Friday, October 9, 2020
Birch Still Standing.
Though someone is cutting them down left right and centre
as we are
these still stand
as we will always!
Isaiah 49:4
I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity; yet surely my cause is with the Lord, and my reward with my God.
1 Corinthians 15:58
Therefore, my beloved, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord, because you know that in the Lord your labour is not in vain.
Words of Grace For Today
In this world the life of honesty and honour, of sacrificial and unconditional love, and of grace and hope is not rewarded by many. It is by many, even in the Courts, attacked and condemned with blood sport, lies and games with one’s life.
It is too often that striving to reflect the life the prophets called us to, to Jesus’ Way of being in the world, often leads us to the same end as he met: lies, injustice, cruelty, torture, and even death.
Met with this profound malfeasance we are readily able to say with Isaiah: We have laboured in vain, we have spent our strength for nothing and vanity. The work of the Devil meets our efforts to live graciously in response to God’s gift of life abundant. Seemingly the Devil wins every time.
Truth is otherwise. The Devil, all his works, and the people that do his deeds against us and so many others only show how lost and condemned those people are who follow his ways. They pronounce with lies that we are criminal, that we are vexatious, that we are unreliable. Their pronouncements do not reflect who we are, what we have done and not done. Their pronouncements reflect how corrupt they and all the liars are that bear false witness against good people like us.
They use their positions of power to create their own illogical, unreal bubble of existence. They dismiss scientists and science, logic and the laws of physics and other sciences (like gravity and toxicity), and the power of truth, love and hope. In their place they construct a world that serves their own greed, corrupt power, and decadent hedonism.
The devil’s miracle is that so many people accept this fantastical construction of ir-reality as if it were real, true, and valid. They construct religions of destruction of their enemies.
We hold to our faith in God who is all-powerful, Creator, and all-knowing. Our God is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. By Grace alone (not by our merit) God forgives us our sin, adopts us as children, and empowers us to be the voice, hands, and feet of God’s own Son, Jesus, who gave his life to redeem us. Our faith does not condemn others. That is in God’s hands, and God’s alone. Our faith gives life, and promises life eternal to those who believe and accept the redemption worked out for them each day, each minute.
Therefore we are steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord, because we know that in the Lord our labour is not in vain.
Covid 19 has nothing on the destructive power of the Devil, his works and the people who do his deeds. By Grace we shall live with God walking with us and suffering with us everything done to us, even through all these trying times. Even if our bodies die, we shall live for God cannot be defeated, nor can we be separated from God.
Breathe as we are still able. These are blessed lives God accompanies us through.