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Life: God’s Version of “Take Your Child to Work’ Day” Week 9 – But Dad, You Promised! Psalm 91:9-14
Life: God’s Version of “Take Your Child to Work’ Day”
Week 9 – He Cares for Us! But Dad, You Promised!
Psalm 91:9-14
† Jesus, Son and Savior †
May the grace, mercy, peace and comfort of God be yours, as you endure life in this broken world!
- Intro: Scratch out that title
This morning I need you to do something.
I need you to take a pen, or one of those little stubby pencils. Got it?
Now open your bulletin to the title page. Come on – this is important!
Now scratch out that crazy title – that He cares for us!
No, not just a line – scribble over it, I don’t want to see those words! Think like a 5 year old, throwing a tantrum.
Now, write in, “But Dad, You Promised!!!!”
Ever have one of those days when you were doing something with your dad and mom, and there was a promise to do something after? Then when the task was done, for whatever reason we find unacceptable, they couldn’t fulfil their promise?
“But Dad, You Promised!”
- Is Frustration a Sign of Weak Faith?
That’s my reaction this week to the reading from Psalm 91, as a mixture of emotions, none of them positive—pour out when I read, “If you make the LORD your refuge, if you make the Most High your shelter, 10 no evil will conquer you; no plague will come near your home.”
On Monday, I thought about talking about how much God cares for us for the promises in this passage are quite clear!
By Wednesday, and the day of 10 critical prayer requests, all involving illness and physical afflictions (which is part of the idea of plague—not just anything that is an illness – but anything that stresses you physically and emotionally. I began wondering if the angels fell asleep or went on vacation this week, for the passage promises, “For he will order his angels to protect you wherever you go. 12 They will hold you up with their hands so you won’t even hurt your foot on a stone.” I mean, if we can’t blame God, maybe the angels got held up in a spiritual battle,
what part of this promise God forgot, and by Friday, I was beginning to question whether we haven’t made the Lord our refuge, we haven’t made him our shelter, all bets and promises are off.
So did God forget, were the angels lazy or delayed, or have we somehow spiritually failed?
And does my even asking that question raise a question of whether I trust God?
Where does doubt turn to sin?
And where does doubt turn to unbelief?
With promises like this, my heart cries out, seriously cries out at times, “But Fathr, You promised!”
And I struggle with the need that we have to cry that, and the fact we do…
So what is the answer? How do we explain suffering, illness and trauma, knowing the promises of God. How can I trust those promises, when it appears they aren’t kept?
I will protect him…
I will ask this again,
- How can we trust those promises, when it appears they aren’t kept?
We can’t just dismiss this seeming contradiction – we have to honestly deal with out doubts, and we can.
Of course, my private devotions didn’t help this week! From reading of the God ordained suffering in Ezekiel to this famous passage from James, “2 Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. 3 For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. 4 So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing. James 1:2-4 (NLT2)
I use other books as well, and whether from Luther or others, everything seemed about suffering and struggling, and how we are blessed. The one based on St. Francis was pretty blunt as well, “Even though he was completely worn out by his prolonged and serious illness, he threw himself on the ground, bruising his weakened bones in the hard fall. Kissing the ground, he said: “I thank you, Lord God, for all these sufferings of mine; and I ask you, my Lord, if it pleases you, to increase them a hundredfold. Because it will be most acceptable to me, that you do not spare me, afflicting me with suffering, since the fulfillment of your will is an overflowing consolation for me.”[1]
So on one hand, we have promises that God will protect us wherever we go – and in another we have the promise and evidence that Christians do have many challenges to deal with—but here is the caveat—what is the result of all of these challenges?
What does Francis see, or James, or King David—who wrote this Psalm but whose life…had its challenges, or Paul with his thorn in the flesh?
How come they can, in on moment cry out “Father God, you promised,” and then a moment later sing his praises, or find comfort in their struggles? It is as if they believe that other promise, that God uses all things for good for those who love Him and are called into His purpose.
That’s how they get there, and how we get there, as we stop seeing the challenges as challenges, but the opportunity to see God at work, doing the miraculous to bless us and others through the suffering.
