31 March 2023 - believe the works

Today's Readings

(Audio)

I have shown you many good works from my Father.

For which of these are you trying to stone me?

They were agitated by the good works as well, especially when they were performed on the Sabbath. But this was because they forced them to contend with the question of what power was at work within him that could accomplish such works. They tried to attribute them to the devil, but as Jesus said, a house divided could not stand. They tried to insist that he was a sinner, but those whom he healed realized that God did not listen to ordinary sinners in the way that he listened to Jesus. The works themselves all pointed to the message that Jesus came to reveal: that he was the Lord of the Sabbath, the Lord with power over the wind and the waves, over sickness and disease, the Lord of life.

The Jews answered him,

"We are not stoning you for a good work but for blasphemy.

You, a man, are making yourself God."

If he had only made the claim to be God but done nothing to back it up then dismissing it might have been reasonable. But what was actually happening was what the disciples of John the Baptist were commanded to report: "the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them" (see Matthew 11:5). To insist on a charge of blasphemy in the face of these good works was to willfully ignore a great manifestation of God in their midst. They ignored him because to accept him would mean to accept his judgment on them, on their hypocrisy, on the whole world view that they believed in order to justify their ascendency and privilege.

We tend to believe about ourselves that we would not reject the works of Jesus in our midst if it were we who witnessed them. But what if he also at the same time upended our entire way of living up until that point, and demanded changes of behavior that we had heretofore given the most thoroughgoing of justifications? Would we willingly break ties with the lies we cherished or would we rather prefer to merely dismiss the works and condemn the one who worked them?

"Is it not written in your law, 'I said, 'You are gods"'?

Scripture was willing to call even deeply flawed people gods in some lesser sense, since their authority, and the fact that they were created in the image of God made them in some sense capable of symbolizing the Almighty. Therefore it was possible, and even not unreasonable, that God himself might reveal himself by taking to himself a human nature. If a normal flawed human could in some way communicate the reality of God then it must also be true that God himself could speak to us as one of us, man to man. He was not so utterly transcendent or disassociated from reality that this association could not exist. Reality, and especially the reality of the human person was designed from the beginning to be opened out unto the word of God communicating himself unto it.

If I do not perform my Father's works, do not believe me;

but if I perform them, even if you do not believe me,

believe the works, so that you may realize and understand

that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.

Jesus demonstrated his claim and offered argument in support of its plausibility. But the nuanced hypocrisy of his audience made it easy for them to get lost in their own counterarguments. The blunt fact of the miraculous and mighty deeds of Jesus was the hardest for them to ignore or explain away so Jesus appealed that they would at least consider that again, at least try to look at those works with sincere and honest hearts.

As Christians we do believe the works. But although we also profess faith that Jesus is the Son of God our lives do not always reflect this. There is still a tension within us between the old lies we cherished and the new life to which we are called. And because of this we need to look again to what Jesus has done and what he said about himself so that we too can come to a place of deeper conversion.

"John performed no sign,

but everything John said about this man was true."

And many there began to believe in him.

The crowds began to believe. But faith must grow beyond humble beginnings into something that can sustain the way of life of a true disciple, one who can follow Jesus even all the way to the cross and beyond. Foundations are tested we encounter suffering and darkness. We second guess arguments and disbelieve works which once seemed obvious. But in the midst of such darkness we are invited to an ever deeper faith, rooted less and less in ourselves and what we can prove, and more and more in what God himself reveals. It is this faith that can make us confident as Jeremiah was confident:

Sing to the LORD,

praise the LORD,

For he has rescued the life of the poor

from the power of the wicked!

Brandon Lake - Son Of Heaven

30 March 2023 - my words

Today's Readings

(Audio)

"Amen, amen, I say to you,

whoever keeps my word will never see death."

What sort of individual could make such a claim? It was unparalleled in the history of religion. Other religious leaders might claim to reveal God's word, and even say that following that word could lead to heaven or enlightenment. But they did not argue it was because it was their word that it had this power, but precisely because of its truth independent of their identity. Prophets might argue that keeping God's word would lead to life in some sense. But no one was so bold as to claim that their words could keep anyone from seeing death. And after all, the whole history of the world was marked by great men and women with teachings who nevertheless died, including Abraham and the prophets.

The sense in which the followers of Jesus would not see death was not simply that they would go on living forever on this earth in their present lives. But there was a real sense in which the they experienced death was no longer the same as it was for others. Physical death had been, as it were, defanged, and transformed into a doorway that led to life with God, and ultimately to the resurrection of the body. Death, the death worthy of fear, was the one which destroyed both body and soul and Gehenna (see Matthew 10:28). Christians, by keeping the word of Jesus, would keep their souls alive spiritually and ultimately even receive back their bodies on the last day. The part the was the most difficult for the crowds to accept was that this was somehow entirely contingent on their response to the person of Jesus himself. 

Jesus answered, "If I glorify myself, my glory is worth nothing;

but it is my Father who glorifies me,

of whom you say, 'He is our God.'

You do not know him, but I know him.

And if I should say that I do not know him,

I would be like you a liar.

The way to know Jesus was who he claimed to be was to allow the Father to reveal what flesh and blood could not, just as he did for Peter (see Matthew 16:17). But the Judeans closed themselves to the Father by the way they responded with hostility to Jesus himself. The revelation was in fact of a piece. Jesus in their midst was a living revelation of the Father. And the Father wanted to work in their hearts to show them the identity of Jesus himself. But this was only possible to the degree that they would turn away from commitment to the lies they chose to believe and to tell about themselves and the world, lies to justify sin, stemming ultimately from the father of lies.

Jesus said to them, "Amen, amen, I say to you,

before Abraham came to be, I AM."

Sometimes we wonder why Jesus sometimes hid his identity, why he was not more immediately clear about who he was. But here we can see something of the reason. He did very much desire to reveal himself, to give the gift of his word, leading to eternal life. But when he did so his hearers were more ready to respond with confusion and hostility than with belief. The more clearly he spoke, the greater the hostility with which he was met. Yet after foundations were laid it was eventually necessary to be perfectly clear that he himself was the great "I AM", was himself God in the flesh, even though it would be this claim that finally made his death on the cross inevitable.

