Mark 4:21-25 There is Nothing Hidden

Observation: Amid a cluster of parables, Jesus tells his disciples and followers a parable of a lamp, which belongs not in a bushel basket or under a bed, but on a lamp stand, to give light to the whole house. Here in Mark's Gospel, Jesus explains that all that is secret will one day be exposed, and that those who "have" will receive more, but those who "have nothing" will have even more taken away. Very strange way to frame this parable. 

Application: I think the traditional way I was always taught to interpret this parable--probably starting as early as Sunday School--is that the lamp stands for our faith, or for the Good News of Jesus. "Hey, share it! This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine!" But Mark's language about secrecy makes me wonder if there's a different way to read this parable. 

What if the "lamp" is simply the light of who we are, good, bad or indifferent? If we try to hide who we are, it will eventually come out anyway. We can put on airs, we can smile politely in public, we can beautify our bodies, our houses, our yards, our lives, but if we're not paying any attention to the state of our spirits--the way we think and feel, the story we tell ourselves when nobody's watching--it won't do any good. 

I don't know why it never occurred to me before today, that hiding a burning lamp under your bed or under a bushel basket is not just a dumb way to use the light of a lamp. It's also super dangerous. The light we hide for too long is liable to burn our house down. There is nothing hidden, except to be disclosed. 

In this age of outrage and anger, I wonder if one way to "shine the light" of who we really are is to be vulnerable when we are feeling hurt. Rather than blasting anger every which way, maybe we put our pain up on a lamp stand, where others can see that we're not indestructible, we're human. Because, come on. They know anyway. Maybe the measure of pain we're willing to share and be honest about will be the measure of healing we're willing to receive from God. Maybe those who have even the tiniest bit of trust in their fellow human beings, or in God, will see that trust multiplied, while those with no trust at all will see exactly what they expected to see: more pain.

Prayer: God, give me the strength to admit I'm weak. Take away my facade, my illusions and lies. Let me shine a light on who I really am, that I may become who you need me to be. Amen.   

Revelation 4:1-8 A Whole Other Place

Observation: Near the beginning of his apocalyptic message, John of Patmos describes a vision of being brought up to heaven "in the spirit." It's a strange vision indeed, with a throne surrounded by lightning, twenty four elders worshiping, and four living creatures--with faces of a lion, ox, human and eagle--proclaiming God's holiness. As alien as this vision may seem, there are many allusions to Old Testament texts that John's audience would have recognized. This reminds John's audience that his message is in line with the prophets of old, and it comes from the same God they've always known. 

Application: That's the tricky part, isn't it? What do we make of these strange visions, and how do they apply to our daily lives as Christians? Should the heavenly numbers--seven, four, twenty-four--have some special significance in our decision making? Do jasper and carnelian have a special role to play in our following Jesus? What are we supposed to make of any of this? 

For all the complex references and strange, terrifying visions found in the Revelation, its basic message is surprisingly simple: God is in charge. God holds the future. Nothing that has happened or will happen will take God by surprise. 

I know many of us have grown up believing that Heaven is our ultimate destination: a cloud-laden realm of angels, far removed from this earth, where we will be reunited with all our loved ones after we die. We are taught that "this world is not our home." That we should think of it as temporary, and not to get too comfortable here. And yet in John's bizarre vision, Heaven does not seem like a very comfortable, familiar place. That's because of one simple fact: we actually don't belong there. Not yet. N.T. Wright talks about Heaven as "the cockpit of the universe", from which God controls all things. If you were to be invited into the cockpit of a passenger jet, you'd see any number of instruments, gauges, and screens that you don't understand. But you can definitely trust that your pilot knows exactly what they are, and how and when to use them to get you both where you need to go. You don't need to be up there during the flight. In fact, you shouldn't. You need to let the pilot do her/his job. 

If you follow me, I think Heaven is the same way. I believe, based on the witness of the New Testament, that there is an "other place," a place beyond the dimensional experience of our world, from which God reigns. When we say that Jesus "ascended into heaven," that's where we are saying he is. But he's not staying there. God will not remain in the cockpit once history has reached its final destination. The witness of Revelation, and many other New Testament books, is that when evil is finally put to rest, heaven and earth will be renewed...and united. The home of God will be among mortals. God will reign in heaven and earth as one kingdom. 

