Give Yourself Away
Commentary
After the Resurrection, Jesus met with his disciples in many places and situations. Many Christians have a hard time believing this. Many say that the disciples lived in a time when people were superstitious, and such encounters were expected. But it is clear when we read the stories about the Resurrection that this was not at all the case. The disciples didn’t believe the women when they said the tomb was empty and there was an angel or two in the tomb. Thomas, absent when Jesus appeared in the upper room, declared he would not believe until he could put his finger in Jesus’ wounds. The disciples who met Jesus on the Emmaus Road didn’t recognize him until they invited him to stay with them for the night. As they sat down to supper, he broke the bread and they knew it was Jesus (he is to be recognized in the bread and wine).
We are all post-Resurrection Christians. We never saw Jesus in the flesh. And we usually doubt those who say they have spoken with or seen Jesus in a vision. We don’t really know what Jesus looked like in life. Nor do we know what his voice sounded like when he was teaching. All we have to go on (unlike his disciples) is how Jesus speaks to our souls.
Today’s scriptures speak to our current condition, telling us that we aren’t the only ones with doubts. They remind us that knowing Jesus is more than a matter of good eyesight. It is having a spirit and a heart that is open to the unknown. Are we open to recognizing Jesus in his various disguises, as Mother Teresa used to say? Then and only then will we be able to say, “I have seen the Lord!” and only then will Easter live within us.
Acts 9:1-6 (7-20)
I love this story, not so much as it is about Saul/Paul but as it is so much about Ananias. I identify with him. Protesting, he is dragged by God to the house of Judas on Straight Street. And what is he protesting about?
“Lord, you don’t know this guy. You don’t know what he’s been doing. You can’t mean for me to go over there?!” Ananias updates God on what Saul had been up to recently — arresting the Christians in his area. Even as they spoke, Saul was having a highly personal meeting with Jesus on the road to Damascus.
Of course! God doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Although, as Tim Rice portrays Jesus saying in “Jesus Christ Superstar,” God is very good on what and when, and not so good at “why.” But this time, God is specific about the ‘why’ — “He is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel; I myself will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.” So, Ananias went. This was definitely an act of faith. For if Saul was struck blind, it was surely an impediment to him seeking out “followers of the Way,” as the first Christians were called.
So Ananias laid his hands on Saul and said, “Brother Saul…” Amazing faith. This enemy is suddenly a brother to the Christians in Damascus. More, this new brother’s eyesight, lost for three days, is suddenly restored as soon as Ananias touches him. Even more, Saul consents to being baptized as soon as his blindness leaves him. Another leap of faith. How does Saul know that Jesus is the source of his recovery? Moreover, this healing is accepted by those early Christians, because Saul changes. No change, no healing, no encounter with the risen Christ. It all has to happen to be authentic.
In the way the lectionary lists the verses in the selection for today, this is the optional part of the story, however. The main story, as far as those who set the lectionary, is just six short verses at the start of Chapter 9. Saul was approaching Damascus, when a sudden light flashed around him, causing him to fall over. Then a voice asks him, “Saul, … why do you persecute me?”
While we translate the Greek to say that Saul responds by asking, “Who are you, Lord?” it could also be translated as “Who are you, Sir?” which fits the situation better. Saul could not possibly know that it was God talking to him, and he would never have called Jesus ‘Lord’ yet. And if he has been struck blind, there is no way he could see who was talking to him.
A few months ago, Guideposts magazine ran an ad, asking of their readers, “Have you ever heard the Voice?” They then asked a number of questions they wanted answers to: “How do you respond when you hear that Voice?” (possible answers include, “I ignore it”, “I do what it says immediately”, “I wait to see if I hear the same thing again,” and a couple of others. What they did not ask was if hearing that Voice has changed the life of the person hearing it.)
This is why I think it’s so important to read the whole story about what happened to Saul. He didn’t get up, brush himself off and start screaming “I can’t see! Help! I can’t see!” At least Luke doesn’t say that was Saul’s first reaction. We’ll never know.
What we do know is that Saul was in for an incredible life. His companions on the journey took him to the home of a person known to them, where they took care of him. Probably cold compresses on his eyes. And Saul can be forgiven if he laid there mumbling to himself about this heretic who was crucified, who seemed to still be alive, and a man named Ananias who was being sent by God to heal him.
