On Church and Mother's Day

Good morning!  We may as well start out by naming the elephant in the room: it’s Mother’s Day.  Sure, it’s the Fourth Sunday of Easter, but really, we all know, it’s Mother’s Day.  You know?  I mean, what’s the resurrection of Christ compared to the awesomeness of moms, right?  

Mother’s Day is incredibly complicated.  On the surface, it seems simple.  Yay, moms.  Let’s have a day to celebrate them, and all the hard work they do, and how much they love their kids!  And there is nothing inherently wrong about this.  But let’s dig a little deeper and underneath that, “yay, moms,” there’s often a lot of other stuff.  We all come here today with our own baggage about moms and motherhood and Mother’s Day - We're so incredibly grateful for our mothers, we're sad that they're no longer with us, we have a terrible relationship with them for whatever reason, our own children -- intentionally or unintentionally -- make it extremely difficult to be a mother, we desperately want to be mothers and are stuck feeling angry or jealous towards those who already are, we feel like we are bad mothers or "not real women" because we have suffered miscarriages or couldn't conceive at all or we delivered by c-section instead of naturally.  Maybe you never knew your biological mom, or she did a terrible job of caring for you as a child, or maybe her brain is wracked by Alzheimer’s and you just don’t know how to relate to her anymore.  Maybe your child has wandered off the beaten path and you wonder what you did wrong in raising him, or whatever.  Even for those of us who have a generally good relationship with our still-living mothers, it isn’t perfect, is it?  No family is, after all.  Mother’s Day is about so much, much more than just flowers and breakfast in bed.  Yes?

So it’s good that Mother’s Day is not a liturgical holiday.  It is not marked in red on the Church Calendar.  It’s not a feast day like Christmas or Easter or Pentecost – All Saints or Ascension or Holy Trinity Sunday or even Reformation Day.  We needn't - and shouldn't - let this holiday, and however we feel about it, define our Christian life.  Because the Church is not about mothers.  It is about Jesus.  Even when the Church has traditionally lifted up specific women like the Virgin Mary or her cousin, Elizabeth, who were both prominent maternal figures, the point is not that they were mothers, but that they pointed to Christ.  Mary’s Magnificat, in Luke 1, is not about “Yay, God made me a mother,” but “yay, God has saved his people!”  Elizabeth’s greeting to Mary is not, “congrats on being pregnant – by the way, how’d that happen?”  It’s, “Come on in, dear mother of my Lord!  And look, the child in my own womb is leaping for joy in the presence of the prenatal Christ!”  Mothers are a good and wonderful thing – and they are meant by God to love and serve and raise their children, and most of them do a darn fine job of it.  But motherhood, and families in general, are not, and cannot be, the focal point of church – ever.  The focus of church is always and only Christ.  

Even our Bible texts for today call us to that.  Let’s look at the story from Acts – the book of Acts, more fully, the Acts of the Apostles, is basically Volume II of the Gospel of Luke.  It’s written by Luke, and it picks up shortly after the first Easter, in the time of the very early Church, as Jesus’ disciples and other believers in Christ began to get their bearings and get organized in a world – and a religion – that had been forever changed by the Resurrection.  And in today’s reading, we get a brief glimpse of what life was like for them.  

“They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.  Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles.  All the believers were together and had everything in common.  They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need.  Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people.  And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.” (Acts 2:42-47)

 Now, it’s important to recognize that these were normal people we are talking about.  They are not living in some ancient hippie commune, or leading some sort of desert monastic life where the cares of the world wouldn’t distract them from religious practice.  Those sorts of lifestyles didn’t develop for at least another couple hundred years.  These are people who had jobs to complete and fields to till and laundry to do and meals to get on the table.  Kids to get to bed even when it was light outside way past bedtime and ill relatives to care for and the thousand other things that come along with daily life.  And surely they lived their lives in all the ways that it was necessary to do so.

But they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.  What do we devote ourselves to?  Work? Sports? Money? Politics? Family?  On this Mother’s Day, it is critical that we remember that families – nuclear families, extended families, friends who are basically family – are important things.  They are gifts from God to us, so that we can be cared for and loved, nourished and nurtured, and experience companionship and a good – abundant, Jesus might say – life.  But they are not God.  They are not God.  

