07/05/07 Mon in the week of the 5th Sun of Easter
[PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS A "MENU" FROM WHICH TO PICK AND CHOOSE ONE OR MORE MEDITATIONS. PLEASE DO NOT THINK YOU HAVE TO PRAY ALL OF IT. PLEASE THINK OF IT AS A BUFFET OF THE DIFFERENT FLAVORS OF CHRISTIANITY. IT IS HOPED THAT ALL WILL PRAY THE COLLECT, REFLECT ON THE DAY'S SCRIPTURES AND PRAY THE ANGLICAN CYCLE OF PRAYER. AFTER THAT, YOUR CHOICE. THANK YOU]
If you would like these meditations to come directly to your in box, please click here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/KnitternunMeditation/
Blessed are those for whom Easter is...
not a hunt, but a find;
not a greeting, but a proclamation;
not outward fashions, but inward grace;
not a day, but an eternity.
Collect
Almighty God, whom truly to know is everlasting life: Grant us so perfectly to know your Son Jesus Christ to be the way, the truth, and the life, that we may steadfastly follow his steps in the way that leads to eternal life; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
++++++++++
Today's Scripture http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/
AM Psalm 56, 57, [58]; PM Psalm 64, 65,
Wisdom 9:1, 7-18; Col. (3:18-4:1)2-18; Luke 7:36-50
++++++++++
From Forward Day by Day: http://www.forwardmovement.org/todaysreading.cfm
Luke 7:36-50. She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair.
What a vivid picture of a woman expressing her love for Jesus with such abandon! For me, as a "well brought up girl," making a disturbance would have broken a cardinal rule of social decorum. Though such a show of emotion was perhaps not uncommon in Jesus' day, the woman's action even then went beyond socially acceptable rules of behavior. Seemingly without concern for consequence, she shared her pain, her love, her heart's desire, her tears. What courage she must have had, not knowing whether Jesus would accept this gift! What depth of spirit! The gift of acceptance and healing she received in return was likely more than even she could have imagined.
This woman's actions are an example for us "well brought up children." What might it mean for us to risk showing our commitment to Christ so openly today? What would it mean for me to risk being outcast because of my desire to meet Jesus, to go somewhere I might not be wanted, to risk rejection? And what might I do to risk the possibility of forgiveness and peace?
++++++++++
Today in the Anglican Cycle of Prayer we pray for the Diocese of North Kigezi (Uganda)
http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acp/index.cfm
++++++++++
Carmelite.com: Reflections http://www.carmelite.com/spirituality/reflection.php
He is within me at each moment; He is guiding and inspiring me with what I must say and do.
St Therese of the Child Jesus
++++++++++
Reading from the Desert Christians http://www.cin.org/dsrtftin.html
Abba Mios of Belos said, "Obedience responds to obedience. When someone obeys God, then God obeys his request."
++++++++++
Sayings of the Jewish Fathers (Pirqe Aboth)
http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/sjf/index.htm
R. Jacob said, This world is like a vestibule before the world to come; prepare thyself at the vestibule, that thou mayest be admitted into the hall.
++++++++++
Daily Meditation (Henri Nouwen) http://www.henrinouwen.org/home/free_eletters/
Seeing the Miracle of Multiplication
The opposite of a scarcity mentality is an abundancy mentality. With an abundancy mentality we say: "There is enough for everyone, more than enough: food, knowledge, love ... everything." With this mind-set we give away whatever we have, to whomever we meet. When we see hungry people we give them food. When we meet ignorant people we share our knowledge; when we encounter people in need of love, we offer them friendship and affection and hospitality and introduce them to our family and friends.
When we live with this mind-set, we will see the miracle that what we give away multiplies: food, knowledge, love ... everything. There will even be many leftovers.
++++++++++
The Merton Reflection for the Week of May 7, 2007 www.mertoninstitute.org
"The first chirps of the waking day birds mark the "point vierge" [the virgin point] of the dawn under a sky as yet without real light, a moment of awe and inexpressible innocence, when the Father in perfect silence opens their eyes. They begin to speak to Him, not with fluent song, but with an awakening question that is their dawn state, their state at the "point vierge." Their condition asks if it is time for them to "be." He answers "Yes." Then, they one by one wake up, and become birds. They manifest themselves as birds, beginning to sing. Presently they will be fully themselves, and will even fly.
