Luke 7: A Gospel of Reversals - "Who Are the Invited? And Who Are the Sinners?"

 

Photographed by Peter Ruprecht

Three words come to mind when giving a meal or a dinner to invited guests: "Honor. Hospitality. Hosting." And so we see these three very important words re-enacted by Simon Levi, a tax collector who invites his friends to meet Jesus who had called him into discipleship. Earlier, Jesus had healed a leper and a paralytic. Now we find Jesus calling a despised tax collector by the name of Simon Levi. And behind each passage of Luke's accounts we find the ever-present religious Pharisees lurking around the edges questioning Jesus' every move and motive.

As the saying goes, "If Jesus were running for public office He might've been more careful about the company He was keeping." But Jesus has a higher mission than one of popularity:

 

¹⁸ “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
    and recovering of sight to the blind,
    to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
¹⁹ to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”

 

- Luke 4.18-19 (as quoted from the prophet Isaiah)

 

In first century Jewish culture the needy weren't always clean or respectable. Especially the hated tax collectors of Rome who requisitioned impossible duties upon the burden of the public in order to meet Rome's ever increasing demands for empire and their own ever-expanding appetites for material wealth and political power.

 

Into this environment Jesus calls Simon Levi to leave his employer and to become His own disciple in a ministry of collecting and disbursing the Kingdom of Heaven's funds from Jesus' wealth and store.

 

Within Luke's account (written on behalf of the Apostle Peter) we find seven meals where Jesus was present: twice with Simon Levi, at the feeding of the 5000, a meal with the Pharisees (where we find Jesus immediately breaking protocol in heated debate), a wedding banquet with its corollary Kingdom call, at a last Passover Meal with His disciples, and a final evening meal with Cleopas and his wife Mary after their long walk along the dusty road of Emmaus:

Luke 5.27-32 - Jesus calls Simon Levi then invites his friends to a meal with Jesus:

²⁷ After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, “Follow me.” ²⁸ And leaving everything, he rose and followed him.

²⁹ And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them. ³⁰ And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” ³¹ And Jesus answered them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. ³² I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.”

Luke 7.36-52 - A Pharisee questions Jesus at Simon's meal about an uninvited woman who bathes his feet with her tears:

³⁸ and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment.

Luke 9.10 - 17 - Jesus feed the 5000

 

Luke 11.37-52 - Jesus attends a meal with the Pharisees:

 

³⁷ While Jesus^[e] was speaking, a Pharisee asked him to dine with him, so he went in and reclined at table. ³⁸ The Pharisee was astonished to see that he did not first wash before dinner. ³⁹ And the Lord said to him, “Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. ⁴⁰ You fools! Did not he who made the outside make the inside also? ⁴¹ But give as alms those things that are within, and behold, everything is clean for you.

⁴² “But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. ⁴³ Woe to you Pharisees! For you love the best seat in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces. ⁴⁴ Woe to you! For you are like unmarked graves, and people walk over them without knowing it.”

⁴⁵ One of the lawyers answered him, “Teacher, in saying these things you insult us also.” ⁴⁶ And he said, “Woe to you lawyers also! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers. ⁴⁷ Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your fathers killed. ⁴⁸ So you are witnesses and you consent to the deeds of your fathers, for they killed them, and you build their tombs. ⁴⁹ Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,’ ⁵⁰ so that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, ⁵¹ from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, it will be required of this generation. ⁵² Woe to you lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge. You did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.”

⁵³ As he went away from there, the scribes and the Pharisees began to press him hard and to provoke him to speak about many things, ⁵⁴ lying in wait for him, to catch him in something he might say.

Luke 14.1-24 - "A Sabbath Healing" and "Inviting the Uninvited"

 

Luke 22.14-38 - Jesus' last Passover Meal with His disciples on the eve of His trial and crucifixion.

 

Luke 24.28-32 - Jesus has an evening meal with two of his disciples, Cleopas and his wife Mary (one of the women who had visited Jesus' tomb earlier that Resurrection morning), after their travels to their village of Emmaus:

 

²⁸ So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He [Jesus] acted as if he were going farther, ²⁹ but they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent.” So he went in to stay with them. ³⁰ When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. ³¹ And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight. ³² They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” ³³ And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem. And they found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together, ³⁴ saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” ³⁵ Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.
 

