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If only we could all be saints
Devotional Thought of the Day:
19 So far as the Law is concerned, however, I am dead—killed by the Law itself—in order that I might live for God. I have been put to death with Christ on his cross, 20 so that it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. This life that I live now, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave his life for me. 21 I refuse to reject the grace of God. But if a person is put right with God through the Law, it means that Christ died for nothing! Galatians 2:19-21 (TEV)
401 ”To be nailed to the Cross!” This aspiration kept coming again and again, as a new light, to the mind and heart and lips of a certain soul. “To be nailed to the Cross?”, he asked himself. “How hard it is!” And yet he knew full well the way he had to go: agere contra—self denial. This is why he earnestly implored, “Help me, Lord!”
“I am my own worst enemy!” It is all too true!
It is why St. Josemaria’s “certain soul” would aspire to be nailed to the cross. It is why we need to be nailed to the cross, to see our broken lives stop entering into one vicious encounter with sin after another.
If only it were as simple as the Apostle Paul indicates, this sacrifice of our self, this denial of that within us that craves its own way, that demands to be nurtured. How incredible life would be, how simple and easy, how full of joy, if we could only lay down all self-interest. If Christ would so dominate our lives, if His desires were our desires, if His ability to love drove us to love the unlovable if we could make reconciling people to the Father our mission, as it was His.
If only we were all saints, for didn’t they find imitating Christ easy?
Of course, they didn’t. Of course, they struggled and had to learn self-denial the hard way, Although now that I think of it, it is not the hard way, it is the only way.
Paul tells us it is only possible by trusting in God, depending upon Him. St Josemaria indicates it happens as we implore Jesus to help us, to come to our aid. Without His involvement, self-denial is contrary to our reflex action. It will take a miracle to override our narcissistic nature, our desire to ourselves first, and automatic response of self-defense.
This is faith too, to be bold enough to ask God for the mercy that helps us rely on Him. It requires faith to depend on Jesus to temper our nature, and He will. That is the promise of our baptism! The promise that there we were crucified with Christ, united with His death.
This is His grace, His rescuing us from our brokenness, our wretchedness. This is what Love looks like, as Jesus rescues us from ourselves, and transforms us into saints.
Let us pray we depend on it more and more. AMEN!
Escriva, Josemaria. The Forge (Kindle Locations 1558-1562). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Inalienable, God-given Rights? There is only one….
Devotional Thought of the Day:
12 Some, however, did receive him and believed in him; so he gave them the right to become God’s children. 13 They did not become God’s children by natural means, that is, by being born as the children of a human father; God himself was their Father. 14 The Word became a human being and, full of grace and truth, lived among us. We saw his glory, the glory which he received as the Father’s only Son. John 1:12-14 (TEV)
255 Jesus came to the Cross, after having prepared himself for thirty three years, all his life! His disciples, if they really want to imitate him, have to convert their existence into a co-redemption of Love, with their own active and passive self-denial. (1)
A lot of my Facebook recently has been filled with people demanding their, or someone else’s “rights”. Here are a few of them.
- a right to a “living wage”
- a right to sexual freedom
- a right to speak our against sexual sin
- a right to life
- a right to end life
- a right to live in a democracy
- a right to own guns of whatever type
- a right to religious freedom (some claiming that right is infringed on in the USA… some really showing how it is infringed upon in places like the Sudan, or North Korea, or Syria. you can actually sign online petitions here in the U.S.A to petition the leaders in the Sudan and Iraq to not follow their laws…
- our right to be treated the way we want in any given relationship.
In some cases, these rights are considered to be God given, or inalienable or universal rights. My sense of irony would ask, in some cases do we want everyone in the world to have that right. For example – in the case of guns, if the right is truly inalienable, do we want our enemies to have the same right? What about those who are violently unstable? Do we want other countries to be able to tell us what we can or can’t do, based on their understanding of what is right?
Even as my thoughts find the irony in such demands, there is something more serious going on here. The idea of “rights” is quickly becoming a form of idolatry, with the idol being us, and our opinion. God doesn’t given these rights (neither does the Constitution – which can be another idol at times) unless we think we speak for God, or more realistically, if we have created God in our own image. demanding our own “God given rights” is often more simply our way of saying life isn’t fair. An adult way of throwing a tantrum and saying we don’t like the what we are given.
Don’t get me wrong – some of these rights are given to us, legally, by powers that ave the right to grant them. Others may have been given out of turn, but still, legally, they may have been given.
