This scripture from Romans 8 is one that is not often used on Sunday mornings. We usually hear it in a memorial service. In fact, I used this very Scripture for my Father-in-law’s funeral last week:
“I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor leaders of nations, nor present things, nor things in the future, nor powers, nor big things, nor deep things, nor anything else in the world will be able to separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord.”
It makes sense to read this during a time of death. All of us have been there, whether it is losing a friend or relative, or reading the headlines: “Norwegian man kills 85 at youth camp.” Paul uses these words to comfort the early Christians in Rome and they can bring for us words of hope: Death will not have the final word. Not evendeath itself can separate us from the love of God, and so we are forever connected to the ones we miss.
If death cannot separate us from God, what about life?
Paul wants to point out a lesson about God’s love, nothing at all will get between us and God. But as Paul reflects on the things that might get in the way, the second one he lists is life.
Life cannot even separate us from God’s love.
Do you ever feel like life is a hindrance to your faith, work, stress, family issues, money problems, fear and anxiety, expectations, selfesteem issues, anger, depression, disappointments, physical or emotional pain?
Is there anyone who cannot relate to at least one of these? Life can be very hard.
Yet these can be the very things that make our faith stronger. Undoubtedly these trials change us as human beings, and when we are left vulnerable, that is when we can finally rely on God’s presence in our lives. But we can also be so overwhelmed that we start believing that we do not have the time nor even the strength to pray. My mother told me one time when she was going through deep physical and emotional pain that she didn’t even have the words to pray. Nothing was there.
So we forget to check in with God and neglect the needed things to nurture a healthy faith. Sometimes life seems to work very hard to keep us separated from the love of God.
What about when times are good? Success, great friends, good health and a positive outlook. There’s money in the account, the anti-depressant is working, life is going well. Can faith be strained during these times? Often, it is during the “good times” in life when our faith suffers the most.
We get comfortable and pat ourselves on the back, thinking we are responsible for our on fortunes; and so faith takes a backseat. So in good times and in bad, life is often successful in building walls between us and God.
I don’t want you to misunderstand me: I’m not saying faith and church are the same. Faith is so much bigger. Even going to church does not necessarily meanyou will have a better faith.
But neither do I feel you can be faithful, alone. Faith is all about relationships and community. If a piece of wood is separated from a fire it can burn brightly for a while, but when it is surrounded byother burning wood, it lasts much longer.
However, church can indeed can get in the way of our faith. I will admit that sometimes I get so caught up in playing Christian that I forget to be Christian. Our assumptions about what faith is, and there are many of them, certain behaviors, a set of moral “pathways,” looking a certain way or acting a certain way, those assumptions can easily be responsible for our faith becoming anemic.
An example of this was when many Christian leaders (early on) vehemently decried the evils of the Harry Potter series for its “display and encouragement of paganism and the occult.” Then Cardinal Ratzinger (now the current pope), James Dobson (Focus on the Family) and Chuck Colson (Prison Ministries), were just some of the few who knew that Harryand his friends were leading millions of children down the anti-Christian path. It was only after the seventh and final book was published did the author, J.K. Rowling, open up about her faith, her Christian faith. Rowling was mute during the entire series of book publishings and film adaptations because she ”was worried that her faith would give away the ending.” In reflecting on her early criticism by many Christian leaders, Rowling says, “I don’t take any responsibility for the lunatic fringes of my own religion.” Oh, and I guess I need to point this out, she’s a Presbyterian.
Scary, huh?
Faith means a lifetime of conversion. As Christians we have a great story to share with the world, and we need to be very careful that we are not just playing church.
What we need to do is be the hands and feet of Christ in a world that desperately needs the hands and feet of Christ.
And when we do, we move beyond the dichotomy of life and death into this new reality of resurrection. The old life has gone; a new life has begun.
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Editor’s note: John Gibson is the pastor of Mt. Vernon Presbyterian Church, Pea Ridge.
He can be contacted through this newspaper at prtnews@ nwaonline.com.
Church, Pages 2 on 08/10/2011