Westmark Corner April 2012
Classmates and Counsins
I love coming to Arizona. Most everything about it is great. The scenery, the mountains, the warmth. The think I really love, though, is the chance to get together with some of the closet friends and family I have made. It is in these contacts that make my visits here rich and delightful.I had dinner the other day with my cousin, Shannon. Shannon is a startling princess of a woman, juggling being the mom of four kids with exceptional levels of energy and a career managing the work of St. Vincent De Paul in the Phoenix area. We can talk and visit at length with ease and breadth. Our conversations range from parenting, to faith, to managing people at work. We drift back to memories and stories of younger years: her ability to school me in basketball games of "horse;" apparently, I am notorious in her family for something she and her siblings call the "Ricky trick." It has something to do with getting out of eating all my dinner and passing straight through to dessert. Along with a tremendous heart for others, she has a passion for God that is inspiring.
The next day I had lunch with one of my classmates from seminary, Bob. Bob was student body president when I arrived on campus at Canadian Theological Seminary. He and his wife were also Americans and so we had an instant connection. Bob is a passionate believer. His love for Christ and for his church is intense. He is also one of the most blunt people I have ever met. Yet his bluntness is overwhelmed by his sincere desire to see people falling in love with and moving forward and deeper in their relationship with God. An hour or two with Bob reinvigorates me with the beauty and prominence of the church's role as the bride of Christ.
Hanging out with classmates and cousins has been a delight and is an increasingly essential discipline for me. They remind me of who I am, who I have been, and where God is leading me. None of us lives life in a vacuum. We have had successes, failures, and reputations, sometimes earned and sometimes undeserved (I am sure I had nothing to do with the so called "ricky trick", but all my protests fall on deaf ears). We have pasts that need to be overcome and potentials that need to be realized.
Paul reminds us of this as he challenges us to walk with faith. In his opening remarks to the believers in Colosse he writes, "We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all God's people--the faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven and about which you have already heard in the true message of the gospel that has come to you. in the same way, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the whole world--just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and truly understood God's grace."
The love and work of God in our life propels us forward. The people we build into our lives can either help us to move forward or hold us back. I am so grateful to have cousins and classmates, and many other who, like St. Paul, keep me sharpened on who I am, as a brother in Christ, and leader in his church.
Who influences you and reminds you of the potential God has laid in you, and the past he has built you from? We are in this faith thing together. Let us continue to build one another up, demonstrating his love and living it out in our interactions, and in building up the bride of Christ, the church.
Pastor Rick Smith
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