#for christ's sake do none of you remember his introduction

[autism-swagger]

Scream fans stop lying to yourselves. Tara is 100% an Oppenheimer guy.

[dailyaudiobible]

01/25/2021 DAB Transcript

Genesis 50:1-Exodus 2:10, Matthew 16:13-17:9, Psalms 21:1-13, Pr 5:1-6

Today is the 25th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I'm Brian it is a joy and an honor to be here with you today as we move into our workweek. And there's a surprise for us today. I have a surprise for you. We’re gonna finish the first book of the Bible today. We’ll finish the book of Genesis. So, just like that we’ve move through a whole book of the Bible, a big one too. And look at all we have covered. From the origin story of creation Adam and Eve, the Tower of Babel, Noah and the flood, Abraham going into a land he didn't know following a God he had never met and entering into a covenantal relationship. And covenants and covenantal language permeates the Bible. The son of promise, Isaac and then his son Jacob, and then his son Joseph, a lot of ground has been covered and lot to plot…to apply to our lives has been placed before us and planted in our hearts. And then so today we will finish the story of Joseph by reading the 50th chapter of Genesis, and then we’ll move in Exodus and when we get there, we’ll kind of do a little flyby and get a little kind of context of where we’re going, and then we’ll read the first couple chapters of Exodus. So, we’re reading from the English Standard Version this week. Genesis chapter 50.

Introduction to the book of Exodus:

Okay. And that concludes the book of Genesis. So, well done to us all for making it through the first full book of the Bible, which brings us now to the second book of the Bible, known as Exodus. And if we remember Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, the first five books of the Bible are known as the Torah or the Pentateuch. So, we’re entering the second book of the Torah. And if we remember when we were talking about Genesis, we’re like really really trying to establish the fact that there's a family line here - Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, whose Israel, and then he has children, and they are the children of Israel. That’s important because it affects the whole Bible. It’s important to know where they came from and their origin story and how everything became what it became because their story so parallels our own life journey. So, when we left the book of Genesis just now Joseph died, had made his brothers promise to bring his bones out of Egypt when they left. Now as we turn our attention to the book of Exodus, we’re moving forward several centuries. And, so, with one turn of the page hundreds of years have gone by. And, so, with the flip of a page then everybody that we’ve been traveling with has died and their progeny has flourished. And, so, we’re hundreds of years in the future now with the future generations of promise and they are still in Egypt. And as we will see their…their prosperity, their flourishing begins to make the Egyptians uneasy because they can one day outgrow them and take over. And, so, they enslave them. And what we will learn is that this slavery goes on for 400 years. So, that's a long time to be holding onto a promise about land, right? And the oppression of the Hebrews by the Egyptians doesn't go unnoticed. And, so, we will meet another major figure in the Bible. We’ll watch him grow up. And he has a very interesting childhood. We’ll watch them flee Egypt. We’ll watch him return from Egypt to set God's people free and his name is Moses. So, basically in Exodus we’ll meet Moses's, we’ll see the plight of the Hebrew people, we’ll watch Moses become the leader of these people and we’ll watch a very drama filled confrontation between God and Egypt and in particular the king of Egypt the Pharaoh. Eventually, God's people will be freed from their slavery and sort of the center part of Exodus will deal with their trials in the desert. And then as we move into the last part of Exodus God will begin to weave His story into the fabric of this new culture. These recently freed slaves are in the desert and God is establishing a completely new culture in the desert among them and He will be weaving Himself into everything that they do. And we’ll see things like the tabernacle and the way that sacrifices are to be given to God. And, so, what we’re watching is God culture making. And we get to sit on the front row and watch it happen. And, so, let's begin. Exodus chapter 1

Commentary:

Okay. So, we've already transitioned from Genesis to Exodus and talked about that.

