In November 2008 I drove out to New Mexico. I wanted to find old missions and churches while I was there, and one was El Santuario de Chimayó. I think there’s a great beauty in the architecture of old missions, and it often reflects the marriage of culture and an attempt to create a something holy for God.
El Santuario de Chimayó in Chimayó, New Mexico | November 2008
In this and the next two posts, I’ll offer an excerpt from NT (Tom) Wright’s, For All God’s Worth, pp. 18-22.
The reason why Chad came to Lichfield, and the reason why an ancient scribe lavished such craftsmanship on those priceless pages, is quite simply that the message in those Gospels is even more priceless: the message, that is, that the true God takes our brokenness and in Christ makes us new; that he picks up the pieces of our life, yes, even of our muddled attempts to follow him, and sticks them together again in a new way; that he heals those who are broken in heart, and gives the medicine to heal their sickness; that he promises new life, resurrection life, beyond all our sickness and death. To celebrate precisely hear is to celebrate not the wonderful achievements of the church but the healing power of God to build his church with battered and broken building-blocks; including people like you and me. Celebration and healing; it is all God’s work.
And what if the seams are still visible? What if the stitching still shows? What if we carry about with us the pains of being half pt back together and half still in pieces? What if we have identity crises, if we live with ambiguities and face problems we can’t fix overnight? Is that no what being a Christian is all about? As Paul continues, we are taken for imposters, and yet are genuine; dying, and behold we live; in pain, yet always full of joy; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, yet possessing everything. Paul is not describing an occasional unfortunate lapse from the norm. This is the normal Christian experience.
Crosses on the fence behind El Santuario | November 2008
