Sunday-We continue our look at the longest psalm, 119:33-40. At v. 37 we ask God to turn eyes away from the meaningless, the fruitless, the useless and to give life in the ways of God. Just before I typed this, i was wasting time on that great vacuum of energy, Facebook. I am not so Calvinistic that I wish every moment to s be spent in prayer or in something useful and empowering, but I do note how much time I fritter away, and then how quick I am to say that I do not have time for something.
Monday-"Friendship is a deep oneness that develops when two people, speaking the truth in love to one another, journey together to the same horizon." -- Timothy Keller-Who were your best friends? Who are your best friends? Does your friendship reflect Keller’s quote? What horizons do friends seek together? Does that “deep oneness” then threaten to merge two distinct people so that they do not learn how to share differences? I notice how many people get “defriended” on Facebook due to religious and partisan political differences.
Tuesday-Frederick Buechner-Pilate's case is different and worse. For him, it was not so much the terrible thing he'd done as the wonderful thing he'd proved incapable of doing. He could have stuck to his guns and resisted the pressure, and told the chief priests to go to hell, where they were obviously heading anyway. He could have spared the man's life. Or if that is asking too much, he could have spared him at least the scourging and catcalls and the appalling way he died
Wednesday-Dan Moseley-”Future is possibility if we don't become locked in the pain of the past.” We do nurture the pain of the past like a fragile flower, like a seedling in a garden. We do allow the past far more control over us than we should. that is true in grief, especially when we begin to enshrine our grief in frozen moments in time, but in maintaining grudges as well. Christians are called to be people f of the Easter dawn, to eye the future with confidence.
Thursday- how stubborn and slow my nature is. And how I keep confusing myself and complicating things for myself by useless twisting and turning. What I need most of all is the grace to really accept God as He gives Himself to me in every situation." (Thomas Merton) I certainly share this issue with the great monk of Kentucky. It is a valuable spiritual reminder that God is with me in the midst of turmoil and confusion. I do not face difficult situations alone.
Friday-Walking on the icy walkways on Presidents’ Day, thought of how temptation can be like an icy spot. You are walking on what looks to be safe and smooth pavement. then you hit patch and slip up without warning. In my view temptation is more like that than as we imagine a deliberate choice, where we weigh options and consequences with care. No, they slip us up, often at our weak point at that moment.
Saturday-"For the true sufferer, the theologian of the cross has good news—news, mind you, not solutions. It is the good news that, in the Crucified One, God has simply willed to force the curse to be a blessing, that the Crucified has, thus, borne our very suffering, that this suffering cannot destroy God’s choice about us but, rather, points to God’s preference to save the weak, broken, and poor, and to resurrect the dead.” Douglas John Hall
No comments:
Post a Comment