So seek your refuge in Jesus, find your home, your shelter in the presence of God. There you will find yourself held onto through the storm, even as you hold onto God. There you will find you know His name, because He has given it you as you were made His child.
The greatest example of this can be seen when Satan confronts Jesus with this passage. Jump off from these heights – angels won’t let you land hard! And while Jesus doesn’t due that, can anyone really say that evil didn’t try to conquer Him?
It did not conquer Him, although He was afflicted more than any other. He endured the cross, despite the pain and the shame the book of Hebrews tells us. But how can a sacrifice that results in your salvation be evil? Not only you – but everyone who trusts and depends on God.
There is our faith! That is why the sacraments are so powerful, as we again realize that God has brought us into His presence, as we come to the altar, as we receive His precious Body and Blood – as we realize as Francis said, that it is okay, because we are more convinced of His will, and desire it more than our comfort in this life.
This is a time of healing, this is the time where we can pour out the doubt, the questions, the pain and stress. This is the time we look at the baptismal font and the altar and take a deep breath – and remember the love of God, and that He calls us by His name-the name by which our salvation and the promise that these challenges will result in good is made…
And then, instead of crying out, “but God, you promised” we cry out, “yes God, you promised, You are my refuge, You are my Home, You are my rescuer, and my Hope! ” as we sing His praises…
AMEN
[1] Pasquale, G., ed. (2011). Day by Day with Saint Francis: 365 Meditations (p. 274). New City Press.
What Good are our Broken Lives? More than you know!
Thoughts which call me closer to Jesus, and to the Cross..
43 “A good tree does not produce bad fruit, nor does a bad tree produce good fruit. 44 Each tree is known by its own fruit. People don’t gather figs from thornbushes, and they don’t get grapes from bushes. 45 Good people bring good things out of the good they stored in their hearts. But evil people bring evil things out of the evil they stored in their hearts. People speak the things that are in their hearts. Luke 6:43-45 NCV
LORD Jesus Christ, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter my sinful heart; yet, Thou deignest to recognize my great poverty and need. Therefore, I fervently desire Thy presence, to nourish, comfort, and strengthen my poor soul. Speak Thy word to my soul and it shall be well with me. Amen.
‘Remember, man, that thou are dust, and unto dust you shall return. There are implications to be found in this. If man had been fashioned from something that could evaporate, then there would be nothing for him to return to. But a man, even while he is living in the flesh, can return to his constituent element: He does this the moment he is ready to be what God has made him. Dust may not be romantic, but there could be nothing more real..”
When I read the words of Jesus, like those in red above, I feel diseased, depressed, for I look at some of the ways in which I live, and I don’t see good fruit. If I see any fruit it is at best too sour, to overripe, and usually too rotten–if it exists at all. I am not sure I count myself as evil, but if the judgement has too choices, good or evil…. well the preponderance of evidence is not always favorable.
And think about that, guilt and shame builds. I see myself as wretched and as a failure, (Please don’t argue – this is how I and many others feel with such a passage being read or meditated upon. ANd there is hope to come!)
So Loehe’s prayer is simple – and archaic, but the words are encouraging – and often mirror where I eventually come to, the prayer that God doesn’t belong in one such as me–but He doesn’t care what I think and know. He knows me enough to know I needed the cross, I needed HIs presence, and as I encounter it, and the love He has for a sinner like me–oh how I want it even more.
And then comes Zeller and Hanson, reminding me of the blessing of Ash Wednesday – the idea that we can return to the dust we were before our creation, and God can recreate us, by the same power that raised Christ Jesus from the dead. We can exchange that dust and ash for beauty, we become His new masterpiece, we become His…again.
The guilt and shame is removed, and for a moment we glimpse of the God who is ours, whom we are united too in baptism, who we commune with in the Eucharist, who we rise with from death and dust to a new and everlasting life.
Hevenly Father, let us know the weight of our sin, if only for an instant, that we may realize our need for Jesus, and for the healing which You so eagerly work in our lives. We oray this in Jesus name, amen!
Lœhe, William. 1914. Seed-Grains of Prayer: A Manual for Evangelical Christians. Translated by H. A. Weller. Chicago: Wartburg Publishing House.
