Archive for the ‘faith’ Tag
“He Saw Her”: Becoming a People of Love
This message continues the series Becoming a People of Love, exploring how love is meant to be the defining characteristic of Jesus’ followers. Jesus teaches that while love for God is foundational, it is our love for one another that reveals our true identity to the world (see John13:34–35). But what does that kind of love actually look like in everyday life?
Rather than offering abstract ideas, this series looks closely at how Jesus loved people in real situations. Becoming people of love, as Jesus models it, is not achieved by trying harder or performing better—it is a slow, transformative work of thee Holy Spirit that flows out of knowing how much we are already loved by God. Jesus begins His ministry grounded in this assurance at His baptism, when the Father declares His delight in Him (Luke 3:21–22). Everything Jesus does flows from belovedness, not striving.
The sermon then turns to two stories that reveal a key aspect of Jesus’ way of love: He truly sees people.
In Luke 7:11–17, Jesus encounters a funeral procession in the village of Nain. Amid the noise and the crowds, Jesus sees a widow who has lost her only son—a loss that leaves her facing deep grief and a future of abject poverty. This is more than simply noticing her; Jesus perceives the full weight of her suffering. Moved with compassion, He interrupts the procession, touches the coffin (risking ritual uncleanness), and restores the boy to life. He then gives the son back to his mother, restoring not just life, but relationship and hope.
A second story in Luke 19 shows the same loving “seeing” from a different perspective. Zacchaeus, a despised tax collector, climbs a tree hoping to see Jesus without being noticed himself. Yet Jesus sees him, calls him by name, and chooses to enter his home. This act of love leads to repentance, transformation, and the restoration of the relationship between Zacchaeus and his community, from which he was excluded as a traitor.
In both stories, the Greek word used for “seeing” implies far more than observation. Jesus sees with understanding, allows what He sees to move His heart, and then acts for the other person’s ultimate good.
The invitation for us is clear. Like Jesus, we can live from a place of confidence in our belovedness and ask the Holy Spirit to help us truly see the people around us—not just their surface, but their stories, pain, and potential. Love may begin with noticing, but it grows when we take time, listen, and respond.
The challenge at the close of the message is simple and profound: Who is God inviting you to see this week—at church, at work, or in daily life?
Your Highest Goal: Making Love the Center of the Christian Life
Love is arguably the word most used—and with the widest range of definitions in our culture. From song lyrics to Valentine’s Day celebrations, everyone talks about love, yet defining it proves surprisingly difficult. Ask a room full of people what love means, and you’re likely to get answers “all over the map.”
Yet Scripture makes it clear that love is not a vague or optional idea. The word love appears repeatedly throughout the Gospels—78 times in total, with a striking concentration in John chapters 13–17. These are Jesus’ own words, spoken at the most intimate moment with His disciples. From the very beginning, John tells us that God’s love entered the world through Jesus (John 1:17). When Jesus is asked to identify the greatest commandment, He responds that loving God fully and loving our neighbour as ourselves sums up the entire Law and the Prophets (Matthew 22:38–40). Later, He gives His disciples a “new command”: to love one another as He has loved them—declaring that this love will be the defining mark of His followers (John 13:33–34).
Clearly, love sits at the very heart of apprenticeship to Jesus.
The apostles understood this as well. The letters of the New Testament use the word love over 170 times. In addressing the Corinthian church’s understanding of spiritual gifts, Paul makes a striking statement: “Make love your highest goal” (1 Corinthians 14:1). He devotes an entire chapter—1 Corinthians 13—to explaining that love is the foundation for all the work of the Holy Spirit. Without love, even the most impressive spiritual activity amounts to nothing.
Because love is so central to Jesus’ teaching and the life of the Church, this new series sets out to go deeper—not only to understand what love is, but to learn how we can become people who are genuinely characterised by it.
One challenge we face is that most modern definitions of love focus on feelings and emotions—things we cannot control or command. As Dharius Daniels in his book “re-Presenting Jesus “observes, “feelings can be managed but not commanded“. This creates a problem, because Jesus does command us to love, and to love in the way He loves (John 15:17). That means love as Jesus demonstrated must be more than emotion; it must be something visible, intentional, and embodied.
