[00:00:00] Foreign.
[00:00:08] Welcome to the collective table where we celebrate the intersections of Jesus, justice and joy.
[00:00:14] This podcast is brought to you by Oceanside Sanctuary Church. Each week we bring our listeners a recording of our weekly Sunday teaching at Oceanside Sanctuary, which ties scripture into the larger conversations happening in our community, congregation, and even the podcast. So we're glad you're here and thanks for listening.
[00:00:38] Okay.
[00:00:42] Yeah, it's me again. Hi.
[00:00:46] So again, for those of you who might not know, my name is Jason Coker. I'm the co lead minister here at the Oceanside Sanctuary along with Janelle, who was just sitting right there a second ago. And we've been going through a teaching series here. Several of us have been involved in teaching this for the past two months or so. We've called this a series on prophetic imagination. We've been going through mostly the Hebrew scriptures, but we actually started out in Luke and then circled back to Luke last week, where we're going to finish today, also in Luke, just a little bit later than where we ended up last week. So we've kind of done this little tour of who are the prophetic figures in Scripture and what does it mean to have a kind of prophetic imagination?
[00:01:38] Sort of the premise of this series has been that these prophetic figures like John the Baptist and Isaiah and Moses and Ezekiel have. And Micah and, you know, there's a long list of folks that we have visited that. That they all have something in common. And what they have in common is the ability to imagine something better that what they're doing when they give us these prophecies, when we're reading these texts, which sometimes seem very hopeful, very optimistic, and at other times seem very dystopian, very pessimistic, very alarmed that what they all have in common is that they're imagining better possibilities, they're imagining a better future.
[00:02:25] And so kind of the premise of this series has been what can we learn about what it's like to have a kind of imagination for what could be, for how things could be aligned with the goodness of God, the righteousness of God. And this has been essentially what we have been doing for the past couple of months. And we've learned a lot. Certainly this is not an exhaustive list. This could just go on and on. But just by way of a reminder, here are a few things that we have covered. First of all, one of the things we've said is that prophetic imagination comes from the wilderness.
[00:03:06] Claire talked about this from Luke chapter three. This was the very beginning of the series when she visited John the Baptist. And what she observed is that John the Baptist comes from the wilderness. That prophetic imagination, whatever it is, it tends to come from to our cities, to civilization, to the centers of power, from the wilderness, from the outside, from the margins. There's something sort of wild and untamed about it and that it speaks to the centers of power from that place of marginalization.
[00:03:40] We also learned From Genesis chapter 15 that prophetic imagination means believing the impossible. And in Genesis chapter 15, I spoke about Abraham, really Abram at the time, gazing at the stars and having the nerve, the gall, to believe that God's promises that even though he and his wife were aged, that they might have offspring that were like the stars in the sky. And what I said is that prophetic imagination is willing to believe impossible things, impossible promises about the future.
[00:04:17] We also learned that prophetic imagination knows when not just to obey, but maybe more importantly, knows when to disobey authority. And some of you might remember that from Genesis chapter, or excuse me, from Exodus chapter 32, that I visited the story of Moses saying no to God. When God said, I'm done with these people. I'm sick of them. I'm sick of their disobedient ways. Let's wipe them out. And you and I will go start fresh. We'll start over again. And I said, moses had the nerve to stand up to God and say no to God. That's one of the reasons he's one of the greatest prophets in Judaism. Not because he was obedient, but because he knew when to be disobedient. And what that speaks to is that prophetic imagination has the character to know when something is right and when something is wrong and when to disobey ultimate authority.
[00:05:17] We also talked about how God is, or prophetic imagination sees God as a divine nurturer. So Janelle spoke from First Kings, chapter 19. And she talked about this, this great story of the prophet who is driven into the wilderness, right? So here, instead of a prophet coming in from the wilderness, you have a prophet, after delivering message to power, being driven out into the wilderness to escape. And in that escape in the wilderness, the prophet discovers that God is present not in expressions of power like the fire or the earthquake or the wind, but instead is present as that still small voice.
[00:05:58] And one of the memorable things I thought Janelle expressed that day is that God is revealed as this nurturing, perhaps even God forbid, a feminine presence, a person who might be willing to express care and concern for not just the lonely prophet in the wilderness, but for all people who are lonely and in the wilderness.