Let's look at one thing and Jesus says in the book of Matthew today because it's really famous. “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul or what shall a man give in return for his soul?” So, this is obviously the call to the path of a disciple of Jesus Christ. Like this is Jesus saying what it's gonna take. “If you want to come after me deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me.” Let's stop there and talk about deny yourself and take up your cross and follow Jesus. That seems to be the precursor of one of the greatest most pervasive themes of the Bible – endurance. And we don't like to hear about it and we don't like to do it that well. And, so, we don't hear about it a lot. And if we can avoid it, we do. And yet, Jesus is saying yeah, the life following me is a life where you’re denying the false identity that you are trying to craft and build. You’re denying yourself and you’re taking up your cross and following me. You’re taking on my identity. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. And that's famous. And, so, we…we think of it in terms of like being willing to die for the cause of Christ, to become a martyr. And, indeed, that has been required of many brothers and sisters over the millennia, but it's deeper than this. It's not just a willingness to humanly die, it's the act of dying to yourself, taking up your cross and following Him. In other words, dying to yourself so that you can actually live for Christ. Later in the New Testament when we get to the letters of Paul, we will hear Paul describe it as a living sacrifice. Okay. So, that's kind of the lay of the land. If you want to be a disciple of Jesus then your identity isn't a worldly crafted thing, it's the identity of the child of the most-high God, a disciple of Christ, and you will have to participate in the act of endurance often. We’re still kind of at the beginning of the year. I…mean it’s not my favorite thing to talk about, endurance. The Bible just brings it up over and over and over and over. And I have over the years, I’ve thought, “why? Like, why can’t your yoke be easy and your burden light? Like, we like those kinds of scriptures better.” But I have come to realize that endurance isn't the absence of God's blessing. Endurance is actually evidence of God's blessing. Think about it. Think about your life. What have the greatest lessons that you have ever learned come through? Challenge, endurance, something that you had to see through, something that you had to stick with. This is how we grow. And Jesus, God made flesh is telling us that this is a part of following Him. In other words, this is a part of how it's supposed to go. So, we've got a reframe some things and rewire some things because none of us likes to go through difficulty and challenge and most of the time we wallow in it, we get stuck in it, we dig a hole there, we camp out there when we’re supposed to move through it and gain strength and wisdom and keep going. But just normally, we get mad at God, and walk away and get rebellious and act like a toddler and only to find that we missed…we…like it took so much longer than it had to take. And we missed so much that we just misunderstood that “I am apparently going into a season of endurance here, of challenge and obstacle. And, yeah, I'm gonna still hate it. It's not fun.” But it is also not a waste of time. It's not without purpose. And Jesus is telling us this right out of the gate. And then He something interesting. “What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?” In other words if we could have a life of ease and get everything that we wanted but we’d lost our identity, we got sucked into creating a false identity because of all the stuff that we have achieved and all of the stuff that we have and we thought that this is who we are and we lost the plot of the story that we are a child of the most-high, then in the end, what does that profit a person? It’s a pile of stuff. It may be cool stuff, but it's a pile of stuff. Hundred years from now nobody's gonna care about any of that stuff except for maybe antique dealers. And, so, let's pour that into our coffee and stir it around today and keep it with us. Endurance is unfortunately my friends, a part of the journey. Endurance, fortunately my friends is a part of the journey. This is how we grow. Let's just bring it really close. Let's pretend we decided that today is the last day we’re going to go through the Bible in community and we step off this train, we don't go any further, we don't endure until the end, we don't maintain the rhythm until the end, we are going to lose so much that God will gift us through His word. But those of us who stick it out show up every day and continue to show up every day, week by week, month by month, we’re going to see transformation in our lives. And this is about the time where were starting to think about, maybe not doing the New Year's resolutions anymore. Like, yeah, salad’s getting’ old and all the stuff that goes with it. And then there's all the temptations all around us to just jump off the wagon of health. And, so, we do. We’re like just this once. And then it becomes the trajectory that we head in. And, so, we can get to the year…end of the year having had wonderful goals for the year that we didn't endure and so we didn't achieve. If we want to achieve being a disciple of Jesus, then we’re gonna have to deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow Him.

Prayer:

Jesus, we enter into that. We invite Your Holy Spirit into that to apply it to our lives in places that need attention in this area right now. But we also acknowledge, You're not asking for something You didn't model. Like You’re not demanding something that You didn't show how it's done and explain it. And we have all these kinds of ideas about what it is to deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow You when at the end of the day this really does boil down to what is driving us. How is it that we are trying to achieve an identity? What is making us continue forward on any given path? What we have to do is lay down anything that's not a path that pursues You. The things that distract us or the things that pull us away, what does that profit us? Help us to see that clearly Holy Spirit, we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

