OUR DWELLING PLACE

My early morning walk this Good Friday brought me in the company of a multitude of pilgrims who walked the stations of the cross, a religious tradition, in this predominantly Catholic country. As a non- catholic Christian  I understand the spiritual significance of this practice as an opportunity for prayer, and meditation following the path of Christ’s passion, reflecting on the suffering and death of our Lord on the cross.

I have been a  practitioner of prayer walking for years, albeit,  on and off, and I felt  I was in good company this morning.    

The thought came to mind, that we are all pilgrims on this earth, traveling, walking, to our dwelling place. But there are others who seem to walk aimlessly not knowing where. As our earthly bodies often take shelter in the dwelling place we call our homes, our inward life, our souls, need to find rest in a dwelling place, far greater than the comfort, joy and peace which our earthly homes could provide. The Lord declares that He has been our dwelling place in all generations(Psalm 90:1).

Maybe some of us are wandering aimlessly,  in the spiritual desert of dryness and hunger. Our souls faint, longing for a place of comfort and rest. And yet  perhaps we  haven’t realized that  all the while God is our dwelling place.  With outstretched  arms He calls “Come home to me and find rest for your soul. “  He is our refuge, our fortress, our high tower.

But some refuse to come. God through the prophet Isaiah said, “All day long I opened my arms to a rebellious people. But they follow their own evil paths and their own crooked schemes.” (Isaiah 65:2)

We pilgrims need  to come home and take residence in Him. He has been our dwelling place.

God only is the creature’s home;

Though rough and straight the road,

Yet nothing else can satisfy

The soul that long’s for God.

God Bless you my friends.

THE WIDE BELIEVING EYES OF A CHILD

THE WIDE BELIEVING EYES OF A CHILD

My friend an intellectual and academic, asks me why I profess to be a Christian, knowing that we used to be rabid skeptics during our college days. I gave him a straight, simple answer.

I told him my conversion was providential. One day I said to myself if I were to remain a skeptic, then I had to be honest in my skepticism. So I got down to read Christianity’s Scripture, not with a critical mind, but to know really what it has to say to me. So I came to the saving grace of Christ, not as a learned man, of which I could not perfectly say I am, but as a child.

The most amazing message that Jesus said, struck me, cutting me down to size. The Savior said, “I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." (Mark 10:15)

Then He continued to say, "I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven.”(Matthew 18:3). “Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven”(Matthew 18:4)

I realized I am a sinner, no doubt about it. And the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23). The best things I will ever attain, or hope to attain, or the best of whatever good I will do or hope to do, cannot impress the Living God, who created everything and  before whom all of us, at the appointed time will stand.

And this is where I part company with some of my friends, who believe that as long as they live good upright and moral lives, as long as their good deeds outweigh the bad, they are right with God.

The problem is no one is good enough. I believe that while there is some innate goodness in man, Scripture declares that man has fallen into sin, and this sin nature, separated him from God. The Bible declares that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.(Romans 3:23) For there is  no one  righteous, not even one.(Romans 3:10).

Even the best of us and the most upright of men cannot stand before the awesome presence of the Almighty God and claim that he deserves to enter God’s Kingdom, or deserves God’s favor, solely upon his own personal merit.  I also realized I cannot approach God on my own terms. Having rejected God at some point in my life,  did not give me any real peace, or joy, at all, but restlessness and turmoil, for I was looking for Him in the wrong places.

I came to the point of understanding that man’s salvation is by grace through faith, not of himself, it is a gift of God, and not of man’s works, so that no one can boast. The gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ, our Lord (Romans 6:23).

This conviction led me to embrace the Christ, of the Christians. For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit. (1 Peter 3:18). This is the living hope of all Christians. Hope that if they die in Christ, they too will live with Him.

Conversion is becoming like a child. Children do not put on airs of pride and arrogance. They do not desire power or authority, they do not make harsh judgments, are free from malice, teachable, trusting, utterly dependent, and weak. A childlike faith is simple, simple enough to understand.

In their book, Wrestling Prayer, Christian authors Eric and Leslie Ludy, aptly said, “So, if you are an intellectual who thinks himself smarter than the Word of God, I hope my unwavering confidence in the Bible doesn't prove a stumbling block but rather an inspiration as you keep reading. For what we are about to enter into is sacred territory that can be apprehended only through the wide, believing eyes of a little child. This divine terrain holds untold blessings in its bosom; however, those blessings will be gleaned only by those who rise up and claim them with the unabashed faith of a five-year-old.”

God Bless you my friend.

Gideon, The Hesitant Warrior

Gideon, The Hesitant Warrior

From the Book of Judges Chapter 6

The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord, and for seven years he gave them into the hands of the Midianites. Because the power of Midian was so oppressive, the Israelites prepared shelters for themselves in mountain clefts, caves and strongholds.

The angel of the Lord came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites. When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior.”

 “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told  us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.”

The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?”

“Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family

The Lord answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites, leaving none alive.”

The call of Gideon, deals with the subject of fear, doubt and insecurity. It also deals with the feeling of hopelessness and despair. All of us at one point have experienced, self doubt, fear, and  despair. Some of us might have felt forsaken.

As we go through these life experiences, God’s word is as relevant today as it was during the time of Gideon. We can draw a lesson from Gideon, a man, who came from the lowest class among the tribes of Israel, obscure, insignificant, and hopelessly insecure.

The story of Gideon happened at a time when Israel, did what was evil in the sight of God, so for seven years, God allowed Israel’s enemies the Midianites to overpower and oppress them. So cruel were the Midinites that the Israelites hid in mountain caves and clefts. They were bereft of any courage to go against their oppressors, they simply despaired of life, losing all hope. 

