Confirmation Sunday

 

 

Yesterday, these 9 young men and women stood in front of their families and talked about what a life of faith means to them. What it looks like in their daily lives. Their mentors and parents also stood to talk about what faith looks like in their lives too.You know what it looks like?

It looks like worrying about your kids and your job and asking God to help you not worry so much.

It looks like gratitude for surviving a car crash many years ago.

It looks like living with chronic illness with no end in sight.

It looks like living with cancer in your past and present and anticipating it again in your future and depending on God to bring you people and also being used by God too.

It looks like the bond of friendship and the rocky relationships we have as family.

It looks like trying to deal with anxiety and depression and body image issues.

It looks like total vulnerability and perseverance.

It looks like grieving the death of those you love.

It looks like trusting strangers and learning to walk one step at a time.

It looks like a life of prayer and of showing up for people.

It looks like lots of questions and realizing God doesn’t make bad things happen to good or bad people.

It looks average, totally normal.

And it looks also like a miracle.

It looks like them. Faith sometimes looks like a hot mess. Faith sometimes looks utterly beautiful and utterly normal. Just like you and me. Yesterday was not a demonstration of accumulated knowledge. It was a courageous act to try and put words to faith. To grapple with the question of God having meaning in your life. And there isn’t faith without relationship: with God and with each other. It’s why we gather. Faith is a gift and we need each other to give and receive it. God has given us to each other to experience the love of God through Jesus.  We’ve been given this great gift of unconditional love so that we can share it and see the world transformed by it. You see, this whole Christianity thing is subversive. Because our answer is always love. And it’s always love for the other – love for the oppressed, love for the impolite, love for the unappreciative, love for the unpopular, love for the enemy. And this love? Well, it changes everything. It changes who you are and how you are. This is what you’re saying yes to today, confirmation youth. This unconditional love. And this is what we say yes to each and every day. It’s miraculous. It’s mundane. It’s a gift. It’s a life of faith.