The Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people; and they came and worked on the house of the Lord of hosts, their God.
1 Timothy 4:14
Do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you through prophecy with the laying on of hands by the council of elders.
Words of Grace For Today
Like the wind that blows unseen, gently and refreshing at times and other times with great effect filling the sails of many and destroying others, the Holy Spirit moves through time and generations, stirring us up to do what we would not otherwise be capable of doing.
In baptism hands bring water over us and us under it, and bless us with touch and holy oil. Gifts of the Holy Spirit wend into our lives at that moment and every moment since, just as wind moves through the air we breathe.
We can try to fake the gifts and the Spirit, like turning on a fan to create air movement in closed spaces, out of reach of the wind. It is fake, and other than to deceive and open a door therewith for the Devil to bring us to do evil work, it is ineffective; certainly it cannot bring God’s blessings.
With confidence, like seasoned sailors, not foolish or reckless, we step into the winds that blow our times this way and that, and thinking-speaking-acting out the Holy gifts given to us, we contribute to the building up of the community of the saints.
The Devil has many people working overtime to destroy. The Holy Spirit has more power in the sacrificial, unconditional love of the saints for all people. The Devil will not triumph, for Christ has already defeated death and all the works of the Devil, though the Devil has not yet admitted it and laid down in surrender.
One person at a time, the wind blows into people’s lives and transforms them into saints with gifts that give life to all, without price exacted, as freely as God has given us life.
What a life it is, for us!
For those who still work to destroy us saints, bit by bit, one feels pity for the curse they live out will eventually consume everything about them and leave only ashes for eternity.
What a hell of life it is for them, until God’s Spirit reaches their hearts … then there is a celebration for the double victory, first that they no longer seek our destruction and second that they are counted among God’s saints on earth.
Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David.
Hebrews 13:20-21
Now may the God of peace, who brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, make you complete in everything good so that you may do his will, working among us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Words of Grace For Today
May God make us complete in everything good so that we may do God’s will.
Incline our ear, come, listen so that we may live.
This sounds like we must take the initiative to turn to God and listen and obey, and therewith somehow earn our right to live.
But those that proceed this verse put it in a different context:
Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.
Incline your ear, and come to me; listen ….
God has set a banquet of food and drink: it is free to buy without money or price. Yes, that’s kind of a contradiction. God does not just dump it on us, so that we must eat and drink.
God invites us, and offers to sell to us for nothing. We get to engage, but the price is free. We do not loose our integrity, but God establishes that God gives freely to us all that we need.
And it is not spam or food beyond it’s best buy date, or canned food, or just water or flavoured sugar water called fruit drinks. God offers rich food, milk, and wine!
This is a feast that we get to take home.
This is the nourishment that will sustain us for 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness of life.
So we are fed, and our thirst slaked. We do not just live when we receive God’s generosity. We live well.
When we have feasted and feasted again at Jesus’ table then we are ready. God has work for us. On our own we have no way of knowing what God’s will is or doing it. But after we have feasted and drunk our fill, then God makes us complete in everything good and equips us to do God’s good work on this earth.
This is the work that God created us to do, to love one another and ourselves, and to love even our enemies. This is the work that is pleasing to Jesus the Christ.
What a life!
No one need thirst or hunger again …
…
We, God’s people, are the one’s called to ensure that this is so, working to provide food and drink and invitations, so that all are invited to God’s feast, where the food is rich, the milk and wine does not run out, and blessings abound.
We are not only in this together, God brings us together, to do God’s will more effectively, to provide for every neighbour, with love.
Surely everyone goes about like a shadow. Surely they are in turmoil for nothing; they heap up, and do not know who will gather.
2 Timothy 1:10
This grace [which saves us and gives us a holy calling] was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Saviour Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Words of Grace For Today
The world’s way of living is to try to make something from nothing, to have more for oneself. It is a turmoil like no other, yet no one can know who will get to gather in the rewards for all our striving to make something for nothing. Few of us reap the rewards of our efforts. Some reap the rewards of many others, and claim it is their right. It is not. Most of us give up great effort and see no reward at all.
