Our mission is to disappear. We proclaim not our story but His; the greatest story ever told in which we all have a part. The people of Babel say “come let us build FOR OURSELVES a city…and so make a name FOR OURSELVES.” But the saints do not proclaim themselves or build for themselves. They disappear into Him. “Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me.”

Human beings often think with the enemy of love…we need Jesus to show us the way of love! Love is not cheap, easy, or safe. Real love is self-giving and self-forgetting. Jesus comes to show us who God is and how God thinks.

Noah and his family receive new life through the branch of a tree…the blind man knew he was blind, and he lets Jesus take him by the hand and lead Him… “outside the village.” Do I?

“Guard against the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.” The disciples are in the boat with the Bread of Life…and they fail to recognize Him! “Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Do you have eyes and not see; ears and not hear? Do you still not understand?”

“This generation seeks a sign…” is the sign of Jesus enough for me? Do I offer a sacrifice of presence or a “sacrifice of praise” to God? That we may learn from the sacrifice of Abel!

The foundation of our hope IS NOT us! Christian hope stands on a fact of history. Do I LIVE belief in the resurrection of Jesus and in the life of the world that is to come? “Cursed is the one who trusts in human beings, who seeks strength in his own flesh…‘woe to you!”

Adam fails in his mission, and Eve has forgotten her identity. This reveals they have already stopped living in relationship with God…relationship, identity, mission. Jesus “does ALL things well.” Do I put relationship with Him first? Am I still grasping for apples, or does He come first?

Today God has heard Adam’s cry and “crowned” creation with Eve. Woman is the being that holds the greatest dignity in creation. In the gospel, Jesus is conquered by the trusting confidence the Syrophoenician woman places in Him.

“The LORD God then took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden, to cultivate and care for it.” God’s expectation is that men “father” creation by caring for it and reverencing its truth, goodness, and beauty. Am I doing this? Do I acknowledge that Jesus shows us how to do (and receive) this?

We are made in the image and likeness of love. Love is our identity, and love is our mission. But we have forgotten this! “This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.”