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If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible that can be done at dailyaudiobible.com as well or in the app as well. And I thank you. If…if the mission that we share in common here to bring the spoken word of God read fresh every day and given freely to the world to anyone who will listen to it anywhere upon this beautiful planet that God has given us to be home any time of day or night, and to build community around that rhythm so that we know we’re not alone – we’re not alone in our quest to move through the Bible and understand it, but we’re not alone, period. We’re not alone, we’re in community together as we take this journey. If that has meant something in your life, then thank you for your partnership. There’s a link on the homepage. If you’re using the app, the link, there’s a button in the upper right-hand corner or if you prefer the mail, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app, which is the little red button up at the top or there are number of numbers that you can use. In the Americas 877-942-4253 is the number to call. If you are in the UK or Europe 44-20-3608-8078 is the number or if you are in Australia or that part of the world. 61-3-8820-5459 is the number to call.

And that's it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi this is Amy calling from the center of Canada. I…I’m lying awake in bed again, another sleepless night. I suffer from insomnia and it's exasperated my…by my depression. I also have type one diabetes and have been unemployed for almost a year now. I feel like I have a lot on my plate. And the thing that I can't stop thinking about and I feel almost obsessive about at this point is finding a partner, a husband. I feel really feel really lonely and I’m…I feel angry that God has let me have this strong desire for my whole life that I have not been able to get rid of or fulfill. And I know it's not up to me but it's really hard for me to let go of trying to do all the right things and go on the dating apps and it all feels so empty.

Hello, Daily Audio Bible this is Duane from Wisconsin. All praise and glory to our wonderful Lord and savior Jesus Christ. Today is January 21st. Yes, I've been away for a bit. My wife and I took a vacation. We went out to see our youngest daughter, our 9th granddaughter was born on Christmas Day and they live out in Seattle. So, we took the train from Milwaukee out to Seattle. So, that was fun to see the beautiful country they God has created. So, everyone's doing well. And I want to thank all of you for your prayers. I am calling in for God's Smile and then there was a gentleman who called in and he said he only has apparently a few months to live. He has cancer and I apologize I can't remember your name, but you wanted us to pray for you. So, Lord we lift up God's Smile and this gentleman who was told that he doesn't have long on this earth. He's battling cancer. Be with God’s Smile Lord. We ask for Your comfort and peace. She is such a joy for us Lord and the peace she gives us, we are asking that You would give her that piece, the piece that she…that flows through her from You to us Lord, we're now asking You would allow it to flow from us to her and that she would get the rest she needs and the strength she needs to carry on and be a light for You as she is. We ask that You be with this gentleman who's battling cancer who has a wife and children Lord. We're asking that You will give him extended time on this earth to be a light for him for his wife to be there with his children and grandchildren. We want to lift this up to You are great and precious Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. And God bless.

Good morning my name is Soniato here from Ontario CA. Please key from my family in Boston they have Covid 19. Her name is Jeannie – Jeanine, Evelyn, Gobanni. Please pray for them for healing. Thank you. God bless you.

Good evening everybody this is God’s Smile here. You know, this community’s a beautiful thing and sometimes a caller just touches you very deep inside and I've just listened to a lady who's recently got out of hospital with Covid an she said that her husband had left her after 46 years. She's no help at the moment and she said that the home health hasn't kicked in. And she's alone. So, I don't know your name dear lady, but I'd like to pray for you. Father God, we as a community, we wrap our owns around this lady and we ask that You would breathe and surround her with Your love not that Your love is never there but Father would You whip it up, would You whip that love up so that it is felt and seen. May she hear You as she reads Your word. And Father when this home health kicks in, I ask dear Lord, I ask because I can come to You and ask these things that this home help would be more than just a help, she would become a friend. And could I go as far to ask dear Lord that You would give her a Christian lady? Wouldn't that be just wonderful? Father I don't know if she has a church, but I pray the church around her would support her. Time's ticking away. I send you my love and a kiss. Kiss kiss. Love you all.

