What will be your legacy

•July 27, 2010 • Leave a Comment

The renewal has just come for our household contents insurance.  It’s a bit of a sobering black and white statement of what you have.

This weeks readings point to what we leave behind on this earth.

The writer of Ecclesiastes feels that everything is meaningless, and whatever is done is like chasing the wind.  They acknowledge that whatever they achieve is ultimately left behind for those who follow.  For the author this is seems to leave them in despair and doubt – after all they do not know what kind of fool may be following on.

This place of questioning and doubt may be somewhere where we all find ourselves at some time.  What is the point?  What are we doing?  We work and worry our way through life – and what do we have to show for it?  There is a place for those questions, because our answers to those will give us our foundation for what we do.

Those that follow us might be fools, or they might be much better stewards of the world than we have been.  They may be the ones to join the dots of the discoveries our generation have made, or they may laugh at us and go a different way.  Our responsibility remains to do what we are called to do in our time.  To live a responsible life – a life that comes from God.

Paul, writing to the Colossians reminds them to keep their eyes fixed on Christ and what he is doing, not on the things of earth.  He is our focus.  He is the reason for the things we do.  We should not be focussing on our hopes and desires – but his.  That is what will save life from being useless.  Whether we think we are getting somewhere or not, living God’s ways is what matters.

Not being immoral, having evil thoughts, being greedy, angry, hateful, and evil – they are the legacy we should leave behind, that our lives might be right with God, and that others may see the way to be right with God too.

Jesus sums all this up in this passage.  A person’s life is not made up of what they own.  More important is the riches we have built up in God’s sight.

What will your legacy be?  For yourself, for the world, for God?

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If you don’t ask

•July 20, 2010 • 1 Comment

One of the wonders of the internet revolution is that we need no longer be left with questions.

When I was a girl, if you had a question, you had to find an adult who might know the answer, go and get the encyclopaedia (which in a book was relatively limited!), wait until the library opened and see what you could find there – or just keep on wondering.  Now Google is my friend (Other search engines are available!).  We have instant information at our fingertips.  When we ask, we can have an instant answer to our question.

But perhaps that takes out some of the effort of asking and seeking out the answer.  And internet searches cannot help us with those questions that only a person can answer, questions of desire and will.

This weeks readings are very interesting questions of God’s heart and mind – and how we ask him for what we want.

Abraham becomes party to God’s plans for Sodom and Gomorrah.  God has heard of their wickedness, and is going to check it out.  If their actions are as wicked as God has heard, then he is going to destroy them.  Serious stuff!  Abraham is concerned by this, and intervenes on behalf of the innocent people he assumes are there, those who have been doing the right thing.  Surely God won’t destroy them for the sake of the wicked.

Abraham bargains hard on behalf of the people, such is his concern for the good and righteous people of Sodom and Gomorrah.  He will not let it drop with God, and manages to get a promise from God that if only ten right living people are found there, God will not bring destruction.

I wonder how I would have reacted in that situation?  Would I have been relieved that at last God was going to do something about those wicked people, and stood by and applauded, assuming it served them right?  Or would I have had the strength of Abraham to think of then people, and plead for the safety and salvation?

How keen are we to plead to God on behalf of others.  Not just mention it briefly to God in passing, but to plead with him for them?  To take seriously the plight of others, however they behave, and show God how serious we are?  Abraham was not going to let it go.  God had to know how serious his request was.

Jesus points to this same issue in Luke 11.  The disciples have seen Jesus praying, and want him to teach them what to do.  Perhaps they had seen that his prayer life was so much more than theirs.

Jesus gives them an outline for prayer that involves honouring God, looking for the kingdom, praying for need, asking forgiveness for sins and protection from temptation.  He then goes on to principles of prayer.  He tells them a strange story of a friend begging for food at midnight.

The point is that this man is a worst case scenario – a friend who won’t open the door to you even if it is midnight!  But eventually he does because of the man’s persistence.  If even this poor example of a  friend will do that, how much more eager will God be to grant our petitions.

Human fathers know how to treat their children – how much more so will our heavenly father.  The only question I suppose is are we willing to ask?

Do we show God the intention of our prayer?  Are we concerned enough to bring situations to God over and over – not because he is stubborn or needs persuading – but to show our seriousness in praying.  Do we care enough to plead with God for the world and situations in it?

Prayer is serious business.  We are not just putting nice words together, but asking God to do something.  We need to show God how serious we are.

And if you don’t ask…

…you don’t get

Posted in God, Jesus, Lectionary
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A visit from God

•July 13, 2010 • Leave a Comment

When I know someone is coming to visit,  I like to make preparations.  Well I need to!  We have a good tidy up and clean.  I want people to feel comfortable, and I suppose to have a good impression.

I suppose how you prepare depends on who is coming to visit.

This weeks lectionary readings involve visits from God.

In Genesis, Abraham is sitting in the entrance to his tent, no doubt resting and sheltering from the heat of the day.  As he does so, he sees three men standing out in the heat.  He rushes to them, and invites them into his home, where they can rest, refresh and shelter from the sun.  So Abraham and Sarah feed them with the best that they have.

As they sit there, it transpires that one of these guests is the Lord, and he brings Sarah and Abraham the news they have been longing for – in less than a year, they will have a son.

Abraham didn’t know who these men were when he invited them in.  The moral of the story?  You never know when you might be entertaining God – and what God might have to say to you when he comes to call.

Who are the people that we could be inviting in? To our homes, our lives, our churches?  And what might they have to say to us?  What could they teach us?  Was has God to say to us, if only we invite him in and sit with him whilst he has chance to tell us?

In Luke, Jesus calls on Martha and Mary.  Now they knew full well who was visiting them – and perhaps that is part of the problem.  Martha goes into a tailspin.  Jesus is here in her house!  If Jesus was here, there were things to do and everything had to be just so.  So much so that she wanted Mary to get up and help her.  I’m sure the last thing Jesus needed was to come to a house of frenetic activity!

Jesus reminds her of what is important – not running around to put on a good show, but taking time to stop and listen to Jesus, to spend time with him and hear what he has to say.

Really when people come to visit us, they are coming to see us – not our house.  They have come to spend time with us, not to assess the quality of our housekeeping.

The important thing, Jesus says, is to listen to him, to spend time with him.

God comes to call on us every day.  He longs for us to ask him in, and to listen and spend time with him.

After all – who knows what we will hear him say to us!

Posted in God, Lectionary
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