my train of thought...

The past couple days I have realized something - more like God has hit me over the head with something! I have been complaining a lot and not fully seeing ALL of the blessings he has given me. I have been complaining about no friends, no car, having a curfew, being broke, being homesick, being tired, being overwhelmed... just about everything under the sun. A couple days ago I looked around and thought, "What on earth do I have to complain about? I have a warm place to stay, tasty food to eat, a rad community of amazing people to live with, a chance to let God drown me in his love and grace and blessings, and the adventure I have always wanted! What more could one possibly want?" I felt humbled and ashamed and in awe all at once. Humbled because once again God has blessed me with so much that I don't deserve. Ashamed because once again I failed to recognize the blessings for what they are. And in awe because once again God has proved himself so faithful to me and I can't help but be in awe of him. He is so awesome.

Speaking of "awesome"... We underestimate the value and power of that word, I think. Webster defines awesome as expressive of awe: deeply reverent. Awe is defined as profound and reverent fear inspired by deity; abashed reverence and fear inspired by authority or power; veneration and latent fear inspired by something sacred, mysterious or morally impressive. Therefore, if we use that term to describe God should it, or can it even, be used to describe other things? I have to say that it can't accurately be used to describe something unholy, not sacred. How could something that refers to deity in the definition be tossed around with so many other things? It's like the word "love." So many people toss that word around - I love my shoes. I love her hair. I love my boyfriend even though I've only been out with him a few times. I know this subject has been covered before but I think we forget sometimes how powerful that word is. The word awesome is just as powerful and we forget that too.

We took part in the Eucharist tonight as a student body. We read I Corinthians 11 out of The Message before we approached the Lord's table. And then the pastor said, "This table is not a table for perfect people. It's a table full of grace. Perfect grace. Unexplained grace. But grace that could be unexplained could not, at the same time, be mysteriously holy." Perfect words.

Regarding this next item, I'm not at all pleased. I am getting the picture that when you meet together it brings out your worst side instead of your best! First, I get this report on your divisiveness, competing with and criticizing each other. I'm reluctant to believe it, but there it is. The best that can be said for it is that the testing process will bring truth into the open and confirm it.

And then I find that you bring your divisions to worship--you come together, and instead of eating the Lord's Supper, you bring in a lot of food from the outside and make pigs of yourselves. Some are left out, and go home hungry. Others have to be carried out, too drunk to walk. I can't believe it! Don't you have your own homes to eat and drink in? Why would you stoop to desecrating God's church? Why would you actually shame God's poor? I never would have believed you would stoop to this. And I'm not going to stand by and say nothing.

Let me go over with you again exactly what goes on in the Lord's Supper and why it is so centrally important. I received my instructions from the Master himself and passed them on to you. The Master, Jesus, on the night of his betrayal, took bread. Having given thanks, he broke it and said,

"This is my body, broken for you. Do this to remember me."

After supper, he did the same thing with the cup: "This cup is my blood, my new covenant with you. Each time you drink this cup, remember me."

What you must solemnly realize is that every time you eat this bread and every time you drink this cup, you reenact in your words and actions the death of the Master. You will be drawn back to this meal again and again until the Master returns. You must never let familiarity breed contempt.

Anyone who eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Master irreverently is like part of the crowd that jeered and spit on him at his death. Is that the kind of "remembrance" you want to be part of? Examine your motives, test your heart, come to this meal in holy awe.

If you give no thought (or worse, don't care) about the broken body of the Master when you eat and drink, you're running the risk of serious consequences. That's why so many of you even now are listless and sick, and others have gone to an early grave. If we get this straight now, we won't have to be straightened out later on. Better to be confronted by the Master now than to face a fiery confrontation later.

So, my friends, when you come together to the Lord's Table, be reverent and courteous with one another. If you're so hungry that you can't wait to be served, go home and get a sandwich. But by no means risk turning this Meal into an eating and drinking binge or a family squabble. It is a spiritual meal--a love feast.

Examine your motives and test your heart; come to this meal in holy awe. Holy awe. There's that word again. From now on, I will think twice about using that word again and ask myself if the thing, event, person, place... is worthy of such a powerful word.

I have never read this passage of Scripture out of The Message. It enabled me to view communion in a different light: luminous glow, warm and gauzy, solemn and joyous, transparent, sacred, holy, all these at once. It was a different experience for me this time. It was an encounter.

I felt like I had more to say than this but I was trying to help a friend witness to another friend online (and have lost "my train of thought"). It was a cool experience and I am glad I was a part of it. At 12:20 tonight we will be talking to the same guy on the phone and hopefully will have more answers at that time and people in the room praying for us and him. He has a lot of questions and it's so exciting! Father, I just ask that you go before us and prepare the way, prepare his heart and open his mind. Come beside us and guide our hearts and give to us the words to speak. Follow behind us and seal up the work you will have us do tonight so that it can't and won't be undone. Amen.