Secondary Infection?
Is there a way to make this metaphor work in a good way?
Dear Church Family,
I thought it was age. After all, when Patty was healing from her fractured ankle, the orthopedic doctor told us age was one reason the process took as long as it was. When my semi-annual sinus junk came along and did not go away very fast, I thought it might be age.
For the first time in about 1475 Sundays, I began a sermon with,
I don’t feel good.
Is that maturity? An attempt to gain sympathy for a potentially poor sermon? Or, honesty.
My aim was both honesty and illustration. I had no idea what was causing the prolonged bout with the crud. Like cancer sleeping in my friend Jason’s body or the shingles in yours and mine, the reality of God’s love need not sleep within us. It is our ongoing hope.
Is there a way to make “Secondary Infection” a metaphor?
Maybe? What Dr. Wall explained to me is that I likely had a virus. When my sinuses did not clear as quickly as in the past, it created the occasion for a secondary bacterial infection to grow. Unattended would mean an ongoing up-and-down battle with the infection. And that is what I was experiencing.
There are times when we take in a virus unbeknownst to us. I had not been around anyone I knew was sick. Consecutive days outside in the wind meant I had taken in something from up north or down south.
Our faithfulness to Jesus is sometimes interrupted by things we take in that are not readily visible to us. We are just out in wind, unaware of what comes at us in the normal circumstances of life. Once we begin to feel odd, not as well, as usual, we adjust. Start taking over-the-counter sinus medications, use Essential Oils, and revert to our immune-boosting Vitamin D and Zinc regimen.
Even these habits mask that a delay in identifying the virus may result in a secondary infection. An occasional, but not ongoing, fever indicates that more is going on. It was this symptom that Dr. Wall keyed on.
When we no longer care for others as we once did. When we look at congregational participation as “not doing much for me.” When my love for others is mediated through the lens of what is in it for me. When forgiveness becomes difficult. When grudges become common. When the secondary infection actually creates the fever.
We need an antibiotic.
We do not need a set of “to-dos.” We have already tried that. We do not need to be shamed or be guilted. We have already learned how to avoid those feelings via rationalization. What we can’t do is manufacture feelings. If anything, we feed the negative when we feel bad.
What do we need? Good News.
God’s one-way love, grace, is not cheap; it is free. God does not give us the generic, the sentimental. It is particular. God’s one-way love comes to us in every Advent Season - Jesus. And with Karl Barth, we agree Advent is the ongoing season of the Church. It is the season when we hear of the first arrival of Love-Made-Flesh. Advent is the Season when we remind that Love-Made-Flesh arrives daily, moment-by-moment, by God’s Spirit. And Advent is the season of Hope that what has been experienced often, even intermittently, will become our final ongoing reality in the fulfillment of God’s promised Kingdom come.
Hear the Good News
When we realize that we have taken in a virus unaware, when it has lingered and resulted in a “secondary infection,” hear the Good News.
God’s one-way-love, made flesh and blood in Jesus, is God’s long-awaited promise already at work in the world, in you, and will be the way of the world to come. The reality that Jesus suffered the resistance created by a virus and its attendant infections, those who in a rage against God’s one-way-love killed him, put to death the consequences of the powerful virus - Sin and Death, Guilt and Shame, Satan and Hell - is as important today as then. When we are taken in by the unsuspecting virus hoping to morph and survive, we are still given the Good News that in Jesus Christ we have been absolved of all our sins. The Resurrection is God’s vindication of God’s One-Way Love revealed in Jesus.
You may not feel good. Here the Good News -
In the Name of Jesus Christ all your sins have been forgiven. All of them.
Sunday we continue in the Season of Advent. Read Matthew 3:1-12 in preparation.
Glad I’m Your Pastor,
Todd
Lottie Moon Post Office
Sending Christmas Cards to church members or attenders? Let us deliver them on Sunday in December. Give an Offering to Lottie Moon equal to the postage you would pay to mail your cards. We will set up our Lottie Moon Post Card tables and your may both give your cards and support International Missions at the same time!
Holiday Luncheon - Next Sunday - December 11
Following worship, we will share our annual Holiday Meal. Make plans to gather with us. If you would like to bring a dish, sign up this Sunday to bring a salad, a vegetable or desert.
Youth Christmas Party - Sunday Evening - December 11
Youth! Let’s get our Christmas Party on! Are you in it to win it? Games. Food. Fun. We will start at 5:30 p.m. Bring a friend!