The New Testament most often uses the Greek word agape to describe God’s love. Rather than defining it abstractly, the best way to understand agape is by looking at the life of Jesus Himself. Over the coming weeks, this series will do exactly that—examining how Jesus lives out love, using 1 Corinthians 13:4–6 as a lens through which to observe His actions and character.
To help frame this journey, a working definition of love—drawn from Jesus’ life and the wisdom of Scripture—has been introduced and will remain visible throughout the series, open to refinement as we continue learning together. Agape-To make an absolute priority of, and to work relentlessly for, the absolute best for another person(s) without expecting a return
To launch this exploration, the sermon concludes in an unusual way: with a story. Stories often reveal truth more powerfully than explanations, and few modern writers capture the lived reality of love better than Bob Goff. The opening story from his book Love Does offers a compelling picture of what it looks like when love moves beyond words and becomes action—a fitting invitation into a series devoted to making love our highest goal.
As we bring this series on the Holy Spirit to a close, we are returning to some of our favourite Scriptures—passages I hope have become at least a little more familiar over the past few weeks. As we have sought to deepen and broaden our understanding of “The Familiar Stranger,” we’ve realised that our most reliable source of insight has, of course, been Jesus himself.
The place where Jesus tells us most about the Holy Spirit is in the remarkable, intimate conversations he shares with his closest friends in John chapters 14–17. These words are spoken as he prepares them for his impending death and eventual return to his Father. The question hanging in the air is obvious: How are they supposed to cope without his physical presence?
Jesus reassures them that God has this fully in hand. He promises that the Father will send the Holy Spirit—someone he refers to as “the Advocate” (John 14:16). Even more astonishing, Jesus insists that this will be better than having him physically present with them, as they had enjoyed for the past three years. If we’re honest, that’s a hard sell—for them, and for us. After all, we never had the privilege of walking with Jesus face to face.
The Helper: Parakletos
In these chapters, Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit directly four times, and each time he uses the Greek word parakletos. English translations render this word in several ways: Advocate, Comforter, Counsellor, and—in the ESV—Helper, which I’ve taken as the title for this message.
A longer definition often used for parakletos is “the one called alongside to help.” Each of the English translations carries its own nuance, but all fit beautifully within that larger meaning.
Let’s take a moment to reflect on those nuances.
- The Comforter is the one who refuses to leave us alone. Jesus says in John 14:18, “I will not leave you as orphans.” The Spirit is present with us in our pain and loss.
- The Advocate is the one who has our back. While the word can suggest legal imagery, it’s far broader than that. Romans 8 gives us a powerful picture of the Spirit actively helping us, interceding for us, and enabling us to resist the lies and deceptions of the evil one.
- The Counsellor helps us see differently. There was a time when seeing a counsellor or therapist was viewed as weakness, even instability. Thankfully, that attitude has largely changed. Good counsellors ask thoughtful questions, help us reframe our experiences, and enable us to understand our own stories more deeply. I know that many times—while listening to a sermon, reading Scripture, or engaging with a book—my thinking has been shifted or expanded. I believe that is often the Holy Spirit at work as our Counsellor.
A Helper from the Beginning
But these ideas are far more than Jesus’ solution to his physical departure. They take us to the very centre of God’s character and what he wants us to know about himself. To see that clearly, we need to go back to Genesis (no surprise there).
In Genesis 2, God creates a beautiful garden and places the man there to work it and care for it (2:15). He provides everything the man needs (2:16), and together they name the animals (2:19). It’s a stunning picture of companionship and shared purpose.
Then we encounter a striking statement in Genesis 2:18: “It is not good for the man to be alone.” That observation is fascinating. The man hasn’t complained. He has God himself for company. And yet God sees something deeper. He declares that aloneness, even in paradise, is not good.
God goes on to say that there is no suitable “helper” among the animals (2:20). I suspect this was not news to God—but perhaps it was something God wanted Adam to discover for himself. God demonstrates that he understands Adam’s needs, even those Adam doesn’t yet fully recognise.
