This week we celebrated Pentecost -- the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles that gave them the courage and tools to go out and proclaim the Good News. In John's gospel, Jesus breathes the Spirit upon upon them, and in Acts of Apostles the Spirit comes down like tongues of fire. Either way, the Spirit empowers them to do things that would otherwise have been impossible.
Fr. David said something that really stuck with me: that religious faith is the most powerful human experience there is. It's real. It's so real that it calls us to, and speaks to us of, the kind of life God wants us to have -- Eternal life. Basing our lives on Christian faith is like building a house on solid rock, like planting our roots in deep earth.
The 'world' is seductive with answers, and it tells us we have everything we need in it. Cars, televisions, hockey matches; everything that is exhilarating; everything that is life. But really, all of it is fleeting, here for a season and then gone. Basing our lives on these things is like building a house on sand, like planting our roots in a land without water.
As Fr. David pointed out, Jesus found his disciples at the shore because they had returned to their old lives and were fishing. It was too much for them, and they ran. But he came after them, and called them back, and gave them the Spirit so they could do the work they were called to do. In the same way we, too, sometimes run away, back to the soft and easy ground that demands less of us. And, in the same way, the Spirit fills us with the power to return to God Who is our rock and fortress. The Spirit is not gone but among us, was given and has not been taken away.
As members of the universal priesthood of all believers, we have been given the power of God and the strength of God to preach the Gospel by building our lives on the faith of Christ Jesus. At Pentecost, we celebrate the work of the Spirit in all the world by recalling those disciples who, though frightened, built up the foundation of our faith.
How do we, as Christians, lead others to the sure foundation of faith, and how do we build upon it by allowing the Spirit to move within ourselves?
Sunday, May 23, 2010
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Game Changers
Written by Jeff Alexander
Who was St. Monica, other than the namesake of the city in southwest California? On this Mother’s Day, it was interesting to hear from Father David Hart the story of St. Monica and her more-famous child, Augustine of Hippo. Before the latter became one of the most important “deep thinkers” of the early church, Augustine led a pretty self-indulgent life of wine, women and song, and became a devotee of non-Christian beliefs and philosophies while away at school in the big city of Carthage. Monica, however, was a devoted Christian, and kept at her son, praying for him and pleading with him to put his belief in Jesus. Augustine eventually became not just a believer, but devoted his life and great mind to working for God.
In Augustine’s life, Monica was the game changer. Without her, he was living it up; he even snuck away from her while they were both in Rome. But Monica was tenacious; she caught up with him in Milan, where Augustine eventually was baptized into the Christian church. Her interventions brought him to a place where he came to faith, and the rest is (literally) history.
The term “game changer” gets tossed around with regularity in the mainstream media. It reflects the point in an event that shifts the momentum significantly. The British media labeled now-former Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s “bigoted woman” gaffe the game changer of the recent election.
Father David challenged us to think about the “game changers” in our lives. Whom has God put in our paths to point us to Him? What circumstances have brought us to a deeper faith, possibly through a crisis? Do others see us as their game changers?
It is at the same time humbling and amazing to consider how God works all things to His plan. Please note: I am not saying that God makes all things happen, and tragedies and victories are both slapped with a generic “good” label. Horrible, heart-wrenching things happen in this world with regularity, just as do joyous, miraculous and triumphant things. But God works within human history – sometimes more directly than others – to bring about goodness and to shine His light in the world. And the ultimate goodness is that souls are won to Him to spend eternity in a new heaven and new earth where horrors and tragedies aren’t even memories, and where “coincidence” isn’t found in the dictionary.
Make the most of your opportunities to change the game for someone every day.
Who was St. Monica, other than the namesake of the city in southwest California? On this Mother’s Day, it was interesting to hear from Father David Hart the story of St. Monica and her more-famous child, Augustine of Hippo. Before the latter became one of the most important “deep thinkers” of the early church, Augustine led a pretty self-indulgent life of wine, women and song, and became a devotee of non-Christian beliefs and philosophies while away at school in the big city of Carthage. Monica, however, was a devoted Christian, and kept at her son, praying for him and pleading with him to put his belief in Jesus. Augustine eventually became not just a believer, but devoted his life and great mind to working for God.
In Augustine’s life, Monica was the game changer. Without her, he was living it up; he even snuck away from her while they were both in Rome. But Monica was tenacious; she caught up with him in Milan, where Augustine eventually was baptized into the Christian church. Her interventions brought him to a place where he came to faith, and the rest is (literally) history.
The term “game changer” gets tossed around with regularity in the mainstream media. It reflects the point in an event that shifts the momentum significantly. The British media labeled now-former Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s “bigoted woman” gaffe the game changer of the recent election.
Father David challenged us to think about the “game changers” in our lives. Whom has God put in our paths to point us to Him? What circumstances have brought us to a deeper faith, possibly through a crisis? Do others see us as their game changers?
