Now, more than Ever

 Now, more than ever, I believe that the world needs  progressive and inclusive religious voices that honor, respect, celebrate, and even encourages differences. Now, more than ever, I believe that as a Christian, we need to be an alternative vision that rejoices in the wonder of the colors of the rainbow in God’s ever changing world.Now, more than ever, the world needs to know that their are Christians who believe that different is beautiful, diversity is welcome, and we leave judgment to God. 

After God created the day and the night, the water and the land, creeping things, plants, trees, and birds, God blessed each one and said it was good. One only needs to make a visit to the zoo, visit a botanical garden, or hike through the wilderness  to see how God gets carried away with the beautiful diversity of shape, form, color, or ability. When God completed each detail of God’s creation, God blessed it and called it good.Now, more than ever we need to see the blessings and call it good. 

In the midst of creation, God created male and female and put them in the garden – a metaphor for all the world – to care for it. Many of my friends on Facebook travel around the world. They post pictures of  so many people. The picture of the people I see are beautiful and uniquely  gifted by God’s grace and love. I see photographs of light skinned people with straight black hair, fair-skinned children with red hair. I walk through my neighborhood and see the beautiful tones of brown and black. In stores, restaurants, hotels and gas stations, I pay my bill to those who have come to America from such places as India, Pakistan, Turkey, Afghanistan, Iraq, Morocco, and countless other nations. In the gym, I exercise with Native Americans that are working hard to find their way through a nation that has been oppressive, has broken treaties and promises,  and taken away so much of their beautiful culture. In all of these, I can look into the eyes of each one and see the face of God. In the same way, I believe God looks into their spirits and reaffirms, everyday, ‘…you are good!’ Now more than ever we need to see the same beauty that God sees in us us and know that all are good. 

In the current religious culture of the United States there is a divide between mainline Christian congregations and more conservative congregations. The mainline congregations such as the Methodist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, American Baptist, the United Church of Christ and others believe that God created all that is in the world and all of us have a sacred honor and trust as Christians to have the best interest of all the world, its people, life, culture and other religions at the center of our understanding of Christian stewardship. In contrast there are the more conservative, evangelical congregations like the Southern Baptist, various Wesleyan traditions, the Nazarene tradition, Church of Christ, and countless other independent congregations  that truly believe in the apocalyptic notion that God will destroy the earth, initiating the Second coming of Christ, and inaugurating the fullness of the ‘Kingdom of God’. They are a passive people that are quick to make judgments, decide what is good and evil, what is of God and what is not, and their faith is more about a personal relationship with Jesus and less communal in understanding. Now, more than ever we need to give life to our fragile earth home and our theology needs to be less about taking life from our earth home and more about giving to our earth home. 

In his farewell to 17 years of serving as a church bureaucrat in the United Church of Christ, the Rev. Dr. Ben Guess, most recently Vice President of Council for Health and Human Services Ministries, (CHHSM) has been called to serve as the Executive Director of the ACLU in Ohio. In his farewell to the United Church of Christ he spoke of the many changes he had seen in 17 years, but he made a comment that has captured my imagination and reminds me what it is to be progressive voice in a time when such a voice is not heard in politics and business of our days. Dr. Guess reminds us that even in significant changes in our life together, the United Church of Christ has ‘…insisted that the gospel is always global and communal, not just local and personal.’

Now, more than ever, we need to remember that God created the Church, in all of its strengths and all of it vulnerabilities, to be the voice of a radically inclusive God that will not be silenced. From the beginning of time, God created all that we know as good and the gospel of Jesus Christ is more than local and personal expressions piety and faith. The gospel is always global and communal. So we will be light in the wilderness. We will show the way to God’s inclusive love, and we will not be silenced. Now, more than ever, this must be our message, our purpose, and our promise. God is good! All the time!