Only those who labour for Christ are rewarded for their efforts, not with the heaps gathered in by others or by themselves. Rather we who labour for Christ receive first the reward for Jesus’ sacrifice, and then we live dedicated to following Christ’s will for us and others.
This is a holy calling. We no longer lives as a shadow, as part human, part darkness, outlined only by a brighter light. We live as the beings God created us to be, full, embodied, clearly seen in the light, solid even in the darkness of any kind, especially that of evil.
When one toils in order to have enough to provide the basics of life to oneself and one’s family, one can see no end of toil. For there is never enough for oneself and one’s own. When one toils in order to have the basics of life for oneself and one’s own … and for all those around in need, then there is always enough … enough for life that is worth living.
Yesterday I stopped at Walmart to pick up the four grocery items I need to deal with GERDS, for which I hope I have enough money since the gift card I was given had less than a dollar on it.
Done the first isle following the assigned directions to maintain physical distancing, I came face to face with two grocery carts. I stopped and waited for the people behind the carts to place in the rather full carts what they were looking for on the shelves. Then the proceeded to come further down the isle the wrong way towards me. I asked them to turn around, that they were going the wrong way. The first of the two carts instead turned to the side of the isle to try to force his way past me. I turned my cart to the side two inches to close the gap and he rammed my cart. I asked again.
With cursing the two cart drivers turned around, and a third man with them, starting verbally abusing me, threatening me to find me in the parking lot. As I continued with my shopping he continued to yell abuse at me from the next isle, from 20 and 50 feet away. I looked for staff. There were none to be found.
I headed for the checkouts, and while I was trying to deal with the 0 value gift card, the verbal abuse and threats started up again as the group joined the que to the checkouts. I yelled for security, afraid for my life, that this guy might actually follow me out into the parking lot!
Security came, or was it the manager. He was questioned. My credit card transaction was held up as they pulled my id. Finally I was allowed to exit the entrance doors to distance me from this guy.
If I could toil for this guy and the guy in a vehicle going 110kph passed me on my bicycle on the right, on the shoulder of highway 55, … If I could toil for these guys to not be idiots, not put my life at risk with their frustration that things are not going their way, how would that look?
I’m at a loss what to do for idiots, and many more others of so many kinds, who breach the social contract we have, which holds the barbaric nature of humanity at bay with such a thin veneer of civility. That thin veneer suffers attacks everyday, and its amazing that it still holds. If we are not careful, if we are not all careful, it will dissolve all too soon.
Then toiling for the basics of life will be an impossibility for us all, idiots, liars, deceivers, even for former holders of great authority, and also for us saints with a holy calling.
Pray that the Light of Christ will shine soon into the darkness that has descended on these lands and on these people,s here and across the globe, so notable as it is just south of the border.
The Light will expose the evil done, burning it up like chaff, as it finally abolishes death and brings life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Soon and Very Soon, we pray; Come and Deliver us, all. We are ALL in this together.
When the Courts take everything ensuring your death, though you’ve done nothing wrong, the social contract disintegrates … further.
When Someone is peels away your protection from harm,
is it evil or good?
It is evil … and it is God’s blessing.
Ecclesiastes 7:14
On the day of prosperity be joyful, and on the day of adversity consider; God has made the one as well as the other, so that mortals may not find out anything that will come after them.
Romans 8:28
We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.
Words of Grace For Today
There are all sorts of explanations for why evil exists.
Prosperity is easy for humans to explain; we worked hard for our success and deserve the privilege and comforts afforded by our prosperity.
Adversity is also easy for humans to explain, as long as it is not their own adversity; they did not work hard but were lazy, or made mistakes because they were not smart, or were corrupt (like everyone else) and got caught, or took risks and had bad luck and were caught out … or … and on go the explanations.