The story doesn’t end here, does it? Not at all. The story is of a man struck down and being asked “Why are you persecuting me, Saul?” But it moves on to the voice telling Ananias, “I have plans for this man. Go give him back his sight.”
In the movie Avatar, the people of Pandora greet each other with “I see you.” It doesn’t mean “I see you with my eyes,” it means “I see that you are one of us. I see the spirit within you. I see your heart.” There is a great deal of tragedy between the first time Jake (the hero of the story) says that because it is the proper greeting and the beginning of the salvation of the Naavi and Jake descends from his humongous flying steed and says to the leader, “I see you.” He is changed. This man, who started out being bitter because his brother had been killed and Jake himself had wound up in a wheelchair, a Marine who was promised his legs would be restored if he could get the Naavi to give up their ancestral home so the people of Earth could mine the mineral under their feet. Despite that promise, Jake changes as he comes to know the Naavi, and soon finds himself wanting to be one of them.
So it is with Saul. First God blinds him so he will know how weak he is, how he is living in the dark. And then he sends a follower of Jesus to heal his blindness. Not that Ananias sees perfectly — it doesn’t take a saint to do the work of God — but when God speaks, he listens, argues and then does what he’s told. Just like the rest of us. And Saul immediately starts to witness to others about the work that Christ is doing in and with and by him. It is not enough that we say, “Yes, I see what you mean. That’s an interesting idea. We must talk about it some time.” The Spirit moves us to say something like, “Yes, I see that God had work to do, so he took on human flesh, and moved people to follow along and get the work done that would restore a fallen world.”
We certainly could use a few million people willing to do so.
Revelation 5:11-14
Too often, people read Revelation and think that it is a foretelling of the End Times (the Apocalypse is big right now in literature and film, featuring people’s faces melting down or everyone going blind in barren landscapes featuring large craters). They skip over the parts where all of creation, from the frogs to the archangels singing praises to God. Today’s scripture is one of those.
Even worse, many who read these words believe that those choirs singing praises to God are singing in a solemn sort of way, rather than in a joyous way. As a pastor, I occasionally would stop the organist or other musicians and say to the congregation, “You know, this is a song of praise, so how can it be that I see so many people here today with a long face and a slow singing voice? We need to up the tempo a bit — not that we’re racing the song — and think about what it means to say to God, “All glory, laud and honor, to Thee, Redeemer King!” Think about it like this: here comes Jesus, and behind him a crowd that could fill the Mall between the Capitol and the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C., all singing as joyfully as they possibly can! We are going to join in that song. It’s almost as though we are heading through the gates of heaven — without having to die to get there!” That often got a chuckle going around the congregation. It always improved the singing.
“To the One seated on the throne and to the Lamb” brings to my mind the first sight I had of a lamb dancing in the spring of the year. Their legs don’t bend, they just hop, first to one side and then the other until they begin to get more control over their movements. Then they spring across the meadow, bleating, sometimes, every time their hooves hit the ground. I laughed out loud, pulled my car over, and watched. When I arrived, late of course, at the home of the parishioners I was scheduled to see, I said, “I’m sorry I’m late. I was watching lambs dance.” The elderly couple laughed and said they understood perfectly. I got a lot of conversation about what they knew about sheep and lambs that helped in sermons for years!
That lamb is the symbol of the innocence of Jesus, but not weakness. The slaughter of that lamb came to be identified with Jesus willingly going to the cross. Our restoration to a loving relationship with God is made plain by our joyous outpouring of song, even now, today, in church (or in our living rooms or kitchens, as we sing our favorite Christian songs). Now take that image and enlarge it.
Enlarge it and focus on one simple fact — that this portion of the Revelation demonstrates: We are not “Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God”. We are children of the Heavenly Parent, the Father who every evening walks down to the street and looks in the direction he last saw us walking when we stormed out of the house. (Well, maybe some of us are the kid who stayed home and despised our brother’s freedom. Whatever. We both need saving, we both need to be reassured that we are still members of the family, we both need to have a second chance at living in a loving family.)
