Reclaim Jesus

According to preacher and well-known author Jim Wallis in his 2019 book Christ in Crisis: Why We Need to Reclaim Jesus: “Many Christians today don’t know or fully realize that racial and cultural integration was an original and primary mission of the first disciples of Jesus.  Galatians, and similar passages in the epistles of Ephesians and Colossians, were culminations of earlier biblical commands about how the children of God should always be welcoming to ‘outsiders.’ 

The early church was making a public statement, because baptism was a public and not a private event.  This was the statement: In this community we will overcome the divisions between Jews and Greeks, men and women, slaves and free.  If you don’t want to be part of the kind of community whose purpose is to bring people together, don’t join this community…”

If only today – and tomorrow – we could see the same attitude applied to those claiming to be members of the Republican and Democratic parties: overcome divisions.   Our “community” is the United Stares of America.  It just seems so many elected officials haven’t joined this special community.   People are not and will not be brought together as these tribes compete for power and control.   Our community suffers – greatly.

Today’s responsorial psalm sings, “Let the Lord enter; he is king of glory.”  If only our beloved nation would.  Divisions are like closed doors.  The Lord knocks, but few hear during our ongoing political death spiral.  Somehow our baptized Christian political leaders must reclaim Jesus.

Deacon David Pierce