Tuesday, October 20, 2009

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

It is at the point of hope that we are most vulnerable, Holy One.

The hope born in us is simple, yet all eternity will not be enough to satisfy it. We hope to know you, and you are inexhaustible.

You are the inexhaustible fountain of life from which all that lives flows. You are the fount of mercy who has mercy even on that which does not yet exist.

How can one have mercy on the nonexistent? I don’t know, but you do.

You look upon the infinite possibilities of life and color and beauty within yourself, and in mercy you make them come to life. Such is the source of my own being, from within you who are Being.

You had mercy on me before I existed. Seeing the possibility of my life, your mercy willed that I should be and know the joy and mystery of just being alive--and of knowing that I had nothing to be bringing myself to be. All is gift.

The inexhaustible flow of your life cannot be dammed or held captive by the cold clutch of death. You bring my brother, Jesus, again to life.

Seeing this, the soul leaps and knows that hope is no illusion. It finds its Source in the Source of Inexhaustible Mercy, in you.

Tasting the sweet surprise of being alive, we sample your mercy. We know you. Hearing the ever-fresh news of Jesus resurrection, we feel hope for all eternity flicker to life in our souls. We know you.

This is our living hope: to know you completely, with a knowledge felt in one’s uttermost depths. I know you as the Inexhaustible Fountain of the life that is in me. I know you as the Infinite Mercy who gives me life again and again that my soul may not die.

The evil one attacks at exactly this spot, seeking to erode the hope of knowing you today.

Surely, today is not special, he taunts. Surely, the pettiness of routine, the crush of deadlines and the challenge of difficult circumstances will push aside all else. Surely, my only real hope is just getting through the thicket of daily detail and making to evening.

But a living hope seeks you in every moment.

So today, I claim again the sweet surprise of being alive with a life I did not make. Today, I claim again the presence of your risen life in my heart and the lives of so many others.

Today, I feel once more that you, Holy Mystery, are the Inexhaustible Fountain of living Mercy that will not let me die.

Today, hope will live in me because you live.

Pr. David L. Miller