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Morning Reflection by Peter Vanderveen
June 25, 2025
“The New Testament isn’t about love; it’s about Jesus.”
Stanley Hauerwas
On Relevance
Just in case you’re already apprehensive, wondering whether this little reflection will be too evangelical (and the name of Jesus will be employed merely as a convenient buzzword), don’t worry. I have no intention of trying to nudge you toward an altar call. Instead, I think that Stanley Hauerwas’ little statement is an excellent reminder of what relevance means for the church.
As long as I have been in ministry, the relevance of the church, or of its programs, or of the sermons preached has been called into question. There are always some whose interest wanes if what is said and done seems irrelevant to their concerns or, perhaps, to any of the pressing issues of the times. For the church, it is assumed, is supposed to address the problems we face, many of which are systemic and intractable. And Jesus, who is primarily understood to have been a great and authoritative teacher, telling us what God wants, should then provide the answers we need – if someone can appropriately, and inspirationally, decipher what he meant in what he said. And if this proves too difficult, our reflex is to say that Jesus stood for love and justice and equality and all the virtues that we have already identified. He just stood for these more definitively – and we, following him, should then do the same.
But here’s the rub: Jesus, in the record of the four Gospels, doesn’t seem all that interested in any of this. He never chose to stand opposed to the political establishment. He didn’t try to reform it. He didn’t even criticize it at the level of policy. Nor did he speak of economics as we do, wondering about who should have what and how markets should work. He didn’t try to change systems or correct history or establish a context that on any level was more fair and equitable. He didn’t even try to establish a church with the idea that if enough people live with enough love and hope and compassion that the world would then be changed. These, of course, are all relevant things, but Jesus’ specific purpose was different.
Jesus said his task was to show us all who God is. And he did this not by writing an enormous thesis designed to set the world right. He did small things. He wandered about, in such a way that he was nowhere and everywhere. He encountered people, without any preset agenda. And when he did, somehow, differently in almost every case, he pointed out how God was present, already, where we least suspected God might be. He didn’t seek to be relevant. He simply showed us what is true. And isn’t this what we need to acknowledge and celebrate above all else.
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