Reflections with GOD for Monday, January 23, 2012

Quotes for Today:
I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope. by Aeschylus (525 BC – 456 BC), Agamemnon
To accomplish great things, we must dream as well as act. by Anatole France (1844 – 1924)
Hope is a waking dream. by Aristotle (384 BC – 322 BC), from Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers
Dreams that do come true can be as unsettling as those that don’t. by Brett Butler, ‘Knee Deep in Paradise’
To want to be what one can be is purpose in life. by Cynthia Ozick, O Magazine, September 2002
He felt that his whole life was some kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it. by Douglas Adams (1952 – 2001), “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”
Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night. by Edgar Allan Poe (1809 – 1849), “Eleonora”
The wisest men follow their own direction. by Euripides (484 BC – 406 BC)
Keep true to the dreams of thy youth. by Friedrich von Schiller (1759 – 1805)
You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say, “Why not?” by George Bernard Shaw (1856 – 1950), “Back to Methuselah” (1921), part 1, act 1
Human beings have an inalienable right to invent themselves. by Germaine Greer, O Magazine, September 2002
They say dreams are the windows of the soul–take a peek and you can see the inner workings, the nuts and bolts. by Henry Bromel, Northern Exposure, The Big Kiss, 1991
Dreams surely are difficult, confusing, and not everything in them is brought to pass for mankind. For fleeting dreams have two gates: one is fashioned of horn and one of ivory. Those which pass through the one of sawn ivory are deceptive, bringing tidings which come to nought, but those which issue from the one of polished horn bring true results when a mortal sees them. by Homer (800 BC – 700 BC), The Odyssey
We need men who can dream of things that never were. by John F. Kennedy (1917 – 1963), speech in Dublin, Ireland, June 28, 1963
Dreams come true. Without that possibility, nature would not incite us to have them. by John Updike (1932 – )
I do not want to die… until I have faithfully made the most of my talent and cultivated the seed that was placed in me until the last small twig has grown. by Kathe Kollwitz, O Magazine, September 2002
My bounce-around life had taught me that dreams were dangerous things – they look solid in your mind, but you just try to reach for them. It’s like gathering clouds. by Kirby Larson, Hattie Big Sky, 2006
There should be fireworks, at least, when a dream dies. by Kirby Larson, Hattie Big Sky, 2006
I think it is often easier to make progress on mega-ambitious dreams. Since no one else is crazy enough to do it, you have little competition. In fact, there are so few people this crazy that I feel like I know them all by first name. by Larry Page, University of Michigan Commencement Address, 2009
You know what it’s like to wake up in the middle of the night with a vivid dream? And you know that if you don’t have a pencil and pad by the bed, it will be completely gone by the next morning. Sometimes it’s important to wake up and stop dreaming. When a really great dream shows up, grab it. by Larry Page, University of Michigan Commencement Address, 2009
You never lose a dream. It just incubates as a hobby. by Larry Page, University of Michigan Commencement Address, 2009
It has never been my object to record my dreams, just to realize them. by Man Ray, O Magazine, September 2002
One must desire something to be alive. by Margaret Deland, O Magazine, September 2002
Now, I say to you today my friends, even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: – ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’ by Martin Luther King Jr. (1929 – 1968), Speech at Civil Rights March on Washington, August 28, 1963
I’ve come to believe that each of us has a personal calling that’s as unique as a fingerprint – and that the best way to succeed is to discover what you love and then find a way to offer it to others in the form of service, working hard, and also allowing the energy of the universe to lead you. by Oprah Winfrey (1954 – ), O Magazine, September 2002
The key to realizing a dream is to focus not on success but significance – and then even the small steps and little victories along your path will take on greater meaning. by Oprah Winfrey (1954 – ), O Magazine, September 2002
The aim of life is self-development. To realize one’s nature perfectly – that is what each of us is here for. by Oscar Wilde (1854 – 1900)
If you stop dreaming, you’re just sleeping. by Ralph Green and Gregory Garcia, Raising Hope, Dream Hoarders, October 5, 2010
It hurts to find out that what you wanted doesn’t match what you dreamed it would be. by Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 09-07-04

Sermon for Today:
The Beauty of a Life of Service by Phillips Brooks (1835-1893)
“Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on Him, if ye continue in My word,
then are ye My disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall
make you free. They answered him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in
bondage to any man; how sayest Thou, ye shall be made free? Jesus answered
them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.
And the servant abideth not in the house forever, but the Son abideth ever. If the Son,
therefore, shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.”(John 8:31-36)
I want to speak to you today about the freedom which Christ gives to His disciples. This is the freedom into which man enters when he fulfils his life. The purpose and result of freedom is service. It sounds to us at first like a contradiction, like a paradox. Great truths very often present themselves to us in the first place as paradoxes, and it is only when we come to combine the two different terms of which they are composed and see how it is only by their meeting that the truth does reveal itself to us, that the truth does become known. It is by this same truth that God frees our souls, not from service, not from duty, but into service and into duty, and he who makes mistakes the purpose of his freedom mistakes the character of his freedom. He who thinks that he is being released from the work, and not set free in order that he may accomplish that work, mistakes the Christ from whom the freedom comes, mistakes the condition into which his soul is invited to enter. For…the freedom of a man simply consists in the larger opportunity to be and to do all that God makes him in His creation capable of being and doing, then certainly if man has been capable of service it is only by the entrance into service, by the acceptance of that life of service, that he enters into the fulness of his freedom and becomes the liberated child of God.
You remember…the way in which the bit of iron, taken out of its uselessness, its helplessness, and set in the midst of the great machine, thereby recognizes the purpose of its existence, and does the work for which it was appointed, for it immediately becomes the servant of the machine into which it was placed. Every part of its impulse flows through all of its substance, and it does the thing which it was made to do. When the ice has melted upon the plain it is only when it finds its way into the river and flows forth freely to do the work which the live water has to do that it really attains to its freedom. Only then is it really liberated from the bondage in which it was held while it was fastened in the chains of winter. The same freed ice waits until it so finds its freedom, and when man is set free simply into the enjoyment of his own life, simply into the realization of his own existence, he has not attained the purposes of his freedom, he has not come to the purposes of his life.
It should not surprise us when we think of freedom as a condition in which a man is called upon to do, and is enabled to do, the duty that God has laid upon him. Duty has become to us such a hard word, service has become to us a word so full of the spirit of bondage, that it surprises us at the first moment when we are called upon to realize that it is in itself a word of freedom. And yet we constantly are lowering the whole thought of our being, we are bringing down the greatness and richness of that with which we have to deal, until we recognize that God does not call us to our fullest life simply for ourselves. The spirit of selfishness is continually creeping in. I think it may almost be said that there has been no selfishness in the history of man like that which has exhibited itself in man’s religious life, showing itself in the way in which man has seized upon spiritual privileges and rejoiced in the good things that are to come to him in the hereafter, because he had made himself the servant of God.
The whole subject of selfishness, and the way in which it loses itself and finds itself again, is a very interesting one, and I wish that we had time to dwell upon it. It comes into a sort of general law which we are recognizing everywhere–the way in which a man very often, in his pursuit of the higher form of a condition in which he has been living, seems to lose that condition for a little while and only to reach it a little farther on. He seems to be abandoned by that power only that he may meet it by and by and enter more deeply into its heart and come more completely into its service. So it is, I think, with the self-devotion, consecration, and self- forget- fulness in which men realize their life. Very often in the lower stages of man’s life he forgets himself, with a slightly emphasized individual existence, not thinking very much of the purpose of his life, till he easily forgets himself among the things that are around him and forgets himself simply because there is so little of himself for him to forget; but do not you know perfectly well how very often when a man’s life becomes intensified and earnest, when he becomes completely possessed with some great passion and desire, it seems for the time to intensify his selfishness? It does intensify his selfishness. He is thinking so much in regard to himself that the thought of other persons and their interests is shut out of his life.
And so very often when a man has set before him the great passion of the divine life, when he is called by God to live the life of God, and to enter into the rewards of God, very often there seems to close around his life a certain bondage of selfishness, and he who gave himself freely to his fellow-men before now seems, by the very intensity, eagerness, and earnestness with which his mind is set upon the prize of the new life which is presented to him–it seems as if everything became concentrated upon himself, the saving of his soul, the winning of his salvation. That seat in heaven seems to burn so before his eyes that he cannot be satisfied for a moment with any thought that draws him away from it, and he presses forward that he may be saved. But by and by, as he enters more deeply into that life, the self-forgetfulness comes to him again and as a thing more divine. By and by, as the man walks up the mountain, he seems to pass out of the cloud which hangs about the lower slopes of the mountain, until at last he stands upon the pinnacle at the top, and there is in the perfect light. Is it not exactly like the mountain at whose foot there seems to be the open sunshine where men see everything, and on whose summit there is the sunshine, but on whose sides, and half way up, there seems to linger a long cloud, in which man has to struggle until he comes to the full result of his life? So it is with self-consecration, with service. You easily do it in some small ways in the lower life. Life becomes intensified and earnest with a serious purpose, and it seems as if it gathered itself together into selfishness. Only then it opens by and by into the largest and noblest works of men, in which they most manifest the richness of their human nature and appropriate the strength of God. Those are great and unselfish acts. We know it at once if we turn to Him who represents the fulness of the nature of our humanity.
When I turn to Jesus and think of Him as the manifestation of His own Christianity–and if men would only look at the life of Jesus to see what Christianity is, and not at the life of the poor representatives of Jesus whom they see around them, there would be so much more clearness, they would be rid of so many difficulties and doubts. When I look at the life of Jesus I see that the purpose of consecration, of emancipation, is service of His fellow-men. I cannot think for a moment of Jesus as doing that which so many religious people think they are doing when they serve Christ, when they give their lives to Him. I cannot think of Him as simply saving His own soul, living His own life, and completing His own nature in the sight of God. It is a life of service from beginning to end. He gives himself to man because He is absolutely the Child of God, and He sets up service, and nothing but service, to be the ultimate purpose, the one great desire, on which the souls of His followers should be set, as His own soul is set, upon it continually.
