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God Gives the Increase
I recently read God Gives the Increase: The History of the Episcopal Church in North Dakota, by Winona H and Robert F. Wilkins which was published in 1959. It is an encyclopedia of information about congregations in our diocese from before it was a diocese or even a state, all written, in good NoDak fashion, as one long, winding tale. It is shot through with anecdotes from another age that illustrate characteristics and qualities that endure in our members today. In reading it, I was impressed, I was humbled but mostly I was inspired.
Our Hebrew Bible tells the story of Moses - late in his relationship with the Holy One -asking to see the face of God. God tells him to hide in the cleft of a rock and God will pass by. In retrospect, Moses will be able to see “the glory of God.” (Exodus 33:16-20)
This is the tricky part about striving to be God’s hands and feet in the world, the challenge of being church. We live in the HERE, in this moment in time, in this set of conditions, in this place, with these people and these challenges. And we seek in this immediate present to serve our communities, our neighbors in the margins, the most vulnerable among us. We rise every day with a commitment to healing the wounds of a broken world.
We also inevitably look with anxiety and hope into the future. What the next growing season will bring, what the weather will be, who is at risk, what is tenuous in our lives, which directions are the trend lines leaning. We cannot help but try to predict, so that we can prepare for the future.
And yet we are implored by almost every word of Scripture, to seek God’s face. Just as Moses pauses in his long journey with Adonai, weary and wondering, seeking some sign that we are growing closer to the intention of the Divine, that what we are doing is pleasing to the Creator. Sadly, we can’t (or rarely can) see God’s face in the moment. And we can’t (or rarely can) see God’s intended path for us laid out ahead of us like lights on a runway.
It is only in retrospect, when we look back over the long path of our journey of faith, that we see the face of God. In unexplainable coincidences, in unaccountable interventions, in the culmination of long discipline, in a pattern that became a turne that became the refrain in our lives.
And in that retrospection we realize that the face of God is not a visage with a nose and eyes and a smile. It is a calm confidence that all will be … not what we intended, not what we hoped for, not what we anticipated, but … what God intended. And in that realization, we don’t just see the face of God, we recognize God as someone who has been present with us all along the way.
As you read this, your elected Diocesan Council and Standing Committee are preparing to gather in Bismarck for a series of business meetings. Since my joining you as Bishop, I have altered and dramatically increased the expectations placed on these good volunteers and they have stepped up to meet those new challenges. They are stitching a pattern that runs through the history of this diocese: strive, adapt, don’t lose hope, work a little harder, rinse and repeat. We do this now as we always have, because in our hearts we know it is this good work that will ultimately show us the face of God.
You remain in my prayers,
+Shay
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