Comforting or Stirring? Preached for Wollaston Congregational Church on April 25th, 2021 Scripture: Acts 4:5-12 This Sunday, the fourth Sunday of Easter, is traditionally known as “Good Shepherd Sunday.” In our scripture from John’s gospel we heard Jesus say “I am the Good Shepherd” and we listened to the words of the famous 23rd psalm “The Lord is my Shepherd.” These are texts that of bring words of comfort to those who follow Jesus, the Good Shepherd. Also we read the assigned scripture from the book of Acts. In this week’s passage, Peter and John are brought before the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem, the religious authorities. This is the same council that handed Jesus over to be crucified. The council is angry that the apostles were preaching, teaching and healing in Jesus’ name. Even though they have the power to convict, as they did with Jesus, Peter responds with a stirring speech, telling them that Jesus, the stone who was rejected, lives on. He has become the chief cornerstone of the movement that will become the church. This morning, we are presented with images of comfort and stirring. And as I committed to last week, I will continue to follow the book of Acts in this Easter season. We encounter Peter and John again, just a few days after the festival Pentecost, 50 days after the Passover on which Jesus was crucified. Even though very little time has passed, Peter has been preaching, teaching and now healing in Jerusalem. So far they have received more than 8,000 new believers. The high priests, Annas and Caiaphas, may have assumed that the Jesus movement had been stamped out, but they are wrong. The Holy Spirit is swirling through Jerusalem, and people are getting stirred up. We might wonder where Peter and John are finding the strength to head up this new movement of the Spirit, this new normal. It has been only a few weeks since they went through the trauma of seeing their beloved leader being crucified. It’s been only a few weeks since Peter was so scared he’d denied knowing his beloved teacher and friend. Perhaps Peter and John have had some time for rest in this hiatus between Jewish festivals. Perhaps there have been a few moments when they sat, again, at Jesus’ feet since he returned in resurrected form. Perhaps seeing Jesus ascend to the Father helped to restore their faith, following the harrowing scenes of violence and abuse during the earlier trial and crucifixion. Somehow, they have built up resilience, such that they are now brave enough to stand in front of the same council that handed Jesus over. And Peter finds the courage and resilience --- not only to defend himself and John --- but to preach in the name of Jesus of Nazareth. It’s been eleven months since George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis. And since that time, according to Newsweek magazine, 181 black Americans have been killed by police. We don’t know the details of all these deaths, but we do know that the killing of people of color by law enforcement is greatly out of proportion with the killing of white people. [1] We know about the killing of Daunte Wright, also in Minneapolis, and Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia, we know about the killing of Breonna Taylor, we know about 13 year old Adam Toledo in Chicago. We know about many more. I wonder, in the wake ongoing racial trauma for the African American community, how people find the strength to keep on organizing, advocating and protesting. And yet the family and friends of George Floyd and so many other activists have worked tirelessly to keep attention on this issue. A small victory came this past week, when former police officer Derek Chauvin was found guilty and held accountable for the murder of George Floyd. One person wrote “the arc bent a millimeter today” a reference to Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who said “the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.” [2] The event of George Floyd’s killing sparked protests throughout the United States and around the world. Citizens of majority white and western countries began to hold their own authorities accountable too. And in sports like European soccer, players have begun to take a knee and a moment of silence before games to draw attention to the “Black Lives Matter” movement. I know that my own inclination is to pay attention to racial justice and equity for a while. But then, I become overwhelmed, I get weary or I get stressed. I have to acknowledge, though, that is not too hard for me to engage with the issues of racism in our culture, and I am called to do it. The issue is, I need to work on my resilience. Over the past couple of months, the Massachusetts Council of Churches has been sharing Facebook live conversations around issues of racism and sexism. The titles of these conversations included: “The Black Church and Politics”, “What Male Colleagues Need to Know” and one conversation I knew I needed to listen to: “What White Woman Need to Know.” [3] This conversation hit home for me, as I suspected it would. There were truths that I needed to hear, even though they were difficult to listen to. Rev. Dr. Choi Hee An, a Korean woman professor of theology and Rev. Dr. Karen Coleman, a black American Episcopal