Monday, October 25, 2004
More Sunday Night
Let me add to what Kathy said. What an incredible experience! It's hard to put into words but to spend the entire evening praising God through song centered around the description of worship found in Rev. 4 &5 was unbelievable. We all created it together. No one told us how to worship or babbed on about the scripture or made a bunch of announcements or anything. It was just praise and prayer created by a community of believers who all love the Lord and wanted to lift up their voices to lift Him up. Having the scripture read to music and then sung by the group afterwards was really, really meaningful.
To me, the big thing is that we all came together to create our worship. Jeff led but we all contributed what we had, almost like a musical praise potluck. It's the closest thing I've had to true worship in a long time and I'd really like to thank Jeff for leading us and allowing it to happen.
Next time someone else can do the Djembe if it's availible and I'll be happy just to sing and read and lift up praise to the Lord. Please come join us and bring something to create with...your heart, your voice, your love, an instrument, whatever you can offer. Bring it and offer it up on the altar we all build to honor and glorify Him.
In Him.
Let me add to what Kathy said. What an incredible experience! It's hard to put into words but to spend the entire evening praising God through song centered around the description of worship found in Rev. 4 &5 was unbelievable. We all created it together. No one told us how to worship or babbed on about the scripture or made a bunch of announcements or anything. It was just praise and prayer created by a community of believers who all love the Lord and wanted to lift up their voices to lift Him up. Having the scripture read to music and then sung by the group afterwards was really, really meaningful.
To me, the big thing is that we all came together to create our worship. Jeff led but we all contributed what we had, almost like a musical praise potluck. It's the closest thing I've had to true worship in a long time and I'd really like to thank Jeff for leading us and allowing it to happen.
Next time someone else can do the Djembe if it's availible and I'll be happy just to sing and read and lift up praise to the Lord. Please come join us and bring something to create with...your heart, your voice, your love, an instrument, whatever you can offer. Bring it and offer it up on the altar we all build to honor and glorify Him.
In Him.
Sunday Night Worship
As most of you know, Jeff Weiss leads a worship 'service' at his home on Sunday evenings from 8:00-9:00. Chad and I try to attend every week and have really enjoyed it. Every week is a little different, ranging from mostly singing and prayer to talking about what God is teaching us or a discussion on something one of us has on our hearts to impromptu, improvisasional music.
Worship last night was wonderful! Jeff got out a borrowed a jimbay (a cool African drum played with the hands) which Chad immediately took over, the rainstick, which Danielle is mastering and an Eggz shaker, which we pass around to whomever wants it. Jeff, of course, played his acoustic guitar and the improv was amazing. We're not all musicians, but most of us can usually keep a beat well enough for the percusion instruments that were available. We all added our own vocals where ever they seemed appropriate (even if they weren't! At least I sing softly, so now one noticed!)
Lots of praising God and laughter and sharing. It was a great time. Come by next week. If you're not ready to add to the music, there is plenty of singing and prayer!
Friday, October 01, 2004
Retreat!!
At the Bible study tonight, there was some discussion about a retreat, during which we will talk about dating and relationships and the Song of Solomon.
We're still looking at possible dates and places, so PLEASE let us know soon if you are interested and any dates that will definitely not work for you. Email Chad or me if you are interested.
At the Bible study tonight, there was some discussion about a retreat, during which we will talk about dating and relationships and the Song of Solomon.
We're still looking at possible dates and places, so PLEASE let us know soon if you are interested and any dates that will definitely not work for you. Email Chad or me if you are interested.
Wednesday, September 22, 2004
I found a website, a blog, actually, that is interesting. The writer simply posts a saying from one of the Desert Fathers each day. It's called Word from the Desert. Today's word was a prayer from St. Isaac the Syrian from the seventh century:
There is also a link to have this sent to you daily in your email, if you don't want to go to the website every day.
Immeasurable Grace
Glory, O Lord, to Your immeasurable grace.
Behold, O Lord, the waves of Your grace have made me silent; and no thought has been left in me before Your good graces.
With what words can we praise You, O good King, You who love our life?
Glory to You for the worlds which You have created for our growth and pleasure, leading us through all that You have created to the knowledge of Your glory, from now and unto the ages. Amen
There is also a link to have this sent to you daily in your email, if you don't want to go to the website every day.
Monday, September 20, 2004
Go and Wash
"Go and wash," He said.
And the blind man did and was healed.
But what of me? What would I have done?
"I don't know the way?"
"I can't see, how do I get there?"
"Why should I go?"
"What's in it for me?"
