To those who kneel before the throne in worship ….
Today marks the end of the liturgical year and we celebrate it by remembering just who Jesus is.
He is the image of the invisible God – the epitome of love, defender of the weak, worker of miracles.
He is the firstborn over all creation – the one from whom light and life flows; the one who speaks and brings beauty and order and purpose into being. By him and for him all things were created – even the authorities of this world for whom he groans when they use their power and position to use and abuse and tear down and oppress.
He holds all things together – from the stars and moons and planets of our ever-expanding universe, to people of different tribes and languages, to families broken by the death of a loved one, to the unnatural gaps in the world like the divide between the rich and the poor. He reminds us that we are all interconnected.
He is the head of the body, the Church. He is the one from whom we take our example and our lead; the one who teaches us how to live; the one who gives us our mission and our meaning; the one who holds together our different gifts, our different passions, our different dreams.
He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead – a God of unimaginable power and possibility; the one who can break every bond that imprisons us, who can resurrect every area of our lives in which we have given up hope, who can open up opportunities for new ways of being and thinking and doing.
The fullness of God dwells in him that he may open our eyes to the fullness of life – to the rest and restoration of gentle rivers and green pastures, to the pressing and cleansing presence of his Spirit in our woundedness, to his comfort in the valleys so dark and full of shadows that we fear we will be lost in them forever.
He is the one who shed his blood on the cross that all things might be reconciled to him who with dying, tortured breath declared, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
This is who Jesus is. Worship him today as your King.
Yours in Christ
Yvonne