Pastor Amy's Thursday Thoughts

As many of you know, I spent last week in Omaha, Nebraska, where I participated in the American Baptist Biennial Mission Summit alongside about 1,000 fellow American Baptists. While my days were very full with board meetings, a theology conference, worship sessions, networking, and meals, I did manage to slip away one day with a friend and walk down to a local artist store. There I saw this statue of a singer made from an old hair dryer! She was singing her heart out while standing next to a small fireman made from an old fire alarm pull. What a fun new creation from old, discarded items.

You may be familiar with this verse in Romans 8:28: “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to God's purpose.” That’s a very hopeful verse, isn’t it? But, it is hard to imagine that all things actually work together for good - especially really hard things likethe deaths of young campers in Texas or the starvation of children in Gaza. Just because an old broken down hair dryer gets new life as a piece of art doesn’t mean that the deep pains and broken parts of this world can be made into beauty.

What can redemption even look like when things seem broken beyond repair?

That verse in Romans is followed by Paul’s statement that things work together for good when we work to be conformed to Jesus. And when we become like Jesus, nothing can separate us from God’s love: “Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?”

The key here is we have to take an active part in helping to turn brokenness to goodness by being transformed ourselves so we shine Christ into this world. How do we take the brokenness of the world and our lives and turn it into goodness? We love one another. We heal the broken. We live at peace. We free captives. We speak the truth.

Let us join God as artists who actively work to turn this world’s pain to beauty - even if the outcome is something entirely new.

Blessings,

Pastor Amy

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