Jan 2023 - Power and Powerlessness

 

COVID-19 has impressed upon us a feeling we Americans do not like to acknowledge: powerlessness. We seize the day. We chart our own course. When life gets tough and challenges confront us, we pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. These old canards, reek of half-truths. Yet, we cling to the mythology of self-determination.

            COVID-19 has ripped this independence from us. Maybe that’s good. We need to need one another, and we are poorer for it when we refuse to recognize our own need. When we step in bold self-reliance, our ability to thrive is limited to our own abilities. When we lean on one another, help each other, and live interdependently, we go places we never imagined. When we live depending on God for life and for good things, we discover there’s no limit to the wonders we’ll behold and be part of.

            I’ll begin my 2023 preaching examining power and powerlessness as we look at Ecclesiastes 3:1-13 on January 8. I was powerless to prevent COVID from interrupting my family’s Christmas celebration. I had the power to affirm and validate my relative’s disappointment. I had the power to pray for her and promise her we will get together soon and resume the family time that was interrupted.

            I cannot force my children to be who I think they should be. I have the power and the opportunity to get to know who they are and to love who they are, just as Jesus loves me as I am.

            I cannot make people in my community be nicer to each other and be kind even across the combustible political divides that so threaten our unity and neighborliness. I do have the power to be kind. God empowers us to be good neighbors.

            I urge you to recognize areas of life where you are powerless. Acknowledging it is no weakness. Rather, to name your powerlessness is to see it and to see that it is not as overwhelming as you fear. Name your powerlessness. Ask God to show you the power you do have. Ask God to redeem your powerlessness, to meet you in it. And learn to live depending on God in all things. That’s my word for our church as we step into 2023.