Here is an unspeakable secret: paradise is all around us and we do not understand. It is wide open. The sword is taken away, but we do not know it: we are off "one to his farm and another to his merchandise." Lights on. Clocks ticking. Thermostats working. Stoves cooking. Electric shavers filling radios with static. "Wisdom," cries the dawn deacon, but we do not attend."
Thomas Merton. Conjectures of A Guilty Bystander. New York: Doubleday, 1966: 131-132 Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1968: 18-19
Thought to Remember
"The most wonderful moment of the day is when creation in its innocence asks permission to "be" once again, as it did on the first morning that ever was."
Conjectures of A Guilty Bystander: 131
++++++++++
From the Principles of the Third Society of St. Francis:
Day Seven - The Second Aim
To spread the spirit of love and harmony
The Order sets out, in the name of Christ, to break down barriers between people and to seek equality for all. We accept as our second aim the spreading of a spirit of love and harmony among all people. We are pledged to fight against the ignorance, pride, and prejudice that breed injustice or partiality of any kind.
++++++++++
Upper Room Daily Reflection http://www.upperroom.org/reflections/
O GOD, WHOSE MERCY is upon generation after generation, fill my spirit with the joy of your Spirit! Grant me the gift of joyous expectation, seeing your coming in a million ways and responding with blessing, with leaping, and with joy. Amen.
- Marjorie Suchocki
The Upper Room Disciplines, 2000
From page 371 of The Upper Room Disciplines, 2000. Copyright © 1999 by Upper Room Books.
+++++++++++
Richard Rohr's Daily Reflection
http://cacradicalgrace.org/getconnected/getconnected_index.html
"The Prodigal Son's Father"
The Father who Jesus knew looks amazingly like what most cultures would call mother. In Luke 15, the story of the prodigal son, Jesus makes his most complete presentation of the character of this Father, whom he called God. The father is in every way the total opposite of the male patriarch and even rejects his older son's appeal to a world of worthiness and merit. He not only allows the younger son to make choices against him, but even empowers him to do so by giving him money! After the son's bad mistakes, the father still refuses his own right to restore order or impose a penance, even though the prodigal son offers to serve as a hired servant. Both his leaving and his returning are treated as necessary but painful acts of adult freedom. In every way he can, the father makes mutuality and vulnerability possible.
from Radical Grace, "Is This 'Women-Stuff' Important?"
++++++++++
From John E. Rotelle, O.S.A., Tradition Day by Day: Readings from Church Writers. Augustinian Press. Villanova, PA, 1994.
http://www.artsci.villanova.edu/dsteelman/tradition/sources.htm
The Holy Spirit
The coming of the Spirit is gentle, his presence fragrant, his weight very light. Rays of light and knowledge stream before him as he approaches. The Spirit comes with the tenderness of a true friend and protector to save, to heal, to teach, to counsel, to strengthen, to console. The Spirit comes to enlighten the mind first of the one who receives him, and then through that person the minds of others as well. As light strikes the eye of those who come out of darkness into sunshine and enables them to see clearly things they could not discern before, so does light flood the souls of those counted worthy of receiving the Holy Spirit and enable them to see things beyond the range of human vision of which they had previously been ignorant.
Cyril of Jerusalem, (316 - 386), bishop of Jerusalem, has left us a precious legacy of twenty-four catechetical sermons.
++++++++++
Daily Readings From "My Utmost for His Highest", Oswald Chambers
http://www.myutmost.org/
BUILDING FOR ETERNITY
"For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it?" Luke 14:28
Our Lord refers not to a cost we have to count, but to a cost which He has counted. The cost was those thirty years in Nazareth, those three years of popularity, scandal and hatred, the deep unfathomable agony in Gethsemane, and the onslaught at Calvary - the pivot upon which the whole of Time and Eternity turns. Jesus Christ has counted the cost. Men are not going to laugh at Him at last and say - "This man began to build, and was not able to finish."
The conditions of discipleship laid down by Our Lord in vv. 26, 27 and 33 mean that the men and women He is going to use in His mighty building enterprises are those in whom He has done everything. "If any man come to Me, and hate not . . . he cannot be My disciple." Our Lord implies that the only men and women He will use in His building enterprises are those who love Him personally, passionately and devotedly beyond any of the closest ties on earth. The conditions are stern, but they are glorious.