Neither are right, necessarily nor primarily, nor are sufficiently correct to stand long on their own. The beginning of the real explanation for prosperity is that God blesses creation with some success. The beginning of the real explanation for adversity is that God blesses creation with some failure.
From there, why we and others enjoy prosperity or adversity, is a complicated mix of circumstances of time and environment and agency – a bit of our own, but mostly others’ agency.
Ecclesiastes’ explanation is interesting: God makes prosperity and adversity so that we do not know what will come in the future. That may well be. It teaches us that ONLY God can be trusted, not adversity (for example of our enemies) nor prosperity.
Paul in many and various ways points us to rely on God alone. Here he provides the reassurance that all things work for good … (which is blatantly not true, but he qualifies it with) for those who love God. Which is blatantly not true, for example all the martyrs through the generations, and all those Christians who have suffered at the cruel hands of others.
Paul is right though in a more profound sense: while the circumstances and suffering of our lives may not seem like they are worked out for good, ours or anyone else’s, God works in marvellous ways to bring blessings from evil. In the end God always will win, and therefore even when we suffer not, God will bring good out of it for us and for all others. In this way Paul is most certainly right. God works all things for good! for everyone.
Even our most evil, cruel enemies.
God is creator and always the victor. We are blessed to be God’s children, adopted by the sacrifice of Jesus.
There is a story of an old farmer who had worked his crops for many years. One day his horse ran away. Upon hearing the news, his neighbours came to visit. “Such bad luck,” they said sympathetically. “May be,” the farmer replied.
The next morning the horse returned, bringing with it three other wild horses. “How wonderful,” the neighbours exclaimed. “May be,” replied the old man.
The following day, his son tried to ride one of the untamed horses, was thrown, and broke his leg. The neighbours again came to offer their sympathy on his misfortune. “May be,” answered the farmer.
The day after, military officials came to the village to draft young men into the army. Seeing that the son’s leg was broken, they passed him by. The neighbours congratulated the farmer on how well things had turned out. “May be,” said the farmer.
We can answer with the farmer, “Maybe.” With Christ we can answer to both prosperity and adversity: “It is God’s blessings, no maybe about it.”
Whether it seems we stand alone, like the tree, or the ice house, where everyone passes us by, or turns far away from us,
God created us all,
and we are ALL in this together!
Psalm 146:7
Who executes justice for the oppressed; who gives food to the hungry? The Lord sets the prisoners free.
John 8:36
So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.
Words of Grace For Today
Who executes justice for the oppressed, gives food to the hungry, and sets the prisoners free?
We should all do this each day!
Do we? Not many and not much! We leave this to God to do.
Who frees humans from their captivity, the real captivity that robs life from us, the captivity to sin (to turn away from God and try to make our way in life on our own, almost always at other people’s expense … so that people are oppressed by our efforts to get ahead in life, so that people go hungry while we are well fed and live in superfluous comfort, so that people are imprisoned for telling the truth as we lie in order to gain and retain our ill-gotten privileges and wealth!
Yes! Who executes justice, feeds the hungry and sets prisoners free when we are the oppressors, the one’s who take away food, and lie to have people imprisoned?
We leave it to God!
And God’s people step forward to undo the injustice, hunger, and falsely imprisonment that we cause … and ignore … or worse, celebrate, as if the one’s we’ve done these atrocities to are our enemies.
They are not. They are God’s people, on this sojourney in life with us.
Thanks be to God, God’s Son, Jesus the Christ, came to live, heal, forgive, die, and be resurrected that we might know God chooses to free us from our captivity to sin.
The Son frees us, and we are free indeed!
Free to be the one’s to bring true justice to the oppressed so no one need fear their neighbour or the authorities’ bullying, false arrests, and robbing of life; to feed the hungry so no one is hungry or without the basic necessities of life; and to set the prisoners free so that no one is falsely convicted or falsely imprisoned, and more …
so that all people will know that God’s Son has set us all free from captivity to sin … we can trust that God will bring out of us all the goodness that God created us and all of creation to be.
