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1Paul,
an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, for the sake of the promise of
life that is in Christ Jesus,
2 To
Timothy, my beloved child: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and
Christ Jesus our Lord.
3 I
am grateful to God—whom I worship with a clear conscience, as my ancestors
did—when I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. 4Recalling
your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. 5I
am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother
Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. 6For
this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through
the laying on of my hands; 7for God did not give us a spirit of
cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline. 8 Do
not be ashamed, then, of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner,
but join with me in suffering for the gospel, relying on the power of God, 9who
saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but
according to his own purpose and grace. This grace was given to us in Christ
Jesus before the ages began, 10but it has now been revealed through
the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life
and immortality to light through the gospel. 11For this gospel I was
appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher, 12and for this
reason I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know the one in whom I
have put my trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard until that day what I
have entrusted to him. 13Hold to the standard of sound teaching that
you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 14Guard
the good treasure entrusted to you, with the help of the Holy Spirit living in
us.
This coming Sunday as you see above, we have a particularly
beautiful scripture from Paul speaking to his protege Timothy. This particular scripture
really had me thinking about how we allow God to define roles of potential in
our hearts to serve Him. The Words that we see in the scriptures we sometimes
have a hard time relating and understanding to ourselves in this postmodern
age. In some senses this has done us a grave disservice to not think about
those words prayerfully in being encouraged in our own individual unique work
in the world as the Body of Christ.
One of these words is the word apostle. It literally means
one who is sent. We are probably more comfortable perhaps with the term
disciple and wonder what the difference is really, and does it matter. There
have been many an article written about discipleship as well as there has been
many a conversation about discipleship; but what sets apart someone to be
considered an apostle? I would just like to take a guess out there and say that
it really has to do with a deep personal relationship with the Lord. This is
one that is invested in building up the foundation of your heart for service.
How deep of a relationship can you have with the Lord truly
depends on you. One of the beautiful aspects of doing different forms of
praying and contemplating the scriptures has had me wonder, what it would be
like to see Jesus in action? We have many, many paintings over the centuries of
what our Lord possibly look looked like in His incarnate human form, but you
can't help but wondering when the Holy Spirit is at work in your life and
speaks through you... He is the third person. The third person of the Trinity.
The Lord Jesus in our human form we can see by His beautiful words, His Living
Word, a picture in our hearts of what He may have looked like but it is still
an impression that we as people living in the 21st century do not have a
photograph of.
Why would this really be so essential for some people? I
think this is a matter of witness and I think it is a matter of truly how deep your
faith is. I'm sure many of us have heard of the film that came out a couple of
years ago about a little boy who kept painting a picture of Jesus that in my
impression looked like Barry Manilow. The young boy was adamant that this truly
was Jesus coming to him in a vision. Who are we to judge how the Lord is
perceived in our hearts? For this young boy, he looks like a cross between the
famous R. Hook painting of Jesus and Barry Manilow the singer. If I had to
sketch out a picture of Jesus for myself I see him as a combination of the
famous painting in the Saint Catherine of Siena monastery of ‘Our Lord the Pantocrator,’
as well as perhaps a combination of the Hook painting and the Franco Zeffirelli
Jesus of Nazareth mini-series’ actor.
Being a faithful people is very hard these days when we
tried to go beyond wonder to define and declare who Jesus the Christ is, and
was and DOES for the world still. This could become a Pandora's box of many
theological discoveries, debates, controversies and so forth. My interest here
is purely as a person of Faith, as a disciple. I am a disciple who believes in
a costly Grace. I am a disciple who believes in a prayerful obedience to
be committed to the cause of delivering the Living Word as the task of being an
aspect of the Body in the world.