 

My interest today is in the Luke 7 account where Simon Levi's Pharisee friends are appalled by the presence of an uninvited, unclean woman who repeatedly weeps upon Jesus' feet while washing and perfuming His feet with her hair. As the story unfolds we find a crowd that has gathered to a meal; a host we now know by the name of Simon Levi; a honored guest, Jesus, who has been invited by Levi to attend as the designee of distinction; an uninvited woman who enters off the unwashed streets (otherwise known as a woman of prostitution servicing the men of the area); and an ensuing disruption of the first order that immediately splits the gathered guests in two - between those who believe Jesus to be Israel's prophet sent by God to release their shackles from under the bondage of the Roman empire, and those still in doubt.

 

From the outset we find Simon Levi, ever the political aspirant, socially arranging to have his well-connected associates meet Jesus so that he might introduce this self-proclaimed prophet of Israel to them and begin bringing about the support money and the political connections that Jesus would need.... Or so he thought. But the one who was also calling himself Israel's Messiah (Savior) had a far more sublime message than the one Levi had contemplated. Believing only that Jesus had called himself into service (e.g. "discipleship") so that through his connections he might be able to help Jesus create the political momentum required for Israel's insurrection from Rome. But it was to an insurrection that he had not surmised... one that would have surprising consequences for both himself and his guests as he would soon find out.

Into the midst of this auspicious gathering a social disruption soon occurs where no one can withhold from heated comment. A disruption that causes the invited guests to vent their considerable feelings upon a social faux-pas that wasn't acceptable. And quickly taking the lead were the "honored ones" within the ranks of Levi's guests - those that spoke for the Jewish community - who should naturally speak out their alarm to Levi their host. So that at once the Pharisees present at the dinner party turn to Levi demanding that he remove a woman of ill-repute who had come into their midst unwelcomed and socially stained. Into which fray Jesus has been benignly thrown into as this same woman falls upon His feet and begins to weep and anoint his feet over and over, again and again. A woman who understands Jesus' truer identity and more radical insurrection to be directed at the very foundations of Jewish society itself. And ultimately to every man and woman's faith and heart.

Meanwhile, in gapped silence everyone awaits Jesus' auspicious response. But His response is totally unlike their pronounced expectations. Instead, Jesus continues to allow the unwanted woman her remarkable prostrations to the horror of both the crowd and their societal representatives, as they each begin doubting Jesus' prophetic ambitions He had earlier announced in Luke 4, and demonstrated by the healing of the sick at the onset of Luke 5. Jesus does exactly the opposite of what they were expecting.

Growing bolder, and more dogmatically angry, the Pharisees none-too-politely ask Levi the question everyone is by now asking, "That if Jesus is a prophet He would've known whom this woman is!" they demanded and hissed as-in-one-breath. And by one fell utterance from the councils of high Jewish society both the woman and Jesus are rejected along with all pretentious claims made by Levi, their dinner host, to the same. Jesus' mission comes into immediate and deep ruin, and with it, any pretensions to what the guests had earlier thought about Jesus' claim of Davidic kingship and rule by power and might.

Most poignantly we, the readers and hearers of Luke's story, now understand that the argument was not so simply about compassion or love, mercy or forgiveness. But about who was really in, and who was really out, according to the covenantal dictates of the invited teachers, rabbis, and priests at the dinner table. In one collective voice Jesus was out. Why? Because He failed to recognize the harlot in their midst as they had: "How could Jesus be Israel's prophet, much less their Messiah King!" And the differences become even more startling when realizing that even as Simon had not washed, nor kissed, nor anointed Jesus' feet, even so had this woman done so with her hair (yet another symbol of heavy shame in the perspective of Jewish culture as related to her sexual trade). And to stretch the dishonor out completely, Jesus is now dishonored along with the woman, even as Simon Levi's quickly diminishing hopes plunged to the ground before his honored guests.

But in a role of reversals we quickly see Jesus lifting up this woman of ill-repute and claiming before one-and-all that she is the truer host and honored guest at the dinner party by virtue of her actions and function. And with one sling of accusation directed towards His newest recruit, Simon, but directed towards all found in attendance, Jesus asks who really were the blind among them? Who really was the spiritually sick and leper of society? Who really was the one that has truly honored Him? Who really was the sinner in their midst? Who really were the symbols of shame in this story? And just as quickly Jesus forgives the woman's sin and tells her to go in peace. That she is welcomed and honored before the presence of God for her repentance and faith. And by these pronouncements Jesus deftly demonstrates both His prophetic status sent against the wickedness of Israel, His Messiahship as one come to forgive sins, and the quality of His wisdom as Israel's newly resurrected Davidic King.