I will render you exceedingly fertile;

I will make nations of you;

kings shall stem from you.

God himself, in the person of Jesus Christ, did all that was necessary to fulfill his covenant promises, including those made to Abraham. When we were too weak, too committed to our lies and self-deception, to preoccupied with our own business, he nevertheless came so that in him all the nations of the earth could be blessed. When we couldn't be bothered to recognize who he was he went as far as dying on the cross to manifest his love for us as clearly as possible, to draw all to himself. Only by realizing this love, by dedicating ourselves to the words given to us by the source of all love, could we hope to enjoy love with him forever, which was the deepest meaning of all of God's promises.

I will give to you

and to your descendants after you

the land in which you are now staying,

the whole land of Canaan, as a permanent possession;

and I will be their God.

Let us rejoice that the identity of Jesus has been made known to us by the Father and that the love of the Father for us has been made known by the Son. Let us look to the love poured out on the cross and be reassured beyond all doubt that he is for us, not against us. Then we will have unshakable hope in his promises, that they do not depend on our human weakness. How might life be different for us if we truly believe that we will never taste death? Yet this is his gift to us. May his word take ever deeper root in our hearts.

Jared Anderson - The Great I Am

29 March 2023 - a free country?

Today's Readings

(Audio)

If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples,

and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

In order to avail ourselves of the truth Jesus teaches we must remain in his word and allow it to shape our life as disciples. It is by remaining, by committed practice and repetition that we come to know the his truth on an experiential level, one which opens expansive vistas of freedom before us. We are reminded of the parable of the seed that grow best in good soil, the seed which is the word of God. To grow well it needs to get beneath the surface and be relatively safe and uninterrupted there as it puts out roots.

They answered him, "We are descendants of Abraham

and have never been enslaved to anyone.

How can you say, 'You will become free'?"

The seed the Word himself was sowing did not find an easy path beneath the soil in the hearts of these crowds, even though they were Jews who, at least in some measure, "believed in him". In their pride they were unwilling to recognize the ways, even the obvious ways, in which they were not free. Even ignoring the deeper spiritual freedom about which Jesus spoke it was laughable for Jews to saw that they had "never been enslaved to anyone". What else could that be but willful blindness to that fact that Israel had been conquered by one hostile power after another, and was at that time under the power of Rome? Yet perhaps their denial revealed their fear of the deeper slavery to which Jesus referred, as though it was something unacknowledged but obviously lurking just below the surface. They didn't want to come and allow Jesus, the light of the world, to expose this dark visage lest they have to confront it.

Jesus answered them, "Amen, amen, I say to you,

everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.

Here we have a lesson that the world refuses to learn, and even we ourselves probably don't fully accept. We tend to imagine sin as freedom and law as constraint. We tend to think that if we do not have the option to sin we are less free. But sin never delivers on the freedom it promises. It never helps. It only steals our freedom, makes us less able to act as we choose thereafter. In modern times we tend to refer to this as addiction. We are very aware of some specific forms addictions can take, such as to drugs or alcohol. But we do not always acknowledge, and do not want to acknowledge the ways in which sin manifests as compulsive behaviors in our own lives. If anyone would suggest that we have such addictions we would probably push back just as strongly as did the crowd.

A slave does not remain in a household forever,

but a son always remains.

So if the Son frees you, then you will truly be free.

Only the Son can give us a relationship that is based on the true freedom of love. The true antidote to slavery is not, as we might imagine, gainful employment by which we can earn our keep and pay our own way. Such a relationship is still not free in the sense God desires for us. He desires us rather to have the freedom of daughters and sons who are allowed to remain forever in the household, not because of their work, but because they are beloved. In order to experience this freedom we must be willing to trade our slavery to sin and even our servitude to performance and work. We must be willing to accept that which is unearned precisely so that it can be a free gift. It is in this way that we can share in the Sons own freedom, when it becomes his gift to us.

But now you are trying to kill me,

a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God;

Abraham did not do this.

When an intervention is staged against our addictions in order to help us to become free it is often then that the true darkness of our slavery becomes apparent. The ways in which we fight against true freedom seem no longer merely psychological but rather as though stemming from spiritual darkness. As a parallel, we might imagine Bilbo struggling to give up the One Ring. We say that God is our Father, yet we do not always love Jesus when he comes to expose the darkness within us in order to give us freedom. Does this lack of light and complicity in darkness mean that we have failed? No. Or at least not yet. We have heard the word speaking, but we need to let him remain in us and do his work. It is he himself, ultimately, who alone can set us free. And it is precisely this that he expends his every effort to accomplish. 

He ordered the furnace to be heated seven times more than usual

and had some of the strongest men in his army

bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego

and cast them into the white-hot furnace.

True freedom looks quite different from the imagined freedom celebrated by our society. The three young men in today's first reading were bound and thrown into a fiery furnace, and yet somehow, mysteriously they were the most free of all the people in Babylon at that moment.

""Did we not cast three men bound into the fire?""

""Assuredly, O king,"" they answered.

""But,"" he replied, ""I see four men unfettered and unhurt,

walking in the fire, and the fourth looks like a son of God.""

This freedom that is not bound by sin or circumstance is available to us as well, if only we will allow Jesus and his word to remain in us.

Hillsong UNITED, TAYA - Another In the Fire

Newsboys - I Am Free (Who The Son Sets Free)

28 March 2023 - as above, not so below

Today's Readings

(Audio)

"I am going away and you will look for me,

but you will die in your sin.

Where I am going you cannot come."

Where was Jesus going? Cleary even the Pharisees understood it had something to do with his death. But the eventual death of the Pharisees would not bring them to the same place if they did not repent and died in their sin. They still belonged to what was below, to the world, and by implication to the "ruler of this world" (see John 12:31).

The disciples of Jesus, by contrast, did not belong to this world but to what was above, because they chose to belong to Jesus himself, the one who came from above and was therefore above all (see John 3:31). But to belong to Jesus required first believing that he was who he claimed to be.

For if you do not believe that I AM,

you will die in your sins.

