Act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with God

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This week as we begin our Stewardship Season we ponder the Kingdom of God and what it is exactly that we individually, and as a faith community might be called to do in order to bring about; participate in and demonstrate the kingdom of God.  Whew….that is a lot to think about for our lives individually and as a faith community.  So, where can we look for a little insight.  Micah 6: 6-8 says that what God wants from us is to act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with God.  Well, that can be a little overwhelming.  How is it exactly do we do these things?  It would be easy for us to get lost in trying to figure out what sort of justice we are to pursue ourselves individually and as a faith community?  Or what does it means to walk humbly with God.? How does mercy work into this equation?  All of us probably have a lot of ideas about what exactly those things mean so here is one way we can think about this.

To act justly:  Think about justice as this—sharing until your neighbor feels safe.  That may not make sense at first but just ponder that for a bit and see what comes up for you.

Love Mercy:  Too often we think of mercy as pity.   But that is a very limiting thought and doesn’t really work when you think about your relationship to God.  Walk with pity with God?  So, what would it be like for you to think of mercy more in terms of compassion.  So, walking compassionately with God.

Walk humbly with your God —   I like to think of humility as being and feeling good about who you are in your relationship with God.  It is important to feel good about who you are in relationship with God.  If you don’t feel good about your relationship with God, it would be difficult to be walk compassionately with God.

As we think about what God would have us do in this time in this place, ponder, in your heart what it would take to help your neighbor feel safe.  Think about how you/we might show compassion.  And think about how we do that in a way that helps us feel good about or be affirmed in our relationship with God.

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