Hi family this is Biola from Maryland I hope you're all doing well. Brian and Jill God bless you. God bless your ministry. We're looking forward to China's little baby. Well, I pray that God will continue to touch her and protect her. Family today is January 22nd. Today would have been my father's birthday. He went home to be with the Lord in 2016 September 20. So, I just want to ask for prayer especially for my mom who is still grieving his death that God would just uphold her and be with her Jesus’ name. A listener from Montana, oh my gosh sister. I listened to your message like two or three times. I was so intrigued and convicted by what you said. Sister, you have such a sweet spirit. I am so happy that you found Daily Audio Bible. You know it is because of new listeners like you that I am proud to give to Daily Audio Bible. It is ministry worth sewing into. Sister I pray that God will continue to let you experience His joy. I can…I can tell from your voice that joy in spite of the blindness I am thanking God for your life and for your sweet 2-year-old and for your husband and for your marriage and I pray that God will continue to just wrap His arms around you and just show you His love intangible ways in the name of Jesus. And then I'm also praying for the brother who called in and said he was blind, and he just found Daily Audio Bible app. Oh wonderful brother. I pray that as…__ word is you walk by faith not by sight that God will show you different things in your life and He will answer your prayers. Before you call He will answer in the name of Jesus. Now Sarah from London I am praying for you sister that God will touch you He will continue to wrap His arms around you He will make your heart for Him. You will have a heart that follows hard after Him in Jesus…

This is Chili from Florida and I'm calling in for an urgent prayer request. I've had some heart issues for quite a while and now I'm in the…the hospital. You know chest pains and just really scared right now. Trying to have faith and trust in the Lord that His hands of healing will heal and touch my body and get me through this. It's just…it's just a scary time, you know, 'cause I did have to also confess to my wife of a sin. I sinned against her recently. So, my hearts also broken. So, I just really need prayer with you guys 'cause I'm just scared right now. Thank you guys I love you very much and I've been with this group for years…

Hi Daily Audio Bible this is Abba’s Joy. It's been a while since I've called in but first, I just want to say I'm so excited because I read through the entire Bible with you all last year and it's been something that I've wanted to do for so long, so many years as a believer. And I finally did it and it was life changing. It was a huge blessing and to be able to do it with you guys was just amazing. But I wanted to call in because I wanted to share something. After listening to the wonderful message from yesterday I went back and read the entry in the God of Your Atory and if you don't have it I encourage you to go get it. So, one thing Brian wrote that was profound to me in my current situation. After all that Joseph had to endure which was not by choice or because of anything he did when he saw his brothers he observed. He could have easily spoken what his flesh may have been feeling or even acted on it but like Brian says in his distress he didn't even reveal himself. He goes on to say to slow down and be observant. My biggest challenge right now DAB community is navigating adolescence with my teenage son. He loves the Lord with all of his heart and has been raised in the word but there's a lot happening that overwhelms an exhaust’s my heart. And anyway, Brian helped me to see that I don't have to reveal myself in my distress I just need to just slow down and sometimes just observe the situation because I don't even know where my son's heart may be at the time. And responding in my distress will only provoke him and escalate both of our emotions. So, for those parents in the same boat as I am trying to raise godly teenagers in the midst of a…of everything that's going on with all these distractions I encourage...

[captcas]

Worth Fighting For

WORTH FIGHTING FOR by capthamm

Killian “Hook” Jones is a dominate up and comer in the UFC while Emma “The Savior” Swan’s career was cut short. When Hook’s manager moves up and the office brings in UFC’s youngest legend to keep him in check, will either of them be able to handle it?

read on ao3 // tumblr: ch 1/ ch 2

[CHAPTER 3/?]

Saturday night brings their monthly movie/game night and Emma has never been more grateful for a distraction. Ruby and the Nolans will come over around 6 o’clock and Henry is practically bouncing off the walls with excitement. Tonight’s theme is Star Wars and this will be Henry’s official introduction to the series; at David’s insistence they’re starting with A New Hope and going release order from there. They’re also going to play Star Wars trivia which Henry will undoubtedly suck at.

Should be a fun night all around.

And it was, until Henry went to bed and the “adults” got to talking.

Ruby cracks another beer and turns to Emma, “So, Emma, you’ve got probably the coolest new job in the world and you haven’t said jack shit.”

She shoots Ruby an icy glare as David and MM stop bickering over whether or not Kylo Ren deserved a redemption arc to hear what Emma has to say.

Emma sighs, “It’s going alright. All the onboarding is underway and between the perks, benefits, and pay, Henry should be set for life.” She’s been fortunate to live off her winnings for the past nine years, being mindful of money and not giving into the lifestyle of frivolous spending many fighters take on, but -even her friends know- she doesn’t have a money tree.

The looks on their faces when she mentions Henry being set for life could melt 1000 Olafs. When she arrived at Ruth Nolan’s home at the age of 16, she never expected to find a family. Hardened by a life too lived for anyone her age, Emma assumed they’d be like every other foster home and use her for the money. To this day, she’s never been so happy to be wrong.

Emma’s not sure what twist of fate landed an orphan with such a great support system, but she’ll be forever grateful. David took to the “protective brother” role immediately. Soon after Emma moved in, he met Mary Margaret (fireworks and butterflies and all that mumbo jumbo) who introduced them to Ruby. They’re small, and maybe a bit scrappy, but they’re family.

She breaks out of her thoughts and returns to the present, “I will need some babysitting though; I’m required to attend each of my client’s Fight Nights. But overall it’s great, really!”

She hopes she squeaked away without having to mention Jones at all but the glint in Ruby’s eye tells her otherwise. “Ok that’s all fine and dandy,” Mary Margaret shoots Ruby an incredulous look, warning her to tread carefully, but Ruby ignores her and continues, “but who’s the client?”

David is giving her a protective father vibe, Ms is practically vibrating, and she's pretty sure Ruby is salivating. Emma sighs realizing she shouldn’t postpone the inevitable, “Killian Jones.”

Ruby practically drops her drink and Mary Margaret squeals, David rolls his eyes and turns back to the TV where SportsCenter has been playing in the background. Mary Margaret beats Ruby to the punch, “THE Killian Jones?! As in Killian “Hook” Jones?!”

Emma nods, standing up to refill the only slightly empty chip bowl in front of her. She knew this was going to happen and she wasn’t exactly looking forward to her friends thirsting over her client– client… right.

Ruby speaks next, “Well that is probably the best case scenario. Do you think he can get us tickets? Have you met him? Is he as gorgeous in person as he is on TV? Can we meet him?”

Emma, now glad she’s in the kitchen with space to breathe, is starting to feel a bit overwhelmed. She knows Ms can sense it and is unsurprised when she speaks next,“For Christ’s sake Ruby let her breathe. She’s probably only had her initial meeting with him.”

Ruby seems to get the hint and it doesn’t take long before Ms is in the kitchen helping Emma pick up the leftover pizza, “We’re happy for you, Emma. He’s a huge client for them, they obviously trust you to do a good job.” Emma nods in thanks and they both head back into the living room. Her sister-in-law’s warmth always calms her (and Ruby) down which allows David to jump in and change the subject to the coverage of some football player’s arrest on SportsCenter. Emma finally catches a breath and realizes just how lucky she is for the friend dynamic they have before settling in to debate if this James Spencer kid should still be eligible for the draft.

As she lays in bed that night, Ms’ words ring through her head. Despite the rollercoaster of emotions she’s been feeling, Killian is a huge client, one that was formerly represented by a namesake for the company. This re energizes her a bit and helps her fall asleep, actually excited for what's to come.

She wakes up Sunday morning and makes Henry some pancakes and declares it a lazy Sunday. Henry happily obliged, cuddling up on the couch with The Deathly Hallows while Emma threw on some shitty reality TV.

. . .

When her alarm rings Monday morning, Emma pulls her pillow over her head like some teenager from one of those Disney Channel movies.

It takes her a second to remember what day it is and why she’s up at this godforsaken hour.

Killian Jones. Right.

She audibly groans before rolling out of bed and getting ready for the day. Between her shower and breakfast she gets Henry up. School starts at 8 so he’s technically running a bit behind but he’ll make it on the bus in time… hopefully.

She’s pouring him a bowl of cereal when he comes out of his room zipping up his sweater and rubbing his eyes.

“Hey, kid. Coco Puffs or Fruit Loops?” He mumbles some semblance of what she thinks is Fruit Loops so she pours the bowl and slides it across the kitchen island. He smiles in thanks as she pours her own bowl and sits beside him.

“So today’s the big day?”

She didn’t tell Henry about her new client and when she spoke to the Nolan’s and Ruby, he was definitely supposed to be sleeping. “How could you possibly know that?”

“You’re not as quiet as you think you are and I’m not as tired as you think I am.” He yawns as if to punctuate his point.

“Uh huh, sure, kid.” He gives her a knowing glance and she realizes she’s not getting out of this. She runs her hands over her face and sighs, “Yes, today is the first meeting and I’m only slightly nervous to fu— screw this whole thing up.”