At which point the story is left unfinished. We don't know if a riot immediately ensued; if Levi collapsed into his seat in dispirited conviction; if those remaining began to understand how horribly wrong they had gotten everything; if the Pharisees found themselves divided in their opinion over Jesus; or, even if the police were called to throw Jesus out of the city. But within the story itself we find it ended so that we - the readers and listeners - become those who are gathered around the banquet table asking the same questions and thinking the same thoughts as those present in the story. A story which calls us to ask who I really am? What might I have done in this same situation? How blinded might I have been if present at this dinner in my opinions about Jesus, myself, or to others considered disrespectable? And whether I would've responded even as the woman of the story did in repentance and faith - rather than as the guests did in anger and disruption, hatred and despise?

If whether we might allow our Father God to take the things that shame us and to turn them around for His own glory and our own shalom. For without a doubt we are the invited ones to God's table who asks us to fully participate in His sacrificial love.... Even as we are to embrace all whom we might consider "unclean" and "unwashed" that comes to this same insurrection table laden with redemption and hope. And at the last, we are the ones who are to enjoy God's banquet meal of love and forgiveness, mercy and compassion, especially with all those around us who have also come to the Passover table of peace and rest, fellowship and refuge. To be wary of following Jesus for any other motives than His call to insurrection to this wicked world of ours. To reclaim it for God by giving up everything we have - even as Simon Levi had belatedly discovered when God stripped him of any last lingering vestiges of worldly hopes and dreams before his peers and honorees. And there discovering that he had it all most horribly wrong. That it wasn't he that could help Jesus, but Jesus who had come to help him, and to deliver him into a more worthy service than his present masters of mammon that he served.

Levi's call was a costly call. And so we will find even in our own lives. That God's Spirit will not rest until all has been undone in our wicked lives of wail and woe until we have come to the end of ourselves and understand it to be chattel worthy only of fire and ash. That in calling us to Himself God is redeeming our souls in every way that a man or woman may be saved. From ourselves and from our crooked worldly aspirations to a life of insurrection meant to restore God's lost Kingdom into this broken world of ours. Who will use all our talents and abilities to wreck this world system we live in if only by heaven's diamond-hardened tools of love and forgiveness. Out of which God Himself will bring about the salvation of all as only He can. Even so Lord Jesus quickly come... coming through us as your human instruments of truth and justice, beauty and judgment, hope and dreams, to be used as swords and battlements to your all-glorious name. Even so, now come. Amen.

R.E. Slater

July 29, 2013

sic, The Cost of Discipleship in Luke - Mars Hill

 

 

 

 

 

Being the Face of God, the Presence of God, Who Through Us Binds and Heals

Why, God?
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/26/opinion/dowd-why-god.html?_r=0

By MAUREEN DOWD, Op-Ed Columnist, Washinggon
The New York Times
December 25, 2012

Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

When my friend Robin was dying, she asked me if I knew a priest she could talk to who would not be, as she put it, “too judgmental.” I knew the perfect man, a friend of our family, a priest conjured up out of an old black-and-white movie, the type who seemed not to exist anymore in a Catholic Church roiled by scandal. Like Father Chuck O’Malley, the New York inner-city priest played by Bing Crosby, Father Kevin O’Neil sings like an angel and plays the piano; he’s handsome, kind and funny. Most important, he has a gift. He can lighten the darkness around the dying and those close to them. When he held my unconscious brother’s hand in the hospital, the doctors were amazed that Michael’s blood pressure would noticeably drop. The only problem was Father Kevin’s reluctance to minister to the dying. It tears at him too much. He did it, though, and he and Robin became quite close. Years later, he still keeps a picture of her in his office. As we’ve seen during this tear-soaked Christmas, death takes no holiday. I asked Father Kevin, who feels the subject so deeply, if he could offer a meditation. This is what he wrote:

 

How does one celebrate Christmas with the fresh memory of 20 children and 7 adults ruthlessly murdered in Newtown; with the searing image from Webster of firemen rushing to save lives ensnared in a burning house by a maniac who wrote that his favorite activity was “killing people”? How can we celebrate the love of a God become flesh when God doesn’t seem to do the loving thing? If we believe, as we do, that God is all-powerful and all-knowing, why doesn’t He use this knowledge and power for good in the face of the evils that touch our lives?

