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Re: Spring Cleaning!

By: joe-taylor in FFFT | Recommend this post (0)
Mon, 04 Mar 13 5:43 PM | 90 view(s)
Boardmark this board | Food For Further Thought 		Msg. 50582 of 65535
(This msg. is a reply to 50564 by joe-taylor)
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Our Pearl of Great Price

"Do you realize that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?" Romans 2: 4

Lent is a forty day treasure hunt. There are clues, maps, signposts. And the object of this quest? Lent's Holy Grail? Jesus. He is our pearl of great price.

Why Jesus?

Jesus is the one by whose dying and rising, time is divided. Jesus is the one who gave to the early Church such uncommon courage that they would sooner die, sooner suffer martyrdom, than betray him by taking up weapons. Jesus is the one who inspired the early church to give up possessions and hold things in common so they could look after each other, and care for the least.

Jesus is the one in whose name his followers challenged slavery, the oppression of women, the demonization and isolation of leapers, the seperation of Jew and Gentile. Jesus is the one who defeated death. Jesus is the one who teaches us that God shows no partiality. Well!

Jesus is the Holy Grail, the treasure we are after. It's hard to believe, I know. But we have it on good authority. If you don't believe me, as Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Ask Paul, Peter, the Marys and Lazarus. Ask Francis, Michelangelo and Bach. Ask Sojourner, Dietrich and Desmond. Ask Tolstoy, Theresa, and Martin.

Why forty days? Well there are lots of biblical stories about 40 years and 40 days and 40 nights.

But I think it has more to do with this: humans are prone to procrastination. Most of us work to deadlines. Consider Easter your deadline.

Let's go.

Dear God, help me to work to the deadline of Easter, but, in case I miss it, grant me, I pray, another year and another Easter for this holy treasure hunt. Amen.

Nancy S. Taylor is Senior Minister of Old South Church in Boston, Massachusetts.


To say that "God exists" is the greatest understatement ever made across space and time.


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The above is a reply to the following message:
Re: Spring Cleaning!
By: joe-taylor in FFFT
Sun, 03 Mar 13 2:58 PM 		Msg. 50564 of 65535

Water

"The Lord says, 'Come everyone who is thirsty--here is water!'"


At a Peace Forum at Syracuse University with the Dalai Lama, participants were asked to explain "justice." Among them was United Church of Christ pastor and former U.N. ambassador, Andrew Young. Young began his remarks by saying "Justice is water." As one example he spoke of how irrigation innovations in the Nile Delta could radically change living conditions, land productivity, and life expectancy in the Middle East and North Africa, one of the worlds most water scarce regions. Without water what is justice?

Like the Bible itself, Young does not speak in generalities about justice and peace, equality and economic fairness. He speaks of the basis of life. We cannot live without water. It flows so freely out of our faucets it's easy to forget, along with what it means to be thirsty. Like power, until the lights go out, we take it for granted.

Faith itself is like thirst that without water dies. We thirst for God on whom we depend for ongoing strength and support. But is that thirst as deep as our need for "real" water? Have we thought of faith as exactly that vital--or is it but a helpful add-on? And have we thought of the water so much of the world needs without which faith is useless or a tool of oppression?

Understanding faith, and justice, in terms of basics like thirst and water drives us to think not just of ourselves but of others, and not just of what's ideal but whats real and needed now. Lent is a good time to clean out, along with old books and boxes, thoughts and ideas that are superfluous and distracting next to what's essential.


May I know what's essential, for myself and others, O God, and act on the faith and justice you inspire. Amen.

William Green is Vice President for Strategy and Development of the Moral Courage Project, NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service.

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