Unfortunately, however, in our culture “family” can become just as much of an idol as an Old Testament golden calf.  It is very easy for us to let “family” slide into first place when it comes to our priorities.  We say it, don’t we, without even blinking an eye: “my life revolves around my family,” or “my life revolves around my kids,”.  And often this happens without our even noticing.  But we wake up one morning and find that the faults of our mother are the entire reason why we can’t seem to get our own life together, and we must ponder this, and wallow in it endlessly.  Or that literally every waking moment of our day is devoted to our children and grandchildren and their needs/wants/desires/or 1000 extracurricular, extra-expensive, extra-time-consuming activities.  This is how our culture is, is it not?  But this is a problem.

Because as Christians, we are not given license to “devote ourselves” to anything other than Christ.  Parents, and grandparents: yes, this means that your children or grandchildren are not the most important people in your life.  Jesus is.  Kids: your friends and family are not the most important people in your life.  Jesus is.  Husbands and wives: your spouse is not the most important person in your life.  Jesus is.  Those of you who have a family structure that doesn’t look like you wish it did: because you lack …. Spouse, children, godly parents, whatever, that cannot be what defines your life.  Jesus is what defines your life. 

Jesus is the Good Shepherd.  Jesus is the Gate.  Jesus is the One by whom we go in and out and are led to food and water and a safe pasture to graze.  Jesus is the One who provides us a fence to protect us from danger, who shields us from thieves and robbers who come to kill and destroy.  Jesus is the only one who can lead us through the valley of the shadow of death, because He has been there first, Himself.  Jesus is the one whom our life revolves around, because it is He who literally gives you life, life abundant, and it is He in whom you have goodness and mercy because you dwell in His house forever.  

What a blessing that is!  What love!  In a culture – and even, too often, a Church – that idolizes “family” above all else, how wonderful it is to know that Jesus the Good Shepherd who leads you beside still waters and restores your soul, the Gate who protects you from evil and opens the doors of Heaven, that same Jesus promises us life and goodness and mercy simply because He loves you – regardless of what your earthly family does or does not look like.  

He leads you to waters that are more still and refreshing than the most tightly tucked-in covers of a bedtime routine.  His goodness and mercy are more than even the most Pinterest-obsessed SuperMom could ever provide.  He protects you from enemies far greater than even abusive or neglectful parents.  His rod and staff comfort you more than a longed-for baby in a barren womb. 

It is to Him and him alone that we look, for the fulfillment of every need, not out of blind obligation “or else”, but because He is our Shepherd.  He calls you by name, and you know His voice.  He knows exactly where the green pastures and still waters are – because He is the green pastures and still waters.  It is safe to follow him, even through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, because He alone knows the way out. 

Mama sheep – and Daddy sheep – you could do nothing better for your children and grandchildren, than to teach them this.  And in fact, all of us here in this congregation are sheep who are led by the Good Shepherd.  We care about, and find a good deal of things in this world important, worthy, helpful, useful, lovely things to support and take part in.  But like the early Church, we devote ourselves only to the teaching of the apostles, to prayer and fellowship and breaking of the bread.  As St. Peter writes, yes, we had all gone astray like distracted, dumb little sheep.  But through the death and resurrection of Jesus, regardless of any other fact about your life, you have been returned to the Shepherd of your soul, and you will dwell in the house of the Lord – forever.  

My goodness, but your cup overflows!

Amen. 

Rest For Bodies and Souls

So, last week in confirmation class, we were going around the room doing “kyries and alleluias” (highs and lows) and it occurred to me that a goodly number of the kids in my class seem to actually hate school.  Just in general.  They hate their classes, they hate the books, they hate the subject material, they hate their teachers, they hate that they have homework, they hate that they have tests, and on down the line.  A good number of them even hate the organized sports that they choose to play!!  

I started pondering, as they were talking…and I noticed that the ones who most hate school also most love gym class…

And then I asked every single kid when the last day was that he or she had “nothing to do” – no plans on the calendar, no place they had to be, no homework, no sports practice, nothing. 