Henry chuckles at her attempted censorship (she never said she was a perfect parent), “You’ll be great, Mom, and Hook seems like a decent enough guy. I’m sure he won’t give you too much trouble.”

She stares at Henry a bit dumbfounded. It shocks her everyday how old he’s getting– nine going on nineteen for sure.  “Are you hiding some Weasley’s Extendable Ears in your room or something? Are you a wizard? Should you be at Hogwarts?” Emma is very obviously trying to derail this conversation but it works, setting Henry off about how he’s finally on the sixth book and explaining the concept of a horcrux.

Oh, her sweet summer child.

God, maybe he is old enough for UFC.

When did that happen?

She ushers Henry to the bus, promising him they’ll watch the sixth movie tonight if he finishes the book today and is to school on time. It’s only September and he can’t be late three times in the first month of school. She kisses his forehead and he wishes her good luck.

Sometimes she wonders how such a screw up ended up with the perfect kid.

After cleaning up the kitchen, Emma finishes getting ready. She jumps on the subway and finds herself at the office with a half hour to spare. She’s never early so she chalks it up to nerves and uses the time to prep for this meeting.

Over the weekend she received multiple emails from Gold’s team surrounding a possible spot for Killian on the card for the pay-per-view Fight Night in November.

A pay-per-view card. She did enough research about Killian this weekend to know that would be his first.

Emma feels like she’s been thrown into the deep end before being taught how to swim.

Go big or go home.

She did a lot of research about Killian and learned practically nothing. She knows he came here from London almost ten years ago and that his team includes his head trainer Robin (husband of now former manager Regina Mills), and three other men named Will Scarlett, August Booth, and William Smee (he’s really selling it with that whole Hook theme). Other than that all she found was his record and highlights. He’s 6-0 which is insane for only being in the circuit for a year and a half– fighters are usually limited to three, maybe four fights a year.

4 of his 6 are knockouts.

He’s good… really good.

Her thoughts are interrupted by a light tapping on the edge of her cubicle. She glances up to find none other than the man himself. She can’t help but double take.

Real professional, Emma.

She's only ever seen him in the ring, at the gym, or dressed up for a business meeting. She’s not sure what she expected, but a leather jacket and pants that fit him like his own skin definitely weren’t it.

He looks good… really good.

Emma snaps herself out of it, “Hi, Mr. Jones, just give me a moment and we can head to the conference room.”

“It’s Killian, love, please.” She notices he winces at the seemingly habitual pet name. Emma ignores the ring of disappointment that runs through her gut at the realization that it may not be reserved for her. “A conference room’s a bit formal, don’t you think? Let’s get out of here, Swan.”

He grabs her hand before she can answer. “Mr.— Killian. Is this allowed?”

He chuckles. “We can plan the meetings at our leisure,” he says the last bit in an almost scary imitation of Regina, “but even still, Regina and I never met in office. A bit silly for two people to take up an entire conference room, yeah? Come on, lass, try something new. It’s called trust.”

Emma rolls her eyes but follows along anyway. The elevator ride should’ve been awkward but Killian kept the conversation flowing by asking her preferred drink. “Coffee, tea, or smoothies?”

Despite the risk of sounding like a child, Emma finds herself being honest with him, “Uhh, I actually prefer hot chocolate… with cinnamon.”

He smiles brightly at her, as though her drink order was the most brilliant discovery this century, “Perfect, Swan. I know just the place.”

She was so swept up in his ambush, she doesn’t realize that this isn’t the cocky, asshat Killian Jones she sees on tv or at the gym until he’s practically dragging her across the street to a small cafe. This Killian seems genuine and carries this almost childlike excitement.

Emma tells herself she has no interest in learning more about this Killian.

(Emma doesn’t have to tell herself that that is complete bullshit.)

. . .

He can’t stop himself from beaming when she offers up her drink order without hesitation. Killian feels like a bloody teenager around her. He promised himself he wouldn’t feel this way again, but something about Emma Swan has completely entranced him.

He finds himself fascinated with every part of her, including the small things, like the fact she takes cinnamon on her hot chocolate.

Once they get to the cafe across the street, Killian forces himself to dial it back. He can tell she’s guarded and as much as he’d like to be friends (more than friends) with the lass, he knows business has to come first.

It wouldn’t exactly be a good look for him if he ran “The Savior” out of the office on her second day.