What is it that Christ has left to be His symbol in the world, that we put upon our churches, what we wear upon our hearts, that stands forth so perpetually us the symbol of Christ’s life? Is it a throne from which a ruler utters his decrees? Is it a mountain top upon which some rapt seer sits, communing with himself and with the voices around him, and gathering great truth into his soul and delighting in it? No, not the throne and not the mountain top. It is the cross. Oh, my brethren, that the cross should be the great symbol of our highest measure, that that which stands for consecration, that that which stands for the divine statement that a man does not live for himself and that a man loses himself when he does live for himself–that that should be the symbol of our religion and the great sign and token of our faith?
What sort of Christians are we that go about asking for the things of this life first, thinking that it shall make us prosperous to be Christians, and then a little higher asking for the things that pertain to the eternal prosperity, when the Great Master, who leaves us the great law, in whom our Christian life is spiritually set forth, has as His great symbol the cross, the cross, the sign of consecration and obedience? It is not simply suffering too. Christ does not stand primarily for suffering. Suffering is an accident. It does not matter whether you and I suffer. “Not enjoyment and not sorrow” is our life, not sorrow any more than enjoyment, but obedience and duty. If duty brings sorrow, let it bring sorrow. It did bring sorrow to the Christ, because it was impossible for a man to serve the absolute righteousness in this world and not to sorrow. If it had brought joy, and glory, and triumph, if it had been greeted at its entrance and applauded on the way, He would have been as truly the consecrated soul that He was in the days when, over a road that was marked with the blood of His footprints, He found His way up at last to the torturing cross. It is not suffering; it is obedience. It is not pain; it is consecration of life. It is the joy of service that makes the life of Christ, and for us to serve Him, serving fellow-man and God–as he served fellow-man and God–whether it bring pain or joy, if we can only get out of our souls the thought that it matters not if we are happy or sorrowful, if only we are dutiful and faithful, and brave and strong, then we should be in the atmosphere, we should be in the great company of the Christ.
It surprises me very often when I hear good Christian people talk about Christ’s entrance into this world, Christ’s coming to save this world. They say it was so marvellous that Jesus should be willing to come down from His throne in heaven and undertake all the strange sorrow and distress that belonged to Him when He came to save the world from its sins. Wonderful? There was no wonder in it; no wonder if we enter up into the region where Jesus lives and think of life as He must have thought of life. It is the same wonder that people feel about the miracles of Jesus. Is it a wonder that when a divine life is among men, nature should have a response to make to Him, and He should do things that you and I, in our little humanity, find it impossible to do? No, indeed, there is no wonder that God loved the world. There is no wonder that Christ, the Son of God, at any sacrifice undertook to save the world. The wonder would have been if God, sitting in His heaven, the wonder would have been if Jesus, ready to come here to the earth and seeing how it was possible to save man from sin by suffering, had not suffered. Do you wonder at the mother, when she gives her life without a hesitation or a cry, when she gives her life with joy, with thankfulness, for her child, counting it her privilege? Do you wonder at the patriot, the hero, when he rushes into the battle to do the good deed which it is possible for him to do? No; read your own nature deeper and you will understand your Christ. It is no wonder that He should have died upon the cross; the wonder would have been if, with the inestimable privilege of saving man, He had shrunk from that cross and turned away. It sets before us that it is not the glories of suffering, it is not the necessity of suffering, it is simply the beauty of obedience and the fulfilment of a man’s life in doing his duty and rendering the service which it is possible for him to render to his fellow-man.
I said that a man when he did that left behind him all the thought of the life which he was willing to live within himself, even all the highest thought. It is not your business and mine to study whether we shall get to heaven, even to study whether we shall be good men; it is our business to study how we shall come into the midst of the purposes of God and have the unspeakable privilege in these few years of doing something of His work. And yet so is our life all one, so is the kingdom of God which surrounds us and infolds us one bright and blessed unity, that when a man has devoted himself to the service of God and his fellow-man, immediately he is thrown back upon his own nature, and he sees now–it is the right place for him to see–that he must be the brave, strong, faithful man, because it is impossible for him to do his duty and to render his service, except it is rendered out of a heart that is full of faithfulness, that is brave and true.
There is one word of Jesus that always comes back to me as about the noblest thing that human lips have ever said upon our earth, and the most comprehensive thing, that seems to sweep into itself all the commonplace experience of mankind. Do you remember when He was sitting with His disciples, at the last supper, how He lifted up His voice and prayed, and in the midst of His prayer there came these wondrous words: “For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified”? The whole of human life is there. Shall a man cultivate himself? No, not primarily. Shall a man serve the world, strive to increase the kingdom of God in the world? Yes, indeed, he shall. How shall he do it? By cultivating himself, and instantly he is thrown back upon his own life. “For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified.” I am my best, not simply for myself, but for the world. My brethren, is there anything in all the teachings that man has had from his fellow-man, all that has come down to him from the lips of God, that is nobler, that is more far-reaching than that–to be my best not simply for my own sake, but for the sake of the world into which, setting my best, I shall make that world more complete, I shall do my little part to renew and to recreate it in the image of God?
That is the law of my existence. And the man that makes that the law of his existence neither neglects himself nor his fellow-men, neither becomes the self-absorbed student and cultivator of his own life upon the one hand, nor does he become, abandoning himself, simply the wasting benefactor of his brethren upon the other. You can help your fellow-men: you must help your fellow-men; but the only way you can help them is by being the noblest and the best man that it is possible for you to be. I watch the workman build upon the building which by and by is to soar into the skies, to toss its pinnacles up to the heaven, and I see him looking up and wondering where those pinnacles are to be, thinking how high they are to be, measuring the feet, wondering how they are to be built, and all the time he is cramming a rotten stone into the building just where he has set to work. Let him forget the pinnacles, if he will, or hold only the floating image of them in his imagination for his inspiration; but the thing that he must do is to put a brave, strong soul, an honest and substantial life into the building just where he is now at work.
It seems to me that that comes home to us all. Men are questioning now as they never have questioned before whether Christianity is indeed the true religion which is to be the salvation of the world. They are feeling how the world needs salvation, how it needs regeneration, how it is wrong and bad all through and through, mixed with the good that is in it everywhere. Everywhere there is the good and the bad, and the great question that is on men’s minds to-day, as I believe it has never been upon men’s minds before, is this: Is this Christian religion, with its high pretensions, this Christian life that claims so much for itself, is it competent for the task that it has undertaken to do? Can it meet all these human problems, and relieve all these human miseries, and fulfil all these human hopes? It is the old story over again, when John the Baptist, puzzled in his prison, said to Jesus, “Art thou He that should come? or look we for another?” It seems to me that the Christian Church is hearing that cry in its ears to-day: “Art thou He that should come?” Can you do this which the world unmistakably needs to be done?
Christian men, it is for us to give our bit of answer to that question. It is for us, in whom the Christian Church is at this moment partially embodied, to declare that Christianity, that the Christian faith, the Christian manhood, can do that for the world which the world needs. You say, “What can I do?” You can furnish one Christian life. You can furnish a life so faithful to every duty, so ready for every service, so determined not to commit every sin, that the great Christian Church shall be the stronger for your living in it, and the problem of the world be answered, and a certain great peace come into this poor, perplexed phase of our humanity as it sees that new revelation of what Christianity is. Yes, Christ can give the world the thing it needs in unknown ways and methods that we have not yet begun to suspect. Christianity has not yet been tried. My friends, no man dares to condemn the Christian faith to-day, because the Christian faith has not been tried. Not until men get rid of the thought that it is a poor machine, an expedient for saving them from suffering and pain, not until they get the grand idea of it as the great power of God present in and through the lives of men, not until then does Christianity enter upon its true trial and become ready to show what it can do. Therefore we struggle against our sin in order that men may be saved around us, and not simply that our own souls may be saved.
Tell me you have a sin that you mean to commit this evening that is going to make this night black. What can keep you from committing that sin? Suppose you look into its consequences. Suppose the wise man tells you what will be the physical consequences of that sin. You shudder and you shrink, and, perhaps, you are partially deterred. Suppose you see the glory that might come to you, physical, temporal, spiritual, if you do not commit that sin. The opposite of it shows itself to you–the blessing and the richness in your life. Again there comes a great power that shall control your lust and wickedness. Suppose there comes to you something even deeper than that, no consequence on consequence at all, but simply an abhorrence for the thing, so that your whole nature shrinks from it as the nature of God shrinks from a sin that is polluting and filthy and corrupt and evil. They are all great powers. Let us thank God for them all. He knows that we are weak enough to need every power that can possibly be brought to bear upon our feeble lives; but if, along with all of them, there could come this other power, if along with them there could come the certainty that if you refrain from that sin to-night you make the sum of sin that is in the world, and so the sum of all temptation that is in the world, and so the sum of future evil that is to spring out of temptation in the world, less, shall there not be a nobler impulse rise up in your heart, and shall you not say: “I will not do it; I will be honest, I will be sober, I will be pure, at least, to-night”? I dare to think that there are men here to whom that appeal can come, men who, perhaps, will be all dull and deaf if one speaks to them about their personal salvation; who, if one dares to picture to them, appealing to their better nature, trusting to their nobler soul, that there is in them the power to save other men from sin, and to help the work of God by the control of their own passions and the fulfilment of their own duty, will be stirred to the higher life. Men–very often we do not trust them enough–will answer to the higher appeal that seems to be beyond them when the poor, lower appeal that comes within the region of their selfishness is cast aside, and they will have nothing to do with it.