This belief in Jesus was the prerequisite that would allow the disciples to be born again from above in baptism, to cut ties with the world under the power of darkness, and indeed to become victors over that world.

Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? (see First John 5:5).

By responding to the word of Jesus in love the disciples opened themselves so that that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit came and made their home with them (see John 14:23). That union, the union with God that believers experience and deepen in this life is meant to be a preparation for the life to come.

Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world (see John 17:24).

This place that Jesus was going was  what he wanted to share with his disciples. It was the mansion he went ahead to prepare for all who would respond to his invitation (see John 14:2). He did not wish that any would perish in sin, and had not abandoned hope that even the Pharisees would repent and come to faith.

So Jesus said to them,

"When you lift up the Son of Man,

then you will realize that I AM

There was something so undeniably true and beautiful about the cross of Christ that it had the potential to break even hardened hearts. It was a demonstration that Jesus was not seeking his own glory. But neither did it reveal him as powerless. It revealed his ability to perfectly love and offer his life as a response to his Father's plan, sustained by his Father's presence.

The one who sent me is with me.

Jesus does not want anyone to die in sin, to become permanently unable to follow him to the Father's house. He does not want to meet anyone at the gate and say, "I never knew you" and does everything possible short of circumventing freewill in order avoid that eventuality. But those who belong to what is below cannot be transformed into those who belong to what is above without the mediation of Christ himself. This may happen implicitly for those with an invincible ignorance about Jesus. But we should never take such ignorance for granted. In any case, it is always better to begin to belong to what is above sooner rather than later, to begin to share in the life that is to come even here and now by faith.

"Why have you brought us up from Egypt to die in this desert,

where there is no food or water?

We are disgusted with this wretched food!"

Let us also do our best to ensure that we remain thankful for the life God has given to us, and to avoid complaining. Complaining can become poison saraph serpents in our midst, to the extent that they can even endanger our spiritual lives. The antidote to this is clear from our texts today: We must look to the cross! We must see the love of the Father for the Son and the Son for the Father and allow ourselves to be drawn into that love. It is that love alone which can ensure that we follow Jesus after our own death. It is that love alone that lasts forever, that is itself meant to be our eternal home.

Songs In His Presence - Abide, O Lord

27 March 2023 - blessed are the merciful

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman 

who had been caught in adultery 

and made her stand in the middle.

It was not zeal for the law nor concern for the sanctity of marriage that made them bring this woman to Jesus. Neither did it have anything to do with justice. Her entire case was subverted to serve as a trap for Jesus. The Law of Moses on its own could do nothing to prevent abuses like this for abuses stemmed from motives and the law could only proscribe actions. But the new law of the Spirit calls us to a higher standard. We too tend to become fixated on sin, especially on sexual sin, and to speak about it and discuss it without any real plan or purpose to do anything about it. In a certain sense we enjoy being scandalized and use our moral outrage as fuel for our curiosity. After all, what business do we have catching anyone "in the very act" of sin? What business do we have publicly shaming those so caught? What merit do our conversations about them have? How do this in any way contribute to God's justice?

for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God (see James 1:20).

How would Jesus respond to this woman brought before him for condemnation? Would he say that she should be stoned, thus contradicting Roman law? Or would he say she should be set free, thus contradicting the law of Moses? It seemed that there was no way out, and this was as the Pharisees intended it. But Jesus turned the tables on his interlocutors. From their pointing the finger at the sin of the woman Jesus shifted the focus instead to each one of them.

Let the one among you who is without sin 

be the first to throw a stone at her.

He said this because in his view there was indeed only one among them who was without sin, one alone who was good (see Mark 10:18). The Pharisees probably considered themselves as Paul once did, blameless according to the law (see Philippians 3:6). But they knew that Jesus did not consider them to be such. They could either insist on stoning the woman and fall under Roman condemnation or they could do nothing and appear weak and sinful in the eyes of the crowd.

And in response, they went away one by one,

beginning with the elders.

We may hope that as Jesus inverted the trap it was not merely out of frustration and failure that the Pharisees departed. Perhaps they really were able to take a deeper look at themselves with Jesus scribbling in the dirt as a contrast to the angry and vengeful personas and to realize what they had become. It was the elders who departed first. Maybe they did indeed have some of the wisdom of age, or at least were by then less able to hide from that fact that their lives had not been perfect by any measure.

“Woman, where are they?

Has no one condemned you?”

She replied, “No one, sir.”

Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you.

Go, and from now on do not sin any more.”

The only one who was sufficiently free to render true justice chose instead to show mercy. The only one with no board or splinter in his own eye demonstrated perfectly how to he was able to help rather than destroy those with a splinter in their own. 

Whether the accused is innocent as Susanna was or guilty as was the woman caught in adultery our own sin makes bringing about justice difficult. Our own prejudices and preconceptions tend to prevent our seeing clearly. And so we need to pray to God as Susanna did for clear minded people like Daniel to speak against injustice. Whenever possible we ought to choose mercy over strict justice. Then, we too may one day hope to be shown mercy.

David Ruis - Mercy Is Falling

26 March 2023 - the waiting

Today's Readings

(Audio)

“Master, the one you love is ill.”

Mary and Martha sent word to Jesus that the one whom he loved was ill. That was all they said, and, they trusted, all they needed to say. They believed the love of the master would inexorably draw him to Lazarus as indeed it did, though not immediately.

Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.

So when he heard that he was ill, 

he remained for two days in the place where he was.

Here was a difficult and mysterious reality. Jesus knew that Lazarus was ill and yet remained where he was for two days. His plan was that the illness not end in death but be for the glory of God. Yet he waited. He appeared to hesitate. His response seemed to be that of one who was indifferent or who at least had other priorities. And yet we read it it was precisely because of his love for Lazarus and his sisters that he remained. This meant that by the time he had arrived Lazarus had already died. How could this have been an action motivated by love? Certainly neither Martha nor Mary immediately experienced it that way.

Lord, if you had been here,

my brother would not have died.