I am speaking about when we add “God given” or inalienable (which is the same thing if you think it through)
In talking of God-given rights, there is only one I find in scripture. The right given to those who trust in God, to be called His children. That can be unpacked, talking about being born again in baptism, talking about God bringing us into a relationship with Him, forgiving our sins. That is the right that God gives to us, one that neither Satan, the world, a government, enemies, nor even family and friends can deny us. To spend our life walking with God, knowing that He is there, that He loves us, that everything that happens is promised to work out for good. (That does stretch our trust at times) Knowing that we are His kids, that He is our dad.
BTW – if we are His kids, that means we will be sometimes treated like His only begotten son. That means, as we imitate those like Paul when they imitated Christ, we will need to deny ourselves, and take up a cross. We will have to give up our man-given or perceived to be given rights, We will have to lay down our lives. Not because we are commanded to, but because that is what those who walk with Jesus do, and have done for two centuries.
When we do, our lives testify to something far greater than our rights.
We testify to the God who gives, who sacrifices because of love, who gives mercifully, who walks with us through our lives, even through the times we make a mess of things. Even when the world is going to kill us.
So next time you think about your rights…. think first of your being a child of God. It will help put things into perspective.
(1) Escriva, Josemaria (2011-01-31). Furrow (Kindle Locations 1247-1250). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
When Is Enough… Enough!?
Devotional/Discussion Thought of the Day: 
38 “Here’s another old saying that deserves a second look: ‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth.’ 39 Is that going to get us anywhere? Here’s what I propose: ‘Don’t hit back at all.’ If someone strikes you, stand there and take it. 40 If someone drags you into court and sues for the shirt off your back, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. 41 And if someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. 42 No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously. 43 “You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ 44 I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, Matthew 5:38-44 (MSG)
I look up to the mountains— does my help come from there? 2 My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth! 3 He will not let you stumble; the one who watches over you will not slumber. 4 Indeed, he who watches over Israel never slumbers or sleeps. 5 The LORD himself watches over you! The LORD stands beside you as your protective shade. 6 The sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon at night. 7 The LORD keeps you from all harm and watches over your life. 8 The LORD keeps watch over you as you come and go, both now and forever. Psalm 121:1-8 (NLT)
“Here am I Lord, I’ve come to do Your will, Here am I Lord, In Your presence, I am still” (1)
5 “Meditate on this slowly: I am asked for very little compared to how much I am being given.” (2)
It is, I know personally, a struggle to deal with some people.
I witnessed it in the past few days, as several people I know were offended (not at the same time), and found myself extremely frustrated by the way I was treated. It literally took me a couple of hours, and some distraction to deal with my own frustration. No, let me be honest, it wasn’t just frustration, there was some anger that was beginning to settle in and take residence in my heart.
The first reading, especially the italicized part, came to mind in the shower this morning. Except in the older translations sense, this is the passage about “turning the other cheek”. But I think Peterson does a good job in getting the heart of the matter. I’ve heard a lot of people “explain” this passage, trying to get out of what we are called to do, trying to justify their own anger, or resentment. We try to justify our thirst for revenge by saying we want to stop them from doing this to others. Or that Jesus couldn’t have had what this person did…
Skip past the second passage for a moment, it was part of my devotions this morning, as were the two short extra-biblical readings. Look at them.
From the Celtic Prayer Book, we find the idea that serving God sometimes means standing still. Psalm 46 comes to mind, but that to is written amidst a storm, against threats. Written by one who was no stranger to war, and yet must trust God to deliver the stillness, to deliver the victory! What a challenge when you know how to treat those who oppress and attack us. Can I be still in those times? Confident in God’s presence and His strength and His desire to work in my life?
Even as I read that, the next part of my devotions include this little passage by St. Josemaria. And I think that I have done far worse to Jesus, and perhaps to others, than was said to me. I think of the others I know, that I observed getting offended, Yeah – we, the offended, the oppressed are not innocent of similar offenses, we don’t have the right to cast the first stone, for the One who would crush us, died for us instead. That puts things into better perspective, as I realize how blessed we are, how the times we’ve offended people were paid for, as Christ proved the depth of God’s love for us by coming and living among us, by dying, by rising, by ascending and He still is there, at the right hand of God the Father, interceding for us.
His ministry to us, through us, isn’t over, until the last sinner/saint has come home.