Oh, this marvellous, this awful power that we have over other people’s lives! Oh! the power of the sin that you have done years and years ago! It is awful to think of it. I think there is hardly anything more terrible to the human thought than this–the picture of a man who, having sinned years and years ago in a way that involved other souls in his sin, and then, having repented of his sin and undertaken another life, knows certainly that the power, the consequence of that sin is going on outside of his reach, beyond even his ken and knowledge. He cannot touch it. You wronged a soul ten years ago. You taught a boy how to tell his first mercantile lie; you degraded the early standards of his youth. What has become of that boy to-day? You may have repented. He has passed put of your sight. He has gone years and years ago. Somewhere in this great, multitudinous mass of humanity he is sinning and sinning and reduplicating and extending the sin that you did. You touched the faith of some believing soul years ago with some miserable sneer of yours, with some cynical and sceptical disparagement of God and of the man who is the utterance of God upon the earth. You taught the soul that was enthusiastic to be full of scepticisms and doubts. You wronged a woman years ago, and her life has gone out from your life, you cannot begin to tell where. You have repented of your sin. You have bowed yourself, it may be, in dust and ashes. You have entered upon a new life. You are pure to-day. But where is the sceptical soul? Where is the ruined woman whom you sent forth into the world out of the shadow of your sin years ago? You cannot touch that life. You cannot reach it. You do not know where it is. No steps of yours, quickened with all your earnestness, can pursue it. No contrition of yours can drawback its consequences. Remorse cannot force the bullet back again into the gun from which it once has gone forth. It makes life awful to the man who has ever sinned, who has ever wronged and hurt another life because of this sin, because no sin ever was done that did not hurt another life. I know the mercy of our God, that while He has put us into each other’s power to a fearful extent, He never will let any soul absolutely go to everlasting ruin for another’s sin; and so I dare to see the love of God pursuing that lost soul where you cannot pursue it. But that does not for one moment lift the shadow from your heart, or cease to make you tremble when you think of how your sin has outgrown itself and is running far, far away where you can never follow it.
Thank God the other thing is true as well. Thank God that when a man does a bit of service, however little it may be, of that too he can never trace the consequences. Thank God that that which in some better moment, in some nobler inspiration, you did ten years ago to make your brother’s faith a little more strong, to let your shop boy confirm and not doubt the confidence in man which he had brought into his business, to establish the purity of a soul instead of staining it and shaking it, thank God, in this quick, electric atmosphere in which we live, that, too, runs forth. Do not say in your terror, “I will do nothing.” You must do something. Only let Christ tell you–let Christ tell you that there is nothing that a man rests upon in the moment, that he thinks of, as he looks back upon it when it has sunk into the past, with any satisfaction, except some service to his fellow-man, some strengthening and helping of a human soul.
Two men are walking down the street together and talking away. See what different conditions those two men are in. One of them has his soul absolutely full of the desire to help his fellow-man. He peers into those faces as he goes, and sees the divine possibility that is in them, and he sees the divine nature everywhere. They are talking about the idlest trifles, about the last bit of local Boston politics. But in their souls one of those men has consecrated himself, with the new morning, to the glorious service of God, and the other of them is asking how he may be a little richer in his miserable wealth when the day sinks. Oh, we look into the other world and read the great words and hear it said, Between me and thee, this and that, there is a great gulf fixed; and we think of something that is to come in the eternal life. Is there any gulf in eternity, is there any gulf between heaven and hell that is wider, and deeper, and blacker, that is more impassable than that gulf which lies between these two men going upon their daily way?
Oh, friends, it is not that God is going to judge us some day. That is not the awful thing. It is that God knows us now. If I stop an instant and know that God knows me through all these misconceptions and blunders of my brethren, that God knows me–that is the awful thing. The future judgment shall but tell it. It is here, here upon my conscience, now. It is awful to think how the commonplace things that men can do, the commonplace thoughts that men can think, the commonplace lives that men can live, are but in the bosom of the future. The thing that impresses me more and more is this–that we only need to have extended to the multitude that which is at this moment present in the few, and the world really would be saved. There is but the need of the extension into a multitude of souls of that which a few souls have already attained in their consecration of themselves to human good, and to the service of God, and I will not say the millennium would have come, I don’t know much about the millennium, but heaven would have come, the new Jerusalem would be here. There are men enough in this church this morning, there are men enough sitting here within the sound of my voice to-day, if they were inspired by the spirit of God and counted it the great privilege of their life, to do the work of God–there are men enough here to save this city, and to make this a glowing city of our Lord, to relieve its poverty, to lighten its darkness, to lift up the cloud that is upon hearts, to turn it into a great, I will not say psalm-singing city, but God-serving, God-abiding city, to touch all the difficult problems of how society and government ought to be organized then with a power with which they should yield their difficulty and open gradually. The light to measure would be clear enough, if only the spirit is there. Give me five hundred men, nay, give me one hundred men of the spirit that I know to-day in three men that I well understand, and I will answer for it that the city shall be saved. And you, my friend, are one of the five hundred–you are one of the one hundred.
“Oh, but,” you say, “is not this slavery over again? You have talked about freedom, and here I am once more a slave. I had about got free from the bondage of my fellow-men, and here I am right in the midst of it again. What has become of my personality, of my independence, if I am to live thus?” Ay, you have got to learn what every noblest man has always learned, that no man becomes independent of his fellow-men excepting in serving his fellow-men. You have got to learn that Christianity comes to us not simply as a luxury but as a force, and no man who values Christianity simply as a luxury which he possesses really gets the Christianity which he tries to value. Only when Christianity is a force, only when I seek independence of men in serving men, do I cease to be a slave to their whims. I must dress as they think I ought to dress; I must walk in the streets as they think I ought to walk; I must do business just after their fashion; I must accept their standards; but when Christ has taken possession of me and I am a total man, I am more or less independent of these men. Shall I care about their little whims and oddities? Shall I care about how they criticise the outside of my life? Shall I peer into their faces as I meet them in the street, to see whether they approve of me or not? And yet am I not their servant? There is nothing now I will not do to serve them, there is nothing now I will not do to save them. If the cross comes, I welcome the cross, and look upon it with joy, if, by my death upon the cross in any way, I may echo the salvation of my Lord and save them. Independent of them? Surely. And yet their servant? Perfectly. Was ever man so independent in Jerusalem as Jesus was? What cared He for the sneer of the Pharisee, for the learned scorn of the Sadducee, for the taunt of the people and the little boys that had been taught to jeer at Him as He went down the street, and yet the very servant of all their life? He says there are two kinds of men–they who sit upon a throne and eat, and they who serve. “I am among you as he that serveth.” Oh, seek independence.
Insist upon independence. Insist that you will not be the slave of the poor, petty standards of your fellow-men. But insist upon it only in the way in which it can be insisted upon, by becoming absolutely the servant of their needs. So only shall you be independent of their whims. There is one great figure, and it has taken in all Christian consciousness, that again and again this work with Christ has been asserted to be the true service in the army of a great master, of a great captain, who goes before us to his victory, that it is asserted that in that captain, in the entrance into his army, every power is set free. Do you remember the words that a good many of us read or heard yesterday in our churches, where Jesus was doing one of His miracles, and it is said that a devil was cast out, the dumb spake? Every power becomes the man’s possession, and he uses it in his freedom, and he fights with it with all his force, just as soon as the devil is cast out of him.
I have tried to tell you the noblest motive in which you should be a pure, an upright, a faithful, and a strong man. It is not for the salvation of your life, it is not for the salvation of yourself. It is not for the satisfaction of your tastes. It is that you may take your place in the great army of God and go forward having something to do with the work that He is doing in the world. You remember the days of the war, and how ashamed of himself a man felt who never touched with his finger the great struggle in which the nation was engaged. Oh, to go through this life and never touch with my finger the vast work that Christ is doing, and when the cry of triumph arises at the end to stand there, not having done one little, unknown, unnoticed thing to bring about that which is the true life of the man and of the world, that is awful. And I dare to believe that there are young men in this church this morning who, failing to be touched by every promise of their own salvation and every threatening of their own damnation, will still lift themselves up and take upon them the duty of men, and be soldiers of Jesus Christ, and have a part in the battle, and have a part somewhere in the victory that is sure to come. Don’t be selfish anywhere. Don’t be selfish, most of all, in your religion. Let yourselves free into your religion, and be utterly unselfish. Claim your freedom in service.

Hymn for Today:
“In the Bleak Midwinter” by Christina G. Rossetti, 1830-1894
1. In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,
earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,
in the bleak midwinter, long ago.
2. Our God, heaven cannot hold him, nor earth sustain;
heaven and earth shall flee away when he comes to reign.
In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed
the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.
3. Angels and archangels may have gathered there,
cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;
but his mother only, in her maiden bliss,
worshiped the beloved with a kiss.
4. What can I give him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;
if I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;
yet what I can I give him: give my heart.

Through the Bible in One Year:
Joshua 21 to 24
1 The heads of families of the Levites then came to the priest, Eleazar, Joshua son of Nun and the heads of families of the tribes of Israel-
2 they were then at Shiloh in Canaan. They said to them, ‘Through Moses, Yahweh ordered us to be given towns to live in, with their pasture lands for our livestock.’
3 In compliance with Yahweh’s order, the Israelites consequently and from their own heritage gave the Levites the following towns with their pasture lands:
4 Lots were cast for the clans of the Kohathites: to those Levites who were sons of Aaron the priest, fell thirteen towns from the tribes of Judah, Simeon and Benjamin;
5 to the other sons of Kohath, by clans,
6 fell ten towns from the tribes of Ephraim, Dan, and the half-tribe of Manasseh. To the sons of Gershon, by clans, fell thirteen towns from the tribes of Issachar, Asher, Naphtali and the half-tribe of Manasseh in Bashan.
7 To the sons of Merari, by clans, fell twelve towns from the tribes of Reuben, Gad and Zebulun.
8 The Israelites assigned these towns and their pasture lands to the Levites by lot, as Yahweh had ordered through Moses.
9 From the tribe of Judah and the tribe of Simeon, they gave the towns named below.
10 The first portion was for the sons of Aaron, belonging to the clans of the Kohathites, to the sons of Levi, since the first lot was theirs.
11 They gave them Kiriath-Arba, Anak’s father’s town — now Hebron — in the highlands of Judah, with its surrounding pasture lands.
