God's Ongoing Yes--April 14, 2021

 God's Ongoing Yes--April 14, 2021

"... and he [the Son, Jesus] sustains all things by his powerful word." [Hebrews 1:3a]

I used to think that it was kind of cheesy when married couples renewed their vows on the occasion of some round number of years since their wedding ceremony.  

I used to think, "What's the point?  You're already married, and the words of your vows don't have an expiration date, so why go through all the hullaballoo and make people eat mediocre hotel roast beef in formalwear just to watch you make promises all over again?"

And I'm still not necessarily a big fan of the hullaballoo part, or the mediocre roast beef, but I think I've come around on the idea of renewing one's vows.  Just maybe not only for the big milestone years--maybe, like, every day.  Maybe the promises that sustain a relationship are worth renewing every day, every hour, in the choices that spouses all the time to orient their lives for the benefit of the other.  Maybe those promises keep being lived into all the time, and maybe every morning is the right time for renewing them.  Not with an elaborate ceremony, but with the assurance each partner makes to keep showing up for their beloved.  Most of the time that can go without any fanfare... but sure, I guess you can break out the champagne and invite your friends when the odometer turns over to another large round number.

My point in all of this is that enduring relationships--like marriage--aren't just set into motion with a one-time ceremony and then left to their own devices.  Contrary to the popular opinion, a marriage is infinitely more than "just a piece of paper."  Rather, those sort of lasting relationships call forth daily renewal.  They are held, not simply by the force of a marriage license or the efficacy of the preacher's prayers at the ceremony, but by the ongoing sustained commitment of the people in relationship to live out what they have promised.  To be in relationship, then, of any kind--marriage, friendship, family and parenting--is to be constantly making and living out the choice, "I want to continue in this.  I will sustain and nurture this.  I will keep this going."  Leaving it to inertia won't do the trick.  So yeah, maybe every relationship requires either the constant intentional commitment and renewal of the people in it, or it dies, like when a shark stops swimming.

And the reason I wanted to take this detour into relationships is that the writer of Hebrews talks about Jesus and all creation in similar terms: that Jesus continues to keep the universe together by the ongoing, persistent choice to sustain it all. Or in other words, Jesus doesn't blush at all to keep renewing his vows to love the world--in fact, every moment he keeps choosing us all over again in love to sustain the universe at all times.  Yes, even despite the fact that we are often pretty fickle partners in that relationship and keep bailing out on him or harming other beloveds he has committed to in the family as well.  Every moment of history--every instant, every split-second--holds Jesus' renewed promise, his word, so to speak, to keep the universe in existence.

We often assume the world is fixed and solid, that it's permanent and lasts forever because it's made of sturdy stuff, right?  Rocks and boulders, metal and earth, mountains and such?  It all looks like it will just last on its own forever because it's big and heavy and massive.  We figure, if you just leave a rock sitting on the ground, it will just stay there forever, and the world itself must be like that--you know, once it was created, it will just sit there, continuing to exist on its own.  But a more honest look says that at every moment it is God's goodness that keeps the whole universe going.  (Scientists, as you might know, are telling us these days that if you look deep down into something solid-looking, like a mountain, like at the sub-atomic level, you find out that the things we think are fixed and permanent are really mostly empty space and vibrations of invisible "strings" that are ephemeral and fleeting--and yet, the universe persists!)

Think about that: we are here, not just because once upon a time, God said, "Let there be light," and now is stuck with a universe that won't go away, like a stray at the back door looking for scraps.  Rather, we are here because at every moment, God continues to keep choosing to keep the universe together--that every second of every eon of the universe's history is God's repeated, renewed, "Yes" to keep it all here, and to keep holding it all together.  Conversely, if God were not supremely faithful and vigilant, the universe could vanish in the blink of an eye if God simply decided to stop holding it all together.  And yet the fact of our continued existence is a reminder that God goes on choosing us, and Jesus, the very Word of God, is that embodied Yes.

The fact that we woke up today is a sign that God continues to love the world and chooses to commit to it.  This new morning is God's renewal of vows for another day's worth of living.  An that's why Jesus matters--Jesus is God's living, breathing promise with human skin and bones on to keep on choosing us, come hell or high water.  

Your and my very existence are evidence that we are beloved... that we are chosen... that God continues to will us into being--or to love us into being, as Mr. Rogers would say.  Whatever else comes in this day, know that much: in Jesus, God continues to say Yes to you, now... and now... and now.

Lord Jesus, we thank you for our existence, and for your faithful commitment to keep us and to stick it out with us, come what may.