How this applies to our lives today is that our daily lives, who we are, where we are, when we are in history, is exactly where we belong. For now, it is our home, fallen as it is. And we need not look to heaven for a better life. We can get started today, in seeing that God's will is done on earth as in heaven. God will take care of the rest. We can glance into the cockpit, but God will fly the plane, thank you very much. 

Prayer: God, your will be done on earth as in heaven. Amen.   

Isaiah 1:1-4, 16-20 "Let Us Argue it Out"

Observation: The book of the prophet Isaiah begins by placing itself in historic context: "during the reign of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah." This places the prophecies in the southern part of modern-day Israel (the part including Jerusalem) around 742-700 BCE. And right off the bat, God speaks about the people's rebellion. What have the people been doing wrong? Too much drinking? Gambling? Illicit sex? Offering the wrong kind of animal in the Temple on the wrong day? Nope. It's much, much simpler than that. 

"Learn to do good: seek justice, rescues the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow." 

And what's even more interesting is God doesn't even assume Judah will take God's word for it. God says, "Come, let us argue it out!" Through the process of real debate, through being truly honest with themselves and with God about their mistreatment of the most vulnerable in their society, Judah can attain repentance and forgiveness, and their "scarlet" sins shall be "like snow".   

Application: I'm going to put this out there. It has become virtually impossible for Christians to talk about economic justice without being viewed as partisan. It's frustrating. And what makes it most frustrating for me is that from where I'm sitting, the Church didn't move. The Scriptures didn't move. Society did. This text has been around for nearly three millennia. Jesus and his fellow rabbis had huge swaths of it committed to memory. And all of a sudden it seems that any talk about caring for the poor--the "oppressed, the widow, the orphan" as Isaiah and others refer to them--is viewed as partisan rhetoric. So Christians don't talk about it. We give our divided society the steering wheel and say, "Here y'all, we'd rather get along amongst ourselves than speak with moral authority on this issue, so you handle this." 

We can talk about interpretation. We can talk about how best to apply prophetic texts like this to our lives. We can ask the question, "Should this text be applied to civic governments, or only to people of faith, or some combination of the two? What, if anything, does this have to do with tax policy? Healthcare policy? Or is it all about voluntary, charitable giving and service by people of faith?" We can ask all that and more. What we can not do is fail to talk about it. We can't repent of what we don't admit or don't see. 

"Come now, let us argue it out, says the Lord." 

Prayer: God, give us the strength to be honest with ourselves, and with you. Help us to obey. Amen. 

Psalm 104:24-35 Leviathan, Because, Why Not?

The Leviathan, a mythical sea creature in the Old Testament.

Mister Trash Wheel, one of my favorite heroes of the Baltimore Harbor.

Observation: Psalm 104 is one of my favorites, because it poetically describes God's relationship with the creation. The psalmist praises God's wisdom in making and feeding all things, and when the time is right, taking away the breath of life, and creating new life. In all this, God knows what God is doing. An interesting piece of this particular creation psalm is the mention of the sea, which was not generally viewed by Old Testament writers as a friendly or useful place. It was a symbol of chaos, a wild and frightening unknown, full of all manner of deadly things. Yet still it's created and sustained by God, God is Lord over it, and God knows exactly what God is doing in creating and recreating the sea. But sometimes, apparently, God just wants to have fun. Depending on the translation, verse 26 reads, "and the Leviathan, whom you formed to sport in it" or "the Leviathan, which your formed for the sport of it." So either God made a giant sea monster which the Israelites know next to nothing about, whose sole purpose in life is to hang out and have fun, or God made a giant sea monster which the Israelites know next to nothing about, because God was hanging out and having fun. Either way, God doesn't just create out of a sense of duty or compulsion. God creates because it's fun. 

Application: Generally in this age of climate change, conversations we have about our relationship to the earth tend to be pretty serious. That's completely understandable. The stakes are very high, and we'll only get one planet. But at the same time, for modern people paying attention, there are a hundred urgent, pressing, serious, ongoing conversations that we need to be having, and they're all interconnected, with no easy solutions, yet we can't afford not to have everyone engaged in working together on moving them forward. It can get very daunting. 

That's why I love "Mister Trash Wheel," one of the newest heroes of Baltimore's Harbor. He's a funny little barge, complete with googley eyes, who happens to have a trash-collecting conveyor belt in his mouth that pulls trash from the water. He has already removed thousands of pounds of trash from the harbor, but just as importantly, he's fun. People like him...at least I do. 