12 The fields and villages of this town, however, they gave to Caleb son of Jephunneh as his property.
13 To the sons of Aaron the priest they gave Hebron, a city of refuge for those who had killed, with its pasture lands, as well as Libnah with its pasture lands,
14 Jattir with its pasture lands, Eshtemoa with its pasture lands,
15 Holon with its pasture lands, Debir with its pasture lands,
16 Ashan with its pasture lands, Juttah with its pasture lands, and Beth-Shemesh with its pasture lands: nine towns taken from these two tribes;
17 and, from the tribe of Benjamin, Gibeon with its pasture lands, Geba with its pasture lands,
18 Anathoth with its pasture lands and Almon with its pasture lands: four towns.
19 Total number of towns for the priests, the sons of Aaron: thirteen towns with their pasture lands.
20 As regards the clans of the sons of Kohath, those Levites still left of the sons of Kohath, the towns of their lot were taken from the tribe of Ephraim.
21 They were given Shechem, a city of refuge for those who had killed, with its pasture lands, in the highlands of Ephraim, as well as Gezer with its pasture lands,
22 Kibzaim with its pasture lands, and Beth-Horon with its pasture lands: four towns;
23 from the tribe of Dan, Elteke with its pasture lands, Gibbethon with its pasture lands,
24 Aijalon with its pasture lands and Gath-Rimmon with its pasture lands: four towns;
25 and, from the half-tribe of Manasseh, Taanach with its pasture lands and Jibleam with its pasture lands: two towns.
26 In all: ten towns with their pasture lands for the remaining clans of the sons of Kohath.
27 To the sons of Gershon, of the levitical clans, were given: from the half-tribe of Manasseh, Golan in Bashan, a city of refuge for those who had killed, with its pasture lands, and Ashtaroth with its pasture lands — two towns;
28 from the tribe of Issachar, Kishion with its pasture lands, Dobrath with its pasture lands,
29 Jarmuth with its pasture lands and En-Gannim with its pasture lands — four towns;
30 from the tribe of Asher, Mishal with its pasture lands, Abdon with its pasture lands,
31 Helkath with its pasture lands and Rehob with its pasture lands — four towns;
32 and, from the tribe of Naphtali, Kedesh in Galilee, a city of refuge for those who had killed, with its pasture lands, Hammoth-Dor with its pasture lands and Kartan with its pasture lands — three towns.
33 Total number of towns of the Gershonites, by clans: thirteen towns with their pasture lands.
34 To the clans of the sons of Merari, the remainder of the Levites, fell: from the tribe of Zebulun, Jokneam with its pasture lands, Kartah with its pasture lands,
35 Rimmon with its pasture lands and Nahalal with its pasture lands — four towns;
36 on the other side of the Jordan opposite Jericho, from the tribe of Reuben, Bezer in the desert, on the tableland, a city of refuge for those who had killed, with its pasture lands, Jahaz with its pasture lands,
37 Kedemoth with its pasture lands and Mephaath with its pasture lands — four towns;
38 and, from the tribe of Gad, Ramoth in Gilead, a city of refuge for those who had killed, with its pasture lands, Mahanaim with its pasture lands,
39 Heshbon with its pasture lands and Jazer with its pasture lands — four towns.
40 Total number of towns forming the lot of the sons of Merari by clans, of the remaining levitical clans: twelve towns.
41 The total number of towns for the Levites in Israelite territory was forty-eight towns with their pasture lands.
42 These towns consisted in each case of the town itself and the pasture land round it. This was the case with all the towns.
43 This was how Yahweh gave the Israelites the entire country which he had sworn to give to their ancestors. They took possession of it and settled in it.
44 Yahweh granted them tranquillity on all their frontiers just as he had sworn to their ancestors and, of all their enemies, not one succeeded in resisting them. Yahweh put all their enemies at their mercy.
45 Of all the promises that Yahweh had made to the House of Israel, not one failed; all were fulfilled.
1 Joshua then summoned the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh
2 and said to them, ‘You have observed everything that Moses, servant of Yahweh, ordered you, and whenever I have given you an order you have listened to me.
3 You have not deserted your brothers, from long ago until today, keeping the observance of the commandment of Yahweh your God.
4 Now that Yahweh your God has granted your brothers the rest that he promised them, go back to your tents, to the country belonging to you which Moses, servant of Yahweh, gave you on the other side of the Jordan.
5 But take great care to practise the commandments and the Law which Moses, servant of Yahweh, has given you: to love Yahweh your God, always to follow his paths, to keep his commandments, to be loyal to him and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul.
6 Joshua blessed them and sent them away, and they went home to their tents.
7 To one half of the tribe of Manasseh, Moses had given a territory in Bashan; to the other half, Joshua gave another among their brothers on the west bank of the Jordan. As Joshua sent them home to their tents, he blessed them
8 and said to them, ‘You are going back to your tents with great wealth, with a great deal of livestock, with silver and gold, bronze and iron and great quantities of clothing; share the spoils of your enemies with your brothers.’
9 The Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh returned home, leaving the Israelites at Shiloh in Canaan, and made for Gilead, the territory which belonged to them as a result of Yahweh’s order given through Moses.
10 When they came to the stone circle by the Jordan, in Canaanite territory, the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh built an altar there beside the Jordan, a large, imposing altar.
11 This came to the ears of the Israelites. ‘Look,’ the word went round, ‘the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh have built this altar on the Canaanite side, near the stone circle by the Jordan, on the Israelites’ bank.’
12 At this news, the whole community of the Israelites mustered at Shiloh, to march against them and make war on them.
13 The Israelites sent the priest Phinehas son of Eleazar to the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh, in Gilead,
14 and with him ten leading men, one man from a leading family from each of the tribes of Israel, each of them being head of his family in the clans of Israel.
15 Having reached the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh in Gilead, they said this:
16 ‘The whole community of Israel says as follows, “What do you mean by this infidelity, which you have committed against the God of Israel by now repudiating your allegiance to Yahweh, and by building yourselves an altar with the intention now of rebelling against Yahweh?
17 “Was the crime which we committed at Peor so slight — although we have not managed to purify ourselves from that even now, in spite of the plague which has ravaged the community of Yahweh-
18 that you must now repudiate your allegiance to Yahweh? For since you are in rebellion against him today, tomorrow his anger will be aroused against the whole community of Israel.
19 “Is the country in which you have settled unclean? Then cross over into the country where Yahweh has settled, there where Yahweh’s Dwelling now stands, and settle among us. But do not rebel against Yahweh or involve us in your rebellion by building a rival altar to the altar of Yahweh our God.
20 When Achan son of Zerah was unfaithful to the curse of destruction, did not the retribution come down on the whole community of Israel, although he was only one man? Did he not have to die for his crime?” ‘
21 The Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh spoke in their turn and answered the heads of the clans of Israel:
22 ‘The God of gods, Yahweh, the God of gods, Yahweh well knows, and let Israel know it too: if there has been rebellion or infidelity to Yahweh on our part, may he refuse to save us today!
23 And if we have built ourselves an altar with the intention of repudiating our allegiance to Yahweh and of presenting burnt offering and oblation or of offering communion sacrifices on it, may Yahweh himself call us to account for it!
24 The truth is, we have done this as a precaution: in the future, your descendants might say to ours, “What connection do you have with Yahweh, God of Israel?
25 Has not Yahweh set the frontier of the Jordan between us and you, you Reubenites and Gadites? You have no share in Yahweh.” Thus, your descendants would be the cause of stopping ours from fearing Yahweh.
26 ‘So we said to each other, “Let us build this altar, not for burnt offerings or other sacrifices
27 but as a witness between us and you and between our descendants after us, attesting that we too have the right to worship Yahweh, in his presence, with our burnt offerings, our victims and our communion sacrifices. And so, in the future your descendants will not be able to say to ours: You have no share in Yahweh.”
28 And we furthermore said, “If ever it were to happen that they did say this either to us or to our descendants in the future, we should reply: Look at this structure, Yahweh’s altar, made by our ancestors not for burnt offerings or other sacrifices but as a witness between us and you.”
29 Far be it from us to rebel against Yahweh or now to repudiate our allegiance to Yahweh by building an altar for burnt offerings or oblations or sacrifices, in rivalry with the altar of Yahweh our God that stands before his Dwelling!’
30 When the priest Phinehas, the leaders of the community and the heads of the clans of Israel who were with him, heard the words spoken by the Gadites, the Reubenites and the Manassehites, they approved of them.
31 The priest Phinehas son of Eleazar then said to the Reubenites, the Gadites and the Manassehites, ‘Today, we can see that Yahweh is among us, since you have not been unfaithful to Yahweh in this matter; this means that you have spared the Israelites from Yahweh’s avenging hand.’
32 The priest Phinehas son of Eleazar and the leaders left the Reubenites and the Gadites and went back from Gilead to Canaan and the Israelites, to whom they reported the answer.
33 The Israelites were pleased to hear this; the Israelites gave thanks to God and spoke no more of marching against them to make war on them and to ravage the country inhabited by the Reubenites and the Gadites.
34 The Reubenites and the Gadites called the altar . . . , ‘Because’, they said, ‘it will be a witness between us that Yahweh is God.’
1 Now long after Yahweh had given Israel rest from all the enemies surrounding them — Joshua was old now, far advanced in years-
2 Joshua summoned all Israel, their elders, leaders, judges and officials, and said to them, ‘I myself am old, far advanced in years;
3 you for your part have witnessed all that Yahweh your God has done to all these nations for your sake; Yahweh your God himself has fought for you.
4 Look, these nations still remaining, and all the nations which I have exterminated from the Jordan all the way to the Great Sea in the west, I have allotted to you as the heritage for your tribes.
5 Yahweh your God will himself drive them out before you; he will dispossess them before you and you will take possession of their country, as Yahweh your God has promised you.
6 ‘So be very firm about keeping and doing everything written in the Book of the Law of Moses, not swerving from that either to right or to left.
7 Never mix with the peoples who are still left beside you. Do not utter the names of their gods, do not swear by them, do not serve them and do not bow down to them.
8 On the contrary, you must be loyal to Yahweh your God as you have been till now.
9 Yahweh has dispossessed great and powerful nations before you, and no one so far has been able to resist you.
10 One man of you was able to rout a thousand of them, since Yahweh your God was himself fighting for you, as he had promised you.
