Thursday, July 22, 2021
We remember the Joy
of the Light freeing us from winter’s grip.
Help us remember
God’s freeing us from evil’s grip
each day.
Deuteronomy 6:11-12
When the Lord your God has brought you into the land that he swore to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—a land with fine, large cities that you did not build, houses filled with all sorts of goods that you did not fill, hewn cisterns that you did not hew, vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant—and when you have eaten your fill, take care that you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
1 John 3:17
How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?
Words of Grace For Today
Today’s world is in upheaval again and for sure still: Covid 19 has taken it’s toll on the world economy and specific countries’ economies, including ours.
Prices for food are up markedly. Prices for fuel are up markedly. Lumber prices are doubled and doubled and tripled again. Prices for goods, if you can find them, are up markedly. Saved money (not able to be out spending it) is burning holes in people’s pockets (not mine) so that demand is up, supply has been cut and the result is shortages and leaps in prices. Thems with lots of money can get what they want while the rest of us get less of what we need.
We do not remember being slaves.
We are still slaves …
slaves to global economies that drive us to behave in markedly unwell ways, unwell for ourselves and to the great detriment of so many other people alive on earth …
so much so that we must ask along with the writer of 1 John, How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? For we have, collectively well forgotten the Lord who would bring us up out of the house of slavery.
The measure of our forgetfulness is easy to see: how many poor among us live without even the basics of life to survive, yet alone flourish?
How we have forgotten the Lord,
for among us
so many people survive or barely survive or don’t survive long without clean water
so many people survive or barely survive or don’t survive long without nourishing food
so many people survive or barely survive or don’t survive long without sufficient clothing
so many people survive or barely survive or don’t survive long without housing or shelter
so many people survive or barely survive or don’t survive long without meaningful labour
so many people survive or barely survive or don’t survive long without being able to love or be loved.
We have the means to provide for everyone in Canada, and for everyone in the whole world, but instead we have forgotten the Lord and we luxuriate in
an overabundance of clean water
good (and not so healthy but sweet and salty snack and luxury) food
huge multiple houses for only a few people (houses that could provide homes for ten times the people).
Our meaningless labours are left to others to sweat out their life long
and
love is made impossible by our demands on people, families, and even children who are not ‘our kind’.
We pray:
Lord help us to remember.
Lord help us to remember
the freedom you offer us each day, the slavery that encases us and makes us blind and deaf to other’s real needs, the gifts you have given us that we have not earned or deserved, our ability to and joy in sharing your gifts with those who need them most.
Free us from our blind prejudices and hate-based, made-up ‘faith’.
Free us from our gluttonous abuse of the earth’s resources that others’ need to survive.
Free us from our unfounded self-righteousness by which we condemn others.
Free us to live by giving life to others.
Lord help us to remember.
Lord help us to remember
You and Your works for us.
Lord help us to remember
Your bounty of gifts given to us as your provision for us as stewards, stewards charged with sharing them all with those most in need.