VOX Domini {Scattered Servants} - Psalm 23

The sheep have scattered.

We are scattered servants.

Dear broken church- Wherever you go from here, know that safety comes from inside you. Carry it like a sacred treasure in your soul. Enter the world with awareness of the gifts you have inside. These gifts are the Voice of God to a broken world.

We sojourn in safe places, but we do not live there.

Vox Domini oves suas in novalibus pasturis.

The voice of God calls His sheep into new pastures.

We are all now scattered servants.

Pain is a teacher, a broken heart is a latent gift, and revival is a blessing that rises up from ashes.

Who will lead us from here?

Psalm 23.

The Lord is my shepherd;

I have followed broken men and women, which led me to my own self-destruction. My vice propensity is to follow these people still, or ones just like them. But the Lord continually invites me to follow only Him, here in this world of broken hearts and counterfeits.

I have all that I need.

I look all about me for safety, love and belonging. I am beginning to discover the great secret- these things come from within. When I enter a room, do I seek to extract all I can from the people therein, or do I come to overflow with the gifts that are inside of me? When I enter a room, do I look for what I can grasp from these people, or do I consider how I can begin to overflow as I learn from them here in this place?

He lets me rest in green meadows;

There have been places of refuge, and He allows me this rest for a season. But they are always temporary, sometimes even fantasy. No matter how much I would like to stay, these safe places have come and gone. They serve a purpose for a needed time, and then God lovingly removes them from my story in order that I can carry on with the mission. It is time to get up from our prolonged rest in safe places and walk into the world into which we carry our sacred and untouchable gifts. Go out to your calling. Do not tarry any longer.

He leads me beside peaceful streams.

I have come to know that as I walk, I can come alongside others who are also headed where I want to go. I should not follow these people, but I can walk in step beside them. My judgement can mature- I can learn to identify those whom I want to journey with. Though the safe place is preferable, the moving waters bring change and renewal in ways that safety never could. To walk beside these people who have Living Water inside them is to surrender the past and open to the future. Water under the bridge is a gift for the thirsty traveler.

He renews my strength.

I could never get up and go on to new things without Divine intervention. Though I am not asked to go this journey on my own, I am asked to travel with nothing other than open hands and a soft heart. All else He will provide because He loves me. He is full of persuasive abundance.

He guides me along right paths, bringing honor to His name.

I am bent on my own chaotic destruction. In this I fully believe. I have known my own depravity. Which is why I need Christ to take the lead. As I decrease, so He increases, and my story becomes His glory. No step towards victory can be taken without His intervention.

Even when I walk through the darkest valley,

I will not be afraid,

for You are close beside me.

There have been low points. Places and people who were my refuge and my identity have been taken away. Safety has been denied to me by people who I wanted to be safe for me. I have known a stark kind of relational bigotry. But as the fear washed over me, so did Grace. And as always, His first words are “don’t be afraid, child.” Fear can be leveraged as fuel for love if we recognize it for what it is- a sign that you are stepping into reality and out of fantasy. A sign that breakthrough is coming in haste, if only we press on.

Your rod and your staff protect and comfort me.

There has been discipline. My mistakes are legion. One cannot experience spiritual formation without seeing the brokenness of the self. I have come to recognize my false motives, my insecurities, my relational failures, my ongoing autonomy and my massive shortcomings. With the staff Jesus has smacked me into reality and with his rod he Has pulled me away from fantasy. The pain is great, but the reward is greater still. His discipline brings safety, which brings comfort, like a parent correcting the child for the sake of love.

You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies.

Because my King loves me, He vanquishes the works of my enemies.

Because He loves me, their authority has now come to an end. They will no longer abuse or neglect the sacred call to shepherd the flock.

My loving Father has called to account those who have blunderingly cut me with the mishandling of power in His name.

Yes, justice comes in due time, on His schedule and not mine. But Justice will not be leveraged as a weapon, where it then becomes fact but no longer Truth. The act of justice is reserved only for the Just King, never meant to be handled by those who follow Him. Thus I am often forced to obediently wait, against my will, for His justice to fall on the works of the unrighteous. But because He loves me, I am vindicated. And because He loves me, I am asked to dine with my enemies at the table of love and forgiveness. Thus communion is a surrender of pride and a leveling of motives. We all come ashamed and we all leave restored. My enemies are the beloved of Christ.