11 Be very careful, as you value your life, to love Yahweh your God.
12 ‘But should you in any way relapse, if you make friends with the remnant of these nations still living beside you, if you intermarry with them, if you mix with them and they with you,
13 then know for certain that Yahweh your God will stop dispossessing these nations before you, and for you they will be a snare, a pitfall, thorns in your sides and thistles in your eyes, until you vanish from this fine country given you by Yahweh your God.
14 ‘Today, you see, I am going the way of all the earth. Acknowledge with all your heart and soul that of all the promises made to you by Yahweh your God, not one has failed: all have been fulfilled — not one has failed.
15 ‘As every promise made to you by Yahweh your God has been fulfilled for you, by the same token Yahweh will fulfil all his threats against you, even to exterminating you from this fine country given you by Yahweh your God.
16 ‘For if you violate the covenant which Yahweh your God has imposed on you, if you go and serve other gods and bow down to them, then Yahweh’s anger will be roused against you and you will quickly vanish from the fine country which he has given you.’
1 Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel together at Shechem; he then summoned all the elders of Israel, its leaders, judges and officials, and they presented themselves in God’s presence.
2 Joshua then said to all the people: ‘Yahweh, the God of Israel, says this, “From time immemorial, your ancestors, Terah, father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the River, and served other gods.
3 I then brought your ancestor Abraham from beyond the River and led him through the length and breadth of Canaan. I increased his descendants and I gave him Isaac.
4 To Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau. To Esau I gave possession of the mountainous country of Seir. Jacob and his sons went down into Egypt.
5 I then sent Moses and Aaron, and plagued Egypt with the wonders that I worked there; finally I brought you out.
6 I brought your ancestors out of Egypt, and you came to the Sea; the Egyptians pursued your ancestors with chariots and horsemen, to the Sea of Reeds.
7 They then called to Yahweh, and he spread a thick fog between you and the Egyptians, and made the sea go back on them and cover them. You saw with your own eyes what I did in Egypt. Then, for a long while, you lived in the desert.
8 I then brought you into the country of the Amorites, who used to live on the further side of the Jordan; they made war on you and I put them at your mercy; after which, you took possession of their country, since I destroyed them before you.
9 Next, Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab, rose to make war on Israel, and sent for Balaam son of Beor to come and curse you.
10 But I would not listen to Balaam; instead, he had to bless you, and I saved you from his power.
11 “You then crossed the Jordan and came to Jericho, but the inhabitants of Jericho made war on you: Amorites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hittites, Girgashites, Hivites and Jebusites, and I put them all at your mercy.
12 I sent hornets ahead of you, which drove out the two Amorite kings before you; this was not the work of your sword or of your bow.
13 And now I have given you a country for which you have not toiled, towns you have not built, although you live in them, vineyards and olive groves you have not planted, although you eat their fruit.”
14 ‘So now, fear Yahweh and serve him truly and sincerely; banish the gods whom your ancestors served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve Yahweh.
15 But if serving Yahweh seems a bad thing to you, today you must make up your minds whom you do mean to serve, whether the gods whom your ancestors served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose country you are now living. As regards my family and me, we shall serve Yahweh.’
16 The people replied, ‘Far be it from us to desert Yahweh and to serve other gods!
17 Yahweh our God was the one who brought us and our ancestors here from Egypt, from the place of slave-labour, who worked those great wonders before our eyes and who kept us safe all along the way we travelled and among all the peoples through whom we passed.
18 And Yahweh has driven all the nations out for us, including the Amorites who used to live in the country. We too shall serve Yahweh, for he is our God.’
19 Joshua then said to the people, ‘You will not be able to serve Yahweh, since he is a holy God, he is a jealous God who will not tolerate either your misdeeds or your sins.
20 If you desert Yahweh and serve the foreigners’ gods, he will turn and maltreat you anew and, in spite of having been good to you in the past, will destroy you.’
21 The people replied to Joshua, ‘No! Yahweh is the one we mean to serve.’
22 Joshua then said to the people, ‘You are witnesses to yourselves that you have chosen Yahweh, to serve him.’ They replied, ‘Witnesses we are!’
23 ‘Then banish the foreign gods which you have with you and give your allegiance to Yahweh, God of Israel!’
24 The people replied to Joshua, ‘Yahweh our God is the one whom we shall serve; his voice we shall obey!’
25 That day Joshua made a covenant for the people; he laid down a statute and ordinance for them at Shechem.
26 Joshua wrote these words in the Book of the Law of God. He then took a large stone and set it up there, under the oak tree in Yahweh’s sanctuary.
27 Joshua then said to all the people, ‘Look, this stone will be a witness to us, since it has heard all the words that Yahweh has spoken to us: it will be a witness against you, in case you should deny your God.’
28 Joshua then dismissed the people, every one to his own heritage.
29 After this, Joshua son of Nun, servant of Yahweh, died; he was a hundred and ten years old.
30 He was buried on the estate which he had received as his heritage, at Timnath-Serah which lies in the highlands of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash.
31 Israel served Yahweh throughout the lifetime of Joshua and throughout the lifetime of those elders who outlived Joshua and had known all the deeds which Yahweh had done for the sake of Israel.
32 As regards the bones of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought from Egypt, these were buried at Shechem in the plot of ground which Jacob had bought for a hundred pieces of silver from the sons of Hamor father of Shechem, and which had become the heritage of the sons of Joseph.
33 Eleazar son of Aaron then died and was buried at Gibeah, the town of his son Phinehas, which had been given to him in the highlands of Ephraim.(New Jerusalem Bible)

Daily Office for Monday, January 23, 2012:
Psalm 41
1 [For the choirmaster Psalm Of David] Blessed is anyone who cares for the poor and the weak; in time of trouble Yahweh rescues him.
2 Yahweh protects him, gives him life and happiness on earth. Do not abandon him to his enemies’ pleasure!
3 Yahweh sustains him on his bed of sickness; you transform altogether the bed where he lies sick.
4 For my part I said, ‘Yahweh, take pity on me! Cure me for I have sinned against you.’
5 My enemies speak to me only of disaster, ‘When will he die and his name disappear?’
6 When people come to see me their talk is hollow, when they get out they spread the news with spite in their hearts.
7 All who hate me whisper together about me and reckon I deserve the misery I suffer.
8 ‘A fatal sickness has a grip on him; now that he is down, he will never get up again.’
9 Even my trusted friend on whom I relied, who shared my table, takes advantage of me.
10 But you, Yahweh, take pity on me! Put me on my feet and I will give them their due.
11 This will convince me that you delight in me, if my enemy no longer exults over me.
12 Then you will keep me unscathed, and set me in your presence for ever.
13 Blessed be Yahweh, the God of Israel, from eternity to eternity. Amen, Amen.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Psalm 52
1 [For the choirmaster Poem Of David When Doeg the Edomite went and warned Saul, 'David has gone to Abimelech's house'] Why take pride in being wicked, you champion in villainy, all day long
2 plotting crime? Your tongue is razor-sharp, you artist in perfidy.
3 You prefer evil to good, lying to uprightness. Pause
4 You revel in destructive talk, treacherous tongue!
5 That is why God will crush you, destroy you once and for all, snatch you from your tent, uproot you from the land of the living.Pause
6 The upright will be awestruck as they see it, they will mock him,
7 ‘So much for someone who would not place his reliance in God, but relied on his own great wealth, and made himself strong by crime.’
8 But I, like a flourishing olive tree in the house of God, put my trust in God’s faithful love, for ever and ever.
9 I shall praise you for ever for what you have done, and shall trust in your name, so full of goodness, in the presence of your faithful.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Psalm 44
1 [For the choirmaster Of the sons of Korah Poem] God, we have heard for ourselves, our ancestors have told us, of the deeds you did in their days, in days of old,
2 by your hand. To establish them in the land you drove out nations, to make room for them you harried peoples.
3 It was not their own sword that won the land, nor their own arms which made them victorious, but your hand it was and your arm, and the light of your presence, for you loved them.
4 You are my king, my God, who decreed Jacob’s victories;
5 through you we conquered our opponents, in your name we trampled down those who rose up against us.
6 For my trust was not in my bow, my victory was not won by my sword;
7 it was you who saved us from our opponents, you who put to shame those who hate us.
8 Our boast was always of God, we praised your name without ceasing.Pause
9 Yet now you have abandoned and humiliated us, you no longer take the field with our armies,
10 you leave us to fall back before the enemy, those who hate us plunder us at will.
11 You hand us over like sheep for slaughter, you scatter us among the nations,
12 you sell your people for a trifle and make no profit on the sale.
13 You make us the butt of our neighbours, the mockery and scorn of those around us,
14 you make us a by-word among nations, other peoples shake their heads over us.
15 All day long I brood on my disgrace, the shame written clear on my face,
16 from the sound of insult and abuse, from the sight of hatred and vengefulness.
17 All this has befallen us though we had not forgotten you, nor been disloyal to your covenant,
18 our hearts never turning away, our feet never straying from your path.
19 Yet you have crushed us in the place where jackals live, and immersed us in shadow dark as death.
20 Had we forgotten the name of our God and stretched out our hands to a foreign god,
21 would not God have found this out, for he knows the secrets of the heart?
22 For your sake we are being massacred all day long, treated as sheep to be slaughtered.
23 Wake, Lord! Why are you asleep? Awake! Do not abandon us for good.
24 Why do you turn your face away, forgetting that we are poor and harrassed?
25 For we are bowed down to the dust, and lie prone on the ground.
26 Arise! Come to our help! Ransom us, as your faithful love demands.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Genesis 14:1-24
1 When Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Chedor-Laomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of the Goiim,
2 made war on Bera king of Sodom, Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar),
3 all the latter joined forces in the Valley of Siddim (now the Salt Sea).
4 For twelve years they had been under the yoke of Chedor-Laomer, but in the thirteenth year they revolted.
5 In the fourteenth year Chedor-Laomer arrived and the kings who had allied themselves with him. They defeated the Rephaim at Ashteroth-Carnaim, the Zuzim at Ham, the Emim in the Plain of Kiriathaim,
6 the Horites in the mountainous district of Seir near El-Paran, which is on the edge of the desert.
