31 May 2021 - magnify

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Mary set out

and traveled to the hill country in haste

to a town of Judah

Mary's concern was consistently with how she could be a blessing to others. Even after receiving what must have been a challenging message from Gabriel she still let the one part of that message that might have indicated a need on the part of someone else motivate her and immediately set her direction.

And behold, Elizabeth, your relative, has also conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her who was called barren; (see Luke 1:36)

Any pregnancy is difficult enough, but one assumes that old age only compounds the challenge, making it even harder for Elizabeth to fulfill her own role and obligations in her family. Hopefully Zechariah tried to help, but it was understandable why another woman would be more able to assist with the domestic matters to which Elizabeth was less and less able to attend.

where she entered the house of Zechariah

and greeted Elizabeth.

Mary went in haste to a place where she could help, a bless where she would be welcomed and could be a blessing.

Most blessed are you among women,

and blessed is the fruit of your womb.

Mary was blessed herself in order that she could be a blessing to others. God knew, and Mary's fiat proved, that she would be one hundred percent available for him and his will, ready to move in haste in response to his call and in response to the need in the world.

Mary was to be the ark of the New Covenant who would bring God's presence into situations such as that of Elizabeth, to that of Simeon in the temple, to Bernadette at Lourdes, to the children at Fatima, to Saint Juan Diego, and to so many others. No one else could have filled this role that was given to Mary. Only she was sufficiently free from self-involvement that her presence could be completely transparent to the presence of Jesus himself.

And how does this happen to me,

that the mother of my Lord should come to me?

For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears,

the infant in my womb leaped for joy.

Mary brought Jesus to Elizabeth and inspired joy in her heart and the heart of her yet unborn child. The moment when the infant leapt for joy was traditionally understood as the moment when he was sanctified himself from original sin while still yet in his mother's womb. We see in this example that the blessings Mary brings were not merely sentimental, or even helpful in challenging circumstances, or even restorative in situations of real hardship. Mary brought transformation. This is because she brought Jesus, yes, but also because she at the same time demonstrated par excellence how to relate to him.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord;

    my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

    for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.

Mary demonstrated how to be sufficiently empty of her own agenda to be completely available for God, to be so humble that his presence overflowed from her to the situations of her daily life. Yes, the Visitation was a high drama of the Spirit. But it was also a mundane and regular aspect of life in those times. The same could be said for the Presentation. It wasn't as though Mary was doing mighty deeds. It was the Almighty that had done and continued to do anything good in her that made her a blessing. And this, she would have us know, was available not only to her, but to all those who fear him in every generation, to the lowly, to those who hunger for righteousness, and to those who wait on the promises of God.

Mary still comes in haste to those who will welcome her and for whom she can bring blessings from God. May we be open to her coming, and learn from the song she teaches us to become like her, to become, in turn, blessings and occasions of the experience of God's presence for others.

The LORD, your God, is in your midst,

    a mighty savior;

He will rejoice over you with gladness,

    and renew you in his love,

He will sing joyfully because of you,

    as one sings at festivals.

John Michael Talbot - Holy is His Name

30 May 2021 - the one and the many

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Did a people ever hear the voice of God

speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live?

We could go on to ask whether any other people received the revelation that God was the unity of three persons in one God that we call the Holy Trinity. We can delight as did the Israelites in the fact that God desired to be known to us, and this so that we could be his people, those especially his, and to live as such.

This is why you must now know,

and fix in your heart, that the LORD is God

We do not backtrack on the strict monotheism of Israel by entering into some kind of qualified polytheism. The sense in which the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are persons is a different sense than that in which pagan deities were thought to be like men and women. The persons of the Trinity are persons in a greater sense than we are, but a sense  does not require the strict separation each to the other that we find in all the other examples of persons of which we have experience. 

We can see something of what it means to be a person of the Holy Trinity when we see God relating to himself in the Scriptures. When the Father sends the Son, when the Son goes forth in obedience to the Father, and when the Father and the Son share in the same Holy Spirit, what we are seeing in the the world of time are the relations of God to himself that exist from all eternity and which relations are themselves the persons that have been made known to us. 

When we relate to each other our relationships are not so real as to become themselves persons. But this is not so for God. God is so fully actualized and complete that his relationships within himself are more real than any merely human relationships. The relationships of God themselves can be described by terms we recognize, Father, Son, and Spirit. But though these terms are familiar, they mean even more in God than they do in humankind (see Ephesians 3:15). We image those relationships in a way that happens over the course of years, more or less perfectly. But God is always the complete fullness of the meaning of the  relationships of Father, Son, and Spirit without beginning or end, from all eternity. Because this is so we are permitted to say that God is love. Not merely is he loving as something he does, but rather love is what he is. God is relationship and so God is love. This is why the name revealed by Jesus in the Gospel today is only one name, "the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" and not 'the names of' as our human expectations might have caused us to guess.

Did a people ever hear the voice of God

speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live?

God desires to be known by us, to take us and to make us his people. The fact that he is not easily understand, reducible to logical formulae and description should give us evidence us the fact that he is exalted, holy, and lifted up. We should not expect a God that is easily comprehensible to us. And yet the fearful reality is that it is the God who is thus exalted that we are called to come to know. This is why the reality of the Trinity isn't an optional extra for the consideration of theologians. But he does not desire to be known so that we can pass a test correctly describing him so much as so that we can enter into the reality of his life.

you received a Spirit of adoption,

through whom we cry, “Abba, Father!”

