Wider Embrace, Deeper Love

Who are you?

Where are you? 

What time is it? What season is it?

Why are you here?

What do you see around you?

These are questions that a doctor may ask, or a nurse, or an EMT in order to determine of someone is alert and oriented, or not and there’s a problem to address

And if you are alert and oriented, these questions can have easy answers, right?

My name is Nathaniel. I’m here in the sanctuary at First Congregational Church. It’s about 10:30am. It’s autumn. I’m here because I’m the pastor leading worship. I see a bunch of dear human beings, children of the living god, here around me in this beautiful space. 

Medically speaking, I for one, right now, am alert and oriented … at least I hope so; I hope you all agree. 

But these questions can be deeper questions if we approach them in a deeper, broader way. 

Who are you? 

Really, in the deepest, truest sense you can name right now: Who are you?

This is a fundamental question. And it is a question that we grow into as we grow and mature. Our answers may change and evolve at different times in our lives. I’m sure you can reflect on the different ways you’ve answered this question at different times in your life. Old answers may break down and be reformed. We may lose track of an important part of our identity, and recover it and find that it’s still true but in a new way. We may need to find new words, new communities of belonging, or even new names.

As a person of faith, our relationship with God and the activity of the Divine in our lives is a central part of our journey with that this question: Who are you?

Then there’s the question:

Where are you? 

Literally where we are may change through our lives in ways that we may or may not name clearly. But also, how we understand where we are, wherever that is, here and now, the broader context, this also can grow and change, or be more accurate or less accurate, narrow or broad. It’s good to take stalk of this. Where are you? Where is this? What does that mean? How do we understand it?

And then, What time is it? What season? 

As the Book of Ecclesiastes says, there is a time and season for everything under the sun, that then call us to be and do according to the season. What season of life are you in? And how do we understand the historical era, “The Times We are Living Through”? What does that ask of us? 

And then the really big question: 

Why are you here?  

Why are you here, here, this moment? What has brought you to this sanctuary on a Sunday morning?

And then why are you here in this existence in a more fundamental sense? Big question, important question. There can be multiple answers; there can be one central answer. There may be times we feel clear about our purpose, times when we are searching or adrift, times we have breakthroughs, times when we experiment and play with the big Why? Why are you here?

This question can draw on the big God-scope of things. “God, why am I here? Why did you breathe me into life? Why did you bring humans to be? Why is there life in the wider than human world? What is the meaning of all this, and my role within it?” 

And then, back to the more concrete:

What do you see around you? What do you observe? Right here and now. 

Am I alert and oriented?

These five questions are always good questions to check in with throughout our lives, and, really, throughout the day. 

It can be a prayer practice, to ask these questions of ourselves. 

These questions can help us to live with greater purpose and greater awareness. Whether or not we always have clear answers. It can be really helpful to realize, you know right now I’m not as sure as I used to be about who I am – I’m going through a transition. It can be really helpful to name that, and to be sure we’re bringing that before God. 

Asking these five questions can be a discernment practice, not only in reflecting personally, but also in talking with family and friends and kindred spirits. 

These are good questions also to ask ourselves as a group, as a church. 

Who are we?

Where are we?

What time is it? What is the Season? What are the times? What is that asking of us?

Why are here?

What do we observe around us?

And then I’ll add the next step: As we prayerfully discern these things, what are we led to do next?

For my part, here and now this morning, I’m not going to just tell you all what I think the answers to these questions are for us as a church. Because this is a group effort, and discernment is something that we are doing together, through conversation, and prayer, and the choices we make big and small. 

I will say it is very clear to me that we as a community of faith have a very important purpose, in this place and this time. We have a very important identity and spirit and reason for being. Thank God. 

We just heard from our Moderator Jen Rickard a very moving statement about our church’s purpose and identity in these times, and our call to a Wider Embrace and Deeper Love. 

Lives are being changed. The love of God is forming and reforming us and moving through us to embrace more widely and love more deeply. 

God has been on the move, God is on the move, God will be on the move through us and through those others we may not yet know who are drawn to participate in this sacred project through and beyond this dear community of faith. 

We have the opportunity and the challenge, the call, to live ever more deeply and fully and clearly and boldly into our purpose and identity, in this place in these times. We have the opportunity and the challenge, the call to live into an ever wider Embrace, an ever deeper Love.

I give thanks to you all; I give thanks to those who came before; I give thanks to those who will come after; I give thanks to widest embrace and the deepest we find with God as manifest through Jesus. 

Thanks be to God. 

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