​I've been writing more about what it means to be a Christian in the dirt — meaning how we live the incarnation, this mystery of glory housed in flesh and bone, embodying love and stubborn hope for new creation in the soil of our everyday lives and the places we inhabit.

Radical Hospitality as the scandalous welcome of God is central to our practices as a faith community. For the kingdom of God is like a big, long banqueting table, full of friends, strangers, neighbors, misfits, and sojourners. I love the invitation of the table. For there is something so earthy, bodily, and yet mystical that happens around the table. When we break bread together, we feel a sense of connection, delight, community, and presence.

So much of how we imagine gathering as the community of God’s people is around the table. Hospitality has been a pillar of Christianity over the millennia as Christians have cared for the sick, the orphan, the widow, and the stranger. Far from the modern, Martha-Stewart-influenced notions of hospitality meant to impress, hospitality was the means of grace to care for those in need. “Welcoming the stranger… is the most often repeated commandment in the Hebrew Scriptures, with the exception of the imperative to worship the one and only God" (Theologian Orland Espín).

In the New Testament, Jesus displayed a radical inclusivity and welcome in which he modeled a spirituality that is shown to the least of these — the hungry, the needy, the prisoner, and the sick (Matt 25). Hospitality comes from two Greek words: philos which means “friend” and xenos which means “stranger.”

Hospitality is the love of strangers.

As followers of Jesus, we are called to love our neighbor and the stranger —those who are often excluded and neglected in society. And this is very challenging today. We are so fragmented in our society. We don’t know our neighbor. We have largely outsourced and institutionalized care for the stranger. We are prone to gather in our homogenous groups, and we don’t often bump up against those who are different from us. We are often isolated from the real needs and hunger of the oppressed and the poor. And we are afraid…that we’ll be overwhelmed, that we’ll be pushed to our limits, that we won’t have enough time, money, and resources…

Yet, Jesus invites us into another way — a way of abundance that combats the scarcity we feel. We are invited into radical love and generosity. Jesus modeled a scandalous and highly controversial faith that welcomed and included those in society who were outsiders. This greatly offended the Pharisees and still offends us today.

Jesus befriended those on the margins, those who were invisible, those who were oppressed, and those without power, privilege, and voice. And he was highly criticized by the religious people of the day for hanging out with the wrong people. The wrong race, the wrong religion, the wrong gender, the wrong status. But we must understand this.

This. Is. The Gospel.

Its essence is radical welcome and inclusion. We see this as Jesus welcomed women, Samaritans, crooks, adulterers, and lepers, many of who were considered to be no less than dogs. No one is outside of God’s mercy and grace. This gospel transforms communities. It breaks down all the divides. The kingdom invitation is for everyone. Slave and free. Rich and poor. Educated and uneducated. Jew & Gentile. Christian & Muslim. Indigenous and refugee. Every shade of black, brown, and white. Straight and gay. Conservative and liberal. Everyone is invited to the table of God.

Because of this, I believe that radical hospitality is central to who we are as a church. For it is the essence of the kingdom.

This is the extravagance of the feast of God.


by Jessica Ketola​

We've been talking about our value of Creative Liberation — a value at the heart of God's work on the earth. Yet, so often we have read the scriptures from a location of privilege and have failed to see that this gospel is good news to the poor. We must decolonize our faith and decenter whiteness, for the Biblical narrative is largely written from the perspective of those who are oppressed. I believe we must reclaim a faith where our conversion to God demands our conversion to our neighbor. Theologians like James Cone, Gustavo Gutiérrez, William Jennings, Miroslav Volf, Renita Weems, and many others can help us understand liberation as a central theme of the Biblical narrative. One of the gifts of graduate school is being introduced to many different perspectives, ideologies, and thought leaders, and I've been ruminating on the intersection of gospel and culture.

Does the gospel of Jesus Christ transform culture? Many Christians today believe in a gospel that transforms the soul but not society. This question then lies at the heart of a Christian’s socio-political understanding. For me, it is a resounding “yes.”

For if the arc of scripture begins with the goodness and shalom of Creation and ends with its restoration in New Creation, then it follows that we are to be participants in this work of transformation. “Can the conclusion be avoided that not only is shalom God’s cause in the world but that all who believe in Jesus will, along with him, engage in the works of shalom? Shalom is both God’s cause in the world and our human calling.”[1] Shalom is the underpinning for a socio-political understanding that seeks human flourishing, justice, and right relationships with God, self, neighbor, and creation. This vision of human happiness and wholeness found in the inseparable love of God and neighbor informs my belief in a Christ who transforms culture.

