"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has preparedfor those who love him.”
~ 1 Corinthians 2:9
Last Sunday, Pastor Becky talked to us about the Bible’s perspective on suffering. Carefully walking us through 2 Corinthians 1:3-7, she reminded us to think fully and biblically on this critically important issue. As we discussed the message and the warm congregational response to it at our weekly Pastor’s meeting this morning, we were struck again by the number of people in the church dealing with difficult suffering issues. We recalled the old seminary preaching teacher who advised, “Preach to the suffering and you’ll never lack an audience.”
But how do we preach to the suffering?
How do we best serve the suffering weak, the lonely, the poor, the sick, blind and broken?
In April, we set aside a month to prayerfully ask God to surprise us. We started every morning with a three word prayer, “Surprise Me God,” and then we tried to pay attention to God’s answers. For many of us, this simple exercise was an excellent reminder of God’s love and presence in our lives. Simply paying better attention surprised us.
In August, we’re going to return to these “surprising” themes. But this time, we’re going to turn the equation completely around. This time we’re going to spend thirty days asking God to help us “Be the Surprise” in the lives of others. We’re going to ask God to open our eyes to all the wonderful ways we might more genuinely love, serve and divinely surprise people around us; how we might be the very surprise of God in the life of someone near us.
Terry Esau, in his book “Be The Surprise,” tells the humorous story from the teenager years of his pastor. Apparently, this young man took a girl to a drive-in movie theater and, as one thing led to another, they began kissing. But it was not a pleasant experience for the future pastor! According to this pastor, the thrill was gone in about thirty seconds. Either this “girl was a terribly inexperienced kisser, or she had significant technique and embouchure issues. Either way, he told us, “It was painful! She kissed too hard. Passion is good, but jackhammer mashing? Not so much.”
Esau goes on to argue we Christians often kiss too hard. We try to evangelize people by throwing 96-mph fastballs and then we almost enjoy it when people swing and miss. We judge, we protest, we boycott, we chastise, we humiliate, we divide, we demean, we exacerbate, we excoriate. We just kiss too blame hard!
Love doesn’t kiss that way. Love kisses gently. Love kisses as love longs to be kissed. Love kisses the suffering all around us in all sorts of wonderful and well-received ways. Love surprises people. Love is the surprise of God.
May God help us kiss gently! May God help us to be the gentle surprise in the world around us!
Amen.