priest and academic, joined the conversation with Rev. Laura Everett, to speak of their own experiences with white women. These were not comfortable truths: white women in the church have not always been their friends and allies. They spoke of white women’s resistance to having conversations about equality. They notice that white women’s body language shows they are disengaging when the conversation gets tough. They say things like “this stresses me out,” or “this gives me a headache.” The two women spoke of the disingenuous “niceness” of white women. White women have acted as their friends, but then have not been loyal to that supposed friendship. White women who have presumed familiarity by asking them inappropriate questions. Hearing these truths, I knew I had been guilty of all these things in my attempts to engage, and then disengage with the topic of racial justice. This was a reminder that even though I’ve done some work on my resilience, I have not done enough. I need to keep going. In a few minutes we will watch excerpts from a video concerning two churches and their engagement with the issues of racism in our culture today. Pilgrim Church, United Church of Christ in Sherborn was my home church for many years before I came to Wollaston. Pilgrim Church has been in relationship and conversation with Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Jamaica Plain since 1992. [4] Sherborn is a very different setting from Wollaston. Pilgrim Church has a different history and different resources. And the issues of racism in Quincy are different from Boston and the suburbs, with more of a focus on anti-Asian racism. Still, I believe we can learn from this video that witnesses a relationship between these majority white and a majority black churches in Greater Boston. In this Easter season as we anticipate the coming of the Holy Spirit yet again, we might ask “will that Spirit be one of comfort or stirring?” There is a saying that the Spirit “afflicts the comfortable and comforts the afflicted.” But this saying does not address the complexity of life. In reality no one is entirely comfortable, and few are entirely afflicted. I imagine that in our times the Spirit is both comforting and stirring for a purpose. This purpose is to build up our resilience to do the work of Christ in the time to come, the new normal. In this year of pandemic trauma and the stirring of anti-racism activism in our culture, we are called to seek resilience. We are called to ponder ways in which even in our setting, we, Wollaston Congregational Church, can grow in our engagement with the issues of the day. We can be grateful that we are not called before the Sanhedrin, like Peter and John. And, still, the spirit is stirring us to tell the truth about our relationship with Christ and with one another. In the video, Witness, Rev. Gloria White Hammond, pastor of the Bethel Afrian American Episcopal church, says that it is important to advocate for justice on a public level and yet … “ … [the] even harder work is to look at me and where is the ‘ism’ in me.” This is work that we can do, Church. May all God’s people say, Amen [1] https://www.newsweek.com/181-black-people-have-been-killed-police-since-george-floyds-death-1584740 [2] Dr. King was paraphrasing a quote of Unitarian minister, Rev. Theodor Parker, https://www.uuworld.org/articles/parker-radical-theologian [3] https://www.facebook.com/Masscouncilofchurches [4] https://www.sneucc.org/newsdetail/spotlight-witness-15202389
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“We all” are Complicit Preached for Wollaston Congregational Church On April 18th, 2021 Scripture: Acts 3:12-21 Today we begin something I’ve put off for too long. Each Easter season – these 50 days between Christ’s resurrection and his ascension back to God the Father – the Lectionary offers a selection of readings from the book of Acts. Most years, I have considered doing a series of sermons on Acts and then I’ve changed my mind. Acts is a strange biblical book, which doesn’t quite fit into any of the usual categories. It is not a part of the Torah, or Jewish law. It is not a prophetic writing or poetic wisdom literature. It is not exactly “gospel” because it describes events that take place after Jesus’s life, and it is not a letter from an evangelist to the early church. Scholars agree that the author of Luke’s gospel also wrote Acts. This is affirmed by the flow between the two books. Acts is a story of the very early followers of Jesus, including the ones who were disciples at Jesus’s side during his lifetime. The events described in Acts take place in turbulent times. The story begins in Jerusalem only 50 days after Jesus’ crucifixion. Many supposed enemies of Rome, as well as petty criminals, are executed on crosses. Crucifixion is the mode of execution favored by the Roman occupiers of ancient Israel, because it is visibly agonizing. Not many years later, the tension in Jerusalem will erupt with the destruction of the temple and the genocide of many Jewish people. Somehow the early followers of Jesus live through these times. They ultimately differentiate themselves from other Jewish groups, and begin to spread through Asia Minor, converting both Jewish and Gentiles to “the way” of Jesus