Description
What does it mean to live faithfully in the world, trusting that God is with us? Deceptively simple, eh? None of the readings offers a neat formula. Instead, they speak about allegiance, faith, love and hope; about a God who is genuinely present and yet cannot be controlled or contained; and about following God into a future though we cannot see it yet.
In Matthew 22:15–22, Jesus is caught in a carefully constructed trap. The Pharisees and Herodians ask whether it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. A simple yes or no could put Jesus in trouble either way – with those who resent Roman occupation or with Roman authority itself. Cleverly, Jesus refuses the terms of the question. He asks his questioners to produce the coin used to pay the tax, which they readily do, and turns the question back upon them. Rather than providing a simple rule separating what belongs to Caesar from what belongs to God, Jesus leaves his hearers with a much larger question about allegiance and faithful living within the complicated realities of the world.
Coin Rubbings slows this story down by putting an actual coin into people’s hands. As its images and words emerge on paper, people of different generations can wonder together about what our money reveals about the society to which we belong and the powers that shape our lives. Like Jesus, we should resist arriving at a single “right” answer. Instead we end in prayer for wisdom to live faithfully, courage to resist what asks more of us than it should, and remembrance that our deepest allegiance is to God’s way.
That question of allegiance connects naturally with 1 Thessalonians 1:1–10. Paul gives thanks for the Thessalonians’ “work of faith and labour of love and steadfastness of hope,” which have become visible in the life of this young Christian community. The Faith, Hope and Love call to worship embodies these three characteristics with simple actions: hands to the heart for faith, hands opened towards others for love, and hands reaching forward for hope. The whole community begins worship by affirming that we live our faith together, trusting Christ, loving one another and reaching towards God’s future.
Exodus 33:12–23 takes us more deeply into the mystery at the centre of such a life. After the golden calf episode, Moses wants reassurance that God will continue to accompany this people. He wants to know God’s intentions and even asks to see God clearly, as we all would love to! God promises presence, but Moses cannot possess this presence. God can be encountered, but never captured or controlled. The passage holds together two important affirmations: God is profoundly near and utterly mysterious.
The Light and Shadow activity gives the congregation a playful, sensory way of exploring this mystery. Light and shadow become images for a God whose presence may be experienced without being fully seen or understood. Like Moses, there may be times when we long to see God clearly and instead glimpse signs and traces of God’s presence. The activity leaves room for wondering: where might we notice God’s presence this week?
The second Exodus activity brings these threads together at the end of worship. Moses’ deepest concern is less about knowing exactly where the journey will lead than whether God will accompany the people: “If your presence will not go, do not carry us up from here.” Without you, there’s no point. God’s answer is the promise, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” In God, Will You Go With Us?, a long piece of fabric moves through the gathered community as everyone repeatedly asks that question and answers together, “God will be with us.” Eventually the fabric becomes a path leading out of the worship space, making God’s promised presence something we follow out.
There’s a movement through these four activities from gathering to wondering to going. We gather as a community shaped by faith, love and hope. We wrestle with what faithful allegiance looks like amid the competing claims of our world. We encounter a God who is present while remaining beyond our grasp. And we go back into that complicated world trusting the promise that God’s presence goes with us.
Perhaps the thread holding the week together is that faithfulness does not require us to have everything worked out. Jesus refuses an easy answer. Moses does not receive the certainty he asks for. The Thessalonians are praised instead for their faith, love and hope. We too are invited to live faithfully amid complexity and uncertainty, attentive to the mysterious presence of the God who goes with us.
