May 2, 2022
Faith as welcome
As I mentioned in last week’s letter, we are soon packing up our house in Toronto and moving to Cincinnati, Ohio. For our remaining months here, we are hoping to say meaningful goodbyes to the people whose friendships we have really treasured. I still can’t really decide what’s best to plan for those goodbyes, whether smaller gatherings or one big open house. Either way, they will involve welcoming friends into our house, a habit we’ve tried to cultivate over many years.
What does welcome look like at your house? I’ve taught my own children that welcome looks like standing at the door, greeting your guests, taking their coat, and offering them something to drink. You clear your schedule when you welcome someone. A much more vivid example of welcome is the hospitality my friends in California have extended to a Ukrainian family, inviting them into their home and letting them stay until they figure what’s next.
To live the life of faith, you can’t just believe in Jesus. You must welcome him. This is to say that belief in Jesus isn’t just right thinking. Belief is also warm reception.
I was struck recently in my daily Bible reading by the reactions of two different towns Jesus visited. The stories are told back-to-back in the Gospel of Luke, which seems very purposeful. In Luke 8:26-39, Jesus and his disciples are arriving in the region of the Gerasenes. They anchor the boat, and Jesus is immediately accosted by a demon-possessed man. A man with a history of violence. This feral man lived in the tombs outside the town, and when Jesus exorcises a multitude of demons from the man, they take possession of a large herd of pigs, plunge over a cliff, and drown.
What was the villagers’ response to this miracle, this seeing of the at-hand kingdom of God? Not: Oh, thank God our neighbor is ok. Not: Oh, thank God this father, this son, this brother has been restored to his family and his right mind.As Luke writes: “Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to depart from them, for they were seized with great fear,” (v. 37).
The villagers refused Jesus welcome. I take this to mean they would not ready themselves to receive the disruptive, saving work Jesus came to accomplish. They couldn’t stomach the thought that Jesus had change in store for them. And maybe that strikes a little close to home. We might be fine to have Jesus passing through town. But let’s not having him staying. Let’s not having him proposing a renovation.
Starting in verse 40, there is a very different kind of crowd, and a very different kind of reception. “Now when Jesus returned, the crowd welcomed him, for they were all waiting for him.” A crowd waited to welcome Jesus, to receive him. They take a fundamentally different stance than the people of the Gerasenes, and their welcome determines how long Jesus will stay and work in their midst.
It’s really such a simple formulation, isn’t it? Faith as welcome. It’s also a scary one, and I think that’s what the people of the Gerasenes realized. Jesus intended to overturn some of their familiar patterns. It seemed clear he would insist upon change. And change isn’t always the thing we want, is it? It’s not exactly the thing I want now: when change means leaving a place I love for a call about which I feel uncertain and ill-equipped.
Welcome, in the life of faith, can be a scary proposition. It certainly feels that way for our family now. There are things we want to hold back from God, areas of our lives we want him to leave alone.
I’m reminded of a line from Shannon Martin’s wonderful memoir, Falling Free, a line I’ve often repeated to myself when I’ve met my own resistance to welcoming Jesus. Maybe it will be helpful for you, too. It’s to imagine Jesus saying to each of us: I have so much more for you than your tired, stubborn ways.
Jesus says, in other words: I have change planned for you. And in the same breath, he reassures: Fear not.
Jen