http://www.caldwellpresby.org/docs/sermons2013/131404_Elly’s%20meditation.pdf
May God be “with you there” with the assurance that Christ does reign, whatever else this broken world may want you to think.
In Christ,
John