The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit

that we are children of God,

and if children, then heirs,

heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ

We dare to call God our Father because we have been taught by the Son and have received the Spirit of adoption. Jesus invites us to enter into and share in his own position as favored child, to enter into the same interchange of love between himself and the Father which is itself the Holy Spirit. The Trinity is made known to us so that we can enter in, so that we can become sons and daughters of the Father, living the life in the Spirit. Because we are made to share in this love of God who is in fact one God we are able to overcome the limits of our own self-isolation and our need for self-protection. 

In the life of the Trinity it is OK for us to be vulnerable enough to have relationships which really and deeply connect us with others. Because he is not merely three different gods we too can be elevated above the isolated individuality that is ours apart from him.  Further, he is not simply one God showing different faces, for then his love would be mere pretense, or something he did. Because of that our own love can become more real and less pretense. We can become partakers of the divine nature (see Second Peter 1:4), which is to say, partakers of an existence which is itself a dance of love.

Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.

Audrey Assad - Holy, Holy, Holy

29 May 2021 - on not taking the bait

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Was John’s baptism of heavenly or of human origin?  Answer me.

The chief priests, the scribes, and the elders asked what might have been a legitimate question when they asked, "By what authority are you doing these things?" It was an answer which Jesus was more than willing to provide at another time in another context.

For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man (see John 5:26-27).

Why then did Jesus not simply provide an answer in the present case? Was he just interested in stirring up trouble? Although Jesus was definitely not trouble averse there was an additional reason in this case.

So they said to Jesus in reply, “We do not know.”

Those who questioned Jesus were being disingenuous. They weren't interested in the truth, and so giving them too much of it would not have been helpful for them. If they had been able to say one thing or the other about the baptism of John, that it was from heaven or from earth, that might be some basis from which a dialog could begin. Even if they had said they did not believe in John, if they were actually interested in the truth about such things, stating that belief directly could have been a beginning with which Jesus could work.

“Neither shall I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

Jesus was willing to discuss the truth with those who wanted to know it. But to those who had no interest. or who had only mere curiosity about what he might say, he would give no answer. Those who were asking questions only so that they could appear favorably in the eyes of others...

“If we say, ‘Of heavenly origin,’ he will say,

‘Then why did you not believe him?’

But shall we say, ‘Of human origin’?”–

they feared the crowd,

...he did not feel compelled to engage in argument. It wasn't that Jesus did anything overly clever and elaborate in his response, as he sometimes trapped his questioners in their own questions (as he did with those who caught the woman in adultery). Rather, he demonstrated a simple, practical principle that can be helpful for anyone. There is no point in arguing with the insincere, with those who have ulterior motives, who aren't willing to at least state the truth as they understand it directly but instead are crafting a message to please a certain demographic. 

Jesus was willing to persuade those who would allow themselves to be swayed, to convince those with ears to hear. But to enter into an argument with ones such as we read about today would have only confused them and possibly caused them to further harden their hearts. The fact that they must have been frustrated with the answer Jesus gave was in fact a challenge to them to become more sincere themselves so that they might learn to say what they meant and to ask what they really didn't understand or desired to know.

The Spirit of Jesus intends for us to have the gift of the same wisdom which Jesus himself displayed. We are meant to know when to engage and when not to engage. We are enjoined to be ready to give an answer (see First Peter 3:15). But we aren't supposed to getting consistently caught up in debates that don't matter, debates about mere words (see Second Timothy 2:14). There is a time to speak and a time to be silent, and Jesus wants us to have the wisdom to know which is which.

When I was young and innocent,

    I sought wisdom openly in my prayer

I prayed for her before the temple,

    and I will seek her until the end,

    and she flourished as a grape soon ripe.

Matt Maher - Sophia

DC Talk - Red Letters

28 May 2021 - zeal for our hearts

Today's Readings

(Audio)

They came to Jerusalem,

and on entering the temple area

he began to drive out those selling and buying there.

We are temples of the Holy Spirit. Just as zeal for the house of his Father consumed our Lord, so too does he zealously pursue our hearts. He is jealous for us with a divine jealousy. He knows that we often pursue idols and he compares this adultery (for instance, see Ezekiel 23:37), infidelity to the one who is all good and deserving of all of our love. He knows that when we permit lesser things to usurp his place in our hearts we do not experience freedom or happiness but rather enslavement, anxiety, and fear. If we try to give Jesus only the religious part of our lives but keep the parts related to career, money, and providing for our families to ourselves, and to run those parts on our own, without reference to him, those parts of our lives will consume us and make us miserable. Assuredly, no one trading in the temple was as happy as those who were actually able to find the peace and quiet of prayer and the presence of God.

He overturned the tables of the money changers

and the seats of those who were selling doves.

He did not permit anyone to carry anything through the temple area.

We hear occasionally about the idea of righteous anger, that is, the right amount of anger, for the right reason, at the right thing. Seeing Jesus angry shows us what might be a legitimate reason to be angry. We see him angry and any social conventions or institutions that prevent people from coming to the Lord and from fully living their God-given potential.

Jesus gets angry with any aspects of our habits or behavior that prevent us from growing closer to him. He might even get a little violent in the means he uses to uproot these vices from us. But this is because he is being protective of a greater positive good we are meant to know, and of our relationship with him. 

My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples?