All that we build is going to be inspected by God. Is God going to detect in His searching fire that we have built on the foundation of Jesus some enterprise of our own? These are days of tremendous enterprises, days when we are trying to work for God, and therein is the snare. Profoundly speaking, we can never work for God. Jesus takes us over for His enterprises, His building schemes entirely, and no soul has any right to claim where he shall be put.
++++++++++
G. K. Chesterton Day by Day
http://www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/gkcday/gkcday.html
MAETERLINCK is as efficient in filling a man with strange spiritual tremors as Messrs. Crosse & Blackwell are in filling a man with jam. But it all depends on what you want to be filled with. Lord Rosebery, being a modern sceptic, probably prefers the spiritual tremors. I, being an orthodox Christian, prefer the jam.
'What's Wrong with the World.'
++++++++++
Today's reading from the Rule of St. Benedict http://www.osb.org/rb/
Prologue
So we have asked the Lord
who is to dwell in His tent,
and we have heard His commands
to anyone who would dwell there;
it remains for us to fulfill those duties.
Therefore we must prepare our hearts and our bodies
to do battle under the holy obedience of His commands;
and let us ask God
that He be pleased to give us the help of His grace
for anything which our nature finds hardly possible.
And if we want to escape the pains of hell
and attain life everlasting,
then, while there is still time,
while we are still in the body
and are able to fulfill all these things
by the light of this life,
we must hasten to do now
what will profit us for eternity.
Commentary: http://www.eriebenedictines.org/Pages/INSPIRATION/insights.html
There is a poignancy in this paragraph that is little associated with great spiritual documents. First, Benedict stresses again that we are not alone in our undertaking to live above the dregs of life. What is "not possible to us by nature," we must "beg for by grace," he says. This is an enterprise between two spirits, in other words, God's and our own. We will fail often, but God will not fail us and we must not stop.
"God," the elder said, "is closer to sinners than to saints."
"But how can that be," the eager disciple asked.
And the elder explained: "God in heaven holds each person by a string. When we sin, we cut the string. Then God ties it up again, making a knot--bringing the sinner a little closer. Again and again sins cut the string--and with each knot God keeps drawing the sinner closer and closer."
Even our weaknesses take us to God if we let them.
It is a very liberating thought: We are not capable of what we are about to do but we are not doing it alone and we are not doing it without purpose. God is with us, holding us up so that the reign of God may be made plain in us and become hope to others. If we can become peacemakers, if we can control our need to control, if we can distinguish between our wants and our needs, then anybody can.
++++++++++
Dynamis http://groups.yahoo.com/group/orthodoxdynamis/
Dynamis is a daily Bible meditation based upon the lectionary of the Holy Orthodox Church.
Monday, May 7, 2007 Christ is Risen!
Priest Alexis, Confessor of Orthodoxy in America
Kellia: Deuteronomy 2:1‑23
Apostle: Acts 12:12‑17
Gospel: St. John 8:42‑51
Preparation to Possess: Deuteronomy 2:1‑23, especially vs. 16‑18
LXX: “When all the men of war, dying out of the midst of the people,
had fallen....the Lord spoke to me, saying, Thou shalt pass over this
day the borders of Moab to Ar.” Having embraced the life in Christ,
we discover before us a land to possess, the Kingdom of God within,
as promised to the Faithful by the Lord Himself.
Being illumined by the Holy Spirit at Baptism, the Orthodox Christian is
called to possess this land by freely choosing to undertake a
multitude of struggles through which we prove ourselves children of the
Light and heirs of eternal good things.
The struggles that follow our choice to pursue the way of the Lord, in
the language of the Baptismal Liturgy, are described as putting away
the old man, corrupt through the lusts of the flesh, and being
clothed upon with the new man after the image of the Lord.?
Being clothed upon with the new man means doing what is required to
possess the Kingdom. In this passage, Moses discloses some of what is
involved in this process: 1) a long period of spiritual purification,
2) a persistent effort to meet the demands of daily life fruitfully
in the Spirit, and 3) an unremitting pursuit of the goal God gives us.
