Dreams for the Kingdom of God
There’s a strip club a couple blocks from me, next to the QT where I buy gas on my way to church services and theology classes. There are people trapped inside.
I love Your kingdom, Lord… Why are You showing me this?
One of the things about Christ Church that drew me in was love that went beyond our walls. Love for the vulnerable, the economically impoverished, the socially marginalized. People with hearts for refugees. Careers devoted to pursuing just legislation, not just tax breaks. Work to improve education in all neighborhoods, not just mine. Grocery bags for us to fill and return, handed out at the exit. Homes and lives opened to foster children. Adoption.
I want a heart like that. I want to have dreams for the kingdom of God, the kingdom that we pray to come on earth. Dreams of shalom for broken places and people that are so close by, but I’m busy and tired and easily overwhelmed — and frankly, I don’t have the bandwidth to fully notice, because I’m working for the comfortable little dreams of my own kingdom come. Lord, have mercy.
I want dreams that break my life open and pour it out for the life of the world that Jesus loves.
The only thing that scares me more than that is the alternative.
I’m pained by my lack of creative desire. The dimness of my love. I can’t manufacture it. And none of us is called to do it alone. It’s not even just “me and Jesus.” I’m so thankful that we are given to each other as members of one body. We so need each other, and we need to hear and to see what the Spirit is putting on one another’s hearts. We need not only to encourage each other and stir each other up toward love and good deeds — we need to collaborate. This is the design: that we in our weakness would be united by the diverse gifts of the Spirit, and we would overflow with a living hope for the world. As you pump your gas, or weed along your sidewalk watching the neighbors’ garage door close, or stand in line at Fry’s… What dreams for the Kingdom is the Spirit stirring in you? Or maybe at this point it’s just a pang, or a question. Just a place to pray, “What do You want me to see?”
We’re following the Spirit. What we need to do first is to listen. Listen and pray. Listen and pray. Let’s do it together as well as individually. Share it with someone and keep praying.
This short video from Deidox.org has done more to stir hope in me than anything else I’ve read or heard this year. I hope it will stir and encourage your hearts too.
https://deidox.org/film/effect-prayer-has-on-troubled-community/
Laura Henrich
Vestry Member