The Now and Not Yet

Sorry about last week. But honestly, it felt garbled and haywire. This week has not been much better. The war, the rising cost of things, the human lives lost. We are not yet in the Kingdom of God. We are not yet to the fulfillment of the promises of God, but we are called to keep working for justice and mercy. To do the small everyday acts to bring about goodness in a world where there is lots of darkness. 

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Welcome to season four of Faith in the Cracks. I'm Pastor Karen Wright. Life has cracks, moments between activities, places where we feel fractured. This is the space where we listen for God in the ordinary moments of life, where we are reminded that just as cracks let things in, it's a space for light and love to shine through. So just like plants grow in the cracks of a sidewalk, let faith grow in the cracks of our lives, trusting that God is at work within us. Episode 9, the Now and the Not Yet. I want to start with an apology for last week's upload. The audio came out garbled and half broken. And honestly, it felt kind of fitting because that's what last week felt like. Weary, garbled. Something that didn't quite make sense or hold together. And honestly, this week doesn't feel a whole lot clearer. The news has been heavy. War continues with Iran. The human cost, the moral cost keeps climbing. And as the Strait of Hormuz is blocked, oil prices are on the rise, which means the cost of everything else goes up too. And there's recently been a report that it is most likely the United States was the one who bombed a girls' school. And I don't know how to hold that. That we bombed a girls' school. An end to all of this comes a deeply troubling theological point when Pete Heggseth and some of the military commanders have been promoting the idea that this escalating conflict somehow hastens the return of Jesus. That they say it's in the Bible, that it's in Revelation, and that they're wrong. This is not anywhere close to what is in the Bible. They're drawing on dispensationalism, which is a framework from John Nelson Darby in the 19th century and made popular in the Left Behind series. This is not a biblical thing. It's a relatively recent mapping of geopolitics onto an incredibly specific reading of apocalyptic texts that are hard to interpret. And that's alarming because theology in a loving God, when we believe in a loving God, our theology should not give permission for violence like this war. And so I've been pondering how to make sense of the world. And I keep going back to the theology of hope, which is a book written by German theologian Jürgen Multmann. And he talks about the now and the not yet. And that Christian hope is not about wishful thinking. It's not an escape hatch. It's living in a reality that God has made promises that have not yet been fulfilled. That the kingdom of God, a world of justice and dignity and peace, is real and it's coming. And when we look around and don't see it, then we're not there yet. We're in the now, in a place that's imperfect. And it's not about sitting back and waiting, it's about doing the work to get to a place where a world is just and fair. And it's living in that tension, living in that place where we are called to do the things that bring that about. And it reminds me in The Hobbit, now this is in the film and not the book, Gandalf says something about some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check. But I found it is in the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love. And I've seen memes to that effect around the internet. And whether or not Tolkien wrote that sentence, it has truth. That we need to do the small acts of kindness and love. And I think that's part of what I try to hang on to is in a world that feels so out of control, I can control showing up with kindness and showing up with love and bearing witness to things that I see that are wrong, and holding on to the good that I know. So if we haven't arrived at the kingdom of God, which surely at this moment we have not, what can we do in small ways to bring about good? The ordinary acts of kindness and love so we can keep hope alive even when the news is heavy. And that's, friends, that's what we're called to do. So I invite you in the week to come, in the months ahead, find ways to show up, ordinary ways to act with kindness and love. And remember that we're in the now, and the kingdom of God is not here yet. But acts of love and kindness and mercy and justice will get us closer. Until next time. Thanks for listening. New podcasts are released every Monday. If you like the show, share it with a friend, or scroll to the bottom of the episode description and support the show for the cost of a cup of coffee once a month. You can also check out my webpage at faithinthecracks.com. As you go through your week, remember you are a child of God and you are love. May God seep into the cracks and bring forth new life.