Ethicist Reinhold Niebuhr’s models for Christ and Culture prove helpful here. [2] Two of the most predominant approaches today hold moral weight, Christ Against Culture and Christ Of Culture. The former offers a faith deeply committed to preserving holiness and a counter-cultural life. The latter offers an engagement with culture and an ability to contextualize faith in the language and forms of the day. Yet, one without the other offers a misshapen gospel. I believe that Christ Transforming Culture demonstrates an incarnational model that holds these two together — in love of God and neighbor, piety and justice, love incarnate in the neighborhood for the flourishing of all. We need a "radical evangelicalism [that] offers a tradition and a trajectory that is biblically based, Christ-centered, and socially involved—a gospel that embraces forgiveness and holiness for individuals and redemption and wholeness for the world." [3]

It is a travesty that piety has been separated from justice in the sociopolitical sphere. For politics is nothing more than the interrelationships between people and how power is shared, a realm ripe for the preservation of salt, liberation from oppression, and restoration of communities.[4] This kingdom liberation does not locate itself in the kingdoms and empires of this world – either in confusing God’s kingdom with a political agenda or in hopes of gaining worldly power or dominion. Rather, it is located once again in the justice and shalom of “right relationship” or “righteousness.” It is in the explicit call of scripture to care for the most vulnerable and needy in our communities, “not in rights asserted against one another” [5] but in responsibilities of humanity’s covenantal bond and “inescapable mutuality.”[6] Faith without works is dead, and a religion that has largely failed to address the injustices of our times is an impotent one. “Christians have not done enough in this area of conversion to the neighbor, to social justice, to history. They have not perceived clearly enough yet that to know God is to do justice.” [7]

2020 was an apocalyptic year, a year of revelation. Amidst pandemic and protest, the deep seeds of racism and white supremacy were exposed in ways that captured our attention. The brutal violence white people’s privilege had distanced them from now played over and over on screens. In the wake of George Floyd’s murder that catalyzed demonstrations all across our nation, it was increasingly difficult to believe that racism was a part of our ugly past.[8] Though this was nothing new for black, latinx, or asian american communities, many white folks awakened to the systemic and persistent evil of white supremacy. This was a time of grief, outrage, and protest amidst the tide of police brutality against black and brown bodies. The prophets cried out, “I can’t breathe.” [9]

You can be sure that God heard their cries. For our God is a God on the side of the oppressed — those who are crushed, degraded, humiliated, exploited, impoverished, defrauded, and enslaved. Yet what was the response of God’s people? Did the Church hear their cries?

Many did not. Many chose to stay clear of the “politics” of the day in a Christ Against Culture stance. Others became even more entrenched in the particular ideology of their political party both right and left, unwilling to converse with the “other” in a Christ Of Culture approach. The polarizing divides were profound — splitting apart families, friends, and churches.

Similar to previous times of civil unrest, there was “the appalling silence of the good people” within the white church, who professed their love for all lives, denied their culpability, and proved to be a “great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom.” [10] There was a refusal to see, let alone address, the systemic nature of racism, resorting once again to a gospel that sanctions the personal over the social. The roots of this bifurcation go back to our country’s inception in the doctrine of the "spirituality of the church." This spirituality attempted to extricate the church from addressing the social evils of slavery, promoting a “Christianity [that] could save one’s soul but not break one’s chains.” [11] Yet, this hideous distortion of the gospel repeats in response to the outcries to value black lives. “Where were the saints trying to change the social order, not just to minister to the slaves [oppressed communities], but to do away with slavery [the systems that brutalize and oppress communities]?” [12] Who was listening to the black and brown prophets of the day?

Fortunately, there is a remnant of Christians who believe that Christ Transforms Culture in the sociopolitical sphere. Those who were willing to repent of America’s greatest sin, white supremacy, offering more than “thoughts and prayers.” They listened deeply to a perspective that contradicted their own. They learned a hard and grievous history. They stood in solidarity with the oppressed in protests and vigils. They followed the prophetic witness of African American, Native American, Asian American, and Latinx theologians and church leaders, engaging in civil action. They spoke out against white supremacy in their pulpits and among their peers not without cost, insisting that all created in the divine image share in equity and justice. They wrestled profoundly and lamented their complicity, beginning to find ways to take up the cause of the oppressed, amplify marginalized voices, and elevate black lives.