You honor me by anointing my head with oil.

There are experiences with Christ that cannot be captured with words. Thus I have learned to spend more time creating pieces of art in my journal and less time writing. When I am honored by the King is when I am open to seeing His beauty. If I can receive His love, He will immediately respond. But often this transaction happens without a single word. Creativity, beauty, art- the creation of honor is the pouring out of holy oil upon the open eyes and into the receptive mind.

My cup overflows with blessings.

Yes, His blessing falls on both the righteous and the unrighteous. But it can only overflow in abundance if it is multiplied by His Spirit. What are my gifts? I am learning. What are my blessings? They are the million different ways God has guided my steps on this journey. I am a sheep exposed out in open pasture, but the true Shepherd is ever beside me, pouring out His favor upon me and filling me with abundance in ways I often fail to appreciate at the time. I am learning to tune my ears to His voice so that I may hear Him call for me to drink deeply of His joy.

Drink deep of His love, scattered flock. You will need it for the journey ahead.

Surely your goodness and unfailing love

will pursue me all the days of my life,

To be pursued. This is a basic need of humanity. We ourselves do not purse love as we should. Instead we pursue temporal pleasures. We use each other, we coerce and manipulate in order to get our needs met.

We are desperate to reproduce safety around us because we don't know it comes from the Love within.

What if we lived as if love was pursuing us every day? What if we believed that goodness was chasing us down regardless of our location on the journey? Then we would not be afraid of what might be outside the four walls of our fears. Our frightened huddles would become a horizon of open courage and strength. The possibilities would be endless, if we believe goodness and love were in pursuit of our soul. We could go anywhere and be safe. We could belong in any place without changing the source of our identity.

We could scatter and serve the world.

And I will live in the house of the Lord forever.

The house of the Lord is sacred ground- both pain and blessing flow out from this place.

His house is everywhere, especially the unsafe places.

But to live there is to embrace the wholeness of this journey. I have learned that we burn brighter together. Here the Voice of God has special clarity.

On this part of the journey I have discovered a Vineyard.

A few of you have already found it too!

It came upon me quite suddenly, but with miraculous clarity. Unexpected but precisely timed. Where do I worship now? With people who are rising up from the ashes of a community that had a near-death experience, seeking to bless their city with the gifts inside them that remain untouched by the decay of the past. As they rise, I will learn from them. I sing with them as we rise up from loss- this is how I will continue to learn and grow in community. A struggling soul, like a struggling church, is ripe for the Spirit to respond, if only we would get on our knees, own our pride and enter into honest prayer.

The Lord is my shepherd and safety comes from within. So I can emerge out into the world to dine with my enemies in the presence of the King. These enemies are my beloved brothers and sisters. We dine together because I surrendered the justice to God, and He adopted us all in an act of radical love.

 No denomination, name, building or label will ever diminish that reality.

Dear broken church. The sheep have scattered. But wherever you go from here, know that safety comes from inside you. Carry it like a sacred treasure in your soul.

Vox Domini oves suas in novalibus pasturis.

The voice of God calls His sheep into new pastures.

Do not be afraid. The Shepherd is calling you. Bring your hurts and your doubts- those are gifts, too. Watch them become the tools for breakthrough.

Your identity remains unchanged, and your soul is eternally safe. Go into the world brave and free, because pain has been your teacher and Jesus is your Savior.

Run now like the wind, wild and free, and the Spirit will pursue you with the Voice of love.

Revival is coming, dear flock. 

But safety is already here, carried along inside of each one of you. It is the Voice of God.

We sojourn in safe places, but we do not live there.

You are safe from within, so venture out with your gifts.
Go as scattered servants into the world.

~Rebecca 

Take Communion With Me- John 13

How to be loved? We don’t know. So Jesus paints a masterpiece upon our dirty feet.

This is where pain turns to memory, so we can tell a different story.