Ancient Israel's experiences during their wilderness pilgrimage serve as types
that describe growth in discipleship. Though initially Israel disobeyed God
and remained camped at Kadesh‑barnea, in time they turned and journeyed
east toward the Red Sea, to the northernmost bay ofthe Gulf of Aqaba and
the settlements of Elath and Ezion‑Geber (vss.1,8).
Journeying in their case actually was a protracted thirty‑eight
year nomadic existence (vs. 14). They survived on manna (see Ex.
16:35), surplus from their flocks, and perhaps produce grown in campsite
gardens (Deut. 2:7). During this time they skirted about the mountains
of Seir, the home of the Edomites (vss. 3, 4), but always staying in the
wilderness to the west and south, making no permanent settlements.
Sparce, nomadic existence served as a means of purification. The
generation who balked at entering the Promised Land from Kadesh‑barnea
reposed (vss. 14‑16), but the younger generation ‑ those who were
children at the time of Israel's initial failure in freedom ‑ matured
by meeting the daily rigors of unsettled, wilderness living.
God slowly honed them into an adaptable force ready to possess the
Promised Land whenever He should direct them.
Similarly, Orthodox Christians ought to consider that the essence of the
life in Christ is nomadic, a spiritual pilgrimage, in which God
is preparing each one for great inner conquest through the daily
spiritual efforts during this life. Others around us in our
neighborhoods, at our jobs, or in the larger communities may have
settled lives as did the Edomites and the Moabites. By struggle
in the wilderness, Israel learned to rely solely upon God,
not the comforts of this life.
At the end of the thirty‑eight years, the process being completed, the
Lord commanded them to go in the direction of the wilderness of Moab
(vs. 8). As they had avoided Edomite territory all those years, now
they were to respect Moabite territory and not to quarrel with them
nor engage in war against them (vs. 9). The People of God as nomads
may need to buy and sell in relation to others (vs. 6), but always let
us understand that we are on a journey, so that we do not become
entangled and diverted along the way to the Promised Land.
Moses reminded Israel that each of the other peoples had dispossessed
giants (called by various names, vss. 10‑23). His reminds us that,
as God’s People, we too face giants in this life before we receive
our possession (vs. 12); but rejoice: by struggle in Christ, we can be victors!
O Christ our God, keep us ever warriors invincible in every attack of
those who assail us, and make us all victors even unto the end,
through Thy crown incorruptible.
If you would like these meditations to come directly to your in box, please click here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/KnitternunMeditation/
Blessed are those for whom Easter is...
not a hunt, but a find;
not a greeting, but a proclamation;
not outward fashions, but inward grace;
not a day, but an eternity.
Collect
Almighty God, whom truly to know is everlasting life: Grant us so perfectly to know your Son Jesus Christ to be the way, the truth, and the life, that we may steadfastly follow his steps in the way that leads to eternal life; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
++++++++++
Today's Scripture http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/
AM Psalm 56, 57, [58]; PM Psalm 64, 65,
Wisdom 9:1, 7-18; Col. (3:18-4:1)2-18; Luke 7:36-50
++++++++++
From Forward Day by Day: http://www.forwardmovement.org/todaysreading.cfm
Luke 7:36-50. She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair.
What a vivid picture of a woman expressing her love for Jesus with such abandon! For me, as a "well brought up girl," making a disturbance would have broken a cardinal rule of social decorum. Though such a show of emotion was perhaps not uncommon in Jesus' day, the woman's action even then went beyond socially acceptable rules of behavior. Seemingly without concern for consequence, she shared her pain, her love, her heart's desire, her tears. What courage she must have had, not knowing whether Jesus would accept this gift! What depth of spirit! The gift of acceptance and healing she received in return was likely more than even she could have imagined.
This woman's actions are an example for us "well brought up children." What might it mean for us to risk showing our commitment to Christ so openly today? What would it mean for me to risk being outcast because of my desire to meet Jesus, to go somewhere I might not be wanted, to risk rejection? And what might I do to risk the possibility of forgiveness and peace?
++++++++++
Today in the Anglican Cycle of Prayer we pray for the Diocese of North Kigezi (Uganda)
http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acp/index.cfm
++++++++++
Carmelite.com: Reflections http://www.carmelite.com/spirituality/reflection.php
He is within me at each moment; He is guiding and inspiring me with what I must say and do.