Yet Christians today must commit to the long, hard road of a lived repentance, “for our conversion to the Lord implies this conversion to our neighbor” — a radical transformation where we come to know “Christ present in exploited and oppressed persons.” [13] “We are not to stand around, hands folded, waiting for shalom to arrive. We are workers in God’s cause,” [14] joining the Spirit’s work of peace-making, justice, and liberation on the earth.


by Jessica Ketola


[1] Nicholas Wolterstorff, “For Justice with Shalom”, in Until Justice and Peace Embrace: The Kuyper Lectures for 1981 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983), 72.
[2] Reinhold Niebuhr, “Types of Christian Ethics,” In Authentic Transformation: A New Vision of Christ and Culture, Glen H. Stassen, Diane M. Yeager, and John Howard Yoder (Nashville: Abingdon, 1996), 15-29.
[3] Donald W. Dayton, Rediscovering an Evangelical Heritage (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2014), 200.
[4] Matthew 5:13, Isaiah 58: 6-7, 12
[5] Karen Lebacqz, “Implications for a Theory of Justice,” in From Christ to the World: Readings in Christian Ethics, eds. Wayne Boulton, Thomas Kennedy, and Allen Verhey (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 257.
[6] Martin Luther King Jr., “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” The Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr, 1963, 1.
[7] Gustavo Gutiérrez, “Liberating Spirituality,” in Spiritual Writings (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2011), 49.
[8] “‘I Can’t Breathe’: The Refrain That Reignited a Movement,” Amnesty International, June 30, 2020, https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2020/06/i-cant-breathe-refrain-reignited-movement.
[9] Jessica Ketola, “A Time of Reckoning, Revelation, Repentance, and Reformation: The Epiphany of America’s Greatest Sin,” Medium, January 12, 2021, https://medium.com/interfaith-now/a-time-of-reckoning-revelation-repentance-and-reformation-7003c588875b.
[10] King, Jr., “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” 4.
[11] Jemar Tisby, The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2019), 38.
[12] Kathleen Jorden, “The Nonviolence of Dorothy Day,” in From Christ to the World: Readings in Christian Ethics, eds. Wayne Boulton, Thomas Kennedy, and Allen Verhey (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 443.
[13] Gutiérrez, “Liberating Spirituality,” 48.
[14] Wolterstorff, “For Justice with Shalom,” 72.

Photo: Touching Strangers Series by Richard Renaldi

As a community, we are shaped by our shared values —those things that we fiercely love and hold dear, our "non-negotiables"  — one of which is  is Deep Listening.

DEEP LISTENING
We listen deeply to the Spirit at work within our own stories, the stories of our neighbors, and the stories of our place until we become fully immersed in the mystery of God’s Story of love that heals us and heals the world.

This posture of Deep Listening locates us well in the humility and self-giving love of Christ's example. Jesus Christ, who spoke Creation into existence, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself of all privilege and power to take on our humanity and enter our world, laying down his life for love (Philippians 2). The scandal of the incarnation is profound.

We also are invited into this cruciform practice to enter the world of others for the sake of love. Yet often, we are caught up in our own worlds, occupied with our own self-interests and the demands of our lives. How do we repent, shift, and orient our lives differently in order to live lives of love?

How do we enter the worlds of others?

​How do we give up our privilege, our biases, our comfort, and our preconceived ideas to truly listen — deeply and thoughtfully? How do we pause before rushing in with our own experiences and worldviews? How do we slow down to listen well and let our hearts be impacted by the stories of our neighbors?

This is vital as we seek to incarnate love in our everyday lives. History is full of the atrocities of imperialism, colonization, racism, and gentrification. Often we fail to enter the world of the other, to esteem their interests higher than ourselves, to truly listen and honor the wisdom of their stories. “For our conversion to the Lord implies this conversion to our neighbor” — a radical transformation where we come to know “Christ present in exploited and oppressed persons.”[1] We are called to listen deeply to the stories that contradict our own, allowing them to affect us, shape us, and form us in the radical love of Christ.


[1] Gustavo Gutiérrez, “Liberating Spirituality,” in Spiritual Writings (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2011), 49.

by Jessica Ketola
ur

Sometimes it seems overly idealistic or naive to continue talking about the beautiful community God has called us to when the world around is groaning and heaving with tumultuous birth pains. For what good does it do to talk about love and justice in a world of hate, violence, and injustice? Yet, I am reminded that the self-giving, non-violent, enemy love that Jesus preached and embodied has the power to change the world.