These verses tell us so much about the character of God.
First, God is a God of relationship (the Trinity) and He created humans for relationship. Even in perfection, isolation is not good. Second, the relationship Adam needs must be suitable—a relationship of equality and companionship, not hierarchy. The English word “helper” can mislead us here.
The Hebrew word used is ezer, and in most of the Old Testament, ezer refers to God himself (for example, Psalm 54:4). That tells us something profound: this “helper” is not lesser, but strong, equal, and life-giving—reflecting God’s own character.
The Ultimate Coming Alongside
From the very beginning, we see that our God is a relational God, and that his creation is designed for relationship—with him and with one another. When that relationship was broken, God continually took steps to remain present with his people: the tabernacle, the temple, and ultimately, his Son.
Now comes what may be the final and most intimate step of all. God sends the Holy Spirit—not just to be with us, but to live in us and work through us. This is a whole new level of “coming alongside.” Perhaps we should even call it “coming inside.”
This is the ultimate Helper.
A Familiar Friend
So I wonder—what have you learned about the Holy Spirit during this series? Has “The Familiar Stranger,” someone you knew existed but found mysterious, begun to feel more like a familiar friend?
One who wants to come alongside and help you.
A partner. A companion.
One who has desired a relationship with humanity since the beginning of time.
The Holy Spirit is relentlessly committed to helping you fulfil God’s call and purpose in your life—reminding you how deeply you are loved, supplying power and gifts, and enabling you to take risks and do things that, on your own, would be utterly impossible.
That is the Helper…and He is closer than you think!
Healing: Living with Faith, Mystery, and Courage
Few subjects stir as much emotion in the church as healing. Because sickness touches every life, the gift of healing feels deeply personal and often painful. It raises hope—but also questions, disappointment, and mystery. Yet healing cannot be ignored. Scripture places it at the very heart of God’s story and the church’s mission.
Healing appears throughout the Bible, from God’s self-revelation as healer in the Old Testament to the ministry of Jesus in the New. The Gospels are filled with accounts of Jesus healing the sick, but Luke 10 is especially striking. There, Jesus commissions not just the Twelve, but seventy-two unnamed disciples to heal the sick and proclaim the nearness of God’s Kingdom. This wider sending points to healing as a normal part of the church’s everyday witness, not a rare or elite activity.
Yet the difficult question remains: if healing is part of God’s Kingdom, why doesn’t everyone get healed? This question has troubled believers throughout history and is closely tied to the broader mystery of unanswered prayer. Jesus consistently linked healing to the coming of the Kingdom of God—a Kingdom that is both “now and not yet.” In Eden, there was no sickness; in the New Creation, there will be none again. The healings we see today are glimpses—tastes—of what is to come. They are signs of God’s future breaking into the present, even while we still live in a broken world.
This tension helps us hold hope and honesty together. Healing sometimes happens, and when it does, it serves as a taste of God’s coming restoration. When it does not, we remain in the mystery of the “not yet.” Even Jesus’ own ministry reflects this tension—most notably at the pool of Bethesda, where only one person was healed.
Jesus healed in many different ways: with a word, a touch, at a distance, even in stages. The common thread was simplicity and authority. He did not use elaborate prayers or perform rituals; he simply said “be healed”. Healing, as one pastor put it, is a profoundly “Jesusie” thing to do.
So why don’t we see it more often today? One reason may be fear—fear of failure, fear of disappointment, fear of trying and not seeing results. Yet Scripture gives us no permission to opt out. While we must accept the mystery, we are still invited to participate.
Healing remains part of the Spirit’s work through the church. Living faithfully in the “not yet” means being willing to try, to pray, and to trust God with the outcome. As followers of Jesus, we are called not just to believe in “Jesus-like” things—but to dare to do them.
Some weeks ago we looked at the subject of discernment. In this sermon we revisit this gift and explore it further through real-life stories, biblical examples, and practical guidance for the life of the church. Discernment is a unique spiritual gift—one acknowledged by both cessationists and continuationists—perhaps because it sits at the very heart of hearing and obeying the Word of God.
