Repentance

Bread and Wine Reading: "Repentance", by Kathleen Norris

Scripture: John 14: 2-6
In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.
And you know the way to the place where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

In her essay, Kathleen Norris tells the story of a little boy who wrote a poem entitled "The Monster Who Was Sorry". He says that when his father yells at him, his first response is to throw his sister down the stairs, to wreck his room, and, finally, to wreck the whole town. "Then", he says, "I sit in my messy house and say to myself, "I shouldn't have done that."

I shouldn't have done that--famous last words. It's a shame they aren't the first words. That's what repentance is all about. It's not mere confession; it's not mere regret; it's not even just a promise to change. Repentance is turning around. It's doing something. It's making the last words the first words. It's looking around at the house in which we dwell and figuring out how to make it the place that God dwells, to make it the place where the Kingdom of God comes to be. That IS the Way.

I used to struggle with this Scripture: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to [God] except through me." So what happens to everyone else? I think my thinking was just too narrow. I am continually finding that God is much wider than I ever thought God to be. I do, with all of my being, think Jesus is the Way, the very embodiment of the way that God leads us to Godself. No, I do not think that those who do not profess to be Christian are disconnected from God. I do not think that Jesus ever intended that. He was just far too relational and inclusive for that! I think, rather, Jesus, as the embodiment, the very human being, the Incarnation of all incarnations of God, was God, the Divine, walking with us to show us The Way--not the "way", as in one distinct and limiting road, but "The Way", the way to be with God, the way to connect to God, the way to be who we are called to be by God.

And, just as a reminder, the writer of The Gospel According to John tells us that there are MANY rooms. In other words, our messy, little space is not the only place God is. But our messy little space is also the place that God desires to be, to pick us up, to clean us up, and to love us into The Way. There are, indeed, many rooms. We each have our place in the Kingdom--now and for all eternity. But REPENT---turn around---look around---there are many rooms...you are all here together....and it is only when you turn and look into each other's eyes that you will finally see The Way, that you will truly see and experience the one and only God, the God embodied by Jesus, the human and the Divine, the God of the interrelational Trinity, the many in one.

Discussion Questions:
What does it mean to make a place that God can dwell?
What are we called to do to "make a place that God can dwell"?
What meaning does this bring to your understanding of repentance?

So begin this journey by turning around and making the last words first!

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

For this season, I will try (yes I will try!) to post at least a short devotional every day on my blog at http://dancingtogod.blogspot.com/.  Many of you are part of the email group that gets it every time I post.  (For those who have signed up through this blog, you will get it but for some reason known only to Google, you will get it 12-18 hours later.  Go figure!)  So if there are others that would like to be part of the email group that gets it right away, just email me through the St. Paul's website at stpaulshouston.org.  (Go to "About St. Paul's", then "staff").

AND another opportunity...I have been posting my Lectionary notes that many of you get emailed each Thursday on http://journeytopenuel.blogspot.com/  It's a once-a-week post but if you're interested, take a look.

Thanks for being a part of my Lenten journey!
Shelli