Hubert con Zeller, “The choice of God”, quoted inJohn Hanson, Coached byJosemaria Escriva, (Scepter,NY, 2024), 54
Where God is Clearly Visible…if You Dare Look!
Thoughts that drag me to the cross…
7 Now you have every spiritual gift you need as you eagerly wait for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ. 8 He will keep you strong to the end so that you will be free from all blame on the day when our Lord Jesus Christ returns. 9 God will do this, for he is faithful to do what he says, and he has invited you into partnership with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. 1 Corinthians 1:7-9 (NLT2)
We must try to perceive Christ in the interruption of our plans and in the disappointment of our expectations; in difficulties, contradictions, and trials. No matter what happens, “We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him”
Daily in the mass we sing, “Heaven and earth are full of your glory” [Isa. 6:3].26 Why do we sing this? Because of the many blessings for which God must be praised, although this is done only by those who see the fulness of them.
As I read Keating and Luther this morning, I knew I had to reconcile that which I copied and pasted above.
I need to see God’s glory, His incredible love, for it surrounds me and those I know who love Him. (It even surrounds those who do not – though they cannot see it at all)
While I know it is there, I need to see it where Luther found it, in the interruption of our plans, in our failed expectations, in all the experiences in our lives that would appear to be negative. It is not easy, to perceive God’s hand in those moments of frustration or fear.
He is there. I can see that after the moment—but during it is a struggle.
Which is why I need to look at St. Paul’s words to the church in Corinth. I need to be reminded of God’s faithfulness. I need to be reminded of His promises, and that we work and walk, hand in hand with Jesus through our lives.
It is easy to see this partnership, this communion at the altar, as we receive His body and blood. TO be honest, there are weeks where that is all that gets me through. But I have to look up at the altar – and see the cross. I need to remember what Christ endured – and how that worked out for our best. Remembering that, I can turn to Him in prayer, and trust in Him.
He will reveal the hard times as beautiful, but that won’t be as important as simply knowing the Lord is with us.
Thomas Keating, The Daily Reader for Contemplative Living: Excerpts from the Works of Father Thomas Keating, O.C.S.O., Sacred Scripture, and Other Spiritual Writings, ed. S. Stephanie Iachetta (New York; London; New Delhi; Sydney: Bloomsbury, 2009), 228.
Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, Vol. 42: Devotional Writings I, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann, vol. 42 (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999), 146.
The Cure for “Boring” Spirituality/Christianity
Thoughts that give me confidence because Jesus is drawing us closer to Him!
I came naked from my mother’s womb,
and I will be naked when I leave.
The LORD gave me what I had,
and the LORD has taken it away.
Praise the name of the LORD!”
Job 1:21
Since all standard hymns have been edited to delete inferior stanzas and since any stanza of the average hymn can be sung in less than one minute … and since many of our best hymns have already been shortened as much as good taste will allow, we are forced to conclude that the habit of omitting the third stanza reveals religious boredom, pure and simple, and it would do our souls good if we would admit it.
As we begin to trust God more, we enjoy a certain freedom from our vices and may often experience great satisfaction in our spiritual endeavors. When God decides we are ready, he invites us to a new level of self-knowledge. God withdraws the initial consolations of conversion, and we are plunged in darkness, spiritual dryness, and confusion. We think that God has abandoned us.… Then comes a period of peace, enjoyment of a new inner freedom, the wonder of new insights. That takes time. Rarely is there a sudden movement to a new level of awareness that is permanent. What happens when we get to the bottom of the pile of our emotional debris? We are in divine union. There is no other obstacle.
The second and third readings are cause and effect.
When our worship becomes dry, when our spiritual lives exist in a state of boredom, we need God to take action.
But I will warn you, it isn’t pretty. It may not be as dramatic as Job encounters, but it will feel like it at times. (It does for me today) The classic devotional text The Dark Night of the Soul, also documents this, and how God allows Satan to strike us, for our good.
Like Job, the journey isn’t easy, like Job the challenges overwhelm us, and we find ourselves at the point of despair, and we will accuse God of abandoning us. That accusation may come with surprising force, because it comes from the darkest regions of our heart and soul.