"Who are you to tell me what to do?"
"Go and wash," He says.
I am the Way and the Truth and the Life.
Wash not only your face but your sins also.
"Go and wash," He said.
And the blind man did and was healed.
But what of me? What would I have done?
"I don't know the way?"
"I can't see, how do I get there?"
"Why should I go?"
"What's in it for me?"
"Who are you to tell me what to do?"
"Go and wash," He says.
I am the Way and the Truth and the Life.
Wash not only your face but your sins also.
Friday, September 03, 2004
Whoops...oh, Hi!
The daily devotionals are on the main site...there was a miscommunication but everything is all better, now.
THIS site is for YOU, Gordon students! Post your thoughts about the study, suggestions for Coffee House, prayer requests, prayer answers, hello and how-do-you-do to the world. Really! Just let me know and I'll send you an invitation to blog and directions (it's easy!) on how to.
If you'd like, we can put a link to your personal blog or web site over there on the left, too. Tell us about your recent mountain biking adventure, your crew workout, see if anyone can help you with your calculus. Whatever!
Have a great 3 day weekend!
The daily devotionals are on the main site...there was a miscommunication but everything is all better, now.
THIS site is for YOU, Gordon students! Post your thoughts about the study, suggestions for Coffee House, prayer requests, prayer answers, hello and how-do-you-do to the world. Really! Just let me know and I'll send you an invitation to blog and directions (it's easy!) on how to.
If you'd like, we can put a link to your personal blog or web site over there on the left, too. Tell us about your recent mountain biking adventure, your crew workout, see if anyone can help you with your calculus. Whatever!
Have a great 3 day weekend!
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Daily Devotional
written by Dr. Gary Cox
Christ is in our Midst!
The Beatitudes are in many ways the magnificent introduction to the greatest sermon ever spoken, the Sermon on the Mount. They set the tenor for three entire chapters of St. Matthew’s Gospel (Matt. 5-7). Using His exhortations to “blessedness” as a starting point, Our Lord then goes on to summon his followers to the Christian life.
It is a startling summons. Jesus tells us first of all He comes not to destroy the Old Covenant, but to complete it (Matt. 5: 17-20). He insists that it is not enough simply to fulfill the letter of the Law---not killing, not committing adultery, not stealing---but one must also obey in spirit. It is not enough merely to avoid the overt deed; a Christian must strive to keep his thoughts in check as well, for, we are told as an example, “whoever looks a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Matt. 5: 28) In every case, Jesus emphasizes over and over again that it is the human heart that must be changed, for even good deeds, like almsgiving, can be spoiled if we do them for the wrong reason (Matt. 6: 1-4).
The centerpiece of the Sermon, according to my Orthodox Study Bible, is Jesus’ discussion of prayer and fasting. Orthodoxy insists that these are the heart of the Christian life, the essential preparation for all the rest. Without prayer, a frequent, even unceasing conversation with God, and fasting---seen not as an effort to gain merit but instead as vital spiritual training (hunger should remind us of our absolute dependence on God, for example; self-denial in small things steels us to deny ourselves sinful temptations)---the rest of the Christian life, already difficult, becomes almost overwhelming.
If all this were not challenging enough, Our Lord presses on, insisting that we trust God completely (Matt. 6: 19-34), and that as we stumble, fall, and get up time after time we absolutely must not judge our brothers (Matt. 7: 1-6).
Jesus concludes with three warnings. First, he insists on the absolute necessity of prayer---we must persevere in our prayer life, no matter how weary we become (Matt. 7: 7-11). Second, he warns against false prophets---any “gospel” that departs from these teachings ought to be suspect. Finally, He reminds that there is a great difference between hearing God’s Word---and keeping It.
If ever there was a program to revolutionize the world---this is it! And yet it doesn’t require us to march, shout, argue or fight---it only requires something infinitely more difficult, and more important, taming our own hearts. Thus the great truthfulness of the modern critique of Christianity (and by extension, us who claim to be Christians): Christianity hasn’t so much failed---as never been tried.
Still, in Our Lord’s commands, we get a sense of what some have become, and of what we are called to be…and can be. Remember my favorite story from the Desert Fathers:
“Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, ‘Abba, as far as I can, I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?’ Then the old man stood up and stretched his hands towards heaven. His fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, ‘If you will, you can become all flame.’” (Sayings of the Desert Fathers, 103).
Gary
Feast of the Martyr Adrian and his wife Natalia
written by Dr. Gary Cox
Christ is in our Midst!