While wisdom and prophecy are vital, they are not the same as discernment. Some of the things God calls us to may appear unwise on the surface, and Scripture reminds us to “test the spirits” (1 John 4:1). These realities point clearly to our need for discernment: the ability to recognise what truly is—or is not—the will of God.
When Discernment Is Needed
Two church stories helped illustrate this. One involved the difficult question of whether a church should remain open; the other asked whether two churches should close and allow a new church to be born. In both cases, the issue was not opinion, strategy, or common sense, but a single, defining question: What is God’s will?
Because of that, discernment could not be rushed or handled individually. It required:
• Community – everyone was involved in seeking God together
• Preparation – time set aside for prayer and fasting
• Clearing the ground – laying aside biases, cultural expectations, and personal preferences
• A “prayer of indifference” – a willingness to accept God’s answer, whatever it might be
Only once that central question was answered could the church move on to the “how.”
Discernment vs. Guidance
In the process of forming a new church, working groups explored issues such as a name and a statement of faith. This stage was not discernment but guidance—a sharing of ideas, perspectives, and opinions. Discernment came later, when the community gathered again, prayed, fasted, and asked whether these proposals truly reflected God’s will.
In both major decisions, God gave a clear and confirming “yes.”
Discernment in Scripture
Scripture shows the same patterns at work. In 2 Samuel 16, David refuses to act on cultural instinct or human advice during Absalom’s rebellion. Instead of reacting, he waits to discern what God is wanting him to do. By contrast, Absalom assumes that wise-sounding counsel must be God’s will—and the result is disaster.
In Acts 21, Paul hears repeated prophecies warning him about his journey to Jerusalem. Rather than rejecting them, he discerns their true purpose: not instructions to stop, but warnings to prepare him for what he already knows God has called him to do. Discernment allows Paul to honour the prophetic voices without being led off course.
What We Learn About Discernment
From these stories and passages, several key principles emerge:
• Discernment is needed when we must decide whether a specific action is God’s will, whether we are indeed recognizing Gods voice.
• It is practiced in community, not in isolation
• It requires intentional preparation, perhaps through prayer and fasting, in order to clear out the noise and be able to hear God’d voice
• God is gracious and faithful to confirm His will in different ways.Even when we are unsure, we can trust God to guide, correct, and reassure us
Ultimately, the gift of discernment helps us listen more carefully, act more faithfully, and walk more confidently in obedience to God—especially in moments of uncertainty, transition, and new beginnings.
When we think about the Christmas story, familiar figures quickly come to mind: shepherds, wise men, angels, Mary and Joseph. Yet one vital participant is often overlooked—the Holy Spirit. This sermon invites us to rediscover His central role in the events leading to Jesus’ birth and to reflect on how God’s creative work continues today.
Luke, the Gentile doctor and careful historian, tells us that he set out to write an accurate account of the events “fulfilled” in the life of Jesus (Luke 1:1–4). While we compress the Christmas story into a few festive weeks each December, the reality is far more complex and costly. The events unfolded over many months, in a world marked by political oppression, economic hardship, and deep uncertainty.
To appreciate the Spirit’s work, we rewind not to December, but to “April”—nine months before Jesus’ birth. In the small, insignificant village of Nazareth, the Holy Spirit enters history in a dramatic and unsettling way.
A Disruptive Announcement
Mary, likely no more than 12–14 years old, was betrothed to Joseph in a binding family contract. While this arrangement was normal in her culture, everything else about that day was not. The angel Gabriel—acting under divine direction—appeared to her with astonishing news: she would conceive a child by the Holy Spirit.
For Mary, this “favor” came at immense personal cost. Pregnancy outside of marriage threatened her future, her reputation, and even her life. Confused and disturbed, she questioned how this could happen—she was a virgin. Gabriel’s answer was simple yet staggering: the Holy Spirit would “come upon” her.
This moment echoes the very beginning of Scripture. Just as the Spirit hovered over the chaos at creation (Genesis 1:2), He now hovered over Mary, bringing new life where it seemed impossible. The incarnation itself—the Word becoming flesh—was the climax of the Spirit’s creative work through history.