It is at the same time humbling and amazing to consider how God works all things to His plan. Please note: I am not saying that God makes all things happen, and tragedies and victories are both slapped with a generic “good” label. Horrible, heart-wrenching things happen in this world with regularity, just as do joyous, miraculous and triumphant things. But God works within human history – sometimes more directly than others – to bring about goodness and to shine His light in the world. And the ultimate goodness is that souls are won to Him to spend eternity in a new heaven and new earth where horrors and tragedies aren’t even memories, and where “coincidence” isn’t found in the dictionary.
Make the most of your opportunities to change the game for someone every day.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Jesus, The Non-Disney Version
This Sunday, Jeff reminded us of the book at the end of the Bible that so many people want to forget: Revelation. This book has caused division within churches and between denominations as people fight over things like if Jesus will come before the millennium or afterward, who the Antichrist is, and whether or not there will be a literal dragon.
Whatever our take on it, Revelation does not present us with an image of Jesus-meek-and-mild. It's an R-rated gore fest filled with rivers of blood and a lot of killing. There's a final battle and everlasting torment. There's even childbirth and prostitution.
Even though we can take comfort in knowing how it ends -- God wins -- Revelation still challenges us and makes us uneasy. It isn't a picture of Jesus that we want to see. It isn't an end we really want to envision. It isn't the kind of all-forgiving, sweet God that we want to believe in. Seen through our modern eyes, it brings on a crisis of Christian belief because it means Jesus has not usurped the place of YHWH in the Hebrew Scriptures and set up a monarchy of absolute pacifism. Jesus comes in power with a sword in his mouth that will be used for slaughter.
This is not the way we imagine God's grace, and it isn't what we understand as every tear being wiped away. So what is it?
As Jeff pointed out, it's a picture of God's justice. Heaven is a perfect place, and so all sin must be eliminated. There's simply no question about it: in a place without death, sorrow, or crying anymore, all that does not fit with God's perfection must be purged. Only in such a place could we dwell with God.
I don't know whether or not the end of times will really be like this. I think the outpouring of God's unmerited grace manifests in the world both as mercy and justice, and that the two cannot be separated.
In this world, it makes sense that the image of God's justice would be one of destructive warfare. After all, we've seen that while love and peace can stand firm against iniquity, and sometimes even overcome it, it can't destroy it. But while this may be a picture of justice we can understand, I don't think it's literally true. In the same way, the image of the Good Shepherd coming to lead us all to green pastures makes sense of God's mercy. But I don't really think it will be like that. These pictures help us grasp what is fundamentally incomprehensible about God, which is that He's both perfectly just and perfectly merciful.
When the end comes, we won't need any of these images anymore. All the images, like all things, will be made new. Until then, Revelation helps us remember that, whatever we think God is like, He isn't that, because He's so much more. Even though He gives Himself to us in the person of Jesus, we cannot enclose or comprehend him in our own flawed humanity.
While building a church on a missionary assignment, Homer Simpson says, "Well, I may not know much about God, but I have to say we built a pretty nice cage for Him." In what ways do we try to limit God to being only what we want Him to be?
Whatever our take on it, Revelation does not present us with an image of Jesus-meek-and-mild. It's an R-rated gore fest filled with rivers of blood and a lot of killing. There's a final battle and everlasting torment. There's even childbirth and prostitution.
Even though we can take comfort in knowing how it ends -- God wins -- Revelation still challenges us and makes us uneasy. It isn't a picture of Jesus that we want to see. It isn't an end we really want to envision. It isn't the kind of all-forgiving, sweet God that we want to believe in. Seen through our modern eyes, it brings on a crisis of Christian belief because it means Jesus has not usurped the place of YHWH in the Hebrew Scriptures and set up a monarchy of absolute pacifism. Jesus comes in power with a sword in his mouth that will be used for slaughter.
This is not the way we imagine God's grace, and it isn't what we understand as every tear being wiped away. So what is it?
As Jeff pointed out, it's a picture of God's justice. Heaven is a perfect place, and so all sin must be eliminated. There's simply no question about it: in a place without death, sorrow, or crying anymore, all that does not fit with God's perfection must be purged. Only in such a place could we dwell with God.
I don't know whether or not the end of times will really be like this. I think the outpouring of God's unmerited grace manifests in the world both as mercy and justice, and that the two cannot be separated.
In this world, it makes sense that the image of God's justice would be one of destructive warfare. After all, we've seen that while love and peace can stand firm against iniquity, and sometimes even overcome it, it can't destroy it. But while this may be a picture of justice we can understand, I don't think it's literally true. In the same way, the image of the Good Shepherd coming to lead us all to green pastures makes sense of God's mercy. But I don't really think it will be like that. These pictures help us grasp what is fundamentally incomprehensible about God, which is that He's both perfectly just and perfectly merciful.
When the end comes, we won't need any of these images anymore. All the images, like all things, will be made new. Until then, Revelation helps us remember that, whatever we think God is like, He isn't that, because He's so much more. Even though He gives Himself to us in the person of Jesus, we cannot enclose or comprehend him in our own flawed humanity.
While building a church on a missionary assignment, Homer Simpson says, "Well, I may not know much about God, but I have to say we built a pretty nice cage for Him." In what ways do we try to limit God to being only what we want Him to be?
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