And the ones who most hate school, and most love gym class, were also most likely to tell me that they simply couldn’t remember the last day they didn’t have anything to do. 

Conversely, the kids with the least jam-packed extracurricular schedules seem to like school more, and were more able to identify their last “day off”.  

Now these kids – all of them – are smart, good kids.  When they are focused, they can laser in on some awesome stuff (once, one of them called me out on saying “God” when I mean “Father” or “First Person of the Trinity” because it sounds like I’m saying Jesus isn’t God).  So it’s always been a mystery to me why they are so opposed to school and to learning, and why they are just so…restless…all the time.  

But that evening, the whole thing hit me like a ton of bricks.  They hate school because it is one more place they “have to be”.  They hate homework because it is one more thing they have to “do”.  They hate teachers because they are each one more person who “expects performance”.  They hate the sports because even though they enjoy them at some level, they don’t ever play for fun, they only ever play to win.  Or the sports that they actually do not enjoy at all, they play because “everyone else does” and everyone else “expects” them to do so, as well.  And I think the thing about gym class is that it’s very low pressure.  It’s activities they enjoy, without a teacher grading them or a coach challenging them to better.  It’s a relaxed environment, with no pressure.  

And so I tried an experiment.  We blazed through the lesson, hitting the high points, and then, I told them to be quiet, to put everything – books, papers, pencils, bags, capri sun packages – everything down.  Put it all down, and we are going to rest.  We are going to rest, and relax, and have quiet time for 3 minutes. 

Three minutes was not nearly as much rest as I needed, but I sat on the floor, watching the clock, and praying for these kids.  They, however, were fidgety as all get out.  Constantly changing position on the couch/chair/floor, sighing, tapping their feet, looking at the clock.  Now, I know that three minutes is not enough time to truly get in the relaxation “zone” – but this whole experiment was telling for me.  When a person is exhausted – just done, burned out, no more gas in the tank – 3 minutes of quiet is glorious.  When you’re that tired, you know exactly what to do with 3 minutes of quiet, and it goes by in the blink of an eye.  When a person has no idea how to just. stop. for 3 minutes, that 3 minutes feels like an eternity.  Which is exactly the feedback I got.  When I finally called time, what I heard was, “That wasn’t 3 minutes!  That was 30 minutes!!!”  No, honey, it was 3 minutes.  I promise.  And so I responded, “You guys just don’t know how to relax,” to which they replied, “Of course we don’t know how to relax!  We never get to!  There’s no time to relax!”  

Wow.  Okay then.  

These kids are so far beyond "tired" that we'd have to peel back several layers to even get to "exhausted."  Which leads to me to wonder if perhaps the greatest faith-gift we could give our “youth” is the gift of rest.  My kids don't harbor objective hostility toward “church”, God, confirmation, the Bible, etc – at least no more than any of the rest of us poor in curvatus se souls do.  But when “confirmation class” and “memory work” and “going to church” and “taking sermon notes” and “doing service projects” and even “fun” events like bowling or pizza that they are “expected” to do and attend and “take seriously” and “put effort into”, then the more turned off they are likely to become, just as they are about school, and even the sports they claim to enjoy.  

How many of the so-called Biblical heroes heard from God in their sleep?  Off the top of my head, I can think of: Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Samuel, Elijah, and NT Joseph.  Even Jesus took time to get away and rest.  Are we stunting our kids’ spiritual growth (and by extension, our own) because they have no downtime, no ability to relax, no way to hear God in the quiet and still – because there is no quiet and still in their lives, and even if there was, they wouldn’t know what to do with it?  

My plan for this week is to start in our normal classroom with kyries and alleluias, followed by devotions, as we always do.  Then I’m going to take them into the dimly lit sanctuary, and give them time to relax.  The only rules will be “no talking”, and “no touching or otherwise disrupting other people”.  They can sit, kneel, lay, stand, on the pews or on the floor.  They can read (Bible or hymnal), they can sleep, they can pray, they can just be there quietly with their thoughts.  

I want to give them 20-30 minutes.  My thought is, they’ll be stir-crazy for the first 10, and after that, they may be able to settle down a little.  Then I’ll bring them all back to the chancel to talk about the experience. 