God’s anger against his people soon waned. It was now time to liberate them from their enemies, and to show mercy to His people, who thought the Lord had abandoned them.

The angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, who was threshing wheat in a wine press. Gideon was simply doing a menial task. All he cared for was to do his work, so he and his family would be able to survive. He had no other ambition. Then an angel came, who greeted him, “The Lord is with you Mighty Warrior”. Gideon was surprised, because far from being a warrior, he was a worker in the field. He also thought the greeting was absurd, because he thought how could God be with him, when even the entire people of Israel have been abandoned by God?

So Gideon spoke to the angel with a hint of disappointment, saying, “ Pardon me, my lord, but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.”

Gideon’s reaction was a natural reaction, characterizing the general sentiment of his people, who thought God had forgotten them. Losing all hope ever escaping from the clutches of their oppressors, Gideon, was full of self doubt.

We too have experienced the feeling of being hopeless and forsaken. And like Gideon we doubt God’s encouragement, and promises, belittling ourselves. The angel’s greeting was heartening. The angel greeted Gideon with words too superfluous for him to believe.

Here is an ordinary obscure workman described by the angel as a mighty warrior. Not only this, the angel said that the Lord was with him. And yet Gideon doubted if he ever amounted to anything the angel said of him. The spirit of timidity has taken control of Gideon.

God had chosen Gideon despite his moral weakness. God commanded Gideon, with the assurance that He is sending him to go and save Israel out of the hands of their enemies.

And yet Gideon still full of insecurity and self doubt put up excuses. He said he was weak, and least among his clan. He appraised himself and felt  was not up to the task. Fear had overcome his will. Gideon looked at the circumstances surrounding himself that he lost sight of the fact that the God of his people is an all powerful God upon whom he should completely trust.  

Again God reassured Gideon, saying, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites, leaving none alive.”

In today’s world, we face hard and difficult circumstances, even as we fight the fierce battles of life. All too often we draw strength upon our own resources. We are apt to follow Gideon’s poor and gloomy outlook, that we forget we have a great and powerful God, who declares, “I am with you, go, Am I not sending you? I will be with you.”

My friends, God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity but of power, love and self-discipline.(2 Timothy 1:7)

Think about it.

STRESS JUNKIE

My wife tells me that her friend wanted to see me about a problem. Then another friend comes along who has another problem. While doing some groceries an acquaintance stops me and shares his problem. I am far too civil to shut down these impositions, but a mild rebuke telling them I'm not in the free legal aid business is almost tempting.

But it is not in my form to be rude, so I bear them all, forcing a smile. In times like this I wish I could shed off my thick lawyer's hide like a molting snake would, so I could just be myself, be left alone, without having to deal with someone else's problem.

The worst thing is, once you wrestle with the problem, there is the pressure of having all the answers to every problem. This is stressful. I don't have all the answers.

Psychologists describe this as the God-complex. The desire to be in control. You begin to like the feeling, the elation of untangling other people's mess becomes a challenge. So you keep on doing it anyway, even if you don't like it. You become a stress junkie.

"Relax, man", says my friend, the intellectual bum. "You are not God, you know."

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.”

-Philippians 2:3

Ambition is the strong desire to do or to achieve something, typically requiring  determination and hard work. St. Paul has no admonition against this. The keywords are “selfish ambition.” This is what the Saint considers  a wrong attitude for a Christian.

Author and Novelist Gore Vidal  once described, “Christianity as the greatest disaster ever to strike the West.”

He said, “It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail.” He added, “Whenever a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies.”

Sounds to be the kind of selfish ambition St. Paul was speaking of, to the Christians in Philippi.

Theologian William Barclay, commented, “Prestige is for many people an even greater temptation than wealth. To be admired and respected, to have a platform seat, to have one’s opinion sought, to be known by name and appearance,  even to be flattered,  are for many people most desirable things.”

Which is the greatest disaster to have ever visited mankind? Is it Christianity or selfish ambition?

Think about it my friend.

BE COOL

BE COOL

I remember my old departed friend, the fake Frenchman Monsieur Javelona who used to quip he belonged to the so called Temperamental Law Firm. What he meant was his partners were more on temper than mental.

Temperament runs thick in my blood. I must have gotten it from my parents who had short fuses. This malady often attacks me.

One day, tension was high as my voice, while I was stressing a point. There was no anger in it but assiduousness. Then  my daughter said, “Tatay, Be Cool.” 

Like cold water dousing burning coals, the hot air was blown by the wind of winsomeness. I wish I could always be cool, quiet, calm and composed.

The wise cleric J. Maurus aptly observed that the mind will never function when it is super hot, only when it is cool and composed.

“Be Cool!”

Well I’m cool for now. No big deal.

MORAL CONFUSION

MORAL CONFUSION

A thief in New Jersey stole $ 7,000.00 in Jewelry, old coins, 

and cash from a widow. The items taken were all she had left from her husband’s estate.

In sorting through his loot, the thief came across several

church offering envelopes, containing money the woman intended to give to the Lord. Leaving their contents inside, he put them in another envelope, addressed it to the woman’s church, and then dropped it in the mail.

When the Minister found out what happened, he commented, “It is a characteristic of the moral confusion of our times that someone would consider stealing from a widow and her children and yet think it reprehensible to steal from the church.”

Like this thief, there are some who think that God’s property line ends at the door of the church and anything or anyone outside of it is fair game.

On the other hand a group of thieves in the Philippines, stole the ancient bell of an old church and sold the metal for scrap. This same group of thieves passed an old beggar holding out her can for alms. One of the thieves dropped  two hundred pesos in paper bills, in the can.

The same Minister would comment, “It is a characteristic of the moral confusion of our times that someone would dare steal the property of the church and yet think that giving to the poor a portion of his loot would erase his sins.”