    But you have made it a den of thieves.”

A second aspect of the holy anger of Jesus was that the purpose of the temple being compromised was causing the exclusion of a whole class of people. These outer courts were meant to be a place where the Gentiles could come to pray. But this could hardly been expected with the clamor and noise of all the buying and selling. It would be hard for the Gentiles to even perceive that this was supposed to be a place of prayer, and if they perceived it, still, it would be almost impossible for them to enter in.

The chief priests and the scribes came to hear of it

and were seeking a way to put him to death,

yet they feared him

because the whole crowd was astonished at his teaching.

To the degree that we don't put God first in our lives we risk being unable to be inclusive in the way that God desires. We will be too full of care for money or sex or power to give the poor and the outcasts of society their due.

We need Jesus to help purify our hearts so that we can bear fruit no matter the season. We must be willing to allow him to chase from our the most inner spheres of our hearts things which do not belong there, whether greed or unforgiveness. When our hearts are functioning as intended, when we are living as temples of the Spirit, our prayers become powerful.

It is, after all, only in God that true wealth and true blessing are to be found.

And for all time their progeny will endure,

    their glory will never be blotted out.

Vineyard Worship - Refiner's Fire

27 May 2021 - desire and sight

Today's Readings

(Audio)

“Jesus, son of David, have pity on me.”

Jesus always responds to our desire for him. He seems especially receptive to those who go out of their way to see him, those who are willing to make a scene, and even to be looked down upon by others. The crowd is a perpetual phenomenon that makes approaching Jesus difficult. We might have to climb a tree to see him. We might have to keep calling out to him when we are told to be silent. We might be rebuked for being too childlike. Yet Jesus responds to those who refuse to let the crowds keep him from them. He preaches to the crowds, but his healing power goes out to those outliers who seek him with all their heart. The path to the Lord's power is humility that perseveres.

And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent.

But he kept calling out all the more, “Son of David, have pity on me.”

Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.”

So they called the blind man, saying to him,

“Take courage; get up, Jesus is calling you.”

It is unfortunate that the crowd seemed to help not so much because those in it cared as because they feel like they should help. They realized that Jesus was apparently requesting the opposite of what they had been attempting in trying to keep Bartimaeus from bothering him, and, to their credit, they were at least able to perform an about face. For our part we want to be more like Bartimaeus and less like the crowd. We want to realize our desperate need for Jesus and act accordingly. We must be on guard against being so comfortable around Jesus that we see our role as a maintenance of the status quo.

Jesus said to him in reply, “What do you want me to do for you?”

The blind man replied to him, “Master, I want to see.”

The members of that crowd didn't realize that there was a way in they themselves were blind. They, and we to some extent are all like the Pharisees, of whom Jesus said, "you remain guilty because you claim you can see" (see John 9:41).  In our complacency and desire for the status quo we necessarily substitute illusion for true vision. But what do we really see if we don't realize the depth of our need for Jesus?

Jesus told him, ‘Go your way; your faith has saved you.”

Immediately he received his sight

and followed him on the way.

The crowd was close to Jesus and believed that it was seeing him. Bartimaeus was at a distance, but he perceived the deeper truth of the identity of Jesus by faith. His unrestrained desire reached out to Jesus and Jesus responded. The faith that saw more deeply than sight also restored vision to his eyes.

The writer of Sirach knew that in this life we never see as much as we might see of God and his works.

Yet even God’s holy ones must fail

    in recounting the wonders of the LORD,

Though God has given these, his hosts, the strength

    to stand firm before his glory.

It is even likely that by comparison to what remains unseen the things we do see are but a small percentage. That there is so much more for us gives us good grounds to have the very same desperate desire of Bartimaeus, the very same willingness to do all we can to direct our gaze toward the light of the world, Jesus Christ, and to see everything else in that glorious light.

The Most High possesses all knowledge,

    and sees from of old the things that are to come:

He makes known the past and the future,

    and reveals the deepest secrets.

Sonicflood - Open the Eyes Of My Heart

David Crowder Band - Undignified

26 May 2021 - motivated

Today's Readings

(Audio)

“Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man

will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, 

and they will condemn him to death

and hand him over to the Gentiles who will mock him,

spit upon him, scourge him, and put him to death,

but after three days he will rise.”

The cross is often the point where we turn back, stumble, or look for alternatives. We're usually OK with following Jesus when he is teaching, when he is working mighty deeds and making his Father known. When we're called to enter into his self-sacrificial love we don't necessarily turn back, but even when we continue to follow him there is often an inward and self-protective turn. Before we encounter the cross we follow Jesus for his own sake. At the cross we bargain and try to make it pay off for ourselves.

They answered him,

“Grant that in your glory

we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.”

The irony is that the cross will pay off for us, but in a way that is beyond what we can imagine or hope. The fruit of the cross for us will be more and not less than anything with which we try to justify it to our flesh beforehand. However we justify it to ourselves the most important thing is that we keep moving forward. 

Jesus said to them, “The chalice that I drink, you will drink,

and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized;

The motivations that help us along the way may be partial, but as long as we do not turn aside from following Jesus those motivations themselves can be transformed by the journey. James and John would have to learn that in the kingdom of Jesus the thrones would be quite different from the ones they imagined. There was still some desire for power and pride that they would need to relinquish on the way to those thrones. But simply by not giving up on Jesus and by persevering in following him they would learn to relinquish them.