And then I guess we’ll see what happens.  It’s an experiment, and it may fail, but it doesn’t strike me as a foolish idea.  What if we made it a goal to teach our kids that “here” – church, the Body of Christ, Christ Himself – you will find rest for your souls, and for your bodies?  If that was their “takeaway” from “youth ministry,” their heart-knowledge about Jesus, that He’s the one who gives them rest when they are tired and weary, well, I’d put that one in the win column.  

What do you all think?  Am I crazy?  Is this going to just not work?  Or am I maybe on to something?  Feedback, please!

So That God's Works Might Be Revealed...

As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

Good morning, dear Christians!  This is not an unfamiliar question, is it?  How often in our lives, when bad stuff happens, do we ask ourselves, “What did I do wrong?”  Or "what did they do wrong?” This seems to happen, I’ve noticed, with circumstances that appear to have no other rational explanation.  Frequently it happens with children – what did I do wrong while I was pregnant? What did I do wrong while I was raising them?  But that’s not the only time – maybe if I had eaten more blueberries, I wouldn’t have cancer? Is God punishing me for not believing in him enough? For that awful decision I made when I was a teenager?  For that terrible, horrible, no good, very bad thing that no one knows about? 

Or we do it to other people…what did they do wrong that they’re homeless?  Or so incredibly poor?  Or can't keep a job?  People don’t get that disease unless they’ve done something they shouldn’t have been doing…

And it is true that there are plenty of circumstances in our lives that come about as a direct result of sin – our own sin, or someone else’s sin.  Sometimes life is hard because we sinned or somebody else sinned, and we are now stuck with the natural consequences.  Getting into a car accident when you’re driving drunk is not God punishing you, it’s just what happens when you do stupid things.  Flunking a test that you didn’t study for is not God’s punishment for being lazy, it’s just what happens when you don’t study.  Yes?  But there are also plenty – plenty – of times, more often than not, I’d wager, when rotten stuff happens to us or to people we love because it just does.  Because this world is not perfect, it is broken and scarred by sin, death, and the power of the devil.  Because God is working on a new Heaven and a new Earth when all this crap that we face in our lives will pass away, but it’s not here yet.  

This is why babies die in miscarriages and natural disasters happen and people who eat right and exercise every day get cancer and so much else.  The junk in this world that just is.  It is what it is.  Even Jesus will tell you that.  

Nobody sinned – this man was born blind.  Because sometimes that happens.

And in those moments when inexplicable, rotten things happen…when we feel most like perhaps God has abandoned us…it is at those times when He is most powerfully there…working, working, working situations that He didn’t cause…but that you better bet your britches He’s gonna use for good.  

So we’re going to play with the text a little bit here, I’ll teach you a little bit about Greek, and we’re actually going to use the screens – now this is the first time that Mike and I have worked on this, so give us both some grace here, but…let’s look again at John 9 verses 3 and 4: 

“Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him.  We must perform the works of Him who sent me..."

Well…not quite.  

Jesus does not say, “He was born blind so that…”

The actual Greek does not contain Jesus’ restatement about the fact of blindness.  The actual Greek reads more like 

“Jesus answered, ‘Neither this man nor his parents have sinned: but that the works of God might be revealed in him.’”  

 Well, that’s kind of an oddball sentence.  It’s like it’s missing a whole clause, right? 

Neither this man nor his parents have sinned, but that the works of God should be made manifest in him   ???  .   

And so most – not all, but many – translators have filled in what appears to be the obvious answer – he was born blind.  And we end up with sentences like the translation I read earlier, 

‘Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.  We must perform the works of him who sent me…’

But here’s the thing about Greek, and it’s why I want to depart a little from some of the major translations…Ancient New Testament Greek contains no punctuation.  They just wrote until they were done.  And part of the task of translating is to figure out where sentences end and commas belong, and so forth, so that what's being said actually makes sense.  We do this in English, too, don’t we? There's a world of difference between:

Let’s eat, Grandma.

Let’s eat Grandma.

Punctuation is important.  

So the Greek for these two verses actually reads, 

“Jesus answered neither this man nor his parents sinned but that the works of God should be revealed in him I must perform the works of him that sent me…”.   

