Co-Working With God
2 Corinthians 6:1-13
In 2 Corinthians, Paul writes that we are “God’s co-workers.” And let’s just stop for a moment and recognize how wild it is to really accept that and embrace it.
Wild because God is supposed to be this divine transcendent person. All powerful, all knowing. Why would God *need* co-workers?
And yet we are. And I think I agree with Paul on this one. There is a lot to do “with” God in our world as we live out our faith. Co-working with God is a big committment, and I would also say it’s a part of how we live into what being a disciple of Jesus Christ really means.
Co-working with God is hard. It leads us to strive for realities that seem impossible to achieve. Co-working with God means not tolerating a neighbor who is hungry or homeless. It means welcoming people we might never have thought we would share community with. It means embracing an identity that isn’t the most popular.
It also means becoming vulnerable to heart break. Because when we co-work with God, we encounter in the world what breaks God’s heart. We have to “open wide” our hearts, to quote Paul in 2 Corinthians. And that might feel impossible today when information is available to us today that exposes us to constant, relentless, and devastating stories of heart break.
One of the reasons we need a relationship with God, and a connection with God’s grace is because we just can’t do this on our own. We can’t fight hunger or homelessness on our own. A relationship with God provides an endless source of connection to one who can heal our heart break, and sustain our weary souls when its all just too much to bear.
So I invite you to consider that God has given you what you need to weather heart break. Whether that heart break comes from pain you are witnessing, pain you have experienced, or even pain you have inflicted. A relationship with God, the grace of Jesus Christ, provides all of us with the stamina to endure so that we can be co-workers with God and bring about God’s will on earth as it is in heaven.
Thanks be to God!