The Bible says God made the Leviathan, and presumably other creatures, "for fun." Not because they're useful to humans, or for some grand eternal purpose, but because it just made the creation a more fun place. As we continue the very serious conversation about how we, created in God's image, can care for the other creations of God, let's not forget: the creation can be a pretty fun place. Let's not take ourselves so seriously that the Leviathan, and his new buddy Mister Trash Wheel, have all the fun. 

Prayer: God, help me restore and care for your creation, by delighting in it, as you do. Amen.  

Job 37:1-13 God Causes it to Happen?

Job 37:1-13 (NRSV)

​"At this also my heart trembles,

and leaps out of its place.

Listen, listen to the thunder of his voice

and the rumbling that comes from his mouth.

Under the whole heaven he lets it loose,

and his lightning to the corners of the earth.

After it his voice roars;

he thunders with his majestic voice

and he does not restrain the lightnings when his voice is heard.

God thunders wondrously with his voice;

he does great things that we cannot comprehend.

For to the snow he says, 'Fall on the earth';

and the shower of rain, his heavy shower of rain,

serves as a sign on everyone's hand,

so that all whom he has made may know it.

Then the animals go into their lairs

and remain in their dens.

From its chamber comes the whirlwind,

and cold from the scattering winds.

By the breath of God ice is given,

and the broad waters are frozen fast.

He loads the thick cloud with moisture;

the clouds scatter his lightning.

They turn round and round by his guidance,

to accomplish all that he commands them

on the face of the habitable world.

Whether for correction, or for his land,

or for love, he causes it to happen.

Observation: Job has suffered terrible losses, even though he feels he has done nothing wrong. His friend Elihu, in the midst of a lengthy debate about why God would allow such things, talks about God's direct hand in every kind of weather, and says we can't always understand why God causes certain kinds of weather. 

Application: I'm struggling with this text for a couple of reasons. 

The first is as ancient as the text itself, and maybe more so. Elihu's point is God directly causes every natural phenomenon, and God has God's own reasons for doing so. Everything from devastating hurricanes to volcanic activity is God's direct doing. I have a hard time believing a God who loves us would go around zapping people with thunder and destroying towns with tornadoes. I think it's a little more complicated than the simple, poetic way it's presented here.  

My second struggle is more modern: the scientific community is increasingly convinced that human activity can and does have an unintended impact on weather patterns. We've always had extreme weather, but the effects of climate change are creating more extreme and inhospitable weather in more places. The idea that "Only God is responsible for bad weather, so God must be getting increasingly angry at us in a way that happens to be directly connected to how much fossil fuels we put into the atmosphere" doesn't seem to hold water. 

What I come away with after wrestling with this text is that I think it's a poetic image--a metaphor--to imagine God's own breath freezing water, God's hand opening up a special room where he holds whirlwinds, God's direct word to the rain or snow saying "fall here, not there." In a world deeply affected by sin, we do not live in harmony with the elements, and there is an element of chaos in dealing with the natural world, which God never wanted for us. That said, I also believe that as we learn more about the natural world, to continue to ignore the small amount of control we have, and act as though we have no role in restoring balance, is morally irresponsible.

In short, sin has messed up our relationship with nature, but since we bear the image of God, we can repent of our sin and do some things to improve that relationship. 

Prayer: God, thank you for the good weather you give us that nourishes the creation. Help us to better understand the weather we see as "bad," to see its part in renewing and creating new life. Help us to be humble in our dealings with all that you have made, and this home where you have called us to live. Amen. 

Numbers 8:5-22 Priesthood

Observation: In this passage God gives instructions for setting apart Levite priests to represent the people before God in Temple worship. In fact, during the night of the Passover God set aside the firstborn of all the Israelites, not just this one tribe. But because God knows the people can't repay this debt, the tribe of Levi will be set aside as priests instead.

Application: For Christians, there's good news and bad news. The good news is that it's not just one family that can be priests. Anyone can. The bad news--or rather, the challenge--is, by our baptism, we ALL are priests. Nobody's off the hook.

We come from a Christian tradition in which we have trained, professional church leaders: pastors and deacons. But we're not "professional  Christians." Every baptized person represents Christ on earth, as well as lifting up the world before God in prayer. None of us can do that perfectly, and God's grace is there for us when we fail. But we are responsible to get up each morning and keep doing it.

Prayer: God, thank you for the gift and responsibility of being your priest. Help me take time to connect with you, and time to serve my neighbor, each day, as you have called me to do. Amen. 