Confirmation, Joy, and Cost
The Holy Spirit did not leave Mary alone with this impossible calling. Soon after, she visited her cousin Elizabeth, whose own miraculous pregnancy had already begun. When Mary arrived, Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, the baby in her womb leapt, and she spoke prophetic words that confirmed Mary’s calling.
In response, Mary erupted in praise—the Magnificat—overflowing with joy and worship, even though she knew suffering lay ahead. The Spirit’s work did not remove pain, misunderstanding, or hardship, but He brought assurance, guidance, and deep joy beneath the surface.
In the months and years that followed, the Holy Spirit continued to protect and guide this fragile family—leading them to safety in Egypt and confirming God’s purposes through voices like Simeon and Anna.
What This Means for Us
The lesson is clear: the Holy Spirit is not a background figure in God’s story. He is the ongoing, active agent of God’s creative and redemptive work. He still comes into lives—personal, communal, and even national—to accomplish what seems impossible.
Like Mary, we are invited to trust. God’s favor does not always look comfortable or safe, but it is never without His presence. Beneath the struggle, the Holy Spirit brings reassurance, protection, and joy beyond imagination.
The “forgotten participant” is, in truth, indispensable—and He is still at work today.
I have decided to conduct an experiment and publish summaries of my Sunday sermons in my blog. Please do comment and let me know if you find it interesting and or helpful and, of course, share with others if you think it will bless them.
This sermon is the sixth in a series on the Holy Spirit entitled “The Familiar Stranger” using Tyler Staton’s book of the same name as a framework.
Suffering is a universal part of being human. Every one of us will face pain in some form, and many struggle to understand how a loving Father fits into a world marked by so much hurt. While entire books explore the theology of suffering, this message focuses on one key question: How does the Holy Spirit work within our suffering to bring redemption?
The apostle Paul’s words in Romans 5:1–5 sound almost shocking — rejoicing in suffering. But Paul isn’t celebrating pain. He’s pointing to the mysterious way God takes the brokenness of a fallen world and uses it to form us into people who can live in His Kingdom even as we long for the fullness that is still to come.
Rather than leaning on platitudes, the message turns to real stories of people who faced deep suffering yet discovered God’s redemptive power through the Holy Spirit:
- Joni Eareckson Tada, paralyzed at 17, wrestled with despair and unanswered prayers for healing. Eventually, she prayed, “If you won’t heal me, teach me how to live.” Out of her suffering grew Joni and Friends, a global ministry advocating for people with disabilities.
- Katherine and Jay Wolfe walked through the trauma of Katherine’s massive stroke at age 26. What could have destroyed their family instead gave birth to Hope Heals—a ministry bringing hope, community, and dignity to the disabled and their caregivers.
- Jesus Himself shows the pattern: led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness, facing rejection, and ultimately entering Gethsemane with anguish. He pleaded three times for another way, yet surrendered to the Father’s will. The resurrection is the ultimate picture of redemptive suffering.
The Holy Spirit doesn’t just redeem suffering on a cosmic scale — He does so personally. The message includes stories of deep personal loss: Sarah’s battle with cancer and Maggie’s tragic loss of her son. These devastating experiences, though still painful, have become part of a story of spiritual formation, hope, and shared healing.
A key truth emerges: redemption often happens in community. When suffering forces us to admit we cannot cope alone, we experience the love of others in transformative ways. The Spirit uses people, presence, and compassion to shape us through our pain.
The conclusion is clear and hope-filled: Suffering is still painful. It’s still wrong. But in the Kingdom of God, evil never gets the last word.
When we allow God into our pain, the Holy Spirit brings surprising, sometimes unimaginable redemption.
In God’s hands, suffering always counts.
