Thursday, September 8, 2022

 

Thursday, September 8, 2022


Psalms 20; 21

2 Chronicles 36:1-14

1 John 5:13-21


Observance: Birth of Mary, mother of the Lord.


And this is the boldness we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.


Thanks be to God for giving us brains that can hold more than one thing at a time. John has just spent an entire letter talking about the beauty of a humble love that serves others, and now at the very end the apple-cart is at risk of turning with this idea of “boldness”. No, this is not some “contradiction” that a teenage rebel can throw in his praying mum's face. John is talking about the next level of spiritual enlightenment.


Humility and self-sacrificial love is a beautiful concept, which Jesus idealised on the cross for us. But our Lord didn't suffer and die so that we could spend the rest of eternity cowering under our omniscient God. Jesus bled and died and rose again so that we could have boldness to step into His holy palace and feast with Him as our brother and friend. If, once we are saved, we continue to hide our face from Him, we are practising a false humility. God has extended this beautiful gift to us. Receiving this gift with gratitude, opening it up, giving thanks for the wonderful present and then using it is what God expects from us.


If we have followed the flow of John's letter, we should now be in a place where we have acknowledged our sins, been cleansed of them, and now stand before our holy God in the perfect righteousness of Christ. The purpose of humanity has been restored. We are made in God's image; we are the vessels through whom God blesses the world. God the Father loves us as a perfect father. God the Son is our brother. God the Holy Spirit is our advocate. This beautiful relationship we now enter in our role as the representative of all these aspects of the Godhead in the material universe. Our primary role as representative is to pray; prayer being the way we spend time in this relationship. Next time we pray the Lord's Prayer, let's use it as it was intended: God's blessings flowing out into the world through us.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Monday, September 12, 2022

  Monday, September 12, 2022 Psalm 33 Habakkuk 1:1-11 Ephesians 1:1-14 In Christ we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace that he lavished on us. The lectionary has taken us from the beloved disciple to one of the most beloved of Paul's epistles: Ephesians. Paul must have loved this church very much: we get a sense of his fondness for them and their shared sense of purpose and worship just from the introduction. In what is likely just an introduction to a letter in the style of the ancient Roman world, Paul has managed to squeeze in the entire, wondrous story of God's work of redemption. Paul has framed it the way it ought to be framed: in a pastoral, encouraging tone. He has three main points here (remember, Paul proceeds logically to build up an argument, unlike John who circles around his main point). First: God intended to save us before the world was formed. Think back to the first l
Read more

“Short time or long – I pray to God not only you but all who are listening become like I am, except for these chains.”

  Monday, September 11, 2023 Psalms 28; 29 1 Kings 7:51-8:21 Acts 26:19-32 Observance: Deiniol, bishop (d. 384) “ Short time or long – I pray to God not only you but all who are listening become like I am, except for these chains.” The great many blessings of being under the protection of the blood of the Lamb fill our hearts with joy and peace. To have the Almighty Creator of the universe, the One who sits above the flood, filling the temple of our being with the cloud of His presence is what it truly means to be human. Every day is filled with adventure; every night turns to the rest of the victor. Certainly there are chains: sometimes they are physical chains, the suffering of being a Christian among people who do not love the Lord. Sometimes they are spiritual; the attacks of the powers of the air who try to distract us from the One we love. But they always fall away. Our Rock of Ages always frees us; always brings us out of the pit of despair. A won
Read more

Monday, September 19

  Monday, September 19 Psalm 45 Nahum 1:15-2:9 Ephesians 4:17-28 ...be renewed in the spirit of your minds... It is far too easy to read some of these Pauline lists of virtues and vices and feel like we have gone back to the dark days before the Reformation. The idea that if we behave ourselves then we can call ourselves “good people” is pagan, not Christian. Paul feels very strongly about how Christians behave, he “affirms and insists” upon it. But it is because of what has already happened that we should mind our step, not because of where we are going. Christ's resurrection is many things, but one aspect relevant for Paul's teaching this morning is that it demonstrates to us the radical new reality in which we now live. We too have passed (spiritually) from death to life; therefore, we experience a “renewal of our minds”. Instead of treading water until we die, we live lives. Everything now makes sense: God has spoken, so we have logic. God made us in His im
Read more