Psalm 40:1-11
1 Corinthians 1:1-9
John 1:29-42
“Safe Forever”
In our Wednesday Bible study meeting this week, we read and discussed the Gospel text. We talked about the earliest disciples of Jesus and how they came to know him, to believe that he was the one sent by God to be their teacher, leader, and saviour.
We noticed the people who were involved in their becoming Jesus’ followers – John, who pointed to the Messiah and essentially said, “That’s him!” Andrew, who met the Christ and then went to find his brother and bring him along. Jesus, who invited them to “come and see” to stay with him and get to know him.
And I found our conversation to be a little nostalgic. I found myself thinking about my parents who brought me to church, friends who shared their faith with me and taught me how to pray, and the gift of the Gospel texts themselves through which I get to spend time with Jesus, getting to know him, and to love him, and to learn his ways.
We marvelled at the fact that when Simon showed up, Jesus looked at him and already knew how Simon (soon to be renamed Peter) would become a servant leader in the community of followers. I thought about how Jesus must have had plans for my role also, even way back when I was professing my faith for the very first time and being baptized.
But as comforting and encouraging as these thoughts may be for us people of faith – remembering that we are God’s beloved, giving thanks for the ways that we came to faith and found meaning and purpose as followers of Jesus – these days in which we are living do not feel like a time for comfortable nostalgia.
I have to admit that I don’t pay attention to the news every day. I suppose there’s a part of me that wants to retreat sometimes and to protect myself from the constant barrage of horrible, evil, unjust things that are happening every day in our world.
Many of us were hoping and praying that 2026 would be better than 2025 for the world. But we’re less than three weeks into this New Year, and already we’ve seen the U.S. attack Venezuela, ramp up the threats against Greenland, and intensify the ICE raids in American cities like Minneapolis, leading to the murder of at least one American citizen.
Elsewhere in the world, thousands of people have been killed in Iran for protesting the current regime. A general election in Uganda was marred by violent protests and the abduction of the opposition leader. The troubles in Ukraine and Gaza continue unabated. AI cyberattacks are targeting banks and government agencies. Health misinformation is causing a resurgence of diseases like measles. And if you’ve been paying attention to the news, you know that I could go on and on.
This is the context in which we are called to be Jesus’ disciples today. Like the earliest disciples who lived out their faith in the midst of occupation, poverty, disease, persecution, and hardship… to be a Christian today is not just an invitation to join a church community, read Bible stories, and enjoy being together. It is a challenging call to engage in the world as Jesus did when he was among us.
A few days after the murder of Renee Good in Minneapolis, I learned that she was a Presbyterian. Of course, I was already shocked and horrified by the fact that a peaceful protester had been shot in the face by an ICE agent. But when I saw posts from Edgewater Presbyterian Church in Illinois and the Presbyterian Church U.S.A., it felt like it hit a little closer to home.
When I read about Renee doing mission work with children and youth in Ireland and realized that what she was doing in Minneapolis was in response to her Christian calling to be a good neighbour, it felt like a wake-up call for all Christians who may be living in our nostalgic memories and our comfortable pews.
I read a reflection online that compared Renee Good to the Good Samaritan, who put themselves in harm’s way in order to be a good neighbour to someone who was in trouble. Only in this case, the Good Samaritan ended up getting killed by the robbers on the road.
I saw a Christian cartoonist’s illustration of Renee Good being nailed to a cross like Jesus, with the soldiers hammering in the nails depicted as ICE agents.
And it made me proud when I watched a video of more than a hundred Christian clergy from all different denominations, gathered in Minneapolis singing, “We shall overcome” in protest of the ICE raids in their city.
When the Apostle Paul wrote his first letter to the Christian Church in Corinth that he had established, his main message was a call to unity in the church. He had heard about disagreements and squabbles among the people, and he pleaded with them to make space for one another with all their diversities and different gifts within the one body of Christ.
You see, he knew that they were living as disciples in a challenging context as well. Corinth was a thriving, and morally complex Roman colony that served as the capital of the province of Achaia. Ancient writers often described Corinth as morally decadent. The Greek term korinthiazomai (“to act like a Corinthian”) was coined to mean “to live immorally.” The city was also marked by extreme wealth inequality, housing both a wealthy elite and a large population of slaves and manual labourers.
And in this context, the Corinthian Christians were “called to be saints,” Paul wrote. They were called to be people who were set apart for a holy purpose and a mission to their neighbours. Paul said that they were “called into a partnership with Jesus” to engage in his compassionate, self-giving, risk-taking mission to the world.
And, he assured them, they already had all the spiritual gifts that they needed to do this. Although the mission seemed impossible and the threats and dangers felt overwhelming, Paul told them that Jesus would “strengthen them to the end.” “God is faithful,” he assured them.
This week, while I was pondering these biblical texts and these times in which we live, I was also reading our next book for the First Church Book Club. “The Sun Does Shine” is the autobiography of Anthony Ray Hinton, a black man from Alabama who was wrongly convicted of multiple murders and spent 30 years on death row, before he was finally exonerated in 2015 and released.
Ray had a strong Christian faith when he was arrested in 1985 and convicted of a crime he did not commit, but he almost gave up on God during the early years of his imprisonment. He hardly spoke to anyone for three years, while he suffered with his anger, fear, isolation, and despair.
Despite the injustice, racism, and indifference that kept Ray locked up in a tiny cell for 30 years with the constant threat of receiving his execution date, Anthony Ray Hinton was strengthened to the end as he embraced his Christian calling within the context where he lived on death row.
It began when he heard another inmate weeping in a nearby cell and he reached out to ask his neighbour what was wrong. It grew into a ministry of solidarity and friendship across differences of race and religion, without regard for whether the inmates were guilty or innocent of the crimes that had put them there.
I won’t tell you anymore, in case you want to read this excellent book or even join in the Book Club discussion at the end of the month. But one of the things that struck me about this true story of one Christian disciple in the most horrific circumstances was that it was in being a disciple that Ray was strengthened to the end. It was in partnering with Jesus in his mission to the inmates and even to the guards on death row that Ray was sustained until his eventual release.
I think the author of Psalm 40 that we read today had a similar experience. Whatever was going on in his life and context felt like he was down in a desolate pit or stuck in a miry bog. He waited patiently for the Lord and he trusted in God, probably hoping for his circumstances to change for the better.
And I don’t know if the psalmist’s troubles all disappeared quickly or completely, but he certainly felt like God had set his feet upon a rock, making his steps secure. He described it as the Lord “putting a new song into [his] mouth, a song of praise to our God.”
Just like Anthony Ray Hinton who grew up in faith, reading the Bible, and singing hymns, and learning to pray, the psalmist had the gift of God’s law within his heart. And when he did God’s will and spoke to others of God’s goodness, it brought him joy and delight.
So, when we pay attention to the news and do not tune out the troubles and the injustices that are taking place around us, I think that the way to survive, the way to avoid being overwhelmed by the horror of it all, is to use our gifts and our lives in God’s mission.
We need to pray for the world and for all who are suffering and struggling today. We need to give for the benefit of those who have needs that we can fill. We need to be good neighbours, not only to the people who live next door to us, but to those who are in danger from unjust powers.
Most of all, we need to use whatever gifts we have been given to partner with Jesus in his mission to the world. Paul assures us that together, we have all the gifts we need, and that we also will be strengthened to the end.
We can trust that God will fulfill the psalmist’s hope and prayer: God’s steadfast love and faithfulness will keep us safe forever.