Dear Family,
We can tell that we are entering another season of holidays, can't we? Go to the store and see Christmas trees adjacent to Halloween costumes and Thanksgiving Day settings. Google something and witness your screen light up with themes pointing to the next great celebration. And even our televisions are victims to the onslaught that is seasonal programming. The other day i was watching my favorite sitcoms, which point to Halloween and the 'trick or treat' theme, and i was enjoying the laughter emerging from my soul, when i decided to check the movie channels. What did i find?
Movie after movie celebrating horror, violence, death, and disturbance. We can click off one channel, turn to one of our regulars, and eventually they, too, will show a horror flick. Our prophets, at least on the television set, may not be godly, but they are noteworthy: Jason, Freddy, the Thing, 'legion of deathly angels,' masked killers with witty retorts, and even ghosts and ghouls on Scooby Doo. The inner sanctum of our homes, which is truly our personal vineyard, is invaded, nightly, by these unwanted characters trying get us to keep our lights on, listen to eery creeks, and stay away from dark basements; it is safe to say that these 'workers' of horror haunt and annoy us, nightly.
But isnt that what anyone does who challenges our stautus quo? Dont they, by virtue of making us feel uncomfortable, annoy us to no end? Some of them are relentless in their drive to 'change' us, and we just want to be free of them. What do we do? We do what any good, godly civilization does: we kill them or we ask them to move to Kansas, which is, in and of itself, a banishment worthy of death.
Seriously though. Any voice that makes us face our fruitless existence becomes that pesty fly that wont go away until we swat it. It has always been that way, and my sense is that it will always be that way. They killed the prophets of ole, and Jesus' parable of the vineyard elucidates this truth. We killed the prophets, in one way or another, of today, and Martin Luther King Jr proves this. But why?
I dont know, unless we are so insecure with the 'truth' these godly people bring that we would rather strike them and silence them than listen to them. It is easier to silence the voice of change than it is to fall in line and produce the fruit they speak about. Maybe it will always be this way, even for those of us 'saved' by Jesus.
However, the parable speaks about religious folks who think they are 'in' when in reality they are, by the fruitlessness of their faith, on the outs. God loves them enough to send, like the Halloween themed shows on our TVs, teachers, prophets, and a Messiah, to help the religious see, but the religious refuse to see or hear or change. So, according to the parable, God is giving the vineyard to fruitful followers. (Those who were often left out of the religious circles).
What will be our destiny? How will we know which path we are on? What is Godly fruit?
According to our reading, within the Brethren context, the fruit of the vineyard God seeks are: mercy and justice. Are we merciful? Are we just? Do we seek justice? Struggle for it? Live for it? I would add these fruits to that as well: love, peace, forgiveness, acceptance, holiness. Are these our fruits? If these are descriptors of what we produce, how much longer will God keep our vineyard open? And if we don't produce these fruits, what's holding us back?
Maybe we fear a loss of life, but i contend life is only truly life when we enter the vineyard and becomes vessels of love, mercy, forgiveness, peace, and holiness. It is only life, true life, abundant life, when these fruits flow from our being. We should no longer worry about the sacrifices we have to make or the lives we will lose to follow Jesus, because what awaits us is something greater and more holistic than we could ever dream. We have yet to experience the fullness of life, but when we bear the fruits of Jesus, we experience the fullness of life, and that makes it all worthwhile.
Whether we like it or not, we will be inundated with images and themes of Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas until 2012 comes into being, and these false prophets will annoy us, for sure. But through it all, outside the comfort of our homes, is a vineyard where the only TRUE prophet lives, and when we quit muting Him, we will find the freedom, the joy, the peace, and the life we have been seeking all along. Amen.
Shalom
Salaam
Peace
Jerry
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