 

The killings on the cusp of Christmas in quiet, little East Coast towns stirred a 30-year-old memory from my first months as a priest in parish ministry in Boston. I was awakened during the night and called to Brigham and Women’s Hospital because a girl of 3 had died. The family was from Peru. My Spanish was passable at best. When I arrived, the little girl’s mother was holding her lifeless body and family members encircled her.

 

They looked to me as I entered. Truth be told, it was the last place I wanted to be. To parents who had just lost their child, I didn’t have any words, in English or Spanish, that wouldn’t seem cheap, empty. But I stayed. I prayed. I sat with them until after sunrise, sometimes in silence, sometimes speaking, to let them know that they were not alone in their suffering and grief. The question in their hearts then, as it is in so many hearts these days, is “Why?”

 

The truest answer is: I don’t know. I have theological training to help me to offer some way to account for the unexplainable. But the questions linger. I remember visiting a dear friend hours before her death and reminding her that death is not the end, that we believe in the Resurrection. I asked her, “Are you there yet?” She replied, “I go back and forth.” There was nothing I wanted more than to bring out a bag of proof and say, “See? You can be absolutely confident now.” But there is no absolute bag of proof. I just stayed with her. A life of faith is often lived “back and forth” by believers and those who minister to them.

 

Implicit here is the question of how we look to God to act and to enter our lives. For whatever reason, certainly foreign to most of us, God has chosen to enter the world today through others, through us. We have stories of miraculous interventions, lightning-bolt moments, but far more often the God of unconditional love comes to us in human form, just as God did over 2,000 years ago.

 

I believe differently now than 30 years ago. First, I do not expect to have all the answers, nor do I believe that people are really looking for them. Second, I don’t look for the hand of God to stop evil. I don’t expect comfort to come from afar. I really do believe that God enters the world through us. And even though I still have the “Why?” questions, they are not so much “Why, God?” questions. We are human and mortal. We will suffer and die. But how we are with one another in that suffering and dying makes all the difference as to whether God’s presence is felt or not and whether we are comforted or not.

 

One true thing is this: Faith is lived in family and community, and God is experienced in family and community. We need one another to be God’s presence. When my younger brother, Brian, died suddenly at 44 years old, I was asking “Why?” and I experienced family and friends as unconditional love in the flesh. They couldn’t explain why he died. Even if they could, it wouldn’t have brought him back. Yet the many ways that people reached out to me let me know that I was not alone. They really were the presence of God to me. They held me up to preach at Brian’s funeral. They consoled me as I tried to comfort others. Suffering isolates us. Loving presence brings us back, makes us belong.

 

A contemporary theologian has described mercy as “entering into the chaos of another.” Christmas is really a celebration of the mercy of God who entered the chaos of our world in the person of Jesus, mercy incarnate. I have never found it easy to be with people who suffer, to enter into the chaos of others. Yet, every time I have done so, it has been a gift to me, better than the wrapped and ribboned packages. I am pulled out of myself to be love’s presence to someone else, even as they are love’s presence to me.

 

I will never satisfactorily answer the question “Why?” because no matter what response I give, it will always fall short. What I do know is that an unconditionally loving presence soothes broken hearts, binds up wounds, and renews us in life. This is a gift that we can all give, particularly to the suffering. When this gift is given, God’s love is present and Christmas happens daily.

 

 

 

How Full Is Your Life? Is It Filled with the Important Stuff?

Lessons of Life

from a mayonaise jar, some golf balls,

and a couple of cans of Beer...

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and 2 beers....

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him.

When the class began, he wordlessly picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls.

He then asked the students if the jar was full.

They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly.

The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls.

He then asked the students again if the jar was full.

They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar.

Of course, the sand filled up everything else.

He asked once more if the jar was full.

The students responded with a unanimous 'yes.'

The professor then produced two Beers from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar effectively filling the empty space between the sand.

The students laughed....

'Now,' said the professor as the laughter subsided, 'I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life.

The golf balls are the important things---your family, your children, your health, your friends and your favorite passions---and if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house and your car.