That’s such a fundamental revolution in the way people think, speak and write, and act that so many people resist this freedom.
And the injustice, hunger for daily bread, and false imprisonments continue and even increase.
It is no solution to turn on (and try to exterminate like the pests they are) the bullies, the oppressors, those who take, deprive others of, and hoard the daily food available in creation, and those who hold others in prison cells or poverty in a reserve or in a land distant and separate. Others will only replace those who are exterminated, and those who exterminated others simply become the oppressors.
God wants a victory for all, a double victory (as Martin Luther King Jr. called it), a victory where everyone is free. God does not delight in an evil person’s death. God delights in Jesus setting them free.
What else did we think God created all this universe, and us in it, for, but for us all to live, choose, love, and hope freely … all by Grace alone?
So now, O Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you? Only to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.
James 1:22
Be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.
Words of Grace For Today
God requires of us?
We must be doers of the word?
Luther described James as a straw Gospel. Like a straw house that the wind blows away with ease and fire burns quickly away. All chaff, no substance.
Before God requires anything of us, Before we ‘get’ to be doers of the Word, God acts.
God acts by creating us, making us able to love, which requires free choice, which means we sin and are bound to choose to sin, so God acts to forgive us, redeem us, and set us free to love, choose, sin, and God walks with us to forgive us, redeems us and set us free again and again to love ….
Always God acts first. Then we are enabled by the Holy Spirit to do what is ‘required’ of us:
to fear God, to walk in God’s ways, to serve God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength!
Make no mistake: it is everyone’s obligation to fear and love God, to walk in God’s ways, and to serve God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength: to be DOERS of God’s Word. We do not get a pass to sit on the sidelines of life and allow EVIL to have it’s way with us and others. We are to WORK against EVIL, in all it’s forms of injustice, violence, and degradation of life.
We do not get to sit on the sidelines like those in Hottelstedt who watched train load after train load of people in cattle cars and box cars pass through their town and not work to stop the obvious extermination of masses of people, genocide to provide for a ‘pure’ Aryan nation. After the war was lost, they excused themselves that they had no idea what was happening just a few kilometres away.
Our duty includes being curious about the work of evil around us, to speak up, to speak out, and to work to stop it. We use Grace and forgiveness, giving God opportunity to rejoice at the redemption of yet more sinners.
It’s not so easy as following rules. It requires everything of us! Thank God life, all of life, has an honourable and glorious purpose! To serve God and be the ones who bring God’s will to actuality here and now … by being the bearers of forgiveness, redemption, and freedom.
Trust God to keep you strong, to walk with you, to protect you.
Psalm 121:4
God, who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
1 Corinthians 1:8
God will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Words of Grace For Today
The challenges of providing for the necessities of physical life are quite daunting at times.
Air is not complicated here in Alberta, yet.
Water … well clean water is a matter of collecting it from the city water dispensing site, cubit metres at a time, not that expensive, except for the cost of getting there and hauling it ‘home’. When it’s below freezing there are significant challenges if keeping it from freezing before one can use it, nearly impossible challenges for me. Or one can buy it much more expensive, filtered by reverse osmosis 5 gallon jugs at a time, and pay to get there and haul it home. Or one can collect rainwater and filter it oneself and sanitize it. Or one can use contaminated lake water … putting one’s own health at risk. Or in the winter one can collect snow and melt it, and boil it, trying to assure oneself that it has not been contaminated by some animal or whatever. Still water is possible. Canada has more fresh water than any other place on earth. Fortunate we are.
Food is an ongoing challenge. Growing it is not an option when one has not home or land or ability to ensure one is able to garden in any specific spot for at least a season. Buying it is necessary, but it costs money, which is in very short supply, though not non-existent. The food bank supplements what one can buy, and food is possible, most of the time, so far.
