Christ the King

The passage below is beautiful. It speaks about Jesus. A prophecy before he was ever born. But we can take the words into our life. I pray that the Lord will give me a disciples tongue... may he make me like an arrow that he can use for his Kingdom. I am sorry that this reflection is brief this week. I am renewing my strength for the start of Advent next week.
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Isaiah 49:1
Listen to me, distant nations, you people who live far away! Before I was born, the Lord chose me and appointed me to be his servant.

2:He made my words as sharp as a sword. With his own hand he protected me. He made me like an arrow, sharp and ready for use.
3:He said to me, "Israel, you are my servant; because of you, people will praise me."
4:I said, "I have worked, but how hopeless it is! I have used up my strength, but have accomplished nothing." Yet I can trust the Lord to defend my cause; he will reward me for what I do.
5:Before I was born, the Lord appointed me; he made me his servant to bring back his people, to bring back the scattered people of Israel. The Lord gives me honour; he is the source of my strength.
6:The Lord said to me, "I have a greater task for you, my servant. Not only will you restore to greatness the people of Israel who have survived, but I will also make you a light to the nations - so that all the world may be saved."
7:Israel's holy God and saviour says to the one who is deeply despised, who is hated by the nations and is the servant of rulers: "Kings will see you released and will rise to show their respect; princes also will see it, and they will bow low to honour you." This will happen because the Lord has chosen his servant; the holy God of Israel keeps his promises.
8:The Lord says to his people, "When the time comes to save you, I will show you favour and answer your cries for help. I will guard and protect you and through you make a covenant with all peoples. I will let you settle once again in your land that is now laid waste.
9:I will say to the prisoners, `Go free!' and to those who are in darkness, `Come out to the light!' They will be like sheep that graze on the hills;
10:they will never be hungry or thirsty. Sun and desert heat will not hurt them, for they will be led by one who loves them. He will lead them to springs of water.
11:"I will make a highway across the mountains and prepare a road for my people to travel.
12:My people will come from far away, from the north and the west, and from Aswan in the south."
13:Sing, heavens! Shout for joy, earth! Let the mountains burst into song! The Lord will comfort his people; he will have pity on his suffering people.

Blessed are you who are poor

To begin with read Jesus words linked here in Luke's gospel

Here was a man whose words were like fire.

I think even now Jesus words can penetrate our comfortable world and challenge us so that we can dare to be different.

Here is a man who presents to us an altered perception of what it means to be living the human life. Here is a man whose words can make us question our existing value system and drag us out of our introspection.

Jesus trades in paradox. We start to listen to him and when we hear him say "HAPPY", "POOR", "KINGDOM OF GOD" in the same sentence we begin to question what he could possibly mean.

How can poor people be happy? How can the hungry be satisfied? In a way the beatitudes are one of the most frightening passages that Jesus teaches. Because what he says invades our life. We spend most of our lives working hard to feed our family, clothe them, pay a mortgage, buy a car (and of course be a success in the process) and yet Jesus comes close to us in today's gospel and says "alas for you who are rich: you are having your consolation now."

It is not something that we should explain away or dilute. Jesus words are addressed us all at an individual level. To each one who listens they are a challenge. They are a challenge to our hearts and directly to our interior lives. Jesus is prompting us in a very direct way to change the orientation of our lives, so that we put the God Who Is Love first and everything else second. He is inviting us to have spiritual integrity and part of having this is to be able to detach from material possessions so that they no longer own us.

You could also say that Jesus words are addressed to us so that we change our hearts from stone to compassionate hearts of flesh. This invitation is from a Jesus who wants to usher in the new reign of God. A lot of the teaching in the gospel of Luke is about the "Kingdom of God" and how to bring it into our lives. Jesus expects his followers to be "yeast" in society, to have integrity. Changing society by their very presence. If our hearts are in the right place then this starts to happen. Christians are not called to be passive. If our faith does anything for us at all it should stir us into a more pure kind of love which isn't selfish.

...and yes then the beatitudes start to come true. We are happy (or happier) when we change and live by the gospel.

Of course we are only human and will struggle with temptation and even fall back at times. But what we need to watch is that the over-all direction of our lives is going the right way. That is towards God and towards each other and not the other way...

The goal is worth it

If you want to serve the Lord, prepare yourself for trials. Be sincere of heart and steadfast. Do not be alarmed by adversity, but attach yourself to the Lord and do not leave him.

(Sirach 2:1-11)

Wow! A hard word from the Lord.

Now I have read it again slowly and tried to stand back from those words inorder to see if I can work out what it means to me. The first question is surely trials happen to everyone? Do you have to be a Christian in order to have a hard time? The answer is of course no! There are plenty of decent non-Christian people around who have a hard or harder time. But the message seems akin to training advice! To an athlete we would say 'no pain - no gain' and we would expect them to take it on board. And expect the pain as part of their training regime? To a Christian who wants to be a disciple we would need to say prepare yourself for trials - emotional or physical pain. But the goal is worth it.

But it also says 'Be sincere of heart and steadfast' - this must be more important than that within us that endures adversity. It is our Spirit led hearts and faithfulness that gives the prime witness to others. If our sincerity of heart leads us to have the loving kindness of God in our lives - then we are on the right track. We are just human imperfect beings though! So we will stumble and fall. How we handle that is important and I will write about that soon.

You are God's work of art

Something today prompted me to think about the fact that we are all loved and appreciated by God.  Quite literally we are all God's work of art and we are his handiwork and he is pleased with us.  In fact more than that he rejoices in us.

But you might not feel that this is true.  Well how then can I convince you?

If you are a believer already then I could quote some scripture to you that might convince you if you already believe in the power of the word to reveal the truth about God. Or I could talk about the person of Jesus and his life death and resurrection.

But I wish that I could find some way of explaining to you that the biggest reason why I am a Christian and a believer is because of my experience of the Holy Spirit and the love of God experienced in my day to day life.  My biggest discovery in my life is that when you pray to the Holy Spirit your prayer will be answered. You need to be open to the fact that when you pray that God will answer you.  Maybe not totally in the way that you would expect or even want.  But the beginning step is opening yourself to the possibility that what I am saying is true.  If you feel that there is just a glimmer of a possibility then why don't you try?  My journey started when I was about seventeen and my prayer was a simple one and probably a bit cheeky but God answered anyway! He is not looking too closely at your words it is your hearts intention that speaks most to him.  May God's Holy Spirit be with you this day and all your days - to strengthen you and bless you.

postscript
If you need them here are two texts from the bible that have helped me over the years:

Ephesians 2:10 "you are God's work of art" Jerusalem Bible

Jeremiah 29:12-13 "Then you will call to me. You will come and pray to me, and I will answer you. You will seek me, and you will find me because you will seek me with all your heart." GNB