The sand is everything else---the small stuff.

'If you put the sand into the jar first,' he continued, 'there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls.

The same goes for life.

If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness.

Spend time with your children.

Spend time with your parents.

Visit with grandparents.

Take your spouse out to dinner.

Play another 18 rounds of golf.

There will always be time to clean the house and mow the lawn.

Take care of the golf balls first---the things that really matter.

Set your priorities.

The rest is just sand.

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the Beer represented.

The professor smiled and said, 'I'm glad you asked.'

The beer just shows you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of beers with a friend.

Matthew 6:25-34

Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?

Philippians 4:6

Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God...

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Pursuit of God’s Peace

in an Anxious World

http://www.pravmir.com/the-pursuit-of-god%E2%80%99s-peace-in-an-anxious-world/

Fr. Joshua Makoul

posted October 17, 2011

The world in which we live is an anxious one, rife with fear and doubt. Economic markets rise and fall, employment fluctuates, conflicts erupt in unexpected places, and each year seems to bring a threat of some new virus that threatens mankind. We are all continuously faced with events outside of our control. As time passes the future takes on greater uncertainty. Indeed, it is often our struggle with uncertainty that plagues our spiritual life and gives birth to fear and worry.

Our society today has seen a dramatic spike in what psychologists call anxiety disorders. Many who struggle with these conditions wrestle with trusting, with uncertainty, with not having control. Not all who struggle with fear and worry, however, have a “disorder,” for such struggle is universal and comes with living in the world. There are many secular treatments and potential remedies for anxiety. As Christians we have all these, and much more, at our disposal in our fight against fear and anxiety. To the challenge of not having control, we have the ultimate answer and solution: God is in control. Those who deny God’s existence or who do not turn to Him in their lives, deny themselves the greatest treatment for fear, anxiety, worry and doubt. Our God offers us something that the world cannot give us, and that is His peace.

In the Gospel of John, our Lord tells us during the Last Supper, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you; . . . not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27). God’s peace is real and tangible. It is there for all who desire it. Jesus posits His peace as the opposite of fear, and says that His peace counters fear and a troubled heart. We also know that God’s peace has protective qualities to it. St. Paul writes in Philippians 4:7, “And [may] the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your minds and hearts through Jesus Christ our Lord.” God’s peace is a gift of God and part of His grace. The peace of God is more than just a mere feeling, it is something given to those who genuinely desire God and a life in communion with Him. The peace of God comes from continual awareness of God, of His presence, and from communion with Him through prayer. It is a quiet contentment and joy that comes from knowing that God is present. To define God’s peace completely, however, would be an impossible feat, as confirmed by the Apostle Paul.

The peace of God, and fear or anxiety, cannot coexist. Fear, doubt, and mistrust are of the devil. As Christians, we may fluctuate with having and preserving God’s peace inside us, only to lose our focus on God and become filled with fear and doubt. It is a struggle, but there are steps one can take to obtain and preserve the peace of God in our hearts. Indeed, the peace of God must be desired, pursued, and maintained.

Prayer is the single most important activity we can do to obtain the peace of God inside of us, and to reacquire it if lost. When we go into our room, close the door, and genuinely seek God, we are opening ourselves for an encounter with the peace of God. Our God is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. The events in the world and at times even in our life may seem chaotic and out of control, but they are not, for there is a beginning and an end. He is in control. When we bring ourselves into contact and dialogue with God, we are bringing balance and stability into our life.

That balance and stability, however, must be maintained. St. Isaac the Syrian often made analogies between how a ship sails from island to island, taking on supplies, and how we pray. We go through our lives sailing from prayer to prayer until we reach our destination. Each time we pray, we are taking on the peace of God which gives us balance and stability. Archimandrite Sophrony, a student of St. Silouan the Athonite, speaking of prayer, said, “Prayer affords an experience of spiritual liberty of which most people are ignorant. The first sign of emancipation is a disinclination to impose one’s will on others. The second is an inner release from the hold of others on oneself.” It could be stated that Archimandrite Sophrony is speaking of the effects of the peace of God on one’s soul. The peace of God has a liberating effect, for to allow oneself to fear what others think or to be driven to impose our opinion or will on others is to lose our spiritual and emotional balance. Indeed, the peace of God has a balancing effect on our lives as well.

