Catherine of Siena: hunger for God

Saturday, April 29, 2017
    Feast of Catherine of Siena, Mystic, Teacher, 1380
Meditation:
    Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”
    —John 4:10 (ESV)
Quotation:
    You, O eternal Trinity, are a deep sea, into which the more I enter the more I find, and the more I find the more I seek. The soul cannot be satiated in your abyss, for she continually hungers after you, the eternal Trinity, desiring to see you with the light of your light. As the hart desires the springs of living water, so my soul desires to leave the prison of this dark body and see you in truth.
    ... Catherine of Siena (1347-1380), Dialog of Catherine of Siena [1378], Treatise of Obedience, xi. (see the book)
    See also John 4:10; Ps. 42:1-2; Isa. 9:2; John 1:4-5,9; 8:12; Eph. 1:18
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, without You, I was starving. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Head: the beginning of eternal life here

Friday, April 28, 2017
    Commemoration of Peter Chanel, Religious, Missionary in the South Pacific, Martyr, 1841
Meditation:
    He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.
    —Deuteronomy 32:10 (KJV)
Quotation:
    We should not draw too sharp a distinction between this “barren land” or “wilderness” of our pilgrimage, and the sweet home that God has prepared. We all know the changes and chances of this troublous life; but we can also know in this vale of tears the healthful spirit of His grace. Health for the whole man is God’s gracious purpose for us here and now, often frustrated, often prevented by unbelief. The life of the saints in light must not emphasize for us simply the contrast between their state and ours, but rather the beginning of the gift of eternal life and all its benefits of inner strength and peace amid earthly vicissitudes.
    ... David Head, Shout for Joy, New York: MacMillan Co., 1962, p. 128 (see the book)
    See also Deut. 32:10-11; Rom. 7:22-24; 8:1-2; 1 Tim. 1:16; Heb. 11:37-40
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, in You I am made whole. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Mascall: the nature of the resurrection

Thursday, April 27, 2017
    Feast of Christina Rossetti, Poet, 1894
Meditation:
    For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
    —1 Corinthians 13:9-12 (ESV)
Quotation:
    There are, of course, interesting questions that can be asked about the nature of the transformation which our Lord’s body underwent in his resurrection, and if we know anything about physics and biology we are quite likely to ask them. But, since we are concerned with an occurrence which is [by hypothesis] unique in certain relevant aspects, we are most unlikely to be able to give confident answers to them. [Paul M.] van Buren’s remarks about biology and the twentieth century are nothing more than rhetoric or, at best, are simply empirical statements about his own psychology. The first century knew as well as the twentieth that dead bodies do not naturally come to life again, and no amount of twentieth-century knowledge about natural processes can tell us what may happen by supernatural means.
    ... E. L. Mascall (1905-1993), The Secularization of Christianity, London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1966, p. 79-80 (see the book)
    See also 1 Cor. 13:9-12; John 6:39-40,54; 10:28; 11:25; Rom. 6:23; 1 John 2:25; Jude 1:21
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your will alone has raised me from death to life. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Owen: hot and cold

Wednesday, April 26, 2017
Meditation:
    In those days there was no king in Israel: every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
    —Judges 21:25 (KJV)
Quotation:
    Common experience declares... how momentary and how useless are those violent fits and gusts of endeavours which proceed from fear and uncertainty, both in things spiritual and temporal, or civil. Whilst men are under the power of actual impressions from such fears, they will convert to God, yea, they will [turn in a moment], and perfect their holiness in an instant; but so soon as that impression wears off (as it will do on every occasion, and upon none at all) such persons are as dead and cold towards God as the lead or iron, which ran but now in a fiery stream, is when the heat is departed from it.
    ... John Owen (1616-1683), V.2 in A Discourse Concerning Holy Spirit, bk. I-V [1674], in Works of John Owen, v. III, London: Johnson & Hunter, 1852, p. 603 (see the book)
    See also Judg. 21:25; Pr. 18:9; Rom. 12:11; Heb. 5:11-14; 6:10-20; 2 Pet. 1:10-11
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, send Your grace, to keep my mind and heart focused on Your will. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Barclay: our sense of need

Tuesday, April 25, 2017
    Feast of Mark the Evangelist
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God? Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope. If you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?”
    —John 5:44-47 (ESV)
Quotation:
    So long as we judge ourselves by human comparisons, there is plenty of room for self-satisfaction, and self-satisfaction kills faith, for faith is born of the sense of need. But when we compare ourselves with Jesus Christ, and through Him, with God, we are humbled to the dust, and then faith is born, for there is nothing left to do but to trust to the mercy of God.
    ... William Barclay (1907-1978), The Gospel of John, v. 1, Edinburgh: Saint Andrew Press, 1965, p. 201 (see the book)
    See also John 5:44-47; Matt. 6:2-6; John 12:39-44; Rom. 8:6-9; 12:2; 1 Cor. 2:12; 2 Cor. 5:16; Heb. 3:12
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant that I may become one who is concerned only with pleasing You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Allen: expecting a response

Monday, April 24, 2017
    Commemoration of Mellitus, First Bishop of London, 624
Meditation:
    And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
    —Matthew 4:19 (ESV)
Quotation:
    To preach the Gospel requires that the preacher should believe that he is sent to those whom he is addressing at the moment, because God has among them those whom He is at the moment calling: it requires that the speaker should expect a response.
    ... Roland Allen (1869-1947), Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or ours?, London: World Dominion Press, 1927, reprinted, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1962, p. 74 (see the book)
    See also Matt. 4:19; 20:16; Mark 1:17-18; Luke 5:10-11; Acts 2:41,47; 5:14; 6:7; 1 Cor. 9:20-22
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I hear Your call to me. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Powell: the use of afflictions

Sunday, April 23, 2017
    Feast of George, Martyr, Patron of England, c.304
    Commemoration of Michael Ramsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, Teacher, 1988
Meditation:
    Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
    —Hebrews 12:9-11 (ESV)
Quotation:
    By afflictions, God is spoiling us [i.e., taking away from us] of what otherwise might have spoiled us. When he makes the world too hot for us to hold, we let it go.
    ... Thomas Powell (see the book)
    See also Heb. 12:9-11; Ps. 118:18; Pr. 19:18; 2 Cor. 4:17; 12:9
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant me a spirit of patience in hardship, that I might not cling to the world. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth