CHALLENGE AND REASSURANCE [F, 10-2-20]

CHRIST IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith & Life for the Years of Winter

I have a hard time these days finding “inspirational” reading that is helpful to me. “Inspirational” writers, even those who rather righteously announce that they are “spiritual but not religious,” seem to think that I need to be inspired by being “challenged” to do stuff. But I’m old. What stuff can I do? I’m not even allowed out of the house. I don’t need challenge. I need reassurance.

Today, in my daily search for helpful guidance for my spirit, I read a meditation about the women who followed Jesus around with their big bulky purses, so that he didn’t have to work a job for pay in order to eat. It was a motley bunch of women. Some were just using their husbands’ credit cards. Some maybe earned their money as “sex workers.” Some were washer women. Some apparently did not put their mite into the temple treasury but used it to get takeout for Jesus.

I’ve always liked that story, always liked those women, that motley crew with not much in common, except they wanted to hear good news and make sure others got to hear it, too. Makes me feel satisfied that they are in the Bible story.

The writer saw that story, though, as a chance to challenge me. “Those women used their resources to support Jesus.  What are you doing to support Jesus with the resources you have?”

Well, sheesh. Not much, and I’d rather not be reminded of it.

Instead of a “challenge,” the writer could have just pointed out that there are good people in the world, folks who try to be supportive. Not that one of them will always show up when I am in need; that’s somewhere between naïve and stupid. But there is reassurance simply in knowing there are good people around.

I would apologize to all the old and feeble people in my churches that I “challenged” when I should have been reassuring, but I can’t, because they are all dead.

I suspect, though, that the Holy Spirit helped them to hear The Word, hear what they needed to, in my words, got reassurance even while I thought the words were about challenge. The Spirit is like that. That’s reassuring.

John Robert McFarland