7 Wheeling round, they came to the Spring of Judgement (that is, Kadesh); they conquered all the territory of the Amalekites and also the Amorites who lived in Hazazon-Tamar.
8 Then the kings of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim and Bela (that is, Zoar) marched out and engaged them in the Valley of Siddim:
9 Chedor-Laomer king of Elam, Tidal king of the Goiim, Amraphel king of Shinar and Arioch king of Ellasar: four kings against five.
10 Now there were many bitumen wells in the Valley of Siddim, and in their flight the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fell into them, while the rest fled into the hills.
11 The conquerors seized all the possessions of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all their provisions, and made off.
12 They also took Lot (the nephew of Abram) and his possessions and made off; he had been living at Sodom.
13 A survivor came to tell Abram, and Aner the Hebrew, who was living at the Oak of the Amorite Mamre, the brother of Eshcol; these were allies of Abram.
14 When Abram heard that his kinsman had been taken captive, he mustered his retainers born in his own household, numbering three hundred and eighteen, and gave chase as far as Dan.
15 He and his retainers deployed against them under cover of dark, defeated them and pursued them as far as Hobah, north of Damascus.
16 He recaptured all the goods as well as his kinsman Lot and his possessions, together with the women and people.
17 When Abram returned from defeating Chedor-Laomer and the kings who had been on his side, the king of Sodom came to meet him in the Valley of Shaveh (that is, the Valley of the King).
18 Melchizedek king of Salem brought bread and wine; he was a priest of God Most High.
19 He pronounced this blessing: Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth. And blessed be God Most High for putting your enemies into your clutches.
20 And Abram gave him a tenth of everything.
21 The king of Sodom said to Abram, ‘Give me the people and take the possessions for yourself.’
22 But Abram replied to the king of Sodom, ‘I swear by God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth:
23 not one thread, not one sandal strap, will I take of what is yours, for you to be able to say, “I made Abram rich.”
24 For myself, nothing — except what the troops have used up, and the share due to the men who came with me, Eshcol, Aner and Mamre; let them take their share.’(New Jerusalem Bible)
Hebrews 8:1-13
1 The principal point of all that we have said is that we have a high priest of exactly this kind. He has taken his seat at the right of the throne of divine Majesty in the heavens,
2 and he is the minister of the sanctuary and of the true Tent which the Lord, and not any man, set up.
3 Every high priest is constituted to offer gifts and sacrifices, and so this one too must have something to offer.
4 In fact, if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are others who make the offerings laid down by the Law,
5 though these maintain the service only of a model or a reflection of the heavenly realities; just as Moses, when he had the Tent to build, was warned by God who said: See that you work to the design that was shown you on the mountain.
6 As it is, he has been given a ministry as far superior as is the covenant of which he is the mediator, which is founded on better promises.
7 If that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no room for a second one to replace it.
8 And in fact God does find fault with them; he says: Look, the days are coming, the Lord declares, when I will make a new covenant with the House of Israel and the House of Judah,
9 but not a covenant like the one I made with their ancestors, the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of Egypt, which covenant of mine they broke, and I too abandoned them, the Lord declares.
10 No, this is the covenant I will make with the House of Israel, when those days have come, the Lord declares: In their minds I shall plant my laws writing them on their hearts. Then I shall be their God, and they shall be my people.
11 There will be no further need for each to teach his neighbour, and each his brother, saying ‘Learn to know the Lord!’ No, they will all know me, from the least to the greatest,
12 since I shall forgive their guilt and never more call their sins to mind.
13 By speaking of a new covenant, he implies that the first one is old. And anything old and ageing is ready to disappear.(New Jerusalem Bible)
John 4:43-54
43 When the two days were over Jesus left for Galilee.
44 He himself had declared that a prophet is not honoured in his own home town.
45 On his arrival the Galileans received him well, having seen all that he had done at Jerusalem during the festival which they too had attended.
46 He went again to Cana in Galilee, where he had changed the water into wine. And there was a royal official whose son was ill at Capernaum;
47 hearing that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judaea, he went and asked him to come and cure his son, as he was at the point of death.
48 Jesus said to him, ‘Unless you see signs and portents you will not believe!’
49 ‘Sir,’ answered the official, ‘come down before my child dies.’
50 ‘Go home,’ said Jesus, ‘your son will live.’ The man believed what Jesus had said and went on his way home;
51 and while he was still on the way his servants met him with the news that his boy was alive.
52 He asked them when the boy had begun to recover. They replied, ‘The fever left him yesterday at the seventh hour.’
53 The father realised that this was exactly the time when Jesus had said, ‘Your son will live’; and he and all his household believed.
54 This new sign, the second, Jesus performed on his return from Judaea to Galilee.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Phillips Brooks:
Psalm 33:1-5,20-21
1 Shout for joy, you upright; praise comes well from the honest.
2 Give thanks to Yahweh on the lyre, play for him on the ten-stringed lyre.
3 Sing to him a new song, make sweet music for your cry of victory.
4 The word of Yahweh is straightforward, all he does springs from his constancy.
5 He loves uprightness and justice; the faithful love of Yahweh fills the earth.
20 We are waiting for Yahweh; he is our help and our shield,
21 for in him our heart rejoices, in his holy name we trust.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Jonah 3:1-10
1 The word of Yahweh was addressed to Jonah a second time.
2 ‘Up!’ he said, ‘Go to Nineveh, the great city, and preach to it as I shall tell you.’
3 Jonah set out and went to Nineveh in obedience to the word of Yahweh. Now Nineveh was a city great beyond compare; to cross it took three days.
4 Jonah began by going a day’s journey into the city and then proclaimed, ‘Only forty days more and Nineveh will be overthrown.’
5 And the people of Nineveh believed in God; they proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least.
6 When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, took off his robe, put on sackcloth and sat down in ashes.
7 He then had it proclaimed throughout Nineveh, by decree of the king and his nobles, as follows: ‘No person or animal, herd or flock, may eat anything; they may not graze, they may not drink any water.
8 All must put on sackcloth and call on God with all their might; and let everyone renounce his evil ways and violent behaviour.
9 Who knows? Perhaps God will change his mind and relent and renounce his burning wrath, so that we shall not perish.’
10 God saw their efforts to renounce their evil ways. And God relented about the disaster which he had threatened to bring on them, and did not bring it.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Ephesians 3:14-21
14 This, then, is what I pray, kneeling before the Father,
15 from whom every fatherhood, in heaven or on earth, takes its name.
16 In the abundance of his glory may he, through his Spirit, enable you to grow firm in power with regard to your inner self,
17 so that Christ may live in your hearts through faith, and then, planted in love and built on love,
18 with all God’s holy people you will have the strength to grasp the breadth and the length, the height and the depth;
19 so that, knowing the love of Christ, which is beyond knowledge, you may be filled with the utter fullness of God.
20 Glory be to him whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine;
21 glory be to him from generation to generation in the Church and in Christ Jesus for ever and ever. Amen.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Matthew 24:24-27
24 for false Christs and false prophets will arise and provide great signs and portents, enough to deceive even the elect, if that were possible.
25 Look! I have given you warning.
26 ‘If, then, they say to you, “Look, he is in the desert,” do not go there; “Look, he is in some hiding place,” do not believe it;
27 because the coming of the Son of man will be like lightning striking in the east and flashing far into the west.(New Jerusalem Bible)
2 Samuel 5:1-7,10
1 All the tribes of Israel then came to David at Hebron and said, ‘Look, we are your own flesh and bone.
2 In days past when Saul was our king, it was you who led Israel on its campaigns, and to you it was that Yahweh promised, “You are to shepherd my people Israel and be leader of Israel.” ‘
3 So all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron, and King David made a pact with them in Yahweh’s presence at Hebron, and they anointed David as king of Israel.
4 David was thirty years old when he became king, and he reigned for forty years.
5 In Hebron he reigned over Judah for seven years and six months; then he reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel and Judah for thirty-three years.
6 The king and his men then marched on Jerusalem, on the Jebusites living in the territory. These said to David, ‘You will not get in here. The blind and the lame will hold you off.’ (That is to say: David will never get in here.)
7 But David captured the citadel of Zion, that is, the City of Davi
10 David grew stronger and stronger, and Yahweh, God of Sabaoth, was with him.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Psalm 89:19-28
19 Once you spoke in a vision, to your faithful you said: ‘I have given strength to a warrior, I have raised up a man chosen from my people.
20 ‘I have found David my servant, and anointed him with my holy oil.
21 My hand will always be with him, my arm will make him strong.
22 ‘No enemy will be able to outwit him, no wicked man overcome him;
23 I shall crush his enemies before him, strike his opponents dead.
24 ‘My constancy and faithful love will be with him, in my name his strength will be triumphant.
25 I shall establish his power over the sea, his dominion over the rivers.
26 ‘He will cry to me, “You are my father, my God, the rock of my salvation!”
27 So I shall make him my first-born, the highest of earthly kings.
28 ‘I shall maintain my faithful love for him always, my covenant with him will stay firm.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Mark 3:19b-30
19 and Judas Iscariot, the man who was to betray him.
20 He went home again, and once more such a crowd collected that they could not even have a meal.
21 When his relations heard of this, they set out to take charge of him; they said, ‘He is out of his mind.’
22 The scribes who had come down from Jerusalem were saying, ‘Beelzebul is in him,’ and, ‘It is through the prince of devils that he drives devils out.’
23 So he called them to him and spoke to them in parables,
24 ‘How can Satan drive out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot last.
25 And if a household is divided against itself, that household can never last.
26 Now if Satan has rebelled against himself and is divided, he cannot last either — it is the end of him.
27 But no one can make his way into a strong man’s house and plunder his property unless he has first tied up the strong man. Only then can he plunder his house.
28 ‘In truth I tell you, all human sins will be forgiven, and all the blasphemies ever uttered;
29 but anyone who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, but is guilty of an eternal sin.’
