wfn.org | Complete Trust in God Is `Ace in the Hole,' Dawn Participants Told

[PCUSA NEWS <pcusa.news@ecunet.org>]

4-January-2000 
00001 
 
    Complete Trust in God Is `Ace in the Hole,' 
    Dawn Participants Told 
 
    Youth gathering turns its attention to Mary 
 
    by Jerry L. Van Marter 
 
INDIANAPOLIS-"Here am I, the servant of the Lord.  Let it be with me 
according to your word." 
 
    These words of Mary the mother of Jesus capture the "hole card" of 
Christian faith: complete trust in God "when the incredible is dumped in 
your lap," the Rev. Houston Hodges told participants in "The Dawn ... an 
Epiphany" Dec. 30. 
 
    After studying Jacob the day before, the more than 2,000 Presbyterian 
young people attending the millennium-turning event turned their attention 
to Mary.  "The wheel of destiny turned and turned and stopped on the least 
likely person in all the world," Hodges said during his morning Bible 
study, which was punctuated by an extraordinary interpretive dance by 
Noelle Goodman-Morris of the Portola Valley (Calif.) Presbyterian Church 
drama troupe, which provided dramatic illustrations of the Bible lessons 
throughout "the Dawn." 
 
    Mary's response to the angel's message that she would become the mother 
of the Messiah, Hodges said, was a disbelieving "Duh, I'm a virgin."  But 
the angel said, "Don't worry, I'll take care of it."  And then, in a 
contemporary translation of the famed magnificat, Hodges told his youthful 
congregation, Mary responds, "It'll be okay." 
 
    "The same is true here," Hodges continued.  "God has something special 
in store for you and no matter how topsy-turvy the world gets and no matter 
how angry or confused you feel, no matter how inadequate you consider 
yourself, it'll be okay.  The trait that brought Mary through was trust and 
that same trait is inside of you - that God can use you for God's purposes 
the same way God used Mary's complete trust." 
 
    While Mary's experience was very dramatic, not all encounters with God 
are so obvious, said the Rev. Mark Goodman-Morris in his evening homily. 
Goodman-Morris, who is pastor of the Portola Valley church and played Jacob 
in the previous day's dramatic presentations, said God comes to people in 
two ways: "the blinding flash of light and the twinkle of the starlight." 
 
    "The core of our being," Goodman-Morris said, "is the realization that 
we are loved by God.  This is the meaning of epiphany - when our longing 
for God meets God's longing for us." 
 
    Such starlight epiphanies happen in a variety of ways, Goodman-Morris 
continued.  "It can be when a song touches you in just the right way, when 
a speaker says just the right word, or when a friend offers you just what 
you need at the exact right moment."  He then said he had such a 
"God-moment" earlier in the day watching his daughter perform her dance 
during the morning Bible study. 
 
    And so it was for Mary, Goodman-Morris said.  "God scooped down and 
scooped Mary up."  

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