While on pilgrimage in Alabama, I took these Gospels with me each day as my devotional. I also began to really think about what it means to be a pilgrim and prayed about what Christine Valters Painter says in The Soul of a Pilgrim: Eight Practices for the Journey Within, “Pilgrim means being willing to court holy disruption, to become profoundly aware of our inner movements, to claim responsibility for our choices about how we respond to this place we find ourselves in and welcome discomfort and strangeness as carrying the possibility of new revelation.”1 I pondered what message God was opening up to me.
As our pilgrimage went on, I continued to pray over these passages as we walked in the footsteps of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Johnathan Daniels, John Lewis, Viola Luzzio, and many others and sat in the pews where foot soldiers sang freedom songs and prayed for change.
I prayed over these passages as we stood on soil where many were sold, lynched, and beaten because they were seen as less than human by their oppressor. I kept asking myself, “God, what are you saying to me and what word am I to bring back to the good people of St. Peters? How can I an African American relate this deep experience with these people who have a skin that automatically gives them ‘privilege’ and sometimes says to me that they represent the oppressor?” Then I recalled a prayer that is attributed to Archbishop Desmond Tutu and said to have been adapted from an original prayer by Sir Francis Drake; this prayer, along with the scriptures, seemed to sum up all that I was praying and feeling.
Disturb us, O Lord
when we are too well-pleased with ourselves
when our dreams have come true because we dreamed too little,
because we sailed too close to the shore.
Disturb us, O Lord
when with the abundance of things we possess,
we have lost our thirst for the water of life
when, having fallen in love with time,
we have ceased to dream of eternity
and in our efforts to build a new earth,
we have allowed our vision of Heaven to grow dim.
Stir us, O Lord
to dare more boldly, to venture into wider seas
where storms show Thy mastery,
where losing sight of land, we shall find the stars.
In the name of Him who pushed back the horizons of our hopes
and invited the brave to follow.
Amen.2
I realized from all these prayers and passages I had been given that God was calling me to urge you to be open to the Holy Spirit, the one who teaches us, the advocate sent in the name of God and who calls us to be like Jesus and to bring peace—a peace that will require us to stir things up and be willing to court holy disruption and to not only be disturbed by the things that we see in the world, but also to disturb. To stand in the gap for those who have no voice. For those who feel that God has forgotten them. For those who after decades of fighting for justice continue to be the subject of bigotry, prejudice, discrimination, and hate. God is calling us to disturb what is the status quo. To disturb those systems that oppress. To disturb those processes that allow us to continue to be separate and unequal. To claim responsibility for our choices about how we respond to this place we find ourselves in and welcome discomfort and strangeness as carrying the possibility of a new revelation. God wants us to be disturbed and shaken by these things so that we can press forward and stir the waters.
We must not continue to be like those who stepped in front of the man who was ill for thirty-eight years and sat by the pool. We must be disturbed by those who step in front of others and proclaim a healing that is not for them. We must not be the people who step in front of others out of our own sense of privilege, not allowing those who are in greater need than we are to reach the healing that they require and that our mighty God has declared for them.
God is asking us to see fully the injustices, hurts, and pains in the world and be so disturbed by them that we want to stir things up for change and court holy disruption as we seek a just society. God is asking us to shake things up. Bishop Jake Owensby says, “The Kingdom is wherever God’s Love is shaking things up and bringing things to new life.”3 God wants us to live a cross-shaped life and that takes us loving so deeply and passionately that we are shaking things up, stirring the waters and disturbing the things that are not in line with the example that Jesus set for us.
God was disturbed by the state of things and sent God’s only begotten Son to stir things up, to disturb things, to court holy disruption, and to shake up the world. Jesus condemned injustice and called out those who were treating others unjustly. And even with this he continued to value every creature. Jesus is calling us to stand up for the marginalized, the oppressed, the forgotten, those whose dignity and value have been stripped from them.
My siblings in Christ, we are the hands, feet, and heart of God in this world and we are all his ambassadors for healing and peace. We are the foot soldiers of the present day. We are the ones who God is calling to disturb things until they are made right. We are the ones who God is calling to stir the waters and to go up the river and make a change. We are the ones who God is calling to come to the table and make room for all. We are the ones who God is calling to court holy disruption to level the playing field for all.
Oh God, give us a vision of the heavenly city, the new Jerusalem, your home among mortals on earth. Let us stir things up so that all people and nations will stream to your city where they will find nourishment, healing, and peace. Let your blessing shine upon all the earth to help us disturb, to shake things up and be willing to court holy disruption as Jesus did so we can see a larger vision of your loving care for all creation. And call us to move beyond our comfortable circles, and into unfamiliar places, as we seek to share your dream of a world made new in Christ as we, like the man by the pool, stand up, take up our mats, and walk the pilgrim’s way. Amen.
1. Christine Valters Painter, “An Interview with Christine Valters Painter,” July 7, 2015, Always We Begin Again, https://myawba.blogspot.com/2015/07/guest-post-christine-valters-paintner.html.
2. The prayer can be found at various sources on the internet: Desmond Tutu, “Disturb Us O Lord,” Godspace, March 2, 2012, https://godspacelight.com/2012/03/02/disturb-us-o-lord-a-prayer-by-desmond-tutu-4/. Also: https://unfinishedsymphony.org/2013/02/24/disturb-us-a-prayer-by-archbishop-desmond-tutu/.
3. Jake Owensby, “Show Up and Look Alert,” MinistryMatters, November 13, 2018, https://www.ministrymatters.com/all/entry/8527/show-up-and-look-alert.
DANIEL 3:14–20, 24–29
There is more than one way to tell a story, especially a story as important as the Christian story; this also applies to the