St Therese of the Child Jesus
++++++++++
Reading from the Desert Christians http://www.cin.org/dsrtftin.html
Abba Mios of Belos said, "Obedience responds to obedience. When someone obeys God, then God obeys his request."
++++++++++
Sayings of the Jewish Fathers (Pirqe Aboth)
http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/sjf/index.htm
R. Jacob said, This world is like a vestibule before the world to come; prepare thyself at the vestibule, that thou mayest be admitted into the hall.
++++++++++
Daily Meditation (Henri Nouwen) http://www.henrinouwen.org/home/free_eletters/
Seeing the Miracle of Multiplication
The opposite of a scarcity mentality is an abundancy mentality. With an abundancy mentality we say: "There is enough for everyone, more than enough: food, knowledge, love ... everything." With this mind-set we give away whatever we have, to whomever we meet. When we see hungry people we give them food. When we meet ignorant people we share our knowledge; when we encounter people in need of love, we offer them friendship and affection and hospitality and introduce them to our family and friends.
When we live with this mind-set, we will see the miracle that what we give away multiplies: food, knowledge, love ... everything. There will even be many leftovers.
++++++++++
The Merton Reflection for the Week of May 7, 2007 www.mertoninstitute.org
"The first chirps of the waking day birds mark the "point vierge" [the virgin point] of the dawn under a sky as yet without real light, a moment of awe and inexpressible innocence, when the Father in perfect silence opens their eyes. They begin to speak to Him, not with fluent song, but with an awakening question that is their dawn state, their state at the "point vierge." Their condition asks if it is time for them to "be." He answers "Yes." Then, they one by one wake up, and become birds. They manifest themselves as birds, beginning to sing. Presently they will be fully themselves, and will even fly.
Here is an unspeakable secret: paradise is all around us and we do not understand. It is wide open. The sword is taken away, but we do not know it: we are off "one to his farm and another to his merchandise." Lights on. Clocks ticking. Thermostats working. Stoves cooking. Electric shavers filling radios with static. "Wisdom," cries the dawn deacon, but we do not attend."
Thomas Merton. Conjectures of A Guilty Bystander. New York: Doubleday, 1966: 131-132 Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1968: 18-19
Thought to Remember
"The most wonderful moment of the day is when creation in its innocence asks permission to "be" once again, as it did on the first morning that ever was."
Conjectures of A Guilty Bystander: 131
++++++++++
From the Principles of the Third Society of St. Francis:
Day Seven - The Second Aim
To spread the spirit of love and harmony
The Order sets out, in the name of Christ, to break down barriers between people and to seek equality for all. We accept as our second aim the spreading of a spirit of love and harmony among all people. We are pledged to fight against the ignorance, pride, and prejudice that breed injustice or partiality of any kind.
++++++++++
Upper Room Daily Reflection http://www.upperroom.org/reflections/
O GOD, WHOSE MERCY is upon generation after generation, fill my spirit with the joy of your Spirit! Grant me the gift of joyous expectation, seeing your coming in a million ways and responding with blessing, with leaping, and with joy. Amen.
- Marjorie Suchocki
The Upper Room Disciplines, 2000
From page 371 of The Upper Room Disciplines, 2000. Copyright © 1999 by Upper Room Books.
+++++++++++
Richard Rohr's Daily Reflection
http://cacradicalgrace.org/getconnected/getconnected_index.html
"The Prodigal Son's Father"
The Father who Jesus knew looks amazingly like what most cultures would call mother. In Luke 15, the story of the prodigal son, Jesus makes his most complete presentation of the character of this Father, whom he called God. The father is in every way the total opposite of the male patriarch and even rejects his older son's appeal to a world of worthiness and merit. He not only allows the younger son to make choices against him, but even empowers him to do so by giving him money! After the son's bad mistakes, the father still refuses his own right to restore order or impose a penance, even though the prodigal son offers to serve as a hired servant. Both his leaving and his returning are treated as necessary but painful acts of adult freedom. In every way he can, the father makes mutuality and vulnerability possible.
from Radical Grace, "Is This 'Women-Stuff' Important?"
