Going for a Swim

As you can probably tell, water is an important spiritual image for me. Over my lifetime I’ve had many experiences of God’s grace and presence that could best be described as immersion experiences. My deep affinity for the Hawaiian Islands is rooted in this experience. Being on the islands is very much an immersion experience for me. With such a deep love of Baptismal imagery it should come as a surprise that another image came to mind as I was preparing for worship this week.

I’m looking at the end of the 8^th Chapter of Romans and have been chewing on a well known passage…v28: “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to God’s purpose.” I’m struck again by that notion of God’s purpose and the relentless nature of God’s redemptive purpose in the world. I’m struck again by how God’s purpose might be delayed as a result of the vagaries of the human experience, but that it can never be ultimately subverted. This truth is like the North Star. It is a bedrock truth by which we can anchor our life. This truth is more than a port in the storms of life. It is a truth around which we can shape and order our life.

In my own life I’m growing in my experience of the great stream that is God’s redemptive work in the world. That relentless redemptive work of God flows inexorably through creation, whether we see it or even believe it; it is there. When we make the conscious effort to step into the stream of God’s redemptive purpose in creation, we experience that grace in very different ways. When we step into the stream, we are enveloped by the water. It acts on us. It affects us. When we step into the stream we experience the water in ways that are impossible if we observe the water only from the safety of the dry river bank. We are unable to know the true nature of the stream until we step into it and feel its effects directly.

The same is true about the movement of God’s grace. It’s one thing to read about God’s mighty acts of salvation. It’s one thing to read about creation. It’s one thing to read the Gospel and hear of Christ’s life. Simply reading these words may take us to the river bank and get us within sight of the stream. However, if we are to truly experience and understand the nature and power of the promise contained in the words, we need to get off the bank and get into the stream of God’s work.

When we read Scripture, we need to read it with a heart that wants to see God and expects to see God at work in our life. When we pray, we need to want and expect to hear God walking through the garden of our life. When we extend ourselves to serve the needs of creation and the human community we need to both carry Christ with us and expect to find Christ in the people whom we serve. When we come to the Table we need to come not with the desire to recollect an experience that is relegated to history; we need to come to Christ’s Table expecting to encounter our host. The more we open ourselves to these experiences, the more we will know and the more we will experience the transformation that is part of the stream of God’s redemptive work in creation.