God hears the accusation as a prayer. A cry for help that will be answered in a way that Keaton recognizes is full of peace. We abandon ourselves into the hands of a loving, merciful God, and are willing to see what He will do, for there is nothing else. Everything, including our hearts and minds are emptied out, and He is there… and that is what we need.
For we realize it is a blessed thing for God to take away what divides us from Him. That is part of His healing ministry.
Oddly enough, this healing work, stripping us of all that isn’t of God–that is the content of many of those “third verses” that Tozer laments the loss of. Consider this one
My sin, oh the bliss of this glorious thought (a thought)
My sin, not in part, but the whole (every bit, every bit, all of it)
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more (yes)
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul
(from It is Well with My Soul!)
God is with us…Blessed Be His Name!
A. W. Tozer, Tozer for the Christian Leader (Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2015).
Thomas Keating, The Daily Reader for Contemplative Living: Excerpts from the Works of Father Thomas Keating, O.C.S.O., Sacred Scripture, and Other Spiritual Writings, ed. S. Stephanie Iachetta (New York; London; New Delhi; Sydney: Bloomsbury, 2009), 179.
Blessed Be the Name of the Lord! (even when it is near impossible!)
31 But the other men who had explored the land with him disagreed. “We can’t go up against them! They are stronger than we are! Numbers 13:11 NLT
27 On the way, Jesus told them, “All of you will desert me. For the Scriptures say, ‘God will strike the Shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ 28 But after I am raised from the dead, I will go ahead of you to Galilee and meet you there.” Mark 14:27-28 (NLT2)
Thus the saintly Job said after he had lost his children and all his property, “The Lord gave it, and the Lord has taken it away; blessed be the name of the Lord” [Job 1:21]. Job, indeed, was a just man from whom no one could take anything because he had nothing that he called his own. God declares in Job 41 [:11], “Whatever is under the heaven is mine; I created it.” Why, then, do you boast about your possessions and wail about an injustice done you? If anyone touches your honor, your reputation, your possessions, or anything else that you have, he is encroaching not upon what is yours, but what is Christ’s! (Martin Luther)
Twice men believed they had lost it all, that they were capable of nothing.
The first time, they were going against giants. They forgot about the promises of God and HIs very presence at the tabernacle. They were not ready to take on the challenge, and they would choose to enter 40 years of trials rather
than recognize that God was there…
The second time is similar and even prophesied. The apostles would see Jesus taken – and even before the cross they ran away, they denied him; they could not stand beside Jesus, as they believed they should. They wanted to be there,
to stand with Him, even against the threat of death. They, too, failed, overwhelmed by their lack of strength and the conviction to hold to the One they trusted in…
So why do we think we shall be any better?
Actually, I think we can do better, but not by the strength of our conviction. Instead, we need to acknowledge not only our weakness but God’s wisdom.
Notice that I did not write God’s strength?
In our weakness, as Luther notes, everything is actually God’s. What He gives, what He takes away, He does out of His love and care for us. He makes a decision – in our favor! That we don’t understand that is challenging, very challenging.
Too many times in my life, I have second-guessed God, complained to Him (and to some others), and struggled with what has happened. Have a situation or two (or five!) like that going on right now! There is nothing I can do to change the situation except turn to God.
I wish I could say that is my first reaction, but like Israel and Peter, my faith in God, my trust in His wisdom waivers. Eventually, I will, as Israel would enter the Holy Land, as Peter would respond to Jesus’s love. At this point in my life, I know how things will end… that I will remember God is God, and He loves me. That doesn’t make the present battle more palatable – I just now have to depend on God’s love to endure… for I don’t walk alone. It may feel like I
do, but that feeling is one I have learned by experience is false. He is here… I’ve seen it too often in the past.
He is here… He is far greater than what oppresses and opposes me. Romans 8:28 and 8:38 are still promised….
If you are struggling in the darkness, I pray for you –that you don’t beat yourself up for not being faithful enough to shatter the darkness by yourself. Look to Jesus, remember the cross – where you were united to Him…where He claimed you as the Father’s child. Breathe deeply of His peace, let His love wash over you. And know there is a morning coming… where you will be able to see God’s love clearly – and how He cared for you through the night.
He is with you… and also with me.
So whatever happens, let us learn to say with Job, “Blessed be the name of the Lord!”