++++++++++
From John E. Rotelle, O.S.A., Tradition Day by Day: Readings from Church Writers. Augustinian Press. Villanova, PA, 1994.
http://www.artsci.villanova.edu/dsteelman/tradition/sources.htm
The Holy Spirit
The coming of the Spirit is gentle, his presence fragrant, his weight very light. Rays of light and knowledge stream before him as he approaches. The Spirit comes with the tenderness of a true friend and protector to save, to heal, to teach, to counsel, to strengthen, to console. The Spirit comes to enlighten the mind first of the one who receives him, and then through that person the minds of others as well. As light strikes the eye of those who come out of darkness into sunshine and enables them to see clearly things they could not discern before, so does light flood the souls of those counted worthy of receiving the Holy Spirit and enable them to see things beyond the range of human vision of which they had previously been ignorant.
Cyril of Jerusalem, (316 - 386), bishop of Jerusalem, has left us a precious legacy of twenty-four catechetical sermons.
++++++++++
Daily Readings From "My Utmost for His Highest", Oswald Chambers
http://www.myutmost.org/
BUILDING FOR ETERNITY
"For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it?" Luke 14:28
Our Lord refers not to a cost we have to count, but to a cost which He has counted. The cost was those thirty years in Nazareth, those three years of popularity, scandal and hatred, the deep unfathomable agony in Gethsemane, and the onslaught at Calvary - the pivot upon which the whole of Time and Eternity turns. Jesus Christ has counted the cost. Men are not going to laugh at Him at last and say - "This man began to build, and was not able to finish."
The conditions of discipleship laid down by Our Lord in vv. 26, 27 and 33 mean that the men and women He is going to use in His mighty building enterprises are those in whom He has done everything. "If any man come to Me, and hate not . . . he cannot be My disciple." Our Lord implies that the only men and women He will use in His building enterprises are those who love Him personally, passionately and devotedly beyond any of the closest ties on earth. The conditions are stern, but they are glorious.
All that we build is going to be inspected by God. Is God going to detect in His searching fire that we have built on the foundation of Jesus some enterprise of our own? These are days of tremendous enterprises, days when we are trying to work for God, and therein is the snare. Profoundly speaking, we can never work for God. Jesus takes us over for His enterprises, His building schemes entirely, and no soul has any right to claim where he shall be put.
++++++++++
G. K. Chesterton Day by Day
http://www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/gkcday/gkcday.html
MAETERLINCK is as efficient in filling a man with strange spiritual tremors as Messrs. Crosse & Blackwell are in filling a man with jam. But it all depends on what you want to be filled with. Lord Rosebery, being a modern sceptic, probably prefers the spiritual tremors. I, being an orthodox Christian, prefer the jam.
'What's Wrong with the World.'
++++++++++
Today's reading from the Rule of St. Benedict http://www.osb.org/rb/
Prologue
So we have asked the Lord
who is to dwell in His tent,
and we have heard His commands
to anyone who would dwell there;
it remains for us to fulfill those duties.
Therefore we must prepare our hearts and our bodies
to do battle under the holy obedience of His commands;
and let us ask God
that He be pleased to give us the help of His grace
for anything which our nature finds hardly possible.
And if we want to escape the pains of hell
and attain life everlasting,
then, while there is still time,
while we are still in the body
and are able to fulfill all these things
by the light of this life,
we must hasten to do now
what will profit us for eternity.
Commentary: http://www.eriebenedictines.org/Pages/INSPIRATION/insights.html
There is a poignancy in this paragraph that is little associated with great spiritual documents. First, Benedict stresses again that we are not alone in our undertaking to live above the dregs of life. What is "not possible to us by nature," we must "beg for by grace," he says. This is an enterprise between two spirits, in other words, God's and our own. We will fail often, but God will not fail us and we must not stop.
"God," the elder said, "is closer to sinners than to saints."
"But how can that be," the eager disciple asked.
And the elder explained: "God in heaven holds each person by a string. When we sin, we cut the string. Then God ties it up again, making a knot--bringing the sinner a little closer. Again and again sins cut the string--and with each knot God keeps drawing the sinner closer and closer."
Even our weaknesses take us to God if we let them.