For the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve

and to give his life as a ransom for many.

The path to glory and fulfillment and the path of humble service and love are the same path. Jesus demonstrated how these two paths are not in opposition. In him we saw, in the flesh, God who is totally content in himself, to whom the universe can offer nothing, whose very existence is a joyous exchange of love. Yet this very same one, this glorious one, chose to become the servant of all so that the love between the persons of the Trinity could overflow into the world. Only in Jesus can this apparent dichotomy of humility and glory make sense to us. Only in him can we see how to follow both paths at once. He can use even imperfect motivations if we pursue him because he himself is the one who can purify them.

Hear the prayer of your servants,

    for you are ever gracious to your people;

    and lead us in the way of justice.

Thus it will be known to the very ends of the earth

    that you are the eternal God.

Chris and Conrad - Lead Me to the Cross

25 May 2021 - delight yourself in him

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Delight yourself in the Lord,

    and he will give you the desires of your heart (see Psalm 37:4).

Christianity is seen by many in the world as a religion of negation, where we deny desire out of duty to God. And assuredly there are plenty of times when we are called to deny our lower desires. But this is not because we desire too much, but rather too little. 

"It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased." 

- CS Lewis

Jesus promised that if we would seek first the kingdom we would receive all else (see Matthew 6:33). But apparently in seeking the kingdom Peter felt more or the absence of the things he gave up and less of the promised results.

‘We have given up everything and followed you.”

Jesus did not say to Peter that he should just ignore his desires and double down on acting from a sense of duty. Nor did he say that all of the rewards of following him would be in the life to come. He told him that he would receive "a hundred times more now in this present age", not as though this age would be perfect, for it would include persecutions as well. It was true that the complete fulfillment of the desire that drew Peter to Jesus and kept him following him would only be fully fulfilled in the life to come. The promise would be completed then, but it did not begin then.

Jesus promised that those who put Jesus and his kingdom first would receive "houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions" right now in this present age. Jesus was clearly speaking of a different relationship to things than one like those which Peter left behind to follow Jesus. Peter's desire for the legitimate goods of his past life was meant to find a new and spiritual fulfillment. All of those who followed Jesus would be his brothers and sisters. The Mother of Jesus would be his own mother, as we celebrated yesterday. The house of anyone would be the house of all, for they shared all things in common. And more than that, the house of the Father would be Peter's own house. It wasn't that Jesus had no concern for family or property but he had a more expansive plan in mind, a still greater fulfillment of those legitimate impulses.

We can learn a new relationship to earthly goods that affirms their value while remaining free from the power they have over us. We can be like Paul who said, "I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound" (see Philippians 4:11). The secret, of course, was to put Jesus first. Hence he went on to say, "I can do all things through him who strengthens me" (see Philippians 4:13). 

What piece of this puzzle was Peter missing? He gave up everything for the sake of Christ but was apparently not experiencing the blessings that life in Christ was meant to entail. It seemed a legitimate question to put to a Messiah who was meant to be the yes to all of the promises of all the prophets. We ask it too. 'Lord, I'm seeking first your kingdom but it feels more like effort and self-denial than like something a hundred times better than the things I left behind.' 

For the LORD is one who always repays,

    and he will give back to you sevenfold.

But offer no bribes, these he does not accept!

    Trust not in sacrifice of the fruits of extortion.

Perhaps we are still thinking of our relationship with Jesus in terms of what we can get from it, as though our efforts are a bribe to God in order to receive blessings. We follow him, but from a desire that is still tainted with selfishness. We seek the kingdom, but not the kingdom first. We still delight in other things more than in the Lord himself. Unfortunately, when Jesus is not absolutely first we will experience the Christian life as more duty and privation than blessing. Insofar as we specify the terms of our relationship and the demands of our own happiness those demands will never be fully met. The secret is not to give up on our good desires, but to learn to desire Jesus more, so much more indeed that if we do not receive this or that particular blessing we will delight so much in the fact that Jesus has allowed it that we will be immune to any feelings of disappointment, able to do all things through him.

When our desire for God is first we make our offerings with "a cheerful countenance" and "a spirit of joy", knowing that "God loves a cheerful giver" (see Second Corinthians 9:7). It is then that our whole lives become offerings that enrich the alter with "a sweet odor before the Most High", an aroma that delights both ourselves and him and all who perceive it.

For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life (see Second Corinthians 2:15-16).

How wonderful that the Lord asks anything from us, he who has no need of anything. How delightful his will can be if we stop insisting on the insubstantial alternatives of the world. Jesus does not necessarily ask of us great or mighty deeds. Simply putting him first, letting our lives be properly ordered to what matters most, is a greater gift to him than any effort of ours.

“Offer to God praise as your sacrifice

    and fulfill your vows to the Most High.

He that offers praise as a sacrifice glorifies me;

    and to him that goes the right way I will show the salvation of God.”

Vineyard Music - You Are Worthy of My Praise

24 May 2021 - mother of the living

Today's Readings

(Audio)

The man called his wife Eve,

    because she became the mother of all the living.