Clothing … is good, fortunately I have enough left from days of having a reasonable income, which is good since second hand stores exist, though they are limited in what they have. Or it is hours and hours away to get to the city where the available clothes are a wider selection. So far, so good, though.
Shelter is a daunting challenge that consumes more than 3/4 my time. In the end, so far, I have shelter from the rain, the snow, the wind, and the cold.
I am fortunate. I still live better than the majority of people alive on earth today, a mere fact of being born in North America and been able to work most of my adult life.
The real challenges that I cannot deal with myself, are other people’s wishes to have me dead, to arrange that that is likely, or to be willing to risk that they hit me when passing me at 110 kph on the right, on the shoulder, as I bicycle to and from town, working like mad to avoid the plentiful potholes that would wreck a rim or at least send me flying to the pavement.
Evil is hard to deal with. It’s always been incomprehensible to me, why some people are so cruel, lie so much, and cheat, or exercise their authority with malfeasance or sadistic processes.
With the daily physical needs of life, God is always there.
With dealing with the power of evil in everyday, God is always there.
The huge challenges of life are the last two necessities, meaningful labour, and love (to love others and to be loved by others.) These are not so much something one can acquire without the cooperation of the community in which one lives, or at least some people in it. When the most powerful people wish me dead … well these are nearly impossible.
When dealing with the power of evil so blatantly exercised by powerful people every day against me, God is always there. Sometimes God saves me from the effects of evil. Other times God simply weeps and suffers with me.
Still God neither slumbers nor abandons me.
As for God strengthening me (or any one for that matter) so that we are ever blameless … that never can happen. God strengthen me and strengthens each of us. We are able to remain gracious … with ourselves and with others, even our enemies who wish us dead. But we cannot on our own ever achieve blamelessness.
God must continue to forgive us each moment. Only by Grace are we now acceptable to God. In the end only by Grace (i.e. that Jesus’ record stands in for our botched, dirty and stained record) do we ever hope to still be acceptable to God.
God does not abandon us, nor does God sleep or slumber. God is on watch and walks with us.
Thanks be to God! For only by Grace do we live. Only by Grace do I live each day.
What about for you?! Do you think you make it through even a day or an hour on your own? Or are you also, by Grace, thankful for each breath?!
David said further to his son Solomon, ‘Be strong and of good courage, and act. Do not be afraid or dismayed; for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you, until all the work for the service of the house of the Lord is finished.
1 Corinthians 4:1
Think of us in this way, as servants of Christ and stewards of God’s mysteries.
Words of Grace For Today
If ever there was a time when we needed good people to be courageous and act, it is now. Evil has found a home in so many institutions, so many pieces of civilization, and in so many hearts and minds. The social contract that underpins civilization has been under attack by those who abuse their power and position and wealth for so long, no one can predict how long it will last, as it teeters next to the abyss with one foot on a banana peel. Predictions are that no matter the election results this November in the USA there will be civil unrest and violence. Among many others who are corrupt (including those with power in the Courts, with positions in politics, with wealth from oil and the inflated economy that surrounds it) Trump is trouble, bad trouble, real bad trouble.
Fortunately not everyone is corrupt, yet. Before corruption, well past the critical mass for unrest, reaches so many people that civilization is shredded by it, we need many many many people who are willing to make good trouble, good trouble for Christ.
Martin Luther wrote, shortly after his trial where he was found guilty:
If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true and not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitioussinners. Be a sinner and sinboldly,but believe andrejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world. As long as we are here [in this world]we have to sin. This life is not the dwelling place of righteousness,but, as Peter says,we look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousnessdwells. It is enough that bythe riches of God’s glory we have come to know the Lamb that takes away the sin of the world.
No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day. Do you think that the purchase price that was paid for the redemption of our sinsby so great a Lamb is too small? Pray boldly—you too are a mighty sinner.
.