I realize that it has been some while since I posted a blog, but I have not felt prompted to write, or maybe I have and I have taken no notice! If it is the latter, please forgive me! However, I wanted to write and share with you something that I shared with those who were with us at New Life Christian Fellowship on Sunday morning. We are currently in a series seeking to deepen our understanding and our day-to-day walk with the Holy Spirit. This series has been inspired by a book by Tyler Staton, “ The Familiar Stranger – re-introducing the Holy Spirit to those in search of an experiential spirituality.“ This is a book I strongly recommend as it addresses one of the most debilitating divisions that we experience in our churches today. Somehow, we have been persuaded that we have to choose between the “Holy Spirit Churches” and the Bible Churches. Tyler makes a powerful case for the equal importance of both and the danger of neglecting either in our personal or church lives.
A life deeply rooted in Scripture is absolutely essential for a healthy relationship to God, self, others, and the world at large. Equally essential, though, is a life deeply rooted in the Holy Spirit, who leads by experience and functions in partnership, not competition, with the explanatory Holy Bible.
A member of our church family made a suggestion that it would be helpful for us to set aside a day during the series for prayer and fasting. An opportunity to hear from the Holy Spirit as a community. We looked at the calendar and selected Saturday, November 29th.
On Sunday morning, however, I believe the Holy Spirit impressed on me that I should go further than simply setting aside a day. I should take my pastoral and leadership responsibility in the same way as the Kings of Israel did at times of great importance, and call everyone who calls New Life Christian Fellowship their church to take this day to pray and fast.
If you are part of the New Life Family, I am doing just that! We will begin the day in the sanctuary at 6:00 am with a time of prayer and worship together, which will last as long as we sense it should. The sanctuary will remain open for prayer until 6:00 pm, when we will break our fast together in the Fellowship Hall. There will be an opportunity to share the things we hear from the Spirit during that time. It is my prayer that there will be at least one person in the sanctuary for the whole of the day.
Now I realize that those of you reading this may not be members of our Church family, and so I have no responsibility to “call” you to anything. However, since I was prompted to write this, I want to suggest that you might find some time, maybe on November 29th, to pray and fast that The Holy Spirit might reveal new ways in which you can partner with Him to serve Him and your local communities at this time of so much need and confusion. I am excited for all of us all to hear from the Holy Spirit in fresh ways and so show the world what it means to be with Jesus, be like Jesus, and do what Jesus did!
I have not written for while mostly because the relentless cacophony of opinions and perspectives that assault us on every subject under the sun has been somewhat overwhelming.
I have been reading ” Mobilizing Hope – Faith Inspired Activism for a Post Civil Rights Generation” by Adam Taylor* and I came across this wonderful devotion from Howard Thurman’s “Meditations of the Heart” that I thought I would share with you:
How good it is to center down!
The streets of our minds seethe with endless traffic;
Our spirits resound with clashings, with noisy silences,
While something deep within hungers and thirsts for the still moment
and the resting lull.
With full intensity we seek, ere the quiet passes, a fresh sense
of order in our living;
A direction, a strong sure purpose that will structure our confusion
and bring meaning in our chaos.
We look at ourselves in this waiting moment –
the kinds of people we are.
The questions persist: what are we doing with our lives? –
what are the motives that order our days?
What is the end of our doings?
Where are we trying to go?
Where do we put the emphasis and where are our values focused?
For what end do we make sacrifices?
Where is my treasure and what do I love most in life?
What do I hate most in life and to what am I true?
Over and over the questions beat in upon the waiting moment.
As we listen, floating up through all the jangling echoes of our turbulence,
there is a sound of another kind –
A deeper note which only the stillness of the heart makes clear.
It moves directly to the core of our being.
Our questions are answered,
Our spirits refreshed, and we move back into the traffic of our daily round
With the peace of the Eternal in our step.
How good it is to center down!
Howard Thurman
*( By the way this book has one of the best chapters on Racial Reconciliation and Racial Justice I have read)
I saw a striking post on face book posing the question if our professional sports stars are not essential why are they our heroes and why do they get paid so much? Interesting thought, but surely a more interesting one is about those largely unknown people who have suddenly become our heroes. The grocery clerks, healthcare aids, teacher/Moms and so many others. These people and many others like them have been plummeted into the front line where there is real danger and the need to work harder than ever.