Eve was meant to be the mother of all the living. She and Adam were meant to bequeath the gift of life to their offspring. Yet although Cain, Abel, and Seth received life in the physical sense from their mother there was obviously something missing. That there was something missing was already apparent to Adam and Eve, now that they felt exposed and vulnerable, and felt the need to hide themselves and wear clothing. It was doubtlessly evident in that the birth of those children would have been among the first experiences of physical pain for Eve, evident in those events which should have been entirely joyous. It was evident too when Adam had to struggle to provide for them, no longer having everything to meet his needs ready at hand, no longer feeling confident and therefore also unsure of his competence in his purpose. It became far more evident in the second generation when Cain murdered his brother. The human family did not wait until old age caused us to have our first encounter with death. Instead, we chose to enlist him in our service. To be mother of all the living sounded so full of promise. But in a world now marked by sin and death to what did that promise amount?

I will put enmity between you and the woman,

    and between your offspring and hers;

He will strike at your head,

    while you strike at his heel.

God did not create death (see Wisdom 1:12). It was never part of the destiny he envisioned for his creatures. Yet he allowed our first parents to choose it, creating for us a world that has been marked by it ever since. From then on God invited us to return to him, to choose the life that we were meant to choose at first.

Today I am giving you a choice of two ways. And I ask heaven and earth to be witnesses of your choice. You can choose life or death. The first choice will bring a blessing. The other choice will bring a curse. So choose life! Then you and your children will live (see Deuteronomy 30:19).

The right choice seemed obvious enough, but in practice, as a race, we consistently failed to choose it. Our choice more often followed the pattern of the choice of Adam and Eve, the choice to decide for ourselves how to live, to decide without reference to God, to choose the broad way that always leads destruction. The Garden was more narrow in that sense than the wider world. And foolishly, we would not accept a paradise that we perceived to confine us, even if the rest of the world was by comparison the driest of deserts.

Fortunately we know that God foresaw the choice of our first parents and every subsequent sin of ours. He knew all of these and had a plan, even from before the first of them, to reverse them, restore us, and to show forth his mercy in a greater way than had we never sinned at all. O Happy Fault is more than a nice sentiment or exaggeration, it is the key that makes sense of history.

When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved,

    he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.”

Then he said to the disciple,

    “Behold, your mother.”

Jesus came that we might believe in him and have life, to have the fullness of life that was lost in the Garden.  As a part of this plan he chose Mary to be his mother and our own, to become the mother of those who were living in the true and deepest sense. This is why when we read about the woman clothed with the sun and crowned with twelve stars in the book of Revelation we also read about her offspring, who are "those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus" (see Revelation 12:16).

Just as Eve was meant to have something to gift to her descendents, of which she could finally only offer a tainted semblance, so too does Mary have gifts for us, but untainted by sin. Eve's gift to humanity was, more or less, her no to the command of God. Mary's gift to us is her yes to his invitation. All that she does by her powerful intercession is ordered toward helping us make that same acceptance of God's call.

All these devoted themselves with one accord to prayer,

    together with some women,

    and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.

Mary said yes to Gabriel and the Holy Spirit came upon her and the power of the Most High overshadowed her (see Luke 1:35) in what can be thought of as a Pentecost before Pentecost. Because she was thus intimately familiar with the Spirit she was also present in the upper room to help the Apostles welcome him. This Holy Spirit is himself the new life we are meant to receive, and Mary is in a privileged place to help us receive him. Let us turn to her for help, to the mother of those who truly live, as we open ourselves to choose the fullness of life that Jesus himself came to bring (see John 10:10).

And of Zion they shall say:

    “One and all were born in her;

And he who has established her

    is the Most High LORD.”

Audrey Assad - O Happy Fault

23 May 2021 - many tongues

Today's Readings

(Audio)

The "whole world had one language and a common speech" (see Genesis 11:1) before they attempted to build the tower at Shinar. The problem was not so much the design plan as the reason for the plan. The builders wanted wanted to make "a tower that reaches to the heavens" and went on to explain, "so that we may make a name for ourselves" (see Genesis 11:4). The people were motivated by fear of being scattered. The solution they proposed was a Godlike principle of unity, a tower, possibly like Babylonian ziggurat, which would be impressive enough to reach up to the heavens. 

The people had a desire to do for themselves what could only really be done for them by God. God saw how that this tower could not really function as a principle to unite the peoples of the world. It glorified strength and as a corollary condemned weakness. It glorified work, and as a corollary condemned rest. It really did represent an attempt to organize humanity around much of what was most fallen in the species since sin of Adam. The desire to reach up to heaven rather than to allow ourselves to be lifted there, and the desire to make a name for ourselves, rather than to receive the name given to us by God, represented some of our worst impulses as a species.

If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 

Nothing would be impossible for them in the sense that they would be free to continue to pursue this cult of strength according to their own designs, to subjugate the truly human to the demands of what was in effect an idol. They had hoped that this idol would be a principle of unity around which they could organize themselves but God saw that it would not be a true unity. It would not provide deep connection between people who built it or lived under its shadow. Had it any vestiges of unity they would have been of the sort that tyranny creates, sacrificing the diversity of peoples their gifts to conformity with the tower. For example, the brick maker would seem valuable, but the farmer less so, the family perhaps even less so. This was not real unity, and the Lord would not let it stand. He acted so as to reveal what was already true, they were not united, and did not have within themselves a the means to achieve a real and meaningful unity.

Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.

The Lord never desired that mankind be scattered. He desired instead that we be united around him. He did not desire that our names remain unknown to one another but rather he desired to give us the names by which we would be known.

And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit

and began to speak in different tongues,

as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim.

