Susan LaffertyToday is the day. Yes, today. While panic swirls in the atmosphere. Surging through conversations and broadcasts and social media. As a global pandemic postpones, cancels, locks down.
Today is the day. To remember what is true. And focus on the lifeblood of this walk by faith. The only way we live and breathe and have our being.
Jesus invites us. Right in the middle of the normal and the upside down. Whether we’re walking through the ordinary or the unprecedented.
They are traveling. Jesus and the disciples. They enter a village, then a house. Martha’s house.
Right before this, Jesus sends the disciples out into the harvest. Two by two. With several instructions. Including the following directive for entering a village.
“Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace to this household.’ If a person of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; but if not, it will return to you” (Luke 10:5-6). The person of peace is their welcome. Their home base. For each particular village.
Now they enter a new village. Then Martha’s house. Perhaps they say “Peace to this household.”
“And a woman named Martha welcomed Him into her home” (Luke 10:38). A person of peace.
Advent. We light candles in the pauses of the season. Waiting.
At times we’re carried along by the crowd in motion around us. Rushing between this and that. We don’t want to be caught up in the shopping and glitter and expectations. But it happens. Again.
So we stop. Breathe. Consider what is true.
And waiting, we worship.