Luther, Martin. 1999. Luther’s Works, Vol. 42: Devotional Writings I. Edited by Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann. Vol. 42. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
Why We (even Luther and a Catholic Saint) Need a “Safe Place”
Thoughts that help us to adore Jesus, and encourage our devotion to Him..
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead 4 and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you. 5 You are being guarded by God’s power through faith for a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 You rejoice in this, even though now for a short time, if necessary, you suffer grief in various trials 7 so that the proven character of your faith—more valuable than gold which, though perishable, is refined by fire—may result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; though not seeing him now, you believe in him, and you rejoice with inexpressible and glorious joy, 9 because you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. I Peter 1:2-9 CSB
When we really come to admire and love the most sacred humanity of Jesus, we will discover each of his wounds, one by one. When we undergo periods of passive purgation, which we find painful and hard to bear, periods when we shed sweet and bitter tears, which we do our best to hide, we will feel the need to enter into each one of his most holy wounds: to be purified and strengthened, rejoicing in his redeeming Blood. We will go there like the doves which, in the words of Scripture, find shelter from the storm in the crevices in the rocks. We hide in this refuge to find the intimacy of Christ. We find his conversation soothing and his countenance comely15 because “those who know that his voice is gentle and pleasing are those who have welcomed the grace of the gospel, which makes them say: ‘You have the words of eternal life.’”
Second, I give thanks to him for these precious gifts, that he has revealed his name to me and bestowed it upon me, that I can glory in his name and be called God’s servant and creature, etc., that his name is my refuge like a mighty fortress to which the righteous man can flee and find protection, as Solomon says [Prov. 18:10]
I’ve heard people mock the youth for needing safe places, a
I’ve heard people make fun of brave people who state that they need a safe place.
Part of me wants to ensure those who make fun of others realize that they need a safe place as well. The easy way to do that is to firmly correct their errors! First, the error of their failure to love their neighbor. Second, their belief that they are beyond the need for a refuge, a sanctuary, a safe place.
Luther needed such a place; he wrote sermons and more than one hymn about the ability to find safety in the Mighty Fortress that is God. The words he wrote were not as much a doctrinal manifesto as the cry of a heart that needed comfort, that needed peace. Look a the words of his cry in what was never meant to be the battle anthem it has become. Look at the description of the prayer. He knew God was his safe place…
St. Josemaria also found that refuge, that place to hide, as he meditated on the love which welcomed the wounds borne at the cross. This is where we find the greatest and truly only safe place, where even sin cannot do its damage. It is paid for; it is forgiven.
At this point, in such a sanctuary, the words of Peter become so much more than words! Go up – and read them again!
There is an ability to deal with grief in various trials. It only comes in those intimate moments with God where we realize His ultimate plan. That amid the refining of our faith, as God removes all that is not of Him, that we find a joy that goes beyond anything we can explain. We may not even think of the eternity promised because we are now experiencing a foretaste of it as we rejoice in Christ!
This intimate grace, so full of compassion, so incredibly healing, as we find rest and peace, this is the glory of God, dwelling in us!
This is our safe place, amid the battles, the storms, the complications, the woundedness, and brokenness….
There are times I hate all of that… and yet… in an odd sense, I appreciate it all. For in it, when I don’t run, I realize I have a safe place….there… amid it all, in Jesus.
Lord, in the middle of life, when we are at our wit’s end… help us to remember that You are our safe place, our sanctuary, our Mighty Fortress. AMEN!
Oh – and stop making fun of people who know they need safe places – and invite them into yours!
Escrivá, Josemaría. Friends of God . Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, Vol. 43: Devotional Writings II, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann, vol. 43 (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999), 201.
Why I… pray the Lord’s Prayer
Thoughts for this day, that draws me closer to God….
7 When you pray, don’t babble like the Gentiles, since they imagine they’ll be heard for their many words. 8 Don’t be like them, because your Father knows the things you need before you ask him. 9 “Therefore, you should pray like this: Our Father in heaven, your name be honored as holy. 10 Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us today our daily bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And do not bring us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. Matthew 6:7-13 (CSBBible)
At dinner on the day after Pentecost [ Martin Luther said], “One shouldn’t think of any other God than Christ; whoever doesn’t speak through the mouth of Christ is not God. God wants to be heard through the Propitiator, and so he’ll listen to nobody except through Christ.
