Dare to Pray!

Oh, my! If we haven't strettttcccchhhhed you yet during the Dare Ya series, we certainly will this weekend. This Saturday and Sunday, we'll dare you to pray dangerous prayers, and we'll give each one of you a personal copy of Regina Sara Ryan's poem "Dangerous Prayers."

I want to take the opportunity today to look both forward and backward a bit. First, I want us to look back to Easter and the beginning of the Dare Ya series. In our daring to dance, to cry, to fly, to dream, and to pray, we are daring to claim that we are Easter people. We are daring to announce that the entire course of history changed through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Not only that, but we are affirming that we have been and will continue to be personally changed by our relationship with God through the person of Jesus Christ and the presence of the Holy Spirit. Who knows better than we do what a risk we take when we dare to be changed, dare to be different!

Looking forward, we end the Dare Ya series next week with "Dare To Believe." Next week is Pentecost, the "birthday" of the church, if you will. It is the day, fifty days after Easter, when we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit, arriving like tongues of flame and "firing up" the baby Christians to come out of their closets-or their safe spaces-and share the Gospel of Jesus Christ throughout the world.

Of particular relevance to us as we celebrate this Pentecost is the multicultural, radically inclusive nature of Pentecost. Empowered by the Holy Spirit, every person present that first Pentecost could comprehend each other's words even though they were speaking in a variety of different languages. We've been trying to recreate that experience in worship. Have you noticed over the past several weeks that we have been blending a variety of languages into our Sunday worship services? I have enjoyed hearing the surprised whispers of recognition all around me as the congregation realizes that an unexpected language is being spoken. "It's German!" someone will whisper excitedly. "Is that Hebrew?" someone wonders. The Sunday that Daniel sang the consecration in Spanish, I couldn't hear your words, but I could see the tears in many of your eyes.

Is there anything more amazing than feeling like the Word of God is being spoken directly to us? In the way we most want to hear? In the words that cut through all our filters and our "stuff" and our defenses and break our hearts wide open?

I dare you to let your heart be broken wide open by the vastness and reality of God's presence. And I dare you not to rush to patch your broken heart back together, but to leave it open...leave it open to life, laughter, tears, learning, joy, dancing, dreaming, love and always, more love.

Liebe, Karlek, Amore,