30 This was because they were saying, ‘There is an unclean spirit in him.’(New Jerusalem Bible)

Monday, 23 January 2012
Monday of the Third week in Ordinary Time
Saint(s) of the day:St John the Almoner, Patriarch of Alexandria (+ c. 620)
Commentary of the day:
Isaac of Stella (?-c.1171), Cistercian monk
Sermon 39, 2-6; SC 207
«Envy: a blasphemy against the Holy Spirit»
«It is by Beelzebul, the prince of devils, that he casts out devils»… It is the characteristic of evildoers, stirred by envy, to shut their eyes as much as they can to other people’s merits and when, overcome by the evidence, they cannot do so any longer, to depreciate or undervalue it. Thus, when the crowd rejoiced in devotion and marvelled at the sight of Christ’s works, the scribes and Pharisees either closed their eyes to what they knew to be true, or brought down what is great, or undervalued what is good. Once, for example, feigning ignorance, they said to him who had worked so many wonderful signs: «What sign can you do that we may believe in you?» (Jn 6,30). In this case, unable to blatantly deny the facts, they wickedly depreciate them…, and they devalue them by saying: «It is by Beelzebul, the prince of devils, that he casts out devils».
Now this, dear brethren, is the blasphemy against the Spirit that binds all those he has seized with the bonds of an eternal sin. This is not to say that it would be impossible for the repentant to gain forgiveness for it all if he «produces fruit as evidence of his repentance» (Lk 3,8). The only thing is that, crushed beneath such a weight of malice, he lacks the strength to reach out to that honorable repentance that isworthy of forgiveness… He who, perceiving the proofs of grace and the Holy Spirit’s working in his brother…, is not afraid to undermine and calumniate and brashly ascribe to the evil spirit what he clearly knows to be of the Holy Spirit: such a one has been so forsaken by this Spirit of grace that he no longer desires the repentance that would obtain his pardon. He is completely in the dark, blinded by his own malice. Indeed, what could be more serious than to dare, out of envy for the brother one had been commanded to love as oneself (Mt 19,19), to blaspheme God’s goodness… and insult his majesty by wanting to discredit a man?

1st Thought for Today:
My Utmost for His HIghest
Reading for Monday 23rd January 2012
TRANSFORMED BY INSIGHT by Oswald Chambers
We all, with open face, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image.(2 Corinthians 3:18)
The outstanding characteristic of a Christian is this unveiled frankness before God so that the life becomes a mirror for other lives. By being filled with the Spirit we are transformed, and by beholding we become mirrors. You always know when a man has been beholding the glory of the Lord, you feel in your inner spirit that he is the mirror of the Lord’s own character. Beware of anything which would sully that mirror in you; it is nearly always a good thing, the good that is not the best.
The golden rule for your life and mine is this concentrated keeping of the life open towards God. Let everything else – work, clothes, food, everything on earth – go by the board, saving that one thing. The rush of other things always tends to obscure this concentration on God. We have to maintain ourselves in the place of beholding, keeping the life absolutely spiritual all through. Let other things come and go as they may, let other people criticize as they will, but never allow anything to obscure the life that is hid with Christ in God. Never be hurried out of the relationship of abiding in Him. It is the one thing that is apt to fluctuate but it ought not to. The severest discipline of a Christian’s life is to learn how to keep “beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord.”

Reflecting God-Cleaner Than Clean
Monday, January 23, 2012
Scripture-Psalm 51:1-9
1 [For the choirmaster Of David When the prophet Nathan had come to him because he had gone to Bathsheba] Have mercy on me, O God, in your faithful love, in your great tenderness wipe away my offences;
2 wash me clean from my guilt, purify me from my sin.
3 For I am well aware of my offences, my sin is constantly in mind.
4 Against you, you alone, I have sinned, I have done what you see to be wrong, that you may show your saving justice when you pass sentence, and your victory may appear when you give judgement,
5 remember, I was born guilty, a sinner from the moment of conception.
6 But you delight in sincerity of heart, and in secret you teach me wisdom.
7 Purify me with hyssop till I am clean, wash me till I am whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear the sound of joy and gladness, and the bones you have crushed will dance.
9 Turn away your face from my sins, and wipe away all my guilt.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Cleaner Than Clean by Gerald Crispin
Have you ever seen something cleaned so thoroughly that it shines like fresh snow in the sun? That was what David desired after being confronted by the Prophet Nathan, the light of God’s truth had revealed the ugly stain of his sin. He felt dirty. Not only had he committed adultery with Bathsheba, but as king he had put her husband in a position to be killed.
In Psalm 51, David calls out to God after being confronted and corrected. David has a deep desire to be cleansed of his sins; he knows all the baths in the entire world won’t wash his sin away. He begins the psalm by asking God for mercy and then acknowledges what he has done. He expresses in vivid detail just how much he wants to be cleansed; by asking to be made whiter than anything else he has seen on earth–snow. I’ve lived in Colorado and I can affirm that there is nothing whiter!
When we mess up (and we will mess up), let us take a lesson from David. Let’s fall on God’s mercy, ask to be forgiven, and seek to be cleansed and made cleaner than clean! Whiter than snow!
Hymn for Today:
“Cleanse Me” by J. Edgar Orr
1. Search me, O God, and know my heart today;
Try me, O Savior, know my thoughts, I pray:
See if there be some wicked way in me:
Cleanse me from ev’ry sin, and set me free.
2. I Praise Thee Lord. for cleansing me from sin:
Fulfill Thy Word, and make me pure within;
Fill me with fire, where once I burned with shame:
Grant my desire to magnify Thy name.
3. Lord, take my life, and make it wholly Thine:
Fill my poor heart with Thy great love divine;
Take all my will, my passion, self and pride;
I now surrender: Lord in me abide.
4. O Holy Ghost, revival comes from Thee:
Send a revival start the work in me:
Thy Word declares Thou wilt supply our need:
For blessing now, O Lord, I humbly plead.
2nd Thought for Today:
“Only repentance clears the way for Messiah’s entrance into our lives. There is no other way to prepare to meet God”(Gay Leonard and Debbie Goodwin)
Prayer Needs:
Many people in Switzerland will come to know Christ and receive the fullness of the Holy Spirit.

Alban Weekly for Monday, January 23, 2012
Gone Fishing by Beverly A. Thompson , George B. Thompson, Jr.
Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to them, “Children, you have no fish, have you?” They answered him, “No.” He said to them, “Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish.(John 21:4–6)
We should not be surprised.
In the midst of grief and anxiety, not to mention a life-changing transition, the disciples headed back to a place that felt normal, natural, familiar, and safe. Little did they know what was in store for them. When all else failed, these guys knew how to fish. They had fished for a living for years. Then one day, this Jesus had called them to follow him, and they dropped their nets and left behind the life they had known.
For hours, these dejected former members of a religious movement gone bad—and then strangely good again—cast their nets to no avail. There were no fish to be caught, just more frustration—until, unexpectedly, a familiar voice urged them to fish from the boat’s other side. They listened to that voice and did just what was asked of them. Then, before they knew it, they had caught loads of fish. Their nets filled to the brim, they joined the One whose voice they had trusted, Jesus. Gathered around that small fire on the beach, they shared a meal with him—a meal they would never forget. Once again, nothing was as they thought: It was deeper, richer, and life-changing.
All too often, congregations that find themselves in the in-between time of a transition do exactly what the disciples did: They go back to whatever they were doing before the crisis presented itself. This strategy worked out well for the disciples in this story—but only because Jesus was there waiting for them, offering them one more chance to understand who he was and the new thing he was calling them to do.
Just like the people in our congregations today, the disciples were part of a faith community that existed within a larger culture. As experienced fishermen, they knew how to function in the fishing-based culture that existed around the Sea of Galilee. They knew what to do, how to do it, and what kinds of techniques might catch different fish. But after leaving their nets behind to follow Jesus, they had become part of the unique community of disciples that arose around their Savior. Being with him had affected their particular culture, but now they found themselves living in between.
This thing we call “culture” is the thread, the deep stream, that connects persons within any group, organization, or community. For this purpose, we will focus on the culture created within communities of faith. Every congregation has its own unique culture. It consists of your congregation’s own particular set of behaviors, values, and norms, and it emerges as a group of people work together toward a common purpose over a period of time.
Especially in times of transition, looking at your church through a cultural lens will help you get a grasp on what is really going on within you. You will gain a greater understanding of your congregation as the complex, culture-creating, and culture-bearing groups that it is. From there, you can begin to figure out what decisions and actions will serve your purposes more effectively.
Look around the lake, pond, river, or seaside where you like to fish. What do you see there? Now consider what you see on the “shoreline” of your church as you arrive on any given Sunday. Try to imagine how you would view it as a first-time visitor. What do you see as you wade into the waters of your church? In short, what makes your church different from or the same as other churches around you?
All the little details, along with everything else that could be seen or observed, make up the first level of your church’s culture. It is the level called “artifacts.” This level contains the most obvious and observable details of a culture. However, just because this level of culture is easy to see doesn’t mean it’s always clearly understood. Appearances can be misleading. Artifacts might look the same from one church to the next, but you will soon discover they do not always mean what you might think.
Peering a little more deeply into the water, you will begin to notice some other things beneath the surface. This second level of culture is called “espoused values,” because it is here where we find statements that express the church’s ideals. These statements, which can be spoken or written, offer the church’s explanation for the artifacts we see on the church’s cultural shore. Espoused values are formal positive expressions of a congregation’s beliefs about who they are and what is important.
Espoused values simply tell us what sounds positive—which, in itself, is not bad. Espoused values are like the reflection we can see in the water itself. The image we glimpse there can be helpful in understanding a congregation. But be careful! What you see and hear in a church’s espoused values never provides a complete or fully accurate picture of that congregation or its culture. To get the full picture, we need to look even more closely.
Congregations typically do not pay attention to the whole story of who they are. However, as you learn to take notice of the culture of your church, you will be more prepared for (and less surprised and confounded by) the things that float up on your shore.
You can begin your fishing expedition by asking a few church members a couple of questions about why they prefer this church to other churches. The answers you hear will be espoused values. The words are true to some extent. But the responses to such direct questions tend to represent what the folks you ask want to believe about themselves and their church. Usually, the answers you get are more about sounding good than helping you understand more deeply what is going on. It is not that folks don’t want to tell you the truth; it is much more that what you can discover in the deepest level is not directly on the church’s radar.
