Sunday-Ps. 30 is powerful as a vision of the future for the grieving. It has the utter joy of someone cured of a mortal ailment as well. When have you felt god’s anger or favor (v. 50? When have you been clothed with joy (v. 11) and when have you been unable to be silent in praise (v. 12)?
Monday-We continue to grow and learn and allow the living God to test the boundaries, to call into question even our "non-negotiables," and to act as (to borrow a phrase from C.S. Lewis) "the eternal Iconoclast" who dismantles every idol we craft, even when that idol is made of our own most precious creeds. Maturity in being human comes as much from discarding the extraneous as it does from acquiring new insights. Ultimately, that which ennobles us is our humility in the face of the holy. As the Tao Te Ching says: "When [humans] lack a sense of awe, there will be disaster." (Chapter 72)**Michael Jinkins
Tuesday- This hymn, Awake My Heart even has us laughing at sin (vs. 4) because we are "clinging forever to Christ, [our] true Savior." We are invited to laugh at what once held us bound, knowing that in Christ we are now set free. There is no longer any place for fear, because as alpha and omega "My Lord will leave me never" (vs. 5). Christ went through death into new life and so "whate'er he passes through. . . I follow him through all." Christ is the first fruit of the new creation to which we also belong through our baptisms. God Pause
Wednesday -We can grow impatient when life doesn’t offer us instant insights or gratification. We call on the wisdom of these monks to accompany us, to teach us what it means to honor the beauty of waiting and attending and witnessing what it is that wants to emerge, rather than what our rational minds want to make happen. The soul always offers us more richness than we can imagine, if we only make space and listen. That is the gift of this threshold time, learning to rest into darkness and mystery, and deeper ways to listen. Abbey of the Arts
Thursday-Resurrection means the worse thing is never the last thing. ~ Rev. Frederick Buechner,
Friday-Doubt arises within the context the faith. It is a wistful longing to be sure of the things in which we trust. But it is not and need not be a problem. Alister McGrath
Saturday-"Know yourself" is good advice. But to know ourselves doesn't mean to analyse ourselves. Sometimes we want to know ourselves as if we were machines that could be taken apart and put back together at will. At certain critical times in our lives it might be helpful to explore in some detail the events that led us to our crises, but we make a mistake when we think that we can ever completely understand ourselves and explain the full meaning of our lives to others. Upper room
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