Sunday, December 27, 2015

Colossians 3:12-13 (NRSV): Spiritual Growth

Colossians 3:12-13 (NRSV): Spiritual Growth
As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

When we allow Him, Jesus Christ rules our hearts even in the most trying moments. One challenge of discipleship comes when we are tempted make an uncharitable choice under duress. However, through humility, patience, and compassion for others, we are to think on, pray to, and act in Christ. We are freely given the grace to lovingly respond to a given challenge, but it is through our free will that we make that response; we choose to reciprocate God’s gifts of “compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience,” bearing with and forgiving one another. But who ever said choices were easy?

Christmas is my favorite time of year, but in the midst of joy and thanksgiving, it, too, can pose uncomfortable interpersonal challenges. This week, I have been reminded of the joy that loving relationships bring and the disappointment brought on by others. Paul’s reminder that God gives the gifts of “compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience” shows how much I need to grow spiritually and reminds me about my dependence on Christ’s mercy and strength.  St. Paul writes that in his weakness, Christ is made strong: “I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me” (2 Corinthians 12:9). And I embrace Paul’s sentiment.

In this week of loving communion with the Incarnate God, let us revel in His grace, knowing we are imperfect but loved despite our imperfections. Let us ask God to grant us the humility to grow, “[bearing] with one another . . . [and forgiving] each other; just as the Lord has forgiven [us].”

Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week, and may you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.

Sunday, December 20, 2015

Mark 9:33-37 (NRSV): Service and Humility

Mark 9:33-37 (NRSV): Service and Humility
. . . For on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest. He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

The disciples, again, get it wrong. As they argue who is the greatest, Jesus corrects them not only verbally but visually. Jesus is clear in his speech: “If anyone would be first, he must be last and servant of all.” As followers of Jesus we must imitate his example of humility, self-giving, and service, putting others before ourselves. This applies to everything we do in life, no matter our job or personal circumstances. We come last; others come first. To illustrate this, Jesus takes the lowest socially-ranked human of the times, a child, and embraces him or her saying, “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me.” When we serve what society deems the least or lowest level citizen, we imitate Christ. But Jesus takes our service a step further. When we serve the least person of honor, we serve Christ himself. After all, God became human in Jesus.  In coming to save a sinful world, Jesus chose to be born among the stench of animals, exposed to the cold, damp air of a stable, raised in a struggling family who had little and worked hard to survive. Jesus came to us not as a worldly king but as a crying child in need of love, totally dependent upon Joseph and Mary. As we prepare for Christmas, let us remember the humility of the Creator of the universe. Let us remember that God loves us so much that he became “the last of all and servant of all.”

Let us all pray that our families and friends be blessed this Christmas and that those children (and their families) who seek shelter and safety in the war-torn corners of the world find protection in the loving arms of Christ’s Body on earth.

Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  
Stan

Sunday, December 13, 2015

Matthew 6:27, 33-34 (NLT): Focusing on Today

Matthew 6:27, 33-34 (NLT): Focusing on Today

Can all your worries add a single moment to your life? . . . .
Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need. So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.

Jesus reminds us that although our anxieties and worries are part of the everyday struggle of this world, we are to put our faith in Him, to “seek the Kingdom of God above all else.” When we incessantly worry about tomorrow, we are piling unnecessary stress upon ourselves. Concern and planning are necessary for providing for our families and ourselves. “Worry,” however, is a distraction; it is a tool of temptation. When we live in the immediacy of the moment, when we lay down our heavy burdens and rest in the love of Jesus (Matthew 11:28), we are more present and aware of how God is working through us, even in our times of doubt, struggle, and failure. By seeking God in the moment, harnessing the gift of grace in the now, we catch glimpses of God working in, through, with, and around us.

Many years ago while strolling through downtown Louisville, Kentucky, the spiritual writer Thomas Merton had a mystical experience of God that changed the direction of his life.  In his famous memoir, Merton writes:

In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world, the world of renunciation and supposed holiness… This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud… I have the immense joy of being man, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate. As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm me, now I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun. (The Seven Storey Mountain)

Merton was able to recognize the immediacy of the moment.  He was able to push aside future anxiety and see God in the people who stood in front of him.  In that moment, he witnessed a life-changing revelation.  I pray that we, too, put aside the anxieties and worries of tomorrow so that we can witness the love and connectivity that God offers us today.

Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  
Stan

Monday, December 7, 2015

1 Corinthians 13:7 (ESV): Love’s Challenge

1 Corinthians 13:7 (ESV): Love’s Challenge
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

St. Paul rightly reminds us that love is not only patient and kind, but it bears, believes, hopes, and endures all things.  In our life’s vocation, we are reminded of this daily.  As parents, spouses, family members, friends, and school employees we are called to love without condition. Very often that love is easy; we give it to someone we adore.  Sometimes, however, we find ourselves in a difficult relationship where we are called to love the disagreeable person in front of us. And that love is not always the easiest kind. If we bear, believe, hope, and endure in the love of Christ working through us, we can offer ourselves to that difficult-to-love person. In that offering of self, we become more like Jesus and bear the fruit of love to others in His name.

Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Sunday, November 29, 2015

Mark 5:18-20 (NLT): Our Christian Mission

Mark 5:18-20 (NLT): Our Christian Mission

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon possessed begged to go with him.  But Jesus said, ‘No, go home to your family, and tell them everything the Lord has done for you and how merciful he has been.’ So the man started off to visit the Ten Towns of that region and began to proclaim the great things Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed at what he told them.

Once I truly came to Christ in May of 2012, I felt truly liberated. At that moment grace was tangible, for I could have scooped it up and held it in my hands to display to all the world.  There is no way to explain this new beginning as other than miraculous; the agony of stress, fear, and deep-seeded emotional pain were gradually released and became manageable. My life is certainly not perfect now, nor will it ever be on this earth, but through Christ’s work in me, all things, both celebrations and setbacks, now have purpose. The overriding question still remains, however: How can I be a better, more effective disciple for Jesus? Early in my walk with Christ, my answer was naive and misguided: I focused on legalism and a devotion to everything “church.” But  through time, prayer, and grace, God speaks through “that still small voice” (1 Kings 19:12-13) about my mission, a mission that always lies in front of me in the simplicity of the everyday.

In the above passage, Jesus frees the demoniac from a grueling spiritual and corporeal prison. In the exuberance of this liberation, he “begs to go with [Jesus].” Devoted discipleship, naturally, would be the response of someone liberated from a terrifying, debilitating force. The liberated man is flooded with grace and wants to witness that grace as one of Christ’s intimate disciples. Instead, the liberated man is given another mission. He is to “proclaim the great things” of the gospel to his own family and community.  Jesus says, “No, go home to your family, and tell them everything the Lord has done for you and how merciful he has been.”

Sometimes the most important mission we can serve for Christ is to be His witnesses among our own family and neighbors. Our calling is more often not formal ministry. It is, instead, spreading the Good News of Jesus Christ among the most intimate communities in our lives, our own families and friends. Most likely, this mission does not require preaching or evangelization in the strict sense, but it asks us to witness, through our character and lives, the light of Christ’s love. Through this mission, we become the living stories of Jesus’ love, mercy, and liberation in the world.

Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Monday, November 23, 2015

Mark 4:20 (NRSV): Being the “Good Soil” to Others

 Mark 4:20 (NRSV): Being the “Good Soil” to Others

And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.”

Mark 4:20 (NRSV): Being the “Good Soil” to Others
“And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.”

In the parable of the sower, Jesus clearly differentiates four environments of the sown seed.  Seeds on the “path,” “rocky ground,” and “among the thorns” do not produce fruit that lasts.  The seed, however, sown in “good soil” flourishes with fruit. Christ wants our hearts to be the “good soil” of the gospel message.  He offers us the opportunity to cultivate our human hearts into the rich, fertile soil of love. Our job, as Jesus states, is to not only hear the gospel but to “accept it.” When we accept the unfathomable love of God through Christ, we become a fertile field ready for planting, a field of “good soil” that will, with God’s grace, yield “thirty, sixty, or a hundredfold.”

