Welcomed From a Distance

One of my morning Scripture readings today was the famous “by faith” passage in Hebrews 11 that talks about how the heroes of faith did not receive “the things promised” and lived as “foreigners and strangers” on earth.  It’s a beautiful text, a powerful portrayal of longing, faith, and hope.

It brought to mind this prayer from Walter Brueggemann.  There are some profound differences, obviously, between Brueggemann’s emphases and that of the writer of Hebrews, but perhaps something of the same theme as well.  Both speak, in their own way, of the life of faith as one in which the things we most want must be seen and welcomed from a distance.

We celebrate your steadfast love.

We count on your faithfulness.

We praise you for your mercy.

We celebrate and

praise and

count on.

 

And then the world does not work right.

We find ourselves unsafe and anxious,

caught up in greed and selfishness,

beset by a culture of violence and threat.

 

We wonder about the mismatch

between you and your creation.

 

Mostly we trust,

down deep we sometimes do not.

We risk truth-telling

about your absence and silence and withdrawal.

 

We do such truth-telling,

telling it to you,

you… absent, silent, withdrawn.

 

You we address, you, our only hope

in this world and in the world to come.