Posts Tagged ‘intimacy’
Real Talk – Br. Lain Wilson
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“How’re you doing?”
How do you usually answer this question? “I’m fine,” perhaps, or “I’m okay.” In our daily interactions we get asked seemingly polite questions like this over and over, and we are conditioned to respond politely.
They don’t want to know your whole life story.
Unless they do. But we can’t know their intention—unless they persist, unless they make known their intention.
“How’re you doing?” “No, really, how’re you doing?”
How do you feel knowing that someone else truly cares to know something true about you?
“Peter felt hurt because [Jesus] said to him the third time, ‘Do you love me?’” (Jn 21:17).
The passage is clear here that Jesus’s repeated asking is the cause of Peter’s hurt. But I think there’s something else going on beneath the surface. It’s not just that Peter is hurt because he is being doubted, but rather that there may be some basis for this doubt.
I think Peter’s hurt at the questioning reveals something true about him: that he has been hurting, that he has been grieving, grieving this whole time—grieving his failure, his cowardice in denying Jesus. Perhaps, that he has been questioning his own love of Jesus—or, rather, his own worthiness for that love. Read More
He Calls Us Each by Name – Br. Lain Wilson
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John 10:11-18
Acts 4:5-12
1 John 3:16-24
Psalm 23
I’ve been thinking this week a lot about a guy named Paul.
Probably not the one you’re thinking of.
He lived about fifteen hundred years ago, somewhere in the eastern Mediterranean.
We know that this Paul, this specific Paul, lived. And we know absolutely nothing else about him.
But we can even know this much because his name appears on a small lead seal, about the size of a quarter.[1] I worked for over a decade with seals like Paul’s.[2] Although they literally sealed, secured correspondence, they also served like an email signature, including information like titles, jobs, devotions, city of origin. Whatever a sender thought was important to signal about themselves, to make themselves known. Or they just included their names, like “Paul.” And that’s it.
Much of my work, effectively, was doing my best to distinguish one Paul from another.
But this work was so rewarding, because that object, and the name that went along with it, are often the only evidence we have that this person lived, the barest glimpse into a life that may have been as rich, in its own way, as our own. Read More
And the Twelve Told Him All – Br. James Koester
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1 John 4:7 – 12
Psalm 72: 1 – 8
Mark 6: 30 – 44
Those of you who have heard me preach before know that when reading Scripture, my attention is often caught, not by the soaring passages, or the amazing miracles, but the details that often creep in around the edge. Yes, the majesty of the Prologue of John, or the poignancy of the Foot Washing at the Last Supper, or the beauty of the Psalms are not to be missed. However, there is more to Scripture than majesty, poignancy and beauty. There is also the ordinary routine of daily living. It is there, in the ordinary routine of daily living, that God can be found as well. And that is why I am drawn, not to the miracle of the loaves and the fish, but to what comes before.
Chapter Six in the Gospel according to Mark is one of those breathless sections of Mark. A lot happens, and I mean a lot. It begins with Jesus’ rejection by his hometown and carries on to the sending out of the Twelve on their mission, the dance of Herodias and the death of John the Baptist, the return of the Twelve from their mission, the Feeding of the Five Thousand, the calming of the sea, and there arrival at Gennesaret. As I mentioned, in 56 breathless verses, Mark crams in an awful lot of action, so much so, that if it were read all at once, our heads would be spinning!
As you may know, this kind of concentrated action is typical of Mark’s Gospel. It reminds me of an excited child coming home from a great adventure trying to condense a whole day’s activity into a few sentences: and then we did this! Then we did that! Then this other thing happened! Then, guess what happened???!!! Read More
Heaven Opened – Br. Luke Ditewig
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St. Michael & All Angels
Genesis 28:10-17
Revelation 12:7-12
John 1:47-51
Today we remember angels, mysteriously other. These outside, beyond, heavenly beings worship before God’s throne, fight evil, and come bearing messages.
When he was afraid, Jacob received a dream. Jacob saw angels ascending and descending on a ladder connecting heaven and earth and heard God speaking to him. God who had seemed beyond and absent broke through to be present in voice and with the sight of angels.
Jacob woke from his dream and said: “Surely the Lord is in this place. … How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is gate of heaven.” So Jacob made a pillar, poured oil on it and called the place Bethel, the house of God. Read More