Many people consider Jesus a "great teacher" and spiritual leader on the par with the Buddha, Mohammed, and the famous Indian gurus. But they will not admit that He is the Incarnate Son of God -- God made flesh and dwelling among us.
However, I wonder if these people have ever considered that not one of the world's religious teachers have ever said the things Jesus said:
I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Other teachers have pointed the way to the truth and the life, but they did not proclaim themselves as "The Way, The Truth, and The Life."
Anyone who comes to me, even though he die, will live. Whoever lives and believes in me will never die....I am the resurrection and the life. No wonder the Jews wanted to stone him for blasphemy. Who would dare to make these claims unless they were true?
Unless you eat my Body and drink my Blood, you will have no life in you. To put these words in the mouth of any other spiritual leader would be horrible. Only Jesus has the power to make these statements and to make them actually effective, or "do-able."
The Father and I are One. Humility would prevent any other person, no matter how spiritual, from saying this -- only Jesus could proclaim that He and the Father are One. The doctrine of the Trinity makes the Incarnation possible.
If anyone will keep my word, the Father and I will come to him and dwell with him. What an amazing promise! I cannot imagine any guru or teacher in the world saying such a thing.
The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath. Wow! "Lord of the Sabbath"!
I am with you always, even to the consummation of the world. No one born of 'the will of a father' can make such a statement.
He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. How many teachers of the world would have wished to baptize with the Holy Spirit, and change the world forever. And yet, unless they baptize in the name of Jesus Christ, they cannot baptize with the Holy Spirit.
To all who come to Him, He gives the power to become children of God. Again, with any other teacher, who would not wish to give others the right, the power, the ability to become children of God. Jesus is the only gateway into eternal life; He alone has the power to forgive sins and to transform lives into the image and spirit of His Father. And so He does: The Father works even until now, and I work also.
Thank God He sent His very Son to redeem us from the bondage of sin and separation! For other teachers can appeal to our emotions and to our minds, but only the Son of God Himself can change our inner man.
Friday, July 15, 2016
Friday, July 8, 2016
A Final Word About Prayer
I have been writing about prayer, but everything I have said is simply an "aid" to prayer, a way of waiting upon the Holy Spirit, Who Himself will teach us to pray. Romans 12:1 says, "Offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God -- which is your spiritual worship. ... then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--- his good, pleasing, and perfect will."
When we come to pray, this is what we are doing -- offering ourselves to God, who then can perfect His will in our lives. At the well, Jesus told the Samaritan woman, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water." When we come to pray, we are asking for living water to spring up within us, to carry us along as a bubbling brook. Teresa of Avila instructed her sisters in prayer by telling them that at first, prayer is like drawing up and hauling water by hand to our garden, but soon it begins to be easier to draw the water from the depths of the earth, and then at last, it flows out without any effort of our own.
And her analogy exactly matches the description in Sirach 24 of "the book of the covenant of God Most High:" It sends out wisdom in full flood like the river Pishon, or like the Tigris at the time of firstfruits; it overflows like the Euphrates with understanding or like the Jordan at the season of harvest. It pours forth instruction like the Nile, like the Gihon at the time of vintage. No one has ever known wisdom fully and from first to last no one has fathomed her, for her thoughts are vaster than the ocean, her purpose more profound than the great abyss.
As for me, I was like a watercourse leading from a river, like a conduit into a pleasure garden. I said, "I will water my garden, soaking its flower bed"; all at once my watercourse became a river, and my river a sea.....Truly, I have not toiled for myself alone but for all who seek wisdom.
When we come to pray, this is what we are doing -- offering ourselves to God, who then can perfect His will in our lives. At the well, Jesus told the Samaritan woman, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water." When we come to pray, we are asking for living water to spring up within us, to carry us along as a bubbling brook. Teresa of Avila instructed her sisters in prayer by telling them that at first, prayer is like drawing up and hauling water by hand to our garden, but soon it begins to be easier to draw the water from the depths of the earth, and then at last, it flows out without any effort of our own.
And her analogy exactly matches the description in Sirach 24 of "the book of the covenant of God Most High:" It sends out wisdom in full flood like the river Pishon, or like the Tigris at the time of firstfruits; it overflows like the Euphrates with understanding or like the Jordan at the season of harvest. It pours forth instruction like the Nile, like the Gihon at the time of vintage. No one has ever known wisdom fully and from first to last no one has fathomed her, for her thoughts are vaster than the ocean, her purpose more profound than the great abyss.
As for me, I was like a watercourse leading from a river, like a conduit into a pleasure garden. I said, "I will water my garden, soaking its flower bed"; all at once my watercourse became a river, and my river a sea.....Truly, I have not toiled for myself alone but for all who seek wisdom.
Jesus told us that the Father would not fail to give the Holy Spirit to those who ask. When we come to pray, we are asking for this great Gift of God -- the Holy Spirit, Who aids us in our weakness. Indeed, He is called The Helper, the Advocate, the Paraclete for that reason. It is He Who leads us in prayer, and when He comes, our effort ceases. St. Augustine said, "Pray as you can, not as you can't." Good advice, for the Spirit leads each of us according to His knowledge and wisdom, and no two of us will pray in exactly the same way.
Prayer is worth whatever effort it takes to begin to develop the habit of what Teresa of Avila calls "a loving conversation with One Who we know loves us." When we are engaged in conversation, whether deep or superficial, with someone who loves us, it is not an effort, and we don't worry that we are not doing it "right." It just flows. That is our aim in prayer -- just conversation with our Father, in the Son, through the Holy Spirit. And the results of prayer are so worth it. Isaiah 58:11 says, The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
When we come to pray, if all we do at first is to stare at the above passage, I guarantee the deep waters of prayer will begin to flow within you.
Prayer is worth whatever effort it takes to begin to develop the habit of what Teresa of Avila calls "a loving conversation with One Who we know loves us." When we are engaged in conversation, whether deep or superficial, with someone who loves us, it is not an effort, and we don't worry that we are not doing it "right." It just flows. That is our aim in prayer -- just conversation with our Father, in the Son, through the Holy Spirit. And the results of prayer are so worth it. Isaiah 58:11 says, The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
When we come to pray, if all we do at first is to stare at the above passage, I guarantee the deep waters of prayer will begin to flow within you.
A Final Word About Prayer
I have been writing about prayer, but everything I have said is simply an "aid" to prayer, a way of waiting upon the Holy Spirit, Who Himself will teach us to pray. Romans 12:1 says, "Offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God -- which is your spiritual worship. ... then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--- his good, pleasing, and perfect will."
When we come to pray, this is what we are doing -- offering ourselves to God, who then can perfect His will in our lives. At the well, Jesus told the Samaritan woman, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water." When we come to pray, we are asking for living water to spring up within us, to carry us along as a bubbling brook. Teresa of Avila instructed her sisters in prayer by telling them that at first, prayer is like drawing up and hauling water by hand to our garden, but soon it begins to be easier to draw the water from the depths of the earth, and then at last, it flows out without any effort of our own.
And her analogy exactly matches the description in Sirach 24 of "the book of the covenant of God Most High:" It sends out wisdom in full flood like the river Pishon, or like the Tigris at the time of firstfruits; it overflows like the Euphrates with understanding or like the Jordan at the season of harvest. It pours forth instruction like the Nile, like the Gihon at the time of vintage. No one has ever known wisdom fully and from first to last no one has fathomed her, for her thoughts are vaster than the ocean, her purpose more profound than the great abyss.
As for me, I was like a watercourse leading from a river, like a conduit into a pleasure garden. I said, "I will water my garden, soaking its flower bed"; all at once my watercourse became a river, and my river a sea.....Truly, I have not toiled for myself alone but for all who seek wisdom.
When we come to pray, this is what we are doing -- offering ourselves to God, who then can perfect His will in our lives. At the well, Jesus told the Samaritan woman, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water." When we come to pray, we are asking for living water to spring up within us, to carry us along as a bubbling brook. Teresa of Avila instructed her sisters in prayer by telling them that at first, prayer is like drawing up and hauling water by hand to our garden, but soon it begins to be easier to draw the water from the depths of the earth, and then at last, it flows out without any effort of our own.
And her analogy exactly matches the description in Sirach 24 of "the book of the covenant of God Most High:" It sends out wisdom in full flood like the river Pishon, or like the Tigris at the time of firstfruits; it overflows like the Euphrates with understanding or like the Jordan at the season of harvest. It pours forth instruction like the Nile, like the Gihon at the time of vintage. No one has ever known wisdom fully and from first to last no one has fathomed her, for her thoughts are vaster than the ocean, her purpose more profound than the great abyss.
As for me, I was like a watercourse leading from a river, like a conduit into a pleasure garden. I said, "I will water my garden, soaking its flower bed"; all at once my watercourse became a river, and my river a sea.....Truly, I have not toiled for myself alone but for all who seek wisdom.
Jesus told us that the Father would not fail to give the Holy Spirit to those who ask. When we come to pray, we are asking for this great Gift of God -- the Holy Spirit, Who aids us in our weakness. Indeed, He is called The Helper, the Advocate, the Paraclete for that reason. It is He Who leads us in prayer, and when He comes, our effort ceases. St. Augustine said, "Pray as you can, not as you can't." Good advice, for the Spirit leads each of us according to His knowledge and wisdom, and no two of us will pray in exactly the same way.
Prayer is worth whatever effort it takes to begin to develop the habit of what Teresa of Avila calls "a loving conversation with One Who we know loves us." When we are engaged in conversation, whether deep or superficial, with someone who loves us, it is not an effort, and we don't worry that we are not doing it "right." It just flows. That is our aim in prayer -- just conversation with our Father, in the Son, through the Holy Spirit. And the results of prayer are so worth it. Isaiah 58:11 says, The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
When we come to pray, if all we do at first is to stare at the above passage, I guarantee the deep waters of prayer will begin to flow within you.
Prayer is worth whatever effort it takes to begin to develop the habit of what Teresa of Avila calls "a loving conversation with One Who we know loves us." When we are engaged in conversation, whether deep or superficial, with someone who loves us, it is not an effort, and we don't worry that we are not doing it "right." It just flows. That is our aim in prayer -- just conversation with our Father, in the Son, through the Holy Spirit. And the results of prayer are so worth it. Isaiah 58:11 says, The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
When we come to pray, if all we do at first is to stare at the above passage, I guarantee the deep waters of prayer will begin to flow within you.
Wednesday, July 6, 2016
When "Thank You" is not Enough
Those who do not know God are those who refuse to turn to Him. (Bernard of Clairvaux)
In my last entry, I recommended, before anything else, addressing the God to whom we are praying: O Wisdom! O Truth! O Holiness and Goodness! Mercy and Kindness! Justice! The One Who sees me! The One Who hears me! If we do not yet know God the Father, we can address our prayer to Jesus Christ, Who comes to reveal to us Who God Is. Our destiny is to know intimately the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ -- the One of Whom He spoke when He said, "The Father and I are One." Once we begin to address Jesus -- and we have the words of Scripture to help us in our weakness -- we enter into the Presence of God: You are the Way, the Truth, and the Life! You are the Good Shepherd! You are the Son of the Living God! You are the Word of God made flesh! You will never reject those who come to You!
Entering into the Presence of God, we stand silent. Ultimately, the only thing we can say is "Thank You," and it is not enough. When we finally see Who God Is, Who He has been to us all the days of our lives, our gratitude cannot be expressed. We are mute before Him. And that is really the best prayer of all. When we try to say what is on our hearts, words fail us. But how necessary it is for us to remember all that God has done for us! Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior! ....for He has done great things for me!"
The Psalms both teach us to recall the great things God has done for us, and at the same time remind us of the dangers of forgetting His deeds toward us. Psalm 106 is worth studying for its progression or slide into idolatry -- just by failing to remember what God has done. In the margin of my Bible, I once made a list of the results of forgetting what God has done: They forgot what God had done; they gave in to craving and grew envious; they worshipped idols, and despised His inheritance. They did not believe His promise, and grumbled in their tents. They did not obey the Lord, and yoked themselves to Baal, sacrificing to lifeless gods. (There is a parallel list in Romans, chapter 1, for those who are interested.)
The next "great step" in prayer is to recall all that God has done for us. And here we have Psalm 103 to guide our thinking and our prayer. The Psalmist is addressing his own soul in this Psalm -- that is, he is speaking to his mind and his emotions: Praise the Lord, O my soul; and all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.
