Reverence for Life, Reverence for God
Dear Church,
First, I want to join with all of you in welcoming Union’s ministry candidate who will join us in worship this weekend. This is a special weekend in the life of the church. It is a privilege for me to be a part of this process with you all.
On a completely different note, January 14 is the birthday of humanitarian Albert Schweitzer, born in 1875. A musical prodigy, he devoted his 20’s to music, art, science, and religion. On his 30th birthday, he resolved to become a medical missionary. He and his wife eventually relocated to West Africa, setting up a hospital in Lambarene, now Gabon. They understood their work to be a small gesture of reparations for all of the social and economic suffering inflicted by European colonialism. In 1952, Schweitzer was awarded the Nobel Prize, both for his humanitarian work and his theology work christened “Reverence for Life.”
In his Nobel lecture, Schweitzer said “What really matters is that we should all of us realize that we are guilty of inhumanity. The horror of this realization should shake us out of our lethargy so that we can direct our hopes and intentions to the coming of an era in which war will have no place.” I can hear that repentant call to work for God’s reign coming from John the Baptist and Jesus both, as they dip us in both the waters of baptism as well as the spirit and fire of baptism we talked about last Sunday. What might our world look like if we took seriously a reverence for life and Albert’s vision of God’s reign? What would our local community look like if we took seriously a reverence for life and Albert’s vision of God’s reign?
Holy God, shape our hopes and intentions, today, toward your love of life and creation. Guide our hands and our feet to make your kingdom a bit more real here and now. Let all God’s children say, “Amen.”
Grace and Peace,
Pastor Alan