That’s all good, but what, I often wonder, does this “good soil” look like in our world?  How do we allow Jesus to renew our hearts to bear the good fruit of the gospel so that it can both flourish in us and be, in turn, blessed, broken, and given to our neighbor? If we “look” and “listen” (Mark 4:12), we can see Christ all around us in the reflection of human love, compassion, and kindness. Recently, StoryCorps posted two daughters’ interview with their loving father Ken Morganstern. Listening carefully to Ken’s three-minute interview, we hear the love of Christ cry out to us through the “good soil” of this man’s heart.  In the interview, Ken’s daughters say to him, ”You’ve created such love around you.” I look at Ken’s example of self-giving and happiness, the legacy of love he leaves, and pray that I, too, can cultivate this “good soil” in my small corner of the world.

Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Monday, November 16, 2015

Mark 1:18 (NRSV): Leaving our Nets

Mark 1:18 (NRSV): Leaving our Nets
And Jesus said to them, ‘Follow me and I will make you fish for people.’
And immediately they left their nets and followed him.”

The Gospel of Mark has an uncanny stylistic tone of immediacy. The biblical scholar, Richard A. Horsley, says the following regarding The Gospel of Mark’s style:
Its style features rapid sequences of brief and vivid concrete episodes linked simply by “and” or “and immediately,” frequently omitted in translation for less awkward reading in English. The narrative often shifts from the past tense into the present tense, enlivening the action. (The New Oxford Annotated Bible 1790)
Mark’s narrative, therefore, is full of Jesus’ and His disciples’ immediate actions.  In these verses, Simon Peter and Andrew are busy at their nets as fisherman on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus passes along the sea, and, wasting no time, calls for them to follow Him. There is no hesitancy on the part of Peter and Andrew: They immediately drop their nets and follow. Radically, these brothers leave behind their livelihood and families to follow Jesus. Does this mean that we must do the same? Yes and no. God’s purpose and will is according to each individual and their station in life. Some are called to literally leave everything, but this is the exception rather than the rule. Most of us, however, are called to leave behind our figurative unhealthy attachments. Nets can trap, confine, tangle, and weigh us down. Our unhealthy attachments do the same to us. It is our job, then, to leave the burden of our figurative nets behind, whatever they may be, and follow Jesus.

  • Please pray for those who lost their lives this weekend in Paris and for the families and friends who mourn.
  • Please pray for Christ’s peace and forgiveness to enter the hearts of all people.
  • Finally, please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Sunday, November 8, 2015

Matthew 5:4-5 (NRSV): The Wounded and Worn Out

Matthew 5:4-5 (NRSV): The Wounded and Worn Out
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.”

Throughout the Gospels, Christ welcomes, heals, and liberates the outcasted meek who mourn. We do not see, in contrast, the Pharisees and Scribes with their flowing robes, preferred seating, ritualistic demeanor, and long public prayers as the captives being set free. Instead, it is the outcast, the prostitute, the tax collector, the leper, the child, and the widow who become the object of Christ’s healing and God’s grace -- those who are meek and mourn.  What sets them apart? Humility, self-admitted sin, and a longing to feel loved and renewed. One of my favorite writers, Philip Yancey, conveys the core message of the Beatitudes in his book The Jesus I Never Knew:

The Beatitudes express quite plainly that God views this world through a different set of lenses. God seems to prefer the poor and those who mourn to the Fortune 500 and supermodels who frolic on the beach. Oddly, God may prefer South Central L. A. to Malibu Beach, and Rwanda to Monte Carlo. In fact, one could almost subtitle the Sermon on the Mount not “survival of the fittest” but “triumph of the victims.” (113)

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

Stan

Sunday, November 1, 2015

Matthew 5:3 (NRSV): Spiritual Humility

Matthew 5:3 (NRSV): Spiritual Humility
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”


The Beatitudes offer one of the most accurate but also hard-to-pin-down lessons on discipleship.  Jesus, delivering His Sermon on the Mount, offers this lesson: We must be poor in spirit in order to receive the kingdom of heaven.  Does poverty, in this context and audience, mean to be monetarily poor? No. Poor in spirit is to practice spiritual humility; it is to rely on God no matter how intellectually talented, rich, or powerful we are in this world.  In this spiritual humility, a humility modeled by Jesus, we find, as Fr. James Martin mentions in his tweet, true happiness. Happy are we who offer ourselves in humble service to God and neighbor.