Reading this psalm in two translations should take us directly into profound prayer, especially if we can remain in David's mindset of speaking to our own mind and heart: He forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases; He redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion. He satisfies your desires with good thing, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's. If these words do not lead us into praise, thanksgiving, and worship, we are hard indeed!
And that brings me into another great help to prayer: the words of Scripture. They are there for us; we fail to use them daily. Once we have created a 'sacred space,' a place to pray, once we have entered into the Presence of God by acknowledging Who He Is, the Scriptures will lead us deeper into prayer. The Holy Spirit hovers over all our reading and study, to bring the words to life for us. The Word of God is our great Teacher and Mentor in prayer. It gives us words beyond our own; it teaches us the ways of God; it ministers life to our dead souls. Every prayer space needs a bible close at hand -- even if the one praying does not yet read the bible.
St. Augustine was wrestling in spirit and in truth with the great truths of Scripture as taught to him by Ambrose. But he could not bring himself to submit his life and his treasures to what he knew to be true. And he heard a child singing, "Take and read; take and read." Fortunately, he had the Scriptures close at hand. Picking up the scroll, he read the words which changed his life: "Put on Christ Jesus, and make no provision for the lusts of the flesh." Now the word of God does not only "say" truth, but it carries within itself the power to do truth. In that moment, Augustine received the grace to finally do what the Word said. And the same is true of us. If the Scripture is near at hand during our time of prayer, the Holy Spirit will direct not only our reading, but our response to the sacred words -- and we will finally bow our heads, our hearts, our minds, and our wills to the Word.
Entering into the Presence of God, we stand silent. Ultimately, the only thing we can say is "Thank You," and it is not enough. When we finally see Who God Is, Who He has been to us all the days of our lives, our gratitude cannot be expressed. We are mute before Him. And that is really the best prayer of all. When we try to say what is on our hearts, words fail us. But how necessary it is for us to remember all that God has done for us! Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior! ....for He has done great things for me!"
The Psalms both teach us to recall the great things God has done for us, and at the same time remind us of the dangers of forgetting His deeds toward us. Psalm 106 is worth studying for its progression or slide into idolatry -- just by failing to remember what God has done. In the margin of my Bible, I once made a list of the results of forgetting what God has done: They forgot what God had done; they gave in to craving and grew envious; they worshipped idols, and despised His inheritance. They did not believe His promise, and grumbled in their tents. They did not obey the Lord, and yoked themselves to Baal, sacrificing to lifeless gods. (There is a parallel list in Romans, chapter 1, for those who are interested.)
The next "great step" in prayer is to recall all that God has done for us. And here we have Psalm 103 to guide our thinking and our prayer. The Psalmist is addressing his own soul in this Psalm -- that is, he is speaking to his mind and his emotions: Praise the Lord, O my soul; and all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.
Reading this psalm in two translations should take us directly into profound prayer, especially if we can remain in David's mindset of speaking to our own mind and heart: He forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases; He redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion. He satisfies your desires with good thing, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's. If these words do not lead us into praise, thanksgiving, and worship, we are hard indeed!
And that brings me into another great help to prayer: the words of Scripture. They are there for us; we fail to use them daily. Once we have created a 'sacred space,' a place to pray, once we have entered into the Presence of God by acknowledging Who He Is, the Scriptures will lead us deeper into prayer. The Holy Spirit hovers over all our reading and study, to bring the words to life for us. The Word of God is our great Teacher and Mentor in prayer. It gives us words beyond our own; it teaches us the ways of God; it ministers life to our dead souls. Every prayer space needs a bible close at hand -- even if the one praying does not yet read the bible.
St. Augustine was wrestling in spirit and in truth with the great truths of Scripture as taught to him by Ambrose. But he could not bring himself to submit his life and his treasures to what he knew to be true. And he heard a child singing, "Take and read; take and read." Fortunately, he had the Scriptures close at hand. Picking up the scroll, he read the words which changed his life: "Put on Christ Jesus, and make no provision for the lusts of the flesh." Now the word of God does not only "say" truth, but it carries within itself the power to do truth. In that moment, Augustine received the grace to finally do what the Word said. And the same is true of us. If the Scripture is near at hand during our time of prayer, the Holy Spirit will direct not only our reading, but our response to the sacred words -- and we will finally bow our heads, our hearts, our minds, and our wills to the Word.
When "Thank You" is not Enough
Those who do not know God are those who refuse to turn to Him. (Bernard of Clairvaux)
In my last entry, I recommended, before anything else, addressing the God to whom we are praying: O Wisdom! O Truth! O Holiness and Goodness! Mercy and Kindness! Justice! The One Who sees me! The One Who hears me! If we do not yet know God the Father, we can address our prayer to Jesus Christ, Who comes to reveal to us Who God Is. Our destiny is to know intimately the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ -- the One of Whom He spoke when He said, "The Father and I are One." Once we begin to address Jesus -- and we have the words of Scripture to help us in our weakness -- we enter into the Presence of God: You are the Way, the Truth, and the Life! You are the Good Shepherd! You are the Son of the Living God! You are the Word of God made flesh! You will never reject those who come to You!
Entering into the Presence of God, we stand silent. Ultimately, the only thing we can say is "Thank You," and it is not enough. When we finally see Who God Is, Who He has been to us all the days of our lives, our gratitude cannot be expressed. We are mute before Him. And that is really the best prayer of all. When we try to say what is on our hearts, words fail us. But how necessary it is for us to remember all that God has done for us! Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior! ....for He has done great things for me!"
The Psalms both teach us to recall the great things God has done for us, and at the same time remind us of the dangers of forgetting His deeds toward us. Psalm 106 is worth studying for its progression or slide into idolatry -- just by failing to remember what God has done. In the margin of my Bible, I once made a list of the results of forgetting what God has done: They forgot what God had done; they gave in to craving and grew envious; they worshipped idols, and despised His inheritance. They did not believe His promise, and grumbled in their tents. They did not obey the Lord, and yoked themselves to Baal, sacrificing to lifeless gods. (There is a parallel list in Romans, chapter 1, for those who are interested.)
The next "great step" in prayer is to recall all that God has done for us. And here we have Psalm 103 to guide our thinking and our prayer. The Psalmist is addressing his own soul in this Psalm -- that is, he is speaking to his mind and his emotions: Praise the Lord, O my soul; and all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.
Reading this psalm in two translations should take us directly into profound prayer, especially if we can remain in David's mindset of speaking to our own mind and heart: He forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases; He redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion. He satisfies your desires with good thing, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's. If these words do not lead us into praise, thanksgiving, and worship, we are hard indeed!
And that brings me into another great help to prayer: the words of Scripture. They are there for us; we fail to use them daily. Once we have created a 'sacred space,' a place to pray, once we have entered into the Presence of God by acknowledging Who He Is, the Scriptures will lead us deeper into prayer. The Holy Spirit hovers over all our reading and study, to bring the words to life for us. The Word of God is our great Teacher and Mentor in prayer. It gives us words beyond our own; it teaches us the ways of God; it ministers life to our dead souls. Every prayer space needs a bible close at hand -- even if the one praying does not yet read the bible.
St. Augustine was wrestling in spirit and in truth with the great truths of Scripture as taught to him by Ambrose. But he could not bring himself to submit his life and his treasures to what he knew to be true. And he heard a child singing, "Take and read; take and read." Fortunately, he had the Scriptures close at hand. Picking up the scroll, he read the words which changed his life: "Put on Christ Jesus, and make no provision for the lusts of the flesh." Now the word of God does not only "say" truth, but it carries within itself the power to do truth. In that moment, Augustine received the grace to finally do what the Word said. And the same is true of us. If the Scripture is near at hand during our time of prayer, the Holy Spirit will direct not only our reading, but our response to the sacred words -- and we will finally bow our heads, our hearts, our minds, and our wills to the Word.
Entering into the Presence of God, we stand silent. Ultimately, the only thing we can say is "Thank You," and it is not enough. When we finally see Who God Is, Who He has been to us all the days of our lives, our gratitude cannot be expressed. We are mute before Him. And that is really the best prayer of all. When we try to say what is on our hearts, words fail us. But how necessary it is for us to remember all that God has done for us! Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior! ....for He has done great things for me!"
The Psalms both teach us to recall the great things God has done for us, and at the same time remind us of the dangers of forgetting His deeds toward us. Psalm 106 is worth studying for its progression or slide into idolatry -- just by failing to remember what God has done. In the margin of my Bible, I once made a list of the results of forgetting what God has done: They forgot what God had done; they gave in to craving and grew envious; they worshipped idols, and despised His inheritance. They did not believe His promise, and grumbled in their tents. They did not obey the Lord, and yoked themselves to Baal, sacrificing to lifeless gods. (There is a parallel list in Romans, chapter 1, for those who are interested.)
The next "great step" in prayer is to recall all that God has done for us. And here we have Psalm 103 to guide our thinking and our prayer. The Psalmist is addressing his own soul in this Psalm -- that is, he is speaking to his mind and his emotions: Praise the Lord, O my soul; and all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.
Reading this psalm in two translations should take us directly into profound prayer, especially if we can remain in David's mindset of speaking to our own mind and heart: He forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases; He redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion. He satisfies your desires with good thing, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's. If these words do not lead us into praise, thanksgiving, and worship, we are hard indeed!
And that brings me into another great help to prayer: the words of Scripture. They are there for us; we fail to use them daily. Once we have created a 'sacred space,' a place to pray, once we have entered into the Presence of God by acknowledging Who He Is, the Scriptures will lead us deeper into prayer. The Holy Spirit hovers over all our reading and study, to bring the words to life for us. The Word of God is our great Teacher and Mentor in prayer. It gives us words beyond our own; it teaches us the ways of God; it ministers life to our dead souls. Every prayer space needs a bible close at hand -- even if the one praying does not yet read the bible.
St. Augustine was wrestling in spirit and in truth with the great truths of Scripture as taught to him by Ambrose. But he could not bring himself to submit his life and his treasures to what he knew to be true. And he heard a child singing, "Take and read; take and read." Fortunately, he had the Scriptures close at hand. Picking up the scroll, he read the words which changed his life: "Put on Christ Jesus, and make no provision for the lusts of the flesh." Now the word of God does not only "say" truth, but it carries within itself the power to do truth. In that moment, Augustine received the grace to finally do what the Word said. And the same is true of us. If the Scripture is near at hand during our time of prayer, the Holy Spirit will direct not only our reading, but our response to the sacred words -- and we will finally bow our heads, our hearts, our minds, and our wills to the Word.
Tuesday, June 14, 2016
Entering into the Presence of God -- 3
As I read over what has gone before, I get discouraged, realizing that once again, I am trying to reduce prayer to a "How-to" formula. And yet I know that everything begins with the move of the Holy Spirit. He alone draws us into prayer, makes Jesus real to us, and reveals all that He wants to give us. And yet, Scripture (in James, I think) says, "Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you." I think that is about all we can do if we want to pray well -- draw near to God and wait.
One of the Psalms says, "Enter His courts with praise and thanksgiving." I think that is wonderful advice. I have found that praise does draw us into the Presence of God, leaving all else behind except Him. The problem is that, until we are instructed by the Holy Spirit, praise does not come easily to us. Because we are by nature sinners, and self-absorbed, it seems difficult for us to really praise God, and when we make the attempt, it feels fake. But that is only because we have not developed the habit of praise; it feels as if we have put on someone else's shoes and are trying to walk in them.
In Advent each year, the church presents to us the ancient "O antiphons:" O Key of David! O Root of Jesse! etc.
I never really understood this form of prayer until I began spontaneously using it myself. When we come to pray, an excellent way to begin is to reflect on Who it is we are talking to. Most of us begin addressing "God" without thinking about Who God Is to us. When we allow ourselves to ask the question Jesus asked: Who do you say that I am? the Holy Spirit descends to open our hearts and minds: O Wisdom! O Goodness! O Truth! O Gentleness! O Mercy! O Protector of the Innocent! O Helper! O Provider! You are the Redeemer of the World! You bend low to instruct the ignorant!
You have led me in right paths for your Name's sake!
One of the Psalms says, "Enter His courts with praise and thanksgiving." I think that is wonderful advice. I have found that praise does draw us into the Presence of God, leaving all else behind except Him. The problem is that, until we are instructed by the Holy Spirit, praise does not come easily to us. Because we are by nature sinners, and self-absorbed, it seems difficult for us to really praise God, and when we make the attempt, it feels fake. But that is only because we have not developed the habit of praise; it feels as if we have put on someone else's shoes and are trying to walk in them.