[00:06:24] In Isaiah chapter two, I suggested to you that prophetic imagination imagines a world where. Where swords have been turned into plowshares, spears into pruning hooks. This comes From Isaiah chapter 2, where the prophet imagines that whatever good future God has for us, it's not a future that is enforced by weapons of war or implements of death and destruction. It's a future committed to goodness, represented by people who are willing to work for food for all people. A society organized not around war and violence, but a society organized around growing good things.
[00:07:08] And then Larry spoke from Micah chapter six. And he said that prophetic imagination is driven by the desire for justice and mercy and humility, which of course makes sense if God is a divine nurturer. If God's desire is that all people have access to good things, then certainly that means that we are driven by a desire. Desire for justice for those who have been oppressed, for mercy for those who have been harmed, for humility rather than arrogance.
[00:07:40] And then just a few weeks ago, I said from Isaiah chapter 61 and 65, that prophetic imagination imagines a future world where all people can flourish. You might remember this passage is the passage in Isaiah 65 where the prophet imagines a world where people actually benefit from their own labor, their own work.
[00:08:04] It says they, being those in the future, will build houses that they actually get to inhabit, that they will work fields that they actually get to benefit from.
[00:08:15] And I said, this is the heart of God. A future where people are invested in their own work, they own their own labor, they own, occupy the structures that they build.
[00:08:32] And then From Leviticus chapter 25, a few weeks ago, I said, maybe one of the most provocative things about prophetic imagination is that it doesn't just imagine these things for individuals.
[00:08:46] Instead, we visited Leviticus chapter 25, where again, Moses, because Moses understands that the heart of God is a good life for all people, regardless of their station, that he implemented a system that we know as jubilee, where every seven weeks of years, every 49 years, a horn is blown in Israel and everybody who has lost their property, who has lost their wealth, is returned to their land, restored to their good fortune. And people who have been enslaved because they've become so poor that they're now indentured servants are liberated and set free. I said Moses had the imagination to not just say that every individual should be able to benefit from their own labor. Not just that God wants all of us to live good and flourishing lives, but he actually thought what we need are social systems that ensure that that happens.
[00:09:49] So he imagined a world where even though wealth tends to aggregate with the wealthy, that even though over time societies tend to become more and more unequal, he created Systems where every 50 years the playing field was leveled, where people were returned to their homes, their property, their families, and were liberated from their slavery.
[00:10:14] So prophetic imagination is not just for individual goodness. It is for social goodness, social equality.
[00:10:22] And then last week I told you we returned to John the Baptist in Luke chapter four. We visited that passage where he says to the people who come out to see him, who told you to flee from the wrath of God? I tell you the truth, that the ax is at the root of the tree ready to cut you down from your inheritance if you don't live in to your vocation as the people of God. And I said prophetic imagination is willing to cut down systems that aren't fulfilling their purpose to create goodness and equality for all people.
[00:11:00] Now, what I said about that last week is that that shouldn't surprise us, that when we live in societies and systems where the very poor and the people who are oppressed the most are ultimately neglected and forgotten and beaten down, that eventually any society that neglects people who are the poorest and the most oppressed will eventually fall, that it will eventually fail, that that empire will crash. And I think that's what we see happening throughout these passages, that we have prophets who come and they speak to the doom that is coming to civilization, to the doom that's coming to the people of God, if they don't pay attention to. To the people who are hurting and suffering the most.
[00:11:50] So before we move on to today's passage, I just want to leave this little nugget with you. And some of you, this is what you'll be talking about later at lunch, right? You'll be like, I don't know about that.
[00:12:05] Some of you have heard me say this sort of thing before. But for some of you, this might be a new idea. And the idea is this, that what we have been visiting in Hebrew scriptures is something that sometimes is called the prophetic tradition. It's a whole stream of passages and scriptures and characters throughout the Hebrew Bible that represent one particular thread in scripture. And that thread has a kind of common theme to it. And the theme is essentially people who come in from the wilderness and they come before those who are in power and they remind them that they're neglecting the people who are suffering the most. That's the prophetic tradition.
[00:12:51] But it's not the only tradition in Scripture. We also, in scripture, have the priestly tradition. The priestly tradition is not really concerned with whether or not people who are poor or oppressed are being treated well. The priestly tradition, instead, is largely concerned with the law. Are we doing exactly what the law tells us to do? Are we obeying the law that Moses gave us?
[00:13:19] And it's not just those two traditions. You also can find at least one other tradition in ancient Hebrew scriptures, and that's sometimes called the kingly tradition.
[00:13:30] The kingly tradition represents the viewpoint of those who have power and have authority.