Christ. The story we heard this morning takes place very soon after the coming of the Holy Spirit, while many Jews are still gathered in Jerusalem for the feast of Pentecost or Shavuot. As we heard from Mary’s reading, Peter and John, have just healed a lame man as they were on their way to pray at the temple. There is quite a commotion in Solomon’s Porch where the healing took place. Seeing the crowd, Peter takes the opportunity to deliver one of his five sermons in the book of Acts. This is one of the reasons I have decided against preaching on the story in the past. But this year, I’m going to do it. This is the kind of biblical passage that has been used for centuries to “blame” the Jewish people for Jesus’ crucifixion. I hesitate to preach on passages like this one, because I’m concerned about our initial response. We hear scripture with 21st century ears, not knowing that we are influenced by those centuries of Christian anti-Semitism. And yet, if we look a little more closely we will discover something in Peter’s sermon that is quite different from an accusation against the Jews. Peter begins “You Israelites …” Even though he begins with the word “you”, Peter and the other apostles are Jewish, Jesus was Jewish, and all those crowded around him in the porch are Jewish. This might as well be a speech that begins with the words “My fellow Americans …” Peter tells the assembled crowd that the healing of the man has been done by the power of the God of Israel, of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all their ancestors. Their God has also glorified Jesus, the one who was so recently crucified, because, he says, they “rejected” him. Of all the people in the crowd, the one who is known to have rejected Jesus is actually Peter. The word rejected is better translated as “disowned.” This is the same word that is used to describe Peter’s denial of Jesus on the night of his arrest. No doubt the painful memory of denying that he knew Jesus three times that night, is fresh in Peter’s mind. Peter is not singling out anyone in the crowd to blame for the crucifixion. He is using the plural “you all” or even “we all.” He also tells the crowd good news. Even though Peter was totally complicit in the rejection or disowning of Jesus, he has been forgiven and restored. He is even given the position of leadership in the new movement that is being birthed. And so he invites those gathered to do the same as him. He invites them to repent from their communal complicity in disowning Jesus. And he invites them to look forward to a time of universal restoration. Sadly, we humans seem to have an incurable tendency to blame. And conversely, we have a tendency to interpret a call for accountability as blame. Looking at the scripture through a lens of blame, we will probably see only two options. Either Peter is blaming “the Jews” for Jesus’ crucifixion. Or with the inclusive “you all”, or even “we all”, he is blaming us. Seeing the crucifixion through the lens of blame has a lot to do with the way different branches of Christianity have dealt with it. Evangelical Christians have tended to focus the blame and the need for repentance on the individual. And mainline Protestants like ourselves, have rejected that notion, but still tend to avoid our own communal complicity and accountability. When I was in college, I was loosely connected with an evangelical Christian organization. This group sponsored a week-long mission, in which they invited a number of persuasive speakers to preach in the largest auditorium on campus. On the night that I attended, I was stunned by what I heard the preacher say. He described the crucifixion of Jesus in excruciating detail: each nail going in through flesh and bone, the process of asphyxiation on the cross. Once he had completed the horrific details of execution, he pivoted to the reason for the crucifixion in cosmic terms. This was consistent with the substitutionary atonement theory favored by conservative traditions. Substitutionary atonement says that because God is purely good and just, God must be paid a price for human sin. And because God did not want to punish us, he sent his own son, Jesus, to bear the punishment and to be sacrificed on the cross. Substitutionary atonement says that Jesus “paid the price for our sin” on the cross. In the auditorium that night, the preacher told us that every sin, every little thing that we had ever done, everything about which we felt guilt or shame, drove another nail into Jesus’ hands and feet. The only response to this was for each individual person to repent and believe, to confess Jesus their personal Lord and Savior. Then, and only then, would our sin and shame be forgiven. Then and only then will we be sure to avoid damnation. I began to sweat and hairs prickled on the back of my neck. I felt as though the preacher could see into my soul and read every less than holy thought. It was painful to imagine that I had caused Jesus’s pain on the cross, and at the same time I knew I did not need to do anything else to become a Christian. I had already been baptized and confirmed as a member of Christ’s family. I knew I wasn’t perfect, but I also knew just enough to perceive this sermon as a guilt trip. Of course, we all do things that need to