In Advent each year, the church presents to us the ancient "O antiphons:" O Key of David! O Root of Jesse! etc.
I never really understood this form of prayer until I began spontaneously using it myself. When we come to pray, an excellent way to begin is to reflect on Who it is we are talking to. Most of us begin addressing "God" without thinking about Who God Is to us. When we allow ourselves to ask the question Jesus asked: Who do you say that I am? the Holy Spirit descends to open our hearts and minds: O Wisdom! O Goodness! O Truth! O Gentleness! O Mercy! O Protector of the Innocent! O Helper! O Provider! You are the Redeemer of the World! You bend low to instruct the ignorant!
You have led me in right paths for your Name's sake!
As we recall Who God Is, Who He has been to us all the days of our lives, we enter into praise and thanksgiving, into His Presence. To remember Who God Is is to stand before Him in Spirit and in Truth, just as Peter did when He confessed the Truth about Jesus. Nothing more need be said if we remember Who God Is, Who He has been to us. Prayer is worship, and worship comes from knowing God.
For those who do not know God, and who therefore cannot worship Him, we need to begin by asking Him to reveal Himself. C. S. Lewis once wrote, "If there is a God, then He must be self-revelatory." No one can reveal who God is except God. We cannot truly pray to someone else's God. But God is ready and willing to give us His own Spirit so that we might know Him. All we need to do is to ask---if you, evil that you are, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more is the Father willing to give the Holy Spirit to those who ask!
I don't know why we are so reluctant to ask God for the one thing He most wants to give us!
Saturday, June 11, 2016
Entering Into the Presence of God -- 2
In Him we live and move and have our very being -- God is present to us at every moment. But we are not always present to Him. The goal of our prayer is to bring ourselves-- heart, mind, soul, and body-- into the very Presence of God, to hear His Voice, to experience His Love for us, to receive His Wisdom, His Guidance, His Truth into our very being. How far away is that experience from simply reciting our prayers!
The very desire to pray is His invitation to us: Come and See! Come and Experience! Come and Taste the goodness of the Lord! Unless the Holy Spirit had been calling us, we would have no desire to enter into His Presence. But if we desire it, it is only because He has willed to fulfill our desire. C. S. Lewis tells us that our desires are keys to our destiny. One does not desire water, except that our bodies were designed to be nourished and sustained by water. We are designed to "run on" water, so to speak. The same is true of hunger, sex, and our other natural desires. Pope John II published his reflections on The Theology of the Body, saying that our bodily desires for union with another are an indication of our desire to be united ultimately with God Himself.
So if we desire to pray, we know that God wants to answer that desire, and that He will answer the deepest longings our hearts. The question is, "How, with all the demands and distractions of our lives pulling at us, how do we enter into the Presence of the Almighty?" I have come to believe from observing life, that if we want something to happen, we must create the space for that activity. For years, I wanted to paint, but not enough to find the time and space to paint. Real artists first set up their "space," and they set up that space with all the equipment they need to paint -- canvas, easel, brushes, etc. Then, when they find or make the time to paint, they go to their space, and the magic begins to happen. Without that space, the desire to paint soon withers. Other things take precedence in life.
So if we really desire to pray, we must first create a space to pray. A certain chair will do the trick, preferably one close to a window. Having a bible close at hand, or at least some kind of spiritual reading, is part of the equipment we need to help us listen to the guidance of the Spirit. Once we establish a place to pray, prayer becomes easier for us; in fact, the physical setup alone begins to trigger prayer in us -- and the more we practice prayer in that place, the more our hearts, minds, and bodies associate the physical setup with prayer, the more natural it becomes for us.
But Time to pray is another part of the equation. Mothers with infants and small children cannot plan their time, no matter how much they desire to pray. That chair may become the place to hold and nurse a baby, to read to a toddler, to hug and talk to a small child. All of these are forms of prayer, of God's love being poured out into the world that so desperately needs it. But the exhausted mother may still desperately need a time to pray, or to receive within herself a renewal of the love she constantly gives to others.
When I was in that situation, having 3 children in 5 years, I found that I was adrift spiritually. Physically, I was exhausted, since my children did not sleep at night. I nursed all my children, so it seemed that I was up every hour and a half, either to feed a baby or to take care of a child with an earache, strep throat, tonsillitis, etc. I recall one day that seems to sum up my life at the time: the oldest child (5) was vomiting on the sofa; the middle child (3), in the midst of potty-training, was crying because she needed to go potty, and the youngest ( a few months old) was screaming with hunger. No matter which direction I headed first, it was the wrong direction. All my life, the two resources I had depended on for health and strength had been sleep and prayer -- and now I had neither. I had no coping strategies to deal with my life at the time, and I did not know how to solve the problem. If I got up early to pray, a baby woke up too and needed attention. I knew I "should" be able to be a loving mother, giving all my children exactly what they needed when they needed it -- and that only added to my guilt and frustration. I felt helpless and angry at my obvious inadequacy to cope with life.
Finally, I struck a "bargain" with God: if you will only give me time to pray, I promise I'll take it, instead of rushing around trying to get something done. Within a week of my promise, my neighbor across the street began to ask if she could take the children with her to the bank, to the grocery, to the post office -- whenever she would be out for just 20 or 30 minutes. Now who does this? I figured it had to be an answer to my prayer. Whenever she took the children with her, I would run to my "prayer chair" and collapse into the arms of God for however long I had free. That time began to steady and calm me, even if I said nothing that could have been construed as "prayer" during that time. What it did was to convince me that God was present to me, even if I could not always be present to Him. It built my faith that He was the Senior Partner in the enterprise of my life, and I began to trust Him a little more.
More about prayer later.
The very desire to pray is His invitation to us: Come and See! Come and Experience! Come and Taste the goodness of the Lord! Unless the Holy Spirit had been calling us, we would have no desire to enter into His Presence. But if we desire it, it is only because He has willed to fulfill our desire. C. S. Lewis tells us that our desires are keys to our destiny. One does not desire water, except that our bodies were designed to be nourished and sustained by water. We are designed to "run on" water, so to speak. The same is true of hunger, sex, and our other natural desires. Pope John II published his reflections on The Theology of the Body, saying that our bodily desires for union with another are an indication of our desire to be united ultimately with God Himself.
So if we desire to pray, we know that God wants to answer that desire, and that He will answer the deepest longings our hearts. The question is, "How, with all the demands and distractions of our lives pulling at us, how do we enter into the Presence of the Almighty?" I have come to believe from observing life, that if we want something to happen, we must create the space for that activity. For years, I wanted to paint, but not enough to find the time and space to paint. Real artists first set up their "space," and they set up that space with all the equipment they need to paint -- canvas, easel, brushes, etc. Then, when they find or make the time to paint, they go to their space, and the magic begins to happen. Without that space, the desire to paint soon withers. Other things take precedence in life.
So if we really desire to pray, we must first create a space to pray. A certain chair will do the trick, preferably one close to a window. Having a bible close at hand, or at least some kind of spiritual reading, is part of the equipment we need to help us listen to the guidance of the Spirit. Once we establish a place to pray, prayer becomes easier for us; in fact, the physical setup alone begins to trigger prayer in us -- and the more we practice prayer in that place, the more our hearts, minds, and bodies associate the physical setup with prayer, the more natural it becomes for us.
But Time to pray is another part of the equation. Mothers with infants and small children cannot plan their time, no matter how much they desire to pray. That chair may become the place to hold and nurse a baby, to read to a toddler, to hug and talk to a small child. All of these are forms of prayer, of God's love being poured out into the world that so desperately needs it. But the exhausted mother may still desperately need a time to pray, or to receive within herself a renewal of the love she constantly gives to others.
When I was in that situation, having 3 children in 5 years, I found that I was adrift spiritually. Physically, I was exhausted, since my children did not sleep at night. I nursed all my children, so it seemed that I was up every hour and a half, either to feed a baby or to take care of a child with an earache, strep throat, tonsillitis, etc. I recall one day that seems to sum up my life at the time: the oldest child (5) was vomiting on the sofa; the middle child (3), in the midst of potty-training, was crying because she needed to go potty, and the youngest ( a few months old) was screaming with hunger. No matter which direction I headed first, it was the wrong direction. All my life, the two resources I had depended on for health and strength had been sleep and prayer -- and now I had neither. I had no coping strategies to deal with my life at the time, and I did not know how to solve the problem. If I got up early to pray, a baby woke up too and needed attention. I knew I "should" be able to be a loving mother, giving all my children exactly what they needed when they needed it -- and that only added to my guilt and frustration. I felt helpless and angry at my obvious inadequacy to cope with life.
Finally, I struck a "bargain" with God: if you will only give me time to pray, I promise I'll take it, instead of rushing around trying to get something done. Within a week of my promise, my neighbor across the street began to ask if she could take the children with her to the bank, to the grocery, to the post office -- whenever she would be out for just 20 or 30 minutes. Now who does this? I figured it had to be an answer to my prayer. Whenever she took the children with her, I would run to my "prayer chair" and collapse into the arms of God for however long I had free. That time began to steady and calm me, even if I said nothing that could have been construed as "prayer" during that time. What it did was to convince me that God was present to me, even if I could not always be present to Him. It built my faith that He was the Senior Partner in the enterprise of my life, and I began to trust Him a little more.
More about prayer later.
Friday, June 10, 2016
Entering into the Presence of God
Someone asked me, "How do you pray?" My answer is that there are as many ways to pray as there are fingerprint patterns. I recommend The Book of All Saints by Adrienne Von Spyrer as an example. Von Spyrer was a Swedish mystic, a physician, wife, and mother, and a convert to Catholicism. When she prayed, she was able to see into, and participate in, the prayer life of all the saints -- and even others who are not canonized, like Shakespeare and Dante. As she saw, she reported her visions to her confessor and scribe, Father Hans Urs Von Balthazor, who wrote what she said. Some of those she saw at prayer she had never heard of previously, but if her confessor suggested them, she could see them. She remarked on the humility of the saints, who allowed themselves to be seen, weaknesses, faults, and all. This is a very large book, but reading through it encourages us who all think we do not know how to pray. On one page or another, we will surely find someone whose prayer resonates with our own.
But since the question was, "How do you pray?" I decided to reflect on my own experience, for whatever it may be worth to someone else. There is not a set pattern so much to my prayer, since at the very beginning, I try to keep in mind Jesus saying, I Am the Alpha and the Omega. I know that He is the beginning and the end, and, being in His Presence, I try to be led by His Spirit in my prayer. It is the job of the Holy Spirit to teach us to pray and to lead us in prayer, so being open to His influence is the most important thing of all. But there are definite helps to being open to the Spirit Who wants to lead us into the Presence of God and to Communion with Him.
The first step is actually a very simple one: we have to have a place and a time to pray, an "appointment" with God, so to speak. I know many people say they pray all day long, and that is a fact for those who have learned to pray. And there are those who pray first thing in the morning, but their routine is really a set of prayers that they "say." Actually, it was one of these who asked me the question. Although she prays regularly and frequently -- more faithfully than I do, in fact --- she is yearning for a deeper communion with God, and that is why she asked the question.
Saying prayers is indeed praying -- but the old Baltimore Catechism defined prayer as "opening our hearts and minds to God." And if we imagine being a disciple of Jesus, walking with Him through the countryside, eating with Him by the way, and conversing with Him throughout the day, I think our "prayer" would certainly include listening to Him with our whole hearts, our whole minds, and our whole strength: Were not our hearts burning within us as He spoke? In fact, I consider prayer much more as listening to God than saying anything at all to Him. Whenever I sense the presence of God, everything in me shuts down and shuts up -- I cannot speak at all, and I understand very little of what is happening. But He works in secret; He is not obligated to give me an explanation of what He is doing.
So it is important to find a time and a place to meet with God. That is the very first step. Tomorrow, God willing, I will write more about this important step.
But since the question was, "How do you pray?" I decided to reflect on my own experience, for whatever it may be worth to someone else. There is not a set pattern so much to my prayer, since at the very beginning, I try to keep in mind Jesus saying, I Am the Alpha and the Omega. I know that He is the beginning and the end, and, being in His Presence, I try to be led by His Spirit in my prayer. It is the job of the Holy Spirit to teach us to pray and to lead us in prayer, so being open to His influence is the most important thing of all. But there are definite helps to being open to the Spirit Who wants to lead us into the Presence of God and to Communion with Him.
