October 9, 2023
“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,
‘See, the home of God is among mortals.
He will dwell with them;
they will be his peoples,
and God himself will be with them and be their God;
he will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.’”
~ Revelation 21:1-4 NRSV
I traveled to the Holy Land in 2011 on a women’s pilgrimage and discovered that walking in locations I’ve heard about all my life, like the Old City of Jerusalem, along the Sea of Galilee, and in shepherds’ fields outside of Bethlehem, brought the Biblical narratives to life in new ways. Rod and I are scheduled to depart for the Holy Land on Sunday, October 15. I’ve been looking forward to experiencing the lands of our spiritual ancestors together. It’s a good thing that we are learning to hold our plans loosely thanks to the pandemic. Stay tuned for updates.
There are no easy answers to the troubles in the Middle East. The conflicts are ancient, thousands of years old, reverberating from the days of the patriarchs in Genesis. One of the things I learned in 2011 had to do with the holder of the key to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (Church of the Resurrection). The various Christian sects fought over which group should hold the key to unlock the church in the morning, and relock it in the evening. The arguments were so bitter, the distrust so overwhelming, that it was decided to have a group of Muslims hold the key.
The book of Revelation reveals the holy city, the new Jerusalem as a place in which God has “moved into the neighborhood” (Eugene Peterson’s The Message Translation). It is the same phrase that Peterson used for to describe Jesus, the Word made flesh, who moved into the neighborhood in the incarnation. It is a place where God lives amongst us, wipes away all of our tears. Death will be no more, mourning and crying and pain will be no more. The Word Made Flesh is present here, now. In Gaza. In Tel Aviv. In Woodstock, VA, and Winston Salem, NC. God help is to live aware of who holds us together, not what tears us apart. ~ Anne
Wayfinding 