Romans 8:26-39

Pentecost +11 – Year A

Romans 8:26-39

G*D's Presence unifies us in the presence of any number of fears.

It is so easy to get caught in the fatalism of predestination, rather than its challenge to live as though one were. It is so easy to get caught in hesitating to live because some power greater than ourselves will knock us down, big time. It is so easy to get caught tip-toeing through life lest this charge or that be brought against us.

Each of these separate us from G*D, self, neighbor, and one another. They over-emphasize an enemy that we cannot love and who cannot love us.

A parabolic approach to life is going to begin the other way around. Once there was a person who was afraid of an enemy. They were so afraid that they began to see an enemy in every reflective surface. Finally, they realized that for every weed seed their enemy tossed into their field of dreams, the only way for them to deal with the harvest was to invite their very own enemy to a weed party at the end of the growing season. There the weed seed and the wheat seed were separated. The weed seeds were burned and the wheat seeds were shared.

From this party both began to see a larger picture -- there was nothing, not even twice as many weed seeds the next growing season (the next new heaven and earth), that would keep us from continuing to share the blessings we have received. Together we planted twice the wheat and found a two-hundred times yield.

We are destined to bless our enemies, so we might as well be about it this season.