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The Church Has No Excuse for Aging…
Devotional Thought of the Day:
1 The people say, “Let’s return to the LORD! He has hurt us, but he will be sure to heal us; he has wounded us, but he will bandage our wounds, won’t he? 2 In two or three days he will revive us, and we will live in his presence. 3 Let us try to know the LORD. He will come to us as surely as the day dawns, as surely as the spring rains fall upon the earth.” Hosea 6:1-3 (TEV)
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is God’s power for salvation n to everyone who believes, first to the Jew, o and also to the Greek. 17 For in it God’s righteousness is revealed from faith to faith, just as it is written: The righteous will live by faith.
18 For God’s wrath is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth, 19 since what can be known about God is evident among them because God has shown it to them. 20 For His invisible attributes, that is, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen since the creation of the world, being understood through what He has made. As a result, people are without excuse. Romans 1:16-20 HCSB
If the Church stays “indoors,” she certainly will age.
The Church is called to come out of herself and to go to the “existential peripheries,” where the mystery of sin, pain, injustice, religious indifference and of all human miseries are found.
In fulfilling its educational role, the Church, eager to employ all suitable aids, is concerned especially about those which are her very own. Foremost among these is catechetical instruction,16 which enlightens and strengthens the faith, nourishes life according to the spirit of Christ, leads to intelligent and active participation in the liturgical mystery17 and gives motivation for apostolic activity.
Romans 1:16 is, for Bible College and Seminary students, repeated often.
I am not ashamed!
But this isn’t a badge of honor, it is not considering the context. It is a call to go out, and help those who have been caught up by sin, those who are in bondage to it, those who are broken by it.
We are to be there for the people without excuse, but therefore, without hope. The word for excuse there is the negative form of the word of the apostle Peter uses when he declares,
15 But have reverence for Christ in your hearts, and honor him as Lord. Be ready at all times to answer anyone who asks you to explain the hope you have in you, 1 Peter 3:15 (TEV)
This world, so full of misery and strife, so full of pain that they have become indifferent to religion cannot realize that they can return to the Lord, That they can return to the Lord who allowed them to deal with the consequences of the sin of the world, including their sin.
They don’t know that God will come to heal them, that they can know Him, not just academically, but in a deep rich way, more deeply that can e described by words, but is celebrated as we take the Body Broken for us, as we share in the blood shed for our sins.
Paul is not ashamed of the gospel because it presents hope to these people who are unaware of that hope even exists, that broken relationships, can be healed, THAT GOD CARES FOR THEM.
This has to be the message of the church. It is not that we are better than them, holier than them that we go out to encounter the world. It is because we found hope for our brokenness, hope that we are being healed, being transformed, a work that isn’t always easily visible, but one that God has promised to do.
If we are not ashamed of this hope, of this ability we are all given to interact and depend on God, then there is no excuse for the church to get old. The is no excuse for us hiding within the doors of our churches, waiting for the pastor to grow our church. We have a world that doesn’t need us to complain about them, but that needs us to give them the hope we have, to help them return to the Lord, to know that anyone can die with Christ and the cross, and be raised to a new life with Him, in Him.
This is the gospel, that God loves us…
Let us not hide that hope within our walls, but let it burst out as fast as the kids run for donuts after service gets out!
Lord have mercy on us all! And help us to spread the news you have!
Pope Francis. (2013). A Year with Pope Francis: Daily Reflections from His Writings. (A. Rossa, Ed.) (p. 192). New York; Mahwah, NJ; Toronto, ON: Paulist Press; Novalis.
Catholic Church. (2011). Declaration on Christian Education: Gravissimum Educationis. In Vatican II Documents. Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana.
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An Odd Responsibility: A Lenten Sermon on Ephesians 5
An Odd Responsibility
Ephesians 5:8-14
† I.H.S. †
May you enjoy the grace, mercy and peace of God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, and in that joy, may He shine through you to a broken world!
An Odd Responsibility
Of all the things scripture tells us to do, the one we heard in the first reading today may be the oddest.
I mean we are encouraged to love God, to love our neighbor, to love even our enemy. We are told to honor our parents, be faithful to our wives and husbands, to care for our children. We are told to no gossip, and be content rather than being jealous of what others are blessed with by God.
None of these are easy, but then we hear this one today, and they seem.. better defined?
Here it is again,
“Carefully determine what pleases the Lord”
Across all of the Bible translations in English that I have, two of them use acceptable, and one uses “what God wants of you”. The rest use the word please, or pleasing. Knowing the Greek word behind it doesn’t help that much – it means good pleasure – or causing or creating peace.
So we are responsible for… making God’s life good?
That seems a bit odd.
And more than a little difficult! How are we supposed to figure this out? Even more concurring,, how can we accomplish it?
I mean if God can’t find peace or be pleased, how are we to see that happen?
The Darkness that consumes and burdens
I mean, at least for me, I feel that life is often just a longer edition of that feeling when you are asleep and someone comes in and turns on the 250 watt light in your bedroom in order to wake you up.
You know, the disorientation, the inability to really see clearly, the pain of looking at everything in harsh, painful more powerful than the sun – light?