May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  


Please keep each other and our special intentions in prayer this week.  

Stan

Sunday, October 25, 2015

1 John 2:9-10 (NRSV): Act in Love

1 John 2:9-10 (NRSV): Act in Love
“Whoever says, ‘I am in the light’, while hating a brother or sister, is still in the darkness. Whoever loves a brother or sister lives in the light, and in such a person there is no cause for stumbling.”

My frustration with closed-minded people sometimes gets the best of me. These moments most often result in my counting to ten and internally reviewing my lack of charity.  But there are many times people act and behave in ways that run counter to my worldview. Those are trying times for me, however, especially when the issues at hand are close to my heart.  My frequent thought is the following: Why do I find it so challenging to love this person? The self-reflective answer is in my need for renewal. This renewal, moreover, is in the light of Jesus Christ.

“The darkness,” according to John, is a cause of spiritual blindness, and many Christians suffer from it. Like a fog, it covers our consciences when we become desensitized to our feelings of hate and sin and no longer seek repentance and reconciliation with the offended person and, in turn, God.  This is the darkness of our fallen humanity; it is what the Early Church Fathers termed concupiscence. Christ, as John reminds us, atoned for that darkness on the cross. He is our light, the example of love and self giving that we must follow. Loving one another, as John writes, is living in this light, and this light give us “no cause for stumbling.”

It is only through Christ’s light in us that we can combat this evil instinct of hate and instead embrace the charitable way of Jesus, a way that connotes loving all people, even if we find their behavior irritating and off-putting.  Love, in this sense, may take the form of hope, hoping for that person’s good; prayer, praying for that person’s conversion; and petition, petitioning God for the grace to be like Christ to that person and to shine a light on their darkness. Loving the difficult-to-love, most importantly, will require change in us, too.  A renewal that only the presence of Christ can make, but we must invite Him in.  I, self-admittedly, need to extend this invitation daily.

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Monday, October 19, 2015

John 12:24-26 (GNT): Dying to Self

John 12:24-26 (GNT): Dying to Self

“I am telling you the truth: a grain of wheat remains no more than a single grain unless it is dropped into the ground and dies. If it does die, then it produces many grains. Those who love their own life will lose it; those who hate their own life in this world will keep it for life eternal. Whoever wants to serve me must follow me, so that my servant will be with me where I am.”

I am tempted daily to make choices that both serve and provide a comfort to me. For instance, when my family asks favors, my children make requests, and my neighbors need me, my subconscious reaction is to think first about how it will effect my day.  Life choices tend to revolve around “me.”

In the above verses, Jesus foreshadows the necessity of His own death: “If [the grain of wheat] does die, it produces many grains.”  Christ dies so the fruit of humanity can be reconciled with God and grafted to Him. Implicitly, Jesus addresses His listeners and readers, too. The faithful in Christ must die to the self-serving allurement of this world. The allurement of this world, in my example, lies in the emphasis of self.  When we die to the ideology of worldly thinking, like the elitist mindset of the Pharisees and chief priests of first-century Palestine, we gain eternal life in Christ. Jesus is not telling us to forget the life we live in this world. He is telling us, instead, to imitate Him in living it: Mercy, unconditional love, self-giving, forgiveness, welcoming the marginalized, and service to others are ways in which we can imitate Christ. For Jesus states that “Whoever wants to serve me must follow me.”

My thinking and living must be transformed, then.  Although my thoughts gravitate toward self will, self comfort, and self satisfaction, the answer lies in the life of Jesus. He provides the road map to living. Through His example and grace, we can all imitate and live a life guided by loving God and neighbor.

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Monday, October 12, 2015

John 13:34-35 (NRSV): We are Known by our Love

John 13:34-35 (NRSV): We are Known by our Love

“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Sometimes I equate witnessing my faith to what Walt Whitman writes in “Song of Myself”: “I sound my barbaric yawp from the rooftops of the world.” In essence, I want to scream and shout, fill giant LCD screens in Times Square, and paint the sky with aeronautical smoke displaying that I am a follower of Jesus Christ.