The first step is actually a very simple one: we have to have a place and a time to pray, an "appointment" with God, so to speak. I know many people say they pray all day long, and that is a fact for those who have learned to pray. And there are those who pray first thing in the morning, but their routine is really a set of prayers that they "say." Actually, it was one of these who asked me the question. Although she prays regularly and frequently -- more faithfully than I do, in fact --- she is yearning for a deeper communion with God, and that is why she asked the question.
Saying prayers is indeed praying -- but the old Baltimore Catechism defined prayer as "opening our hearts and minds to God." And if we imagine being a disciple of Jesus, walking with Him through the countryside, eating with Him by the way, and conversing with Him throughout the day, I think our "prayer" would certainly include listening to Him with our whole hearts, our whole minds, and our whole strength: Were not our hearts burning within us as He spoke? In fact, I consider prayer much more as listening to God than saying anything at all to Him. Whenever I sense the presence of God, everything in me shuts down and shuts up -- I cannot speak at all, and I understand very little of what is happening. But He works in secret; He is not obligated to give me an explanation of what He is doing.
So it is important to find a time and a place to meet with God. That is the very first step. Tomorrow, God willing, I will write more about this important step.
Monday, May 30, 2016
Let Me Feed You!
Jesus fed 5000 people on the mountainside when they had no means of feeding themselves. God fed the multitude in the desert when they had no means of feeding themselves. When we are hungry and have no way to feed ourselves, God will feed us.
I am convinced that the reason so many people cannot or do not read the Bible is that either they are not yet hungry enough for spiritual truth, or they are trying to feed themselves instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to feed them what they need. So many of us determine we will "read the Bible," and so we begin -- at the first page of Genesis. Undoubtedly, the more persistent of us will get further on, but sooner or later, all of us will bog down somewhere before we get very far.
The Bible is not a "book," even though it does have a beginning, a middle, and an end. Rather, it is a library, written over a period of roughly a thousand years by multiple authors with multiple viewpoints -- yet all used by the Holy Spirit to tell one story. If we walked into a library and selected the first book nearest the door, determined to read our way around the shelves, we would soon give up. When we come to God's library, we need a Divine Guide -- someone to show us where to begin and what to read. We need to begin with worship, with acknowledging that we ourselves are incapable of feeding ourselves with divine truth. We need to acknowledge our helplessness to read, to understand, to digest the living Word of God. We need humility to ask the Holy Spirit to feed us the "pure milk of the Word of God" until we grow up into full maturity. We need to believe that God will feed us with the "finest of wheat."
A few times in my life, I have been in a restaurant where the owner says, "Let me feed you." After that, I simply put myself in his capable hands and relax, knowing that he will bring me only the best he has to offer. And I know that I will be satisfied, not only physically, but "spiritually," or aesthetically. Our relationship with God is no different. If we put ourselves in His hands, saying, "Feed my hunger for You, for Truth," will He refuse our prayer? Only He knows the deepest hunger of our souls; only He knows where our minds need understanding. And He is more than able to do what we ask. We need only sit with our bibles on our laps and follow the leading of the Holy Spirit.
Faith is believing what God has said -- to US! Most of us struggle to believe what God has said to others, but we do not realize that He has given us the same food. It is hard to believe something that has not fed our own hunger. Our faith begins with an encounter with the Risen Jesus -- He is alive! How do we know that, except that we have 'met' Him on the way, as did the disciples going to Emmaeus? If we allow Him to feed us where we are, we will recognize Him in the breaking of the bread. Our gratitude for having been fed at the point of our hunger is the catalyst for our belief.
Years ago, when I first began reading the Bible, I was devouring it day by day, under the anointing of the Holy Spirit. I simply could not get enough. After I had read it through twice, I began studying the geography, the history, the meaning of words, etc. All of this reading and study, however, was nothing I was doing on my own -- it was the result of someone praying for me to receive "the baptism of the Holy Spirit." And it came like a fire, unexpectedly. I began reading the Acts of the Apostles, but only because that's where the book literally fell open. When I realized I was reading about what had just happened to me personally, I couldn't stop reading.
The day came, however, when I could no longer read the Bible for months at a time. I would just sit and hold it on my lap, loving it, but not being able to read it. Finally, Jesus spoke to me: Let Me feed you! I realized then that I had been 'feeding myself' with all the study -- study that was necessary for a time. But now, I had to let go and let the Spirit of God lead me through the Scriptures most necessary for the moment and the situation. One cannot go to school forever, as necessary as it is to begin there. Sooner or later, we must begin to apply the knowledge we receive to the life we are living.
I would challenge anyone who wants to know the Word of God to do an experiment: begin with acknowledging Who God is and worshipping the One Who put the Word together for our benefit. Allow Him to lead you to the section and the passage you need to read. Because we read in order to meet the living God, the Word of God. Only then will our reading lead to faith.
I am convinced that the reason so many people cannot or do not read the Bible is that either they are not yet hungry enough for spiritual truth, or they are trying to feed themselves instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to feed them what they need. So many of us determine we will "read the Bible," and so we begin -- at the first page of Genesis. Undoubtedly, the more persistent of us will get further on, but sooner or later, all of us will bog down somewhere before we get very far.
The Bible is not a "book," even though it does have a beginning, a middle, and an end. Rather, it is a library, written over a period of roughly a thousand years by multiple authors with multiple viewpoints -- yet all used by the Holy Spirit to tell one story. If we walked into a library and selected the first book nearest the door, determined to read our way around the shelves, we would soon give up. When we come to God's library, we need a Divine Guide -- someone to show us where to begin and what to read. We need to begin with worship, with acknowledging that we ourselves are incapable of feeding ourselves with divine truth. We need to acknowledge our helplessness to read, to understand, to digest the living Word of God. We need humility to ask the Holy Spirit to feed us the "pure milk of the Word of God" until we grow up into full maturity. We need to believe that God will feed us with the "finest of wheat."
A few times in my life, I have been in a restaurant where the owner says, "Let me feed you." After that, I simply put myself in his capable hands and relax, knowing that he will bring me only the best he has to offer. And I know that I will be satisfied, not only physically, but "spiritually," or aesthetically. Our relationship with God is no different. If we put ourselves in His hands, saying, "Feed my hunger for You, for Truth," will He refuse our prayer? Only He knows the deepest hunger of our souls; only He knows where our minds need understanding. And He is more than able to do what we ask. We need only sit with our bibles on our laps and follow the leading of the Holy Spirit.
Faith is believing what God has said -- to US! Most of us struggle to believe what God has said to others, but we do not realize that He has given us the same food. It is hard to believe something that has not fed our own hunger. Our faith begins with an encounter with the Risen Jesus -- He is alive! How do we know that, except that we have 'met' Him on the way, as did the disciples going to Emmaeus? If we allow Him to feed us where we are, we will recognize Him in the breaking of the bread. Our gratitude for having been fed at the point of our hunger is the catalyst for our belief.
Years ago, when I first began reading the Bible, I was devouring it day by day, under the anointing of the Holy Spirit. I simply could not get enough. After I had read it through twice, I began studying the geography, the history, the meaning of words, etc. All of this reading and study, however, was nothing I was doing on my own -- it was the result of someone praying for me to receive "the baptism of the Holy Spirit." And it came like a fire, unexpectedly. I began reading the Acts of the Apostles, but only because that's where the book literally fell open. When I realized I was reading about what had just happened to me personally, I couldn't stop reading.
The day came, however, when I could no longer read the Bible for months at a time. I would just sit and hold it on my lap, loving it, but not being able to read it. Finally, Jesus spoke to me: Let Me feed you! I realized then that I had been 'feeding myself' with all the study -- study that was necessary for a time. But now, I had to let go and let the Spirit of God lead me through the Scriptures most necessary for the moment and the situation. One cannot go to school forever, as necessary as it is to begin there. Sooner or later, we must begin to apply the knowledge we receive to the life we are living.
I would challenge anyone who wants to know the Word of God to do an experiment: begin with acknowledging Who God is and worshipping the One Who put the Word together for our benefit. Allow Him to lead you to the section and the passage you need to read. Because we read in order to meet the living God, the Word of God. Only then will our reading lead to faith.
Saturday, May 28, 2016
Is One Religion as Good as Another?
It sounds very liberal and open-minded to acknowledge all religions as equal and good. But if we are realistic and even scientific in our investigation, we begin to discover that not all religions produce the same results. We might begin by asking, "What is the purpose of religion?" Even with this question, we begin to find huge differences in religions. And then, once we have defined for ourselves the purpose of religion, we find great differences in the results.
One good place to begin a search for the Truth is to read Iran: Desperate for God --An oppressive Islamic state drives its people into the arms of Christ, a book published by the Living Sacrifice Book Company in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. This book is told or written by Islamic believers who all devotedly practiced Islam, to the point of depression and suicide. They did all and more that their religion required of them, and became more and more oppressed and depressed. Some even attempted suicide, for they had no hope at all. All of their constant prayers and penances and self-denials led to despair.
It seems that the point or purpose of Islam is to control people, not to release them into the freedom of the Children of God. They are so fearful of Allah and his displeasure. One girl reported her fear that if any of her hair would show, she would be hanged by her hair in "heaven," or if she did not cover her hands and wrists, she would hang by her hands for all eternity. Fear is the over-riding emotion of faithful Islamic practice in Iran. (I cannot report about the Islamic experience in America or other countries, for I know nothing about that, except for the students I taught who were Muslim men and women, and I know only a very little about their experience.)
In every story in Iran: Desperate for God, the writer tells of an experience of Jesus Christ, either from having been given a book, a New Testament, or of seeing a movie about Jesus. Here is a quotation from a young boy who had begun in 5th grade earnestly searching and reading all about Islam. But someone had given him a booklet about Jesus:
One good place to begin a search for the Truth is to read Iran: Desperate for God --An oppressive Islamic state drives its people into the arms of Christ, a book published by the Living Sacrifice Book Company in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. This book is told or written by Islamic believers who all devotedly practiced Islam, to the point of depression and suicide. They did all and more that their religion required of them, and became more and more oppressed and depressed. Some even attempted suicide, for they had no hope at all. All of their constant prayers and penances and self-denials led to despair.
It seems that the point or purpose of Islam is to control people, not to release them into the freedom of the Children of God. They are so fearful of Allah and his displeasure. One girl reported her fear that if any of her hair would show, she would be hanged by her hair in "heaven," or if she did not cover her hands and wrists, she would hang by her hands for all eternity. Fear is the over-riding emotion of faithful Islamic practice in Iran. (I cannot report about the Islamic experience in America or other countries, for I know nothing about that, except for the students I taught who were Muslim men and women, and I know only a very little about their experience.)
In every story in Iran: Desperate for God, the writer tells of an experience of Jesus Christ, either from having been given a book, a New Testament, or of seeing a movie about Jesus. Here is a quotation from a young boy who had begun in 5th grade earnestly searching and reading all about Islam. But someone had given him a booklet about Jesus:
From the moment I read that Jesus booklet, I started to search for this God they're all talking about. First of all, I read the Communist books again. But now all I found was a lot of emptiness in them. I discovered that when Lenin wanted to swear, he said, "To God, I swear." Then I went to the other religions to search, starting with historical beliefs in the books of Iran, Japan, India, Lebanon, China, and Brazil. I read all about the religions so I could compare them. then I started studying space and stars, hypnotism, spirits, and telepathy......I tried to write these down in a notebook. I wrote notes especially about Islam during the heat of this religious revolution ....Nobody was able to answer the questions I recorded to ask them. There are so many problems even ayatollahs cannot give an answer.
Finally, this 13-year old boy was able to get his hands on a Bible that an old man lent him, even though it was forbidden to own a Bible in Iran at the time. The Bible was in English, but the boy struggled to read it, and he decided to go directly to the mullahs with his questions. The first question he asked was from the Koran, chapter 3, verse 3: If anyone wants to have salvation and enter heaven, they have to believe in Torah and also in the Bible and in the New Testament.. Then the boy quoted other passages regarding Jesus Christ from the Koran, as well as passages from the Bible. The mullah got red in the face and said, "Your ideas are not interesting; I can't talk to you."