Spiritually the world seems that dark at times, as people stumble around, not sure of what is right, but absolutely convinced of what is not good. Sometimes we even justify staying in the dark, because if we saw what was truly going on, the shock and horror would be even more overwhelming.
If the darkness hides the world’s evil deeds and intentions, it can also do the same thing for us, hiding the thoughts, words, and deeds that we are personally ashamed of, the failures that haunt us, that cause us shame. Yet the spiritual darkness gives us the illusion that no one sees those things, no one else knows them, even God.
The darkness may seem comforting, it may seem safe, but spiritual darkness and ignorance has severe problems, Guilt, shame, loneliness, despair, and the pervasive darkness which causes us to live without hope, without any healing of our soul, or the relationships that break.
The work of the light
So into this darkness that oppresses more than it relieves, that hides from the world but not our conscience, comes the glory of Christ.
it takes us a while to get used to it. At first, we might think that the light is the spotlight used to interrogate us, like the third-degree interrogations in old war and spy movies. For it does reveal the dark shameful things, the thoughts and words and deeds of the past that haunt us.
We need to understand that rather than being an interrogation tool, this is the light by which God examines us, to cut away that which isn’t of us, the sin and unrighteousness, the shame and the grief, the pain and resentment, and the light which strengthens and allows our souls to heal.
It takes a while to get used to, to learn to welcome, but as Paul promises,
“This light within you produces only what is good, and right, and true.”
This light, this glory of God so shows things for what they are that we let God remove them from our lives.
Which is why we can live without them, though it may take a while to realize that, as we wander around, trying to get used to walking in the light, as those people who are the people of light.
This is what grace is, this is why we are here, to help each other realize we aren’t alone in this world, that we can live lives where forgiveness is more powerful than brokenness, where reconciliation is always possible, and is desired by God. That not only can we desire to grow in holiness, we can see God at work in us, transforming us into His holy people.
And this is what we discover pleases Him, it is what He desires, it is what He spent eternity planning, and why Jesus came and died on the cross to shatter our darkness, to remove our sin. It is what we truly need to understand – that what pleases God is our being His people, trusting in Him, depending on Him to care and provide for us, having faith in the promises He has made us, including forgiving our sins, and make us His holy people, and welcoming us as we dwell in His glory.
And freed from the darkness, freed from its oppression and evil, freed from the guilt and shame it causes, we live in the light, for we have had revealed to us the truth of the old hymn Paul quoted,
We have awoken, We have risen from the dead! For Christ has come and dwelt with us, and we have seen His glory. AMEN!
Out of Sight? Out of Mind?
Devotional Thought of The Day:
33 “No one lights a lamp and then hides it or puts it under a bowl;p instead, he puts it on the lamp-stand, so that people may see the light as they come in. 34Your eyes are like a lamp for the body. When your eyes are sound, your whole body is full of light; but when your eyes are no good, your whole body will be in darkness. 35Make certain, then, that the light in you is not darkness. 36If your whole body is full of light, with no part of it in darkness, it will be bright all over, as when a lamp shines on you with its brightness.” Luke 11:33-36 TEV
Constantine the Great, having written with great respect to St. Anthony, the religious about him were greatly astonished. “Why,” said he, “do you feel astonished that a king should write to a man? Be astonished, rather, that the Eternal God should have written down his law to mortal men; yea, more, should have spoken to them by word of mouth in the person of his Son.” (1)
God does not want
a house built by people,
but faithfulness to his word
and acceptance of his design.
It is God himself
who builds the house
but of living stones
marked by his Spirit.
It is a blessing for parents of toddlers, this truth that out of sight, out of mind.
Yet it is true for us as adults as well, and then can become a curse if we aren’t careful. For the longer our eyes are taken off of something, the easier it is for us to forget and even neglect that which was once all important.
Like God.
We can forget Him, if not completely, then enough to obscure who He is, what He has instilled in us.
His peace, His comfort, His mercy, His love.
And what it means to live life in reflection of that love. What Pope Francis calls “His design”, what He wills, the plans He has laid out for us. The more we neglect seeing Chirst in our lives, the more sin reigns, the more it makes sense, the more it offers false comfort, quickly fading imitations of joy, and quickly tires us out. A lack of seeing Christ leasd us to a life we cannot be satisfied with, on that quickly turns toxic, as we do what is right in our own eyes.
We need to regain this vision of Christ, we need to let His light enter through our eyes, to contemplate, to think about, to become enlightened to the depth of His love for us, His people, His family. We need to realize that not only did God love us enough to guide our lives with His law. but that He revealed us the love in and through Jesus.
He is our light, He is our life, and our thoughts need to be infused by the presence of our God. Not as in a rote behavior, or religious obligation, but as our very life. With the joy that comes from walking with One whose love for you is proven over and over.
So fill your eyes with Him! Fill your mind with those things that we praise Him for, things that are true, noble, holy, just, pure, lovely, sacrificial, (see Phil.4:8)
He is with you!
AMEN!
Pope Francis. A Year with Pope Francis: Daily Reflections from His Writings. Ed. Alberto Rossa. New York; Mahwah, NJ; Toronto, ON: Paulist Press; Novalis, 2013. Print.
(1) Francis de Sales, Saint. An Introduction to the Devout Life. Dublin: M. H. Gill and Son, 1885. Print.
