(Editor’s note: In an editorial on Monday, March 30, the Enterprise invited local religious leaders to share sermons with the community through the newspaper’s Opinion page, since they are not allowed to hold services in person. This is one of the responses.)

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Greetings, And thank you to the Enterprise for this opportunity to share a message. High Peaks Church is honored to be a part of the community of Saranac Lake. We endeavor to be a source of God’s goodness to our community and the region. We like to use the phrase that the gospel is about good news, not good advice. This is what I hope to convey. The scriptural text is from the book of Acts, a history of the early church, written by the physician Luke.

Acts 17:22-27: “So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said: ‘Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: “To the unknown god.” What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us.'”

In this passage the apostle Paul is speaking to the philosophers in Athens. They were thirsty for knowledge but also had many idols. Paul chooses to address the fact that they had erected a statue to the “unknown god.”

I particularly would like to focus on the last verse (27). It is somewhat paradoxical, as he acknowledges a grasping and searching for God — yet he declares that “he (God) is actually not far from each one of us.” This is a truth that impresses me more and more as time goes on. God is near, yet we are unaware.

The human heart has always had an ability to follow after many different idols; in modern times it seems to be secularism, knowledge, affluence, political ideology, etc. Yet in all of this we are looking for the divine. Even in the modern age, superstition abounds, just in case there is an “unknown God.”

For many, spiritual soul searching comes about during a time of crisis or pain. The trials of life tend to open our spiritual ears. C.S. Lewis said, “Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pain. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

During this pandemic, our collective spiritual ears are open. The things that we trust in have not produced the results we need during this time. The gods of this age seem insufficient for the problem at hand. Things that would obscure our ability to seek and find God are evaporating, giving us an opportunity to look deeper.

The apostle Paul, with the purpose of revealing a God who is near, affirms to the Athenian philosophers that the God of creation is at work and engaged in the affairs of man. He then closes his Mars Hill sermon by bringing the message back to Christ. He proclaims that God “has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17:31).

Raising Him from the dead?! The hope of the resurrection is the centerpiece of the Christian faith. It is this hope that inspired Paul to share the message in Athens. It’s this hope that enables us to face trials, sickness, tribulation, sorrow and death. It is this hope that enables us to love and serve others in seemingly hopeless situations. Hope makes us civilized.

But the idea of the resurrection makes the claims of Paul and the Christian faith personally challenging. Can I accept these claims of Jesus or not? Is he The Way, The Truth, The Life? Is he The Resurrection and the Life? The reaction from the philosophers on Mars Hill was recorded in Acts 17:32:

“Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. But others said, ‘We will hear you again about this.'”

Easter — the celebration of the resurrection is approaching, it is a time of great hope for Christians. I encourage Christ followers to celebrate the Hope of the Resurrection! Let that hope rise up and flow from your life to others.

Perhaps you are someone who has heard about this hope peripherally, or you are someone who has walked away from the faith of your parents. During this time of trial we have an opportunity for our spiritual ears to be opened. We have the chance now instead of simply brushing it off to say, “We will hear you again about this.” The willingness to hear is faith at work, and I believe as we tune our hearts and ears, as we humble ourselves and turn from our self-reliance, we will personally find, “he (God) is actually not far from each one of us.”

The Rev. Bruce McCulley is pastor of High Peaks Church in Saranac Lake.