There is goodness in every heart – I have seen it.
The world is not the way the media would have us believe.
We do not need to live in fear.
Choose not to!
Choose to see the loving hearts that make the world a better place.
See the people who care for each other without expecting a reward.
Notice your fellow travellers.
Glimpse the beauty and the courage in every soul.
See the goodness of this world.
Be the goodness of this world.
“as we forgive those who sin against us…”
These simple words, they ring and sing
From praying mouths and hearts.
Those words engraved upon my soul.
Since I was four, or there abouts.
I learnt “trespass against us” then,
And made me think of signs
Saying “Keep off the Grass” in public spots
And I worried about fines.
My own grass has been trampled on
Quite wrecking tender roots.
With no regard for the damage done,
In spiky heels and steel capped boots.
At times it’s been a muddy mess,
And I’ve been cross and hurt.
How dare they not see what they did,
When they turned my lawn to dirt!
It’s easy to be resentful.
Hoping that one day
Those tramplers see what they have done
And find the words to say…
A simple “sorry” from the heart.
It would make me feel much better.
But would it fix my muddied lawn?
Would I then forgive the debtor?
If I do not myself forgive,
Who is it that I punish?
It’s only me who grieves the loss
And my resentment will not vanish
I wonder if the disciples knew
When they asked Jesus how to pray,
If he would tell them to search their hearts
To see where the answer lay.
For it is only in forgiveness
That we can be whole and healed
And God’s forgiveness is by Grace.
But our own is deep concealed.
The muddy mess recovers now,
As tender shoots push through.
Bathed in the sunshine of God’s love,
And the gentle, moistening dew.
Perhaps the grass that’s growing now
Is stronger than the last.
Perhaps adversity will serve
To find redemption from the past.
But I cannot just sit and wait
And hope for the repair.
I must rake and feed and water and trim
And work through the despair.
Forgiving others? That’s truly tough.
I really want to do it.
So I sit with Jesus by my side
Holding my hand, as I work through it.
I think prayer is sometimes a misunderstood word and can be confused with worship (veneration) and meditation (listening).
The Latin root word is precar meaning something lent to be returned later, and from which we also get words such as precious (valuable and undeserved) and precarious (relying upon another).
Prayer is rooted in the concept of grace and dependence.
In French it became prierius which refers to the idea of something being dependent on the good grace of somebody else.
This helps to make more sense of the Hebrew word Tefilah (תפילה) which is usually translated as prayer.
Tefilah is an intimate sharing of heart and soul – communion – reaching deeper and deeper and finding God in that extreme honesty.
Tefilah is derived from the root Pe-Lamed-Lamed and the word l’hitpalel, meaning:
“to judge oneself”!
This word origin provides insight into the purpose of prayer. The most important part of any prayer is the introspection it provides, the moment that we spend looking inside ourselves, seeing our role in the universe and our relationship to God.
Prayer is 2 way communication between yourself and God and it doesn’t need to be vital, important stuff. It can be as banal as most Facebook chatter but it is rooted in the concept that we talk to God because we know that we are utterly dependent upon him for our existence and, just as we talk to humans upon whom we are dependent, we get joy from the communication.
We talk to God with extreme honesty, and sometime that honesty takes time and courage to discover.
We sometimes have very powerful self-protective barriers that can hide the truth from ourselves and these can take considerable time and energy to break down.
God is so often described as TRUTH, it seems redundant to again assert that God is Truth.
Yet that is where God is to be found, in the truth, in the real and the objective core.
So when I prayer, I pray to be enlightened by the truth, even when it is painful, and I rub away diligently at the dirty marks and smudges that hide the truth from me.
I pray in order to judge myself, and in doing so, I am set free by the truth, and there is God.
Oh God, why is it so easy to criticise?
To see the faults in others
and find them irritating
even impossible?
And why is it so hard
to see the good in some?
To see past a rampant ego
to the fragile soul it is protecting?
For defenses are never pretty.
They are not meant to encourage us
to want to venture inside.
They are prickly, spiky things,
hard and topped with boiling oil
designed to repel.
So often I need help
to see past the defenses
to the delicate treasures inside.
For often the strongest battlements
hide the most fragile hearts.
How can I be sure I am doing the right thing?
How can I know that my actions and my decisions are what you truly desire, Lord?
Help me to thrust aside my own ego
that ego that makes me selfish and proud
that ego that expects reward for my goodness.
Help me to understand that none but you is good
and listen with an open heart and mind to you when I pray.
For you have promised to always hear us when we pray
but our prayers must be for the common good or for the good of others
not just wishes for our selfish desires.
So we are told to “pray in Jesus name”.
Help me to understand better each day what that truly means.
Help me to align myself with Jesus and pray as he would pray,
not that my will, but that your will be done.
Then will all things truly be possible.
