Leaning On Jesus

From 6 October:

Tattie Holidays are here already. Seems summer never really arrived and it was over. The swiftness of life seems more and more a common theme in my life. The hardships of life also seem more and more to make themselves known and I wrestle with the state of the world and the directions it is going. The value of God in our society is getting less and less and the churches as a whole are struggling to make God meaningful in the world we live in. In discussions with many, the idea of a real God seems at a certain level to be more and more difficult to believe. Yet I am encouraged that while many reject God as a part of their lives there are others that value their relationship greatly. There are also many that I encounter, that while rejecting a deity, are also seeking for a spiritual context for the lives they live. 

By now you are asking what that has to do with the swiftness of the passing of time. Well it is this, that as the days pass and I find the dilemmas of life hard to understand in a purely secular context. I take comfort in a faith that continues to grow. I find understanding in a scripture that said things many centuries ago that are still more than relevant in the 21^st century. I find answers to life’s problems that help me get from day to day and week to week.

I was told not to long ago though that this was a crutch. And at the time really hadn't thought through what the problem was with that comment. I sort of dismissed it as an off handed remark and threw the idea away. Yet as I think about it I ask; is it so terrible that we use a crutch? We don’t usually see a person using a crutch in the day to day world and say that the crutch they lean on is bad or that they are bad for using it. But yet why is it a bad thing when the ‘crutch’ happens to be the Christian faith? Thankfully Jesus himself said he was the great physician and he came to heal those who were sick. He came not to call the perfect to repentance but the sinners to a place of grace.

My prayer this week is that the days don’t fly past any faster than I have time to find that one that wants to make me spiritually well and that I have the sense to lean on him to support me in this crazy paced world we live in today. Read Matthew 5 in the gospels for a view of who Christ said was blessed. It isn’t those who think they have all the answers rather it is the meek and the poor in spirit... those that are learning to lean on the one who came to seek and to save those who are lost.

Leaning on Jesus,

Rev. Jon Bergen