That is where the second reading, my psalm of the day comes into this discussion. Do I trust God at these words? Do I know my help is coming from on high? Do I realize that He doesn’t sleep, Do I realize that what happens to me will work out for good somehow, for this is His promise. The promise of the crucified Lord. The promise of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit?
In the words of a man who needed to know God’s deliverance….
Yes, I believe, Lord help me believe.
A form of a heart depth’s cry for the Lord’s compassion…. and the hope, the expectation that we will know it. AMEN
(1) Meditations for day 17, Celtic Daily Prayer
(2)Escriva, Josemaria (2011-01-31). Furrow (Kindle Locations 261-262). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Real Burdens, Real Crosses to bear, and walking with Christ
Devotional Thought of the Day:
37 “Those who love their father or mother more than me are not fit to be my disciples; those who love their son or daughter more than me are not fit to be my disciples. 38 Those who do not take up their cross and follow in my steps are not fit to be my disciples. 39 Those who try to gain their own life will lose it; but those who lose their life for my sake will gain it. Matthew 10:37-39 (TEV)
995 A Christian always triumphs from the Cross, through his self-renunciation, because he allows God’s omnipotence to act. (1)
521 I wrote to you: Though I can understand that it’s not an uncommon way of talking, I’m not happy when I hear people describe the difficulties born of pride as “crosses”. These burdens are not the Cross, the true Cross, because they are not Christ’s Cross. So struggle against those invented obstacles, which have nothing to do with the seal Christ has set on you. Get rid of all the disguises of self! (2)
I came across these two quotes this morning from St. Josemaria Escriva in two different books – one that I finished yesterday, and one that I picked up and continued in this morning. In them, and in the passage from Matthew above, I find something that has been on my heart for a while.
We don’t understand crosses, or burdens that we are to carry. We even label some people our crosses to bear, or our “thorns in the flesh”, as if the only reason they are in our lives is to keep us humble, broken, and praying for mercy.
In 521, St Josemaria describes that we take on problems,which we label crosses, that we think are holy burdens, but are not really. When we find a person burdensome, bothersome, requiring great patience, when we barely tolerate his presence. If that is all we do, we haven’t born Christ’s cross, we haven’t shouldered a burden God would give us to bear.
That is not to say we do not have crosses to bear, that we are free to disobey what Christ commissions us to live, as His masterpeiece. (see Eph 2:10) There is a transformation in us, at our baptism, that as we live in faith causes us to take up the very crosses God has wanted us to bear, to make the sacrifices, to love, not just rolerate, the unlovable. A cross that requires us to confront brokenness, sinfulness, not with the goal of condemnation, but with the goal of seeing people healed in Jesus Christ. To lift the weary, to nurse the sick. These crosses take self-denial, or as it is put above, self-renunciation, Its putting others welfare – especially their eternal welfare, before our own wants and needs.
This is exactly what Paul is talking about in Philippians 2:
1 Your life in Christ makes you strong, and his love comforts you. You have fellowship with the Spirit, and you have kindness and compassion for one another. 2 I urge you, then, to make me completely happy by having the same thoughts, sharing the same love, and being one in soul and mind. 3 Don’t do anything from selfish ambition or from a cheap desire to boast, but be humble toward one another, always considering others better than yourselves. 4 And look out for one another’s interests, not just for your own. 5 The attitude you should have is the one that Christ Jesus had: Philippians 2:1-5 (TEV)
You might suggest that this is too much of a burden, that you are as unable to comply with this standard, as you are with the law of Moses. That I can’t expect sinners who are justified in Chirst to become this obedient, this transformed, this…. holy.
If that is true, why then inlude Christ’s commission to bear the cross in scripture? Or at least have it footnoted with the statement that this is the ideal? No, this is really what Christ commissions, what he expects, Beyond the above commissions, and Eph. 2:10, and Romans 12:1-8, and all of 1 John, we could add the Beattitudes, Hebrews 12:1-3, and the list goes on.
You have a cross to take up, a place to serve, where you bring people face to face with the God who brought you to Him.
How you do it, is actually simple – you remember you are nailed to the cross with Him, that you have died, that you have risen as His. That He never will leave us, and that as we look to Him, He transforms us into His likeness. THe description of that is the people who take up the cross – and walk like Him.
So I encourage you… start this new year right,
Call our Lord Have Mercy, and realize that loving others is proof that He has.
(1) Escriva, Josemaria (2011-01-31). Furrow (Kindle Locations 4024-4025). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
(2) Escriva, Josemaria (2011-01-31). The Forge (Kindle Locations 1976-1980). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
