Which Comes First?

Grace, Mission, Hope, or Choice?

You’ve heard the old quandary question, which came first, the chicken or the egg? I haven’t answered that one yet, either.

So which comes first, Grace, Mission, Hope or Choice? Which one is most important? Which can you do without or skip over? Do you have to figure them out in some sort of order?

This isn’t baseball. You don’t have to touch each of the four bases in a preconceived order, in order to score.

Rather, you may encounter one, and then be led to the others.

You may be struck dumbfounded by Grace, shocked and humbled that God loves you, just as you are. That sparks within you and yours a desire to respond and reciprocate by going on Mission. Or Grace may then help you see Hope, when you all had believed everything was hopeless. Awareness of Grace can take you straight to making a Choice.

You may be inspired by a person on a Mission, or you all may be on your Mission already, active in a call or cause out of great love and challenge. Mission, especially if that Mission directs you and yours to admire the life and work of Jesus in the world, may take you to the love of God in Grace. Belief that your Mission work is not in vain- or an exercise in futility- can help you all see Hope in the Dream of God making a better world now and in the future. A call to a Mission requires making a Choice, one time and daily thereafter.

Perhaps you can see Hope, that the world as it is, is not the world that always will be. You all can see change toward the good out in front and before you, in ways large and small, personal and systemic. Even if it’s one step up and two steps back. You can name that sense of movement God working in Grace for the greater good. You and yours can find yourself working to make that Hope real on your Mission. You all choose to see Hope, ignoring the little voices inside your heads and in the headlines that nothing will ever change, because you and yours are being the change you want to see in the world.

Or you’ve been presented with a stark Choice in your lives. You came to a fork in the road, and you all chose life, not death. Having chosen, you know you aren’t enough as you are, that you’re being carried in a power greater and higher. Call that power Grace. Having chosen the fork that leads to life, not death, you can see in Hope that God is making a way out of no way. Having chosen that fork, you’re on your Missions.

The Way of Mission isn’t a baseball field. It’s a network, one to the other, then back again. All in the power of God.

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