It is hard to read Colossians without noticing Paul’s repeated emphasis on Christ’s sufficiency. From his prayer that the Colossians find ALL wisdom and FULL understanding in Christ (1:9-14) to the majestic hymn about ALL things created through, by, and for Christ (1:15-20) to Paul’s own commission to present the FULL mystery of God, namely Christ (1:24-27), there is one centre: Christ!

It’s certainly no surprise, then, that Paul’s central admonition to the Colossians is to keep their life centered solely on Christ: “So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness” (2:6-7).

For this reason, our Core Values have the very same centre: Christ, the Word of God! May you find inspiration, energy, and Spirit-filled fruit as you continue to centre your life on Christ!

One of the things I love about Connections’ gatherings is our communion meal. We celebrate and embody the gift of the cross in our breaking bread together. In the churches of my childhood, our weekly participation in the Lord’s Supper was more symbolic. Each week someone would share a mini sermon to remind us about Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. The week-in, week-out refrain was that we humans are maggoty worms whose shortcomings deserve death, but instead Jesus took our place. Some call this understanding of the cross, “substitutionary atonement.” Even though I deserve death, Jesus substitutes his undeserved death in order that I might have life. It is beautiful. It is also bothersome.

Unintentionally, those mini sermons taught me God is a dispassionate, rational-above-all, judge most interested in payment for wrongdoing, not caring whether the violator, the violated, or an innocent third party pays up. In what universe is that justice?! Does that picture of God even fit with Jesus’ loving and generous Abba?

If God’s primary concern is justice, balancing the scales of wrong with right, then God is not much different than Zeus, and the cross is only pseudo-justice, a cruel cosmic jape. But if God is the loving father of Jesus, and we humans are God’s precious children, then the cross isn’t about transgressions sorted out in a court of law, but relationships reconciled in the living room. In the living room, the cross is about relinquishing tit-for-tat and reconciling with people who may or may not be like us, who may have been hostile enemies; in the living room the primary concern is unconditional forgiveness, limitless forgiveness, boundary-less forgiveness. In the living room the concern is doing the tough work of mending what has been ripped apart.

This holiday season, let the cross shape to whom you open your table. Our weekly communion meals proclaim the cross of Jesus is the heart of God, and the heart of who we are. The cross shows us reconciliation is always possible; the cross shows us the path to forgiveness is costly.