Rev. Lindsey Peterson
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Oftentimes in parish ministry, the heartbeat feels very far away. Oftentimes, the business of the operation of church feels like it has become the point, rather than a thing we do to move us toward the point.
I’ve been thinking of, and feeling, Christ in this way lately: as the compassionate heartbeat of creation. Christ as a name for the compassionate heartbeat of creation.
To say we are in Christ, is then to say we are in the compassionate heartbeat of creation. We are near it, inside it, in touch with it, connected and moving with its pulse. That compels me and clarifies me. Am I inside this compassionate heartbeat of creation; in touch with it, moving with its pulse? Is church?
1 Timothy is a warning about what keeps us far from this compassionate heartbeat of creation, or as the author describes it, from “the life that really is life.” The love of money. Being people identified with our wealth with a mindset of supremacy is the central barrier.
To be able to take hold of the life which really is life, the author advises that the rich people have to let go their ideological and practical hold on the supremacy of their wealth. They have to give it away. They have to release their hold on their life of supremacy to take hold of the life which is really life.
Our SNEUCC churches are wealthy. Some of our churches have actual money in the bank; more have generations of European-settler privilege in our physical assets and our congregational habits. To get to the point -- real life, living inside the compassionate heartbeat of creation -- we have to give that supremacy away. The money, the assets, and the habits of supremacy in our reverence for particular old ways, as if we possess the right way.
The compassionate heartbeat of creation calls; we do not possess it, but we can belong to it. And in so belonging, we can be moved and live the life which really is life here and now today.
I offer American jazz vocalist, songwriter, and actress Abby Lincoln’s beautiful wisdom as a guiding refrain:
Throw it away, throw it away; give your love, live your life, each and every day.
And keep your hand wide open, let the sun shine through;
’cause you can never lose a thing, if it belongs to you.
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