John 21:1-19
This is easily one of my three favorite stories in the Gospels. Picture this: It’s been a hard few days. Our teacher and friend, Jesus, has been executed like a common criminal. When they stripped him for the crucifixion, we could see that he’d been beaten — hard. Then they mocked him. And poor Peter followed after the arresting officers right into the house where he was being tried (against every Roman or Jewish law, not in a court, not in the city gate, not in public, in the middle of the night), but when the people in the courtyard started questioning him about his Galilean accent, his rough hands, the way he was dressed, he denied that he knew Jesus. The very thing Jesus had foretold: “Tonight you will deny me three times” came true.
Now they’re gathered alone by themselves, short a few of the disciples, dejected, frightened, angry, grief-stricken. Finally, Peter says, “I’m going fishing.”
This is a huge statement. He was fishing when he met Jesus for the first time. A lot of months and days separate him — all of them — from those innocent days. Simon Peter, his brother Andrew and their cousins James and John had their own business with their father, two boats and a lot of nets. It was uncertain work, the result was out of their hands if they found no fish. It was hard work, back-breaking work to haul a net full of fish out of the water. They lived outdoors, their skin dried from the sun and the water and the ooze from the fish. But it didn’t require a lot of thinking. Once you got the hang of it, there was a rhythm to the work, with only the wind and water to think about. Rocking in the boat, looking for signs of a school of fish, it wiped away the troubles that awaited them on land.
And then came Jesus. “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
They left their nets and boats by the lake. Following Jesus was interesting, for sure. Not that they could always figure out what he was saying. In those moments, Jesus could be angry. “How long must I put up with you?” “How can you not understand a simple story about sowing seed? How can you miss that this is about God trying to sow seed in you? And increasingly Jesus had a dark cloud over him. He talked about going to Jerusalem to be arrested and crucified, “For no prophet ever died outside of Jerusalem.”
Peter had tried to talk to Jesus, tried to make him see that God would not allow his messiah to be killed. But Jesus called him an instrument of Satan, and told him to get behind him, because he was a temptation Jesus was having a hard time with. None of them understood why Jesus got angry at Peter. Any one of them could have said the same thing, but Peter had a special relationship with Jesus, and often spoke for the group. Jesus seemed to have forgotten that.
So Peter, in his sadness and confusion, believing that their time with Jesus was over, decided to go back to the one thing he had understood all his life — fishing. And others of the group said, “We’ll come with you.” Peter should not be alone in the boat. He was distraught enough to make a serious error and hurt himself, or worse.
It was still dark out when they left — in that latitude, the sun comes up and sets abruptly, no long, slow dawns. But as the sun was rising, there stood a man on the beach. “You boys catchin’ anything?” A common question, an opening to talk to fishermen. “Nope. Haven’t see any at all.”
“Well, cast the net on the right side of the boat.”
So they did. What, after all, had they to lose? And maybe his angle of sight made the fish visible to him but not those in the boat. And immediately they had a net full of fish, so many they couldn’t get it in the boat, so they headed for shore. “The disciple Jesus loved” was also in the boat (that’s a different sermon) and said, “It’s the Lord!” And Peter, ever the impulsive one, slipped on his tunic and jumped into the water. That must have been interesting. The boat was 300 feet from the shore, so the water was surely over his head.
When the boat caught up to Peter (or vice versa) they found that Jesus had built a charcoal fire and was toasting bread and fish. He told them to bring some more fish so they could all eat breakfast together. And they did, each wanting to ask him “Who are you?” but not daring to do so, “because they knew it was the Lord.”
A friend once asked me how I knew it was Jesus who was talking to me when I first met him in a vision. “I knew,” I said. “But how did you know?” She was a mother, so I said, “You know those times when your daughter is nowhere near you, and you suddenly know you’d better get to her because she’s just about to get hurt?”
“Of course.”
Were you ever wrong? I mean, did you think it was your daughter but found out it was your neighbor’s daughter?”
“No.”
“That’s how I knew.”
It takes practice, of course, to be a follower of Jesus, to learn to listen for his advice and guidance and chastisement. To remember that God said long ago (to Jeremiah); “Know that I have plans for you. Not plans to hurt you, but to be good to you.” And that that plan is the same for us — not to hurt us or try us beyond our ability to bear, but for our good, plans a loving father or mother has for their own children. Not foolish plans, not plans to cheat or lie to get their children whatever they want. Plans for our welfare. Plans to meet us where we are, whether in a boat on the water or the sand of a beach; in the midst of a storm, walking on the water or on a hilltop where the wind blows constantly. Jesus meets us and claims us and comforts us. And changes us.