Both Mary and Martha expressed the faith that if Jesus had been present he could have prevented the death of Lazarus. Neither asked, but we might imagine they wondered why this had been allowed to happen. They believed that Jesus had healing power and the love of Lazarus to motivate him to use that power. Did they blame Jesus for hesitating? Or did they simply lament that he hadn't arrived in time? Both sisters seemed to have resigned themselves to the reality of the situation, at least partially. But both demonstrated a readiness to be led into deeper faith. 

But even now I know that whatever you ask of God,

God will give you.

Martha seemed to say that she didn't understand what had happened, or why it had been allowed to happen, or what could be done about it. But rather than attribute the tragedy to any limitation on the part of Jesus she clung to her faith in his power. Martha believed, along with many Jews of her time, in the resurrection on the last day. But she did not yet realize, could not yet have realized, that Jesus himself was to be the basis and the source of that resurrection. Yet even in the midst of tragedy, with Lazarus dead and buried, she allowed herself to entertain this hope when Jesus proclaimed it to her.

Jesus told her,

“I am the resurrection and the life; 

whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, 

and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.

Do you believe this?”

She said to him, “Yes, Lord.

I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God,

the one who is coming into the world.”

She came to believe, her faith growing over time into a full and robust confession of the identity of Jesus.  We must imagine that she would not have been able to be moved to this confession if Jesus had come at once and Lazarus had simply been healed. Jesus provided the occasion for those who were present to place their hope in something more than a simple and immediate response to an illness. Even though Lazarus was to be given life again he would eventually succumb to death once more. But now those who came to recognize Jesus as the resurrection and the life would not need to have their faith in him shaken by that or by any death thereafter. In this way death began to lose its hold on them, and the slavery in which it held the entire world through fear and despair began to be broken. Yet without Jesus allowing the initial sorrowful event it seemed unlikely that the confession of faith could have been made. It seemed in some way to require the vulnerability that the event produced. It was as though without the hope for the short term solution being removed they would never have thought or dared to hope for more. 

Mary also demonstrated elements of faith that are worthy of imitation. She grieved, but when she heard Jesus had come she did not hesitate but got up quickly and went. When she saw Jesus she did not simply complain or reason with him but fell at his feet. She didn't understand, and she was suffering, but she knew that best place to be at such a time was at the feet of Jesus himself. 

When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her weeping, 

he became perturbed and deeply troubled

Jesus did not allow the circumstances to unfold as they did because of a lack of compassion. On a human level he seemed to be every bit as sorrowful even as Martha or Mary. But on another level he endured and accepted it so that the greater good of the glory of God could be accomplished.

He cried out in a loud voice, 

“Lazarus, come out!”

The dead man came out,

tied hand and foot with burial bands, 

and his face was wrapped in a cloth.

Jesus continues to be perturbed and moved with compassion for the suffering that fills our world today. Yet rather than simply resolving it for us it appears that he continues to remain where he is for two days, still waits for the third day to come. And we don't readily understand this mystery, still insist that it would be best for him to always and immediately fix everything before it gets any worse. Yet this is not his way, even though his compassion makes him deeply sympathetic. He needs to provide us with a situation in which we can raise our hope, come to deeper faith in him, and to learn to trust in something more and better than mere prolongation of life in this world. He wants us to come to a place where we recognize that, for the one who is both God and man, death is no more of a permanent condition than sleep. If we can come to believe that Jesus truly is the resurrection and the life we may still mourn that brothers and sisters have fallen asleep, because we would prefer their continued presence with us. But we need not mourn like those who have no hope (see First Thessalonians 4:13).

If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, 

the one who raised Christ from the dead 

will give life to your mortal bodies also, 

through his Spirit dwelling in you.

We need not despair in the face of death. The supernatural life of the Spirit that Christians now share is the guarantee that what is now true of our spirits will one day come to characterize our bodies and indeed the entire cosmos. A day is coming when all of the dead will hear the voice of the Son God, and those who hear it will live (see John 5:25). This will be the true resurrection when we will not, like Lazarus, die again. Death, the last enemy will finally be conquered (see First Corinthians 15:26).

None of this comes about without cost to Jesus himself. In exchange for the life of Lazarus he set off the inexorable chain or circumstances that would result in his own death. But it was always his plan to give his life for the world. Let us learn to open ourselves to the fullness of this gift, which is now already his Spirit dwelling within us, who is himself the promise of the life we hope to enjoy with God forever, and already even now a participation therein.

I trust in the LORD;

my soul trusts in his word.

More than sentinels wait for the dawn,

let Israel wait for the LORD.

John Mark McMillan - Death In His Grave

John Michael Talbot - I Am The Bread Of Life

Trip Lee Featuring This'sl - Lazarus (rap warning)

25 March 2023 - public service announcement

Today's Readings

(Audio)

But Ahaz answered,

"I will not ask! I will not tempt the LORD!"

Like Ahaz use piety as an excuse when we are worried that the Lord is becoming too involved in our lives. Ahaz had plans of his own consisting of political strategies. He had been told that he needed firm faith in order to be established but he preferred an apparently more concrete alliance with Assyria. But should we be quick to blame him? When God goes 'off script' with us and requires us to step out in faith, to listen and to respond dynamically moment to moment, aren't we similarly likely to find reasons justify our refusal? We do this as though we ourselves are the ones being asked for the sign rather than God, as though the onus would be on us to bring about his plans. Holy fear and discernment is appropriate while we make sure what we have heard is from God. But once we know it is from God we ought to trust him even if it is seems unusual or unprecedented. If we have a prophet or an angel at our door with a message it is always better to respond like Mary than like Zechariah or Ahaz.

Therefore the Lord himself will give you this sign:

the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son,

and shall name him Emmanuel,

which means "God is with us!"

The Lord's plans will come to fruition whether or not we cooperate. But we may miss out on the blessings that come from participating in the fulfillment of his plans. We gather that there was some sort of proximate and preliminary fulfillment to Isaiah's prophecy to Ahaz at the time. But we have to imagine that if he had been willing to trust more in God things would have gone better, and more blessings would have been unleashed. Could he have ushered the incarnation into the world ahead of schedule? In any case, God knew how he would respond, and used it as an opportunity to prepare the world for the sign he would eventually give through the virgin who would demonstrate that faith with which Ahaz failed to respond. 

