He Comes Back

I have felt very distant from God since my grandfather died a few weeks ago.

His funeral was perfect. All of his family was in one place, the church was beautiful, and he would have loved the music choices.

And then life happened. Work has been busy. Parenting each morning and night has been a blur. And two of our closest friends got married last weekend. My prayers lately have been little more than a way to help me fall asleep.

Like I said, distant from God.

After Jesus was crucified, his disciples hid behind a locked door, fearful they would meet a similar fate as he did. Their prophet was gone. No more healing. No more generosity. You can almost hear them whispering amongst themselves: “That was fun while it lasted.”

They must have felt very far from God in that moment.

But Jesus came back to them. “Peace be with you.” And he sent them on the mission that led to the establishment of the church. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

My fear whenever the drudgery and distractions of everyday life crowds out my faith is that I won’t get it back. Like a week away from running, my endurance will fade away. I’ll find more reasons not to go to church. I’ll stop praying. And if the past month is any indication, that’s exactly what will happen.

But that fear assumes that I am entirely in control of my own faith. That if not for my own dogged willpower, I wouldn’t believe in God. And I’m not sure that’s true.

When I was in high school, I learned that my grandfather had made a series of bad real estate investments. I forget exactly what went wrong, but I remember very clearly the only detail that mattered: Grandad was too generous and kind to be a landlord. He couldn’t evict anyone.

Then, as I got older, I heard another story, this one from Grandad himself: When he had come home from Korea, and gone through the books of his family’s grocery store, it turned out they had been letting people buy on credit for years without ever paying them back. His parents were too kind and generous to own a store. They couldn’t charge anyone.

Grandad couldn’t have shed his legacy of generosity if he’d tried. And I’m not so sure that faith is so easy to shed, either.

Before he was crucified, Jesus told his disciples: “I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.”

See you next week.

Emmett

John 20:19-23

On the evening of that first day of the week,
when the doors were locked, where the disciples were,
for fear of the Jews,
Jesus came and stood in their midst
and said to them, “Peace be with you.”
When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side.
The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.
Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you.
As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them,
“Receive the Holy Spirit.
Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them,
and whose sins you retain are retained.”