There is no healing without change. This is the core of the Gospel: Come, follow me. Be changed. Be one of my brothers and sisters. Give all you have away, so you can be free of the fear of the future. And then give yourself away, so your faith can go through the forge and be changed.
We are all post-Resurrection Christians. We never saw Jesus in the flesh. And we usually doubt those who say they have spoken with or seen Jesus in a vision. We don’t really know what Jesus looked like in life. Nor do we know what his voice sounded like when he was teaching. All we have to go on (unlike his disciples) is how Jesus speaks to our souls.
Today’s scriptures speak to our current condition, telling us that we aren’t the only ones with doubts. They remind us that knowing Jesus is more than a matter of good eyesight. It is having a spirit and a heart that is open to the unknown. Are we open to recognizing Jesus in his various disguises, as Mother Teresa used to say? Then and only then will we be able to say, “I have seen the Lord!” and only then will Easter live within us.
Acts 9:1-6 (7-20)
I love this story, not so much as it is about Saul/Paul but as it is so much about Ananias. I identify with him. Protesting, he is dragged by God to the house of Judas on Straight Street. And what is he protesting about?
“Lord, you don’t know this guy. You don’t know what he’s been doing. You can’t mean for me to go over there?!” Ananias updates God on what Saul had been up to recently — arresting the Christians in his area. Even as they spoke, Saul was having a highly personal meeting with Jesus on the road to Damascus.
Of course! God doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Although, as Tim Rice portrays Jesus saying in “Jesus Christ Superstar,” God is very good on what and when, and not so good at “why.” But this time, God is specific about the ‘why’ — “He is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel; I myself will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.” So, Ananias went. This was definitely an act of faith. For if Saul was struck blind, it was surely an impediment to him seeking out “followers of the Way,” as the first Christians were called.
So Ananias laid his hands on Saul and said, “Brother Saul…” Amazing faith. This enemy is suddenly a brother to the Christians in Damascus. More, this new brother’s eyesight, lost for three days, is suddenly restored as soon as Ananias touches him. Even more, Saul consents to being baptized as soon as his blindness leaves him. Another leap of faith. How does Saul know that Jesus is the source of his recovery? Moreover, this healing is accepted by those early Christians, because Saul changes. No change, no healing, no encounter with the risen Christ. It all has to happen to be authentic.
In the way the lectionary lists the verses in the selection for today, this is the optional part of the story, however. The main story, as far as those who set the lectionary, is just six short verses at the start of Chapter 9. Saul was approaching Damascus, when a sudden light flashed around him, causing him to fall over. Then a voice asks him, “Saul, … why do you persecute me?”
While we translate the Greek to say that Saul responds by asking, “Who are you, Lord?” it could also be translated as “Who are you, Sir?” which fits the situation better. Saul could not possibly know that it was God talking to him, and he would never have called Jesus ‘Lord’ yet. And if he has been struck blind, there is no way he could see who was talking to him.
A few months ago, Guideposts magazine ran an ad, asking of their readers, “Have you ever heard the Voice?” They then asked a number of questions they wanted answers to: “How do you respond when you hear that Voice?” (possible answers include, “I ignore it”, “I do what it says immediately”, “I wait to see if I hear the same thing again,” and a couple of others. What they did not ask was if hearing that Voice has changed the life of the person hearing it.)
This is why I think it’s so important to read the whole story about what happened to Saul. He didn’t get up, brush himself off and start screaming “I can’t see! Help! I can’t see!” At least Luke doesn’t say that was Saul’s first reaction. We’ll never know.
What we do know is that Saul was in for an incredible life. His companions on the journey took him to the home of a person known to them, where they took care of him. Probably cold compresses on his eyes. And Saul can be forgiven if he laid there mumbling to himself about this heretic who was crucified, who seemed to still be alive, and a man named Ananias who was being sent by God to heal him.
The story doesn’t end here, does it? Not at all. The story is of a man struck down and being asked “Why are you persecuting me, Saul?” But it moves on to the voice telling Ananias, “I have plans for this man. Go give him back his sight.”