The boy continued his search for the truth: I always believed the real God should have noble characteristics. The God I wanted couldn't like bad things for His children. He should know everything and know how that person wants to live in the future. This God in my mind would always care for His children.
In every one of these stories, when the searcher discovers Christianity, they also find freedom, joy, peace. Their experience is such that they immediately want to share their joy with members of their families and with their friends, even though doing so might bring imprisonment and death. I downloaded this book on my Kindle for $1.99, I think, and I have read it through more than one time. Experiences like these prove to anyone who thinks about it the truth of Jesus Christ: You shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall make you free.
The purpose of religion is not a rule, but a relationship. If we look at the relationship of believers to their 'gods,' we will inevitably discover the real God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. His brothers and sisters will come into the same relationship with the Father that Jesus Christ Himself had, for this is His purpose for us -- to make us sons and daughters of the Living God.
Wednesday, May 25, 2016
The Fifth Dimension
Bring Me your mind for rest and renewal. Let Me infuse My Presence into your thoughts. As your mind stops racing, your body relaxes and you regain awareness of Me. This awareness is vital to your spiritual well-being; it is your lifeline, spiritually speaking.
There are actually more than four dimensions in the world. In addition to the three dimensions of space and the one of time, there is the dimension of openness to My Presence. This dimension transcends the others, giving you glimpses of heaven while you still reside on earth. This was part of My original design for mankind. Adam and Eve used to walk with Me in the garden, before their expulsion from Eden. I want you to walk with Me in the garden of your heart, where I have taken up permanent residence. --- Jesus Calling, May 24
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In all thy ways, acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths (Proverbs 3:6)
The common condition of mankind seems to be belief that God is not interested -- or that He is interested, but unable to communicate with us. Even if we say that He is "able" to direct us, we do not really believe that He will. We believe that He is occupied daily with ".more important things" than our affairs; even if He were waiting to direct our ways, we seriously doubt that we have the capacity to hear His direction.
"I never hear anything; God does not speak to me," we say. "I have never heard the Voice of God." And yet Jesus said, "My sheep know My voice." Surely that must mean that we have heard Him and that we recognize His Voice. I think the common experience is that we indeed have heard God speaking to us, but we just cannot believe the experience; we imagine that we have "made it up," that we are talking to ourselves. And we are afraid to believe.
I heard a priest on the radio telling that his people always say that God does not speak to them. One day while he was praying, the Lord said to him: If you have a mother and father who speak only to one another and never to their children, what kind of parents would they be? They would be terrible parents. What kind of God do you think I am that I never speak to my children?
The Bible is filled, filled with stories of those who heard God's voice and obeyed: Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Gideon, all the prophets, John the Baptist, Mary, Paul, and so on. The "fifth dimension" of openness to the Divine Presence changes our world on a daily basis. All we have to do to be convinced is to read a publication like Guideposts, stories of ordinary men and women whose lives are directed by an inner Voice, often saving their lives from a great danger.
One man, who has learned to be directed from within, told the story about his wife saying that God never speaks to her. So one morning, while lying in bed praying before getting up, he asked God to direct her to wake up, put her arms around him, and tell him that she loved him very much. Then, as he said, "I folded my arms behind my head and just waited." Of course, she did exactly what he had asked in prayer. Laughing, he pointed out to her that she had indeed "heard the voice of God," though there were no words involved.
The passage from Proverbs above says to "acknowledge" God in all our ways, and He will direct our paths. But in the Hebrew, the word is "Know" God, and "knowing" in Hebrew means to be intimate with, to know from the inside out, the way we know our spouses. If we know Him in all our ways, if we are open to His direction, we can be very sure that He will not disappoint us. One of the Psalms says, "Direct my feet into the way of peace." We do not have to hear a voice; we do not have to understand with our minds, to know that we are being directed.
Psalm 23 says, He leads me in right paths for His Name's sake." And Is. 30: Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, "This is the way; walk in it." Is. 33: He will be the sure foundation for your times, a rich store of salvation and wisdom and knowledge; the fear of the Lord is the key to this treasure (v.6).
I wish we could all believe that God will direct our paths; when the fifth dimension becomes a reality to us, our small worlds will change forever, and those worlds will impact the whole world.
Friday, April 29, 2016
An Image that Stirred Me
During a recent discussion with my family, my sister wondered if God could really hear a single prayer with all the other prayers flying around the world. My brother then gave an example of two electrons that can now be split by modern technology. No matter how far apart these electrons are moved, thousands of miles apart, each electron is still somehow "conscious" of the other one, and will still react to whatever happens to its "twin." If we change the spin direction of one of the two, the other will instantly react and change its spin also. Amazing science!
The example of the two electrons continues to haunt me, in a good way. I cannot stop thinking about how each one of us is somehow an "electron" of the Divine Creator. If we are created in His Image and Likeness, if His breath has given us life, we must also be animated by His Spirit, and He is keenly aware of where we are and what affects our lives. On our part, we may not be as aware of our other twin, or Partner, but His Spirit in us still communicates with its Divine Counterpart: in Him we live and move and have our very being, Scripture tells us.
The Book of Romans tells us that the Spirit of God prays in us when we do not know how to pray for ourselves -- and moreover, He prays in us with "unutterable groanings." I have read about someone who experienced the Spirit praying in him and over him when he himself was helpless to even pray for himself. So, to answer my sister's question, it is not so much a question of God "hearing" our prayer as that He Himself is doing the praying for us and in us. And it is more that we, like the twin electron, become conscious of what the Spirit is praying in us and respond to His prayer by joining our mind and heart to His intentions.
Einstein said that any scientist who does not believe in God is either a very bad scientist or he is lying. It makes sense to me that the world God created would tell us a very great deal about its creator, if we only had eyes to see it. I have been reading lately a book called Radical Amazement: Contemplative Lessons from Black Holes, Supernovas, and Other wonders of the Universe. The book begins with a quote from Abraham Heschel, one of my favorite authors: Awareness of the divine begins with wonder. Then we read this:
Thomas Aquinas said that a mistake in our understanding of creation will necessarily cause a mistake in our understanding of God. Imagine what that means for us who live in an age in which scientific discoveries have taken us far beyond the truths we held in our youth.
Heschel said that the insights that connect us to God come not on the level of discursive thinking but on the level of wonder and radical amazement, in the depth of awe, in our sensitivity to the mystery, in our awareness of the ineffable. Living in radical amazement brings us into the space in which great things happen to the soul.
Before she entered the cloister at 15, Therese of Liseux traveled with her father to the Alps, because she said that beauty opened her soul and made room for God. We might say the same for science, if we believe in intelligent design of the universe.
The example of the two electrons continues to haunt me, in a good way. I cannot stop thinking about how each one of us is somehow an "electron" of the Divine Creator. If we are created in His Image and Likeness, if His breath has given us life, we must also be animated by His Spirit, and He is keenly aware of where we are and what affects our lives. On our part, we may not be as aware of our other twin, or Partner, but His Spirit in us still communicates with its Divine Counterpart: in Him we live and move and have our very being, Scripture tells us.
The Book of Romans tells us that the Spirit of God prays in us when we do not know how to pray for ourselves -- and moreover, He prays in us with "unutterable groanings." I have read about someone who experienced the Spirit praying in him and over him when he himself was helpless to even pray for himself. So, to answer my sister's question, it is not so much a question of God "hearing" our prayer as that He Himself is doing the praying for us and in us. And it is more that we, like the twin electron, become conscious of what the Spirit is praying in us and respond to His prayer by joining our mind and heart to His intentions.
Einstein said that any scientist who does not believe in God is either a very bad scientist or he is lying. It makes sense to me that the world God created would tell us a very great deal about its creator, if we only had eyes to see it. I have been reading lately a book called Radical Amazement: Contemplative Lessons from Black Holes, Supernovas, and Other wonders of the Universe. The book begins with a quote from Abraham Heschel, one of my favorite authors: Awareness of the divine begins with wonder. Then we read this:
Thomas Aquinas said that a mistake in our understanding of creation will necessarily cause a mistake in our understanding of God. Imagine what that means for us who live in an age in which scientific discoveries have taken us far beyond the truths we held in our youth.
Heschel said that the insights that connect us to God come not on the level of discursive thinking but on the level of wonder and radical amazement, in the depth of awe, in our sensitivity to the mystery, in our awareness of the ineffable. Living in radical amazement brings us into the space in which great things happen to the soul.
Before she entered the cloister at 15, Therese of Liseux traveled with her father to the Alps, because she said that beauty opened her soul and made room for God. We might say the same for science, if we believe in intelligent design of the universe.
Saturday, April 2, 2016
A Prayer Journal
Dear God, I cannot love Thee the way I want to. You are the slim crescent of a moon that I see and my self is the earth's shadow that keeps me from seeing all the moon. The crescent is very beautiful and perhaps that is all one like I am should or could see; but what I am afraid of, dear God, is that my self shadow will grow so large that it blocks the whole moon, and that I will judge myself by the shadow that is nothing.
I do not know you God because I am in the way. Please help me to push myself aside.
-- Flannery O'Connor, Journal, 1946
Her prayer journal, which she kept for only one year as a college student, reveals an inner life seeking God. She earnestly desired that her writing be service to God: Please let Christian principles permeate my writing and please let there be enough of my writing published for Christian principles to permeate, she wrote. But her seeking God was neither "pious" nor sweet -- it was rough and honest:
I do not mean to deny the traditional prayers I have said all my life; but I have been saying them and not feeling them. My attention is always very fugitive....My intellect is so limited, Lord, that I can only trust in You to preserve me as I should be....I would like to write a beautiful prayer, but I have nothing to do it from. There is a whole sensible world around me that I should be able to turn to Your praise; but I cannot do it. Yet at some insipid moment when I may possibly be thinking of floor wax or pigeon eggs, the opening of a beautiful prayer may come up from my subconscious and lead me to write something exalted. I am not a philosopher or I could understand these things.
Even as a twenty-year old college student, O'Connor consecrated her life to God, asking that He lead her where she should go. She feared remaining in church because of laziness or fear of hell; she wanted more of God than she deserved to ask, in her opinion. She was often discouraged about her work, but wholly believed that it was God who directed her in it:
Don't let me ever think, dear God, that I was anything but the instrument for Your story -- just like the typewriter was mine.....dear God, I wish you would take care of making it a sound story because I don't know how, just like I didn't know how to write it but it came.
O'Connor's honesty and humility inspire me as much as her stories. One of the funniest and yet most inspiring books I have read is The Habit of Being, a collection of her letters to friends and acquaintances. Reading this book often sent me into peals of laughter, even though I was reading it in bed late at night. O'Connor's unpretentious ways of seeing life were a reflection of her honest appraisal of her own weaknesses and those of others, and yet of her absolute faith that God is with us through it all. Once, someone asked her opinion of the feminist movement, still in its very infancy. Her reply was that she had never thought to divide the world into "male" and "female" categories; rather, she said, she tended to divide people into "irksome" and "not so irksome" labels. Now, that's honest!
Through Flannery O'Connor's eyes, the world tends to be set upright and its falsity exposed. In contact with her, through her letters, her stories, and her prayers, I begin to see things sometimes the way I imagine God might see them, could I consult Him.
Friday, April 1, 2016
Icons
Every person is the very icon of God incarnate in the world
--- Mother Maria Skobtsova, Orthodox Nun and Martyr (1891-1945).
The woman quoted above survived the revolution of 1923 in Russia and escaped to Paris where she began to serve destitute Russian refugees. She opened a soup kitchen and lived in the basement, where she slept on a cot beside the boiler. After the German occupation of Paris, she worked with her chaplain to hide and rescue Jews, leading eventually to her arrest, along with her son. She died on Holy Saturday, March 31, 1945, after two years in the Ravensbruck concentration camp.
I have a friend who does not like icons, because she thinks they are "creepy." I never quite understood the art of icons myself, until I read that the wide, staring eyes of the figures mean that we are supposed to gaze through them to heaven, and through them, heaven is supposed to gaze back at us. When I visited a Russian Orthodox Church in St. Petersburg, I began to appreciate icons more. There, one is surrounded by icons, as many as can be placed on the wall, not just one layer, but several layers of icons -- one at eye level, one above, and one below. As I stood there amongst the Russian worshippers following the service, I did have the feeling of being surrounded by saints through whom I could see the face of God and through whom God could see me.
