... and rest clears the mind...

Thankfully it has cooled off!  My apartment is only 76 right now and it is 5AM.  Feels refreshing!  The dawn is about to break and I can hear the birds beginning to chirp.  The first light of the day is playing peek-a-boo on the horizon.  Kenny Chesney is softly singing from the old radio that my mom used to stand at the kitchen counter, looking out the kitchen window, and listen to the funeral announcements.  The wheat is ripening, farmers are resting and I am teasing a message from my heart for the eager Sunday morning ears.  Can it get any better than that?

Where is your staircase leading you?
The scripture I am working with today is Ezekiel 2:1-5 and Mark 6:1-13 where there is a common thread of human frailty within certain context. Ezekiel has been called by God to do the job that most are called to do. Care for others and watch over humanity. In biblical terms he is called a 'prophet' calling out to those who have rebelled and turned away from the God of Israel. God is telling Eze to go and take a stand. God reminds Eze that the people are "impudent and stubborn" (vs4). Funny the people of 6th century BCE sound much like us today. Then in Mark, Jesus has returned to his hometown and begins to teach. Those who are listening are a little leery. The bible says they were "astounded". I wonder if that is what Justin Beiber witnesses when he returns to Stratford? His mom likely still chastises him for leaving his cereal bowl on the counter.

Well Jesus comes into this context and attempts to share with them what he has learned and what he knows about God. Ezekiel begins his journey trying to help people understand that the God of Israel is for real. Both on a journey that feels like a mammoth task. Has anything changed today? As students of Jesus we look out into a world that is consumed with materialism, greed, poverty and a numbness that has taken over the young people.  Where is it leading us?  With worship and spirituality being contained into one hour on a Sunday morning for a very select few how do we stand on the soapbox and tell those who have been pawns in a consumerist world to wake up and realize their very soul is being raped by their behaviour?

We do it by being Christian.  We follow Jesus and continue to share the good news that God is alive and well in our heart and that should we become present to the spirit we will feel a renewed breath of life.  While I was away in Jogja, I realized and separated Jesus from Christ.  The man Jesus stood for much  more than the Christian faith gives him credit for.  Like Ezekiel before him Jesus was called to God to save the people from themselves and in the wake Roman execution Jesus somehow morphed into this superhero.  A superhero who was predestined and predetermined to the death he endured. 

So I ask you what does it mean for you to be a Christian?  Are you tied to doctrines and predestination or are you a Jesus follower and an Ezekiel that God can nudge, from the inside out, to "stand up on your feet and hear what God has to say to you" (vs1)?  God is real, but real in the sense that God is within the fibre of our being as the creator of all life and through the Spirit we are called to live and breath.  Life is about action and challenging others to step up when they see injustice and step out of the luxuries that numb us into a sense of security. 

Separate Jesus from Christ and come to the hometown of Nazareth, go out two by two and help to cleanse the world of social poisons, free yourself from the material overkill and feel the freedom that can be in your heart.  As the sun comes up over the horizon it will rise afresh as you see the world through a new lens.