I am under the discipline of intimacy with my Father, and this is what He has shown me about my transformation this week-

I am a Judas, just coming in from the dark of night. My feet have been made dirty by the steps of betrayal.

You, reader, are also a Judas in need of grace. Your story is different but the larger narrative is the same- we are in the same community of sinners made hungry from the ache of rejection.

We all hunger for that piece of bread which openly identifies the betrayal of our very feet.

So before the effects of the day set in, come now before Him, kneeling at His feet and bowing low, hair undone, breathing a breath prayer three times with hands pressed together at heart center.

This week I had two sermons bombard me with the realization that my spiritual transformation is not going exactly as I had imagined.

On Monday I listened in to a sermon from The Garden Church, a talk by Dave Lomas titled “Lean Back”. It was about John chapter 13.

Several days later I tuned into a recording from VOX Community, a sermon by Jack West called “Betrayal and Forgiveness”. It was also about John chapter 13.

Coincidence? No. This is how I hear from God- the only way for Him to get through my stubborn pride is to repeatedly tell me the same thing in a variety of different ways. Eventually He gets through- eventually.

So John 13 seems to be of import in my walk with Jesus this week. What is He trying to teach me here? This is the account of Jesus washing all of the disciple’s feet, just moments before the betrayal of one of those disciples, Judas.

This is coming right after I wrote about Luke 7:37 in a blog about intimacy and the washing of Jesus' feet by a woman of ill-repute.

Ok, Jesus. Let’s journey here together, then-

John 13  (NLT)

Jesus Washes His Disciples’ Feet

13 Before the Passover celebration, Jesus knew that his hour had come to leave this world and return to his Father. He had loved his disciples during his ministry on earth, and now he loved them to the very end.^[a] 2 It was time for supper, and the devil had already prompted Judas,^[b] son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. ³ Jesus knew that the Father had given him authority over everything and that he had come from God and would return to God. ⁴ So he got up from the table, took off his robe, wrapped a towel around his waist, ⁵ and poured water into a basin. Then he began to wash the disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel he had around him.

His masterpiece is being painted upon our feet 

with water made dirty by our own sinful betrayal.

We see Jesus kneeling at the feet of his betrayer, moments before those very same feet would walk out on Him and cooperate with the plan for His suffering.

Have feet ever walked out on you, reader? What if Jesus asked you to kneel down and wash them without the resolution of conflict?

This is the struggle of the human heart. To put forth your actual, physical sin before Jesus and have Him cleanse it with grace. To come hungry for love, because betrayal has made us empty.

This humility intermingles with the offering of love and we are repulsed and compelled. We lean back and look down, to watch the beloved head bend over our sins with ministrations of grace.

Have you ever washed the feet of your betrayer? It will haunt your soul for a lifetime and call you to reckon with your innermost being.

If you have the audacity to wash the feet of your enemy, rest assured that God is pursing your heart with a tenacity that defies the gravity of shame.

So Jesus calls us all to repentance-

¹² After washing their feet, he put on his robe again and sat down and asked, “Do you understand what I was doing? ¹³ You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and you are right, because that’s what I am. ¹⁴ And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet. ¹⁵ I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you. ¹⁶ I tell you the truth, slaves are not greater than their master. Nor is the messenger more important than the one who sends the message. ¹⁷ Now that you know these things, God will bless you for doing them.

Can we do this? Are we, His followers, capable of extending forgiveness so generously, lavishing it upon those who would walk out on our offering of love?

Why are we stil carrying around this awful baggage of betrayal? When are we going to set it down and rest, allowing our King to minister to the very feet which carried us away from His mercy and love?

Oh, but did you know, you are Judas, too? Yes, because betrayal makes us hungry for truth. And if we are hungry, we are the one to whom Jesus hands the bread dipped for sinners-

²¹ Now Jesus was deeply troubled,^[f] and he exclaimed, “I tell you the truth, one of you will betray me!”

Betrayal. Yes, this is a loaded word. For each person it means something different, but to all of us it means the same- a burden of pain.

Who is the betrayer in need of forgiveness? It is I, the hungry sinner who consumes the bread at the table of Christ.

Will you take communion with me?

