Listen

All who are led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons and daughters. You didn’t receive a spirit of slavery to lead you back again into fear, but you received a Spirit that shows you are adopted as his children. With this Spirit, we cry, “Abba, Father.” The same Spirit agrees with our spirit, that we are God’s children. But if we are children, we are also heirs. We are God’s heirs and fellow heirs with Christ, if we really suffer with him so that we can also be glorified with him.

Romans 8:14-17

Think

Paul wrote these words to a church that was struggling to hold onto hope and remember who and whose they were. There was conflict and tension in their community. Folks were walking on eggshells within that church. Paul is so honest in this passage, and just before this, about the messy parts of life.

Have you ever had an experience where you forgot who and whose you were? I had that experience when my parents went through a divorce. I struggled to see my family fall apart. Throughout that time, my friends and church community surrounded me. I found passages like this comforting. God was my parent. No matter what happened with my family, I knew that I belonged to God. That promise comforted me and gave me courage.

Susan Sytsma Bratt

Question to Ponder:

How have you seen God at work in messy times in your life?

Pray

Gracious God, thank you for your abiding love for me. Right now, one of the tough things I’m facing is…

Help me to pay attention to your presence today. Amen.

Go

God, give us eyes to see the wideness of your world, shimmering with beauty and holiness.

Stimulate our imaginations, infusing us with courage and hope.

Surround us with friendship.

Plant us as seeds of resurrection.

Amen.

Peterson Center for Christian Imagination