Witnessing our love for God is a good thing, but our t-shirts, wristbands, and bumper stickers can sometimes function as the phylacteries, long garments, and tassels the Pharisees wore in the square when they prayed in public (see Matthew 23:5), externals that call attention to ourselves rather than God.

Jesus, however, in the beginning of the Book of Glory in John’s Gospel, tells His disciples something different: We are known by our love.  According to Scripture, the true testament of being Christ’s followers is how much we love God and neighbor, and in this passage, Jesus emphasizes our love for neighbor. The phrase “love one another,” for example, is repeated three times in these verses alone.

As I put away the bells and whistles of excited advertisement, I ask God to grant me the grace to love the person in front of me more, even when it is a difficult task. For as Christians, we are known by our love.

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Monday, October 5, 2015

Mark 10:15 (NRSV): Simplicity of Faith

Mark 10:15 (NRSV): Simplicity of Faith

“Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.”

In first-century Palestine, children were seen as parental property, voiceless beings expected to show devoted obedience.  Although marginalized, Children then were no different from children today -- impartial, innocent, and full of trusting love.  An adult, on the other hand, adopts a critical, callous point of view of the world.  In an adult-like manner, we question, doubt, and readily claim our self righteousness in matters of faith. But Jesus demands that we receive the kingdom of God as children. We must, therefore, slough off the facade of egotism and pride and open our minds and hearts to the truth of the gospel: God loves us so much that even while we are steeped in our own sins, Christ died for each of us (Romans 5:8). Receiving the kingdom of God as a child means having humble faith, loving God with an innocent heart, and loving our neighbor with impartiality.  When we live as children of God, looking up to Him with total dependence and trust, we “receive the kingdom of God.” I pray that our lives reflect Christ’s love and light to others.

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Monday, September 28, 2015

Psalm 19:14 (NRSV): Daily Offering

Psalm 19:14 (NRSV): Daily Offering


“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
   be acceptable to you,
   O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.”


When we sync what we say with how we feel, the world is right in many ways, and our lives are more truthful. When our thoughts and feelings are rooted in Christ, our actions reflect peace and love for others. In this verse, David prays for the grace that his every word and meditation be pleasing to God.  As we venture into our week, let us ask God to bless every word and thought we offer to the world and that it bring Him glory.

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Sunday, September 20, 2015

John 3:16-17 (GNT): God's Love

John 3:16-17 (GNT): God's Love

For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to be its judge, but to be its savior.

These verses are the most well-known words in all of Scripture.  But what is Jesus saying to Nicodemus, a Pharisee too worried about what his peers think?

  1. God loves us unconditionally.  For we are made in His image and likeness, but after the fall in Eden, we need to be redeemed.  Our moment of redemption is at hand in the only Son.
  2. We must truly turn our hearts over to Christ in faith, not a faith of physicality and miracles, but a faith of trust and total surrender to God.
  3. Eternal life is found in Christ, not the world.
  4. Christ did not come into the world to judge us.  Jesus took on human flesh to save us.

Let us commit ourselves, in faith, to the love and mercy Jesus our Redeemer and celebrate the gift of God’s grace that is the genesis of our faith.  As we go into the world this week, let us serve others knowing we bear the love and light of Christ in our hearts.

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Saturday, September 19, 2015

Hebrews 11:1 (GNT): Faith

Hebrews 11:1 (GNT): Faith

“To have faith is to be sure of the things we hope for, to be certain of the things we cannot see.”

This verse and the entire eleventh chapter of Hebrews are a powerful reminder of the surety of our hope in Christ, and the certainty of the blessings and graces we sometimes cannot see.  Let us look around our world and in faith count the wonderful blessings that surround us daily, especially our families, the spectacular kids we serve, and the wonderful people with whom we work.  


May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Sunday, September 6, 2015

Isaiah 58:6-7 (NIV): Advocating for the Mistreated

Isaiah 58:6-7 (NIV): Advocating for the Mistreated

“Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
   and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
   and break every yoke?
Is it not to share your food with the hungry
   and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
   and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?”