In the movie Avatar, the people of Pandora greet each other with “I see you.” It doesn’t mean “I see you with my eyes,” it means “I see that you are one of us. I see the spirit within you. I see your heart.” There is a great deal of tragedy between the first time Jake (the hero of the story) says that because it is the proper greeting and the beginning of the salvation of the Naavi and Jake descends from his humongous flying steed and says to the leader, “I see you.” He is changed. This man, who started out being bitter because his brother had been killed and Jake himself had wound up in a wheelchair, a Marine who was promised his legs would be restored if he could get the Naavi to give up their ancestral home so the people of Earth could mine the mineral under their feet. Despite that promise, Jake changes as he comes to know the Naavi, and soon finds himself wanting to be one of them.
So it is with Saul. First God blinds him so he will know how weak he is, how he is living in the dark. And then he sends a follower of Jesus to heal his blindness. Not that Ananias sees perfectly — it doesn’t take a saint to do the work of God — but when God speaks, he listens, argues and then does what he’s told. Just like the rest of us. And Saul immediately starts to witness to others about the work that Christ is doing in and with and by him. It is not enough that we say, “Yes, I see what you mean. That’s an interesting idea. We must talk about it some time.” The Spirit moves us to say something like, “Yes, I see that God had work to do, so he took on human flesh, and moved people to follow along and get the work done that would restore a fallen world.”
We certainly could use a few million people willing to do so.
Revelation 5:11-14
Too often, people read Revelation and think that it is a foretelling of the End Times (the Apocalypse is big right now in literature and film, featuring people’s faces melting down or everyone going blind in barren landscapes featuring large craters). They skip over the parts where all of creation, from the frogs to the archangels singing praises to God. Today’s scripture is one of those.
Even worse, many who read these words believe that those choirs singing praises to God are singing in a solemn sort of way, rather than in a joyous way. As a pastor, I occasionally would stop the organist or other musicians and say to the congregation, “You know, this is a song of praise, so how can it be that I see so many people here today with a long face and a slow singing voice? We need to up the tempo a bit — not that we’re racing the song — and think about what it means to say to God, “All glory, laud and honor, to Thee, Redeemer King!” Think about it like this: here comes Jesus, and behind him a crowd that could fill the Mall between the Capitol and the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C., all singing as joyfully as they possibly can! We are going to join in that song. It’s almost as though we are heading through the gates of heaven — without having to die to get there!” That often got a chuckle going around the congregation. It always improved the singing.
“To the One seated on the throne and to the Lamb” brings to my mind the first sight I had of a lamb dancing in the spring of the year. Their legs don’t bend, they just hop, first to one side and then the other until they begin to get more control over their movements. Then they spring across the meadow, bleating, sometimes, every time their hooves hit the ground. I laughed out loud, pulled my car over, and watched. When I arrived, late of course, at the home of the parishioners I was scheduled to see, I said, “I’m sorry I’m late. I was watching lambs dance.” The elderly couple laughed and said they understood perfectly. I got a lot of conversation about what they knew about sheep and lambs that helped in sermons for years!
That lamb is the symbol of the innocence of Jesus, but not weakness. The slaughter of that lamb came to be identified with Jesus willingly going to the cross. Our restoration to a loving relationship with God is made plain by our joyous outpouring of song, even now, today, in church (or in our living rooms or kitchens, as we sing our favorite Christian songs). Now take that image and enlarge it.
Enlarge it and focus on one simple fact — that this portion of the Revelation demonstrates: We are not “Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God”. We are children of the Heavenly Parent, the Father who every evening walks down to the street and looks in the direction he last saw us walking when we stormed out of the house. (Well, maybe some of us are the kid who stayed home and despised our brother’s freedom. Whatever. We both need saving, we both need to be reassured that we are still members of the family, we both need to have a second chance at living in a loving family.)
John 21:1-19
This is easily one of my three favorite stories in the Gospels. Picture this: It’s been a hard few days. Our teacher and friend, Jesus, has been executed like a common criminal. When they stripped him for the crucifixion, we could see that he’d been beaten — hard. Then they mocked him. And poor Peter followed after the arresting officers right into the house where he was being tried (against every Roman or Jewish law, not in a court, not in the city gate, not in public, in the middle of the night), but when the people in the courtyard started questioning him about his Galilean accent, his rough hands, the way he was dressed, he denied that he knew Jesus. The very thing Jesus had foretold: “Tonight you will deny me three times” came true.
