8-9-13 - Breaking and Entering

Jesus’ last instruction about being ready has a more ominous tone – “But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour."

Theologians often speak of the Kingdom life of God “breaking in” to our temporal reality – but not quite this literally. Who wants to think of the in-breaking life of God as a criminal invasion of personal space? Why would Jesus use such a negative analogy for something he invites us to anticipate as beneficial?

Maybe to get our attention? To remind us that the life of God comes to us in ways we cannot plan, predict or fully defend ourselves against? The coming of God has aspects of judgment – both Peter and Paul, in New Testament letters, refer to the day of judgment as an event that comes “like a thief in the night.” And the coming of God brings blessings, benefits we don’t want to miss by being “asleep,” unaware. The way of following God in Christ involves tuning our senses and our spirit to become more and more aware of God’s life in, around and through us.

I believe Jesus is telling us to be alert to something we cannot control. God doesn’t always seem to show up in the “expected hours” – between 10 and 11:15 on a Sunday morning, say, or when we’re late for a meeting and desperate for a parking space. There are more critical occasions when it seems like God has not shown up either – and then we see God has.

I once found out I had to move out of an apartment in 72 hours rather than the month I’d been promised. I had a new place lined up but it was not available for a month. I panicked – then started working the phones. Soon I’d found storage in an empty church school classroom, two friend with trucks and six friends with strong backs. They showed up at 9 on the given morning and by noon my stuff was safely stowed and I was on my way to a lunch appointment I had thought I’d have to cancel. The solutions had come faster than the problem.

“Where were you?” I had asked God when this little crisis first hit. “How could you let this happen?” As I saw I wasn’t even going to be late to the lunch date, I had one of those epiphanies: “Oh yeah – you rarely prevent the mess. You show up in it, bringing unexpected grace.” (As a friend once pointed you, you can't get a bigger mess than Good Friday... but that wasn't the end of the story.)

You may have far more heart-breaking examples of times you sought signs of God’s activity and couldn’t find it. That is a hard mystery. Yet, if we focus only on where we don’t see God, we miss all the places God is. God is rarely in the last place we perceived him – the movement of God is always forward. And God does not hide from us – more often, our assumptions and preconceived notions cloud our vision.

If you want to become more spiritually alert, here are some prayer prompts for today:

• If you have some unfinished business with God about times you felt God did not show up, speak it. Relationships require honesty, and there is nothing we feel that God doesn’t want to hear.
• Ask God to give you a clue today of where you might perceive his life around you.
• Invite the Holy Spirit to awaken your ability to perceive her life in you.
• Pay attention to inner prompts you might get about someone or something, or to where you feel peace or do not feel peace.

The more we become aware of the life of God around us, the more we become aware of the life of God around us. And there's a lot of life!