Ephesians 1:15-23 Under His Feet

"Hey man...you've changed."

Observation: Ephesians gives a poetic vision of the ascended Christ. God "raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but in the age to come." A far cry from the rural peasant from Galilee that we knew...

Application: Happy Ascension Day! Today on the church calendar, forty days after the day of resurrection, ten days before the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, we celebrate Christ being taken up to heaven and sitting at God's right hand.

I have ambivalent feelings about Ascension Day, because in a way, with all this poetic imagery, the world seems to finally be getting the Messiah it wants: on a high throne, in a fancy palace, far removed from the dirt and grime and pain of daily human existence..."above it all." We, and all creation, are just "under his feet."

We know from the Bible what has happened all too often to human rulers once they get power. David goes from a humble, faithful shepherd boy, to a selfish and lecherous king. Solomon goes from a wise student to uber-wealthy power broker with hundreds of wives and almost as many gods. In human history, power corrupts. Being removed from the daily lives of ordinary people is not a good thing for most royals. By that logic, ascension to a whole other level of existence would not be a great thing for the ministry and mission of Jesus.

But that's where the metaphor of "ascension," "enthronement" and being "seated at God's right hand" kind of breaks down. Granted, to make sense of a physical resurrection, we have to believe that Jesus' body is indeed still...somewhere. And for lack of a better understanding of this mystery, we call that somewhere "God's right hand." Jesus is in heaven, with his Father. But does that mean he's removed from all human suffering? From the very people he died to save, and the sheep he promised to shepherd? No way.

By raising Jesus "above all rule and authority" and lifting his name "above all names," God is not giving Jesus a "promotion." Jesus has always been king, from manger to cross. What God is lifting up before all is Jesus' way of life. God is lifting up faith, compassion, justice, mercy and self-giving love as the real authority and power in this universe. And by the power of the Holy Spirit, which has descended and filled us, that power  and authority still rules our world. Jesus is not removed from our pain. Jesus is the head of the church--united to us forever--and Jesus' presence fills all in all. Love has been lifted up, only to reach out once again.

Prayer: Jesus, thank you for sitting at God's right hand. Help me to lift your way--the way of self-giving love--above any other way. Amen. 

Mark 16:19-20 "I Believe in Happy Endings"

Observation: The oldest copies of Mark's Gospel do not include this final story, of Jesus' appearing and preaching to his disciples, then ascending into heaven and sitting at God's right hand. This part was probably written a few centuries later, to more closely match the end of Luke's gospel. Yet for many centuries of Christian history, this "longer ending of Mark" was part of the story for many believers. In fact, it forms the basis for some parts of the Lutheran Confessions.

Application: We have a natural tendency to try to make sense of things that confuse us. Mark's Gospel (the original version) ends with an angel announcing Jesus' resurrection, and the women running out, terrified, and telling no one what they saw. I mean...what??? Like, Jesus is on the loose somewhere, but nobody knows where he is or what he's doing? This ending reminds me of how Disney might resolve a chaotic story like that.

I don't think it's wrong to try and make sense of a life that often seems crazy and disordered. As I've heard said before, the key to a happy ending is knowing when to stop telling the story. 

Common sense dictates that the disciples did eventually encounter Jesus, and that the women at the tomb did eventually tell their story. Other witnesses say he did indeed ascend. But was it necessary to make Mark's Gospel "fall in line"? 

Sometimes we do need to sit with what feels like an incomplete story. Our lives, our world, our history, still feel very unresolved, much like Mark's original story, and it's very tempting to go for an "easy ending." But rest assured, the story is still in God's hands, still being told, and the ending was already decided in the life, death and Resurrection of Christ. 

Prayer: Jesus, help us to accept that which feels too open-ended, and give it to you to finish. Amen. 

Deuteronomy 11:1-17 It's Not Our Kids' Job

Observation: In a final speech to the people of Israel, Moses is addressing the last living people to have witnessed God's action in leading them out of slavery in Egypt. Therefore, Moses reminds parents that if they don't acknowledge God's goodness and follow God's commands, neither will their kids.

Application: Even as a pastor, I still struggle with the modern parenting dilemma, "how much of my own faith should I push on my kids, and how much should I allow them to discover for themselves?" My dad once told me a story of himself as a willful teen in the 1970's announcing to his father, "Dad, I'm not going to church anymore," to which my grandfather (true to form) responded, "Okay, son, where you gonna live?" That's not really my parenting style, nor, thankfully, the one my parents went with. And yet, growing up, church was an expectation for me, and you better believe we bring our kids to church too. Unless they're deathly ill, they're there. When we're traveling, we figure out another church to try.

