Today’s text
1 Peter 1:1-2
Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
Reflection
Morning is the time for new birth, though you are not confined to the rhythms and seasons of my life, Holy One. You can make new birth occur any where, any time. That is your way and power, and you almost always surprise.
But morning is a time of hope for newness in my heart. Daylight appears with the longing that maybe today I can get it right, do all I need to do, complete my labors and come to the day’s end with a peaceful heart.
It’s a nifty formula, if entirely misguided. My hope is premised on me getting things done, organizing my life so that the nagging anxiety of uncompleted tasks is put to bed by the work of my mind and hands.
The whole effort of trying to still my soul is moved by my fear of failing, of looking and being inadequate, unprepared and foolish.
How’s that for getting down to basics?
New birth is not found in my efforts. All I can do is anxiety management, but what I want and need is to end the anxiety altogether. This can happen only if I become someone new, someone other than whom I too often am.
Someone new must be born (again) within me. Even now, that happens. You, Jesus, come to me, come in me, in the morning light, changing my heart. No, you give me a new heart. The heart of my soul turns from worry over myself to simple trust in the Love who is the Father.
I become as you are. You trust the Love who is always enough, knowing that all that really needs to be done is not what the anxious mind suggests. All that matters is to express whatever this Love moves in heart and mind.
That is enough for the day, for any day.
You knew this every day.
So be born again in me, Lord Jesus, that my heart may be ever new.
Pr. David L. Miller
http://prayingthemystery.blogspot.com/
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Friday, October 16, 2009
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Today’s text
1 Peter 1:1-2
Peter, apostle of Jesus Christ, to all those living as aliens in the Dispersion of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who have been chosen, in the foresight of God the Father, to be made holy by the Spirit, obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.
Reflection
Now, I return to work after a week of respite, wondering if I can hold the slender insights that appeared during these days away from the stress that steals my soul.
My soul has known no rest, no peace in my normal labors. The peace that passes all understanding has passed me by altogether. It has been utterly beyond my reach, belonging to a world far removed from the one I have inhabited in recent weeks.
Now, I see that your peace has eluded me because I was dwelling, by choice, in fear, in a home of my own making, a place where I could protect myself from the judgments of others. I was not true to my own heart, the heart that is in me when I know you as all-surpassing love.
I have known grace and peace in abundance, and reading these words (from 1 Peter) I am captured by the generosity of heart of the writer. But this generosity has its Source in the surging waters of your abundance, in the incomprehensibility of your divine kindness.
May grace and peace be yours--be mine--in abundance. This is your heart speaking to this oft-despairing soul so needy and resistant to trusting your kindness.
Lacking trust, I protect myself from others, from their views and judgments, not revealing the heart of this soul of mine, where I know you as the Love you are. Amid difference and controversy, I seek reasons others may find convincing or worthy of respect, knowing all the while that I am being false to my truest self, to the soul that I am, to the Love that dwells there, to You.
I know no peace, no rest, because I am not living in your love but in an illusion I create for my own protection. You make a home for me in which to abide, and I try to build my own.
I know why. The home you make for me is the way of Jesus, my brother. Sprinkled with his blood, I have his life, his Spirit, a paschal spirit in which the way of life is letting go, releasing control, refusing my normal strategies of self-protection and relying on your love alone.
The way to new life is through death, the way to joy is through sorrow, the way to assurance is abandonment of the supports and protective walls I build for myself. Abundant peace arises from frightening vulnerability. This is the blood-sprinkled way into which my life has been initiated.
Seven days away has taught me this … again.
I ache for the abundance of peace you promise, Loving One, but the way to this home scares me. May my hope and aching need prove stronger than my fear.
May I trust you to be the abundant home I crave, and let go of all that is not you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Note: Thanks for blessing me with your notes, letting me know that you are still receiving … and welcoming these posts. May God’s peace rest upon you all.
1 Peter 1:1-2
Peter, apostle of Jesus Christ, to all those living as aliens in the Dispersion of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who have been chosen, in the foresight of God the Father, to be made holy by the Spirit, obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.
Reflection
Now, I return to work after a week of respite, wondering if I can hold the slender insights that appeared during these days away from the stress that steals my soul.
My soul has known no rest, no peace in my normal labors. The peace that passes all understanding has passed me by altogether. It has been utterly beyond my reach, belonging to a world far removed from the one I have inhabited in recent weeks.
Now, I see that your peace has eluded me because I was dwelling, by choice, in fear, in a home of my own making, a place where I could protect myself from the judgments of others. I was not true to my own heart, the heart that is in me when I know you as all-surpassing love.
I have known grace and peace in abundance, and reading these words (from 1 Peter) I am captured by the generosity of heart of the writer. But this generosity has its Source in the surging waters of your abundance, in the incomprehensibility of your divine kindness.
May grace and peace be yours--be mine--in abundance. This is your heart speaking to this oft-despairing soul so needy and resistant to trusting your kindness.
Lacking trust, I protect myself from others, from their views and judgments, not revealing the heart of this soul of mine, where I know you as the Love you are. Amid difference and controversy, I seek reasons others may find convincing or worthy of respect, knowing all the while that I am being false to my truest self, to the soul that I am, to the Love that dwells there, to You.
I know no peace, no rest, because I am not living in your love but in an illusion I create for my own protection. You make a home for me in which to abide, and I try to build my own.
