This year, it’s not enough to give up sugar, even though it might remind you of your frailty. This year, it’s more serious. It’s not the year to give up chocolate—it’s the year to choose a discipline that opens your heart to love your neighbor, and yes, even your enemy. It’s not the year to give up wine—it’s the year to choose to see God in all people. It’s not the year to give up coffee—it’s a year to practice justice with your body and not just your mind, to choose to love instead of hate. 

You are the salt of the earth! 

Not “you might be the salt of the earth.” Not “you are becoming the salt of the earth.” It’s “you are the salt of the earth.” You melt the ice, you make everyone want to eat French fries because without salt they’re not worth eating, you preserve food, you are the salt of the earth.

Your very existence matters and changes things. God doesn’t just want you here, God recognizes that your very being matters.

The Church, the body of Christ in the world, for all the world for all to see, isn’t some sort of impenetrable fortress, strong beyond expectation, able to withstand all the devil’s wiles with perfect wisdom, no. It’s not like that.

It’s stranger. Funnier. Weaker. Filled with quirks and unsightly warts. Uglier.

And it’s beautiful. So beautiful.

God calls those who are ready. And before we all make excuses, before we say “that can’t be us,” I want to remind us that we are ready. The seeds have been sown. The groundwork has been laid. 

We’re ready to hear the call of God, to drop our nets and immediately follow. We’re ready to repent, to have our minds be blown away with the beauty of the kindom of heaven unfolding among us. We’re ready to repent from the hatred and dehumanization of those whom we call our enemies. We’re ready to repent and to move towards the good, to choose love instead of violence, to get wrapped up in justice, kindness, and jubilee instead of death and tyranny. 

Image: "Fishers of men" by Rex DeLoney

All around us things are not right. We are not showing hospitality and love to the foreigners in our land. We are not loving our neighbors as ourselves. 

And we are the ones, God’s hands and feet, God’s body in the world today, witnesses. We must be Church together, to be light so that we together, like Isaiah can be God’s servant not only for those we know, our own tribes, but so that the light of God’s salvation may reach to the ends of the world. 

We must look and see. We must tell these stories to one another. But we are not alone and this work is not impossible. We have one other; we’re in this together.  

Joseph gets a sign, a dream, an angel — a messenger from God — he didn’t have to be afraid, God was with him, he could live his part of his story with courageous joy. The God who saves is with us.

Don’t be afraid. Ask for the sign. Listen to your dreams. And be ready to live in awe-filled dread.

We don't think that we need a savior if everything is going smoothly. But when things aren’t going well. That’s when we start worrying, start praying, start begging God for something else. 

Maybe it’s not happening all in an instant, a moment of divine healing, the fire coming down from heaven. It’s happening inch by inch as we decide and then live the truth that all human life is worth preserving. It’s happening little by little as we decide and then live it, that all humans have dignity. It’s happening slowly and stubbornly as we decide and then live the hope and the faith and the love that in us, small at first, growing to great. 

We are in a “we’re lost and we need God more than ever” moment. This is a time to double down on our love, to read those Baptismal vows daily and then to do them. This is a time to look deeply as we offer the peace of Christ, to surrender to the love of God, to let ourselves be found by the Good Shepherd, and to pray for those who are lost.

Image: Shepherd in Spring by J. Kirk Richards