God alone

How can I write this, I who crave acceptance among my peers!  And not just acceptance, but honor and adulation; I hate to even write it down because I know how lacking I am in every respect!  Not too bad at writing, but lacking in grammatical structure, spelling (thank you spell check)  and a wee bit melodramatic!  Thoughts that flit through while writing or in conversation, will misdirect my thesis often take my writing (or conversations hostage) and create confusion and lack of confidence.  My charity is weak, half-hearted and easily diverted to more selfish works.  I am not ugly, but, well, I am 42 and not blond!  I am mediocre in every sense, yet I crave recognition for being smart, talented, and beautiful inside and out. I fear recognition as much as I crave it because I do not want anyone to know just how mediocre I am. And know I will expose myself as the lazy, inconsiderate, and self obsessed person that I truly am.

I wonder how many feel this way?  How many of us are caught up in the vicious cycle of wanting to be known, but fearing exposure?  I find myself asking God how anything I do can be of any use since all thing pass through this confused and self centered mind of mine.  All my actions are over analysed, and condemned as selfish.  As far back as I remember a accusatory voice has whispered or sometimes shouted "who do you think you are?"  And this voice intrudes in all that I do, whether it is altruistic or more ambitious; and it stops me in my tracks.  I have kept a journal  for a few years off and on, but I always find it difficult to write about myself, or to write my prayers to God.  If I re read them I feel absolute shame at how pathetic I am, how desperate I am to be somebody that all who know admire.  "Who do you think you are" after all, you are too afraid to do anything of worth because of course you know how inadequate you really are, how mediocre you are.  But I so desire to be great, to do great things to be a part of a great story.

Last Sunday I published a short scripture reflection on a unknown blog that has no readers except me, but it was public so I felt exposed and naked as I hit the word publish.  I also felt energized and inspired, but the "who do you think you" are voice kept intruding! You think that you are worthy to comment on Scripture?  No.  You think that you can actually bring a reflection to completion and coherence? No.  But I want to know Jesus.  I want Him to know me.  My reflection, whether or not it made sense, described how all my misdirected desire of the past, all of my pent up and wasted passion was for Jesus.  And the gospel of last Sunday told me that He Himself will satisfy my heart's desire and He will not send me away to find satisfaction elsewhere, but in Him all desire is satisfied.  And how many more times I will have to go back to Him and eschew the accomplishments of this world, seemingly hiding in fear of failure, but more and more relying on God Alone, to know me and to direct me in Truth.  God never say's "who do you think you are", though I sometimes have to push through that thought to get past it, keeping my heart, mind and soul focused on Jeses.  That is not easy for someone as easily distracted as myself. 

So today, in reading Romans 2, I have gravitated to versus 16 ":.... God will judge people's hidden works through Christ Jesus" and 29: "......his praise is not from human beings but from God."   And He will give me my true identity and He will judge me with truth and in Him I can put my pull trust for in my weakness and insecurity He will draw forth humanity and beauty.

In all things Praise be to God!

Prayer Reflections on Romans 1: 18-32

Romans 1:18-20

"The wrath of God is indeed being revealed from heaven against every impiety and wickedness of those who suppress the truth by their wickedness.  For what can be known about God is evident to them.  Ever since the creation of the world his invisible attributes of eternal power and divinity have been able to be understood and perceived in what he has made"

There are passages in scripture that always cause my heart to tremble a bit, and I can feel a surge of passion welling up in my soul.  This is one of them, and as I read it, I remember some of the times that I have seen the power and majesty, beauty and mystery of creation.  I am not a world traveler, my travels have been confined to the United States and Canada; but the majesty of creation never fails to stir my heart.  The fearsome power of nature leaves me, as a humble observer, with the knowledge of my frail humanity and provokes terror at how truly insecure I am in this world.  How easily I could be snuffed out by cold, hunger or any number of calamities that could befall a city girl out in the wilds of nature.  Perceptions of divinity and eternity are there to be sure, but how easily I am reduced to insecurity, instead of humility and how susceptible I am to allow the surge of passion in my heart to be the subject of servile fear instead of pious Fear of the Lord.

There is power in this world that I can perceive; I can stand next to waters surging against stone with such force the I can feel the cool, misty breeze stirred up by it.  I have looked out a car window as we have driven through the vast and seemingly endless Great Plains and I have been at once overwhelmed by it's immensity and thrilled by it! The mountains never fail to impress me with their majesty, and their unyielding might. I am frail ,and in these moments the illusion of security that I normally enjoy in the comfort of my modern lifestyle crumbles, even as my heart surges with passion. What if I ignore the passion that surges forth from my heart towards the power that I am overwhelmed by; or worse, I subject it to finite things or fear? I have done this often in the fears of lesser things, such as the fear of being rejected and ignored.

