Lent: Given

There's a car I see around town when I’m out and about, with a bumper sticker that declares “You will meet God.” I don't like it.

Maybe I'm projecting my own tone onto it, but that bumper sticker sounds ominous and threatening. It's like God is in charge of standards and he's cracking his knuckles with delight at the job to come. He's been keeping tally of everything I do during the day, and he's just itching to open a can of whoop-ass on me, put me in my place and get me to toe the line, or zing! He's going to throw me into the sun.

Every minute that I don't get thrown into the sun is a gift of mercy given to me in place of what I really deserve.

Here's the thing. If that's your view of God, you're missing the big picture. God is not the headmaster of the school who fires a teacher for coming to school pregnant before she gets married. He's not the one to tell a trans teen “There are only two genders.” And he sure as heck isn't about talking tough and insulting everyone he disagrees with.

God is the guy in charge of standards, but the standards he enforces are the ones that provide sanctuary from those who want to push people out and drive hem away. When you meet God, you're the broken one who's been chased out of home, hounded by the authorities and left at the end of your rope while powerful men chase you, hurling insults and calling for your blood.

When you meet God, he's the one who stands in all his terrible fury, wraps you in his arms, and in that disturbingly calm voice, asks the authorities, the politicians and the good clean moral people who have been hounding you, “Is there a problem?”

Every minute that we live, just like every dollar that we have, is given to us to provide and to be that sanctuary to those who need it.


Copyright © 2019 by David Learn. Used with permission.


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