be confessed. We all need to make amends and turn back toward God. But the kind of spectacle I witnessed in the auditorium that night focuses all the attention on the individual and their behavior. That perspective sets us on a path of sin and shame, followed by confession and forgiveness: rinse and repeat. In this approach, the need for communal confession and repentance is forgotten. On the other hand, mainline churches like ours also have a problem in our approach to the cross. Many of us dislike the notion of substitutionary atonement but we also do not like the part that is missing: communal confession and repentance. We avoid individual confession and at the same time avoid accountability for our complicity. I knew a woman, named Joan, in my home UCC church, who complained about the prayer of corporate confession in our weekly Order of Worship. “I am a good person,” she argued, “I care for the sick and the poor, I’m kind and generous. I don’t like being required to confess.” Joan was, indeed, a good and kind person. She went out of her way to care for others. She drove church members to medical appointments. She visited the sick and the dying even in the most awkward and unpleasant circumstances. She gave generously to the church and other organizations. But Joan was forgetting her complicity in the culture. She was forgetting that she, and you and I, are a part of “you all” and “we all.” Current day Christians remember that we were not around 2,000 years ago to crucify Jesus. But we are reluctant to confess our complicity in a culture that crucifies people in our own time and place. Our black, brown, Asian neighbors are experiencing violence in our culture and even execution in some circumstances. White mainline protestants were reluctant to confess the racism of the culture and stand with Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the time of the civil rights movement. Perhaps many lives would have been spared, if we had fully supported the movement, not only in marching together, but challenging our own assumptions about race. We, mainline protestants have been reluctant to challenge our own assumptions about race, in case we find something shameful in ourselves. We prefer to stay out of the fray, and blame others for acts of violence against black, indigenous and people of color. On the one hand we dismiss the idea that our small indiscretions may add a nail to the crucifixion of Jesus. And on the other, we avoid the larger issue of corporate complicity. We avoid the “you all” and the “we all” of Peter’s speech. May we remember, though that Peter’s speech does not end with “you all” and “we all.” This is why I had Mary read extra verses from our text this week. Peter invites the crowd to repent and turn toward God. He reminds them that they can be restored, like the lame man. They can even play a part of God’s universal restoration for humanity and the world. If Peter’s complicity in disowning Jesus can be wiped out, so that he can assume leadership of the early church, so too can our complicity be wiped out. First we face it, first we address it, and then we turn toward God. If we do that we put ourselves in a position to be restored, to stand with our neighbors, even those being crucified in our time. May all God’s say Amen To See and To Be Seen Preached for Wollaston Congregational Church Easter 2021, Sunday April 4th Scripture: John 20:1-18 Rev. Kim Murphy and I arrived at the beach, while was still a little dark. In the pre-dawn light the Quincy Point Congregation and those of us from Wollaston trod carefully down the rough stones steps onto the beach. And we stood on the dry sand, scatters with broken shells and pebbles. There was a faint smell of salt in the chilly air. We took in the quiet of pre-dawn, the birds just beginning to wake, a little traffic passing by. This is a thin place – the beach at sunrise – a place in which heaven and earth seem to meet. In our scripture reading this morning we heard “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb …” The tomb is not on a beach, but in a garden. The smells are the pre-dawn smells of earth and vegetation. The flowers have not yet opened to release their scents. The sounds, still, are the birds beginning to stir. There is damp earth, instead of dry sand, beneath Mary’s feet. We do not know if the sunrise will be visible from this place. This setting will be a thin place for Mary, because it is a place where heaven and earth certainly meet on this first Easter morning. According to John, on this morning after the Sabbath and following the crucifixion, Mary Magdalene comes to the tomb alone, while it is still dark. It is still dark, because Jesus is understood to be dead and gone. It is still dark, because Mary, with all the disciples, is grieving. It is still dark, because they do not understand what has happened. Mary and the other disciples are traumatized. They witnessed their beloved teacher and leader being tortured and hung until death on a Roman cross. They observed his wounded, lifeless body taken from the cross and sealed in a tomb. And so, at the first opportunity, Mary comes to the tomb: perhaps to grieve, perhaps to spend time alone in prayer. Instead of tranquility, she experiences trauma yet again, when