We’re just going to leave the part about day and night alone for right now…  

But now we have to punctuate it.  Let’s fill in the easy stuff first.  It’s pretty obvious where the quote marks should go – Jesus answered – what did he answer? – Neither this man… so we’ll fill in the quote marks and the comma after answered, because that’s English convention.  Now, we can also put a comma after “sinned”, since the word ‘but’ is a conjunction, it’s the start of a new clause.    

But we still have a run-on sentence, or at least a run-on clause.  

 “…but that the works of God should be revealed in him I must perform the works of him that sent me [when are we performing those works?] while it is day the night is coming when no man can work.” 

 As I said before, the most typical translation breaks that run-on clause by putting a period and ending the sentence right here: 

“Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him. I must perform the works of him that sent me while it is day: the night is coming when no man can work," 

But what if we change it up?  What if instead of putting a comma after "sinned", we put a period?  And instead of a period after "him," we put a comma?  So that the whole thing reads, 

“Neither this man nor his parents sinned.  But that the works of God should be revealed in him, I must perform the works of him that sent me…”

Well now, that’s different, isn’t it?  That changes the whole situation.  It shifts the man’s blindness from something that God did to him, or at the very least that God allowed to happen, just so that God would have an opportunity to perform a miracle, it changes that to something that, well, just happened, because these things do, but that God is now going to use to “perform his works” in the guy. 

 

Now, I do think we should be careful.  We need to have humility, and realize that most translators are not punctuating it like this. But. I really do think that we can go with it, and here’s why.  God does not willingly afflict people with suffering, just so that he can come back later and prove how awesome He is.  When life is miserable, for whatever reason, it’s true that God will use that to draw us closer to Him, He will take that opportunity to show his glory, his power to heal and resurrect.  But God does not decide to actively make our lives miserable, just so He can show off.  Not at all.  Not. At. All.  

So let’s run with this, for today.  “Neither this man nor his parents sinned.  But that the works of God should be revealed in him, I must perform the works of him that sent Me.”

Okay then, so…what is the work of God?  Miracles? Healing this man’s eyes, so he can see?  Well, yes.  Certainly God does miracles.  But we can’t read Scripture in a vacuum.  We will always have a better understanding of Scripture if we read what’s around it, if we know what else has happened in the story, or what is going to happen.  If we have a sense for even the entire book of the Bible that we are reading, and the entire framework that the author is working from.  So what is the work of God?  I’m glad you asked!  

Let’s flip back a few pages to John chapter 6, verses 28-30:

“Then they asked him, ‘What must we do to do the works God requires?’”  Jesus answered, ‘The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.’” 

The “work of God” is to believe in the one He has sent.  So let’s substitute that into our verses from chapter 9: 

“Neither this man nor his parents sinned.  But that God's work belief in the one God has sent might be revealed in him, I must perform the works of Him that sent Me.” 

Huh.  

This whole story is about the man who was born blind coming to faith in Jesus.  Please notice that this man does not begin the story with faith.  He is not blind old Bartimaeus, calling out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”  This is not the woman with the flow of blood hoping to touch just the edge of his robe so that she will be healed.  He is not the centurion saying to Jesus, “I’m not worthy to have you come to my house, but if you only just say the word, my daughter will be healed.”  No, this man born blind is, by all accounts, just going about his day, minding his own business, and nowhere does he ask that his blindness would be healed.  But Jesus does it anyway.  Jesus heals him because it is that healing process, and everything that happens afterward, that leads this man to believe in Jesus, that leads to the work of God, belief in the one God has sent, to be revealed, to be made manifest, in his man.  

So then, let’s look at the rest of the story – pretty soon after the guy gets healed, the neighbors start to ask.  “Hey wait a second?  Is that the guy who used to have to beg for money because he couldn’t work?  Wasn’t he blind or something?  Well, he’s not blind now…It can’t be the same guy…no, I think it is… ‘Hey buddy, didn’t you used to be blind?  What happened?’”  

And he responds, “Yeah I was, but then some dude named Jesus did this thing with the spit and the mud and the… and when I washed it off, I could see…I don’t know how it worked, man, but I swear to you, that’s what happened.”  A man named Jesus.  That’s his starting place.