We can always trust the moving and the leading of the Holy Spirit in our lives and in our experiences. On the other hand, we cannot always trust our human leanings and our fleshly and carnal desires.
I have never gotten tired of talking about prayer, and with God’s grace I never will. I remember that, back in the thirties, as a young priest, people of all kinds used to come to me looking for ways of getting closer to our Lord. To all of them, university students and workers, healthy and sick, rich and poor, priests and laymen, I gave the same advice: “Pray.” If anyone replied, “I don’t even know how to begin,” I would advise him to put himself in God’s presence and tell him of his desires and anxiety, with that very same complaint: “Lord, I don’t know how to pray!” Often, humble admissions like that were the beginning of an intimate relationship with Christ, a lasting friendship with him. Many years have gone by, and I still don’t know of a better recipe. If you think you’re not quite ready to pray, go to Jesus as his disciples did and say to him, “Lord, teach us how to pray.”18 You will discover how the Holy Spirit “comes to the aid of our weakness; when we do not know what prayer to offer, to pray as we ought, the Spirit himself intercedes for us, with groans beyond all utterance,”19 which are impossible to describe, for no words are adequate to express their depth.
I find it odd, that when people talk about repetitive prayer, they often mention the verse just before Jesus teaches the disciples to pray… the Lord’s Prayer. Don’t babble on, or don’t be vain and repetitious as others translate the passage. And then comes the Lord’s prayer, which people say is vain and repetitious.
I will be the first to admit I have used it that way. Back in junior high school, we had races to see who could say it the fastest, or the entire rosary (I went to a Catholic parochial school.) And in doing so, we sinned, violating the
command about using God’s name in vain, for we didn’t think about Jesus when we prayed, we focused on speed and diction… not even the meaning of the words. There are days when I say it in church – that my thoughts are not focused on the words as much if we are saying it. (Which is why we more often sing it) It is easy to disengage. but that does not change it… just me.
As I have grown older, there have been more than a few times where I did not know how to pray. The words would not come through the anxiety, the words wouldn’t come through the tears, or even the times, where so overwhelmed, I
couldn’t cry. Finally, out of frustration, I would cry out, and pray the Lord’s prayer, letting the words of Jesus burrow through all the debris crushing my heart and soul.
And then, as St Josemaria put it, it was up to the Holy Spirit. Indeed, in those times, it is only the comfort of the Holy Spirit that brings that prayer to mind, who uses these words of Jesus to bring life where there is no life.
Tozer is dead on accurate with his point – it is the Spirit we need to trust, as we pray as Jesus said. For Satan loves to deny us hope, and peace, and the realization of God’s love.
And so by praying as Jesus taught, we again admit we don’t know how to pray, and in that humility the intimacy with God grows, we hear what He’s told us He will provide – from His kingdom, to His perfect Will occurring in our lives, to
what we need daily, food, the ability to know we are forgiven and the enabling of our forgiveness. What wonderful things! He goes on to provide us a way from temptation, and rescue us from evil….. WOW….
Because I didn’t know how to pray in the brokenness of the moment, I pray, and as the Trinity hears, my heart is reminded of what God provides.
And somehow, miraculously, I find peace in the storm.
That is why I pray the Lord’s prayer, it is where God leads, and the comfort it brings is extraordinary.
I pray you may as well!
Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, Vol. 54: Table Talk, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann, vol. 54 (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999), 155.
A. W. Tozer and Marilynne E. Foster, Tozer on the Holy Spirit: A 366-Day Devotional (Camp Hill, PA: WingSpread, 2007).
Escrivá, Josemaría. Friends of God . Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
When Trusting God is Challenging…
Devotional thought for this day:
31 For the Lord will not reject us forever. 32 Even if he causes suffering, he will show compassion according to the abundance of his faithful love. 33 For he does not enjoy bringing affliction or suffering on mankind. Lamentations 3:31-33 (CSBBible)
O most lovely and most loving Heart of Jesus, miserable is the heart which does not love Thee! O God, for the love of men Thou didst die on the cross, helpless and forsaken, and how then can men live so forgetful of Thee?
