Devotional for the First Sunday of Advent
November 29, 2020
Mark 13:24-37 

By Esther Rodriguez and Helen Ryde, Members of the MFSA Racial Audit Team 

It’s easy to fall asleep. Not necessarily at night when the anxieties of the day often catch up with us and don’t let us rest, but to fall asleep even as we are awake. Especially those of us (who is most of us) who carry varying levels of privilege in our lives. We can easily tune out the struggles, obstacles, abuses of others, especially if they are different than us. It takes a great deal of intentionality to stay awake, especially when doing so is uncomfortable. The consequences of not being vigilant or intentional in our discomfort are grave. Not only are we not attentive to the sufferings of others and the privilege that it is to alleviate suffering, but we miss out on the good that comes -- the salvation and wholeness that comes with knowing our siblings and being known by our siblings. I have experienced this time and time again. Most recently it has been as a member of the MFSA Racial Audit Team. For me it has been a place where I have felt seen in a world where I often don’t feel seen. But it has also been a place where I’ve been reminded, through community with persons different than me, of the many gifts that my siblings have to offer me as well.  I don’t want to miss out on either of those things. I don’t want the head of the household, the gifts of salvation, to come and find me inattentive and unaware of those around me -- those who cry for justice in whom I am found and who are found in me. 

Being part of the MFSA Racial Audit Team has been a gift for me (Helen) too. As a white person I find myself regularly reminded of the ease with which I can fall asleep to the systemic racial injustice that my siblings of color experience on a daily basis. My white privilege affords me the option to tune out, to turn away, to fall asleep. Yet the passage from Mark reminds me that I have a responsibility, I have been given a job to do, we’ve all been given a job to do. Our jobs are not all the same and our lived experience will impact the way we see the work before us. I am learning that part of my job is to stay awake, stay alert and stay engaged. To remind myself that just because the headlines might change, the underlying systemic injustices are still there and still need to be dismantled. And the work as part of the Racial Audit team has reminded me again and again that this is not work to be done alone. This work requires all of us. All our experiences, skills, perspectives are needed. The work of building beloved community is done IN community with each other. Our work is to keep each other on task, keep each other alert and ready. In this Advent season we wait together for the gift, it’s an active waiting, it is a communal waiting, it is a knowing that the gift will bring light and more work will be illuminated and together we will pursue it.  

You make our collective work possible by your witness for justice every day in your church, community, and Annual Conference. MFSA does not receive any financial support from the United Methodist Church's giving channels. 100% of our budget is funded through your membership dues and your generosity in giving. 

Rev. Esther Rodriguez is the lead pastor of Spring of Life UMC in Orlando, FL. She was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico and has lived in the state of Florida since she was in third grade. She graduated high school in Lake Placid and received a B.A. in Religion from Florida Southern College. She received her Master of Divinity from Asbury Theological Seminary’s Orlando campus in 2011. After seminary she was on staff at Killearn UMC in Tallahassee, where she was the Director of the Shadetree Group, a missional ministry serving underserved persons in Gadsden County, as well as serving as a preaching pastor at Killearn UMC. She also served as an Associate Pastor at Trinity UMC in Gainesville, FL and lead pastor at Tice UMC in Fort Myers. She was ordained an Elder in Full Connection in 2016. Esther began working on a Doctor of Ministry at Duke Divinity School in 2017, which she hopes to finish in 2020. 

She has served on a number of social justice and mission boards which have taken her to serve in different parts of the world including: Haiti, Nicaragua, Cuba and South Africa. 

She is a singer, an amateur guitarist, a former trombone player, and a movie-lover. She also enjoys traveling, theology, musicals, coffee and reading. She’s passionate about Christian contemplative practices, church, missions, worship, advocacy, serving and empowering the marginalized of society and reaching those who’ve left the church or have been hurt by the church, among other things. She has two pets, Kora (dog) and Zooey (cat), is a Gryffindor and bilingual. Her call to ministry is founded and propelled by her experience of God’s grace.

Helen has worked for Reconciling Ministries Network (RMN) since 2012 and serves on RMN’s Organizing Team. Helen fell in love with the United States in 1983 when they visited New Jersey and Virginia for a field hockey tour with their high school. They spent 15 mostly-happy years in non-denominational charismatic churches in the U.K., everything apart from the conversion therapy piece was good. Eventually Helen moved to Massachusetts in 1998, met Mrs. Lovely (their spouse Kate) in 1999, and joined the United Methodist Church in Provincetown in 2005. Helen and Kate currently live on the NC coast with their cute and naughty dog Bella. Prior to joining RMN, Helen was Vice President of a global financial services company and a special needs teacher. They graduated in post-graduate secondary education from Canterbury Christ Church University, Kent, England. Helen is a Home Missioner in the Order of Deaconess and Home Missioner in The United Methodist Church, appointed by the Bishop of the Western NC Conference to their role at RMN.