SHADYSIDE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Holy God, you know humanity better than we know ourselves.  And so you are well acquainted with our preoccupation to divide ourselves into teams.  If someone on another team does anything well, we are tempted to discount it because it didn’t come from our tribe, nation, or religion.  This spiritual competitiveness is at least as old as the day when Cain rose up against Abel simply because you had regard for Abel’s offering.  And our self-righteous judgments have never stopped.

You are God, and no deity worthy of worship can possibly be contained in any religion, including Christianity.  So I pray that you will open my ears, eyes, and heart to receive the glimpses of you that come from the non-Christians.

I am not saying that the revelation of Jesus Christ is not sufficient.  It is.  But I do know that he has a tendency to show up in places where I don’t expect him to be.  It isn’t Christianity that can save me.  For that, I need the unpredictable Christ who is far bigger than my team’s understanding of him.  Amen.