The Spirit was able to reverse the Tower of Babel. He brought about a unity that incorporated the diversity of the peoples and their gifts, that did not require the sacrifice of what made human individuals unique. All other attempts at unity that are not grounded in the unity of between the Father and the Son, the unity who the Holy Spirit is, are attempts that are ultimately going to be incomplete, speaking different languages, calling for sacrifices of conformity with the specific blueprints of the that specific tower, however it is architected.

To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit

is given for some benefit.

Only the unity given by God could be a unity that made allowed individuals to retain what made them uniquely and irreplaceably valuable. The Spirit would even manifest as new and supernatural gifts, not as all the same in everyone, but flowing to be used in service of the bigger plan of which God himself was the architect, a plan for which no part was expendable, no gift without value.

No one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.

Rather than a concern for our own names, the Spirit teaches us first to speak the name of Jesus. In speaking that one name we receive the fullness of our identities as individuals. We become Christians, 'little Christs', sons and daughters in the Son, a royal family of priests, prophets, and kings. As all of those realities become true of us we do not become less individual but more. Our own name is not erased, but elevated.

To the one who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it (see Revelation 2:17).

The flesh in us still responds to fear by the desire to build towers of our own, to create our own stability in a sea of chaos. When this occurs let us hear Jesus speak to us the peace that only he can give and to open ourselves once more to the breath of his Spirit.

Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you.

As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them,

“Receive the Holy Spirit.

Rather than building towers of pride the Spirit wants to build us into a temple of praise,  as living stones, each unique, each gifted, each glorifying the name of Jesus.

Francesca Battistelli - Holy Spirit

John Michael Talbot - One Bread, One Body

22 May 2021 - what about him?

Today's Readings

(Audio)

When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, “Lord, what about him?”

What happens to us when we learn that we are going to have to face a challenge, or discover that the specific way in which Jesus will call us to carry our own cross? Often we start to compare ourselves with others who appear to have it easier, and seem to have been given a path we would prefer to the path prepared for us. 

Parents may look longingly at the peace and quiet of the cloister. Those in the cloister may long for the more intimate relationships of family life. Priests might wish they didn't have a business and the expectations of so many different people to manage. Couples might wish that had more freedom to do what they wanted as individuals without always living in compromise with their partners. All of us tend to see the grass as greener somewhere else at times. All of us occasionally ask, "Lord, what about him, or her, or them?"

Jesus said to him, “What if I want him to remain until I come?

Even if John would not have to walk the martyr's path as did Peter nevertheless he would not escape the need to grow in the same holiness, to carry his cross and die to self. Perhaps he had already progressed further, being present as he was at the cross of Christ. But one thing is certain, he too needed the holiness without which no one can see God (see Hebrews 12:14). He died with Christ in baptism and was not exempted from the need to allow that reality to be manifest in and transform his life. 

Everyone faces challenges that are specially designed for them as individuals. But the point for Peter was not so much to take solace in the fact that John wasn't getting off the hook. Peter was not going to be able to look at the path Jesus had planned for John and understand how it was fair. He needed to trust that what Jesus wanted was best and keep his gaze forward, fixed on the mission.

What concern is it of yours?  

You follow me.

Jesus says this same thing to us when we start asking about the paths of others we would prefer, the lives we would rather live, the vocations that seem preferable to our own. He tells us that all such comparisons are only going to confuse and upset us, and most consequentially, distract us from embracing the path he has planned for us. When we are tempted to look back, to look to the left or the right, we need to hear Jesus telling us, "Eyes forward. Follow me."

looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith (see Hebrews 12:2).

Jesus himself embraced a path harder than any we will be called to walk, bearing as he did the sins of all the world. Because we are united to him, and because he shares our own yoke, we can walk any path without fear if only we learn to trust him and to rely on his help. This trust was why Paul would not stop speaking his message, no matter the consequences that he knew were all too likely.

This is the reason, then, I have requested to see you

and to speak with you, for it is on account of the hope of Israel

that I wear these chains.” 

We too share the hope of Israel, the promise of the Kingdom of God in which we already live by faith, under the Lordship of the messiah and king, Jesus Christ himself. It is to this hope in our king that we should look when we temptations draw us away from the call to follow him.

Peter Furler - Greater Is He

21 May 2021 - symmetry of love

Today's Readings

(Audio)

After Jesus had revealed himself to his disciples and eaten breakfast with them

This breakfast had been at "a charcoal fire with fish on it and bread" (see John 21:9). It might have been uncomfortably suggestive to Peter, who remembered the fire where he stood with the slaves and the guards and betrayed Jesus.

Now the slaves and the guards were standing around a charcoal fire that they had made, because it was cold, and were warming themselves. Peter was also standing there keeping warm (see John 18:18).

During the Last Supper Jesus told Peter that he was not ready to go where Jesus was going, but that he would follow him later. At the time, Peter was bold in the love he promised to Jesus, telling him that he would go with him even to death, saying "Master, why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you" (see John 13:36). Yet the prediction of Jesus proved true and Peter's weakness caused him to turn away from following Jesus. The charcoal fire was evocative of this greatest of failures. 

“Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?”

If Peter had already been having doubts about himself in how that betrayal had altered his relationship with Jesus hearing this question the first time probably only drove him closer to despair. Yet he did not run from the question for he knew that he did in fact love Jesus, though he was weak, and he knew that Jesus knew it as well.

“Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”

Was Peter convinced of his own answer? Jesus asked him three times to show him that he could be really convinced and believe that his love for Jesus was restored, no longer flawed, not damaged beyond repair. Jesus let Peter answer three times to cancel out the threefold denial he had made during the events of the Passion. Jesus worked deeply in Peter's Spirit by this simple dialog, not content to just act as though things were back to normal, but desiring to reestablish their relationship in truth, without shadows.

Peter was distressed that he had said to him a third time,

“Do you love me?” and he said to him,

“Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.”

We need not fear to bring anything to Jesus in confession. We need not even fear the weakness of our own love when we do so. Jesus is leading us just as surely as he did Peter. He himself will meet our failures with a symmetry of love that turns what were once weaknesses into new kinds of strength. In this way only can we be made ready to follow him.

but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands,

and someone else will dress you

and lead you where you do not want to go.”

He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God.

It would seem like the attrition to our sense of self worth caused by our human weakness would gradually diminish our ability to trust in our love for Jesus. And indeed, apart from his healing words, we would likely be reduced to a life where we would shrink from his plans for us because us the cumulative negative self image that would inexorably form in us. The lambs in our care would be at risk because we wouldn't believe ourselves up to the task. Jesus did not leave us alone in our weakness any more than he did Peter. As for Peter, loving the sheep is precisely how Jesus wants us to show our love and friendship for him.

He said to him, “Tend my sheep.”

For Peter there was a very specific call to tend the sheep as a pastor of the Church. But we all have sheep we are called to tend. We are called to give both physical bread and the word of God to those in our care, to those whom we can help. The most fundamental way we do this is by our own testimony to Jesus, a testimony that will only be persuasive if we are not overcome by guilt and self doubt.

and about a certain Jesus who had died

but who Paul claimed was alive.

Jesus proves he is alive each time he overcomes our own failures and limitations. Each time he points us away from self pity toward the task at hand.

Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.

Brian Blum - Song of Peter

Songs In His Presence - So Bless the Lord

 

20 May 2021 - one in the Spirit, one in the Lord

Today's Readings

(Audio)

so that they may all be one

Jesus calls us to a unity with him and with our fellow disciples that transcends any natural human parallel. This unity should mean more than that we simply occupy the same space as one another while being nice to one another. We typically prefer to achieve unity by intentionally avoiding conflict, by leaving others as free as possible to do there own thing, and especially by avoiding challenging or making demands of one another. The sort of unity we prefer might qualify as the utopian vision of some, but it is not that for which Jesus prayed.

that the world may believe that you sent me.

If we are to be signs of the unity of the Triune God we must be something more than a well behaved kindergarten class on a good day. We are called to more than simply non-aggression and politeness. We are called to a unity that is based on our love for one another, not it the sense of sentimentality so much as of concrete willingness to sacrifice for one another, to bear one another's burdens, and yes, to challenge one another when appropriate. It is only possible to love in this way when we know and can reference the final purpose of the lives of those whom we love, which is to be happy with God forever in heaven. Union of love is only possible when there is also a union of truth. 

I in them and you in me,

that they may be brought to perfection as one,

that the world may know that you sent me,

and that you loved them even as you loved me.

The unity to which Jesus calls us is not something we can achieve on our own. We prefer to pursue our own ends, and to allow others into our story when the ends they pursue happen to coincide. We don't have a natural affinity for relationships that challenge us, and for the same reason, we prefer truths that allow for complacency in our lives. The only way that we can love in the way that we are called to love and to believe even things that are hurtful to our prideful ego is for Jesus to bring this about supernaturally in us.

that the love with which you loved me

may be in them and I in them.

The unity of Christians functions supernaturally. It is a gift of the Spirit, but one which clearly will not be present unless we open ourselves to it.

with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (see Ephesians 4:2-3).

We have lately been reading about how profoundly this unity connected Paul  to those for whom he was responsible. Acts reveals a Church united in truth, united in love, with mission as its shared purpose. But let us also remember that Paul was not afraid to speak difficult words to those whom he loved, whether the Galatians, or Peter himself. It was because he was genuine in this way that people came to love him as they did.

The reading from Acts this morning might function as more of a cautionary tale about the flimsiness of the world's attempts at unity that are not grounded in truth. Let us take heed of that as we strive to understand and be united in the truth given to us in the Church. Without intentionally making that truth our own we will be at risk for just the sort of disputes as we read about today.

I am on trial for hope in the resurrection of the dead.”

When he said this,

a dispute broke out between the Pharisees and Sadducees,

and the group became divided.

Scripture reminds us, "how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!" (see Psalm 133:1). Have we experienced this unity before, perhaps with a close friend or in a faith sharing group? How might we experience more of it in our lives? It does tend to require that we make ourselves vulnerable. But when we are guided to do so by the Spirit in these contexts we will find that it is worth it.

And I have given them the glory you gave me,

so that they may be one, as we are one

Jars of Clay - They Will Know We Are Christians

Matt Maher - Hold Us Together

19 May 2021 - in the world but not of the world

Today's Readings

(Audio)

I do not ask that you take them out of the world

Our role is in fact to remain in the world as witnesses, to be the presence of Jesus to others. Yet in Jesus we have a new relationship to the world, one of freedom, in which we are no longer slaves to the subhuman forces of sin that reign in the world.

Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? (see Galatians 4:8-1).