she discovers that the tomb is has been broken open and Jesus’ body is gone. She is distraught and runs to meet Peter and the disciple whom Jesus loved, telling them that the body is gone. Peter and the other disciple come running to the tomb, they witness its emptiness. They do not understand that Jesus must rise from the dead. And so, they leave as rapidly as they had arrived, perhaps in fear. Mary remains alone, weeping outside the tomb. Suddenly she notices two angels inside the tomb, at each end of the place where Jesus was laid. They ask her “woman, why are you weeping?” She repeats what she told the disciples “They have taken away my Lord …” she still believes the body has been stolen. Now, she turns, looking away from the tomb and into the garden. Perhaps the dawn is just beginning. Perhaps the sun is showing its first arc above the horizon. She sees a man, who is Jesus. But she still doesn’t know it. She supposes he is the gardener. He repeats the words of the angels, asking “woman, why are you weeping?” and then “whom are you looking for?” Still she doesn’t perceive … and asks if he has taken the body of her Lord away, where has he laid him? Finally, the sun rises and dawn breaks, the birds break into joyful song, the flowers burst open and releasing their scents. He has seen her before she sees him, and exclaims “Mary!” And she responds “Rabbouni/teacher!” She wants to embrace him, but he will not let her. Instead he instructs her to go tell his “brothers” that he is ascending … to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. He SENDS her, and because he does, she becomes the first apostle. And so she goes and tells the others, “I have seen the Lord!” The metaphors of light and darkness crop up throughout John’s gospel. These symbols stand for revelation, and for that which is hidden. Jesus, as the light of the world, shines on that which is hidden and reveals it. The passage we read today reveals something that has been hidden in the telling of the gospel. We met Mary Magdalene for the first time only a few verses before this episode. She was among the women who stood at the foot of the cross. And yet, we can see, from this extravagantly told this intimate encounter, that Mary and Jesus know one another very well. He is her beloved Rabbi or teacher. She is his devoted disciple or student. She is from Magdala, on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee, close to Capernaum where Jesus began his ministry. We can assume she has been among the disciples from the beginning. Western Christianity has not been kind to Mary. She has been conflated with the nameless woman who anointed Jesus at Bethany. And that woman has been assumed to be a prostitute. I suspect that this shaming of Mary led to other references to her being edited out of the gospel. I have been curious about Mary Magdalene since I first visited a retreat center named the Hallelujah Farm a few years ago. The Hallelujah Farm is a lovingly restored post and beam farmhouse, sitting in the midst of rolling hills in south-western New Hampshire. In the springtime flowers are bursting and birds are singing. It is the perfect Easter setting. Guests of the retreat center meet for discussion, prayer, and worship in a great room at the end of the farmhouse. This room is named the “Mary Magdalene Chapel.” A huge stone fireplace serves as an altar. On the mantle there is an icon depicting Mary Magdalene resplendent in red. On either side are windows overlooking a meadow and a valley. The whole space is bright and airy, the floor is natural wood, gently polished, with a large circular cutout at the center that contains fine sand. Candles may be set in the sand. And over the course of a retreat, participants create swirls of art in it. The guests gather, seated on chairs or cushions arranged in a circle around the cutout. Whether they are praying or in conversation, everyone is seen and everyone can see everyone else. There are no back rows, no one is hidden. At the doorway to the room, guests are requested to remove their outdoor shoes. Practically speaking this preserves the floor. Spiritually, it is a reminder that those who enter are walking on holy ground. A plaque tells guests that the chapel is dedicated to Mary Magdalene, the first Apostle, fitting for a center named the Hallelujah Farm. The chapel epitomizes the warmth and hospitality of the Farm. The circular arrangement of the space creates an atmosphere of levelness and equality. It is a thin place, in which earth and heaven seem to meet. We are fortunate that the author of John’s gospel placed Mary in the thin place of the garden at dawn. The first person to witness the resurrected Christ cannot be edited out. Light must shine on her. She has been seen here. Perhaps you have seen the picture of African children, sitting on the ground in a large circle. They are bare-footed and they sit with the soles of their feet facing into the circle. There is no space between the feet: the little side-by-side soles form a perfect circle. In the circle each child is seen, and each child sees each of the other children. In the garden Mary “sees the Lord” and equally importantly she is seen. Today we celebrate the first resurrection dawn, with all the joy of Easters past. And