Divine Interruption

Our pastor, John Waters (see his blog Until Sunday to the right) has been preaching a series on this theme. Yesterday's sermon dealt with suffering, something very present in our church and community in the past 36 hours. One of our college students who had grown up in our church, passed away in the early morning hours of November 14, after being in car wreck. Luke Anderson, touched so many lives in our church and our community, so the entire service was incredibly timely, amazing how God works that way, isn't it.

Luke was an incredible young man, who I got to know as a student and more recently, as a friend. My heart aches for his family and his many friends. I confess this has shaken me more than I could have ever thought possible.

As I was reading this morning, I came across these words from Henri Nouwen, "Make the conscious choice to move the attention of your anxious heart away from {the} waves and direct it to the One who walks on them and says, 'It's me. Don't be afraid.'...Look at him and say, 'Lord, have mercy.' Say it again and again, not anxiously but with confidence that he is very close to you and will put your soul to rest."

I miss you Luke!