I have so many times let fear distract me from the True God; the fearsome power and majesty of nature, it's fickleness and cruelty create insecurity that as human beings we long to escape.  The banality of our modern existence often floods us with fears of the ultimate futility of all things around us. To reach out and, by some supplication or incantation or even by some possession of beauty or position of prestige, render the outcome that  will insure our prosperity or even just our survival is grasped at, and the passion that is so powerful in the human heart, which wells up in us for the glory of God, so as to make us ready to have Him enter our hearts, is so easily diverted to things of this world that we long to have some control over.  The fear that we then allow to direct our passion directs it in superficiality and vanity. And now my passion is muted and dulled, pointless unless it provides some tangible pleasure. Does this sound unfamiliar?  Are there not distraction in my life that divert my strength and energy toward things that cannot fulfill my hearts passion and desire? Toward things that ultimately drain our passion and replace it with slavery, and we so willingly make the exchange!

But St. Paul's verse is a warning that we must not allow those fears to prevail, for the very things that stir up feelings that should provoke our intellect to ponder and search for God, have a tendency to become the object of our passion and our fear becomes servile, our passions become degraded, and it is because we have not used our passion to energize our intellect to fully discern that God  is the Creator of the power of nature.  God is the Father of me; of all of us, even those of us who remain invisible and unseen by the finite power of this world.  St.Paul warns us that the wrath we experience is not just some where far out in the future, but here and now in the perversion of our intellect and the degradation of our morality and dignity.

Romans 1:21-24,28-32

For although they knew God they did not accord him glory as God or give him thanks.  Instead, they became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless minds were darkened.  While claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for the likeness of an image for the likeness of an image of mortal man, or of birds or of four legged animals or of snakes. Therefore, God handed them over to impurity through the lusts of their hearts for the mutual degradation of their bodies.....And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God handed them over to their undiscerning mind to do what is improper.  They are filled with every form of wickedness, evil, greed, and malice; full of envy, murder, rivalry, treachery, and spite.  They are gossips, and scandlemongers and they hate God.  They are insolent, haughty,boastful, ingenious in their wickedness and rebellious toward their parents.  They are senseless, faithless, ruthless.  Although they know the just decree of God that all who practice such things deserve death, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.

The consequence (wrath) of our actions are terrifying!

Corpus Christi Procession 2009 2 at OneTrueMedia.com

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Wrath of God

When it is cold, shall we ponder the wrath of God? Am I strong enough in virtue and holiness to endure the awesome, incomprehensible presence of God?

NOT sitting in Santa's lap!!!

What to do when you dress up the kids for that special picture with Santa and they categorically REFUSE to even go near him!!!!("Never like it! Never never ever!!!!") Well, after walking all around the mall and finally viewing Santa from a safe and non-threatening distance (from one level above), showing them all the children that are telling Santa what they want for Christmas and how safe and fun it was, we tried again. Knowing that e-mail was also an effective means of communicating with Santa, Luke was not convinced that this Santa's lap thing was necessary. Sophia was not going without Luke and since I have enough pictures of screaming, unhappy and terrified children in the laps of various seasonal characters (and Gepetto from Disney World) we whipped out the cell phone and snapped pictures of them near, but not too near Santa with all the pretty decorations in the background! It is already a favorite, because of the story it tells!

Modesty Matters

Modesty and mystery, I could not say it any better! Click on the title and see what I mean!

Know That They Are Not Gods

In our study of Baruch and Zachariah question 4 of our assignment asks what the most frequent refrain was in chapter 6 and then write a  reflection on what this means for us today.  There were many interesting answers, mine was a comparison between the two extremes of scientific worship.

 4.   The most frequent refrain in chapter 6 is “Know that they are not God’s, do not fear them.” This phrase appears in:  versus 4, 14, 22, 28, 64, 68

  I think that this could be applied to our cultures wrestling with matters of science.  There is an atheistic scientific mindset which is in awe (fear) of science itself. This mindset tells us that science has the keys to happiness and fulfillment especially if we can disposes ourselves of the pesky notion that we are made in the image and likeness of God.  C.S. Lewis referred to this as the abolition of man, referring to a scientific atheism that seeks to destroy what makes human beings human!  How else do you get a culture to accept the premise that a human embryo is a disposable body part factory to be exploited with out regard to inalienable rights! B. F. Skinner made a really chilling claim  in support of this type of “progress”:  ”to… man we say good riddance!  Only by dispossessing him can we turn to the real causes of human behavior.  Only then can we turn from the inferred to the observed, from the miraculous to the natural, from the inaccessible to the manipulable” (Beyond Freedom and Dignity…quote taken from Archbishop Chaput’s book “Render Unto Ceasar”   And if this progressive march is interrupted by calls for a serious look at the ethical limits of science, that is heresy and you might be called a “flat earther” or have the ghost of Galileo thrown at you.  But Baruch reminds us: “know that (science) is not a god, do not (reverence) it”

On the other hand there are those people of faith who seem to fear (not awe) science.  They fear discoveries that point to the origin of man on a natural level, or they fear what they do not understand.  This is a lack of trust in the God of the Universe, who made us in His image and likeness, and gave us curiosity and intellects and the desire to understand a universe that can seem chaotic and random at times., but deep in our souls we know that it is not and we seek to find that Order.  This fear makes science into a god, by giving it the power to dethrone the Lord.  Know that science is not a god, you do not need to fear it.