Few are those who truly believe this, and fewer still are those who actually live it out. Dorothy Day was one of them. Day was a social activist, journalist, Catholic convert, mother, political radical, pacifist, servant of God, and more. Yet Day embodied what it means to put faith into action for social justice, deeply seated in her conviction to serve the poor and vulnerable. Her prophetic witness continues today.

Whenever I groan within myself and think how hard it is to keep writing about love in these times of tension and strife which may at any moment become for us all a time of terror, I think to myself, "What else is the world interested in?" What else do we all want, each one of us, except to love and be loved, in our families, in our work, in all our relationships. God is Love. Love casts out fear. Even the most ardent revolutionist, seeking to change the world, to overturn the tables of the money changers, is trying to make a world where it is easier for people to love, to stand in that relationship with each other of love. We want with all our hearts to love, to be loved. And not just in the family but to look upon all as our mothers, sisters, brothers, children. It is when we love the most intensely and most humanly, that we can recognize how tepid is our love for others. The keenness and intensity of love brings with it suffering, of course, but joy too because it is a foretaste of heaven.*
​
As you seek to live into a way of love, let this encourage your hearts. It is only within the love of God and neighbor that we see heaven here on earth. This is the way God's kingdom comes.
So we pray for the Spirit of God to infuse our hearts, minds, spirits, and bodies with the power of love. May we have eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts to perceive God's redemptive work all around us. And may we have the courage to take some risks, to put our bodies in the way of grace, to step in and join God there. Enter into the mystery of communion you were created for. Love and be loved.


​by Jessica Ketola

* Excerpt from "On Pilgrimage," The Catholic Worker, April 1948, 1, 2, 11.

Cultivating a vision of hope in a world of despair

Love. It’s the thing that makes the whole world go round. In this time of prolonged societal disruption, grief, and suffering, it is now more important than ever to have practices that ground us in the love of God. God who set the world in motion is at the center of the Cosmos pulling everything and everyone into the divine force of Love.

Love is remaking the whole world.

Love is the most powerful force, nd nothing can separate us from the Love of God. Nothing, no thing, can stop the eternal work of God. No pandemic. No injustice. No natural disasters, politics, illness, losses, or crises. Nothing can separate us from this love.

I know I need to hear this. I need to feel this. I need to know this deep down. As the uncertainty and losses of the pandemic persist, love is what carries me, nourishes me, and sustains me. Whether it is visible or not, I need to know that God is at work right smack dab in the middle of the mess. I need to believe in the goodness of God and the power of Love.

And I don’t think I’m alone. This year, the Apple TV comedy, Ted Lasso, became an instant hit telling a heart-warming tale about an American coach hired to rescue a Premiership football team in the U.K. — despite a total lack of experience. The show’s popularity speaks to how its optimism and hope were tremendous gifts amid the darkness of a pandemic world. One of the things that seemed to resonate deeply is Ted’s Lasso faith in God and humanity. He envisioned a world of goodness and love. The bright yellow sign that he posted in the locker room is now a meme everywhere — BELIEVE!
​
This is a message that we need to hear, a vision we need to see. Ignatius of Loyola, who was a Spanish Catholic priest and theologian in the sixteenth century and founder of the Society of Jesus (The Jesuits), offered us a vision of a world held in love. You see, he observed that our vision largely controls our perception and experience of the world and thus is at the heart of our spiritual journey. It’s often said, “I’ll believe it when I see it.” But Ignatius Loyola reverses the saying:

“When I believe it, I’ll see it.”

If we think the world is a bleak place, full of evil, greedy, selfish people who have no love for God or each other, that’s what we will see when we look around. If we think that our world is full of goodness and opportunity, a place that God created and sustains and loves, that is what we’ll find.

Ignatius offered this vision in the Spiritual Exercises intended to help people grow in their love for God, beginning with the Principle and Foundation.

God who loves us creates us and wants to share life with us forever. Our love response takes shape in our praise and honor and service of the God of our life.

All the things in this world are also created because of God’s love and they become a context of gifts, presented to us so that we can know God more easily and make a return of love more readily.

As a result, we show reverence for all the gifts of creation and collaborate with God in using them so that by being good stewards we develop as loving persons in our care of God’s world and its development. But if we abuse any of these gifts of creation or, on the contrary, take them as the center of our lives, we break our relationship with God and hinder our growth as loving persons.

