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 along Luke 10:1-11 with you as you wander
After this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go. He said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. Go on your way. See, I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves. Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; and greet no one on the road. Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace to this house!’ And if anyone is there who shares in peace, your peace will rest on that person; but if not, it will return to you. Remain in the same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide, for the laborer deserves to be paid. Do not move about from house to house. Whenever you enter a town and its people welcome you, eat what is set before you; cure the sick who are there, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ But whenever you enter a town and they do not welcome you, go out into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you. Yet know this: the kingdom of God has come near.’"
Some questions to consider as you travel today:
- Jesus sends his disciples out with only the barest of necessities. Have you ever traveled and found yourself a little under-prepared? How did you make it through?
- Jesus sends us out like lambs in the midst of wolves; innocents in a crowd of predators. How do we resist the temptation to become jaded and “wolf-like?”
- Jesus counsels his disciples that sometimes they will be welcomed, and sometimes rejected. How have you found a welcome with others? How have you handled rejection? How do you shake the dust off, and move forward in faith?
Buen Camino!
Rev. Dr. David Chisham
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