Bread and Wine Reading: "I Thirst for You", Mother Teresa
Scripture Reading: John 7: 37-39
On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, “Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.” ’ Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
Scripture Reading: John 19: 28
After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfill the scripture), ‘I am thirsty.’
The first Scripture for today is one of our favorites. We look at it as God’s promise of refuge, of healing, of comfort. But we miss what I think may be the focus of the passage: “Come to me.” God created us and made us in the image of God, made us so that we would desire to be with the one whose image we share. As Mother Teresa beautifully portrays in her essay, “I know you through and through—I know everything about you…I have followed you through the years, and I have always loved you—even in your wanderings.” That is the crux: God loves us. God love us so much that God created us, created the world in which we live, and has tried since the onset of Creation to get us to “come”.
We read this first Scripture with the assurance that God embraces us, that God will be there when we are in need. It is one of our favorites. God is there when we need God the most. And yet, we still don’t come. But God created the world, trying so many ways to convince us how much we are loved. “Good grief,” God must have thought at times, “how many burning bushes and over-zealous prophets does it really take?” And yet, we march on…we allow poverty to continue in our lives; we let greed consume our being; and in an effort to preserve the image and the lives that we have created for ourselves, we turn aside or plow over or underutilize or march against the one next to us, the one who God loves just as much as God loves us. No, we never came.
And so God comes to us once again. God comes to show us what life is, how life should be, and when we rejected the thought of change, God hung there with as much love as in the beginning. “I thirst.” God will always welcome the thirsty and quench our thirst. But God thirsts with a depth and profundity that we will never grasp. God thirsts for us to come. God thirsts for us to enter the Passion of Christ and stand at the foot of the Cross that we might be swept up in the new beginning, the New Creation. “I thirst…” “Come to me.”
Discussion Questions:
1.) What gets in the way of our truly believing and accepting that God loves us this much?
2.) What would that do for our lives if we truly embraced that?
3.) What is your own response to God’s thirst for you?
So go forth and quench the deep and abiding thirst of God!
Grace and Peace,
Shelli
Showing posts with label Discipleship. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Discipleship. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Monday, February 25, 2013
Followers, Not Admirers
Bread and Wine Reading: "Followers, Not Admirers", Soren Kierkegaard
Scripture Reading: Matthew 4: 18-22
As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” Immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.
We like this Scripture. It is the beginning of Jesus gathering together his disciples, those who would be with him through his ministry, and those who would accompany him as he began spreading the Good News. I’m wondering, though, how many truly understood what they were actually signing up to do. The rest of the Gospels usually depict these men following Jesus around, asking questions, and often-times looking like a somewhat bumbling group as they crawl on top of each other clamoring to be named first. But this was a big deal. They were changing their whole lives. There was no going back. And ahead of them lay a call to travel out of comfortable boundaries, stretch one’s mind and one’s faith beyond the usual grounds, encounter rejection and possibly even expulsion from “acceptable” society, and ultimately be left alone standing at the foot of the cross. This was not going to be a safe journey!
Kierkegaard reminds us that “Christ came into the world with the purpose of saving, not instructing it.” He goes on to lay out the difference between a follower of Christ, one who strives to be Christ and follows Christ’s lead beyond what is easily seen and planned, and an admirer, one who, though looking to Christ, chooses to keep oneself partially detached and at a safe distance. There are lots of admirers of Christ in the world. They are willing to follow Christ as long as the journey stays within the acceptable boundaries of doctrines and definitions, rules and regulations. They are willing to follow Christ and worship Christ as long as they can maintain their secure and stable lives. And they are willing to follow Christ as long as the blessings are plentiful and abundant and they are not drawn too far into social or physical peril. After all, God protects us, right? But admirable though that may be, that is not what Christ calls us to do.
We are not called to stand at a safe distance and admire what Christ does, even emulate Jesus’ very life when it is feasible and fits well into our own. We are, rather, called to follow God into the deepest mysteries of life. We are called to follow Christ all the way to the cross (and you’ll remember how that came out!) But there, at the foot of the cross, we are raised to new life. So, in this Lenten season, shift your focus beyond admiring Christ and become a true follower. It is hard, even risky, but the glory waiting for you within the mystery of God is beyond anything that you could even imagine.
Discussion Questions:1.) What reasons do you have for maintaining a “safe distance” from Christ?
2.) In what ways are you an “admirer” of Christ and in what ways do you think you are truly a follower?
3.) Kierkegaard contends that being a true follower requires sacrifice. What sacrifices do you think we are called to make in this 21st century society?
So go forth, and follow Christ to the Cross!
Grace and Peace,
Shelli
Scripture Reading: Matthew 4: 18-22
As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” Immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.
We like this Scripture. It is the beginning of Jesus gathering together his disciples, those who would be with him through his ministry, and those who would accompany him as he began spreading the Good News. I’m wondering, though, how many truly understood what they were actually signing up to do. The rest of the Gospels usually depict these men following Jesus around, asking questions, and often-times looking like a somewhat bumbling group as they crawl on top of each other clamoring to be named first. But this was a big deal. They were changing their whole lives. There was no going back. And ahead of them lay a call to travel out of comfortable boundaries, stretch one’s mind and one’s faith beyond the usual grounds, encounter rejection and possibly even expulsion from “acceptable” society, and ultimately be left alone standing at the foot of the cross. This was not going to be a safe journey!
Kierkegaard reminds us that “Christ came into the world with the purpose of saving, not instructing it.” He goes on to lay out the difference between a follower of Christ, one who strives to be Christ and follows Christ’s lead beyond what is easily seen and planned, and an admirer, one who, though looking to Christ, chooses to keep oneself partially detached and at a safe distance. There are lots of admirers of Christ in the world. They are willing to follow Christ as long as the journey stays within the acceptable boundaries of doctrines and definitions, rules and regulations. They are willing to follow Christ and worship Christ as long as they can maintain their secure and stable lives. And they are willing to follow Christ as long as the blessings are plentiful and abundant and they are not drawn too far into social or physical peril. After all, God protects us, right? But admirable though that may be, that is not what Christ calls us to do.
We are not called to stand at a safe distance and admire what Christ does, even emulate Jesus’ very life when it is feasible and fits well into our own. We are, rather, called to follow God into the deepest mysteries of life. We are called to follow Christ all the way to the cross (and you’ll remember how that came out!) But there, at the foot of the cross, we are raised to new life. So, in this Lenten season, shift your focus beyond admiring Christ and become a true follower. It is hard, even risky, but the glory waiting for you within the mystery of God is beyond anything that you could even imagine.
Discussion Questions:1.) What reasons do you have for maintaining a “safe distance” from Christ?
2.) In what ways are you an “admirer” of Christ and in what ways do you think you are truly a follower?
3.) Kierkegaard contends that being a true follower requires sacrifice. What sacrifices do you think we are called to make in this 21st century society?
So go forth, and follow Christ to the Cross!
Grace and Peace,
Shelli
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