One step we can take to preserve the peace of God in us is to be cautious about what we expose ourselves to. As a society, we have become increasingly dependent on the media to keep us informed. We are depending, however, on a media that exploits our fears in order to boost ratings. It is to the media’s benefit to create fear, doubt, and worry. To be dependent upon an institution that encourages fear and uncertainty is disastrous for our spirituality and brings us much unnecessary struggle. It is good for us as Christians to be informed, yet we must stay balanced, and beware falling into fear and worry and then repeatedly returning to the news for reassurance. Those who do this will only find more reinforcement for their fear. If we find ourselves in distress about something on the news, it is important only to give ourselves small doses, remembering always to turn it over to prayer. If a potential danger is resolved, the media will not offer reassurance, but will often simply cease to report on the topic, as it has then become insignificant. As part of maintaining God’s peace, we do not want to feed our fear.

Another step to preserve the peace of God in us is to walk and live according to God’s will, not just following His commandments, but also walking the path that He calls us to walk. As we hear noise when a car starts going off the road, so in our life we “hear noise” when we stray off the path that God has prepared for us. The noise in this case would be the loss of God’s peace. We then reacquire it once we have corrected our straying or wandering. Our work here is twofold: first we do our best to flee from sin moment to moment in our life; and second we keep our life on the path that is according to God’s will. When we sin, it is like the car going off the road; however, we can also lose our way completely and begin heading down a path that can lead to us becoming entirely lost. Such is the case when we try to live a life that is other than what God called us to live. We need to strive to live in a state of being attuned genuinely to God’s will. Such an open heart would readily become a dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, and not be subject to any distress from a lack of direction.

Finally, and especially in today’s world, we need to recognize the source of our anxiety, and consciously give up control, trust God more, and tolerate uncertainty, being at peace with not knowing all the details. Sometimes we try to control even the events in our life that we clearly can have no control over. Indeed, the more we try and control things we cannot control, then the more out-of-control we may feel. This is one of the fastest ways to lose the peace of God in our hearts. Many feel that, by worrying, they are somehow doing something about the problem, and as a result get a false sense of control. In the end, however, the worrying exhausts them and leaves them void of God’s peace.

The peace of God is a beautiful thing; it is there for each of us if we desire it. Assuredly, just as we miss the sound of a gentle wind blowing through the trees during a busy day, so we is all around us. Pray in silence, flee from sin, stay on the path that is according to God’s will, guard your senses, and allow yourself to give up control and trust God. Truly then we can have the peace of God which surpasses all understanding, and which will fill our minds and hearts.

Source: The Word Magazine, October 2011 Edition

In Jesus, We "Can't Go Back" (by the Weepies)

The band, The Weepies

I recently stumbled upon an Indie song that reminded me of our tortured quest for spiritual discovery and personal finality within the broader spaces of our daily lives. A quest driven by a spiritual hunger endlessly searching for Jesus in the life-and-light of this sinful world hungry for the touch of God that is too often marked by personal journeys of solitude made up of failure, indecision, hardship, and dead-ends.

But for those in Jesus, each and every human breast is filled with the restless desire to apprehend the life of Christ read about in the stories of the gospels. Or spoken about by men and women within the pages of Scripture. Each story telling us to be still and to know that we are not alone in this broken world of hopelessness and faithlessness. That our Father-God was there every step of the way in dogged pursuit and constant fellowship providing a host of like-minded disciples everywhere present around us as witnesses to this remorseless passion, this inspired dream, that has maddeningly driven us forward towards wholeness. Towards completeness. Towards spiritual healing.

Which holy passion can only be divinely sated through a fortitude of courage against the burdens braved within every human breast and heart. That would somehow find the faith to overcome the impossibilities of this relentless quest placed within us by our Father God for meaning, for purpose, for finality, for reconciliation. A quest whereby each supplicant would humbly discover the inner courage, or patient brokenness, to carry forward despite personal failure, defeat and sin. A faith that would forgive ourselves even as it would forgive those around us.

Mustering a courage to believe that God's forgiveness is meant as much for ourselves as it is for those He has placed around-and-about us. Who might glimpse with us the forgiveness that comes from the deep wellsprings of the Spirit's burden of love and guidance unquenched and unquenchable. Whose indefatigable presence sustains us when all else will not. Who is the touchstone of our being searching for the promises of truth and beauty within life itself, which substance seems to so easily elude our repeated, foundering grasp, to overwhelm our impoverished souls upon the rocky shoals of defeat and death. When our very hearts would give up on the insanity we cannot put away from within us, to be driven out of the depths of our haggard defeats and loneliness by the Spirit when we would so easily give up on our very selves. He who is ever faithful, our guide, counselor, and life itself.

