“Cruciform self-giving is the distinctive dimension of holiness.”- Michael Gorman
“A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.”- Isaiah 42:3
In Chapter 6 (“What’s Even Better than a Bucket List”) of The Broken Way, Ann Voskamp confesses her daily need to re-member koinonia. That daily process enables Ann to “draw cruciform communion from my believing head to my forgetting heart.”
Although we believe in Jesus, Ann adds, we sometimes don’t believe in Jesus working in us (emphasis Ann’s). Yet, as an Orthodox Hasidic rabbi stressed when he talked with Ann on a flight, God’s belief in you far exceeds the strength of your belief in Him:
“You may believe in God, but never forget — it’s God who believes in you. Every morning that the sun rises and you get to rise? That’s God saying He believes in you, that He believes the story He’s writing through you. He believes in you as a gift the world needs.”
Therefore, Ms. Voskamp asks, can you believe in Jesus in a way that creates certainty of Jesus’ belief in you? Jesus believes in you enough to have chosen you. And if Jesus believes in you and what can be given through you, how is it possible not to believe?
In conclusion, Ann offers these words of comfort, hope, and strength. She writes:
“Jesus didn’t just calm one storm — He can calm all our storms. Jesus sings grace in the wind, He pours mercy out like rain. . . . And He comes as a sign to us, a sign of the cross, a sign God’s reaching for us, believing in us, in love . . . in redemption . . . making all things new, in making us enough because He is.”
Today’s question: How have you shown cruciform self-giving during your desert, transition time? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “Waiting room theology”
