May 7, Easter 5a (John 14:1-14)
Jesus is the dam that holds us when the levee breaks.
Have you ever been in a situation where your heart was so stirred up, so unsettled, so confused that you didn’t know what you would do or where you would turn? Jesus’ disciples feel this way. In a time of doubt and uncertainty, Jesus speaks words of comfort to them: “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” The word for “troubled” means “stir up, unsettle, throw into confusion.” To put it another way, Do not let your hearts be stirred up, unsettled, thrown into confusion. Trust in God. Trust also in me.
I live two and a half hours from San Antonio. Between 1845 and 1921, seven catastrophic floods hit that city. The floods caused major damage to downtown buildings and killed many people. In 1921 alone, 50 people were killed.
Something had to be done to remedy the problem, so over a 12-year period (1929–1941) city architects built a series of canals and dams to manage the flow of the San Antonio River to prevent it from rising so high and flooding the community. It was a major architectural marvel for its time.
