God’s saving power is for all people across time and space. God wills us to believe in divine power, to call upon it, and to respond in faith when we perceive it at work around or within us. We get so lost in our own limited realities that we forget the reality of what is possible with God. We put human power above God, forgetting that God called all creation into being. Power begins and ends with God. And God cares about the details of God’s creation, from the awe-inspiring placing of the stars in the universe to domestic care for ailing mothers-in-law. Continually God uses God’s power to draw us to fullness.
We endure and continue in faith only because of God’s sustaining Spirit—yet we still have responsibilities. What do we do with the invitations to belief, discipline, commitment, perseverance, witness, and proclamation? How do we remain open to God’s transforming power, allowing our lives be a light that breaks through the darkness of fear, hunger, sickness, poverty, oppression, enslavement, and captivity? The first three Sundays this month steep us in the reality of God’s power and presence. We are reminded who God is, of what God is capable, and how we are called to follow. The month closes with the first Sunday of Lent. We know what the coming weeks will bring. The reality of Lent could not be endured without the reality of God’s power and presence offered in these initial weeks.
Enuma Okoro, of Durham, North Carolina, is the author of Reluctant Pilgrim and co-author of Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals.
[ February 5 ]
Wonder-Working Power
Isaiah 40:21-31; Psalm 147:1-11,20c;
1 Corinthians 9:16-23; Mark 1:29-39
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