And the "saints" were not just those who depictions hung on the walls, but also those who devoutly worshipped God, who stood around me making the sign of the cross frequently and bowing low in reverence. (No one sits in a Russian Orthodox Church, as there are no pews or kneelers -- everyone stands. From my observation, it might make for a more devout and attentive American congregation if we followed their practice.)
Anyway, I recalled that experience several days ago when I read the quote from Maria Skobtsova-- every person is an icon of God incarnate in the world. I had always heard that we were supposed to see Jesus in every person we meet, but most of the time I failed miserably on that account. Occasionally, I would see a suffering soul -- an alcoholic, a homeless person, someone suffering from hunger or poverty -- and I would see the suffering Jesus. But on a day to day basis, especially when I worked with some difficult people, I simply did not know how to "see Jesus" in them.
However, recently, I spent some time with someone whose values and views on life had often clashed with my own, someone I had resented at times for her obsession with Hollywood and tv stars and their lives. While she was talking to me about the recent death of a Hollywood star, I suddenly recalled Maria Skobtsova's quotation -- and I saw in my friend an "icon" of God. Jesus is the "exact Image" of the invisible God -- and we are partial, totally inexact, and poorly representational images of the invisible God --- but images nevertheless. A person can give to others only what she herself possesses, and whatever God has given to any of His creatures is a part of who He is and what He possesses.
So through our eyes, others can see God, and God can see us. Sort of changes the way we see things, I think. Tomorrow, God willing, and computer cooperating, I will write about one of my favorite "icons" of God -- Flannery O'Connor.
However, recently, I spent some time with someone whose values and views on life had often clashed with my own, someone I had resented at times for her obsession with Hollywood and tv stars and their lives. While she was talking to me about the recent death of a Hollywood star, I suddenly recalled Maria Skobtsova's quotation -- and I saw in my friend an "icon" of God. Jesus is the "exact Image" of the invisible God -- and we are partial, totally inexact, and poorly representational images of the invisible God --- but images nevertheless. A person can give to others only what she herself possesses, and whatever God has given to any of His creatures is a part of who He is and what He possesses.
So through our eyes, others can see God, and God can see us. Sort of changes the way we see things, I think. Tomorrow, God willing, and computer cooperating, I will write about one of my favorite "icons" of God -- Flannery O'Connor.
Saturday, March 26, 2016
Knowing God
Now this is eternal life: That they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent (Jn. 17:3).
Philip said, "Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us." Jesus answered: "Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father"(Jn. 14:8-9).
In all thy ways, acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths (Proverbs 3:6).
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In the original Hebrew, the passage from Proverbs above is more literally, "in all your ways know Him." This fundamental statement of how to relate to God implies more than mere reverence. Nodding in God's direction is not enough: you must know him by living closely with him, relating to him personally in every aspect of your life [note in The Student Bible (New International Version).
If eternal life consists in knowing God, it makes sense that He must necessarily reveal Himself to mankind. Otherwise, though wise men may speculate about who He is, none of us could really "know" Him. In the Hebrew language, to "know" someone means not speculation, but intimacy with. For example, Adam "knew" Eve, and she conceived a son. In the quotation from Proverbs above, "In all thy ways, know Him, and He will direct thy paths," we see daily intimacy with the Lord, not necessarily theological understanding.
And how are we to truly "know" God? From the beginning, God revealed Himself to Abraham, who grew to know God on the journey, on the way to a land "he knew not" -- nor did he know the way. Daily, he depended on revelation, on listening, on hearing the voice of the One Who guided him, and who taught him, despite mistakes along the way. I have a friend who does not believe we should honor Abraham; because of his great error(s), we have the eternal division between Jews and Arabs, for example. However, we honor Abraham not because he was perfect and upright, but because he knew God in all his ways. As a model for us, he walked with God, learning as he went, and he trusted that God would not abandon or forsake him, even in his errors and mistakes.
God continued to reveal Himself to men and women throughout the Old Testament, even when they went astray. Reflecting on His continuous revelation to the Jews gives us His Word -- his revelation to mankind. And finally, He sent His own Son, the "exact representation of the eternal God," "the refulgence of His eternal glory."
Whoever sees Jesus, the Living Word -- revelation-- sees the Father. In Jesus, we see the Father scooping up the poor, the oppressed, the depressed, the leper, the outcast, the woman at the well, the hungry and thirsty, the one on the fringe -- we see the embrace of God to mankind. Whatever we see Jesus do, we know for sure that it is the Father "living in him, doing His work" (Jn 17). How can we be afraid of the Father when we have seen the Son, who 'pitched his tent among us'?
And how can we now be afraid of death, when we have seen the Son who has overcome man's last and greatest threat? The Son himself has tasted death for all of us and has conquered it. And not death only -- but intense suffering beforehand. I have heard people say they are not afraid to die, but they are afraid of suffering, of pain. Jesus took on our life, our flesh, our humanity to go through it with us and going through it, to conquer it in our place. His Spirit living in us is victorious over all the threats of our enemies.
And this is why Jesus is the (only) way to the Father. Only He can impart to us true knowledge/experience of the only true God. Only His Spirit in us can overcome death and suffering and lead us to the Father. There is no other way to know God and thus to have eternal life.
Saturday, March 19, 2016
Deuteronomy revisited
The book of Deuteronomy is Moses' commentary on the events of Exodus. Much of the Bible is actually a re-visiting, or a commentary on previous historical events. That is why just a smattering, or a surface reading, of the bible is not enough -- we have to understand the original reference, plus the reflection on the meaning of the event.
Deuteronomy is the purest form of Jewish historical writing because it explains the meaning behind the events of the Exodus. As a prophet, Moses saw history from God's perspective, especially toward the end of his life. Jewish historical writing always seeks to explain the significance of what happened. We might call it a philosophy of history, or history from the Divine perspective.
The events in Deuteronomy cover about two months, including 30 days of mourning for Moses. The book records the last words of Moses to the people of Israel as they prepare to cross the Jordan River into the Promised Land, after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. The crossing takes place about one month after Moses' death.
The book opens with the words of a narrator who sets the words of Moses into context; it helps to consult a good map as you read, because the narrator gives the historical events as background to Moses, and Moses himself reviews the journey leading up to the crossing into Canaan.
In chapter 1, he reminds the people that when they had set out from Egypt and arrived at Mt. Horeb (Sinai), their numbers were so large that he could no longer act as judge for them. So he appointed "wise and respected men" from each tribe as judges of "thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens and as tribal officials." And he told them, "Bring me a case too hard for you, and I will hear it." Nowhere in the world up to this time had such a system existed, but this system originating in the wilderness of Sinai eventually became the basis for our system of lower courts, district courts, state courts, and the Supreme Court system of the United States.
Later on, Moses will tell the people that because they were governed by the laws of God, their reputation would increase among other nations who saw their wisdom and understanding and say, "Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people" (Deut. 4:6). God was teaching them to govern themselves, as a free people, unlike other nations governed only by kings and despots. Ronald Reagan once observed that in the United States, by law, the country was to be governed by 'we the people' instead of by kings and nobility.
The philosophy under which we live as a free people comes to us directly from the history of the Jewish people in the desert. Having been freed from slavery, they needed at least 40 years to learn the mentality of freedom before they were to settle on a land and govern themselves under the leadership of "wise and respected" men.
I cannot help but reflect on the fact that when the US was governed by the laws of God as public policy embraced by the people at large, other nations saw us as a "great nation of wise and understanding people." I am afraid that, as we lose the focus of God in our nation, our world reputation also diminishes. Like the nation of Israel, we are becoming more like the 'pagan' nations around us and less and less like the light of the world.
God said to Abraham (and to his descendants), "I will bless you and you will be a blessing" (to the whole world). When people ask, "Why were the Jews chosen?" the answer is that they were chosen to be the conduit through which God could bless the entire world. As other nations witnessed what it meant to be in relationship with the God of Israel, and what the results could be, they were to be drawn into the same relationship, sharing in the blessings of Israel. Unfortunately, not remaining in relationship with Yahweh exposed the nation of Israel to the results of consorting with pagan deities: child-sacrifice, moral weakness, vulnerability to their enemies, etc.
We have much to learn from reflecting on the words of Moses in Deuteronomy.
Deuteronomy is the purest form of Jewish historical writing because it explains the meaning behind the events of the Exodus. As a prophet, Moses saw history from God's perspective, especially toward the end of his life. Jewish historical writing always seeks to explain the significance of what happened. We might call it a philosophy of history, or history from the Divine perspective.
The events in Deuteronomy cover about two months, including 30 days of mourning for Moses. The book records the last words of Moses to the people of Israel as they prepare to cross the Jordan River into the Promised Land, after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. The crossing takes place about one month after Moses' death.
The book opens with the words of a narrator who sets the words of Moses into context; it helps to consult a good map as you read, because the narrator gives the historical events as background to Moses, and Moses himself reviews the journey leading up to the crossing into Canaan.
In chapter 1, he reminds the people that when they had set out from Egypt and arrived at Mt. Horeb (Sinai), their numbers were so large that he could no longer act as judge for them. So he appointed "wise and respected men" from each tribe as judges of "thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens and as tribal officials." And he told them, "Bring me a case too hard for you, and I will hear it." Nowhere in the world up to this time had such a system existed, but this system originating in the wilderness of Sinai eventually became the basis for our system of lower courts, district courts, state courts, and the Supreme Court system of the United States.
Later on, Moses will tell the people that because they were governed by the laws of God, their reputation would increase among other nations who saw their wisdom and understanding and say, "Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people" (Deut. 4:6). God was teaching them to govern themselves, as a free people, unlike other nations governed only by kings and despots. Ronald Reagan once observed that in the United States, by law, the country was to be governed by 'we the people' instead of by kings and nobility.
The philosophy under which we live as a free people comes to us directly from the history of the Jewish people in the desert. Having been freed from slavery, they needed at least 40 years to learn the mentality of freedom before they were to settle on a land and govern themselves under the leadership of "wise and respected" men.
I cannot help but reflect on the fact that when the US was governed by the laws of God as public policy embraced by the people at large, other nations saw us as a "great nation of wise and understanding people." I am afraid that, as we lose the focus of God in our nation, our world reputation also diminishes. Like the nation of Israel, we are becoming more like the 'pagan' nations around us and less and less like the light of the world.
God said to Abraham (and to his descendants), "I will bless you and you will be a blessing" (to the whole world). When people ask, "Why were the Jews chosen?" the answer is that they were chosen to be the conduit through which God could bless the entire world. As other nations witnessed what it meant to be in relationship with the God of Israel, and what the results could be, they were to be drawn into the same relationship, sharing in the blessings of Israel. Unfortunately, not remaining in relationship with Yahweh exposed the nation of Israel to the results of consorting with pagan deities: child-sacrifice, moral weakness, vulnerability to their enemies, etc.
We have much to learn from reflecting on the words of Moses in Deuteronomy.
Friday, March 18, 2016
Here in this spot.....
What other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the Lord our God is near us whenever we pray to him? (Deut. 4:7)
Jesus didn't come to give us small-time rules and regulations. He came to reveal great truths -- truths that stagger the mind. Spend some time with one of those great truths: Jesus is truly God, and truly one of us. And He is present to me now (--from The Little White Book: Friday, March 18).
Recently, I was able to visit the Church of the Annunciation in Nazareth. At the time of the Annunciation, Nazareth was such a backwater village that its entire population consisted of about 50 people. The site where the church now stands probably takes up most of the space of the original village.
But as soon as I entered the church, I thought, "Here, in this spot on earth, God became man, taking on the flesh of the Virgin, becoming one of us." I was so moved by the idea that "here, on this spot," the spot where I now stood, Jesus took on human flesh and "pitched his tent among us," in the words of St. John. Is He not still there in memory, in Presence, in Spirit -- the place where he was cherished as a child, where He learned the Law in the local synagogue, the place where he learned to help Joseph in the workshop?
Is He not still there among the villagers, the Christians, the Jews, the Muslims who pursue their daily tasks, the sellers and shop-keepers who daily squeeze pomegranate juice and orange juice for visitors from all over the world, and those who sell rosaries on the sidewalk?
There is something about walking in the same village that Jesus walked, about traveling the short distance from there to Cana, and beyond there to the other villages and remote spots around the sea of Galilee that makes one sense the Presence of God on earth in a way that we don't usually sense it in New Orleans or New York City, for example.
