A Word from Laura: If I Don’t Know You…
“If I don’t know you, I don’t trust you.”
As members of an organization’s board, the Zoom callers in my meeting were discussing tensions around a recent difficult decision. Our decision did not relate directly to racism, but the anxiety was exacerbated by contemporary societal tension.
An African-American member of the group shared, “If I don’t know you, I don’t trust you.” It wasn’t that she didn’t know us, a somewhat diverse racial group. She was reminding us that especially in culturally diverse situations and organizations, we couldn’t just show up and assume a level of trust. Trust has to be built over time, through shared experiences and expectations, and as everyone committed to getting to know each other and to hearing each other’s stories.
All of us acknowledged this level of understanding and trust takes time and work, and it’s even harder to achieve these days, watching each other in Zoom squares. In this time of social distance every group, organization and community of faith knows these challenges. You may have sensed them in your own work environment or other groups. Western Church is no different.
The need to know before we can trust applies to our faith, too. I need to know God, at least a little, before I can trust God. In this Sunday’s scripture (Isaiah 25:1-9), the prophet we know as Isaiah speaks to us from a city in ruins, a level of societal chaos with echoes of our own. Facing the rubble of an invasion described in cosmic terms, the prophet holds fast to trusting God’s commitment to those most in need. In the face of death all around, the prophet remains grounded in God’s commitment to life, especially for those most in need, to sheltering those most vulnerable. As the world is falling apart, the prophet remains steadfastly hopeful, knowing the One who is still “swallowing up death.
If we don’t know God, we can’t trust God. In the midst of today’s challenges, we need to know God the way the prophet did. We need to share expectations and experiences with God, just as we do with other people. And not for God’s sake, but for our own, so that we might trust in the future God wants for all of us.
Join us for worship this Sunday, in hopes that we all might come to know God, so that knowing God we might trust God, and trusting God, we might live with hope, even now.
Towards hope,
Laura