Words of Challenge

Over the past two days, we reflected on Ezekiel’s call story (2:1-5) and on how sometimes God sends prophets into our lives with the message we most need to hear. 

Today, I can’t help but think about a conversation we had with one of the candidates for the Associate Pastor position at our church. He ended up not being the right person at that time, but something he said really caught my heart. He was telling us about his youth group at a previous church. He learned that there was a Christian campus ministry at the nearby high school that was targeting the popular kids. The idea was that if they got the popular kids, their friends would follow. 

In contrast to this, he and the lead pastor of his church covenanted to pray every week, “Lord, send us the ones no one else wants…” Send us the ones no one else wants…

And he said God honored that prayer. They had every misfit, every kid with problems… every kid who was different. 

I thought:  That would be a challenge. But isn’t that exactly where Jesus’ heart is?

Then I remember years before that when I was teaching in Jamaica, I remember at some point that year, the government held a national prayer breakfast in downtown Kingston. All the prominent people – politicians and business leaders from around the island attended. 

On the news that night, they interviewed this woman who was not at the prayer breakfast, but standing outside with a small group in protest. (I thought: What could they be protesting? It’s a prayer breakfast!) And she said, “All these people here praying…praying for a miracle? I’ll tell you, it’s a miracle I’m still alive after 21 years in this slum of Trenchtown! They have means, they have money. They have power.  But look at us here. We’re hungry. We’re dying of violence. They claim to be people of faith, but do they hear our cries for mercy?” 

God says to Ezekiel, whether the people hear or refuse to hear, they will know, they will know that a prophet has been among them.

Let us pray:  Open our hearts, O God, to your prophetic word to us this day. Comfort us where we need comfort. Challenge us where we need challenged. And heal us where we need healing; through Christ our Lord. Amen.