11 February 2016 - firmly planted i'll be

[ Today's Readings ]

Choose life, then,
that you and your descendants may live, by loving the LORD, your God,
heeding his voice, and holding fast to him.

Jesus, you want us to choose life. You allow us to opt for death and doom if we want them. But you don't want them for us. You take no delight in the death of the sinner (see Ezekiel 18:23). We tend to think you're out to get us. We often believe you're looking for an excuse to judge us. Rather it is that you're out to save us and looking for an excuse to show us mercy.

Help us to delight in your law, Jesus. Help us to meditate on it as much as we can. The way to true life is not the obvious way which the world presents to us.

If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself
and take up his cross daily and follow me.
For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it,
but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.

Yet when we deny ourselves and take up our crosses daily to follow you Jesus we do find life. We find life that is more true and lasting than the life the world offers.

He is like a tree
planted near running water,
That yields its fruit in due season,
and whose leaves never fade.
Whatever he does, prospers.

The world can't offer life like this. It is a desert that can't quench our thirst. It promises fruit but reveals mostly famine. All of its promises fade.

The way to true life is hard to see from this perspective of our selfishness and pride. How can death lead to life?

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit (see John 12:24).

Death leads to life only because in it we are most fully united with you, Jesus. So don't just let us charge off toward self-hatred. Instead, let us charge off toward self-sacrifice for your sake.

Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me (see John 15:4).

When we abide in you, Jesus, the grain of our lives falls into the earth and dies, but united to you and your resurrection it bears much fruit. The things truly done in pursuit of this path always prosper.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law (see Galatians 5:22-23).

To help us own our desire to delight in his law, let's sing: