1 Peter 1:3-9, Acts 2:22-26, 32
Diane Robey gave me a book and said, “You have to read this.” I started reading Theo of Golden and almost couldn’t put it down. But the truth is I really didn’t want it to end. As I read, I dog-eared pages. I underlined a few things. I savored the beautiful language. Then I started saying to a few people, “You have to read this.”
So, I’m going to tell you about it, but I don’t plan to spoil anything. Theo is a debonair older gentleman who comes to stay a while in Golden, Georgia, a small town. He has a secret. He is not forthcoming about his true identity… and that’s the part of the story you will have to find out for yourself.
Theo visits the local coffee shop called, The Chalice, where 92 pencil-drawn portraits hang on the walls. A local artist has rendered these drawings that represent “a full range of humanity.”[1] They’re exquisite, personal, and rich in detail which contrasts with the simple black pencil on white paper in a plain but sturdy black frame. Theo is an observer of details, so he is determined to learn the story of the portraits. He wonders why the lovely things hang in the coffeeshop and don’t belong to their rightful owners – the person whose portrait it is? When he learns from the barista that these are all, in fact, real life people in Golden, an idea begins to form: He will buy each one, contact the subject of the drawing, invite them to meet him, and he will bestow the piece as a gift.
I want to tell you about the first bestowal. On back of the first portrait was the name Minette Prentiss. Theo found an address for her and sent her a hand-written letter inviting her to meet him. He told her about the portrait. He introduced himself in a humble, disarmingly funny way, and suggested they meet in a very public spot in the light of day. Though Minette felt strangely about it at first, she decided she wanted to meet the man behind the letter written with a fountain pen on linen paper, the man who had her picture.
What happens at these bestowals is why I wanted to tell you about this book. In a relatively brief interaction, Theo presents the portrait to each person while telling them what he sees in their face. To Minette, a young professional CPA, he admitted that when he looked at all the faces in the gallery, he thought he should probably start this experiment with the kindest face of them all. “Who looks most likely to humor an old man with a silly idea?” He pointed to her portrait and said, “this one was the kindest.” He would go on to say, eyes fixed on the portrait: “There is strength in this face… And bravery… And kindness.” And a bit softer, he said, “And sadness. The good kind. It’s all there.”[2] Minette wanted him to explain, so he went on, “The face belongs to one who has suffered loss. That is what I thought when I first saw it. But perhaps I am mistaken…”
“The portrait is telling you the truth,” she said. “I don’t know if there is any strength or bravery or kindness, but there is sadness in that face, there has been for a long time.”[3] Minette went on to explain a complicated relationship with a father she could never please, never live up to his expectations, and the strain that put on them both.
Theo’s invitation was to an in-person interaction, that didn’t play around with small talk, but got right to the truth, right to the heart of real people. Allen Levi, the author, says a theme of the book is incarnational reality. The kids might just say, irl, in real life. With every bestowal, Theo offers words of truth and blessing, irl.
Over the next several weeks, we are going to consider Peter’s first letter, an Easter letter, sent to a church and its people who are struggling for a sense of place and purpose in a world at odds with Christ’s heart, mind, and spirit.[4]
This resonated with me. Weatherly is a church not altogether unlike this early Christian church in 1 Peter. We are at odds with those whose gods are money and power; and we are at odds with those who wield the Bible as a weapon, and the church as a threshing floor (separating the good from the bad, the “ins” from the “outs.” We are seeking to be one in heart, mind and spirit with Christ, but that is harder than it sounds, especially in a society with such contrasts.
The writer of First Peter greets the audience as God’s “chosen,” though describing them as “exiled” and Gentiles. But these are Christ-followers, so in Christ they are adopted children of Abraham, and like Israel, who wandered in exile – God was with them. The same is true for the faithful today who feel untethered, like they don’t belong anywhere. The letter assures that like their ancestors in faith, they may be misunderstood and mistreated in their situation, their society, but their true home is a promised land with all the people of God.
[Peter] praises God for the mercy that causes us to be
“born again into a living hope” through Jesus’ resurrection and the power of the Spirit. [In this letter] God is inviting all people into a new family centered around Jesus, a family that has a new identity as God’s beloved children and a new hope of a world reborn by God’s love…”[5]
This tells us something that the resurrection proves. The resurrection proves that ultimately, no one is beyond the love of God, nothing can separate us from the love of God. Even if these new believers are misunderstood, lost, feeling exiled, or are only “adopted” into this faith – that is enough.
