Proclaiming the Gospel in a Divided Society

QUESTION FROM THE DIOCESE OF FLORIDA MEET AND GREET

The word gospel, Evangelio, itself means good telling, good news! 

This was said by the angels when they announced the birth of Christ to bewildered shepherds;" I bring you good news of great joy!" In Luke 4:18, the words of the prophet Isaiah that Jesus applied to himself at the synagogue in Nazareth…"The Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim the good news, the description of his mission, and his charge to the disciples…" This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come."

There is a very interesting IPSOS poll, "Jesus in America" which was commissioned by our very own Episcopal church which is informative! 

Ask a Christian to describe other Christians and the answers likely will be “giving,” “compassionate,” “loving” and “respectful.”Ask a non-Christian, on the other hand, and the more likely descriptors you’ll get for Christians are “hypocritical,” “judgmental” and “self-righteous.” Non-Christians are also far more likely to say Christians do not represent the teachings of Jesus.

The challenge for each of us is going to be whether our proclamation of the Good News goes beyond our lips to transform our lives, our families, parishes, and the church. Jesus did pray for his disciple’s proclamation to be more than just words, he prayed that they may be one…so that the world might believe.  

In the pages of the New Testament, we see a community worshipping God where, by the power of the Spirit,  languages are no barrier, where all, no matter the ethnicity social status, or condition, are baptized to be part of one body, where gender, nationality, tribal identity and other things that were sources of division in society are said not to matter because we are one in Christ. 

The question for me is; Can we model that? Can we be, to a divided world, an example of Beloved Community, where despite disagreements, and differences we are one family, the family of God?…Can we model that in this small part of the Church?  

These interesting words are attributed to St, Francis, preach always, and when necessary use words! Frankly, our divided society, needs less talk and more action, less preaching, and more praxis! 

The gospel will be seen as good news in our divided society,  to the extent that we Christians can be living examples of what it means to be transformed by the resurrection of Christ and how his sovereignty and kingship are lived among those who proclaim his message. 

Blessings

Seraph