This is not the only time where the Scriptures declare God can cause suffering.
Jeremiah is clear, God doesn;t like afflicting or causing us to suffering, Yet trusting Him when it happens is certainly a challenge. Especially when the lesson is not for those who are suffering, but for those who are simply witnessing the suffering.
It is one thing if we deserve the suffering, or the person suffering does. We deserve enough of it, we need to be disciplined, in a way that only God can. That is, God disciplines us with great love, and with the specific aim of causing growth and restoration, to draw us back into the realization that He is present in our lives.
But what about when the lesson is for someone else, when our suffering serves as an example for those who are not suffering? The story of Job, the suffering of Paul, the embracing suffering of Eric Liddell and so many martyrs, people whose lives were cut short or damaged. How do we justify their suffering?
Or how are we able to trust in God, when it is our turn to suffer?
The only way I know, it to look to the heart of Jesus. We must allow the Holy Spirit to drive our intimacy with God so deep that we are sure of His love and care! We need to know this even as Jesus knew that the feeling of the Father’s abandonment would lead to the greatest of praise! (Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22) Intinacy with God causes us not to trust Him in the moment of suffering, but to rejoice in it!
This is why I love the altar, the place where peace is so clear, as the Lord’s Supper is being given, a momnet in time where we realize that Christ suffered for us, and that sharing in His sufferings is sharing with Him.
This doesn’t make the suffering easier…the pains still are there, the exhaustion, the mental anguish, and yet in its midst, there is peace.
For He is there… and seeing Him with us, we find ourselves in peace…..
And I will take that peace, that peace beyond all understanding, over things going “perfectly”.
Alphonsus de Liguori, The Holy Eucharist, ed. Eugene Grimm, The Complete Works of Saint Alphonsus de Liguori (New York; London; Dublin; Cincinnati; St. Louis: Benziger Brothers; R. Washbourne; M. H. Gill & Son, 1887), 301.
What Now? Hope…
Devotional Thought of the Day:
4 On the third dayq Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5 Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go over there to worship; then we’ll come back to you.” 6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac.r In his hand he took the fire and the knife,s and the two of them walked on together.
7 Then Isaac spoke to his father Abraham and said, “My father.”
And he replied, “Here I am, my son.”
Isaac said, “The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provideG,t the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” Then the two of them walked on together. Genesis 22:4-8 CSB
Love also implies hope. The Christian’s vision of our surroundings has to be optimistic. Not the naïve optimism of someone oblivious to the undeniable presence of evil, but that supernatural joy that is founded on a trusting abandonment to the plans of God’s loving Providence and on the free collaboration of people of good will with those plans.
To their mortal eyes He appeared as fire, and may we not safely conclude that those Scripture-taught believers knew at once what it meant? The God who had appeared to them as fire throughout all their long history was now dwelling in them as fire. He had moved from without to the interior of their lives. The Shekinah that had once blazed over the mercy seat now blazed on their foreheads as an external emblem of the fire that had invaded their natures.
This was Deity giving Himself to ransomed men. The flame was the seal of a new union. They were now men and women of the Fire.
I have seen a lot of despair in the last week. Politically among both those expeccted to win, and thosse expeccted to lose. I have seen it as well asthoseewh look at their churches and wonder how the churh will continue to be the church. They look for aswers, they dreamm dreamss, they read book about journeying into the unknown, looking for anything that wilgive them hope to continue their ministry, no matter how different it will look. Some of us, are in despair, because a good friend is ill, another is dealing with the loss of memory, and th ability to express their wisdom. More despair is being adresed by those who have someone dear to thm dying, and even harder, when onperson is being sucked into a ife of sn.
In the midst of this, I have hearpeople cry out, “now what?”
And I cry with them. I have to ask that question, for if I do not, I will not see the answer.
What now?
Hope!
(remember, it is a verb!) Hope, looking forward to the things God has promised.
So, what now? HOPE
You see that hope in Abraham, knowing he was going to sacrifice his son, and yet he says, that they will return together. You see it as he is tying up his son, and utters that God will provide.
No knowledge of how, but clinging to the idea that God cannot go back on his promise!