Luther is not encouraging us to sin wildly. He states clearly that we sin already, no matter what we believe, think, do or do not do. The matter is then what? Do we recognize God’s Grace as the ultimate determination of our lives (each breath we take and each action we commit?) When we do, then we move beyond fearing our own sin. We accept it. We accept others’ sins. We exercise God’s Grace for ourselves and for others.
Levelled down to begging God for mercy, then we all can start to act, and act courageously. We can do everything the Holy Spirit gives us the power to do to counter the work of the Devil. So acting courageously we will continue to sin. This does not stop us for we trust God’ Grace.
David instructs Solomon to act, to serve God, for God will be with him.
Paul writes that we are servants of Jesus, stewards of God’s mysteries.
I gave thanks yesterday for water and fire, sufficient safe water and contained fire that keeps me warm, cooks food, and boils water.
It’s difficult to get water. Gas is too expensive to borrow a truck to travel the 25+ km there and 25 km back to get town water. There is no well and the lake water is contaminated far to much to use more than occasionally. No children have emerged from a swim with an extra leg or hand, but it’s bad. I have a bicycle that costs just my energy to run, though it’s not suitable for hauling water in any quantity. I have developed a way to collect rainwater. Since the recent rains I now have nearly full stores of rainwater, filtered and treated.
The stove that keeps me warm burns wood. LOTS of work. Every year the stove needs to be serviced, or more accurately rebuilt, fixed again and again, in order to eek out another winter of warmth from it. I was able to get this done over the Thanksgiving weekend, and it’s ready for the coming winter. There are other things I have to complete, but that one is the primary one.
Now I am set to work at surviving the winter, and living well!
What do we do with all that is life that God has given us?
David hoped his son would be faithful and serve God as Solomon ruled as king of Israel following David’s reign.
Paul hoped the Corinthians would learn to respect each other, not get caught in senseless squabbles, and look to serve (instead of rule over) others.
What do you hope for?
To live without sin and without trouble is not possible.
So serving Christ, trusting God’s Grace alone to save us, we can be so bold as opportunities provide for us, so that (though we may fail and likely will do something terribly wrong) God’s Grace will be known by many people through our words and actions (not by our sins.)
The point is, we will sin anyway, no matter what. Trying all your life not to sin is a useless consumption of our limited time alive. To do so would guarantee that we did nothing good at all. Not one little good thing at all.
Better to sin boldly.
Better to trust God to be with us.
Better to serve Christ and hold on to the mysteries we know about God.
Make trouble, good trouble. Invite others to make good trouble. We’re going to make trouble of some kind. Best we choose to make trouble, good trouble, serving Christ…
and trusting God’s forgiveness will extend also to us … especially when we need it.
I say to the Lord, ‘You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.’
John 17:3
This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.
Words of Grace For Today
Another Sci-Fi flick portrays the destruction of the human species, not quite by it’s own hand. An alien intelligence helps us along. Yet encountering a single, sort of good or at least good enough person, preserves her spirit, reincarnates her into an AI being and elevates that spirit to a new level, another dimension. The movie is boring, for all sorts of reasons, not least is that the move to a next level is in itself not interesting, nor effectively portrayed. How can it be?
Life is full of goodness, just because it is filled with challenges, hair falling out, birth of children (grandchildren if one is so blessed), losses and victories, getting wet and cold – and being comfortable and warm …. Life is good and interesting because it is embodied. It is mundane. It is vulgar and we strive to make it honourable and civilized.
Too many people assume that the thin veneer of civilization can be maintained even as they violate the basic sensibilities of respect and empathy for others that is at the heart of any good civilization. Out to get the most for themselves, they act as barbarians towards the truth, towards other people, and toward justice. When people with power start to create psuedo-realities that have little to nothing to do with reality, civilization teeters on the brink of chaos.
What follows history portrays often enough: we become barbarians, killing and maiming each other in order to survive and take the plunder for ourselves.
Courts that proceed based on blatant lies and allow people and lawyers complete latitude to kill others indirectly through the unjust results, invite more than insurrection. They invite the collapse of civilization.
The only thing that can save us is …
reform?
truth?
might?
No, none of these save us. Only God’s Grace saves us. Only Grace received and then exercised for others can possibly rebuild civilization enough that it can withstand the onslaught to the social contract that awaits us, that is underway already by fools, idiots, and fanatical makers of ir-realities and chaos.
The Irish called it shenanigans. Leprechauns, playful beings, pull on the strings of daily events, disrupting the procession from morning to night to morning just enough to bring humour to our efforts to be in control at all, at all.
That’s not this kind of shenanigans. This is the kind perpetrated by the evil minded dwarfs that work to thwart life wherever and how ever they can. That kind of shenanigans is the kind that unseats civilizations and all the powers that exist in it.
Presidents, Prime Ministers, Rulers and Courts who play with dwarf-minded shenanigans work to unseat themselves. Either they need to be unseated sooner than later, or God needs to give us the miracle of double victories. First that the injustice stops and truth dictates the winners. Second that the liars and creators of ir-reality, even the Rulers themselves, are won over to live for goodness sake, with Grace and empathy for all people.
This is life, filled with Grace, that God created us to enjoy on our journeys. Eternal life is to know the God who created us, to fear and love God. And eternal life is to know Jesus, God’s only Son, who sacrificed himself so that we may indeed live, with God walking on our journeys with us.
Try as we may, there is no real goodness that comes out of us, ourselves. All goodness that seems to come from us, is the reflection and result of God’s Grace winding its way in and through us.
Thank God for Grace!
Please God save us; give us double victories, your miracles in these troubling times. Covid 19 does not make things worse, or people worse. It merely raises the stress so that who evil people are, and how dangerous our times are, become frightening clear.
God save us, all of us! We are all in this together!
For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm.
Mark 4:39
He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm.
Words of Grace For Today
God Creates with a Word.
Kings’, emperors’, and pharaohs’ power was such that they need only speak and others would make it happen for them! No one dared to disobey.
God speaks and the nothingness of the not-yet-universe becomes something, something firm, solid, and existing. That’s infinitely more power than the most powerful ruler.
The people of Jesus’ time saw the world much differently than we do today. A firmament, a dome and separator, stood in the sky. On our side of it the world existed. On the other side of it was the chaos of not-creation, the nothingness that God created the world out of. The chaos was, as best one could translate it in terms available today, anti-matter, or anti-existence.
The point of all that is that this same chaos-anti-matter-anti-creation came up in the oceans. The water, the deep, was the same thing that was beyond the firmament, which was clear because when the firmament leaked it rained. When one ventured forth on the sea, one was courageous indeed, for one came into contact with anti-creation.
When storms rose up on the sea, the anger of God or simply the chaos of not-creation rose up to consume everything in it’s way. The disciples in the boat with Jesus feared not only the storm that could wash them out of the boat and send it and them into the deep. The disciples feared the power of chaos, the power of not-creation, or antimatter that could swallow up them, their boat and who knew what all else. Anyone caught in a flood will have stories of this fear. It is part of our human DNA.
Jesus is not afraid!
Human that he is fully, he is also fully God. He proves it. He speaks and the chaos of anti-creation is stilled. He commands all of creation and all of not-creation.
Now that is someone we want on our side.
But that cannot and never does happen.
Instead God brings us on to God’s side, and Jesus pays the price to make that possible, and the Holy Spirit moves in and through us to get the work of God to come out of us, in spite of us remaining sinners. Wonders never cease with God working us for the goodness of creation.
Which is good, because Evil never ceases to flow from our sins destroying the goodness of life for us and those around us, and those that come after us for generations.
Next time you see it rain, or the waves rise from the water of a lake or ocean, imagine the truth that those before us knew: this is the chaos out of which God created, which can consume us back to not-creation.
Thanks be to God, the waves are down, the sky up, and the rain is sufficient but not too much. It’s a balance, that involves us as well, if we wish to cooperate with God’s good creation.
