What Do You Do When the Old No Longer Works and the New Has Not Arrived?

Acts 1:1-11; Daniel 1:1-17; “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing,” the poem by James Weldon Johnson Guest preacher the Rev. Floyd Thompkins, Director of the Center for Innovation in Ministry at San Francisco Theological Seminary, looks at the story describing Daniel's invitation to compromise his beliefs and his integrity in order to be seen as successful and important, as defined by the king and the dominant culture. Daniel refuses to give up his integrity, not because being himself "works," as the culture defines it, but because God called him to be faithful, regardless of what appears to work. God promises not to make him successful but to sustain him. Faith is not about doing what works, but about who we are and what God is calling us to do and be.