I consider myself as someone who has been sent but what is
that really saying? Is that coming from a place of the ego or is it coming from
a place of hearing God deeply and realizing that God truly answers prayers? I
spent the earlier part of my life as an artist, a thinker and a poet. The
second half of my life has seen a crossroads between various ministries in
valleys and over mountaintops, but I truly see this as God's plans for me to
minister to one's deepest heart's desire to grow in faith with God. Growing in
faith with God is not just a Sunday morning affair that's a common thing to say
of course, it is to be a lifestyle.
Shepherding the church of God in the world as a humble
servant is a key towards a discipleship that stretches the self, beyond the
self. I think the best way to really begin to wrap your mind around this
is to really think of that third person of the Trinity literally there within your
heart, within your very self. Prayer brings about the conversation with that
very Holy Spirit within us and helps to shape us to see that we are in the
world, but not to be of it. One of the greatest images I have collaged together
to encapsulate our struggle as the Lord's disciples was something years later as
thinking of a pair of little horns holding up a halo. The Reformation saw this
as ‘simul justus et peccator’ or as translated from the Latin as “simultaneously
both Saint and sinner.”
Within the ordinary of our everyday lives we overlooked the
reigning Grace, gifts and miracles of God on our journey. If we even began to
not only see miracles come to life, no matter how small they may be and begin
to truly feel God within us as this guiding Holy Spirit we would understand
what an apostle truly is. Should I dare to think myself that I have the
potential to be an apostle of the Lord? If we really looked at Timothy's second
letter not just seeing it as a sketch or snippet from the beautiful pastoral ministry
of Paul to his protégé, we can see the truth of God in efforts to share the Holy
Spirit with others to develop a faith that can move mountains.
The abstract poetic words and thoughts of a faith that can
move mountains comes from how powerful our spirit is when encouraged,
enlightened, strengthened and inspired by the Holy Spirit of God. This is a
life built by witness no matter how flimsy at times your witness may seem or
overly ordinary your witness may seem to others; we all have something beautiful
in common: we have been constructed in the image of God. We truly are the
children of Grace and promise. This is
not just a staple statement I have incorporated into many of my messages, but
it is a truth.
It was said when our Lord and savior was ready to be
condemned to the cross that Pontius Pilate rebuked back to him saying: “what is
truth?” That's an important question for us to think about today when we have
gone way past Eden’s apple incident in condemnatory behavior and justification
of self over and above God and neighbor. The moments we have made God
purely an aspect of the heavens in distance from us and not one who has come
down to earth and be in many senses a sacrifice even within us as His Holy
Spirit; how can we relate ourselves our very selves to the sense of a
covenantal discipleship?
I do not see myself as merely a ministerial professional or
pastor of a church in the world, but I see myself as a covenantal disciple. The
only one who could really judge our roles which we need to keep clear here, is
the Lord... if your faith has uplifted you to feel you can move mountains of
doubt and other people's stigmas upon you then perhaps you do have an extra
ordinary discipleship! Why not? There is a fine line in our doubting each other
as well as within ourselves between the ego and being a humble servant to the
Lord and our neighbor.
One of the beautiful Ministries I have had the opportunity
to investigate early on in my own faith Journey has been Stephens Ministries.
This is literally training laity to develop a skill of compassion, empathy for
those within their own congregation and even beyond the congregation in
visitation ministry. I've been seeing the other side of that by doing Hospice
Care again in the interim hope of serving up north in the near future. Being
the hands and feet of Jesus the heart's ears are greatly open to one suffering
and sorrow. This is just one side or one of many things that we can
discover when we allow ourselves to deeply feel the Lord's presence in our very
self, working through us.
Harboring a faith that can move mountains goes beyond faith
in action it is really truthfully how God's love, His Holy Spirit's guidance is
genuinely incorporated in our very selves. For us to be encouraged today, I
would challenge you to think beyond “the 12.” Take the time to think about and
see the many people who have been people pioneering in their faith doing
amazing things in their little corner of the world whether in the country or in
the desert with a love within themselves that can move mountains and touch the
sky.
Rev. Nicole A.M. Collins
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