Christmas is over; next year’s goose is getting fat. I hope these devotions have blessed you and pushed you at times into reflection and prayer.
We have a bit more than a month before Lent begins. Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) is February 12. Devotions for Lent and Easter will begin on that day … God willing. God bless us every one.
Make my soul, Lord, rock my soul
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Epiphany Sunday
Isaiah 60:1-4
Rise up in splendor, Jerusalem! Your light has come, the glory of the Lord shines round about you. Upon you the Lord shines, and over you appears his glory. Raise your eyes and look about.”
Peter writes of scoffers who say, “Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” Not so, says Peter. But with the Lord, “a thousand years are like a day.”
In my own version of silence, waiting and watching, patience ebbs and flows. This Sunday is dedicated to epiphany. In Soul Making, Alan Jones likens epiphany to “God-placed time-bombs inside us, programmed to go off at certain intervals in order to make a gaping hole in us so that can continue to be open to life.”
God creates space in me to choose myself or God. W. H. Auden says that everything I do is an act of worship, either of God or of myself. Usually this new space gives me another chance to participate in the sacrament of the present moment rather than regretting the past or fearing the future. Rise up in splendor, your light has come.
My friend Larry reminded me yesterday that 10% of learning happens when I read, 20% when I write about what I read, and 70% when I do it. If I’m only using 10% of my brainpower, here’s the reason why. I’m not doing it. What am I, scared? Over you appears his glory, raise your eyes and look about!
A few more wise words from Alan Jones: “Without the occasional brush with the unexpected, human life soon becomes a mere matter of routine; and before we know where we are, a casual indifference and even brutality takes over and we begin to die inside. The shock breaks open the deadly “everydayness” that ensnares us and brings something awesome and terrifying to our reluctant attention: the believer’s name for that ‘something’ is God.
“God ceases to be a subject for philosophical debate, still less the object of our part-time and casual allegiance. This God is no hobby. God is felt in places too deep for words; in depths beyond ideas and concepts. God is felt in pain, sorrow, and contradiction.
“This, in itself, comes as a shock, since we tend to make religion only of our better moments. Our worst moments tend to be repressed and denied. When that happens, we begin to lie to ourselves; and when we lie, the very fabric of life begins to fall apart.”
Learning from God about myself – these epiphanies make life rich. They require ripping and tearing of my self-made skin, and God is not reluctant. Upon you the Lord shines, and over you appears his glory. Raise your eyes and look about. I watch and wait and watch and wait in sometimes agonizing wonder.
It is your justice, Lord, and your mercy that falls like rain and flowers from day to day, and your profound peace reigns till the moon be no more. You rule from sea to sea to shining sea, and from the River unto the ends of earth. May your name be forever; blessed be your name forever. You fill us all and all the earth with your great glory – Amen and Amen! — (from Psalm 72)
http://www.christiancounselingservice.com/archived_devotions.php?article_id=1136