Pastors often don’t realize that churches can run into trouble when they pay attention only to espoused values and artifacts. More often than not, what you see is not what you get. Churches say they want pastors to do a certain thing, to take on some pet church project. All too often, the pastor discovers that when she or he does just that, the church’s apple-cart is toppled and chaos begins to take over.
You can learn to anticipate this kind of potential pitfall. Once you begin the process of discovering more about your culture, you learn to appreciate its richness. There is more to what you see on the shore, or even hear spoken aloud, than meets the eye.
As your fishing line begins to drop deeper into the waters, you may sometimes seem to get caught on something. Those things that seem to anchor the pond, lake, or ocean are the “submerged beliefs.” This is the third level of church culture, the place where your congregation’s energy rests. Even though its particular elements have been “down there” for a while, this third level is rarely noticed or acknowledged, so its various elements are seldom, if ever, spoken aloud. Yet, in order for the fish to thrive in this body of water, their life must be supported and nourished by what is deep below the surface.
It is still not common for most people to think about the lives of our faith communities in terms of culture—especially as we dig below the level of things that are observable (artifacts) and desirable (espoused values). Yet benign ignorance will not help your church during its in-between times! There is more energy within your congregation than you realize. Learning how to understand the complex character of this energy is one crucial way to help your church in the long run.
The story of Jesus helping his old friends catch fish offers a charming yet telling image of congregations in transition. When things get difficult, we may be tempted, just as the disciples were, to revert back to what we used to do. It is all too easy to be misled by what appears to be floating on the surface. Artifacts and espoused values never tell the whole story. Your church needs to find a way to “cast its net” to another side of the boat.
If you want to understand your church’s particular culture, you will learn to engage this process of cultural “fishing.” You will want to gather a small, dedicated group of members who are committed to this honest discovery. This group should include longtime members who are “key culture bearers,”as well as some newer, active members too. This fishing expedition takes commitment, hope, and “a sense of urgency.”
The question with which you will want to live is simple: “What will happen to our church if we keep on doing what we have done over and over again?” The time you spend together in this discovery process will affect the road taken during your journey of transition.
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Adapted from Grace for the Journey: Practices and Possibilities for In-Between Times by Beverly A. Thompson and George B. Thompson, Jr., copyright © 2011 by the Alban Institute. All rights reserved.
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The Upper Room Daily Devotional
Monday, January 23, 2012
The Painful Truth
Suggested Bible Reading:
Read James 1:18-25
18 By his own choice he gave birth to us by the message of the truth so that we should be a sort of first-fruits of all his creation.
19 Remember this, my dear brothers: everyone should be quick to listen but slow to speak and slow to human anger;
20 God’s saving justice is never served by human anger;
21 so do away with all impurities and remnants of evil. Humbly welcome the Word which has been planted in you and can save your souls.
22 But you must do what the Word tells you and not just listen to it and deceive yourselves.
23 Anyone who listens to the Word and takes no action is like someone who looks at his own features in a mirror and,
24 once he has seen what he looks like, goes off and immediately forgets it.
25 But anyone who looks steadily at the perfect law of freedom and keeps to it — not listening and forgetting, but putting it into practice — will be blessed in every undertaking.(New Jerusalem Bible)
Today’s Scripture:
If any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror . . . and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like.(James 1:23-24 (NRSV))
Today’s Devotional
When my dad was a young man, someone said to him, “You know, you never give a compliment or say anything good about others.” These words devastated him, but their truth also changed him. He became an affirming, caring, and expressive man because he was able to listen and willing to change.
Generally, we do not like people who tell us the hard truth about ourselves. Today Abraham Lincoln may be revered as one of our greatest U.S. presidents, but during his lifetime his speaking painful truths got him vilified and hated by many. Martin Luther King, Jr. told the hard truth about racism and segregation, and some people hated him for it. Nelson Mandela was thrown into prison for his prophetic stance on apartheid. If Isaiah or Jeremiah or Amos were living today and said what he did back then, we probably wouldn’t admire him as we do now. This is the nature of painful truth; it looks better in retrospect.
After centuries or even decades, it’s easier to fool ourselves into thinking that a message wasn’t intended for us than to act on it. But if we listen to God’s words today and apply them to ourselves, God will help us to change. by Dan G. Johnson (Florida, USA)
3rd Thought for the Day: Join — or start — a Christian accountability group. See www.upperroom.org.
Prayer: Dear God, help us to listen closely to your words in the Bible — and to change. Amen.
Prayer Focus: Friends who tell me the truth
The scripture quotation, unless otherwise indicated, is from the NEW REVISED STANDARD VERSION of the Bible, copyright © 1989, by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Copyright ©2012 by The Upper Room, a ministry of GBOD. All rights reserved. Do not reproduce or redistribute without written permission from the publisher.

Daily Meditation: Wisdom — January 23, 2012
Center for Action and Contemplation
WISDOM
“Wisdom is a spirit, a friend to all.”(Wisdom 1:6)
It is usually over time and with patience that we come to see the wonderful patterns of grace, which is why it takes most of us a long time to be converted. Our focus slowly moves from an initial preoccupation with perfect actions (“first half of life” issues), to naked presence itself. The code word for that is simply “prayer,” but it became cheapened by misuse.
Jesus will often call prayer “vigilance,” “seeing,” or “being awake.” When you are aware and awakened, you will know for yourself all that you need to know. In fact, “Stay awake” is the last thing Jesus says to the apostles—three or perhaps four times—before he is taken away to be killed (Matthew 26:38-45). Finally, continuing to find them asleep, he kindly but sadly says, “Sleep now and take your rest,” which might have been his resigned forgiving statement to the church itself.
It is not that we do not want to be awake; but very few teachers have actually told us how to do that in a very practical way. We call it the teaching of “contemplation.” Adapted from Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality, p. 16
Starter Prayer:
Grant me wisdom. by Father Richard Rohr

4th Thought for Today:
Monday January 23, 2012
Community, a Quality of the Heart
The word community has many connotations, some positive, some negative. Community can make us think of a safe togetherness, shared meals, common goals, and joyful celebrations. It also can call forth images of sectarian exclusivity, in-group language, self-satisfied isolation, and romantic naiveté. However, community is first of all a quality of the heart. It grows from the spiritual knowledge that we are alive not for ourselves but for one another. Community is the fruit of our capacity to make the interests of others more important than our own (see Philippians 2:4). The question, therefore, is not “How can we make community?” but “How can we develop and nurture giving hearts?” by Henri J. M. Nouwen

5th Thought for Today:
Monday 23 January 2012
Entering a New Age
We are entering in a totally new age where either we’re going to move into universalism and a quest for greater love–love that needs to discover one’s culture, to discover one’s language, to be proud of culture, to love one’s culture but to be open to other people’s culture, and this has to do with welcoming difference. by Jean Vanier
Belonging: The Search for Acceptance
Windborne Production Video

1.23.12 – “…but they weren’t embarrassed” from The Church of the Resurrection-United Methodist in Leawood, Kansas, United States
Daily Scripture: Genesis 2:18 “Yahweh God said, ‘It is not right that the man should be alone. I shall make him a helper.’
19 So from the soil Yahweh God fashioned all the wild animals and all the birds of heaven. These he brought to the man to see what he would call them; each one was to bear the name the man would give it.
20 The man gave names to all the cattle, all the birds of heaven and all the wild animals. But no helper suitable for the man was found for him.
21 Then, Yahweh God made the man fall into a deep sleep. And, while he was asleep, he took one of his ribs and closed the flesh up again forthwith.
22 Yahweh God fashioned the rib he had taken from the man into a woman, and brought her to the man.
23 And the man said: This one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh! She is to be called Woman, because she was taken from Man.
24 This is why a man leaves his father and mother and becomes attached to his wife, and they become one flesh.
25 Now, both of them were naked, the man and his wife, but they felt no shame before each other.”(New Jerusalem Bible)
Reflection Questions:
“The two of them were naked, the man and his wife, but they weren’t embarrassed,” Genesis said of human innocence. In Genesis 3, that changed at once when Adam and Eve abandoned God’s way. Distrustful and alienated, they covered themselves, and hid from God (Gen. 3:7-10). God’s original intent for our sexuality, said Genesis, was the delight and bonding of chapter 2.
In 1706, Matthew Henry wrote that Eve was “Not made out of his [Adam's] head to top him, not out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved.” What does this archetypal story tell you about the intended quality of romantic relationships?
In Genesis 1, we read that all that God made was “very good.” Then, startlingly, we find that “It’s NOT GOOD that the human is alone.” What timeless principles do you see in this story that apply to married or single, male or female? How did the man’s joy as he met his partner speak to what God wanted sexual attraction to do for relationships?
Weekly Prayer:
Lord God, “a man embraces his wife, and they become one flesh”? Wow—Genesis said the first human couple were really strongly attracted to each other! Sometimes I have that sense, too, but so many things (grief, illness, betrayal, unresolved childhood hurts, even just human brokenness in one or both partners) can go wrong. This week, teach me about the joy, bonding and sharing of life that “good sex,” sex as you intend it to be, can bring to our lives. Amen.
Monday 1.23.12 Insight from Rev. Andrew Conard
Rev. Andrew Conard is a Christian, husband, father, son, brother, friend, United Methodist and also Associate Pastor at The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection West.
The story of the creation of the man and his wife is beautiful. I appreciated the quote from the GPS today that made the connection between the story of creation and some of the key qualities of romantic relationships – equality, protection and love. These are important qualities of committed relationships and are an inherent part of who we were created to be as humans. We are created to be in relationship with one another and God. This is one of the timeless principles that I see in this passage. Despite being originally created for healthy relationship, there are times when we mess up and break these connections. The good news is that whether it is with God or with one another we have the opportunity to recognize that we have done wrong and to be forgiven. I am grateful for this truth.
Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, TODAY’S NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 2001, 2005 by International Bible Society®. Used by permission of International Bible Society®. All rights reserved worldwide.