still we – Christians – remember that we live in an “already and not yet” time. Jesus has already walked the earth. Christ has already been resurrected and has ascended. Meanwhile, we do not yet live in a world where all God’s children are seen, called by their names, fed, cared for, and know that they are beloved. And so, as we walk away from the garden or the beach, this morning, may we prepare our hearts and minds to see the Jesuses and the Marys in our world. - Perhaps, Jesus literally is the gardener – the immigrant landscaper – who mows and trims all day and returns to his lodgings at night. - Perhaps Mary is the Asian American grandmother, who is beaten in public, and bystanders choose not to see or intervene. - Perhaps Mary is the black American grandmother who fears that the next child to be born will be a boy, destined for the school to prison pipeline. - Perhaps Jesus is the unkempt person, hovering outside the liquor store or hanging on the street corner. - Or perhaps they are the many children, who have been lost to the system, in the chaos of a year of online and hybrid learning. Friends, we will experience the resurrection dawn each time we see and are seen: we are seen by our family or by our neighbors, by those who serve us in the grocery store, the gas station, or the coffee shop. This morning, (in this thin place) may you see the Lord, and may you know that you are seen. And then know that you, apostle, are sent, both to see and to tell “I have seen the Lord!” May it be so, Amen. Preached for the Inter Church Council of North Quincy and Wollaston Good Friday Service Friday, April 2nd, 2021 "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit." Years (and years) ago, when I was a pre-teen in secondary education, my school would hold a morning assembly several times each week. At that time and in that place, this took the form of a worship service, in which we would sing hymns from our school hymn book and read together prayers from a little blue prayer book taped inside the hymnal. The headmaster frequently led us in a prayer that stays with me to this day. It begins “Into your hands, O God, I commend myself this day.” In my mind this was the perfect prayer to begin a school day. I could pour my pre-teen concerns into those few words: acne, friendships and cliques, the in-crowd and the out-crowd, romantic crushes, and of course the stresses of grades and homework. This was the prayer of my pre-teen self, who did not know what else to pray, and still wanted God to go with her through the school day. The gospel writer, Luke, presents Jesus primarily as faithful to God, his heavenly Father. Jesus is faithful his whole life long … born to a faithful mother, Mary, … and faithful as a child, in the temple, many years before our scene today. Jesus was faithful through the 40 days he spent being tempted wilderness, faithful in his calling to ministry to declare “good news to the poor.” And now he is faithful even in death, as he cries out “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit" and breathes his last breath. These are his last words of faith and trust. I am comforted by the thought that perhaps Jesus, also, learned these words as a child, not from a school prayer book, but from Israel’s song book. Jesus is reciting a verse from Psalm 31, a psalm Jesus might have used as a bedtime prayer throughout his life. The entire psalm expresses a deep faithfulness and trust in God: God as our protector, God as our redeemer, God as our refuge. Even though I take comfort from the thought that Jesus and I prayed very similar words as children, Jesus’ trust and faithfulness far exceed my faith. While I cling to the illusion of control, Jesus submits to what must be. He submits what is done to him by a world that would stamp out goodness and innocence. Over this past year of pandemic, we … children, adults, teens, pre-teens … have had much more to worry about than acne, friendships and homework. Children have had their world turned upside down by social isolation, the loss of loved ones, exhausted and anxious parents, online learning frequently without a stable internet or adult support. And many students who relied on school for support and guidance, structure or protection, have been lost in the chaos. Meanwhile, adults and children have gone through the pain of sickness and death, often alone, the stresses of overwhelming responsibilities in their work and family life. The pandemic has revealed much about what is broken in our world, but perhaps the greatest revelation is that our sense of control over our world is an illusion. While Jesus made the choice for faithfulness and trust, we are left with no choice but to trust in God. And so, may we pray together, as Jesus prayed: In times of pain and exhaustion, “into your hands O God.” In times of confession, “into your hands O God.” In times of anxiety, when we want to fall asleep but cant’, “into your hands O God.” In a time of overwhelming responsibility and confusion, “into your hands, O God.” It’s the prayer of a pre-teen who doesn’t know what else to pray. And it’s also the prayer of Jesus, who knows exactly what to pray … “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” |
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