And coming to her, he said,

"Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you."

It is only by grace that we are able to respond with faith. Without grace faith tends to appear to be insubstantial, a trap to ensnare the naïve and the gullible. When even the most intelligent bring their full powers of analysis to the content of the faith they do not inexorable arrive at the truth that faith does in fact contain. Instead it remains possible for them to discover in it what they desire to discover, whether true or false. Those who begin from a place of pride rather than, as with Mary, humility, almost inevitably disregard and dismiss the ideas of faith. Those who are invested in sin always subvert faith to something that will not be a challenge to their sunk cost. This is why it was Mary, and only Mary, who was able to respond with all that she was to the profound message of Gabriel. We sinners, even those of us who have grace but are not yet full of grace and only grace, would not have been sufficiently free to say yes as Mary did.

"How can this be,

since I have no relations with a man?"

Mary did not say, 'Can this be?', nor 'Prove it.' Rather, she asked how it would come about, because, yes, she did not understand, but especially so that she could cooperate as God would have her do.

The Holy Spirit will come upon you,

and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.

Therefore the child to be born

will be called holy, the Son of God.

We can see that the response required of Mary did not demand anything superhuman on her part, but was rather dependent on the supernatural gift of God. The grace she had that allowed her to say yes was the doorway that gave the Holy Spirit the full access to her that he required to bring Emmanuel to the world. None of this was anything she strictly possessed as her own, but was entirely a matter of reliance and trust in God, from beginning to end, as made possible by God's on gift.

Mary said, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord.

May it be done to me according to your word.

We may often act more like Ahaz, but we are meant to grow to become like Mary, more and more. We may be invested in sin to some extent, and still wrestling with our pride. But we now have the example of Mary as an invitation to all of what God can do in those who place their trust in him. If we choose to stand under her mantle she will help us learn to live with the Holy Spirit upon us, overshadowed by the power of the Most High. This, no doubt, was her role in the upper room at Pentecost. And this morning to she wants to help us to have this experience. It begins when we let her teach us to speak as she did, in agreement with the word of God: "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word."

Your justice I kept not hid within my heart;

your faithfulness and your salvation I have spoken of;

I have made no secret of your kindness and your truth

in the vast assembly.

Michael Card - Immanuel

24 March 2023 - the feast of these

Today's Readings

(Audio)

But when his brothers had gone up to the feast,

he himself also went up, not openly but as it were in secret.

These relatives of Jesus had their own ideas about how he should handle public relations. They themselves did not believe in him and seemed to think that a confrontation in Judea might final force him to give up on the whole thing. Or else he might finally prove himself in a definitive and conclusive way. They would accept either outcome. But the brothers were thinking in a worldly way, concerned with approaches that would win the praise of the world. Jesus had to operate differently, carefully, because the world hated him. He knew exactly what moves to make and those which would have to wait, because he knew the Jewish authorities were trying to kill him.  He himself would be the one who dictated the time and circumstances under which he would lay down his life. 

Is he not the one they are trying to kill?

And look, he is speaking openly and they say nothing to him.

Could the authorities have realized that he is the Christ?

Jesus was not afraid to give testimony, to try to persuade, to continue to the very last to seek and to save the lost. He didn't go to the feast for his glory, but because it was a part of his Father's plan for the progressive manifestation of the identity of the Son. He did not argue with the citizens of Jerusalem because he had something to prove, but neither did he hold back because of fear. He did strive to clarify his identity and his mission, and to reject the distortions about him that were made based on appearances. He did this not out of pride for he knew that even this would lead inexorably to the cross.  But out of obedience his Father and love for mankind he couldn't help but try.

So Jesus cried out in the temple area as he was teaching and said,

"You know me and also know where I am from.

They did not know where he was from. They thought that they did, and that knowing that made them feel some measure of control over him. But there was more to Jesus than mere appearance would tell. His earthly origins seemed to make it unlikely or impossible that he was the Messiah. But the hidden reality of his heavenly origins was the guarantee that he was. If those to whom he came realized this hidden reality he himself ought to have been received as the culmination of God's revelation to the Jewish people. But the leadership, at least, was finally too interested in self-promotion and too invested in sin to see it. If they had truly desired what the Father desired they would have welcomed the Son. But instead they were fated to act as the wicked described in the book of Wisdom:

To us he is the censure of our thoughts;

merely to see him is a hardship for us,

Because his life is not like that of others,

and different are his ways.

He judges us debased;

he holds aloof from our paths as from things impure.

He calls blest the destiny of the just

and boasts that God is his Father.

In what ways do we presume to know about Jesus "where he is from"? What limits do we imagine upon him because of our familiarity with what we have seen of him in the past? When we imagine these limitations on Jesus what is our reason? Is it because we ourselves are invested in sin, or at least in comfort? Is he sometimes a censure even to our ways of living and acting that makes us want to put him to the test? 

So they tried to arrest him,

but no one laid a hand upon him,

because his hour had not yet come.

We would probably humanly prefer a dramatic revelation to the world of the identity of Jesus that would be impossible to deny. In this we are much like the faithless brothers. We can't easily come to terms with the hidden aspect of his mission. That he holds back at all from what he could do seems to us grounds for doubt in his power or his intention. But then as now Jesus is going about his mission of building the Kingdom with surgical precision. He is ensuring that he will be able to manifest the Father's love in the most perfect way possible, and that no one who is given to him by the Father will be lost. We are called to trust him as he speaks to us openly and from his heart, learning ourselves to desire the will that is both his and his Father's.

The LORD is close to the brokenhearted;

and those who are crushed in spirit he saves.

Brandon Lake - Son Of Heaven

23 March 2023 - witness testimony

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Jesus said to the Jews:

"If I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is not true.

Here we notice that Jesus was conforming his argument to the Jewish idea that testimony must be confirmed by multiple witnesses. But isn't it a little bit frustrating to see someone not stand up in their own defense, particularly when we know that said individual could make an airtight case? Don't we prefer to see someone coming on their own name, making their own case, and being vindicated? We can see in the approach Jesus took that he was not concerned with the praise of men. By contrast, the Pharisees preferred an approach where the praise of men was an integral part, because they themselves are addicted to it. They ultimately reveled in the triumph of the individual ego whereas Jesus delighted instead in a response of love to the will of his Father.