So heal me, Lord
make me whole
but not for my own sake
but so that I may be fit to serve you
and to serve others
for your sake.
I truly ask, in Jesus precious name.
Amen
ATONE – To make reparation, compensation, or amends, for an offence, crime or sin one has committed.
It restores balance. It is intentional karma.
But what if you have committed no sin?
Jesus was blameless, yet his death is atonement.
So why did Jesus die?
As a child, it seemed to me to be a rotten ending to a really good story.
I was told that, by his death on the cross, Jesus “obtained an eternal deliverance for all his people”.
But nobody explained to me how that worked.
Apparently, it was something I would understand when I was older.
Yet I was also told that God was all loving and all forgiving, so somehow, the idea that God REQUIRED Jesus to die in order to be able to forgive us all for being the humans he had created in the first place – well that made no sense.
So why was atonement necessary?
The numerous Theories of the Atonement might help, now that I am older.
There are historical theories, and more modern theories that attempt to explain the atonemant,
The Ransom Theory: This was the earliest theory, originating with the early church. This theory proposess that Christ offered himself as a ransom (Mark 10:45).
But, it does not make clear who this ransom was paid to, although many in the early church believed the ransom as paid to the devil.
However, if the devil requires a ransom, doesn’t that mean he has the upper hand and is telling God what he requires?
The Recapitulation Theory: This theory originated with Irenaeus (125-202 AD) and relates the concept back to Genesis.
Irenaeus considered Jesus’ work to be undoing the sins of Adam.
Adam was disobedient to God, but Jesus was obedient even to death. Irenaeus also compared Eve and Mary to contrast the deceptive nature of Eve with the accepting nature of Mary.
But, if I don’t believe Adam and Eve were literal people (and I don’t since I believe in evolution) this theory is not going to work for me.
The Satisfaction Theory: Proposed by Anselm of Canterbury (1034-1109) who suggested that God’s honour and dignity had been offended and it could only be satisfied by the sacrifice of Jesus – a debt paid to God on behalf of sinners.
But, this makes God seem like a petty despot, so I don’t like that one, despite thinking that Anselm is a great name 🙂
The Penal-Substitution Theory: The 16th century Reformers built upon Anselm’s theory but thought it was incomplete because it was based upon God’s honour rather than his justice and holiness. Jesus died for humankind, and in doing so, he took all our collective sins upon himself and set us free from the demands of the Law so that both the Law and the holiness of God are satisfied.
But, I still feel this makes God look a bit feeble.
The Moral- Influence Theory – Peter Abelard (1079-1142) suggested that Jesus died to influence mankind toward moral improvement. He suggested Jesus’ death was planned to impress mankind with the sheer magnitude of God’s love so that thier hearts would be softened and they would turn back to him.
In this theory, the atonement is not for God’s benefit but for ours, and this makes sense to me.
In essence, the death of Jesus touches us and influences us to changed behaviour and a better life.
I can see the logic of this one.
The Governmental Theory: This view was formulated by Hugo Grotius (1583-1645) and was adopted by Jacobus Arminius, Charles Finney, Jonathan Edwards the younger, and Methodism. It posits that God made Christ an example of suffering because he needed to show humankind that our sins displease him.
In this, my least favourite theory, God needs to stamp his authority and he does that by venting all his anger on Christ.
But, to me this makes God sound like one of those Roman legionnaires who were reputed to have randomly killed every 10th man in their ranks in order to assert their authority.
Modern theories
The Declaratory Theory: Albrecht Ritschl (1822-89)
This is an extension of the Moral Influence theory which says Jesus died to show us how much God loves us.
Makes sense to me.
The Guaranty (Guarantee) Theory: J. C. K. von Hofmann (1810-77)
Jesus died to gain followers and prove that what he said about himself was true.
Maybe, partly.
Vicarious Repentance Theory: John McLeod Campbell (1800-1872). This theory suggests that only a perfect repentance can atone for sin. Jesus died in order to be one with God’s condemnation of sin. By dying, he condemned sin, and also confessed it.
Maybe, partly.
Christ Victor Theory: G. E. H. Aulén (1879-1977).
I left this to last because it is the theory that both makes sense to me logically and fits with my own awareness of God in my life.
In Christ Victor the world is seen as one of opposing forces of good and evil in divine conflict. By dying on the cross and resurrecting, Jesus banished the powers that had maintained a hold over humanity. The atonement is viewed as divine conflict and victory over the hostile powers that hold humanity in subjection.
faith
feɪθ/
noun – complete trust or confidence in someone or something.
When we say we have “faith” it does not mean that we believe without proof. It means we trust.
We trust God because of what we have learnt of God. We “believe in” God, not in a sense of wishful thinking, but because we trust that God is good and cares for us.
Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen
St Francis of Assisi – 13th century
