Kraemer: What is the Church for?

Saturday, June 23, 2012
    Feast of Etheldreda, Abbess of Ely, c.678
Meditation:
    Although I am less than the least of all God’s people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things.
    —Ephesians 3:8-9 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The underlying questions are always: What is the Church? What is the Church for? If that is not kept in mind, the lay ministry, about which so much is being said at present, remains on the level of a many-sided activity in which the self-assertion of the laity threatens to be more evident than a new manifestation of the Church in modern society. The responsible participation of the laity in the discharge of the Church’s divine calling is not primarily a matter of idealism and enthusiasm or organizational efficiency, but a new grasp and commitment to the meaning of God’s redemptive purpose with mankind and with the world in the past, the present, and the future: a purpose which has its foundation and inexhaustible content in Christ.
    ... Hendrik Kraemer (1888-1965), A Theology of the Laity, London: Lutterworth Press, 1958, p. 91 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, all parts of the Church point back to You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Smith: the pure fountains

Friday, June 22, 2012
    Feast of Alban, first Martyr of Britain, c.209
Meditation:
    He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.” Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.
    —Luke 24:44-45 (NIV)
Quotation:
    It is high time to ... shew in briefe what we proposed to ourselves, and what course we held in this our perusal and survey of the Bible. Truly (good Christian Reader) we never thought from the beginning, that we should neede to make a new Translation, nor yet to make of a bad one a good one, but to make a good one better, or out of many good ones, one principal good one, not justly to be excepted against; that hath bene our indeavour, that our marke. To that purpose there were many chosen, that were greater in other mens eyes then in their owne, and that sought the truth rather then their own praise... If you aske what they had before them, truely it was the Hebrew text of the Olde Testament, the Greeke of the New. These are the two golden pipes, or rather conduits, where-through the olive branches emptie themselves into the golde.
    ... Miles Smith (1554-1624), in the preface to The Authorised Version of the English Bible [1611], Cambridge: The University Press, 1909, p. 25 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your church praises You for Your word. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Faber: a generous belief of others

Thursday, June 21, 2012
Meditation:
    For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.
    —Romans 12:3 (NIV)
Quotation:
    How many times in life have we been wrong when we put a kind construction on the conduct of others? We shall not need our fingers to count those mistakes upon. Moreover grace is really much more common than our querulousness is generally willing to allow. We may suspect its operations in the worst men we meet with. Thus, without any forced impossibility, we may call in supernatural considerations in order to make our criticisms more ingenious in their charity. When we grow a little holier, we shall summon also to our aid those supernatural motives in ourselves, which, by depressing our own ideas of ourselves, elevate our generous belief in others.
    ... Frederick William Faber (1814-1863), Spiritual Conferences, London: Thomas Richardson & Son, 1860, p. 27-28 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant me a measure of humility. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Ellul: the break with God

Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Meditation:
    But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.
    —Isaiah 59:2 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The mistake of centuries of Christianity has been to regard sin as a moral fault. Biblically this is not the case. Sin is a break with God and all that this entails.
    ... Jacques Ellul (1912-1994), Anarchy and Christianity, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1991, p. 20 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, banish my sin and restore me to Your fellowship. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Singh: laying hold of God

Tuesday, June 19, 2012
    Commemoration of Sundar Singh of India, Sadhu, Evangelist, Teacher, 1929
Meditation:
    In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering.
    —Hebrews 2:10 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Prayer does not consist in an effort to obtain from God the things which are necessary for this life. Prayer is an effort to lay hold of God Himself, the Author of life, and when we have found Him who is the source of life and have entered into communion with Him, then the whole of life is ours and with Him all that will make life perfect.
    ... Sadhu Sundar Singh (1889-1929), At the Master’s Feet, Fleming H. Revell, 1922, p. 41 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, may I ever cling to You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Paton: social action

Monday, June 18, 2012
Meditation:
    [The Son] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
    —Colossians 1:15-17 (NIV)
Quotation:
    I do not think I am fanciful in discerning among some of those who most earnestly plead against the Christian social movement a feeling that there is something fundamentally intractable, inscrutable, mysterious about the world, and that no more can be hoped for than an heroic protest in the name of Christ, made in obedience but with no sort of hope that anything can come of it. I hope I am not wrong in saying that there is nothing Christian in such an attitude. It savours of the Paganism that saw behind the world a kind of ironical malice; that made Polycrates throw his ring into the sea, and called the Furies the Kindly Ones, if haply they might be so appeased.
    But we stand outside this world of darkness, for we have learnt that all things were created by the eternal Word, who is Christ Jesus. We know, in the Pauline phrase, that it is in Him that the whole universal order of things consists or holds together. Those who! have come to know that, know in consequence that they are in their Father’s house. It is a big house, and they have begun to explore only a little of it. It has great reaches, and some of them are still shadowy. But it is His house, all of it.
    ... William Paton
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your are truly engaged with the world. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Barth: God's Fatherhood

Sunday, June 17, 2012
    Commemoration of Samuel & Henrietta Barnett, Social Reformers, 1913 & 1936
Meditation:
    I ask you, therefore, not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you, which are your glory. For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name.
    —Ephesians 3:13-15 (NIV)
Quotation:
    We must not measure by natural human fatherhood what it means that God is our Father. It is from God’s fatherhood that our natural human fatherhood acquires any meaning and dignity it has. God is the Father “from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name.”
    ... Karl Barth (1886-1968), Church Dogmatics, v. I, part 1 [1936], Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004, p. 389 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You are my true Father. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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