Uncomfortable.

I’m not talking about my jeans, although if I don’t stop mainlining pepper-jack those are soon to follow.

This year has been uncomfortable. Strange, foreign, and downright prickly. And please don’t be offended by the word “foreign”. We’re running out of descriptors, people. I just mean “unfamiliar”.

Everything seems broken. And we disagree on how to fix it. Like, really, vehemently disagree. To the point where relationships are strained, maybe beyond repair.

I’m going to be uncomfortably honest and confess that I’ve had low-level anxiety pretty much since the shut-downs. Covid, our economy, police brutality, civil unrest and destruction, division in the church, in families, and in friendships; government overreach, the election..and add to this our own heartbreak as we lost our baby in April. This year has been a giant suck-fest and it’s been overwhelmingly… uncomfortable.

So here we are, one day before the election. I don’t know what to expect in the remaining two months of 2020, but I doubt it will get better. Sorry for the optimism; I just can’t imagine the country will pull together and all the hateful words will just be swept under the carpet as we socially distance around the Christmas tree. Just kidding. I’m not doing that.

So where is the hope?

Do you know where I’m going with this?

We can’t legislate racism. We can’t mandate love that lays down its life or preferences for the people around us. Having “our” person in office isn’t going to make the world a better place, because our actual problem is sin. Until we address sin, we will stay broken, no matter what pretty package our “answers” to the world’s problems are wrapped in.

That’s not comfortable to say. No one likes to hear that the problem isn’t “out there” but is, in fact, too close for comfort. It’s us. It’s not “them”. It’s us.

If our hope is in this world, or the people trying to run it, we will be let down. Without a doubt.

So what’s the good news?

There is hope.

Jesus is still at work, saving people from their sin and from eternal separation from God. He came, he loved, he spoke truth and he made people so uncomfortable that they killed him. And then he rose again, proving unequivocally that he. is. God. And his Word is full of so many promises for his people. Promises of hope and a future, no matter the tragedy of current circumstances.

It’s the only hope we’ve got, but it’s more than enough.

Jesus 2020.

Love you guys.