Devotion 407 - WRONG

This was one of those days.

The hair didn’t comb right.

The clothes didn’t wear right.  The kid didn’t act right.

The Sunday school lesson didn’t get done right.

One day, one vote, and millions of voices are filled with cries of wrong.

I am late as I greet my six-year old students.  I tell them in my fake enthusiasm that we are going to learn about thanksgiving. I show the kids the foam turkey and ask them what it is.  In the driest of tones one of my tots replies, “weird.”

It is the icing on my stink cake.

I cut the paper that should have been prepped before class.  Now that we have determined the weird ling is indeed a turkey all the children decide they are hungry and definitely not thankful.  It is unanimous.

I hand out paper and loads of markers.  I promise cookies and ask each one to draw five things they are thankful for.

“Jesus,” one shouts, always the first and always the best answer to every question in life and Sunday School.  We are on a roll.

The cookies are on the table and the creativity is flowing.

“Water,” one child shouts.  I realize the cookies might have prompted this response but I ask why this little person is thankful for water.

“I like to drink it,” she replies.  I do too but I am confident I have never, ever thanked God for it.

“Bath time!” a child yells.  It kind of goes with water but again hot, steamy bath water is one of my best friends.  I have never told Him so.

“Trees and animals!” Another replied.  We are rolling now.  I love those too and I am coming to grips with just how ungrateful I am.

You see I can write a dissertation telling you what’s wrong.   There are the things I find wrong with me, the things that frustrate me about my people and my environs.  Then there is this pervasive wrong that has seemingly swept our country never stopping to catch its breath and say thank you.

We may love or hate the presidential choice, but we must, we absolutely must embrace the fact that we got to choose.

We may loathe the system, but have we considered the alternative of dictatorship in lieu of democracy?

We may detest social media, but never before have we enjoyed the absolute freedom of thought leadership without the threat of arrest or censorship.

How do we right what feels like wrong?

How do we see blessing through tears?

How do we find the Father when eyes seem fixed on fear?

I draw a line down the middle of my Sunday school paper.  On the left, I write the wrongs and on the right, the blessings.

I don’t know how long your list is.

I don’t know the path you walk.

I don’t know what it feels like to be marginalized.

I don’t know if we have won or lost.

I don’t want to believe a system or a leader can fail.

I don’t know the answers.

But I know who is on the right side of my list and His name is Jesus.

You see the world has seen good and bad leaders.  The world has seen the glory of freedom of the travesty of suppression.  The world has seen the rise and fall of great nations.

Let us remember Beloved,  Jesus remains on the throne.

Let us remember the future of our country does not rest in the next four years but the forbearance of God’s hand to allow this nation to repent and call on His mercy.

For now we have one list, one item, one call to duty and that is to press on, be grateful and be part of the solution and absolutely not part of the problem.  

We all have our platforms.  We all have our homes, our neighborhoods, our workplaces and our places to shine light, to speak blessing, to share hope and to reflect glory.  Let us not forget a thousand wrongs need only one right.

That right is Jesus.

“But you are the ones chosen by God, chosen for the high calling of priestly work, chosen to be a holy people, God’s instruments to do his work and speak out for him, to tell others of the night-and-day difference he made for you—from nothing to something, from rejected to accepted.”

1 Peter 2:9 (The Message)