The Key to Life

DAILY BYTE

A man was outside on his hands and knees below a lantern when a friend walked up. “What are you doing,” the friend asked. “I’m looking for my key. I’ve lost it.” So his friend got down on his hands and knees too, and they both searched for a long time in the dirt beneath the lantern. Finding nothing, his friend finally turned to him and asked, “Where exactly did you lose it?” The man replied, “I lost it in the house, but there is more light out here….” (edited from Soul Food: Stories to Nourish the Spirit & the Heart by Jack Kornfield & Christina Feldman)

This story reminds me a lot of Jesus’ parables, and it reminds me of our search to identify where the key to life is. We often think we know where or with whom we should search to find the truth about God and the movement of the Holy Spirit. It would have been obvious for the man to search for the key in his own house – the place where he knew the lay of the land, and there were no surprises, just as we are content to find truth where we are, in the places where we’re comfortable, in control, and have a map for where to look.

But perhaps what this man teaches us is that we could search and search in the usual places, but we’re missing the point of the search, if we’re sitting in the darkness alone. The point of the search may not be to find the key immediately. It really is to go look where there’s light and to be searching alongside others.

And therein often lies the surprise for us. In the scripture we’ll look at this week, we find people of faith quite surprised by where the light of God’s Holy Spirit has wandered. They are surprised and a bit unsure of the people and the territory where it’s found.

And because they’re negative about the people God is bringing alongside them, the people who are supposed to be God’s greatest apostles find themselves actually hindering the work of God’s Spirit.

And so, we’re going to look at one way we often hinder the work of the Holy Spirit. And that is in the difficult context of being Christian and relating to people from other faith traditions.

We live in a vastly diverse world in communities with Hindus, Muslims, Jews, atheists, agnostics, African traditionalists, Buddhists – you name it. And it seems there is a lot of talk in Christian circles about converting people of other faiths, particularly Muslims. However, there seems to be very little talk about simple conversation with Muslim people…

It also seems that it’s quite easy to make sweeping generalizations about “all Muslims” or “all atheists” or all “Hindus” based on our experience with a few…

It seems that whether we want to admit it, or not - because if we admit it, it will make us look racist or intolerant - we do look at each other with eyes of scepticism and a bit of fear.

Somehow, the presence of other faiths seems to shake our own. Somehow, it shakes our sense of community and our solidarity. But there’s no way around it - we all live together in this world, and God created us all.

What has your attitude been toward people of different faiths? Do you find yourself making broad generalizations about groups of people based (if you’re honest) on experiences you’ve had with just a few?

Do you know anyone of a different faith? Have you invited them to tea?

FOCUS READING

Acts 11:1-3 (NRSV)

Now the apostles and the believers who were in Judea heard that the Gentiles had also accepted the word of God. So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers criticized him, saying, “Why did you go to uncircumcised men and eat with them?”