You sent emissaries to John, and he testified to the truth.

I do not accept human testimony,

but I say this so that you may be saved.

Jesus did not leave the Judeans without any explanation or testimony. He pointed to John the Baptist, whose words had captured their imaginations but not their hearts, at least not in a lasting way. Rather than being opened by the testimony of John it seemed that they hardened their hearts to it. They did not follow it through to John's own declaration of Jesus as the lamb of God who would take away the sins of the world.

But I have testimony greater than John's.

The works that the Father gave me to accomplish,

these works that I perform testify on my behalf

that the Father has sent me.

Jesus did not perform his deeds to receive the praise of men, always telling those who saw or received them not to speak about them. Often his works had quite the opposite effect on the religious leadership, stirring up discontent and persecution rather than revelation of the Father. But the works themselves were the finger of God at work, works that could not be done by someone to whom the Father did not listen. The way Jesus performed these deeds without calling attention to himself demonstrated an example of how good works could reveal him as the light of the world even while he himself did not do them to be seen, that is, to receive the praise of men.

But you have never heard his voice nor seen his form,

and you do not have his word remaining in you,

because you do not believe in the one whom he has sent.

The Son himself was the Word of the Father. Refusing to listen to the Son was the same decision as refusing to listen to the Father. The Word desired to dwell and to "remain" in them but they were not interested. But the Judeans could not escape this need to respond to the Son in order to be rightly related to the Father. Wherever they thought to look they were in fact confronted with the Son himself and a need to make a decision about him. Even in the Scriptures of the Old Covenant they were making an implicit choice about Jesus himself, to whom all Scriptures pointed.

For if you had believed Moses,

you would have believed me,

because he wrote about me.

The Law and the Scriptures seemed safely impersonal and inert. The Judeans were able to use them to justify themselves and their ways of life. Jesus, by contrast, was living and effective, dangerous to any ways of life that were anything less than love. He was a concrete particular historical individual, one who seemed to have elements of his personality both that would captivate and also that others would find hard to swallow. It was easy to reject him just as we often push away from those who are not 'our type of people' or 'compatible personalities'. There was an amazing draw toward the person of Jesus himself, but it required allowing one's heart to be made more capacious to fully accept him. This was why and how accepting him was also accepting the lowest and the least, the sinners and the tax collectors, and many whom we would find naturally grating. Accepting Jesus was in some way also accepting humanity as God accepted it. Being preoccupied with praise and accomplishment made this possibility of accepting Jesus all but invisible to the Judeans. But God himself had always been working with his people to develop in them a heart of mercy, one that would embrace sinners and stand in the breech for them. May he also develop this capacious heart of mercy in us so that we can embrace the testimony about that Son, so that he himself may come to live and remain in our hearts.

Then he spoke of exterminating them,

but Moses, his chosen one,

Withstood him in the breach

to turn back his destructive wrath.

Maverick City Music (featuring Dante Bowe and Naomi Raine) - Testify

22 March 2023 - Son of Man at work

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Jesus answered the Jews:

"My Father is at work until now, so I am at work."

Jesus justified his work on the sabbath by appealing to the fact that it was consistent with his Father, since the Father did not cease to give life or to take it away even on the sabbath. But this argument was seemed to the Judeans to be blasphemous since they correctly understood that he was "making himself equal to God". 

Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son cannot do anything on his own,

but only what he sees the Father doing;

for what he does, the Son will do also.

Jesus clarified, lest they be confused and think that he was establishing himself as some rival alternative to the God of Israel. There could in fact be no competition between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. The Father gave everything of himself, pouring himself out in love to the Son, and the Son could not help but respond by doing the works that the Father gave him to accomplish.

Whoever does not honor the Son

does not honor the Father who sent him.

The Son was about the business of fulfilling the desire of the Father, which was to raise the dead to give life. The Father was pleased to entrust this task to the Son, glorifying the Son who would in turn perfectly honor the Father. But the difficult part of this for the crowds was that this meant that it was now precisely their response to Jesus himself that could save them from condemnation and make them pass from death to life. 

Amen, amen, I say to you, the hour is coming and is now here

when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God,

and those who hear will live.

The profound centrality of the person of Jesus in the destiny of every human being is indeed a lot to take in. It is properly his voice alone that will call the dead to life, his judgment that will determine their eternal destiny. Such claims far surpass any that a prophet or any merely human creature could make. But Jesus did not make these claims because he was a narcissistic lunatic, nor did he lie in order to fool others and get something for himself. Listen to the sober rationale that Jesus gave for saying these things:

"I cannot do anything on my own;

I judge as I hear, and my judgment is just,

because I do not seek my own will

but the will of the one who sent me."

Jesus is the one who was given the name above every name because he preferred the Father's will to his human will and humbled himself even unto death (see Philippians 2:6-11). That name, because it refers to the whole history, reality, and presence, of Jesus himself, is now the only name given under heaven by which we can be saved (see Acts 4:12).

Jesus has staked his rightful claim of lordship over the world and our lives. Do we sometimes balk at these claims as too extreme? Do we try to restrict the sphere of his rule in our lives or in our world? Whenever we do that we are implicitly, whether we fully realize it or not, denying life and asking for judgment without his mercy. Let us instead praise this name above all names, so that we too can look forward to his voice calling us to life.

The reign is Jesus is not one of a tyrant or a despot. It is the reign of a shepherd king, one who leads with the compassion about which we hear in the first reading from Isaiah:

Along the ways they shall find pasture,

on every bare height shall their pastures be.

They shall not hunger or thirst,

nor shall the scorching wind or the sun strike them;

For he who pities them leads them

and guides them beside springs of water.

ILP Chorale - At The Name Of Jesus

Inspiration from:

Martin, Francis; Wright, William M. IV. The Gospel of John (Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture) (p. 105). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.  

21 March 2023 - water works?

Today's Readings

(Audio)

One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years.