When reading the above Old Testament passage, we cannot help but recall Christ’s words in Matthew 25: 35-36 (NIV):

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

The prophet Isaiah, in the above passage, communicates God’s expectation of true fasting and genuine sacrifice.  Denying ourselves food and forgoing chocolate or coffee tends to be our vision of sacrifice and happens quite often during Lent, but God through His prophet and Jesus in the Gospel are getting at something much greater: loving our neighbor as ourselves by advocating for the mistreated. We simply cannot sit in “sackcloth and ashes” or starve ourselves and expect miracles to happen.  God uses us in very real, tangible ways to reach out to each other, especially those in need.

Recently, I listened to a TED talk given by former president Jimmy Carter.  President Carter spoke about a topic that stirred my emotions, the mistreatment of women and girls throughout the world. As both a father and husband, my heart grew aflame at his message.  What he says is true not only in countries like Egypt and Africa, but in our own backyards. Women are unequally treated, victimized, and abused, more often in the name of male-dominated misinterpretation of religious texts. President carter states the following:

I can tell you without any equivocation that the number one abuse of human rights on Earth is, strangely, not addressed quite often, is the abuse of women and girls. . . There are a couple of reasons for this ... First of all is the misinterpretation of religious scriptures, holy scriptures, in the Bible, Old Testament, New Testament, Quran ..., and these have been misinterpreted by men who are now in the ascendant positions in the synagogues and the churches and in the mosques. And they interpret these rules to make sure that women are ordinarily relegated to a secondary position compared to men in the eyes of God.

President Carter, as a human rights activist, embodies what God demands through the prophet Isaiah, and what Christ calls for in the Gospel, to love others with a severe and devoted heart, especially those who are marginalized and unjustly treated. Let us follow God’s command and President Carter's example, for this is “the kind of fasting [God has] chosen.”

May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan

Sunday, August 30, 2015

Mark 7:1-5, 20-23 (NRSV): What Truly Matters?

Mark 7:1-5, 20-23 (NRSV): What Truly Matters?


So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?”  He said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written,
‘This people honors me with their lips,
   but their hearts are far from me;
in vain do they worship me,
   teaching human precepts as doctrines.’
You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.”
… And he said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come ... All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”


I have a confession to make: I am a former legalist, a former doctrinal specialist, a former Pharisee. Once I first truly came to Christ, and I am not talking about at the baptismal font but when I first said “yes” to His prompting of love, I envisioned a life of discipleship as a vast area of learning about and sticking to doctrine. If it was doctrinally in Scripture and tradition, I wanted to know about it and enmesh it in my life. As you can imagine, I quickly hit a life-sized, spiritual wall.  In my zeal to know more about Jesus and His church, I was failing to nurture our relationship, a relationship that is built on His grace, mercy, and love. I was the Pharisee in this Scripture asking myself, and indirectly others, “Why do [you] not live according to the tradition of the elders…?”


Through life experience, grace, and prayer, God reveals that human tradition is without meaning if it is void of His love and mercy.  Jesus exemplifies this throughout the Gospels, and it is ingrained in all of His teachings. How could I have missed it?


This weekend, my son asked if we could go to his favorite restaurant for lunch. Although we were at the end of our summer budget, we agreed and had a delicious meal together.  During our meal, however, there was a raucous, inappropriate conversation taking place at an adjacent table.  The group, comprised of adults, was loud and their content and language were not conducive to family dining.  “From within,” I became enraged and began internally railing against these patrons, casting burning looks of implied judgment toward my wife: We were thinking the same thing.


I had an epiphany.  In the midst of my “evil intentions,” God was calling me to not hate but to pray for these people. Admittedly, I did not want to, but it felt necessary. When we got into the van and later returned home, my son and I had a conversation about how difficult it can be to love others unconditionally.


It is so easy and satisfying to judge others and think through the lens of condemnation, but Christ demands that we slough off our evil intentions and stick to what truly matters, mercifully loving others even in the face of offense and irritation. Thankfully, I am still Christ’s work in progress and desperately dependent on His grace.


May you all be blessed and encouraged in the love and peace of Christ.  

Stan