Newman: patience

Sunday, August 11, 2024
    Feast of Clare of Assisi, Founder of the Order of Minoresses (Poor Clares), 1253
    Commemoration of John Henry Newman, Priest, Teacher, Tractarian, 1890
Meditation:
    Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop and how patient he is for the autumn and spring rains. You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord’s coming is near.
    —James 5:7-8 (NIV)
Quotation:
    May I be patient! It is so difficult to realise what one believes, and to make these trials, as they are intended, real blessings.
    ... John Henry Cardinal Newman (1801-1890), in a letter, 1828, Letters and Correspondence of John Henry Newman, v. I, London: Longmans, Green, 1903, p. 160 (see the book)
    See also Jas. 5:7-8; Ps. 37:7; Hab. 2:3-4; Luke 21:19; Rom. 8:18; Gal. 5:22-23; 6:9; Col. 1:10-11; 3:12; Jas. 1:2-4; 1 Pet. 1:6
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant me patience as You form me to Your likeness. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Clark: becoming common

Saturday, August 10, 2024
    Feast of Lawrence, Deacon at Rome, Martyr, 258
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and “sinners.”’”
    —Luke 7:33-34 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Must we then have strange music... unlike the world’s music, and a special language with an imagery that illuminates the minds only of the religious? Or dare we do what our Lord did, and see the Name hallowed in all life that is real and honest and good? Indeed, it was a scandal to the religious men of Jesus’ day when they saw what He did with sacred things. With Jesus all life was sacred and nothing was profane until sin entered in. And so it was that the word “common,” which used to mean profane and unclean, became the New Testament word for the Communion of Saints and for the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
    ... Howard Hewlett Clark (1903-1983), “Sermon at the Opening Service,” included in Anglican Congress 1963: Report of Proceedings, Eugene Rathbone Fairweather, ed., Editorial Committee, Anglican Congress, 1963, p. 11 (see the book)
    See also Luke 7:33-34; Ps. 101:2-3; Matt. 9:10; 11:18-19; Mark 2:15; 12:38-40; Luke 5:29; 15:1; 19:5; John 14:23; 1 Cor. 10:16-17; 1 John 1:3
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your touch makes the profane sacred. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Macdonald: the advantage of the poor

Friday, August 9, 2024
    Feast of Mary Sumner, Founder of the Mothers’ Union, 1921
Meditation:
    Then Jesus said to his disciples, “I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”
    —Matthew 19:23-24 (NIV)
Quotation:
    As to the poor, I am afraid I was always in some danger of being a partisan of theirs against the rich; and that a clergyman ought never to be. And, indeed, the poor rich have more need of the care of the clergyman than the others, seeing it is hardly that the rich shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, and the poor have all the advantage over them in that respect.
    ... George MacDonald (1824-1905), Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood, v. I [1867], London: Strahan & Co., 1873, p. 61 (see the book)
    See also Matt. 19:23-24; Ps. 49:5-10; Eccl. 5:10; Matt. 6:19-21; 24; Mark 10:24-25; Luke 12:15; 16:13; 18:24-25; 1 Tim. 6:9-10; Heb. 13:5; Jas. 1:9-10; 5:1-3
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, teach me to be wise about the possessions of which I am steward. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Pascal: convincing the whole man

Thursday, August 8, 2024
    Feast of Dominic, Priest, Founder of the Order of Preachers, 1221
Meditation:
    I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me in leading the Gentiles to obey God by what I have said and done—by the power of signs and miracles, through the power of the Spirit. So from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum, I have fully proclaimed the gospel of Christ.
    —Romans 15:18-19 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Miracles and truth are necessary, because it is necessary to convince the entire man, in body and soul.
    ... Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), Pensées (Thoughts) [1660], P.F. Collier & Son, 1910, #806, p. 285 (see the book)
    See also Rom. 15:18-19; Matt. 11:2-5; Luke 4:14; Acts 1:8; 15:12; 1 Cor. 1:22-25; 2 Cor. 12:12; Heb. 2:4
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your power is manifest all around us. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Germanus: By fruit, the ancient Foe's device

Wednesday, August 7, 2024
    Commemoration of John Mason Neale, Priest, Poet, 1866
Meditation:
    Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.”
    The Jews replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?”
    But the temple he had spoken of was his body.
    —John 2:19-21 (NIV)
Quotation:
By fruit, the ancient Foe’s device
Drave Adam forth from Paradise:
Christ, by the cross of shame and pain,
Brought back the dying Thief again:
“When in Thy kingdom, Lord,” said he,
“Thou shalt return, remember me!”