We have been transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light (see Colossians 1:13). As Christians, grace makes us one with Christ and with one another. This unity is the fundamental truth about us that is meant to define us and shape our lives. The Father is always ready on his end to consecrate us in this truth. But we must do our part, which is to receive his word, meditate upon it, and to let it shape our words and actions. Otherwise, our consecration would be like a priest empowered to say mass who refused, preferring instead to stay home and watch television. We must act in line with what God has made true about us, remembering that we are meant to be in the world but not of it, living like "those who deal with the world [but] as though they had no dealings with it" (see First Corinthians 7:31).

We have been made members of a better kingdom and given a better purpose. We tend to forget about this truth and revert to living from old habit patterns and ways of thinking. The Evil One desires this forgetfulness in us. Jesus prays for us against the Evil One, and gives us his word precisely as the antidote to this sort of forgetfulness. 

Life apart from Christ may once have afforded us some pleasures. But now that we have been consecrated to Christ true joy is possible for us. This is not as a consequence of circumstances, but as a gift of the Spirit. The Evil One would prefer we backslide into our former ways of attempting to satisfy ourselves without reference to God. But being grounded in the word rather than the world reminds us that joy is ours to receive, not because we deserve it, nor because of the circumstances, but rather because Jesus himself loves us and desires to share his joy with us.

We see in Paul exactly this same concern that his followers remain in the truth so that the truth can bear fruit in them. There is the same link between the truth and the fruit we receive, which Paul calls our inheritance.

And now I commend you to God

and to that gracious word of his that can build you up

and give you the inheritance among all who are consecrated.

The word can build us up. The more meditate on it, speak it, pray it, and live it, the more we will be built, becoming temples fit to be dwelling places of God in the Spirit. We might worry that this other worldly life might make us no earthly good. But Paul's life proved this false. Our new life, in the world but not of it, does not make us less human, but more. Our relationships with others are strengthened beyond what is even possible at a natural level.

They were all weeping loudly

as they threw their arms around Paul and kissed him,

Hillsong (Featuring Darlene Zschech) - This Kingdom

18 May 2021 - glorify thy name

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Give glory to your son, so that your son may glorify you,

just as you gave him authority over all people,

so that your son may give eternal life to all you gave him.

God made us all to glorify him so that the world may know him, and, in knowing him, have eternal life. We must therefore live in such a way as to glorify God. This means that we must be willing to let our light shine for God, even to be willing to pray, 'Give glory to your sons and daughters so that we may glorify you.' 

We must not be content to hide in the shadows when the hour arrives for us. We naturally fear the hour of the cross and what it entails and tend to shrink from it. But if we first pray that God manifests his glory through our participation in his hour and his cross we will have good grounds for confidence. Commonly we hide from both the cross and from glory. We hide from the cross because we fear to suffer. We hide from glory out of a false humility which is really wrong handed if God is the one who brings the glory. We should rightly fear any glory that is not from him because such exultation would only set us up for a fall. But the glory God gives is unique in that it is his action in us. When it is truly from him it is foolproof. However, if we know a little bit more about what God is offering we may hide from the glory because we realize that the glory itself entails the humility, the hour of darkness, the sacrifice. But again, if we realize that it is his work and not so much our own we need not fear.

The world offers you comfort. But you were not made for comfort. You were made for greatness

- Pope Benedict XVI

Jesus was glorified by the Father in his resurrection and ascension. But his glory was already shown forth before that triumph in his passion and death on a cross. This was because his death on the cross revealed in the world of time the love he had for the Father from all eternity. It was so evident that a Centurion who witnessed it said, "Truly this was the Son of God!" (see Matthew 27:54). What the Centurion saw manifested in time was Jesus receiving everything he was from the Father and offering it back to the Father, showing forth the love who was the Holy Spirit himself, thus revealing the Trinity, the glory from before the world began, to the world of time.

Now glorify me, Father, with you,

with the glory that I had with you before the world began.

It was this Trinitarian revelation that itself would be eternal life for us. Eternal life was not something given as a consequence of intellectual data. Rather, it was knowing the Father as the Son knew the Father and knowing the Son as the Father knew the Son, which was a different sort of knowledge from the merely abstract, something which itself could be truly called eternal life. In God this was a selfless way of knowing that automatically in itself was a glorification of the other, and in that sense, an outpouring of love. For us it would be a gaze into eternity that could anchor the one who saw it in that place beyond time. 

I pray for them.

I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me,

because they are yours, and everything of mine is yours

and everything of yours is mine,

and I have been glorified in them.

Jesus prayed for us. This was not trivial. By his prayer we entered into the exchange whereby everything of the Son's was the Father's and everything of the Father's was the Son's. By this prayer Jesus showed his intention to include us in his own self-offering to the Father. By this prayer the doorway to the divine life of the trinity was opened to us.

But now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem.

Paul was not reluctant to meet his own hour when it came, nor to show forth God's glory in his own life. The Son had made himself known to Paul at Damascus and the Spirit was given to him when he was baptized so that he could live for the glory of God. By his encounter with the Son his life was taken up into the life of God and his mission became that of the Son, animated by the same Spirit that filled Jesus himself. Because of the difference it made for Paul in his own life he became the most compelling of witnesses for that life to others. It is meant to be so for us as well.

I earnestly bore witness for both Jews and Greeks

to repentance before God and to faith in our Lord Jesus.

The Maranatha! Singers - Glorify Thy Name