I know why. The home you make for me is the way of Jesus, my brother. Sprinkled with his blood, I have his life, his Spirit, a paschal spirit in which the way of life is letting go, releasing control, refusing my normal strategies of self-protection and relying on your love alone.
The way to new life is through death, the way to joy is through sorrow, the way to assurance is abandonment of the supports and protective walls I build for myself. Abundant peace arises from frightening vulnerability. This is the blood-sprinkled way into which my life has been initiated.
Seven days away has taught me this … again.
I ache for the abundance of peace you promise, Loving One, but the way to this home scares me. May my hope and aching need prove stronger than my fear.
May I trust you to be the abundant home I crave, and let go of all that is not you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Note: Thanks for blessing me with your notes, letting me know that you are still receiving … and welcoming these posts. May God’s peace rest upon you all.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
October 11, 2009
Today’s text
1 Peter 1:1-2
Peter, apostle of Jesus Christ, to all those living as aliens in the Dispersion of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who have been chosen, in the foresight of God the Father, to be made holy by the Spirit, obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.
Reflection
I have heard the cry of refugees, living “behind the wire” of cold camps far from home. “When?” they all ask silently or aloud, fearing the answer. I never had an answer to give them, not the one I wanted to give.
I wanted to say, “Soon; the time is near,” but I could not. I didn’t know, so I shook my head and stared at the dead dust on my shoes into which their lives had descended with no end point in sight.
They yearned for what every refugee wants: home.
So do I, my Lord. I hunger for home. It’s not a new feeling, even the intensity of this distress is not unknown to me, but it has been a great while since it has been so strong.
My dispersion is not one of geography but of heart. I am what I am not; and what I am not, that is what I am.
I dwell far from home, from the heart of love where I know peace, where I rest secure in the heart of my soul … and you. When I find and enter my truest heart I discover yours also.
I am at peace, content to be who I am, neither more nor less, and the demands of others to be what they need or want me to be flies away. It does not matter.
All that matters is the dwelling, the abiding, the resting in that secret soul where I know who I am in the warm light of your smile.
My tears are not yet those of fullest joy. I stand at the portal, yearning to enter, to come home to myself and to you. But I still am an exile from the home I seek.
What keeps me out? What prevents me from entering? This is a mystery to me, for even now I see your smile, Blessed Mystery. Your hand extends to sprinkle me with the blood, the life of Jesus, who always knew his heart and yours, never knowing this distance I feel except, perhaps, in the final hours of his torture.
You want to sprinkle me with his life, his consciousness, the graced awareness of his identity as your beloved, your special servant. The heart that is his you would give to me. You have chosen me for this.
Move my soul to enter the blessedness you hungrily give. I want to come home.
Take from me every word and desire that hides and protects me from the judgments of others, for in fear I turn from being the heart that I am and become an exile from myself and the great bounty of your heart, my home.
Pr. David L. Miller
Note: I have made few posts in recent monthes as I wrote a book, Marks of the Christian Life, soon to be released by Augsburg Fortress. Please let me know if you are still receiving and find these posts useful.
Today’s text
1 Peter 1:1-2
Peter, apostle of Jesus Christ, to all those living as aliens in the Dispersion of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who have been chosen, in the foresight of God the Father, to be made holy by the Spirit, obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.
Reflection
I have heard the cry of refugees, living “behind the wire” of cold camps far from home. “When?” they all ask silently or aloud, fearing the answer. I never had an answer to give them, not the one I wanted to give.
I wanted to say, “Soon; the time is near,” but I could not. I didn’t know, so I shook my head and stared at the dead dust on my shoes into which their lives had descended with no end point in sight.
They yearned for what every refugee wants: home.
So do I, my Lord. I hunger for home. It’s not a new feeling, even the intensity of this distress is not unknown to me, but it has been a great while since it has been so strong.
My dispersion is not one of geography but of heart. I am what I am not; and what I am not, that is what I am.
I dwell far from home, from the heart of love where I know peace, where I rest secure in the heart of my soul … and you. When I find and enter my truest heart I discover yours also.
I am at peace, content to be who I am, neither more nor less, and the demands of others to be what they need or want me to be flies away. It does not matter.
All that matters is the dwelling, the abiding, the resting in that secret soul where I know who I am in the warm light of your smile.
My tears are not yet those of fullest joy. I stand at the portal, yearning to enter, to come home to myself and to you. But I still am an exile from the home I seek.
What keeps me out? What prevents me from entering? This is a mystery to me, for even now I see your smile, Blessed Mystery. Your hand extends to sprinkle me with the blood, the life of Jesus, who always knew his heart and yours, never knowing this distance I feel except, perhaps, in the final hours of his torture.
You want to sprinkle me with his life, his consciousness, the graced awareness of his identity as your beloved, your special servant. The heart that is his you would give to me. You have chosen me for this.
Move my soul to enter the blessedness you hungrily give. I want to come home.
Take from me every word and desire that hides and protects me from the judgments of others, for in fear I turn from being the heart that I am and become an exile from myself and the great bounty of your heart, my home.
Pr. David L. Miller
Note: I have made few posts in recent monthes as I wrote a book, Marks of the Christian Life, soon to be released by Augsburg Fortress. Please let me know if you are still receiving and find these posts useful.
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