I've heard people before say, "I want my kids to be able to choose their own spiritual path, so I won't push any particular path on them." And I'll admit, I do sometimes feel a pang of doubt, wondering whether we are exerting undue influence on our kids and young people by setting out the expectation that worship, prayer and talking about God as a family will be part of their lives. Are kids born Christian? Well, no. We do indeed share our faith with them at a formative time in their lives. You could reasonably call that "indoctrination." But here's the thing...

We do that with literally every other part of their lives, and don't bat an eye. I have no compunction about indoctrinating my kids to believe spinach is better for them than cupcakes, and that they need to get outside and exercise. I'll tell my young, impressionable kids any chance I get, that girls are every bit as capable and smart as boys and should get equal opportunities in this world. I will gladly "brainwash" my kids to believe that we'll only ever get one planet, and we'd better take care of it. That compassion is more important than strength. That I will love them no matter what...and so will God.

You may have heard before that faith is "caught, rather than taught." And it's true. Kids will learn their spirituality from their parents. Maybe those parents choose to have a light touch--to lead with questions, to ask kids what they think about God, about Jesus, about human nature. That's fine. In fact it's great. But the single most important thing parents can do if they want kids to have a vibrant spirituality, even if it looks different from ours, is have a vibrant spirituality ourselves, and not hoard it away from them as though it's some kind of secret. Like Moses said, it is not the job of our kids to figure out faith on their own. It's our job to witness to them, which is more than reciting dogmas; it's sharing our own stories of what God has done in our lives and living as if those stories are true. 

What my parents never told me is that here's no finish line for our faith development. I'm fully aware that any parents reading this are trying to figure out their own faith, let alone what they want to teach their kids. Maybe some reading this have been burned by organized religion, or never did find a style of worship or theology that really matches what they believe. The hard truth is, there may not be a "perfect church" out there for you. They're all full of humans, and humans screw up. A lot. But the other hard truth is your kids can see if your words don't match your actions. They can see if you're struggling with God and trying to figure it out, or if you've just decided that spirituality is not a priority in your own life. They know. The best thing you can do is be authentic about it.

Prayer: God, I pray for parents today. May they feel your grace, and your love. May they have some grace on themselves as well. May they continue to work on their relationship with you. May they be the type of person they want their kids to be. May they make disciples, simply by being your disciples. Amen.      

Isaiah 42:5-9 The Idol of Familiarity

Observation: When the people of Judah are in Exile, it is especially important for them to remember exactly who their God is. The Lord, the Great "I Am," is no local tribal deity, but the one who stretched out the heavens and earth... including Babylon, where the Judahites now reside against their will. No idol from the past or present compares. God is still in charge, even here, and God is doing a new thing.

Application: Here's something to ponder, for what it's worth...the God we think we know is an idol. Why? Because God is YHWH, "The Lord." This translates to "I will be what I will be." Any God we think we know or can fully understand is by definition an idol. Any idea of God in our heads who is bound to a particular time, who doesn't live dynamically in this moment and do new things, is not God.

The picture of white Jesus from our Sunday School classrooms growing up? It's an idol. The concept of God as an angry white bearded dude sitting on a cloud? Idol. All our favorite hymns, all our beautiful buildings, all our memories from summer camps that might lead us to believe God is somewhere in the past, if we get so attached to those things that we can't hear God calling from the future, they are idols. Period.

On the other hand, if we receive these things humbly, as seeing through a glass dimly, if we know that all the gifts of our tradition are just a teeny, tiny fraction of a fraction of the Lord who is beyond our knowing, they can help us as we try to perceive the new thing God wants to do today.

Prayer: God, help us to move beyond the pictures of you in our heads, and to perceive the new thing you are doing. Amen. 

Acts 10:1-34 What God Has Made Clean

Observation: This is a turning point in the Book of Acts. After Saul's conversion, but before his ministry to the Gentiles begins in earnest (and really before the Jerusalem church really knows what to make of him), Peter has a vision. In that vision, God lowers a sheet filled with all sorts of animals, both "clean" (meaning kosher) and "unclean" (meaning not kosher, the stuff Gentiles eat). God tells Peter "get up, kill and eat." Peter wants no part of it. An angel says, "What God has made clean, you must not call profane." When Peter wakes up, he is invited to the house of a Gentile, Cornelius, a Roman centurion, to preach the Gospel. Had Peter not had this vision, entering a Gentile home would have been out of the question, and even still, Peter voices his misgivings. Yet he goes, and he preaches the Gospel. Spoiler alert: this sets up our first reading for Sunday, in which the Holy Spirit pours out on all these Gentiles, and they are baptized.