²⁶ Jesus responded, “It is the one to whom I give the bread I dip in the bowl.” And when he had dipped it, he gave it to Judas, son of Simon Iscariot. ²⁷ When Judas had eaten the bread, Satan entered into him. Then Jesus told him, “Hurry and do what you’re going to do.” ²⁸ None of the others at the table knew what Jesus meant. ²⁹ Since Judas was their treasurer, some thought Jesus was telling him to go and pay for the food or to give some money to the poor.³⁰ So Judas left at once, going out into the night.

You can either dine with Jesus at His table of forgiveness, or you can go out into the night. 

The night: a place of shame and regret. A place where your will is not opposed, and you are left to your own devices. This is where the dark things are, a place without love or tenderness. A place where nobody ever washes a brother’s dirty feet. A place of judgement and the rendering of punishment.

The night is the place where you realize you are a hungry sinner, made empty by your betrayal of Christ's ministrations of love, longing for a morsel even if that very morsel publically declares your incrediable need for forgiveness.

God, You call us to love. To really love.

To love ourself despite being wrong. To love our betrayer despite the betrayal.

In the sermon at VOX, Jack West made a statement which fell as profound up my sinners ears: "We must enter into a larger gravitational experience than the one in which we were harmed. Unforgiveness ends in the collapse of the smaller story upon it's author. All stories that are not expansive and don't have forgiveness at their center will eventually collapes on their author."

Jesus, You are calling us into a larger story as you wash the sins from our betraying feet.

This is impossibly hard.

We cannot do it without You.

But because You have already washed our feet before we betrayed you, we now have the power to forgive the feet of those who will never apologize for the ways they have betrayed us.

So we can gather at the communion table in the safe haven of neutrality-

⁴ So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. ³⁵ Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”

We are all hungry sinners in need of the bread. The one to whom Christ gives the morsel to dip and consume, that is the one who will betray Him.

That sinner is me.

That sinner is you.

For we have hurt one another, and in doing so we have betrayed His command to love.

Will you take communion with me?

How to be loved by the One who loves us? We don’t know. So Jesus paints a masterpiece upon our dirty feet.

This is where pain turns to memory, so we can tell a different story.

So before the effects of the day set in, come now before Him, kneeling at His feet and bowing low, hair undone, breathing a breath prayer three times with hands pressed together at heart center.

Meet me at the table, friends, for here we can re-imagine that which we call the story of betrayal. Perhaps you can help me retell my journey from a higher point of grace.

Come hungry to this table, because when you accept a morsel of bread from the One who names and claims our pain, then your betrayal of His love becomes the channel for His grace.

I am a Judas, just coming in from the dark of night. My feet have been made dirty again by the steps of betrayal.

You, too, are a Judas in need of grace. Your story is different but the larger narrative is the same- we are in the same community of sinners made hungry from the ache of betrayal.

Take communion with me, won’t you?

It’s the starting place for forgiveness, it is the birth place of freedom. If nothing else, we can dine side by side and watch Jesus wash our feet. From there, God knows what can be accomplished in us.

Take communion with me. For there are no betrayers when the table has been set by the gentle cleansing hands of our King. Instead, there is a community of consumers who are being transformed into redemptive works of grace.

"Father, you see my heart, and You know how I have walked into the dark of night away from Your cleansing love. I come again to the communion table to empty my soul, spirit and mind of everything that does not worship You. Does regret or guilt sing Your praise? No. Does longing for things long past bring about change? Never. Can holding onto betrayal lift You higher in my thoughts? No. Jesus, my King, arrest my soul, tame my spirit, transform my mind and meet me at my dirty feet. As the dark of night melts into the light of day, let all things within me be surrendered and made new. I want to walk away from the communion table transformed into a child of dignity and humility. I declare my need for the morsel of bread which You hold out as the others look on, for I am the one upon whom Your forgiveness must fall first. Meet me this week, Jesus. Go with me to the communion table on Sunday. Honor my feeble attempts to reconcile. Bless my desire for unity and healing. Wash my feet again. Thank you, Father. Amen."

I will meet you around the communion table, my friends. 
See you Sunday.

Rebecca

~*~

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