The Beatitudes are in many ways the magnificent introduction to the greatest sermon ever spoken, the Sermon on the Mount. They set the tenor for three entire chapters of St. Matthew’s Gospel (Matt. 5-7). Using His exhortations to “blessedness” as a starting point, Our Lord then goes on to summon his followers to the Christian life.
It is a startling summons. Jesus tells us first of all He comes not to destroy the Old Covenant, but to complete it (Matt. 5: 17-20). He insists that it is not enough simply to fulfill the letter of the Law---not killing, not committing adultery, not stealing---but one must also obey in spirit. It is not enough merely to avoid the overt deed; a Christian must strive to keep his thoughts in check as well, for, we are told as an example, “whoever looks a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Matt. 5: 28) In every case, Jesus emphasizes over and over again that it is the human heart that must be changed, for even good deeds, like almsgiving, can be spoiled if we do them for the wrong reason (Matt. 6: 1-4).
The centerpiece of the Sermon, according to my Orthodox Study Bible, is Jesus’ discussion of prayer and fasting. Orthodoxy insists that these are the heart of the Christian life, the essential preparation for all the rest. Without prayer, a frequent, even unceasing conversation with God, and fasting---seen not as an effort to gain merit but instead as vital spiritual training (hunger should remind us of our absolute dependence on God, for example; self-denial in small things steels us to deny ourselves sinful temptations)---the rest of the Christian life, already difficult, becomes almost overwhelming.
If all this were not challenging enough, Our Lord presses on, insisting that we trust God completely (Matt. 6: 19-34), and that as we stumble, fall, and get up time after time we absolutely must not judge our brothers (Matt. 7: 1-6).
Jesus concludes with three warnings. First, he insists on the absolute necessity of prayer---we must persevere in our prayer life, no matter how weary we become (Matt. 7: 7-11). Second, he warns against false prophets---any “gospel” that departs from these teachings ought to be suspect. Finally, He reminds that there is a great difference between hearing God’s Word---and keeping It.
If ever there was a program to revolutionize the world---this is it! And yet it doesn’t require us to march, shout, argue or fight---it only requires something infinitely more difficult, and more important, taming our own hearts. Thus the great truthfulness of the modern critique of Christianity (and by extension, us who claim to be Christians): Christianity hasn’t so much failed---as never been tried.
Still, in Our Lord’s commands, we get a sense of what some have become, and of what we are called to be…and can be. Remember my favorite story from the Desert Fathers:
“Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, ‘Abba, as far as I can, I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?’ Then the old man stood up and stretched his hands towards heaven. His fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, ‘If you will, you can become all flame.’” (Sayings of the Desert Fathers, 103).
Gary
Feast of the Martyr Adrian and his wife Natalia
Wednesday, August 25, 2004
Daily Devotional
Christ be with you!
One day Abba Macarius was on his way back from his cell from the marsh, carrying palm leaves. And look! There was the devil in the road, carrying a sickle and trying to attack him. But he couldn’t and said: I am suffering a great deal of violence from you, O Macarius. I do everything you do for sure. When you fast, I do not eat and when you keep vigil, I do not sleep at all. Yet there is only one thing in which you outdo me. Then Abba Macarius asked: What is it? The devil replied: It is your humility, and because of it I am powerless against you. (Translation by Yushi Nomura from Desert Wisdom: Sayings of the Desert Fathers)
In most translations of Scripture, Matthew 5:3 is written: Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. This is the translation found in the NIV, the New American Standard Bible, the New American Bible, The King James version, the New Jerusalem Bible. Almost all commentators read this passage as saying that the idea of being “poor in spirit” is the idea of humility. That true blessing comes not from a sense of pride, from material wealth, from friends or family or any other worldly thing but from a realization that we are a part of a community; that our needs and our ideas and our actions are part of a larger environment and that they affect this environment in many, many ways.
Pride is the belief that we are more important, smart, wise, beautiful, sacrificial, what-have-you than those around us. It is the belief that our ideas have more value than others, our needs take a higher precedence than those of others, that our experience is more valid or “true” than someone else’s, that our actions are or will be more effective than the actions of those who share in our community. Yet, over and over in the Scripture we are warned that such an attitude is not in line with what God would like for us.
In some of the more modern translations of Matthew 5:3 there is a different take on the passage. The Message reads:
You’re blessed when you are at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and His rule.
And, one of my favorites, from the Contemporary English Translation:
God blesses those who depend only on Him, for they belong in the kingdom of Heaven.