And while the neighbors might think it’s a little weird, the Pharisees are outright disturbed.  They can’t let this go on.  This Jesus guy has been running around upsetting apple carts all over the place…and now he’s healing blind people?  And on the Sabbath no less?  Oh, of course it was on the Sabbath…golly gee…it’s always on the Sabbath.  So the Pharisees, who, remember, are the rule-enforcers of the Jewish people, call the man in and ask him what happened, and he tells the same story.  He put mud on my eyes, and I washed them.  I was blind, and now I can see.  Now, the Pharisees are split over what to think – “He can’t possibly be from God…he was working…on the Sabbath!  Sinner.”  “Well, yeah, but how is somebody who is such a sinner able to do these kinds of signs?  That doesn’t make any sense!” So they ask the guy himself – gosh, there’s an idea – it was your eyes he opened, what do you say?  And the man says, “He is a prophet.”  Ok, so we’ve gone from “Some guy named Jesus,” to “a prophet.”

But the Pharisees, of course, because they have their own spiritual blindness issues going on, just can’t let it go.  So they go to the guy’s parents – “He really was blind from the time he was born?”  “Yeah, he really was.”  “Well, what just happened?”  “Uh, we don’t know.  Ask him, he’s an adult.  And, please don’t kick us out of the synagogue!”  So they call the guy back in, and they go through the whole thing all over again…and the guy says, “Why are you asking all this?  When I already told you?  And you didn’t believe me the first time?  Do you guys want to be one of his disciples, too?”…implying, of course, that he has since become one of Jesus’ followers…and he even puts the problem into sharp relief for the Pharisees… “Look, you don’t know anything about him, but that he healed me.  And we all know that God only does stuff like this with people who listen to him and obey his will…so there’s no way that he can possibly be a sinner…he’s got to be from God!”  To which the Pharisees’ response is basically, “Hey ya smartmouth, you think you’re better than us?”  And they kick him out.  

But Jesus goes and finds him – Jesus always goes and finds…Jesus goes and finds him and says, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”  “Who is he? Tell me so that I can believe.”  “It’s me, Jesus says.  The one you’re talking to right now.”  And the man answers, “Lord, I believe.”  

Jesus tells the crowds of people following him, “The work of God is to believe in the one He has sent.”  

Jesus tells his disciples, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned.  But so that the work of God might be revealed in him, I must perform the works of the one who sent me.”  

At the moment that the man says, “Lord, I believe,” the work of God – belief in the one God has sent – has been revealed in the man.  Praise the Lord.  

This is what Jesus does with us, as well.  Sometimes stuff happens.  Rotten things.  Things with no explanation.  Or things that have an explanation, but are certainly not our fault.  And even things that are our fault.  Even the consequences of our own sin, can be quite unpleasant.  Life is tough.  And while God never causes these things, once they happen, He works them over into something that is at least useful. 

 

By his own death and resurrection, Jesus has overcome all the death and darkness in the whole world.  He will open your eyes to see that He is the Christ, the one whom God has sent, to bring you out of darkness, and into his marvelous light.  He does indeed have the power to forgive our sins, to heal our sicknesses, to raise us from the dead, to put back together the situations and relationships that are broken beyond repair.  He alone has that power – He is the one who performs the miracles.  But as much as he does not wish us to suffer, his primary concern is not that we would have no earthly troubles.  His primary concern is not that life be smooth sailing all the time.  His primary concern is that you would believe in Him, the One whom God has sent.  And so as He is healing your sicknesses and infirmities, as He is fixing the things that are broken, in the moment when He is forgiving your sins and raising you from the dead, in the midst of that all of that, He is drawing you unto Himself.  He is teaching you to believe in him, and to trust him for everything, even for life itself.  

The very end – the last two verses – of John’s Gospel tells us exactly why John bothered to sit down and write all this out: “Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book.  But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”  

The world can be a terrible place, and terrible things happen in it.  But even in the midst of terrible things, know that God is hard at work, overcoming sin, death, and the devil, bringing you to faith, and teaching you to trust Him, to believe in Jesus, the One whom God has sent, so that by believing, you may have life in his name.  

Amen.