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“The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the message concerning faith that we proclaim: 9 If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. – Romans 10:8-9
One of the greatest promises I find throughout scripture is the promise that God is with us. We relive that promise in our faith celebrating Emanuel at Christmas, the living God through the resurrection at Easter, and the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives at Pentecost. All of the major celebrations of our faith point us to an ever-present God.
The presence of God in our lives calls us, as believers, as Christians, to be present with one another. We call that incarnational ministry. It is the ministry of being present. As God is present with us, we are present with one another. We share in life’s ups and downs, joys and concerns. Knowing that we have one another by our side, helps us to know the God that is with us, and is on our side. We need to know that presence of God as we navigate, especially, through the trails that this world throws our way.
The world in which we now live, with the realities of a deadly, harmful virus has disrupted that presence greatly. Now, we no longer feel safe being around one another. We are experiencing another spike in cases, and because of that, we are again closed to being together in worship. The last message I received from our district superintendent, Jason Gattis stated: “Bishop Taylor has decided to close in-person services (indoor, outdoor, drive-in) for churches in Knox and Sevier Counties. The closure will be through July and the conference COVID Task Force will reassess on July 28th.” We are not the only counties that received notice like this, I’ve heard from ministry colleges all over the conference who received similar messages from the superintendents. We, again, find ourselves apart, for several weeks, and we do not yet know when we can be together, again.
Now, more than ever before, the familiar words from the apostle Paul come to mind. Long a part of evangelists have called the “romans road to salvation,” we hear how salvation is as close as the words on our lips and the belief in our hearts. However, I want to take us a little deeper in our understanding.
Just previous to this verse, Paul is talking about the salvation of Israel. He is speaking as one who has been a religious leader, a pharisee among the Jews. However, he states that their zeal for God is misguided because it is not based on knowledge which he now has. He looks at the old ways of belief, that from Moses righteousness comes from following the law. That is, if you live the perfect interpretation of the law of God, you will be saved. But faith says the law is flawed, and the only perfect perfection is Christ. So do we ascend up to Christ, or descend to bring Christ up, because he is dead therefor in the ground, or in heaven?
The best response to this is, “neither.” Christ is in heaven, but Christ is God, and the best knowledge is that God is with us, therefore, Christ is with us. Christ is calling us together, binding us in perfect love, in perfect community, and does so even when we are unaware.
We continue to be told by those in power that we should not be together, that we need to keep our distance from one another, and that out of care for one another, the church building needs to remain closed. We can become very disheartened by this news. However, the other way to look at it is this. We are apart because we care for one another in community. We are apart, yet God is continuing to pull us together in spirit, by His Holy Spirit. We are apart, but the gospel is still alive in us. We are apart, but ministry is still happening because of us. We are apart, yet we are living out our salvation in love because we know our God and our community is a close as a word on our lips, as close as a heartbeat. Their love for us, and our love for one another does not end at the doorsteps to the church. Instead the church of Jesus Christ is alive and doing well inside each of us.
Friends, I know how hard it is for us not to join together in the sanctuary, but our true sanctuary is open, our hearts are open to worship the living God no matter where we are. May our lives bring praise to the one who is always present with us.
Grace & Peace,
Sam