Allshorn: the eternal matters most

Sunday, April 14, 2024
Meditation:
    We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints—the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel that has come to you. All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God’s grace in all its truth.
    —Colossians 1:3-6
Quotation:
    The one great fear which is a holy fear is, I think, lest you make your adventure too small, too easy, too self-full, too mediocre. Christianity fails because people will keep on the surface too much, they will not go down to face these deep inner obediences; and that is ultimately to be beaten by themselves.
    We talk big and play so small. And the world has found it out—the great bulk have discarded Christianity as the way of Hope and put their hope in other things.
    ... Florence Allshorn (1887-1950), The Notebooks of Florence Allshorn, London: SCM Press, 1957, p. 26 (see the book)
    See also Col. 1:3-6; Ps. 1:2; 25:10; 111:10; Matt. 5:3; 24:14; 28:19-20; Mark 16:15; Rom. 1:5; 16:25-27; Col. 1:27; Jas. 1:22
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, show me my self-made limitations, that I may be bolder for you. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Thomas: God likes you

Saturday, April 13, 2024
Meditation:
    Jesus replied, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”
    —John 14:23 (NIV)
Quotation:
    God reveals Himself as a God who isn’t mad at us. He likes us. Do you know that in experience, that God likes you? He likes you and wants to be with you and hang around with you—wants to go to coffee with you, wants to be involved in your housework, or your job, or whatever it is. And if you knew this, if you do know Him, you know that you would like that.
    ... Eugene M. Thomas, in a talk delivered May 15, 1983, on the subject “Not Being Worldly” (see the book)
    See also John 14:23; Josh. 1:5; Ps. 16:7; 46:7,11; Isa. 41:10; Matt. 1:23; 18:20; 28:19-20; Mark 16:20; John 3:16; 14:16-18; Acts 18:9-10; Rom. 5:8; 2 Cor. 5:18-21; 2 Tim. 4:17; 2 Pet. 3:9; 1 John 4:9-10,19; Rev. 3:20
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I cling to You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Trueblood: believe in

Friday, April 12, 2024
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.”
    —John 14:1 (KJV)
Quotation:
    A Christian is a person who, though he knows that he is both ignorant and imperfect, believes that he has a clue to reality. He is not willing to settle for the notion that finite things and finite persons constitute the whole of reality, because he can see they all point beyond themselves. In short, he believes in God. There is a radical difference between “believe in” and “believe that.” The person who believes in involves his whole self in an attitude of trust.
    ... Elton Trueblood (1900-1994), The Future of the Christian, Harper & Row, 1971, p. 79 (see the book)
    See also John 14:1; Ps. 139:6; Eccl. 11:5; Isa. 12:2; Mark 9:24; John 6:29,40; 12:44; Rom. 8:24-26; 1 Cor. 3:19; 1 Pet. 1:21; 1 John 5:10-11
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I do not understand Your ways, but help me to trust You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Capon: just dead

Thursday, April 11, 2024
    Commemoration of George Augustus Selwyn, first Bishop of New Zealand, 1878
Meditation:
    When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.
    —Colossians 2:13-14 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Jesus came to raise the dead. The only qualification for the gift of the Gospel is to be dead. You don’t have to be smart... You don’t have to be good. You don’t have to be wise. You don’t have to be wonderful. You don’t have to be anything... you just have to be dead. That’s it.
    ... Robert Farrar Capon (1925-2013), The Door Interviews, Mike Yaconelli, Zondervan, 1989, p. 230 (see the book)
    See also Col. 2:13-14; Matt. 8:22; 17:9;22:31-32; Mark 12:25-27; Luke 9:60; 20:35-38; John 5:21,24-25,28-29; Acts 2:24; 17:32; 26:8; Rom. 4:17; 6:4-5,8-11; 8:10-11; 1 Cor. 6:14; 15:21-22,51-54; 2 Cor. 1:9; Eph. 2:1-5; Rev. 1:17-18
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You have raised us to life. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Law: an uneven application

Wednesday, April 10, 2024
    Feast of William Law, Priest, Mystic, 1761
    Commemoration of William of Ockham, Franciscan Friar, Philosopher, Teacher, 1347
    Commemoration of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Priest, Scientist, Visionary, 1955
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
    —Matthew 5:48 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Is it not therefore exceeding strange, that people should place so much piety in the attendance upon public worship, concerning which there is not one precept of our Lord’s to be found, and yet neglect these common duties of our ordinary life, which are commanded in every page of the Gospel?
    ... William Law (1686-1761), A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life [1728], London: Methuen, 1899, p. 9 (see the book)
    See also Matt. 5:48; Gen. 17:1; Lev. 11:44; Deut. 18:13; Mic. 6:8; Luke 6:36; 2 Cor. 7:1; 13:11; 1 Pet. 1:15-16; 1 John 3:17
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, show me my neglects. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Bonhoeffer: to whom confess?

Tuesday, April 9, 2024
    Feast of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Teacher, Martyr, 1945
Meditation:
    Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness.
    —1 John 3:4 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Anybody who lives beneath the Cross and who has discerned in the Cross of Jesus the utter wickedness of all men and of his own heart will find there is no sin that can ever be alien to him. Anybody who has once been horrified by the dreadfulness of his own sin that nailed Jesus to the Cross will no longer be horrified by even the rankest sins of a brother.
    ... Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), Life Together [1954], tr. Daniel W. Bloesch & James H. Burtness, Fortress Press, 2004, p. 118 (see the book)
    See also 1 John 3:4; Ps. 25:11; Matt. 15:17-20; Luke 6:45; John 8:34; Rom. 7:13,22-24; Eph. 2:1-2; Heb. 12:1; Jas. 1:13-15; Jude 1:22-23
Quiet time reflection:
    Do I hate my sin enough? CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Pike: God will deliver

Monday, April 8, 2024
    Commemoration of William Augustus Muhlenberg of New York, Priest, 1877
Meditation:
    The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.
    —Galatians 6:8-9 (NIV)
Quotation:
    [Continued from yesterday]
    But since cause-and-effect is under the personal control of God, He can introduce into the situation other causes than the ones which we ourselves can control. When in faith we come to God for cleansing from the mess we have made of things, and when we ask for power to reverse causes we have set in motion, God sends in other causes by His Holy Spirit. It may be by direct intervention, or by a combination of circumstances which He controls. We can, therefore, be delivered from the wrath to come, because God will add other causes than those that we have initiated.
    ... Kenneth L. Pike (1912-2001), With Heart and Mind, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1962, p. 62 (see the book)
    See also Gal. 6:8-9; Ps. 92:5; Rom. 6:13; 8:13-14; 11:33; 1 Cor. 15:28,58
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I place the events of my life in Your hands. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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