Today’s readings: Click on today’s date at http://www.usccb.org/bible/
In Flanders fields the poppies grow
Saturday, February 21, 2015
Saturday of the First Week of Lent
Psalm 86:11
Teach me your way, O Lord, that I may walk in your truth.
The psalm singer is “afflicted and poor.” But like Bartimaeus he cries out with abandon: “Lord Jesus Christ! Son of David! Have mercy on me, a sinner!”
Have mercy. Teach me how to walk through my life. Step by step. Day by day. Here, and now.
After a certain point, there is nothing obvious about these teachings. They depend on God’s intimate knowledge of his son, his daughter. In the silence, as I discard my expectations, God’s words are for me. Clear for me.
He knows us all so well. God does. Far better than I know myself, certainly far better than I can ever know you.
You ask me for advice, or maybe I ask you. How then shall we live? But this is God’s business, he who made us, he who holds us and gives us breath today and today and today. So we do well to be still. Wait for the Lord. Yes. Wait and watch him do what we ask him to do: Teach me, O Lord.
Otherwise, it’s too tempting to debate with one another, “What is truth?” Truth rides uncomfortably on the shoulders of its heroes, waiting till we turn away in favor of another brighter star. We know so little except what we see.
I think I’m often like a soldier trapped in a trench for months on end, knowing nothing except terror and gunfire. Earth’s bounty has dried up in the grays of this endless autumn. My helmet is heavy, and my clothes are in rags. There isn’t much food. Teach me, O Lord.
Where is spring? Where is the life you’ve shown me before? Can I wait like this, Lord? I crave the sunlight of dawn and the songs of larks waking me. They are gone. What now? Teach me, O Lord, that I may walk in your truth.
We need be in no hurry to reach back for the sweet memories, or forward to the haven of heaven. God is with me now, and he is teaching me now. I can learn to be still and let the learning come. Living water, bread of life. Rest.
Each breath I take is sweet, and I say thank you. Your gracious hands surround my face with their warmth and when I lean up against your chest, I can feel your own God’s heart beating, Jesus. Teach me, let me walk in your truth. Lead me in the way everlasting.
http://www.christiancounselingservice.com/archived_devotions.php?article_id=1335
