loving relationship

Sunday July 14^th, Deuteronomy 30: 11 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, "Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?" 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, "Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?"  We often make the Christian life more difficult than it needs to be.  We tend to fill it with rules and regulations, do’s and don’ts, catechism to memorize, and sometimes even sermon notes for the confirmation class.  If we think about it, we all really know they should be for the adults, not the confirmation class.  What we know in the back of our minds is that the tougher we make it, the more we clergy types are in control and can feel good about ourselves.  The problem is that the more we are in control, God is pushed to the side.  If the body of Christ were to truly be the body of Christ, there would be less for clergy to do and we clergy types might find ourselves out of a job.  The truth is, what we do is not rocket science.  It involves living out a loving relationship with God the Creator, living in a loving relationship with one another as Community, and living in relationship with the Creation from which we were formed and demonstrating that to the faith community we serve.  It involves being willing each day to have your eyes opened to some new dimension of what that might be and trusting in God to help show you new ways to show those loving relationships.  It involves walking one day at a time as a child of God, knowing that the gift of salvation is yours, as well as your neighbors, through the grace of God.