Application: For some reason as I'm reading this (and preparing a sermon on Acts 10) I'm struck by the image of the Berlin Wall coming down. As of February, that wall had been demolished for the same number of days as it stood. For a whole generation of Germans, it must have felt as though the wall had always been there, and it always would be. Now, there is a whole generation of adults who have never known it. 

Now, try to imagine a cultural and religious wall like that--the wall between Jews and Gentiles--that had stood for a thousand years, ever since Moses led the people into the promised land. Imagine being Peter, told by his parents, who were told by their parents, that Gentiles are an unclean people, and we are not to eat with them, or so much as enter their homes. Imagine how shocking and unnatural it would feel to be asked, by God, to call these people "clean". This miraculous encounter notwithstanding, the Bible attests that this was a hang-up Peter took with him to his grave. He gave grudging approval to Paul's ministry to Gentiles, but Peter continued to feel most comfortable among his own kind.  

There are so, so many ways this applies to our life of faith today, from simple questions like, "What do Lutherans make of guitars and screens in the worship space?" to much bigger questions like "How can Christian communities work to dismantle racism?" and "How can Christians best welcome those whose sexual orientation, gender identity, or family make-up doesn't look like what we grew up with?" It wasn't very long ago, after all, that divorced persons were not accepted in most churches, and those churches had some very clear scriptural "justification" for their views. But there was a movement in our society, and in the Church, and that wall came down. Maybe it's time for a few others to come down, too.

It's always hard to look at the questions of our own day with historic perspective, but the plain fact is, almost any defining issue for our church today pales in comparison to the Gentile issue in the first century. It was a game-changer. And in that case, God was clearly on the side of breaking down walls. What to make of that with the issues we are now facing, I leave to the Holy Spirit and your conscience. But I can say I'll pray for you as you wrestle. 

Prayer: God, help us to listen for your voice, and strain our eyes to see your vision for our society. Break down the walls that separate us, and teach us to love one another as you have loved us. 

Psalm 80 Restore Us

Observation: The refrain of this Psalm is "Restore us, O God". The psalmist compares Israel to a vine God planted and cared for, only to neglect it, so the vineyard wall breaks down and a wild boar eats its fruit.

Application: I can't help remembering that the pope once referred to Martin Luther as "A boar in God's vineyard". The irony is, depending on your perspective, in that case the "boar" was actually God's means of restoring and reforming the church.

When you pray for restoration--or anything else, for that matter---chances are, God's way of answering that prayer will be pretty different from what we expect. Sometimes healing means facing our pain. Sometimes restoration means being open to tough criticisms. What we may perceive as a "wild boar" could be a prophet seeking to renew us with God's word. Resurrection is a promise of God, but with it comes a cross, every time.

Prayer: God, I know the danger of praying for restoration, whether in the church, the world or my own life. I know it will look a lot different than I picture, and likely as not it'll be terrifying. But on a good day, I still am ready to ask: Restore us. 

John 14:8-14 Union With God

Observation: When Philip asks Jesus, "show us the Father," Jesus reveals what he's been trying to show his disciples all along. Jesus is intimately connected with his Father. If you've seen one, you've seen the other. They mutually dwell within one another, and those who are united to Jesus are united to the Father as well.

Application: Sometimes I get a little wrapped up in ideas, rather than real life experiences. Like Philip, I want to dwell on some aspect of God that I haven't seen--some unrevealed truth, that will make everything make sense. The pieces of the puzzle that I have, that which I have seen of God, or at least the things I've seen that I attribute to God, never feel like enough.

Jesus' words bring me back to reality. I'll never understand all of God--any God small enough for me to understand isn't really God anyway--but I can know God, by getting to know Jesus. I can learn from him in the Gospels, I can know his presence in worship, in the sacraments, in moments of mercy and forgiveness in everyday life.

Prayer: Jesus, I can only know union with God through your union with God. I can only know true peace through you. Abide in me, and help me to abide in you, just as you abide in the Father and the Spirit. Bring me to awareness of your unity with creation. Amen.