different and still the same

We hosted an open time for folks to drop by on Tuesday to view and hear the inauguration via our large screen and good sound system in the sanctuary at Fairlawn West.

I was teary eyed and pumped.

Now time is the same again. The news reports have the same voices on the same topics with different policies implemented, but the world has not changed!

The election of Obama is the culmination of wider change. Oh, maybe not the culmination, but a major accomplishment on the road. But the world has not changed.

These are the times when I am confronted by and reminded that true change comes from God and it is a change that happens from the inside out of all of us. Barack Obama is no more a change agent than the rest of us. Right now he is a great gift of a vessel used by God to show us on what God can do with each of us. And all of us as a human family. And many have allowed God's work in them to change them which has led to where we stand today with the son of an immigrant from Africa (we've had lots of European immigrant children become president).

However the election, new policies and directives, a Democratic controlled Congress and White House...these in and of themselves do not indicate true change. Whether we are joyed by this reality in Washington or are cynical and critical of it, we all need to be changed...from above. Day by day. Step by step. Breath by breath. And this is what Jesus Christ has done and is doing as God's change agent. Thanks be to God for servants like Barack Obama who accept this change from above as the guide of their life. There are more like him. They may be much more anonymous than him. But no less vital in God's action in human history. And they aren't all overtly "Christian." Yet they are no less followers of Jesus Christ than those who are overtly Christian. In truth many who follow Jesus and aren't overtly Christian are more true to God than a number who claim the title "Christian" for themselves. That's a sign of how God is in charge and we aren't!

Here's the link for a great, short youtube video by Brian McLaren on what it means to follow Jesus today...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NtgjNLNpao