[00:13:36] And they, of course, are very concerned with power and authority and how it is exercised properly. And here's the bit that some of you might not like or have heard before, and some of you will love this, right? You're really the odd ones.
[00:13:56] The prophetic and the priestly and the kingly traditions in scripture do not agree with each other.
[00:14:03] In fact, they are almost constantly at odds.
[00:14:08] The priestly tradition is concerned with law. The kingly tradition is concerned with order.
[00:14:15] And we are often obsessed with law and order.
[00:14:20] And if you are obsessed with law and order, then there is nothing more annoying to you than some dude walking in from the wilderness and telling you that you are doing it wrong.
[00:14:37] So the prophetic tradition is a tradition of terribly annoying people showing up at exactly the wrong time and telling the people who are in charge, the people who are experts in the law, and the people who are tasked with actually carrying the mantle and the weight of. Of authority. The. The prophetic tradition are the annoying, difficult, unreasonable Bernie Sanders of the world who show up at court and say, you're wicked, you're profane, you're doing this all wrong.
[00:15:24] And what's really, I think, important for any Christian to understand about the Bible is that the Bible does not contain these traditions who all happily and harmoniously agree with each other about who God is and who God stands with.
[00:15:41] Because, of course, the priests think that God stands with the law, and the kings believe that God stands with authority and power.
[00:15:52] And the prophets are those annoying folks who show up on occasion and tell them both that they're completely wrong.
[00:16:00] And nobody likes that, including the prophets.
[00:16:05] Nobody likes playing a role in society where you're like the burr in everybody's saddle, the thorn in everybody's side.
[00:16:16] But this is what Scripture is. Scripture is a representation of the ongoing debate that we have in the world between law, order, and justice for those who suffer.
[00:16:36] And it would be easy to say, I think, tempting even to say that one of these traditions is always right.
[00:16:45] But the reasonable part of me will rise up and remind myself, and today I will remind you that we need all three, that we need order in our world.
[00:17:00] We need some reasonable expression of authority who says, here's how things are going to be done. And we need law. We need somebody. Despite how you may or may not feel about lawyers, right? We do need people who interpret the law and explain the law and understand how those laws can contribute to a good order in society.
[00:17:25] But it's also true that law and order, given enough time and enough space and enough leash, will eventually favor those who have power.
[00:17:40] Power will end up in the hands of fewer and fewer people who use it to enrich themselves. And for that reason, every society needs prophets who wander in from the wilderness and say, hey, you guys are screwing this all up.
[00:17:58] It's time to go back to what the purpose of this was.
[00:18:03] So some of you might find that, you know, comforting. Some of you might find that disturbing. The idea that there are voices in scripture that disagree with each other. I think that's a feature, not a bug.
[00:18:17] I think the reason we have four gospels is because we need four different perspectives on who Jesus was. And those four perspectives do not agree about everything.
[00:18:28] We need different voices. We need diversity and equity and inclusion.
[00:18:38] And that's what this is. Scripture is a narrative of tremendously diverse viewpoints.
[00:18:46] Now, at some point, Jesus enters this chat, and that's where we're going to end today. In Luke chapter 4, Jesus weighs in on this exact narrative. In Luke chapter 4, verse 16, Jesus shows up after being tempted in the wilderness, after preparing for his public ministry. He shows up at a synagogue. And we see this recorded in Luke chapter 4:16. And it says, when he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up, this is the town where he grew up in. He went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. And he stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. And he unrolled the scroll and found the place where it's written. The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
[00:19:40] He sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free and to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
[00:19:51] And he rolled up the scroll and he gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all the synagogue were fixed on him. And then he began to say to them, Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.
[00:20:10] This is Jesus entering into the conversation between the priests and the kings and the prophets. And Jesus takes a stand with the prophets in this conversation. This great ongoing debate in this amazing religious tradition that is constantly asking the question, what's more important? Law or order or mercy for those who suffering? And Jesus takes a side in that debate.
[00:20:46] Now, if you have read any of the Gospels, you know that Jesus affirms the goodness of the law.
[00:20:54] But in affirming the goodness of the law, like any good prophet, he reminds them that the purpose of the law is this passage that he quotes that he reads from Isaiah 60:1. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has announced good news for the poor.
[00:21:17] This, by the way, is from Isaiah chapter 61. You've heard this passage many times. What you may or may not know is that in Isaiah chapter 61, the prophet Isaiah is referring to another passage that we read in this series, which comes of course from Moses's words in Leviticus 25, when Isaiah and later Jesus describes the year of the Lord's favor, when he says, the spirit is upon me to proclaim release to the captives. He is quoting from Isaiah 60:1, who is referring to Leviticus 25, which is the law of jubilee.