And there discover a sacred space that we knew not existed until quitting all our schemes and consumptive pursuits. And in that space find that it was us, ourselves, that our Father God relentlessly pursued, and not us who pursued the everlasting God Himself. And in the discovery, belatedly find that it was the journey itself that made us what we have become. That would give to us the finality our being craved through its undying quest that God had benevolently planted in our hearts, minds, souls and being. Which hunger never ceased to rage in us that Jesus might reign as Lord and King within this feeble life of ours so tortured and cursed at times, so magnified with beauty and love.

This then was the completing fellowship that we sought. That we yearned for without understanding its passion and rage. Whose spiritual wholeness drove us to serve all manner of masters till at last the almighty God of grace and forgiveness persisted within our every step and breath of holy being, thought, and contemplation. Even as we beheld that very same hunger that drove Jesus from the wilderness of humanity's hopelessness onto the very cross of death and sacrifice itself. A cross that He willingly embraced, and courageously moved towards, at the hands of His Father, where both quest and destiny met together at Calvary's nob hill to there join His burdens with ours. Creating that sublime moment and mystical union as our Savior where we would be birthed towards wholeness and renewal begun by Jesus so very long ago. A journey leading towards sacrifice and healing. A journey only completed by entry into Jesus' previous fellowship of sacrifice and suffering leading to the bountiful lands of eternal life filling this life now of ours - even as it would find completion within the blood-stained corridors of eternity ahead.

For this holy union of sacrifice, lost, and even death, was ever ours to bear, and not Jesus' alone. Even though we - like our Savior - would cast it far from us. To be rid of its heavy burdens. Its sorrowing defeats. Its lonely trials and broken heartaches. Yet knowing deep within our being that only by willful sacrifice will all come right till embraced by redemption's brighter dawns of life both now-and-forevermore. And until that day, by God's grace and mercy, by the persistency of His dogged fellowship laid in the purifying foundation of Christ our Lord, and by the faithful guidance and mercies of His Holy Spirit, we "walk on, walk on, walk on" till that quest has come to its end. And our journey finds completion unto the very breast of divine fellowship we were created for. Longed for. Needed. Though denied it ever while we lived to our poverty and peril (Isaiah 52.13 - 53.12).

 

R.E. Slater

September 28, 2012
rev. April 10, 2013

*This prose piece is a form of "liquid prose" matching the
song's rhythms and tonalities that inspired its creation.

 

Psalm 139

English Standard Version (ESV)

Search Me, O God, and Know My Heart

 

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.

 

139 O Lord, you have searched me and known me!

² You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.
³ You search out my path and my lying down
and are acquainted with all my ways.
⁴ Even before a word is on my tongue,
behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.
⁵ You hem me in, behind and before,
and lay your hand upon me.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
it is high; I cannot attain it.

 

⁷ Where shall I go from your Spirit?
Or where shall I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I ascend to heaven, you are there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
⁹ If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light about me be night,”
¹² even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is bright as the day,
for darkness is as light with you.

 

¹³ For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother's womb.
¹⁴ I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.^[a]
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
¹⁵ My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them.

 

¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ If I would count them, they are more than the sand.
I awake, and I am still with you.

 

¹⁹ Oh that you would slay the wicked, O God!
O men of blood, depart from me!
²⁰ They speak against you with malicious intent;
your enemies take your name in vain.^[b]
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord?
And do I not loathe those who rise up against you?
²² I hate them with complete hatred;
I count them my enemies.

 

²³ Search me, O God, and know my heart!
Try me and know my thoughts!^[c]
24 And see if there be any grievous way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting!^[d]

Can't go back now- the weepies

 

THE WEEPIES LYRICS

Send "Can't Go Back Now" Ringtone to your Cell

"Can't Go Back Now"

Yesterday when you were young
Everything you needed done was done for you
Now you do it on your own
But you find you're all alone, what can you do?