In everyday life, then, we must hold ourselves in balance before all created gifts insofar as we have a choice and are not bound by some responsibility. We should not fix our desires on health or sickness, wealth or poverty, success or failure, a long life or a short one. For everything has the potential of calling forth in us a more loving response to our life forever with God.

Our only desire and our one choice should be this: I want and I choose what better leads to God’s deepening life in me.

[What Is Ignatian Spirituality? by David L. Fleming, SJ]

What stands out to me is this.

Everything has the potential of calling forth in us a more loving response in our life with God.

This means that EVERYTHING in our lives right now — the joys and the sorrows, the gifts and the losses, the disillusionment and the hope, the beauty and the brokenness, the grace and the struggle…everything has the potential of calling us deeper into the love and life of God. Everything.

Nothing is wasted.

Not the last two years of what sometimes feels like Groundhog Day on repeat — days of uncertainty, anxiety, polarization, grief, protest, boredom, Netflix binging, pajamas, Zoom calls, and quarantine. For our God is a God of redemption, a God of the impossible, a God who brings fruitfulness out of barrenness and life out of death.

We began this year with the Advent invitation to believe, joining in the ancient chorus of saints who like Mary echoed a deep and resounding yes to birth the holy. For nothing is impossible with God.

I believe that we must begin to see through the eyes of faith. For negativity and cynicism dominate the airspace these days. I get it. We are feeling the prolonged effects of collective trauma, isolation, and loss. And yet there is another reality that is greater than any suffering or evil — God’s kingdom of Love is here healing and remaking the whole world.
​
So what do you see? What do you believe?

In the literal and spiritual fog of this season, can you put your trust in this Love that “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things “(I Corinthians 13:7). Love is all that matters. No one, no circumstance, no thing can take love away. When everything else is shaken, only love remains.

So however your battle-worn souls come today, love is here to greet you. Love welcomes you into a space just for you. You can lay all your worries and burdens, your striving and your surviving aside for just a few moments to slow down, breathe, inhale, and exhale. Experience the Spirit here with you, present, now. Sit in the loving gaze of your Creator. Receive deep nourishment as you root down deep into the abundant and eternal love of the Divine. I encourage you even now and through the coming days and weeks to meditate on this love of God and to begin to shift your vision to see the world through eyes of hope, faith, and love.

I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:16–21)

May you experience profound grace to believe in a God who is able to accomplish abundantly far more than you can ask or imagine.

For what you believe, you will see.
​
So why not join the long history of saints, reformers, and dreamers and follow the seminal message of the hour….BELIEVE!

​by Jessica Ketola

Fall is in the air and the lit wick of my pumpkin harvest candle is signaling the return to all that is warm and cozy. A new season is upon us, though it remains a continuation of what is turning out to be a woefully prolonged season of pandemic.

As Covid-19 surges, the summer of hope has ended in gloom. Or so the headlines read. We were so ready for the new-found freedom of vaccines to liberate us from the tyranny of the virus, but here we are again back to overwhelmed hospitals and alarming death tolls. Lord, in your mercy.

It is disheartening, numbing, maddening. I haven't even wanted to think about it.

And yet, hope persists.

In a world that makes sense less and less — a world that seems hell bent on the decimation, brokenness, and fragmentation of relationship on every level, strata, and sphere — a world that is rife with chaos, violence, upheaval, and turmoil, we stand firmly in a Love that is redeeming all things. Our story is the greatest story ever told. We must not forget that Love is the most powerful force in the world. God, our Creator, Liberator, Restorer, Comforter and Friend is the very essence and embodiment of Love, and Love will win the day. So in the midst of spiritual, political, environmental, social, and economic devastation, we can hold onto fierce and stubborn hope.

In fact, we know from history that it is precisely in these moments of great societal upheaval that the Spirit breaks out in new and powerful ways to forward God's work of renewal and transformation on the earth. The great expansion of the gospel in the first few centuries of the early church was birthed in tumultuous times of oppression, war, persecution, and pandemic. So though the earth is groaning and heaving with birth pains all around us, this is the time in which we as the church are called to embody Love on the earth.

For I believe that the Spirit is indeed birthing a new thing. Our American way is crumbling; and the North American church is flailing. We are desperately in need of reformation. This is why we as The Practicing Church remain committed to reimagining the church in the neighborhood. We must find ways to reconnect to the Real, to incarnate in our places, to embody our faith, and to be restorers of all that is good and holy and sacred in the world. We are called to offer hope in the midst of despair, mercy in the face of judgment, wholeness in the midst of great fragmentation, comfort in grief, vulnerability in shame, and peace in violence. We are called to reinterpret the gospel in our time and in our place as good news and healing for all that is broken.

Last month, we had the gift of attending a cohort through Sustainable Faith with other parish-style communities who are also dreaming, praying, and leaning into more embodied, holistic, and relational ways to be the church. We returned home more certain and encouraged that in fact God is unfolding a beautiful work in us. And so many all around the country and the globe are also responding to the invitation to follow the Spirit into a land unknown and unseen, hearing God's words, Behold, I am doing a new thing. [Isaiah 43:19]

A few months ago, I had the privilege of being interviewed for The Lean-In Podcast to share our story of embodying love and justice in our neighborhood and community. It was just released yesterday and I hope you will listen and share it with your networks, but mostly that your heart will be encouraged as you listen to God's work in and through us.

Earlier this year, we were featured in an article for Duke's Faith & Leadership publication. I continue to be amazed that our small community is being used to encourage and inspire others to repent, to reimagine, and to re-form what it means to be the church today. I am so amazed at God's goodness and faithfulness to us over and over again.

This is why in spite of all the bad news that bombards us, we continue to LEAN IN to the goodness and mercy of God with stubborn hope, faith, and love for what is unseen but being revealed in us. 

I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. - Romans 8:18-25


by Jessica Ketola

God entered the world on the margins.
Not in Jerusalem but in the obscurity of Bethlehem
God was revealed to the shepherds not the priests
To the outcasts and the ruffians, God announced the good news.

Good news and great tidings of joy to all people.
Not just tax cuts for the rich or more comforts for the privileged.
This is good news for the poor.
To break the chains of oppression.
To set the prisoner free.
To heal the sick.
To comfort those who are brokenhearted.
To announce that God is not displeased with us, nor angry or withholding.
God is on our side. God is here. Present now.
The God of Love, revealed in Christ Jesus, is with us.

This, this is the good news the angels sang.
Filling the sky with their reverberating sounds.
Summons of peace on earth, good will to all people everywhere.
Regardless of culture, race, class, religion, or gender.
Songs shining the light of a midnight star
Into the darkest places of our collective lives.

We must not underestimate the power of the manger
And the hope it holds.
The Christmas song of the angels is not as innocent as it sounds.
It has turned the world upside down before now.
It still can.

​
by Jessica Ketola

Cultivating A Daily Practice of Love

In difficult times, how do you stay grounded? The onslaught of 2020 continues with the ferocity of pandemics, protests, and politics. It is challenging to maintain our equilibrium in the midst of so much chaos, change, and loss. And yet we know the harshest seasons push us to grow. During winter, a tree is dormant to the naked eye. But underneath the surface, it is hard at work growing and expanding its root system in search of valuable nutrients. So it goes with our souls. It is precisely in times like these that we are invited to root and ground ourselves in deeper ways.

But how you ask? In the midst of work deadlines, spinning plates, and bleak headlines? How?

Love. Love is the answer.

Love has the power to strengthen, nourish, and ground us in the midst of all the fray. The tumultuous storm that surrounds us is not of our own choosing. And yet, we can choose to surrender to love in the midst of its pounding waves. These are the waters of transformation.

Cultivate a Daily Practice
In order to access the power of love, you will need to cultivate a daily practice to ground yourself. This is easier said than done. So much competes for our time and attention. And yet in the midst of the fray, how are you making time for what is most important? Or do you find yourself scattered and weary from the demands of the urgent? There is plenty of research about the health benefits of prayer and spiritual meditation that make us less anxious and more resilient, present, and hopeful.

Are you finding some minutes of your day for stillness, reflection, prayer, or meditation? Are you sitting in the loving gaze and tender affection of God?

If you are daily immersing yourself in love, most likely you are beginning to experience what it feels like to be grounded in what is most true about your life. Love has a way of ordering and reordering our lives. The unimportant things begin to lose their pull and what is most core to our being increases in its desire.

Curiosity Can Cure Our Cynicism
If a daily practice eludes you, you may be feeling a sense of frustration, guilt, or cynicism. But guilt does us no good. And self-flagellation moves us away from love, not towards it. Here is where curiosity can cure our cynicism.

What do we believe that is keeping us from abiding and resting in love? What are we afraid of?