One of our church family posted this wonderful prayer for these unsung heroes and in case you missed it I wanted to share it with you. The question is how can we make sure that these people each of whom has a name, who were serving us faithfully before this crisis are not taken for granted in the future?
Bless the merciful
A Sunday Blessing
By: Sarah Bessey
March 29, 2020
Oh, God. Bless the merciful. Bless them.
Bless the hospital chaplains who are crying and praying in trauma rooms with the scared and the hurting. Bless the doctors and the nurses, the janitors and the lunch ladies, the front-line workers and behind the scenes faithful ones during this terrible time. Bless the ones in the nursing homes with lonely seniors, putting themselves at risk to keep caring for the vulnerable. Bless the families on the other side of the window glass with phones, smiling and waving and holding up signs of love to their elders. Bless the vulnerable and at-risk and those who open their doors to them even in the midst of a pandemic. Bless the scared kids and the adults who notice them.
Bless the ones who cry too much and feel too much. Bless the wounded healers.
Bless the kind ones, who speak words of life and gentleness. Bless the benefit-of-the-doubt givers, the one-more-chance lavishers. Bless the comforters and the kleenex-passers. Bless the walkers-in-another’s-shoes. Bless the wheelchair pushers. Bless the ones there waiting after the chips fall, and the edifice crumbles, and the truth comes out. Bless them for their grace for both the flyers and the thud-ers, for the fury and the glory. Bless the ones baking bread and leaving it on doorsteps for the parents they can’t risk seeing. Bless the ones who serve without fanfare or book deals or media attention. Bless the ones who love vulnerable children, day after day after day. Bless the ones who are lonely and alone, who are isolated and vulnerable, who are struggling to breathe.
Bless the ones who lavish grace and bandage wounds and figure out how to make ventilators in factories. Bless the ones who intubate and the ones who are crying in the stairwell, overwhelmed by caring. Bless them for they give dignity to the rest of us. Bless them because they see us and they love us anyway.
Bless them for standing in our thin places between too-much and not-enough, the places where our hearts are breaking and our fears are manifesting and we are so scared and so alone. Bless them for being the ones that show up in the fault lines to hold our hands and pray and weep with those who weep.
Bless them for their patience, for their uncanny ability to just keep going, for their ability to be present instead of checking out for something less demanding. Bless them for long days on their feet in uncomfortable PPE gear, sweaty and exhausted and filled with mercy for us anyway. Bless them for their determination in the face of suffering, for the patience in the teeth of our it’s-going-to-get-worse predictions, and their faith in our story.
Bless them for their heart to ease the suffering, to smooth the edges, widen the roads. Bless them for their cups of cold water, and their plates of food, for their prison visiting, for their preemie-baby hat knitting, for the signs in the windows saying “thank you, essential workers!” decorated with stickers and glitter. Bless them for the healing work of their gifts. Bless them when they smell of salt tears and someone else’s sh** and our unwashed bodies. Bless the funeral workers and the priests who have run out of words. Bless the journalists and politicians who are wise and merciful, the public health officials and the sign language interpreters. Bless the site preppers and the cleaners. Bless the merciful because they are so often the only glimpse of goodness.
Bless the merciful as they carry our own burdens with us; we cannot know how low they are bowed with the grief of the whole world groaning for healing and hope even as they keep moving forward. Bless them in their anger. Bless them in their frustrations. Bless them in their fears. Bless them in their exhaustion. Bless them when they are overwhelmed and want to quit. Bless their sleep and their rising.
Bless the ones who care for the ageing and the dying, for those making the way a bit smoother for the families left behind. Bless the ones who hold the hands of the poor and broken and you and me. Bless the ones running right towards the hurting with their hands outstretched.
At the end of all this may we bless them with rest and gratitude, with compassionate and generous policies and pay, with just systems and actions. At the end of all this, may they know they were our heroes not in spite of their weakness and humanity and moments of breaking but because of them. At the end of this, may we value love and mercy.
Bless them because it takes more courage and strength to be merciful, compassionate, and kind than we could have ever imagined. May they find love and strength, courage and compassion at their rock bottom.
From the Zebra Bag 