Trust in God is the Foundation of Cross-Cultural Collaboration
It was proposed in my small group this past Sunday that a feast at the end of the age, attended by people from all generations and from the ends of the earth might not be such a good idea. After all, what if there was food I was afraid to try, something new I wouldn’t like? Will I be expected to make small talk, that is, if I and those near me can even speak the same language? If we find it hard to talk to people of different cultures and languages now, can you imagine a more anxiety inducing atmosphere to usher in the reign of peace? Maybe we should call it off or at least ask God to offer a takeout option.
While for some, a feast of nations may sound purely exciting, the kingdom is for the socially anxious and the introvert too. If this is to go well for everyone, there must be some fullness that the Spirit will bring to completion in us that could gird us not only to endure such a time, but to experience something rich enough to be worthy of the culmination of the ages, the reward of the faithful. In a mysterious gifting, we can imagine at how the shortness of our energies, tempers, perspectives, and appetites will meet the longness of the same in the Spirit, creating people of true, deep, wonderful, diverse community without fear or anxiety and creating a feast defined by joy and reconciliation.
HOW???
Isaiah 25 speaks about this feast:
6 On this mountain the Lord Almighty will prepare
a feast of rich food for all peoples,
a banquet of aged wine—
the best of meats and the finest of wines.
7 On this mountain he will destroy
the shroud that enfolds all peoples,
the sheet that covers all nations;
8 he will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears
from all faces;
he will remove his people’s disgrace
from all the earth.
The Lord has spoken.
9 In that day they will say,
“Surely this is our God;
we trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the Lord, we trusted in him;
let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.”
At the feast of nations, God swallows death, wipes tears, and removes disgrace. And what do the nations say in response? They say that they trusted. The spirit of reconciliation and freedom from death is rooted in trust. This feast of celebration is joyful because of the faith that they had in their God who has not failed them. Shroud removed, faces dry, honor restored, it is celebration time.
Trust is the beginning, the antidote of anxiety. It belongs to the world of life, where death can no longer reign through its minions of sadness and disgrace. Through trust, shame and regret have no hold in the world of life, freeing the truly alive unto unfettered community. Trust is the foundation of the union of peace and celebration of all nations at the feast on the mountain of the Lord.
To be certain, no gift of the Spirit is now withheld from us. Can we, then, tap into that Spiritual gifting for community now? Of course! In fact, we are called to. Pain, pettiness, shaming, awkwardness, strife, social-fatigue, anxiety, insider-outsider dynamics, racism, classism, and sexism are the agents of death that shroud the people of God now. Yet these and all other struggles of community come from our shortness, not the Spirit’s longness. To participate in the kingdom of God, we must confront all of these with Spiritual power, that our communities might image that of the great feasting community on the mountain of God. For they are the people who can say “Surely, this is our God.”
Cross-cultural community is our final hope and our present lifeline. It is also our Spiritual calling. It will require humility, submission to the Spirit, submission to others, and trying new things. If you are struggling to take the first step. Start with trust. Let trust in God humble you to the task that you may be filled with the Spirit for the work. Your statement of trust in God is the beginning of cross-cultural-collaboration.