Adopt-A-Lifestyle

Faith without deeds is dead. (James 2:26, NIV)

            Church reformer Martin Luther struggled so with the idea of works that he wanted to delete  the book of James from the New Testament. While I respect Luther, faith and works have never been incompatible aspects of the Christian journey for me. Granted, you can do one or the other to extreme.

            You can sit on your duff and read the Bible and pray all day while you neglect responsibilities and the needs of others. It’s also easy to swing the other direction by being so busy serving that you have no time for cultivating a deeper personal relationship with God. You may even come to think that works grant your entrance into Heaven. Both extremes are inappropriate.

            Works are a marker, a demonstration of what goes on on the inside. If I love my husband but never play Scrabble with him, never make or buy him anything with cherries, scarcely talk with him or about him positively, you would rightly wonder if I love him. Doing those things are all good indications that I love this guy. What’s on the inside comes out.

            I haven’t had any email or snail mail from God this week, but I envision him with a big smile on his face. His kids in this neck of the world have been busy with faith and practice. A lot of what is on the inside of his kids came out.

            On Wednesday about three hundred people actually did come out. To pray. Who does that anymore? Three hundred people who said enough is enough violence in this part of town. We’re going to ask the God of Peace to take back this part of town. Three hundred people sang in worship of the Almighty God of the Universe and walked a troubled neighborhood, asking for God to reign there (faith and deeds). It was wonderful! And now we live in expectation (more faith) of what God will do to answer that prayer.

            This morning, after a dry week, rain came and then hovered over town. Sigh. This morning was Adopt-A-Block. A team from the church planned to spruce up Miss J.’s yard. “God, send the rain away, so we can touch this household.” (Many prayers go up from my patio door prayer point.)

            By nine-thirty, we could work. Clip. Snip. Crack. Snap. Bush after bush, branch after branch got a trim.  Even elderly Miss J. took a turn with the nippers or directed some of the operation.

John and Darrell attacked the tall bushes. David worked the fence row. Bianca and Maria chopped away while Jennifer and Jason worked their way along the row of bushes.  Becky and her grandsons raked and picked up, and so did Zis and Marc. Javier ran the weed eater. Rose handled the weeds in the sidewalk and snapped photos, and the rake and I became good buddies.

            In three hours smiles creased our faces. Things were looking good and tidy once again. Miss J.? She said, “You have no idea what this means to me.”

            Perhaps she’s right. But I also think that in another way we do. When God’s people get to pray, live, and serve in faith, asking God to push back the darkness of the Enemy’s kingdom, there is a joy. It is what we were made to do. That’s why it feels so marvelous.

            Faith without works is dead? Faith with works was very much alive this week. I’m tuned in to the next episode!