by Pastor Douglas Brauner
It’s All About Context
You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.
Today is the one day when everyone is Irish, however, I truly am part Irish, even with a German name like Brauner. My great-grandmother was Agness Dunn, born March 22, 1880, in Illinois, daughter of Peter Dunn who was born in Ireland, that’s right, my great, great grandfather was born in Ireland.
I don’t know anything about Agnes and Peter other than they were Irish, just as I don’t know the story behind this old overhead projector. There is no context to it. I thought, how strange that it sat near the sidewalk as if someone would pick it up and claim it as their treasured possession.
I wish that I had taken a different angle for this pic, stepping back and including more of its surroundings. Its context might have given the projector a more complete story, more for the viewer to digest.
There is a greater context to our lives than what people initially see.
Jesus understood the importance of context.
Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.”
John 4:16-18 English Standard Version
How did this woman feel when Jesus revealed her secret, when he exposed the bigger picture of her life? Though we don’t know how she felt at that moment, we do know that she responded positively to Jesus’ presence and his mercy toward her.
We can’t understand people without getting to know them, without understanding the context of their lives. It’s easy to take a person out of their context and judge them. The way of Jesus is to understand their context. It takes time. It takes effort. It takes heart, all which Jesus possessed as he cared for this woman. All which we possess as we have been baptized into his way of living.
Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado
