This reflection on the Mt25i Gathering is from Seth, who also participated in the Mt25i Bible Study last year.
I have been to many conferences, retreats, etc. in my life; usually I leave each of these with a head full of new information, pages and pages of notes, and an overall sense that I will never have enough time to do anything with all that I’ve “learned.” This recent Mathew 25 Gathering was refreshingly different: we rested; we spent time in liturgy; we heard stories; we were told to leave pretense at the door; we practiced silence and solitude; we played. In a word, we “Gathered,” like a family gathering around a table at the end of the day to listen to each other, reflect on the world around them, pray for one another, and enjoy the company.
I was struck by several of the themes running through our entire time, and these have stuck with me. Instead of factual knowledge that, to be honest, fades away pretty quickly for me, these themes seem to be sitting at a deeper level. They are below the surface, like the ink from a tattoo. I’m not always consciously aware of them, but they are still there, shaping the way I live.
The first theme is simply that God loves us. I remember thinking to myself at one point, “Do we really and truly believe that God is a God of love? That he wholeheartedly and fully wants what's best for his creation? That, rather than just waiting for us to fail so he can judge us, he is working to help us succeed? We assent to these truths all of the time, but do we really believe them? And if we did really believe them, what would that do? How changed would the church be? How changed would our world be? And what would happen if we truly believed that this love is not just for us but for every single person we see?
The second theme is that prayer is not just something we do before or after the real work of God’s kingdom; it IS the work in and of itself. Hopeful and expectant prayer is akin to rolling up our sleeves, picking up our tools, and working. It requires effort, blood, sweat and tears. And prayer is a defiant resistance to the brokenness and injustices of our world. In God’s economy prayer is kingdom building. Full stop.
The third theme that struck me is that the real work of God's kingdom happens not on center stage in the world’s spotlight, but rather backstage. We don’t always see it, and it’s often overlooked, but it’s there. From a nomadic nobody, to an enslaved people, to a tiny kingdom, to an exiled community, to an occupied nation, to a band of misfits and outcasts, following a backwoods carpenter…God’s kingdom grows in the corners. In the smallnesses of this life will we find God most actively at work. I’m convinced this is why, in Matthew 25, Jesus tells his followers that the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick, and those in prison are where we will find him. It is easy to gloss over these words of Christ, but if we call ourselves his followers, we must take him at his word.
I am incredibly grateful for the M25 Initiative. This group is not just about social justice at a surface level; M25 is about real, lasting, deep change in our world through real, lasting, deep formation of Christ’s Church and Her people. One of the amazing ongoing opportunities for just this purpose is the monthly Old Testament study called “The Lord Roars.” We went through much of the Old Testament last year in the first part of the study. We looked at the ways in which God is especially concerned with the cause of the orphan, the widow, the poor, and the foreigner; in other words, those who are most vulnerable in our world and have the least amount of agency in their situation. This is “baked in” to the entire narrative of the Old Testament. And ultimately, as we understand the heart of God here, we see that this concern for the “least of these” is not optional for the people of God. Pursuing justice and flourishing for those who cannot find it themselves is a key defining characteristic of God’s chosen people.
This study has been incredibly eye opening, convicting, troubling, and yet hopeful. And this year we are continuing the study as we walk with the prophets in Scripture. Theirs is a life of proclaiming God’s passionate care for the most vulnerable, his grief and anger at Israel’s failure to follow suit, and his plan to make things right once and for all. I am really looking forward to this journey; I’m hopeful that this will significantly form all who are involved and ripple out to our entire congregation. May we all be formed to work for God’s Shalom in our world.