Often times, it is our subterranean fears and hurts that unconsciously drive us. We are afraid we won’t be productive “enough” if we take moments of stillness out of our busy day. Many of us have distorted images about who God is and what God demands. We are afraid that God cannot be trusted. Or perhaps we are afraid we are unworthy of love.

It is here in the rawness of our wrestling where love comes rushing in. God meets us right where we are, not in the place we want to be. In all our frustration, desire, avoidance, longing, and unbelief — God is near.

So don’t give up. Lean in with curiosity, honesty, and vulnerability.

Love Awaits.
​Love is calling and inviting you. The lovingkindness of God chases after you. This is not a duty, but a gracious invitation to live life in union and communion with Love — to let love heal you and empower you to bring healing to others.

Imagine for a moment that you lived fully, authentically, and vulnerably out of a deep and abiding love. What would be true about your life? Imagine what would be possible if you were free from all the fear and self-doubt that constrains you. Imagine the powerful good of a life given over to Love. Is there any other pursuit more worthwhile?

The Miracle of Practice and of Becoming
So this is the opportune time to cultivate a practice of love. New practices take time to establish, so give yourself plenty of grace (There is so much grace!). Keep on keeping on; and whatever you do, don’t give up!

No one becomes a marathon runner, concert pianist, or “saint” overnight. Over time, as new neural pathways are formed and new “muscles” are developed, consistent practice gives way to proficiency. What once was hard becomes automatic. This is the miracle of practice and of becoming.

They say you become what you practice. So let us practice love, and in turn, become people of love.

Love is the most powerful force in the universe, and there is no storm — no pandemic, politics, racism, quarantine, hurricane, or fire — that can overcome it. Though we will continue to lament, to work for change, and insist on justice, we will rest in Love. For we know that the tumult of this season will do its work if we let it — to secure us, nourish us, and ground us in Love.

by Jessica Ketola

Hope As Resistance In An Election Season

Now is not a time for despair, but for hope. We know all too well the insanity of reasons for anxiety and gloom. But pessimism does us no good. If ever there was a time to hold onto faith, it is now. This election season is one of heightened anxiety, fear, and division. And never before have the stakes felt so high. Whatever your politics may be, it feels like the earth is collapsing underneath our feet. And perhaps it is. Kingdoms rise and fall, but that which is eternal endures forever.

I don’t mean to trivialize your anxiety. I feel it too. Rumors of voter fraud and intimidation, gun stockpiles, conspiracy theories, and civil war have us all unnerved. There are no trite answers sufficient to meet the magnitude of suffering. That would only be unkind, adding insult to injury. No, what I am suggesting is that there are truths that are deeper, wider, longer, and higher than every fear, every abuse, and every lie.

These three things endure forever — hope, faith, and love; and the greatest of these is love. When everything is said and done, love wins.

Love Wins
As a follower of Jesus, I am angry and heartbroken over the suffering and denigration of so many across our country. We are enduring overwhelming grief and loss in this time of pandemic; and it seems to be a piling-on of epic proportions. This election, I find myself sick with the greed, the violence, and the racism of our times. Our country is broken, divided, and reeling. I long for a world that is just, where the vulnerable are cared for, the oppressed are lifted up, and every human is shown dignity. I believe God calls us to stay attentive to the policies and leaders that impact our collective well-being. We must not only vote for ourselves, but for the common good. Love insists that we use our vote to work toward creating God’s beloved community on earth.

But will love win in this election?

We can only hope.

Hope As Resistance
Along with our voting, our mobilizing, our outreach, and our organizing, we must hold onto stubborn hope. Hope is resistance. Faith is protest. Love is defiance. We must resist the powers of violence, hate, and greed. We must not let fear have the last word. If the empire is falling, let it fall. But let us resolve to rebuild and co-create the world that we dream of.

No matter what happens in this election, I can assure you that the deep polarization and fragmentation of our day will persist. There is no magic wand. It will take you and me and everybody coming together across the divides to tear down unjust systems. We must not abdicate our God-given responsibility and creativity to steward a world in which all can flourish. For now is not a time for despair, but for hope.
​

​by Jessica Ketola

​The chaos continues this week in the aftermath of a presidential debate that devolved into a debacle of a shouting match. This and a million other issues under the category, “things gone wrong with the planet” threaten to incite ulcers, high blood pressure, anxiety disorders, or worse. We find ourselves living in dystopian times of plague, quarantine, civil unrest, demagogues, hurricanes, and fires. And as the election looms, the madness of divisiveness and power-grabbing escalates.