Thirty-eight years was a long time to be unwell. It was the same length of time that the Israelites wandered in the desert after leaving Egypt. It seemed altogether too long a time to expect one to maintain hope, desire for something better. Much easier, it would seem, to just try to accept the new normal and to make the best of it. How many of his years his illness had this man spent lying by these pools? No doubt there was originally a hope to benefit from their healing waters. But as year after year went on and he saw others healed he must have gradually come to accept that he himself would never make it to the waters in time.

"Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool

when the water is stirred up;

while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before me."

What did this man now experience as he sat near this pool, and why did he continue to choose this place to spend his time? Was there much left besides self-pity and perhaps jealousy at the "someone else" who always seemed to beat him to the healing waters?

"Do you want to be well?"

We too have grown accustomed to much that was meant to be temporary, and have allowed ourselves to become defined by our flaws. At first we do often push against our spiritual and physical ailments with an initial burst of enthusiasm but then quickly give up when there are not immediate results. We grumble like Israel in the desert. We complain like this man by the pool. Rather than seeing evidence of God's providence along the way we narrow our focus to dwell on what we do not have. We are preoccupied with what we left behind in Egypt or what others seem to be experiencing around us. We neglect to notice that the constant presence of the supernatural at work means that nothing is as yet hopeless.

"Do you want to be well?"

When Jesus comes to meet us in our sorry state he has to excavate the desire for wholeness from underneath all of the detritus of our attempts to accept our situation and make the best of it. Beneath our despair, our jealousy, and our lack of initiative is still a genuine desire. It remains within us no matter what we say, just as the man being near the pool was proof that he could not entirely shake his desire for wholeness although he lived in the constant sorrow of knowing that on his own he could never attain it. In response to the question of Jesus as whether he wanted to be well he was afraid to even venture an answer, afraid that it would be just one more disappointment.

Jesus said to him, "Rise, take up your mat, and walk."

Immediately the man became well, took up his mat, and walked.

What the man could not do on his own, the desire he could not even articulate, Jesus read in his heart and granted him. The man couldn't move toward the pool quickly enough for healing, couldn't even verbally move toward Jesus on his own. But his thirty-eight year journey had not been for nothing, and he was no longer alone. The words of Jesus to the man carried more than a merely physical healing. They contained the spiritual antidote to the self-pity and despair that had consumed the man.

Jesus said to him, "Rise, take up your mat, and walk."

Immediately the man became well, took up his mat, and walked.

The man was not only able to move freely, but was able to take immediate action, no longer meditating on his weakness, but depending on the words of Jesus for strength. Is it possible that we have given up on blessings that Jesus himself does intend to bestow? It may yet be that he intends healing for us from self-pity and despair, making us responsive to the call of love in our lives. The fact that of ourselves we can't find the way to these blessings should not diminish our hope for them. Nor should seeing others receive them and not ourselves. All of this is simply bringing us to the critical threshold that will finally impel us to take Jesus at his word.

So the Jews said to the man who was cured,

"It is the sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to carry your mat."

The man had to take action. It would not have been enough for him to be healed and continue lying by the pool. The action was a corrective for the deeper spiritual sickness, and it was for this reason that it was entirely appropriate on the Sabbath. We cannot imagine this felt anything like work to man, but rather celebration and joy. He was indeed so preoccupied with the experience that even Jesus slipped away without him knowing.

After this Jesus found him in the temple area and said to him,

"Look, you are well; do not sin any more,

so that nothing worse may happen to you."

For a second time Jesus found the man, giving clarity about his identity, and showing the way to continue from the initial blessing down the path of discipleship. Did the man continue to respond to Jesus with prompt obedience? It is unclear. We may hope that in telling the Judeans what happened he was trying to honor Jesus rather than to bring about his persecution. But for us the point is that even great blessings are not meant to be our only experience of Jesus. They are meant to lead to a life of faithful discipleship. They are meant to remove obstacles to the wholeness that Jesus intends for every one of us. But we can truly discover who we are meant to be only by continuing to follow him as his disciples. The promised land is precisely wherever Jesus himself is found. The living waters promised in Ezekiel are precisely those that flow from his Sacred Heart.

Wherever the river flows,

every sort of living creature that can multiply shall live,

and there shall be abundant fish,

for wherever this water comes the sea shall be made fresh.

Darrell Evans - Let The River Flow

20 March 2023 - Angels. Have we heard?

Today's Readings

(Audio)

Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man,

yet unwilling to expose her to shame,

decided to divorce her quietly.

Joseph was a righteous man, who knew the character of his betrothed, and therefore knew that the conventional explanations for how the conception of this child came about could not apply. She was found with child through the Holy Spirit, not through some unknown father. What to do in a case of adultery would have been clear, but what to do in this case had no precedent. The chief goal of Joseph in his plan was to avoid exposing Mary to shame. He was a righteous man, but not so righteous that he took it for granted that he had any right to be involved in the miraculous events that were beginning to unfold. He already knew Mary to be quite extraordinary and probably already felt unworthy of her to some degree. This miraculous conception probably increased those feelings in him to the point that he finally had to reckon with them. His strategy was to get out before he did any damage to these chosen of God, feeling, we might imagine, like a massive lumbering animal tiptoeing out of a porcelain shop.

Joseph, son of David,

do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home.

For it is through the Holy Spirit

that this child has been conceived in her.

Joseph's actual father was Jacob. The angel was therefore conveying to him something about himself that he had forgotten, something genuine that he could contribute to the Holy Family without fear of tarnishing it. Furthermore, the angel reassured Joseph that what was taking place was no mere happy accident, but rather the plan of God through the Holy Spirit. He could have confidence therefore that his own limitations and liabilities had already been factored in and that God was able to use Joseph to name Jesus, to give to him the benefits of a royal lineage so that Jesus too would be a true son of David. Joseph, righteous but fallible, was nevertheless the one intended by God to be the leader and protector of the Holy Family. 

She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus,

because he will save his people from their sins.