At the resurrection, what was believed to be lost,
a life lived in vain,
a waste of a movement,
a waste of faith, believed to be dead and buried,
Hope, long gone with the body of the dead Jesus in the tomb, was –
In fact, categorically, reborn!
Redeemed!
Repurposed!
Re-created!
Resurrected!
That’s the truth at the bottom of Easter, as Chuck Poole writes:
“Nothing done in the name of our Lord will be wasted, lost, or pointless, because God’s goodness and power will ultimately triumph over all that is evil and hurtful and wrong.”[6]
And so Peter preaches with passion and writes a letter of encouragement to these early Christians: In his great mercy, he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. (1:3b)
The truth at the bottom of Easter is that after all the Alleluias, we live in this world where children are hungry, where families break apart, where someone fights each day for their sobriety, where the doctor’s diagnosis is devastating, where the call comes to say your world has just been turned upside down and will never be the same again… But the truth at the bottom of Easter is that God’s goodness and mercy, Christ’s living hope will prevail. How will it prevail in this hard world? Because someone learned on Easter Sundays the truth that 1. No one is beyond the love of God and 2. nothing done for God is done in vain…
“A life lived for God, though it may appear to be hidden (exiled) in obscurity, or lost in failure, defeat, and death, is a life not lived in vain because God will make of that life something more than anyone ever dreamed, imagined, or dared to hope.”[7]
That’s the church’s message. The simplest kindness or comfort offered to the weakest of God’s children reminds them they belong to the family of God.
Some who have resources will give whole heartedly to lift the poor, while others will take up the cause of the immigrant, or the Trans kid, or the neuro-diverse young adult who simply needs to be shown some patience and a kind word.
“Some will pray by name for people who will never know it, but will someday feel it, and will make it their life’s mission to reach out to the outcast and the stranger. And they will know that, in the light of Easter’s truth, it all matters and none of it is in vain”[8] because of the living hope of the resurrection.
You wonder what evangelism looks like in a community like ours? It looks like Theo’s incarnational moment with Minette. At the end of a much longer, revealing conversation than either of them expected, “he held out the portrait and declared only loud enough for her to hear, ‘Mrs Minette Glissen Prentiss, before I go, I remind you, this face belongs to one who is strong and brave and kind. It belongs to one who is capable of saintliness. You my dear, are your Gammy’s pride and joy, the gold of Golden, the wine of the Challice, and for an old man new to your town, a great blessing. I present to you this portrait of St. Minette.’”[9]
Sometimes, a letter from someone who knows you, helps remind you who you are and who you are called to be.
{insert letter from Rick and Ellen Burnette}
…Along these lines, over the past 30 years we have witnessed how Weatherly has stood with the Least of These, including the residents of Huntsville’s Lincoln Mill, the neglected communities of Appalachia, and Thailand’s marginalized hilltribes, even while boldly advocating for immigrants. Your more recent concern and support for the Immokalee farmworker community is an extension of who you are. As challenges being faced by our immigrant neighbors, whether in Huntsville or Immokalee, aren’t going to vanish overnight, we ask you to join us in offering advocacy and assistance wherever God leads.
With gratitude and affection, Rick and Ellen Burnette (Cultivate Abundance)
A letter like that one means a lot, doesn’t it? In a few short paragraphs, someone names what they see in you, what they appreciate from you, what you mean to them, who they need you to be.
Over the next several weeks, somewhere in the letter of First Peter, the letters from ministry and mission partners, the bestowals of portraits in Theo of Golden, I pray that we will be reminded of who we are, called to live into the best of our nature, called to live into the living hope of the resurrection of Christ. May it be so.
[1]Theo of Golden is Allen Levi’s first novel. What began in 2023 as a self-published book that he hoped maybe a thousand readers would buy landed in the #1 spot on the NYT best-seller list in March 2026. It has sold over 1 million copies.
[2] Ibid. p. 34
[3] Ibid. p. 36
[4] Stephen Cook, pastor Second Baptist, Memphis references Barbara Lundblad with this comment.
[5] https://bibleproject.com/guides/book-of-1-peter/#1-peter-11-12-gentile-christians-as-chosen-exiles
[6] Poole, Charles E., The Flute Beneath the Gold, Reading the Bible and Speaking the Truth, Smyth & Helwys, 2002
[7] Poole, Charles E.
[8] ibid.
[9] Levi, Allen, Theo of Golden, p. 41