Thy Holy Passion we adore
And Resurrection evermore:
With heart and voice to Thee on high,
As Adam and the Thief we cry:
“When in Thy kingdom Thou shalt be
“Victor o’er all things, think of me!”

Thou, after three appointed days,
Thy Body’s Temple didst upraise:
And Adam’s children, one and all,
With Adam, to New Life didst call:
“When Thou,” they cry, “shalt Victor be
“In that Thy kingdom, think of me!”

Early, O Christ, to find Thy Tomb,
The weeping Ointment-bearers come.
The Angel, cloth’d in white, hath said,
“Why seek the Living with the dead?
“The Lord of Life hath burst death’s chain,
“Whom here ye mourn and seek in vain.”

The Apostles, on Thy Vision bent,
To that appointed mountain went:
And there they worship when they see,
And there the message comes from Thee,
That every race beneath the skies
They should disciple and baptize.

We praise the Father, God on High,
The Holy Son we magnify:
Nor less our praises shall adore
The Holy Ghost for evermore;
This grace, Blest Trinity, we crave;
Thy suppliant servants hear and save.
    ... St. Germanus (634?-734?) & John Mason Neale (1818-1866), Hymns of the Eastern Church, London: J. T. Hayes, 1870, p. 87-89 (see the book)
    See also John 2:19-21; Gen. 3:22-24; Matt. 12:38-39; 28:5-6,16-20; Luke 23:42; 24:5-6
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You have cancelled the Fall.

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Phillips: the morality of justification by faith

Tuesday, August 6, 2024
Meditation:
    Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
    —Romans 12:2 (NIV)
Quotation:
    One of Paul’s most important teachings... is the doctrine of what we call “justification by faith.” It frequently appears to the non-Christian mind that this is an immoral or at least unmoral doctrine. Paul appears to be saying that a man is justified before God, not by his goodness or badness, not by his good deeds or bad deeds, but by believing in a certain doctrine of Atonement.
    Of course, when we come to examine the matter more closely, we can see that there is nothing unmoral in this teaching at all. For if “faith” means using a God-given faculty to apprehend the unseen divine order, and means, moreover, involving oneself in that order by personal commitment, we can at once see how different that is from merely accepting a certain view of Christian redemption... That which man in every religion, every century, every country, was powerless to effect, God has achieved by the devastating humility o f His action and suffering in Jesus Christ. Now, accepting such an action as a fait accompli is only possible by this perceptive faculty of “faith.” It requires not merely intellectual assent but a shifting of personal trust from the achievements of the self to the completely undeserved action of God. To accept this teaching by mind and heart does, indeed, require a metanoia [Gr. “transformation”], a revolution in the outlook of both heart and mind.
    ... J. B. Phillips (1906-1982), New Testament Christianity, London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1956, chapt. iv, p. 45-46 (see the book)
    See also Rom. 12:2; Matt. 9:13; 20:28; Mark 2:17; 10:45; Luke 5:32; Acts 5:5; 20:21; 26:20; Rom. 2:4; 3:25-26; 2 Cor. 7:8-10; 2 Tim. 2:25-26; 2 Pet. 3:9; 1 John 2:2; 4:10
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, continue the transformation of my mind for the sake of Christ. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Eckhart: the presence of the Kingdom

Monday, August 5, 2024
    Feast of Oswald, King of Northumbria, Martyr, 642
Meditation:
    Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within you.”
    —Luke 17:20-21 (NIV)
Quotation:
    God’s Kingdom is no small thing: we may survey in imagination all the worlds of God’s creation, but they are not God’s Kingdom. In whichever soul His Kingdom appeareth, and which knoweth God’s Kingdom, that soul needeth no human preaching or instruction; it is taught from within and assured of eternal life.
    ... Meister Eckhart (1260?-1327?), Meister Eckhart’s Sermons, tr., Claud Field, H. R. Allenson, London, 1909, p. 20 (see the book)
    See also Luke 17:20-21; Jer. 31:33-34; Matt. 12:28; John 16:13; 18:36; Rom. 14:17-18; Col. 1:27
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your Spirit testifies within me to the Kingdom. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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