You and me walk on, walk on, walk on
'Cause you can't go back now

You know there will be days
When you're so tired
That you can't take another step
The night will have no stars
And you'll think you've gone as far
As you will ever get

You and me walk on, walk on, walk on
'Cause you can't go back now

And yeah, yeah, you go where you want to go
Yeah, yeah, be what you want to be
If you ever turn around, you'll see me

I can't really say
Why everybody wishes they were somewhere else
But in the end, the only steps that matter
Are the ones you take all by yourself

You and me walk on, walk on, walk on
Yeah, you and me walk on, walk on, walk on
'Cause you can't go back now
Walk on, walk on, walk on
You can't go back now.

 

 

 

 

Official Website - http://theweepies.com/

 

Wikipedia Info - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_weepies

 

THE WEEPIES

 

Indie duo The Weepies have sold more than a million singles and half a million albums; their simple, direct songwriting has sent them to the top of the folk charts in a dozen countries. With more than 100 TV & media placements, they are one of the most licensed current musical groups in the world.

 

In 2001, a girl walks into a bar...

 

Her name is Deb Talan. She’s an up and coming singer/songwriter who has garnered tremendous word-of-mouth support and critical praise for her debut CD, Something Burning. Boston’s legendary music venue Club Passim has become her performing-home, but tonight she’s there to check out a new songwriter she’s been obsessing over, a musician from New York City named Steve Tannen. She’s been listening to his debut CD, Big Señorita, non-stop for about a month.

 

Guy walks into a bar...

 

His name is Steve Tannen. He’s at Club Passim in Boston to play a show supporting his debut release, Big Señorita. He’s been playing rock and roll in NYC dive bars for a couple of years, but since the release of his solo CD he’s garnered tremendous word-of-mouth support and critical praise. He’s nervous because Boston is a new town for him, but he’s even more nervous once he looks out at the crowded room and recognizes the pretty young woman down front as singer/songwriter Deb Talan. In a word, he’s intimidated; he’s been obsessing over her debut CD, Something Burning, non-stop for about a month.

 

Deb Talan and Steve Tannen began writing together the night they first met and soon formed THE WEEPIES. “We were fans of each other. When we met, there was an electric connection that made us both nervous. After the show, when everyone went home, we stayed up all night playing songs for each other, drinking a bottle of wine and trading an acoustic guitar back and forth in a tiny apartment,” says Talan. "That night has lasted ten years so far," adds Tannen.

 

A breath of fresh air for fans of songwriters, The Weepies features two unique voices and one unforgettable sound. With a self-released debut and three CDs on Nettwerk Records, the duo has become an indie success story, each release ranking among the top 10 digitally downloaded in the US. After a three year touring hiatus – during which time they got married, had two children and made two records - the band returned to touring in late 2010, playing 26 sold out shows across America. The Weepies now live in Southern California and are working on another album.


 

Stop Waiting For God To Tell You What To Do With Your Life

http://justinzoradi.com/home/item/stop-waiting-for-god.html
by Justin Zoradi
April 25, 2012

The waterbed, the pinprick, and the tidal wave

 

 

A friend told me that while he hated bussing tables at the restaurant where he was working, he was still waiting for God to tell him what to do with his life. He believed that if he was patient enough and did his work well, eventually God would reveal his true calling.

 

I told him I don’t think God works like that.

 

We all want to do meaningful work and find our passion, but I can guarantee you this: Your purpose in life will never be written on the wall. And it will never be revealed to you in full.

 

I watched a brilliant video recently where some Danish filmmakers did a bunch of really stupid things and slowed them down to 2,500 frames a second. They blew up microwaves, chain-sawed coke bottles, and at the very end, pricked a tiny hole in a waterbed. At first, nothing really happened. A few drops of water spilled out. But in a matter of seconds, 200 gallons exploded from that tiny hole, flooding the bedroom.

 

You want to do meaningful work? Stop sitting on your hands waiting for God to tell you what to do.

 

No matter how lofty, unattainable, or idealistic, choose that one thing that keeps you up at night and stick a pin through it. Only then can the tidal wave of God’s glory and purpose flood your bedroom.

 

It seems like a lot of people are walking around holding that pin, scared to commit to putting it somewhere. Many people die holding it, their purpose and passion endlessly prayed for but never pursued.

 

I believe God joins us only when we take that initial risk. If you have a tiny twinge of passion toward anything, you have to jump right through it on your own. It is there that God will meet you.

-JZ

http://justinzoradi.com/