I like this translation because it takes me to the heart of humility. If I have any wisdom, if my ideas are to have any value, if my actions are to truly bring about any good then they must begin in my total dependence on God. If Love is the heart of our faith as Christians, we know what it is only because God showed us through the sending of His Son to take our places on the cross. If I am to show hope to a world full of despair, it is only because of “a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into a heritage that can never be spoilt or soiled and never fade away.” (I Peter 1:3-4, New Jerusalem Bible) If I can make peace it is only because,
“…He is the peace between us, and has made the two into one entity and broken down the barrier which used to keep them apart, by destroying in His own person the hostility…His purpose in this was, by restoring peace, to create a single New Man out of the two of them, and through the cross, to reconcile both to God in one Body; in His own person He killed the hostility. He came to bring the good news of peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.” (Eph 2:14-17, New Jerusalem Bible)
If I realize that it is through God that I might have all of these things only then can I lay down my pride. If I can, just for one moment, rely on Him and realize that all that I have that is good comes from Him then will I find humility.
Abba Macarius in the story above does not defeat the Adversary with his own strength or his own wisdom. He relies on God to see him through each day. He does what is set before him in humility and is thus invulnerable to the attacks of the devil. Today, as you work in His fields, try not to give Satan an avenue through which to attack you. Set aside your pride and rely on God. Submit yourself to His direction in who you are. Place your needs below His and set aside your wisdom for that which He supplies. Spend time looking to Him and listening for Him today and follow where He leads you.
In Him
Christ be with you!
One day Abba Macarius was on his way back from his cell from the marsh, carrying palm leaves. And look! There was the devil in the road, carrying a sickle and trying to attack him. But he couldn’t and said: I am suffering a great deal of violence from you, O Macarius. I do everything you do for sure. When you fast, I do not eat and when you keep vigil, I do not sleep at all. Yet there is only one thing in which you outdo me. Then Abba Macarius asked: What is it? The devil replied: It is your humility, and because of it I am powerless against you. (Translation by Yushi Nomura from Desert Wisdom: Sayings of the Desert Fathers)
In most translations of Scripture, Matthew 5:3 is written: Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. This is the translation found in the NIV, the New American Standard Bible, the New American Bible, The King James version, the New Jerusalem Bible. Almost all commentators read this passage as saying that the idea of being “poor in spirit” is the idea of humility. That true blessing comes not from a sense of pride, from material wealth, from friends or family or any other worldly thing but from a realization that we are a part of a community; that our needs and our ideas and our actions are part of a larger environment and that they affect this environment in many, many ways.
Pride is the belief that we are more important, smart, wise, beautiful, sacrificial, what-have-you than those around us. It is the belief that our ideas have more value than others, our needs take a higher precedence than those of others, that our experience is more valid or “true” than someone else’s, that our actions are or will be more effective than the actions of those who share in our community. Yet, over and over in the Scripture we are warned that such an attitude is not in line with what God would like for us.
In some of the more modern translations of Matthew 5:3 there is a different take on the passage. The Message reads:
You’re blessed when you are at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and His rule.
And, one of my favorites, from the Contemporary English Translation:
God blesses those who depend only on Him, for they belong in the kingdom of Heaven.
I like this translation because it takes me to the heart of humility. If I have any wisdom, if my ideas are to have any value, if my actions are to truly bring about any good then they must begin in my total dependence on God. If Love is the heart of our faith as Christians, we know what it is only because God showed us through the sending of His Son to take our places on the cross. If I am to show hope to a world full of despair, it is only because of “a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into a heritage that can never be spoilt or soiled and never fade away.” (I Peter 1:3-4, New Jerusalem Bible) If I can make peace it is only because,
“…He is the peace between us, and has made the two into one entity and broken down the barrier which used to keep them apart, by destroying in His own person the hostility…His purpose in this was, by restoring peace, to create a single New Man out of the two of them, and through the cross, to reconcile both to God in one Body; in His own person He killed the hostility. He came to bring the good news of peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.” (Eph 2:14-17, New Jerusalem Bible)
If I realize that it is through God that I might have all of these things only then can I lay down my pride. If I can, just for one moment, rely on Him and realize that all that I have that is good comes from Him then will I find humility.
Abba Macarius in the story above does not defeat the Adversary with his own strength or his own wisdom. He relies on God to see him through each day. He does what is set before him in humility and is thus invulnerable to the attacks of the devil. Today, as you work in His fields, try not to give Satan an avenue through which to attack you. Set aside your pride and rely on God. Submit yourself to His direction in who you are. Place your needs below His and set aside your wisdom for that which He supplies. Spend time looking to Him and listening for Him today and follow where He leads you.
In Him