In re-reading the Book of Deuteronomy, I see Moses telling the people how close, how present, God is to them at all times. They had experienced His Presence with them for 40 years in the desert, in the pillar of cloud by night and the pillar of fire by day, leading them and causing them to rest at times. And now, as they are about to enter the Promised Land, the signs of His presence with them will change:
The Lord will send a blessing on your barns and on everything you put your hand to. The Lord your God will bless you in the land He is giving to you. The Lord will establish you as His holy people, as He promised you on oath, if you keep the commands of the Lord your God and walk in His ways. Then all the peoples on earth will see that you are called by the name of the Lord, and they will fear you. The Lord will grant you abundant prosperity-- in the fruit of your womb, in the young of your livestock, and the crops of your ground-- in the land He swore to your forefathers to give you.
The Lord will open the heavens, the storehouse of his bounty, to send rain on your land in season and to bless all the work of your hands. You will lend to many nations but will borrow from none. The Lord will make you the head, not the tail. If you pay attention to the commands of the Lord your God that I give you this day and carefully follow them, you will always be at the top, never at the bottom.....(Deut. 28).
It is interesting, once we are familiar with the New Testament and especially the words of Jesus on Holy Thursday, to re-read Deuteronomy, the final words of Moses before his death. Both leaders stress the continuing Presence of God among His people:
The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged (Deut. 31:8 -- and also in v. 6).
The words of Jesus in the Gospel of John on the night before His death echo the final words of Moses to the Israelites: Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him.....if anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him and we will come to him and make our home with him....Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.....(see Deut. 7:21).....
Anyone who reads Chapters 14-16 of John will see and hear echoes of Moses in Deuteronomy as he prepared to leave his beloved people. They (the people) were prepared to enter the Promised Land under the leadership not of Moses himself but of his delegate, Joshua. And Jesus, preparing his church, his people, to enter and dwell in another promised land, under the leadership of his delegate, Peter, also promises that He will "go with us," His Presence will never leave or forsake us.
Both men stress the continuing Presence of God with us, "here in this spot." It is easier to "feel" in the Holy Land, in Nazareth, on the very ground where Jesus once walked, but it is no less true on our holy ground, that God is with us. Reading the Book of Deuteronomy makes me want to weep, when I read the signs of God's continuing Presence among His people. I see in those words the promises of God also to America, and I see in both nations the failure to listen and obey the words of the Lord.
I have been reading and thinking much about the current situation of Israel, trying to understand where they are now in reference to the promises of God to be with them. And again, I see echoes in America of the same situation that I see in Israel. Maybe in a future blog, I can try to capture what I am now seeing.
Thursday, February 11, 2016
The Tree of Life
I have been writing a lot about the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil -- that is, the tree located in the soul of man (his intellect, his will, and his emotions). But there is another tree in the Garden of Paradise-- the Tree of Life, from which man is not only free to eat at will, but which is necessary for him to sustain life itself.When we are "rooted and grounded" in Christ, His Spirit flows through our souls (our hearts, our minds, our wills) to produce fruit 60, 70, or 100 fold. Isaiah 11 gives us the characteristics of Christ's Spirit: wisdom, knowledge, understanding, counsel, piety, fortitude, and fear of the Lord. We learned these at one time as the "Gifts of the Holy Spirit. When we draw our view and understanding of the world from these roots, our lives produce the "Fruits of the Holy Spirit:" love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, generosity, gentleness, and self-control.
Most of us are desperately searching for love, joy, and peace, without realizing that we are looking in the wrong direction. These are produced by a tree whose roots are in good soil, the Spirit of God. We cannot produce these fruits by eating of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Another way to name that tree is to call it the Tree of Sensuality -- that is, the fruit revealed to us by the senses.
When we reach down deep for Wisdom, Knowledge, and Understanding of the way mankind and the world systems operate, we begin to see the artificiality and superficiality of the world. We begin to see from God's viewpoint: "My ways are not your ways, nor are My thoughts your thoughts...." But there is a remedy for that situation --- God sends His word deep into the hearts and minds of those who seek Him, and His word produces fruit that will last:
As the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
and do not return to it without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it (Is. 55: 10-11)
(Read the next few verses to see what "fruit" is produced by the Word of God in our lives.)
In the Parable of the Sower, Jesus tells us that He Himself is the Sower, and the seed is the Word of God. He is sowing good seed into our hearts. If our hearts are prepared to receive the seed, we will become rooted and grounded in the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, and our lives will produce fruit that will last forever.
Saturday, February 6, 2016
If You Knew the Gift of God.....
Conscience, Intuition, Communion -- All three rely on direct sensing, independent of any outside influence. They represent a kind of knowledge which comes to us without any help from the mind, emotions, or will. We really know through intuition; the mind helps us to understand what we know. All the movements of the Holy Spirit on our human spirit are known through conscience, intuition, and communion.
( --- from yesterday's posting on Body, Soul, Spirit)
*********************************************************************
Late January 2010: I was standing in my back yard surveying the damage from a recent freeze, thinking about all the work I'd have to do when spring arrived. Suddenly, without explanation, I was surrounded from top to bottom by a bubble of deep peace, and I knew that I would not be doing that yard work. At the time, I thought it meant I was going to die, and the peace that surrounded me made it all okay.
"Okay," I said, "just give me time to clean out the attic so the kids don't have to do it when I'm gone." Immediately, still surrounded by a bubble of peace, I went inside and started cleaning out the attic, not telling my husband why I was suddenly so industrious. Two weeks later, I found out that I had lung cancer; in fact, the surgeon sent me home to die after my first visit with him, because he said the cancer was in both lungs, and there was nothing he could do. Chemo was not effective with this type of cancer, he told me. Still, the peace remained. I already "knew" I was going to die; it didn't matter much HOW I was going to die.
Surprisingly, the surgeon who sent me home on a Friday afternoon called me on Tuesday morning. "I spoke to your pulmonologist," he told me. "He thinks that what is in your left lung is not cancer, but inflammation. Regardless, he wants me to treat the right lung." Again, perfect peace reigned in me. The surgeon decided to cut me down the middle, as they do with open-heart surgery, so he could look at both lungs. He ended up cutting out most of the right lung and doing three excisions in the left lung.
Two weeks later, as I was learning to breathe all over again, I thought to myself, "I guess I'm not going to die; I'd better figure out what I am going to do." That was six years ago. I am eternally grateful to the pulmonologist whose intuition told him that it was not cancer in the left lung, showing up on the PET scan. Both doctors viewed the same scan; one sent me home to die, and one said, "Not so fast!" How did the latter know he was looking at inflammation in the left lung? Intuition -- and maybe communion with God also.
And the peace that surrounded and enveloped me throughout the event? A Gift from God: intuition, communion -- beyond any knowledge my mind or emotions or "positive thinking" could have conjured up in those circumstances. I thought I was going to die two weeks before I had a clue that I had lung cancer -- and I knew myself and my life to be in the hands of a loving God. Nothing was going to happen to me that He did not know about, and I trusted Him.
I am so thankful for good doctors, and for the amazing work of God in both the skill and knowledge of the doctors and in me. He preserved me from all anxiety, worry, fear, and restlessness. I never lost a moment's sleep over the diagnosis or over the surgery. Throughout the entire time, I felt wrapped up in the peace of God.
Jesus told the woman at the well, "If you knew the Gift of God, you would ask....and I would give a spring of water welling up to eternal life." What an amazing Gift! If only I could tell the world......
( --- from yesterday's posting on Body, Soul, Spirit)
*********************************************************************
Late January 2010: I was standing in my back yard surveying the damage from a recent freeze, thinking about all the work I'd have to do when spring arrived. Suddenly, without explanation, I was surrounded from top to bottom by a bubble of deep peace, and I knew that I would not be doing that yard work. At the time, I thought it meant I was going to die, and the peace that surrounded me made it all okay.
"Okay," I said, "just give me time to clean out the attic so the kids don't have to do it when I'm gone." Immediately, still surrounded by a bubble of peace, I went inside and started cleaning out the attic, not telling my husband why I was suddenly so industrious. Two weeks later, I found out that I had lung cancer; in fact, the surgeon sent me home to die after my first visit with him, because he said the cancer was in both lungs, and there was nothing he could do. Chemo was not effective with this type of cancer, he told me. Still, the peace remained. I already "knew" I was going to die; it didn't matter much HOW I was going to die.
Surprisingly, the surgeon who sent me home on a Friday afternoon called me on Tuesday morning. "I spoke to your pulmonologist," he told me. "He thinks that what is in your left lung is not cancer, but inflammation. Regardless, he wants me to treat the right lung." Again, perfect peace reigned in me. The surgeon decided to cut me down the middle, as they do with open-heart surgery, so he could look at both lungs. He ended up cutting out most of the right lung and doing three excisions in the left lung.
Two weeks later, as I was learning to breathe all over again, I thought to myself, "I guess I'm not going to die; I'd better figure out what I am going to do." That was six years ago. I am eternally grateful to the pulmonologist whose intuition told him that it was not cancer in the left lung, showing up on the PET scan. Both doctors viewed the same scan; one sent me home to die, and one said, "Not so fast!" How did the latter know he was looking at inflammation in the left lung? Intuition -- and maybe communion with God also.
And the peace that surrounded and enveloped me throughout the event? A Gift from God: intuition, communion -- beyond any knowledge my mind or emotions or "positive thinking" could have conjured up in those circumstances. I thought I was going to die two weeks before I had a clue that I had lung cancer -- and I knew myself and my life to be in the hands of a loving God. Nothing was going to happen to me that He did not know about, and I trusted Him.
I am so thankful for good doctors, and for the amazing work of God in both the skill and knowledge of the doctors and in me. He preserved me from all anxiety, worry, fear, and restlessness. I never lost a moment's sleep over the diagnosis or over the surgery. Throughout the entire time, I felt wrapped up in the peace of God.
Jesus told the woman at the well, "If you knew the Gift of God, you would ask....and I would give a spring of water welling up to eternal life." What an amazing Gift! If only I could tell the world......
Thursday, February 4, 2016
Body, Soul, Spirit -- Part II
There are certain functions that belong to the spirit of man, functions which the "soul" cannot approach, no matter how educated, sophisticated, or intelligent we are. The three functions of the spirit are conscience, intuition, and communion. None of these functions operate according to knowledge stored in the mind, but all three are spontaneous and direct judgments, which never bend to outside opinions.
All three rely on direct sensing, independent of any outside influence. They represent a kind of knowledge which comes to us without any help from the mind, emotions, or will. We really know through intuition; the mind helps us to understand what we know. All the movements of the Holy Spirit on our human spirit are known through conscience, intuition, and communion.
The soul -- that is, the mind, the will, and the emotions -- is incompetent to worship God, according to Jesus' words in John 4: Those who worship God worship in spirit and in truth. This does not mean what we are "taught" to worship according to doctrine -- in fact, Jesus addresses that question when He tells the woman, "You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."
"I know that when the Messiah comes," said the woman, "He will explain everything to us." In other words, with the Messiah's explanation, she will begin to understand (with her mind) that which she worships with her spirit. In fact, one of the functions of the spirit is to enlighten the mind through communion with the Divine Presence, Who teaches us and explains reality to us.
We will never reach communion by thinking, by reasoning, by philosophy. God is not apprehended by our thoughts, or by our feelings, or by our intentions. He can be known directly only in our spirits. Communion with God takes place in the inner man, and not in the soul, or outer man. It is in the spirit that the Holy Spirit regenerates us, teaches us, and leads us into peace.
I have written before about my own efforts to find peace in the midst of chaos by transcendental meditation, Unitarianism, and yoga -- thinking "positive thoughts," closing my eyes and humming, or whatever. None of these things really worked beyond the moment I was actually engaged in the practice. Then a wise nun said to me, "Gayle, you cannot give yourself peace." Her words struck home; for the first time, I realized that peace is not within reach of human nature--- it is a gift from the Holy Spirit. For the first time, I looked "up" instead of "within" myself -- and the Holy Spirit was swift to descend in answer to my prayer. ( No wonder He is portrayed as a dove.)
If we remain in bondage to the soul -- the mind, the will, the emotions -- we will never experience the life of the Spirit/spirit.. That is why Jesus said, "Unless you are born again of water and the Spirit, you cannot see the kingdom of heaven." Before re-birth, we are so sunken and surrounded by Soul that we cannot tell whether our spirit is alive and well or not. The spirit feels dead to God and to the things of God. We are controlled daily by what is in our heads, in our emotions, and in our decisions -- self-consciousness, in other words.