This disruption is rocking people’s faith. Many are leaving the church as the American Church is largely flailing and failing to step up to this moment — either by our silence, our complicity to white supremacy, our nationality posing as Christianity, or by our politics that seem to be the antithesis of Christ-likeness. I get it. This is madness!

But I urge you, don’t give up on Jesus. Because Jesus’ self-giving love is the antidote for the present-day ills in our society. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Nelson Mandela, even Gandhi practiced this powerful way of love, meeting injustice and violence with soul force. They believed that you cannot fight hate with hate — only with love. This ideology came from Jesus himself.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice,
for they will be filled.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called children of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for doing right,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” — Matthew 5:3–10

This is why I implore you — don’t leave faith.
​Because faith, hope, and love are what the world needs more of right now, not less!

And don’t give up on Jesus either.
Because Jesus has shown us the way, defeating the darkest evil with love, forgiveness, humility, and sacrifice.

And please don’t walk away from the church altogether.
There are many followers of Jesus on the ground, living the way of love and peace in very ordinary and yet extraordinary ways. We’re here. You just got to find us. Love cannot exist without community. And we’re going to need each other to work together to create a better world.

For this is not the first time the human race has faced challenges. And as followers of Jesus, we understand that a whole new world is being birthed. In spite of all the suffering and the tumult of these times, our triune God who has set the world in motion is at the center of the universe pulling everything and everyone into Love.

Love is the most powerful force in the cosmos.

This is why now, more than ever, we need to ground ourselves in the love of God. Love is everything.

If this crazy world and compromised church have got you spinning, choose Love.

Love is the lens through which all of the gospel is to be interpreted. Jesus said it himself in his greatest commandment to love God with all of your being and to love your neighbor as yourself. (Matthew 22:37–40) All of the scripture can be summed up in this.

Love liberates the oppressed, heals the brokenhearted, bestows mercy to the undeserving, welcomes the outcast, embraces the untouchables, reverses power structures, and lifts up the poor. Love is why we signed up to follow Jesus in the first place. And Jesus’ revolutionary love is still as compelling as ever. So how are we to be faithful to love in such a time as this?

“He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” — Micah 6:8

DO JUSTICE
As the deep roots of racism and white supremacy have been exposed in this hour, the church must not be silent. When our own president refuses, we must unequivocally condemn white supremacy. It is demonic. And as the church, we must repent from our complicity to whiteness, defined here as a “death-dealing, anti-life, anti-God system of dehumanization (Deuteronomy 12:3).” Donelle Wyche [Read Full Article: In Search of White Partners: What BIPOC Need]

“Christ calls us to repentance…for allowing whiteness to exist, to flourish, to victimize, to terrorize, and to oppress. We need to repent of the ways we have remained silent as whiteness has destroyed God’s creation, God’s image-bearers, and God’s vision for humanity.”

It is not enough to merely acknowledge this present evil. The way of love commands that we do justice and act justly.

When there is so much animosity and fear towards the “other” — resulting in hate crimes, children in cages, and horror and violence of all kinds, the Biblical call to love the stranger and the alien is paramount. In this era when so many deny climate change and actively ignore issues of environmental injustice, our faith requires us to care for the earth and advocate for God’s love toward all of creation. When the rich continue to get richer off the backs of the poor in the face of rising poverty, displacement, and unemployment, the upending-powerful love of Jesus calls us to create new communities and economies where all can flourish. Love does not consume; it creates. Love gives up power for the greater good.

Self-giving love conquers evil. Jesus showed us the way.

LOVE KINDNESS & WALK HUMBLY
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails” (I Corinthians 13:4–8).

As we find ourselves in the midst of the mania of a heated and polarized political election, love is essential. For it is important to stay faithful to love midst the rising tensions. Eugene Cho, who wrote Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk: A Christian’s Guide To Engaging Politics encourages us.

“Stay engaged. Remain hopeful. Love anyway. Walk with integrity. Fight for the vulnerable, and bear witness to the love, mercy, and grace of Christ. For it’s not only WHAT we believe, but HOW we engage.”

The end never justifies the means, lest we become the very thing we hate. This is why Jesus called us to the radical act of enemy love. Love is supreme. For we do not put our hope in political parties or empires, but we put our hope in the loving and peaceable kin-dom of God. And we follow Christ’s example to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly.

It is time for followers of Jesus to reclaim this revolutionary way of Love, to reimagine a new kind of Christ-follower, and to come together to work toward a new world.


by Jessica Ketola