[00:22:01] It is that year. The year of the Lord's favor is the year that the shofars are blown after 49 years to signify to the entire people of God that this is the year that no matter how far behind you have become economically, you will now be restored to your property, to your land, to your people. If you have been enslaved as a servant because you became so poor, today is the day that you are set free.
[00:22:34] In other words, Jesus's gospel is jubilee.
[00:22:39] Jesus's gospel is the announcement that that day that only comes every 50 years has finally come. The day when everybody's fortunes are restored to them, when everybody who is enslaved becomes free. The good news, the gospel of Jesus is the proclamation that jubilee has come.
[00:23:00] I don't know what version of the gospel you heard a couple of weeks I told you about like me accepting Jesus into my hearts. And I told you that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Like it's what I understood at the time as like 6 year old who was very suspicious about all this Christian stuff, but I figured I might as well hedge my bets, right?
[00:23:18] Because hell didn't sound good.
[00:23:21] That was the gospel I heard as a 5 and 6 and 7 year old kid in Sunday school every morning. I didn't hear Anything about Jubilee. I didn't hear anything about how Jesus's gospel was a pronouncement that those who are abjectly poor are now being delivered into economic freedom.
[00:23:39] I didn't hear anything about how Jesus's gospel was a pronouncement that those who have been enslaved or oppressed are now free. But that is Jesus's gospel.
[00:23:49] There is nothing in here about accepting him into your heart so that when you die you can go to heaven for all eternity. There is nothing in here about being freed or liberated from your sense of guilt because you think too much about sex or you smoke cigarettes or, you know, God forbid you stole a GI Joe from Walmart when you were a kid.
[00:24:11] That was a little personal.
[00:24:19] I mean, be free of that guilt, for God's sake.
[00:24:27] What you need is to know that no matter how screwed up you are, no matter how you know broken your desires are, no matter how distant you feel from God, if what you need is a gospel that reinforces to you the reality that you really are connected to the source of life, the creator of the universe, and that nothing you can ever do will separate you from great, I want you to know that.
[00:24:54] But that is not really Jesus's foundational gospel.
[00:25:00] Jesus's gospel takes all of that to be a given.
[00:25:05] Yes, of course we're connected to the source of life, the creator of the universe. Jesus says it this way. The kingdom of God is at hand. It's close by. It's available to you.
[00:25:15] Of course, that's true. But because that's true, it should utterly piss us off that anybody is cut off from their own ability to contribute to their own needs, their own good. Because we are forever connected to the source of life. It should be unacceptable to us that any woman is told that because she doesn't have a penis, that she can't lead in any setting, that she can't employ her gifts. It should be utterly unacceptable to us because God is the source of life, that we can never be disconnected from. From that. Of course people who are queer or non binary should be included in the goodness of any community that cares about righteousness and justice and peace. Of course, of course, of course.
[00:26:06] Because we can never be disconnected from the goodness of the creator of the universe. It's absurd that anybody should be considered inferior because of the color of their skin. Or that we should deny the reality that we live in a country that for 400 years has established systems and structures to keep brown and black people down. That's just a given.
[00:26:34] If you need to Be reminded that God loves you. Please let me just remind you, God loves you.
[00:26:42] God created you.
[00:26:44] God desires you to be connected to goodness and righteousness and peace.
[00:26:51] But that is not so that you can spend the rest of your days blissfully ignorant of the suffering of those who are poor and oppressed because you're connected to the God of goodness and righteousness and peace. That should be intolerable to you.
[00:27:15] Those very real social realities should be completely unacceptable. And so it makes sense that Jesus Gospel is the pronouncement of jubilee, not just an individual liberation, but a social and political liberation.
[00:27:37] And of course, it also makes sense that this was not good news for everybody later in in the same book, in Luke, chapter six, in Luke's version of the Sermon on the Mount, you've all heard the Sermon on the Mount. We, we really like to quote Matthew's Sermon on the Mount that says, blessed are you who are poor in spirit. But in Luke's version of the Sermon on the Mount, it doesn't say poor in spirit. It just says, blessed are you who are poor.
[00:28:05] Well, the only way it makes sense for Jesus to say, hey, you are blessed because you're poor on this day. The only way that makes sense is if he just announced that they won't be poor anymore because the jubilee has come.
[00:28:21] The only way it makes sense for Jesus to say blessed are those who weep is because now they won't weep anymore because jubilee has come.
