Collect and Readings for The Second Sunday before Lent – Proverbs 8.1,22-31, Psalm 104.26-end, Colossians 1.15-20, John 1.1-14
The Prayer for today
Almighty God, you have created the heavens and the earth and made us in your own image: teach us to discern your hand in all your works and your likeness in all your children; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit reigns supreme over all things, now and for ever. Amen.
Last week we were reflecting on the forgiving nature of God and this week, with the reading from Proverbs to help us, it is as if we are savouring the extraordinary creative energy of God’s wisdom, holding it and marvelling at it, personalised for accessibility. What is God’s wisdom like? With a sensitive, delighting in all the unfolding wonders, appreciating, and valuing with a childlike innocence which is playful, yet candid and pure.
It is a lovely if unexpected image and helps us to understand more of God’s nature. There is a lightness and gentleness of touch here which act as a balance to our more usual serious-minded image of a God of power and responsibility. We sense a wonderful harmony of what we, from our separate-gendered perspective might see as the masculine and feminine attributes of God.
Coming to the introduction of John’s Gospel from such an approach road, tunes us in to appreciate the mystery of the eternal Word. In one sense, Jesus the Christ is that Word separately enfleshed, visible to us when God remains hidden from our sight. There is clearly a link between personified Wisdom, of the Hebrew tradition, and the personified eternal Word, which resonated with Greek thinking. The One who draws all this together is Christ, living out, in human person terms, the creative loving of God.
As Paul explains in his letter to the Christians at Colossae, God was dwelling in all his faithfulness in the person of Jesus, so that he alone was able to reconcile all to himself, healing the creative harmony which sin had ripped apart.
The wisdom Christ displays, then, is of complete integrity and vulnerable love. Some things to think about:
1. If we who believe have the right to become ‘children of God’ by adoption, how would you expect our redeemed lives to look?
2. God created people in his own image as both male and female; Wisdom and the Spirit are both referred to as ‘she’, and the Word of God became flesh as male. What do we miss if our understanding of God is predominantly ‘male’?
God bless
Rev’d Fiona Robinson
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Collect and Readings for The Sunday next before Lent – 2 Kings 2.1-12, Psalm 50.1-6, 2 Corinthians 4.3-6, Mark 9.2-9
The Prayer for today
Almighty Father, whose Son was revealed in majesty before he suffered death upon the cross: give us grace to perceive his glory, that we may be strengthened to suffer with him and be changed into his likeness, from glory to glory; who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
It is easy to understand why, since ancient times, people have worshipped the sun. Quite apart from its dazzling beauty, and its faithfulness in appearing each morning, all living things seem to sense that they depend on the sun for survival. Plants grow their first sensitive shoots towards it and adjust their flowering according to the length of daylight. Many flowers turn their heads to follow the sun’s progress through the day, and all the complexities of animal and plant activity are locked into their relationship with our nearest star. Earth and the other planets in the solar system owe their very development to it.
So it is not surprising that sunlike images of fire and light are frequently used to describe the presence of the living God – images which speak of power, essence of life, sustaining support, faithfulness and beauty that hurts when we look at it directly. Or when we look at it from the other direction and see how God inevitably displays his nature in his creation, and it says a lot about him that the very first word of creation was ‘Let there be light!’ Creating the sunlight, and a teeming planet’s life depending on it, was providing us with clues about the energising Creator, and our dependence on him.
It certainly feels entirely appropriate that God’s glory, being seen in Jesus as he is transfigured, shows him being lit up, bright and seemingly pure. The people of Israel had in their communal history many stories of fiery encounters with God, such as Moses’ burning bush, the pillar of fire guiding and protecting them on their escape from Egypt, the extra person seen in the burning fiery furnace, and the heavenly chariots of fire as Elijah is taken from Elisha’s sight. This week’s Psalm is one of many expressing God as a consuming fire.
Mark’s account of the transfiguration comes immediately after Jesus has been telling his disciples about his necessary suffering and death before he comes into glory. To help them cope with what is ahead they are allowed a fleeting glimpse of the holistic truth, where the glory is evident, so that when it is hidden in the horror of the cross, they may begin to understand what real glory involves.
Some things to think about:
1. Are we wary of God showing his glory, preferring to ‘tone him down’?
2. How do you think the transfiguration helped the disciples who witnessed it?
God bless
Rev’d Fiona Robinson
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Collect and Readings for The First Sunday of Lent – Genesis 9.8-17, Psalm 25.1-9, 1 Peter 3.18-end, Mark 1.9-15
The Prayer for today
Almighty God, whose Son Jesus Christ did fast forty days in the wilderness, and was tempted as we are, yet without sin: give us grace to discipline ourselves in obedience to thy Spirit; and, as thou knowest our weakness, so may we know thy power to save; through Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
This week we begin the season of Lent, committing the next six weeks to preparing ourselves for the festival of the Resurrection by looking seriously at the implications of turning to God at our baptism. So, it is appropriate to start at the point of Jesus’ baptism filling him with God’s Spirit and promptly driving him into a six-week ordeal of vocational testing and spiritual battling.
Jesus’ ministry did not begin with warm glowing feelings but rigorous self-discipline, painful soul-searching and cost-counting. When he later spoke about our need to count the cost of discipleship he was talking from personal experience. Committing ourselves wholeheartedly to God’s service is indeed a costly business, and one it is quite natural to back away from as we start to realise the full implications. Are we really willing to say to God, ‘Thy will be done; thy kingdom come’? Wouldn’t we prefer it to be our will and kingdom with God’s blessing! Most of us feel fine about obedience until it differs from what we want in life; at which point we start jumping up and down complaining about the unfairness of it all.
One of the precious, valuable things we can learn from Jesus’ example is to recognise the conflicts as a valid part of the process. Jesus knew he had some difficult things to face, and he knew he would not be ready for his ministry until he had taken time out to face them squarely, however unpleasant that might be. All too often our reaction is to deny our fears and questions, or edit them before approaching God with them, as we consider them inappropriate prayer material.
But the truth is that God wants our real, honest selves, and can’t start working in earnest with us until we are willing to share with him everything – and that includes misgivings, things which embarrass us to mention to anyone, recognition of things we had hoped for and dreamed about and which we dislike the idea of giving up. If there is anything we feel ashamed to mention to God, then that’s probably the most important thing he wants us to say.
Of course, we are not going to come to any of this lightly or easily. We are wonderfully inventive when it comes to rewriting the agendas we find threatening to us or prefer to ignore. That is why we all need a wilderness, and time to be alone with God, without distraction. The wilderness is honesty, and we need to get used to its bare and uncompromising landscape, where conflicts are bound to confront us, but from which we will emerge stronger and more integrated as people, ready to go out in God’s power.
Noah and his family are at that point as the rainbow of God’s saving promise marks the end of the storms and floods, and they can walk as new people into a new landscape.
Some things to think about:
1. Why can God only work with us in earnest when we are totally honest with him?
2. What is it that makes us decide whether or not discipleship is too costly?
God bless
Rev’d Fiona Robinson
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