On the one hand, we aren't as righteous as Joseph. When we are invited to participate in God's plans our reasons to refuse the request are usually less noble. Rather than concern that our human limitations will subvert God's plans we are often more concerned that God's plans will interfere with our own plans and disrupt our status quo. But as we spiritually mature our excuses become better. We say, 'Oh no, not me. I'm not good enough', but not necessarily out of righteousness. Yet here is the lesson for us today: God knows what he was getting was he gives us the invitation to be involved in his plan, to join him as laborers in his vineyard. It is not because of our righteousness or lack thereof that the invitation is given or that makes the work possible. It is always fundamentally a work of the Spirit himself in which we are invited to share. It is faith, not perfection, that makes us fit for the task.

When Joseph awoke,

he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him

and took his wife into his home.

Once Joseph understood what was asked of him by God he did not hesitate but responded with prompt obedience. This is a good model for us as well. Any hesitation would have allowed the emotional pressure of various excuses and contrary interpretations of the situation to mount upon Joseph. It is similar for us. When we at last discern the right way to go we should go immediately and without hesitation. This initial impulse may perhaps feel immensely difficult to obey but if we manage to do it the the subsequent work will often proceed much more smoothly, without a constant internal back and forth of thought and emotion.

He believed, hoping against hope,

that he would become the father of many nations,

according to what was said, Thus shall your descendants be.

That is why it was credited to him as righteousness.

Like Abraham and Joseph we are called to have faith in the mysterious and hidden power of God to bring his plans to perfection in spite of apparent obstacles that would make it impossible for him to do so. We are meant to trust that things that appear to be obstacles to us are not in fact obstacles to God for whom all things are possible.

Through Joseph, and because he responded with faith, we received the true son of David who built for God the true and perfect temple, which was his own body. Through Joseph, Jesus, the Messiah and King received his both his name and his royal pedigree. But it was God himself who established forever his throne and his Kingdom. Human cooperation with the divine plan is always going to be intimidating, especially the more we come to know ourselves. But if we also and at the same time come to know and trust in God we too can respond promptly when he calls us, and trust in his Spirit to aid us in our weakness.

For this reason, it depends on faith,

so that it may be a gift,

and the promise may be guaranteed to all his descendants,

not to those who only adhere to the law

but to those who follow the faith of Abraham

Chris Tomlin - Angels We Have Heard On High

19 March 2023 - open eyes

Today's Readings

(Audio)

"Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents,

that he was born blind?"

Jesus answered,

"Neither he nor his parents sinned;

it is so that the works of God might be made visible through him.

When we encounter suffering and difficulties in the world we tend to want to find someone to blame. Was it this man who was at fault or was it his parents? But what we actually discover is that there is seldom a one to one correspondence between guilt and suffering. Considering this negatively, it is because the entire world apart from Christ is in darkness, was in fact consigned to darkness by the sin of our first parents. But the positive aspect is more important, which is that God did so in precisely in order to bestow grace and mercy.

For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all (see Romans 11:32).

The coming of Jesus into the world as the light of world meant that everything that was formerly only an occasion to lament the darkness could now became  an opportunity to receive enlightenment and to rejoice in the light. Every single instance of suffering, sorrow, and sadness, could now be transformed into moments of healing, transformation, and renewal. 

When he had said this, he spat on the ground

and made clay with the saliva,

and smeared the clay on his eyes,

and said to him,

"Go wash in the Pool of Siloam" —which means Sent—.

So he went and washed, and came back able to see.

Jesus does not seem to choose to open the eyes of every blind man over whom a Christian prays (though perhaps it is a matter of timing rather than than an outright refusal). But he does and will become the light for everyone who had heretofore walked in darkness. He himself is the inner logic that can make sense of all that seems to be wrong with the world, the redeemer because of whom we speak of our felix culpa, our happy fault. It is a truly wonderful thing to internalize this inner logic in our own hearts. It is so valuable that it can somehow make sense of an entire life spent without sight until one at last encountered Jesus. The man born blind did not hold a grudge for the past years lost, but rather rejoiced in the new thing God had done. Even the death of Lazarus paled in comparison to the joy and meaning of seeing him restored to life, and seeing in that restoration the truth that Jesus himself was the resurrection and the life. Similarly, in every instance of suffering, there is waiting an ever greater revelation of Jesus himself, a burst of light that entirely changes our perspective.

So they said to him, "How were your eyes opened?"

Like the man born blind we too need to learn to speak of our testimony about how Jesus himself transformed darkness to light in our own lives. Like him, we may at first stumble and demonstrate more confusion than clarity. It is as though our eyes are still adjusting to the new spiritual light of Jesus. And it can be precisely in dialog that we achieve greater clarity about what we experienced as some words seem to ring with truth and others seem insufficient.

Now the Jews did not believe

that he had been blind and gained his sight

until they summoned the parents of the one who had gained his sight.

When we receive significant transformation from Jesus it is often the case that the world is sufficiently disturbed and offended to demand and explanation from us. Rather than rejoicing in the increase of light they lament the diminishing darkness. This is part of the reason why we must be ready to give testimony.

But before all this they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for my name's sake.  This will be your opportunity to bear witness (see Luke 21:12-13).

We will ultimately find that no one can answer for us, not even our parents. We must be the ones who believe in our hearts and confess with our lips that Jesus is Lord (see Romans 10:9), just as we hear from the blind man , ""I do believe, Lord," and he worshiped him". What we see in the blind man is that even the questions from the world around us that range from hostile to indifferent can help to shape our testimony, and to clarify our confession of faith.

Then Jesus said,

"I came into this world for judgment,

so that those who do not see might see,

and those who do see might become blind."

Let us be among those who come to Jesus to receive the gift of enlightenment, not among those who are so attached to the darkness that we prefer to stumble around and insist on calling it sight. There is always more that the light of Christ can reveal to us, ever greater clarity about the reality of how he is, and how good and how beautiful. 

Live as children of light,

for light produces every kind of goodness

and righteousness and truth.

Once we receive the light of Christ we can begin to see as God sees, through appearances to the heart. It is then that we can begin to discover, to celebrate, and even to participate in the otherwise hidden work of the Spirit in the world.

The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit (see John 3:8).

Even the valley of the shadow of death is not dark when our shepherd is with us!

DC Talk - In The Light

Dan Schutte - City Of God

Ike Ndolo - Awake O Sleeper