[00:28:31] And this, by the way, is the only reason it makes sense that in Luke's version of the Beatitudes, he doesn't just say, blessed are those who pour. Blessed are those who are are mourning. Blessed are those who have been tormented for righteousness sake. He goes on to say, oh, and by the way, woe to you who are rich, because on the day of jubilee, those who have built wealth unjustly, who have oppressed people in order to become richer, they will lose that wealth because it will be redistributed to those who are poor.
[00:29:14] But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are full or well fed, because you will be hungry.
[00:29:25] Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep. Listen, almost nothing in my newsfeed right now is more infuriating than the disgusting glee that people are taking by the deportation of folks who are in this country legally.
[00:29:48] It's bad enough that people with student visas are being snatched off the street, disappeared. That's bad enough. But what might be actually worse is the delight that people are taking in it.
[00:30:05] Woe to you who are laughing now because you will weep.
[00:30:14] This is fairly disruptive.
[00:30:18] This is a fairly offensive gospel for certain people.
[00:30:26] It's offensive to those who have built their lives upon the oppression. The marginalization of those who are weak doesn't mean that it's wrong to have a good job. It doesn't mean that it's wrong to own a business. It doesn't mean that it's wrong to have money. It means that those who have built their wealth on the backs of those who are suffering will find justice.
[00:30:56] And that's not good news.
[00:31:01] It's not good news.
[00:31:04] It's good news for those who have been oppressed. It's bad news for those who have oppressed. Isaiah says this very poetically, which, you know, you got to love that about the prophets, right? They sort of cloak their social revolution in beautiful language, which makes it more memorable, I think. But sometimes the unfortunate thing about that is we lose in the poetic language, we lose the reality of the kind of revolutionary nature of these passages. In Isaiah, chapter 40, you heard this at the very beginning of the series because this is part of what in Claire's sermon, she read from Luke. It's a quote from Isaiah 40.
[00:31:53] A voice cries out in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. What does it mean to prepare the way of the Lord? Well, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. In other words, a clear, straight path to the source of life and goodness and righteousness. And this is the bit that is interesting. Verse 4. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low. The uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain, and then the glory of the Lord will be revealed. Listen, spoiler alert.
[00:32:34] Isaiah is not saying, like, actual mountains will be made low or actual valleys will be raised up. Isaiah is not talking about earthquakes or tectonic shifts. He's talking about those who have positioned themselves very high being made low, and those who have been made low being raised up. This is unavoidably political.
[00:33:05] So what does this mean for us?
[00:33:08] Well, it means a couple of things, I think. The first is, as Christians, if you're a Christian, if you consider yourself to be a follower of Jesus, I want you to know that you have. By aligning yourself with Jesus, you are aligning yourself with the prophetic tradition.
[00:33:30] And that is not to say again that there isn't a very important role for the priestly tradition or a very important role for the kingly tradition. And of course, There is theology that sort of makes Jesus aligned with all three.
[00:33:48] But I want you to know that Jesus is a part of the prophetic tradition, and that means that you are aligned with a teacher who stood on behalf of those who were poor and marginalized and oppressed.
[00:34:02] I don't know if you like that or not, but that's what it's meant to be. That's what Christians are meant to be. They're meant to be people who wander in from the wilderness and say to the powers that be, no, you're doing this wrong.
[00:34:23] The point of the law is to make sure that nobody ends up abjectly poor. The point of authority is to protect the weak.
[00:34:33] And so when the law empowers people to hoard unjust power, it's our job to say, no, that is not acceptable.
[00:34:49] The second thing I want you to know is that as prophetic people, because of what I just said, we bring good news to the poor, the sick, the oppressed.
[00:35:01] That's our job.
[00:35:04] Our job is not to, like, make as many Christians as possible so that we can, like, fill government with Christians so that we can have all the power in the world.
[00:35:12] Our job is not to, like, win the global. Like, you know, I don't know what's, like, an ultimate sporting match for people who are sporting right, like, right now is basketball, right? It's March Madness, right? Like, Christianity is not like Duke. Well, maybe that's not the right. Maybe that's not the right thing. Christianity is not like, you know, the Tennessee Volunteers who are somehow competing to win, you know, the NCAA tournament against, you know, like, the Jews and the. And the Muslims and the Baha'I folks. And you get my point.
[00:35:51] This is not a contest to see which team wins at the end of the age.
[00:35:57] The point is for us to be people who wander in from the wilderness and bring good news to those who have gotten nothing but bad news up to this point.
[00:36:08] The third thing that I want you to know, and you already know this, if this is the kind of work that you do, is that prophets are often very lonely.
[00:36:24] Prophets are often, like Janelle pointed out in her sermon, huddled in caves, hiding from the powers that be.
[00:36:36] Prophets are very famously martyred.
[00:36:41] Jesus was martyred not because God needed to satisfy God's anger, because you think too much about sex or smoke cigarettes.
[00:36:52] Jesus was murdered because he was a burr in the saddle, the powers that be.
[00:36:59] And in order to shut him up, finally, once and for all, they killed him.
[00:37:08] So if you are aligned with Jesus, you might feel a little Unsafe speaking truth to power.
[00:37:20] The good news is that you might feel alone in that, but you're not alone.
[00:37:29] You're not alone.
[00:37:36] You're not alone.
[00:37:41] You're not alone.
[00:37:46] You're angry, you're frustrated, you're disheartened, maybe you're afraid, but you're not alone.
[00:38:00] Half the point of abusive power is to make you think you are alone, is to make you think that you're a part of the losing team, but you're not.
[00:38:17] Because first of all, you have everybody else who will do things like help mobilize a protest on Saturday, April 5, to make a public demonstration of the fact that the unjust expressions of power happening right now by the executive branch of the United States is not acceptable and will not stand.
[00:38:46] And so our very own Larry Warner is just one of many who's helping to organize just one of many protests happening right here in Oceanside on Saturday, April 5.
[00:39:02] If you want this little flyer, you can come and get it from me, or Larry will be handing them out on the front porch. Yes, we know he's doing that.
[00:39:16] He's not the only one.
[00:39:18] I mentioned this last week.
[00:39:22] You're not alone.
[00:39:24] And even if you were alone, truly, genuinely alone, even if it was just you, God really is with you.
[00:39:44] And I know that's kind of hard to hear because the people doing the oppressing think God is with them, too.
[00:39:55] And sometimes you did some oppressing and you thought God was with you then.
[00:40:04] And for that reason, you're afraid to tell yourself that God is with you.
[00:40:12] But when you stand with those who have been oppressed and marginalized, you are standing with God.
[00:40:22] Every breath you take in that work unites you with the presence of the One who created you. And all life and all goodness and all righteousness and all peace, you're not alone.
[00:40:46] In the days and the weeks and the months and, yes, the years ahead, I want you to remember that you're not alone.
[00:40:57] God is with you.
[00:40:59] I am with you.
[00:41:01] Janelle is with you. Our staff is with you. Larry is with you.
[00:41:08] Nancy is with you.
[00:41:11] Rebecca is with you. Corey is with you.
[00:41:17] Alex is with you.
[00:41:23] And together we can be a beacon of hope for those who suffer. Amen. Would you pray with me?
[00:41:55] So my prayer for us today is that we would continue the prayer that Janelle began during the invocation where she invited us to just breathe.
[00:42:13] I want to invite you to consider the possibility that prayer is not this sort of banal expression of asking God to fulfill our wants, but instead, prayer is that space that we carve out to be reminded that every time we breathe in, we are breathing in the ruach, the spirit of God.
[00:42:52] That our very existence is dependent upon the source of life.
[00:43:00] And that prayer can be as simple as remembering to breathe.
[00:43:11] That it's not a magic trick, it's not saying the right words and the right combination so that God will finally magically give us what we want.
[00:43:23] It's just that space that we have carved out, dedicated to remind ourselves that nothing can separate us from the source of life.
[00:43:37] And because we are not separated from the Divine nurturer, that we can persevere.
[00:43:48] So I want to invite you to breathe again.
[00:43:53] Breathe in goodness and breathe out gratitude.
[00:44:08] Breathe in peace, breathe out generosity.
[00:44:21] Breathe in grace.
[00:44:26] Breathe out forgiveness.
[00:44:31] God, hear our prayers.
[00:44:35] Teach us to cultivate an acute sense of your presence in our lives.
[00:44:48] Give us, like the prophets, the courage to imagine better things.
[00:44:59] Give us, like the prophets, the courage to obey when it's right and disobey when it's right.
[00:45:12] Connect us to you and to each other in ways that help us to persevere. We pray all this in Jesus name.
[00:45:23] Thank you for joining us for this Sunday teaching, no matter when or where you're tuning in.
[00:45:28] To learn more about our community or to support the work we do, Visit
[email protected] We hope to see you again soon.
