Deliver Who? Escape Clause

Deliver us from evil.
Jesus taught the disciples as they wanted to learn to pray. At West Grove, we have been studying the familiar and profound words of Lord’s Prayer this Lent.
In the somber and realistic evaluation of our world, the sixth petition of Jesus’ prayer levels with God- bring us not into the time of trial and rescue us from the evil one.
On this Good Friday, as we walk with Jesus, he is past the request not to be in a time of trial, as he is already on the cross. Let us not forget the imperative to rescue us from the evil one. Jesus knew that testing and challenge were an inevitable part of our lives, as it was his. Not that God sends testing, but rather our lives have trials. We are not absent from the systems of oppression and injustice in our lives. We are not spared these challenges because of our faith or credentialing.
Our baptismal vows in the United Methodist tradition call us to resist evil, injustice, oppression, in whatever forms they present themselves. This is similar in many of our sister faith traditions as well. We are called to the resistance work, acknowledging what is already present.
In this season, I am grateful for each and every one of you who are making masks for yourselves and others. For those of you who are staying home and those who doing essential work.
Resistance is strategizing and organizing.
I am grateful for those of you who look isolation and disconnection in the eye and banish it in the name of Jesus, through virtual connection. I give thanks for those of you who work to end poverty and hungry by feeding your neighbors at the Bridge and West Grove’s food Pantry.
Resistance is naming the injustice and oppression in our world.
And the injustices we are just calling out like the inequities in school districts as we offer virtual education, health care access in incarcerated populations, and more. In Chicago over 70% of COVID19 are African Americans, when 30% of the area population is . The same is true in Philadelphia and other cities as well. What acts of resistance are we called to?
I grateful to the prophets among us who have seen injustice in the world, and they’ve corrected it (For the Hamilton fans, among us).
However, on this Good Friday, we are reminded for all of you who are freedom fighters, resisting evil, oppression, and injustice, there is still a need to be delivered from evil. Evil that is real and life limiting.
Anyone who has ever delivered a child, orchestrated the delivery of vaccine for global pandemic or seen a miracle before their own eyes, begins to glimpse that deliverance requires dependence on God as the only way out.
Rescue us, we pray.
It always darkest before it is dawn.
On this Good Friday, with Jesus still on the cross, we can not fast forward to a triumphant moment of Easter. Nor can we do so, in our global holy week of pandemic. We resist the evil, injustice, and oppression in whatever they present themselves, and depend on the God of us all, to rescue us. No escape clause needed. God is faithful.
This is the gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, thanks be to God, Amen.