Today (and/or tomorrow if your schedule doesn’t permit today), get outside for a good, long walk or jog or ride. If you’re physically limited, take a drive to a park or quiet place (by all means avoid the Interstates lest your spiritual pilgrimage end up in a infuriating traffic jam), and if you’re completely locked down because of COVID, then make it a spiritual journey to a place of peace. Take the story of Jesus’ calling the 72, from the Gospel according to Luke, with you:
After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road. “When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ If someone who promotes peace is there, your peace will rest on them; if not, it will return to you. Stay there, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages. Do not move around from house to house. “When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is offered to you. Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your town we wipe from our feet as a warning to you. Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God has come near.’ I tell you, it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town. “Whoever listens to you listens to me; whoever rejects you rejects me; but whoever rejects me rejects him who sent me.” The seventy-two returned with joy and said, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.” He replied, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do. “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no one knows who the Father is except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” Then he turned to his disciples and said privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it."
Some questions to consider as you travel today:
- Jesus sent his followers out to spread the Good News. How have you been a harbinger of God’s Good News?
- As Jesus sent his followers, he counseled them to travel lightly and not take extra baggage; what have you let go of that enabled you to travel in a new direction?
- Jesus’ followers returned with great news of what they saw. What good news do you have to share with Jesus today?
Buen Camino!
Rev. Dr. David Chisham
© 2021 All rights reserved.
At times I put aside most of what I had-career, sense of self.