Our personalities will be influenced either by the Spirit of God or by the world around us, as it shapes and molds our opinions. One of my favorite Psalms is 32:
All three rely on direct sensing, independent of any outside influence. They represent a kind of knowledge which comes to us without any help from the mind, emotions, or will. We really know through intuition; the mind helps us to understand what we know. All the movements of the Holy Spirit on our human spirit are known through conscience, intuition, and communion.
The soul -- that is, the mind, the will, and the emotions -- is incompetent to worship God, according to Jesus' words in John 4: Those who worship God worship in spirit and in truth. This does not mean what we are "taught" to worship according to doctrine -- in fact, Jesus addresses that question when He tells the woman, "You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth."
"I know that when the Messiah comes," said the woman, "He will explain everything to us." In other words, with the Messiah's explanation, she will begin to understand (with her mind) that which she worships with her spirit. In fact, one of the functions of the spirit is to enlighten the mind through communion with the Divine Presence, Who teaches us and explains reality to us.
We will never reach communion by thinking, by reasoning, by philosophy. God is not apprehended by our thoughts, or by our feelings, or by our intentions. He can be known directly only in our spirits. Communion with God takes place in the inner man, and not in the soul, or outer man. It is in the spirit that the Holy Spirit regenerates us, teaches us, and leads us into peace.
I have written before about my own efforts to find peace in the midst of chaos by transcendental meditation, Unitarianism, and yoga -- thinking "positive thoughts," closing my eyes and humming, or whatever. None of these things really worked beyond the moment I was actually engaged in the practice. Then a wise nun said to me, "Gayle, you cannot give yourself peace." Her words struck home; for the first time, I realized that peace is not within reach of human nature--- it is a gift from the Holy Spirit. For the first time, I looked "up" instead of "within" myself -- and the Holy Spirit was swift to descend in answer to my prayer. ( No wonder He is portrayed as a dove.)
If we remain in bondage to the soul -- the mind, the will, the emotions -- we will never experience the life of the Spirit/spirit.. That is why Jesus said, "Unless you are born again of water and the Spirit, you cannot see the kingdom of heaven." Before re-birth, we are so sunken and surrounded by Soul that we cannot tell whether our spirit is alive and well or not. The spirit feels dead to God and to the things of God. We are controlled daily by what is in our heads, in our emotions, and in our decisions -- self-consciousness, in other words.
Our personalities will be influenced either by the Spirit of God or by the world around us, as it shapes and molds our opinions. One of my favorite Psalms is 32:
I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go;
I will counsel you and watch over you.
Do not be like the horse or the mule,
which have no understanding
but must be controlled by bit and bridle
or they will not come to you.
Many are the woes of the wicked,
but the Lord's unfailing love
surrounds the man who trusts in him.
Rejoice in the Lord and be glad, you righteous;
sing, all you who are upright in heart!
Here we see that one who listens, or communes with, God receives both understanding to the mind and joy to the heart. As Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior." Once the spirit connects with God, the soul is also enlightened and lifted. Strength pours out of the spirit into the soul, and from there into the body also.
Tuesday, February 2, 2016
The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is -- his good, pleasing, and perfect will (Romans 12:2).
A renewed mind is Presence-focused. Train your mind to seek Me in every moment, every situation....I am always present in your spirit. Seek My Face, speak to Me, and I will light up your mind (Jesus Calling, Feb. 2).
****************************************************************
"So what's wrong with knowledge?" one of my students asked one day. "Why doesn't God want us to have knowledge?" This question was in reference to the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in Genesis, the one tree in the Garden from which Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat. Contrasting that tree was the "Tree of Life" in the center of the Garden, from which they were allowed to partake freely.
The day I began to read the Book of Proverbs, I discovered an electrifying idea: [Wisdom] is a tree of life to those who embrace her; those who lay hold of her will be blessed (3:18). In order to get the full impact of this statement, it helps to continue reading Proverbs, especially 4-8, and the Book of Wisdom also. In other words, the Tree of Life in the Garden is the Tree of Wisdom!
Coupled with the idea of Proverbs 4:13, we begin at last to understand something about the reading from Genesis and human nature: Guard well your heart, for out of it flow all the issues of life, or an alternate reading might be: Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.
When the Bible speaks about the "heart," the reference is always to the "spirit," or the "inner man" -- that part of us in closest connection with the Holy Spirit. A couple of days ago, I wrote about the difference between "soul" and "spirit." And our choice as human beings is to live according to the soul or to "keep in step with" (be led by) the Spirit of God. Hence the difference between the Tree of Life (Wisdom) and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. To live by Wisdom is LIFE to man; to live by Knowledge is certain death.
One more distinction should be made: when the Bible uses the word "knowledge," it always means "intimacy with," not just head knowledge or book learning. For example, the Scripture says that Adam "knew" Eve, and she conceived. To "know" is to embrace, to become one with. So our choice is to become one with the world and what it offers us, or to become one with the Spirit of God, who teaches us which way to go, despite all outward appearances: In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths (Proverbs 3:6).
With our minds, we can "see" only what is apparent to us. The myth of the "poison apple" in Sleeping Beauty in a good example: our eyes behold luscious fruit; we cannot see the hidden danger --- unless we are warned by the Holy Spirit speaking in our spirit. If we believe our senses, we are doomed. If we adhere to the Spirit of God leading us to Truth, we are saved.
I usually represent the tripartite human complex as three concentric circles, with the largest, outer circle representing the physical part of us, and the smallest, inner circle representing the spirit in us. In between the two is the "soul," comprised of mind, emotions, and will (choice). Our "choice" at every moment is to adhere to what our physical senses are telling us or to turn inward, seeking the Face of God and listening to the Voice of the Holy Spirit advising us and telling us where to go and what to do.
If we follow the Spirit, He will "light up our minds," giving us wisdom and understanding of the things we see. This wisdom can never be gleaned through books or other people -- unless they themselves have been directed by the Spirit of God.
Next time, I will explore a little further the differences between soul and spirit.
Sunday, January 31, 2016
The On-going Presence of Christ
Someone recently told me a remarkable story. It seems that when the Pope went to New York, he was scheduled to say Mass in St. Patrick's Cathedral. Before anyone was admitted to the Cathedral that morning, the bomb squad brought in their dogs to sniff out any danger that might be present in the church. As soon as the dogs entered the Cathedral, they began to alert for the presence of a person, and continued to do so, despite the fact that no one could be found in the church. Finally, the squad had to conclude that the dogs were mistaken -- but those who believed in the Eucharistic Presence of Jesus on the altar reached a different conclusion: The dogs were reacting to Jesus, truly present with us, just as He promised: I am with you, even to the consummation of the world.
This story has resonated with me. Although I always believed in the Eucharistic Presence, now somehow, it seems different to me -- not just a "psychic" presence, as for example, when I feel the presence of a friend or relative who died some years ago -- but rather, a "real" Presence, just as we were always taught. The grace of this realization actually changed Pope Pius X (1835-1914) in his ministry many years ago.
When he was elected to the papal office, he saw that the way he imagined and wanted and honored a pope was a far cry from what he himself could present. He saw himself divided, full of shortcomings. Although he was very committed to the well-being of the Church, he was permeated by weaknesses -- his prayer life was sometimes very tepid, for example. He was deeply horrified by the election; he could not believe they were serious. He figured there must have been some mistake. He worried that he had presented a false image of himself, and that his words made him sound more significant than he truly was. But then he thought this might be the opportunity to turn his life around. He thought at first that by daily effort, he could change who he was, and he committed himself to this work, at first in the sense of what people called "a creditable performance."
But then it dawned on him: The Presence of Christ can achieve anything. Yesterday, I wrote that the Apostles knew that they were unlettered and ungifted in speech and personal charism -- but they also knew the Power of Jesus Christ present in them and working through them, beyond their personal gifts. In the same way, Pius X realized that despite his personal weaknesses, a living, paternal Presence extended over the whole church, not as something earned or worked at by him, but in the sense of the Lord's Presence renewed and full of life. Pius was but the instrument through whom Jesus governed his church.
And now, the Eucharist appeared to him as the assurance of Christ's Presence to the church. From that moment on, his prayer centered not on self-improvement, but on communion, centered around the power of this Presence. Pius' effort was only to remain in the Presence of Christ; he tested everything through the reality of communion with Jesus. This reality became so actual, so active, so deeply immersed in his mission that he became the "apostle of the Eucharist." He saw the Power and the Love of Christ as descending from above in a living stream in which he was permitted to share. Everything that he previously thought and reflected upon became unimportant to him, because nothing to him was more important than the real Presence of Christ with His church. Instead of a program of self-improvement, he entered into the place of John, the Beloved Disciple who was a close friend of Jesus. He began to experience in a living way the love of Jesus for the church, for His friends.
I remember as a child being told that before Pius X, people had to wait until their Confirmation to receive the Eucharist for the first time (around 12-13 years of age). But Pius X was the one who lowered the age of reception to 7 years old, when a child could understand Who is this Jesus that he received in the host. And I remember even as a young child being grateful to him for allowing me to receive communion in the first grade.
I have a friend whose father was an Episcopal priest. One day, she was riding her bike past the Catholic church and decided to enter, to see what the church looked like on the inside. That one visit so moved her that she decided to become a Catholic -- much like the experience of Thomas Merton many years before. I have to wonder how many people have had that same experience. When we Catholics grow up hearing about the "Real Presence" of Christ on the altar, it becomes all too familiar for us to believe it in a dynamic way. Sometimes it takes a dog to teach us the truth!
This story has resonated with me. Although I always believed in the Eucharistic Presence, now somehow, it seems different to me -- not just a "psychic" presence, as for example, when I feel the presence of a friend or relative who died some years ago -- but rather, a "real" Presence, just as we were always taught. The grace of this realization actually changed Pope Pius X (1835-1914) in his ministry many years ago.
When he was elected to the papal office, he saw that the way he imagined and wanted and honored a pope was a far cry from what he himself could present. He saw himself divided, full of shortcomings. Although he was very committed to the well-being of the Church, he was permeated by weaknesses -- his prayer life was sometimes very tepid, for example. He was deeply horrified by the election; he could not believe they were serious. He figured there must have been some mistake. He worried that he had presented a false image of himself, and that his words made him sound more significant than he truly was. But then he thought this might be the opportunity to turn his life around. He thought at first that by daily effort, he could change who he was, and he committed himself to this work, at first in the sense of what people called "a creditable performance."
But then it dawned on him: The Presence of Christ can achieve anything. Yesterday, I wrote that the Apostles knew that they were unlettered and ungifted in speech and personal charism -- but they also knew the Power of Jesus Christ present in them and working through them, beyond their personal gifts. In the same way, Pius X realized that despite his personal weaknesses, a living, paternal Presence extended over the whole church, not as something earned or worked at by him, but in the sense of the Lord's Presence renewed and full of life. Pius was but the instrument through whom Jesus governed his church.
And now, the Eucharist appeared to him as the assurance of Christ's Presence to the church. From that moment on, his prayer centered not on self-improvement, but on communion, centered around the power of this Presence. Pius' effort was only to remain in the Presence of Christ; he tested everything through the reality of communion with Jesus. This reality became so actual, so active, so deeply immersed in his mission that he became the "apostle of the Eucharist." He saw the Power and the Love of Christ as descending from above in a living stream in which he was permitted to share. Everything that he previously thought and reflected upon became unimportant to him, because nothing to him was more important than the real Presence of Christ with His church. Instead of a program of self-improvement, he entered into the place of John, the Beloved Disciple who was a close friend of Jesus. He began to experience in a living way the love of Jesus for the church, for His friends.
I remember as a child being told that before Pius X, people had to wait until their Confirmation to receive the Eucharist for the first time (around 12-13 years of age). But Pius X was the one who lowered the age of reception to 7 years old, when a child could understand Who is this Jesus that he received in the host. And I remember even as a young child being grateful to him for allowing me to receive communion in the first grade.
I have a friend whose father was an Episcopal priest. One day, she was riding her bike past the Catholic church and decided to enter, to see what the church looked like on the inside. That one visit so moved her that she decided to become a Catholic -- much like the experience of Thomas Merton many years before. I have to wonder how many people have had that same experience. When we Catholics grow up hearing about the "Real Presence" of Christ on the altar, it becomes all too familiar for us to believe it in a dynamic way. Sometimes it takes a dog to teach us the truth!
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