It hardly seems possible that February is ending and we are already counting the days down until Easter. As we approach once again this season of rebirth it is easy to see the progression of the seasons as we move from the darkness of winter toward the warmth and freshness of spring. Here in the Bay Area spring comes very early, already the trees along the walkway to our sanctuary are in full bloom and beginning to leaf out. New life is what God has not only promised us, but firmly established in our reality with the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. One of the great hymns in our green hymnal truly lifts up the connection between the rise and fall of the seasons and the way God has chosen to create new life within us. The hymn takes the cycle God has made so familiar to us in the rise and fall of the seasons and uses it to help us understand the miracle of life, death and rebirth that we will experience in Jesus Christ.

Now the green blade rises from the buried grain,
Wheat that in the dark earth many years has lain;
Love lives again, that with the dead has been:
Love is come again, like wheat that springs up green.

The seasons are comfortable but Jesus death on the cross is certainly not. In our culture we shy away from any and all thoughts of death. For this reason many churches no longer even have Good Friday services, they just make people uncomfortable.
The truth, the only path to new life, is found in the harsh reality of Good Friday. You have to let go of the past before you can move forward. Every winter things die in order for new life to appear in the spring. This is true in our life with Christ and our church as well. The seasons in our lives come and go and if we are not willing to allow things to die, the new cannot spring forth. This harsh truth becomes especially difficult as we grow older. We remember how effective we were and it seems that younger people are not nearly as committed or as skillful. Watching things in our church dwindle or fail is a very painful process.
To even begin to understand we need to get a firmer grip on God’s purpose for our faith community. As difficult as it might be, the task of every generation is to pass along the Gospel, and the church that serves it, to the generations that follow. The church is just not ours to keep or control. Our calling is to pass along the faith, to become disciples in order to make disciples.
To do this we will need to be courageous. It means putting aside your dream and desires and choosing to dream God’s dreams. That is difficult for anyone. Even Jesus when faced with the cost of birthing this new dream of God, prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane; "My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want." (Matthew 26:39)

Trying to sort out the difference between what we want and what God wants is a difficult process. This kind of maturity in Christ takes a wisdom that is different from the world’s and a courageous faith to accept. It means we have to actively seek out those with spiritual gifts like prophecy and discernment who are well read in scripture and grounded in the faith and not rely solely on our hard won worldly experience.
This is living as God designed. The Body of Christ cannot function without the cycle of life, death and rebirth. Nor can we move forward without earnestly seeking out the gifts God has given us and using them. This is true for us as individuals as well as in our life together as the Body of Christ.
Jesus life, death and resurrection are indeed our way, our life and our truth - not an easy path. It is the way of the cross. We have to let go of our old life and surrender to the new. We need to understand God’s purpose for our church and his calling in our life and have the courage to leave the old behind and follow the new calling. And finally we need to choose and actively embrace the Resurrection Life we are called to, we must Invite others into a relationship with Jesus, Grow together in faith and love and Serve our Church, our community and our world as Christ calls us. This is our mission statement here at RLC, and truly when we live it out as the Body of Christ we are able to live the truth of Paul’s dream for a people of God; “we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.” (2 Corinthians 5:16-18)

Pastor Jim Bliss
March 2008