A favorite quote of mine is one I discovered just before Ray and I began Summer Greek two years ago: "I love the recklessness of faith; first you leap and then you sprout wings." (William Sloane Coffin)
That quote describes so many steps on this journey. Quitting work to attend Greek, selling a house and moving near campus, taking out student loans to finance our education, volunteering on the Gulf coast last winter, and now packing up to move into an apartment we have not even seen...
Add to that the financial concerns of not having our house rented out, not knowing if we should leave extra 'stuff' here or move it into storage, etc. As we wrote in a recent email to many of our friends and family, and have discussed with one of our classmates here on campus, this uncertainty - or rather, the willingness to proceed in spite of the uncertainty - seems to be a major component of the internship experience and the whole seminary process. Sort of a test of your resolve - first you leave home and come to campus, then you leave campus and venture into the unknown again - knowing that you will be returning again in a year. Just the sheer logistics of moving repeatedly are enough to deter the faint-hearted!
So is it recklessness that brings us to this point, or is it faith? When should a sane, sensible person say "Enough!"? Or does faith enable us to leap and simply trust that the necessary wings will indeed sprout? How much are we responsible for and how much should we leave in God's hands?
Yesterday in worship, as the gospel was read and preached (the feeding of the 5,000 from John 6: 1-15), I was reminded again that the God who created the heavens and the earth, led his people through the wilderness, and sent his own Son to feed and heal and redeem - this same almighty God will lead us through our wildernesses and feed us and provide for us here on earth AND bring us to eternal life.
So, by the not-so-recklessness of faith, I'm back to packing boxes with a calm spirit, preparing for the move by doing the part that I can and awaiting God's action to take care of the rest.
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News from Ray & Ruth Ann about life at Seminary. This web log was started as we prepared for a trip to Mississippi to spend a month with LDR (Lutheran Disaster Response), and continued when we returned to seminary. The blog went with us on internship, and now has followed us back to seminary for our senior year.
1 comment:
So...you have answered the Everett question of "What does the wilderness look like?"
There is good sermon fodder in here for when it comes time to discuss walking by faith and not by sight.
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