Hope is not naive! Hope is not to be confused with blind optimism. Hope is not blind to either evil, or the consequences of sin that is so visible in our broken world. It recognizes that, and something more….
It is abandoning our worries, our anxieities, our fears and pains simply because the Holy Spirit has invaded our lives. His presence, an unquenchable fire, causes us to endure…. even as it purifies us. This is where hope comes from, as the Holy Spirit is the guarantee of God’s love for us.
To realize the promises of God, such as this one, “5 Then I, myself, will be a protective wall of fire around Jerusalem, says the LORD. And I will be the glory inside the city!’” Zechariah 2:5 (NLT2)
This is the role of the Spirit in our lives… it is the Spirit who gives us real life… who gives us hope.
So what now? Hope! for the Lord is with you!!
Fazio, Mariano . Last of the Romantics: St. Josemaria in the Twenty-First Century (p. 68). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
A. W. Tozer and Marilynne E. Foster, Tozer on the Holy Spirit: A 366-Day Devotional (Camp Hill, PA: WingSpread, 2007).
Can We Lament? Will We Recognize its Cause?
Devotional Thought of the Day:
1 Our glittering gold has grown dull; the stones of the Temple lie scattered in the streets. 2 Zion’s young people were as precious to us as gold, but now they are treated like common clay pots. 3 Even a mother wolf will nurse her cubs, but my people are like ostriches, cruel to their young. 4 They let their babies die of hunger and thirst; children are begging for food that no one will give them. 5 People who once ate the finest foods die starving in the streets; those raised in luxury are pawing through garbage for food. 6 My people have been punished even more than the inhabitants of Sodom, which met a sudden downfall at the hands of God.
Lamentations 4:1-6 (TEV)
Our inner life should not be less important to us than outward performance, than sports, or technical ability. The “growth of the interior person” is deserving of our whole commitment: the world needs those who have become interiorly mature and rich.
There are a lot of people “remembering” today. A lot of people saying “never forget”.
But what have they remembered? The heroes, of whom we have so little information and background? Are they remembering the pain, the shock, the hurt, and dare I say the hatred towards those that look like, or sound like those who hijacked planes?
Or are they fondly looking back at 9/12 and the “revival” of patriotism that swept America?
As I came across these two readings this morning, I wondered the unthinkable. How many of those people in the twin towers walked with God that day? How many of them didn’t?
As I read Jeremiah’s lament, I wonder if we’ve lost the ability to lament of the present, and only remember the past? Do we see the trauma today, as we look out on the homeless, those who are abused, those who are traumatized by their health, their finances, the relationships that are shadows, dark shadows of what they should be, that they are in? Do we see those who might let their babies die. Do we see those who are suffering the punishment due for their sin… or sadly… ours?
We need to lament of the present! We need to be able to see the brokenness that surrounds us, and be there, bringing the comfort that only God can give them, but gives to them through His people.
Many of those situations don’t have easy fixes. But lament, in the presence of God, reminds us that He is with us, that has a plan, His presence brings a peace that is beyond understanding, which is why a Christian makes a difference when they bear Jesus into that room, into that situation. Into that moment of despair.
But to do that, we have to be connected to God ourselves. We have to have the awareness of His presence that comes from wrestling with our own lament, and being comforted by Him. It comes from spending time communing with God, and finding the rich strength that comes to us as we take and eat, and take and drink the Body and Blood of the Lord. As we cry out with our heart, and know His response. As we find rest at the end of our tears, knowing He is our fortress and sanctuary, that He is our “safe place”
God is with us, and will be.
Not just as we remember on 9/11, but as we struggle every day amid trauma and strife, amid anxiety and pain, for He has sent us into these places, to reflect His light in darkness.
Lord, help us see that in our lives which we need to lament. Help us be there for those who do not know they can, help us hold the hands, dry the tears, weeop and laugh. Lord, help us to realize your presence, and do those things, not for their own sake, or even ours, but to walk with you. In Jesus name, AMEN!
Joseph Ratzinger, Co-Workers of the Truth: Meditations for Every Day of the Year, ed. Irene Grassl, trans. Mary Frances McCarthy and Lothar Krauth (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992), 292.
