Today’s fast is artificial light.
Without reading ahead I kind of stepped on today’s reflection. Chole describes John’s prison questions this way: “the distance between what John thought Jesus would do and what Jesus actually did was straining John’s certainty of who Jesus was.”
Oh, my! How well I can identify with this feeling!
I’ve told anyone who will listen that when Dominic was killed I dragged a lifetime of what I thought I knew and understood about God into the light of child loss. It absolutely strained my certainty of who Jesus is.
And my questions made some folks uncomfortable just as John’s question makes some Bible teachers uncomfortable.
Too often we want to shush or shout down the hearts that are simply trying to make some sense of things that neither make sense nor seem (on the surface) to reflect the loving heart of a Faithful Father.
A key invitation of our spiritual journeys is to be emotionally honest about our uncertainties. Questions such as the one asked by John are signs of a living, growing, active faith, not evidence of a dying one. Jesus’ calm response to John echoes to us today: ‘Recall what I have done in the past. Accept me as the Great I Am of your future.’
Alicia Britt Chole
Hebrews chapter 11 is known as the “Hall of Faith”.
For today’s Lenten exercise, Chole suggests laying aside screens and electric lights to read that chapter by candlelight this evening.
I highly recommend it! Do it aloud if you are able.
Speaking the names, the circumstances, the journeys of those whose hearts trusted the heart of the Lord who made them and who led them but who also allowed hardship, disappointment and even death, is breathtaking and heartbreaking.
But it puts my life in context of His bigger story.
Redemption, restoration, re-creation and the ultimate Sabbath rest of eternal glory and perfect relationship.
God needs nothing, asks nothing and demands nothing, like the stars. It is life with God which demands these things…. You do not have to sit outside in the dark. If, however you want to look at the stars, you will find that the darkness is necessary. But the stars neither require it nor demand it.
Annie Dillard
**As promised, I am sharing thoughts on 40 DAYS OF DECREASE (a Lenten journal/devotional). If you choose to get and use the book yourself, I’ll be a day behind in sharing so as not to influence anyone else’s experience.**
thelifeididntchoose 