I heard a story years ago about a man standing in front of St. Peter at Pearly Gates. The man was overcome with excitement, jumping up and down and rubbing his hands together. As Saint Peter let him through the gate, he asked the man why he was so excited. “I can’t wait to get to the feast!” the man replied. The next woman in line saw a look of sadness pass across St. Peter’s face and asked him what was wrong. “That man who just passed through… he didn’t know it, but he’s leaving the feast.”

My church is going through a leadership transition. Some people are looking back thinking about all they will miss, worried that things will be different now. Some people are looking forward (some anxiously) wondering what’s going to happen. Perhaps some love the idea of change and can’t wait for something new. (OK, I realize that’s counter to the Lutheran stereotype.) I wonder how many of us are focused right here, right now… focused on the precious present… the feast God has invited us to. How many of us are reading God’s word, talking with each other, watching what’s happening and working at discerning God’s will for us and for our church?

Instead of living in the past or the future, God invites us to be co-laborers in the Kingdom of God right here, right now. God invites us to live like Jesus, studying God’s word and spending time with God in prayer, talking to God and listening and watching as God talks with us. God invites us to work together to discern God’s will in our lives and in our congregation. Like Jesus, let’s be feasting with God’s disciples and with all those God trusts us to invite to the feast, now.

Read Revelations 21: 1-5 and 2 Corinthians 5:17, and remember: God loves YOU unconditionally!

Mike