It is a very liberating thought: We are not capable of what we are about to do but we are not doing it alone and we are not doing it without purpose. God is with us, holding us up so that the reign of God may be made plain in us and become hope to others. If we can become peacemakers, if we can control our need to control, if we can distinguish between our wants and our needs, then anybody can.
++++++++++
Dynamis http://groups.yahoo.com/group/orthodoxdynamis/
Dynamis is a daily Bible meditation based upon the lectionary of the Holy Orthodox Church.
Monday, May 7, 2007 Christ is Risen!
Priest Alexis, Confessor of Orthodoxy in America
Kellia: Deuteronomy 2:1‑23
Apostle: Acts 12:12‑17
Gospel: St. John 8:42‑51
Preparation to Possess: Deuteronomy 2:1‑23, especially vs. 16‑18
LXX: “When all the men of war, dying out of the midst of the people,
had fallen....the Lord spoke to me, saying, Thou shalt pass over this
day the borders of Moab to Ar.” Having embraced the life in Christ,
we discover before us a land to possess, the Kingdom of God within,
as promised to the Faithful by the Lord Himself.
Being illumined by the Holy Spirit at Baptism, the Orthodox Christian is
called to possess this land by freely choosing to undertake a
multitude of struggles through which we prove ourselves children of the
Light and heirs of eternal good things.
The struggles that follow our choice to pursue the way of the Lord, in
the language of the Baptismal Liturgy, are described as putting away
the old man, corrupt through the lusts of the flesh, and being
clothed upon with the new man after the image of the Lord.?
Being clothed upon with the new man means doing what is required to
possess the Kingdom. In this passage, Moses discloses some of what is
involved in this process: 1) a long period of spiritual purification,
2) a persistent effort to meet the demands of daily life fruitfully
in the Spirit, and 3) an unremitting pursuit of the goal God gives us.
Ancient Israel's experiences during their wilderness pilgrimage serve as types
that describe growth in discipleship. Though initially Israel disobeyed God
and remained camped at Kadesh‑barnea, in time they turned and journeyed
east toward the Red Sea, to the northernmost bay ofthe Gulf of Aqaba and
the settlements of Elath and Ezion‑Geber (vss.1,8).
Journeying in their case actually was a protracted thirty‑eight
year nomadic existence (vs. 14). They survived on manna (see Ex.
16:35), surplus from their flocks, and perhaps produce grown in campsite
gardens (Deut. 2:7). During this time they skirted about the mountains
of Seir, the home of the Edomites (vss. 3, 4), but always staying in the
wilderness to the west and south, making no permanent settlements.
Sparce, nomadic existence served as a means of purification. The
generation who balked at entering the Promised Land from Kadesh‑barnea
reposed (vss. 14‑16), but the younger generation ‑ those who were
children at the time of Israel's initial failure in freedom ‑ matured
by meeting the daily rigors of unsettled, wilderness living.
God slowly honed them into an adaptable force ready to possess the
Promised Land whenever He should direct them.
Similarly, Orthodox Christians ought to consider that the essence of the
life in Christ is nomadic, a spiritual pilgrimage, in which God
is preparing each one for great inner conquest through the daily
spiritual efforts during this life. Others around us in our
neighborhoods, at our jobs, or in the larger communities may have
settled lives as did the Edomites and the Moabites. By struggle
in the wilderness, Israel learned to rely solely upon God,
not the comforts of this life.
At the end of the thirty‑eight years, the process being completed, the
Lord commanded them to go in the direction of the wilderness of Moab
(vs. 8). As they had avoided Edomite territory all those years, now
they were to respect Moabite territory and not to quarrel with them
nor engage in war against them (vs. 9). The People of God as nomads
may need to buy and sell in relation to others (vs. 6), but always let
us understand that we are on a journey, so that we do not become
entangled and diverted along the way to the Promised Land.
Moses reminded Israel that each of the other peoples had dispossessed
giants (called by various names, vss. 10‑23). His reminds us that,
as God’s People, we too face giants in this life before we receive
our possession (vs. 12); but rejoice: by struggle in Christ, we can be victors!
O Christ our God, keep us ever warriors invincible in every attack of
those who assail us, and make us all victors even unto the end,
through Thy crown incorruptible.
posted by Gloriamarie Amalfitano @ 4:54 PM
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