Carmichael: avoiding helpfulness

Saturday, June 5, 2010
    Feast of Boniface (Wynfrith) of Crediton, Archbishop of Mainz, Apostle of Germany, Martyr, 754
Meditation:
    Give generously to [your needy brother] and do so without a grudging heart; then because of this the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you put your hand to
    —Deuteronomy 15:10 (NIV)
Quotation:
    If something I am asked to do for another feels burdensome; if, yielding to an inward unwillingness, I avoid doing it, then I know nothing of Calvary love.
    ... Amy Carmichael (1867-1951), If [1938], London: SPCK, 1961, p. 50 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, make a willing heart within me. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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CT: the greatest need

Friday, June 4, 2010
Meditation:
    For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
    —Romans 1:20-23 (NIV)
Quotation:
    None of these good works [e.g., HIV/AIDS outreach, relief of hunger, poverty, or eliminating malaria or tuberculosis]—nay, great works—deal with the most profound social problem facing humankind.
    That social problem is alienation from God.
    ... Christianity Today Magazine, Carol Stream, IL, “The Greatest Social Need”, editorial for January 19, 2009 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, help me to make You known to those You have placed before me. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Merton: living by faith?

Thursday, June 3, 2010
    Feast of Edward King, Bishop of Lincoln, Teacher, 1910
    Commemoration of Martyrs of Uganda, 1886 & 1978
Meditation:
    [We] know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.
    —Galatians 2:16 (NIV)
Quotation:
    When the time comes to enter the darkness in which we are naked and helpless and alone; in which we see the insufficiency of our greatest strength and the hollowness of our strongest virtues; in which we have nothing of our own to rely on, and nothing in our nature to support us, and nothing in the world to guide us or give us fight—then we find out whether or not we live by faith.
    ... Thomas Merton (1915-1968), Seeds of Contemplation, London: Hollis & Carter, 1949, New Directions. 1949, p. 172 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, strengthen my faith. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Beecher: the Holy Ghost

Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Meditation:
    This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.
    —1 Corinthians 2:13-14 (NIV)
Quotation:
    I should as soon attempt to raise flowers if there were no atmosphere, or produce fruits if there were neither light nor heat, as to regenerate men if I did not believe there was a Holy Ghost.
    ... Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887), The Sermons of Henry Ward Beecher in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, eighth series, New York: J. B. Ford, 1873, p. 390 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, it is only by Your Spirit that we turn towards You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Johnson: more faith

Tuesday, June 1, 2010
    Feast of Justin, Martyr at Rome, c.165
    Commemoration of Angela de’Merici, Founder of the Institute of St. Ursula, 1540
Meditation:
    When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick. This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah: “He took up our infirmities and carried our diseases.”
    —Matthew 8:16-17 (NIV)
Quotation:
    In a modern-day brand of Christianity devoted to good works, faith in the forgiveness of sin deteriorates, and the Golden Rule becomes a means of salvation rather than the fruit of salvation. An empty stomach is no way to a man’s heart, and racial justice is long overdue, but a cup of water can never replace the healing power of the Cross. In a country where famine and poverty have reduced the day’s ration to a bowl of rice and the domicile to one room, food and shelter are obviously important, but so is faith in God’s mercy. Faith is indispensable. Neither individual holiness nor social concern can be legislated... The fact is that the more seriously one takes the demands of God, the more conscious of his own need for mercy he becomes. But, fortunately, as Kierkegaard put it, “The opposite of sin is not ‘virtue’ but faith.”
    ... Paul G. Johnson (b. 1931), Buried Alive, Richmond: John Knox Press, 1968, p. 143 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I believe Your promise of forgiveness. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Carmichael: a fort in enemy country

Monday, May 31, 2010
Meditation:
    Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
    —Hebrews 12:2 (NIV)
Quotation:
    I do not find that this position, that of unbroken peacefulness and inward song, is one which we can hope to hold unassailed. It is no soft arrangement of pillows, no easy-chair. It is a fort in an enemy’s country, and the foe is wise in assault and especially in surprise. And yet there can be nothing to fear, for it is not a place that we must keep, but a stronghold in which we are kept, if only, in the moment we are conscious of attack, we look “away unto our faith’s Princely Leader and Perfecter, Jesus, who endured.”
    ... Amy Carmichael (1867-1951), Rose from Brier [1933], London: SPCK, 1950, p. 76 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You have spoken peace to Your people. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Merton: enter by love

Sunday, May 30, 2010
    Trinity Sunday
    Feast of Josephine Butler, Social Reformer, 1906
    Commemoration of Joan of Arc, Visionary, 1431
    Commemoration of Apolo Kivebulaya, Priest, Evangelist, 1933
Meditation:
    No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.
    —1 John 4:12-13 (NIV)
Quotation:
    We enter into the Mystery of the Holy Trinity not so much by thinking and imagining, as by loving. Thought and imagination soon reach the limits beyond which they cannot pass, and these limits still fall infinitely short of the reality of God. But love, overstepping all bounds and flying beyond limitations with the wings of God’s own Spirit, penetrates into the very depths of the mystery and apprehends Him Whom our intelligence is unable to see.
    ... Thomas Merton (1915-1968), The Living Bread, Farrar, New York: Straus & Cudahy, 1956; reprint, Macmillan, 1980, p. 51 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You Spirit sings a psalm of praise to You within my heart. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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