Now they’re gathered alone by themselves, short a few of the disciples, dejected, frightened, angry, grief-stricken. Finally, Peter says, “I’m going fishing.”
This is a huge statement. He was fishing when he met Jesus for the first time. A lot of months and days separate him — all of them — from those innocent days. Simon Peter, his brother Andrew and their cousins James and John had their own business with their father, two boats and a lot of nets. It was uncertain work, the result was out of their hands if they found no fish. It was hard work, back-breaking work to haul a net full of fish out of the water. They lived outdoors, their skin dried from the sun and the water and the ooze from the fish. But it didn’t require a lot of thinking. Once you got the hang of it, there was a rhythm to the work, with only the wind and water to think about. Rocking in the boat, looking for signs of a school of fish, it wiped away the troubles that awaited them on land.
And then came Jesus. “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
They left their nets and boats by the lake. Following Jesus was interesting, for sure. Not that they could always figure out what he was saying. In those moments, Jesus could be angry. “How long must I put up with you?” “How can you not understand a simple story about sowing seed? How can you miss that this is about God trying to sow seed in you? And increasingly Jesus had a dark cloud over him. He talked about going to Jerusalem to be arrested and crucified, “For no prophet ever died outside of Jerusalem.”
Peter had tried to talk to Jesus, tried to make him see that God would not allow his messiah to be killed. But Jesus called him an instrument of Satan, and told him to get behind him, because he was a temptation Jesus was having a hard time with. None of them understood why Jesus got angry at Peter. Any one of them could have said the same thing, but Peter had a special relationship with Jesus, and often spoke for the group. Jesus seemed to have forgotten that.
So Peter, in his sadness and confusion, believing that their time with Jesus was over, decided to go back to the one thing he had understood all his life — fishing. And others of the group said, “We’ll come with you.” Peter should not be alone in the boat. He was distraught enough to make a serious error and hurt himself, or worse.
It was still dark out when they left — in that latitude, the sun comes up and sets abruptly, no long, slow dawns. But as the sun was rising, there stood a man on the beach. “You boys catchin’ anything?” A common question, an opening to talk to fishermen. “Nope. Haven’t see any at all.”
“Well, cast the net on the right side of the boat.”
So they did. What, after all, had they to lose? And maybe his angle of sight made the fish visible to him but not those in the boat. And immediately they had a net full of fish, so many they couldn’t get it in the boat, so they headed for shore. “The disciple Jesus loved” was also in the boat (that’s a different sermon) and said, “It’s the Lord!” And Peter, ever the impulsive one, slipped on his tunic and jumped into the water. That must have been interesting. The boat was 300 feet from the shore, so the water was surely over his head.
When the boat caught up to Peter (or vice versa) they found that Jesus had built a charcoal fire and was toasting bread and fish. He told them to bring some more fish so they could all eat breakfast together. And they did, each wanting to ask him “Who are you?” but not daring to do so, “because they knew it was the Lord.”
A friend once asked me how I knew it was Jesus who was talking to me when I first met him in a vision. “I knew,” I said. “But how did you know?” She was a mother, so I said, “You know those times when your daughter is nowhere near you, and you suddenly know you’d better get to her because she’s just about to get hurt?”
“Of course.”
Were you ever wrong? I mean, did you think it was your daughter but found out it was your neighbor’s daughter?”
“No.”
“That’s how I knew.”
It takes practice, of course, to be a follower of Jesus, to learn to listen for his advice and guidance and chastisement. To remember that God said long ago (to Jeremiah); “Know that I have plans for you. Not plans to hurt you, but to be good to you.” And that that plan is the same for us — not to hurt us or try us beyond our ability to bear, but for our good, plans a loving father or mother has for their own children. Not foolish plans, not plans to cheat or lie to get their children whatever they want. Plans for our welfare. Plans to meet us where we are, whether in a boat on the water or the sand of a beach; in the midst of a storm, walking on the water or on a hilltop where the wind blows constantly. Jesus meets us and claims us and comforts us. And changes us.
There is no healing without change. This is the core of the Gospel: Come, follow me. Be changed. Be one of my brothers and sisters. Give all you have away, so you can be free of the fear of the future. And then give yourself away, so your faith can go through the forge and be changed.