Somehow he thinks he doesn’t have that power.

He’d like to. (Obviously not to run her out of the office, but he’d like his existence to mean that much to her.)

Bloody hell, he's being ridiculous.

They sit down across from each other at a small table by the window. He expects to start the conversation but before he can form a coherent thought she’s speaking.

“So, Killian. I’ve already received some correspondence from Gold’s team. I’m not sure how much time you usually take between fights and I know it’s already the end of September but…”

She’s rambling and he doesn’t think he’s ever seen anybody so adorable when they’re nervous.

Adorable is not a professional descriptor.

Killian Jones doesn’t want “professional” with Emma Swan.

Fuck.

“...Gold is hoping to get you on the main card for November 14th.”

Did she just say main card?

He chokes on his coffee.

“Main card, Swan? I’ve never been on the main card. Strictly early prelims…”

She eyes him suspiciously, “Usually that’s a good thing. Upward momentum and all that. His team is clearly impressed by your dominant record.”

“Is his team the only one impressed?” The flirt escapes him before he can stop it.  

Bloody idiot.

She doesn’t even bat an eye, “The entire league seems to be impressed, Jones.” Her tone tells him she knows what just happened but she shut it down immediately.

He likes a challenge.

Emma Swan may be his favorite challenge yet.

Emma Swan is off limits, but Killian will be damned if he cares.

. . .

Emma is surprised when Killian pays for their drinks despite her insistence that she can charge it to Mills Management. She’s also surprised by how nice he is.

She keeps waiting for the other shoe to drop.

She’s still waiting.

He’s definitely flirtatious, every other sentence being easily twisted into some sort of innuendo, but she can tell it’s a front. The little things he does like tipping the barista an extra fifty cents or holding the door for her, let on to the man behind the persona.

Well, and the fact he practically chokes when she tells him they want him for the main card.

He seems genuinely shocked that anyone would be impressed by him. His mask comes out almost immediately, another innuendo laced into his question. She doesn’t let him go there, shutting it down as quickly as it started. For this to work, she needs him the real him. Not the cocky MMA fighter who he used to catch the eye of UFC execs. She compliments him, and it’s beyond genuine. That seems to calm his nerves a bit as they move into social media management and he shifts into a professionalism she’s not entirely prepared for.

She’s not sure she wants professional Killian Jones.

Whoa, Emma, pump the breaks.

She shakes it off as she watches him take notes on what she’s saying about the importance of a lead up on Twitter and how it can set the tone for the entire fight. His tongue runs along the inside of his lower lip as he concentrates and she can’t help the overwhelming wave of attraction that hits her.

Like lightning.

It’s not just the tongue, (but that’s not helping) it’s his dedication to this sport and how he actually gives a fuck about what she’s saying. Killian never displayed even a hint of the deeply rooted misogyny that runs rampant throughout the industry. He actually seems almost humbled by her presence. The words escape her mouth before she can’t stop them, “Why are you actually taking anything I say seriously?”

Very professional, Emma. Way to instill confidence in your client. Smooth.

His head snaps up at her abrupt question and he looks confused. “I know you don’t like being called a legend, Swan, but you were a damn good fighter. If I walk out of this partnership with half the following and success you had, I’d call that a win.”

She’s stunned by his sincerity.

Brick. Wall. (She thinks she hears Pink Floyd somewhere in the distance.)

“And I suppose you think you know all about me from our, what, three conversations now?” She knows it’s snippy, that’s the point.

He stops typing and puts his phone down. “Pardon me, love, but you’re a bit of an open book.”

Emma scoffs, “Anyone with the internet knows I prefer people don’t call me a legend.”

“Aye, but do they know it’s because you feel too young with a career too short to have made an impact? That you feel choosing yourself, a life, over MMA removes all glory from your name?”

Emma is entirely shaken by his apparent ability to read her like a fucking picture book. (Does that even make sense? Do you read picture books?) Emma never had a formal retirement ceremony; gloves in the middle of the ring and all that. She had asked Gold to be taken off the roster and for a quiet exit and that’s what he’d given her. The public doesn’t know the real reason she left MMA, her attempt at keeping Henry’s life as normal as possible, but somehow Killian–

Brick. Brick. Brick.

“Let’s talk about Instagram.” She sees the disappointment sweep across his face, realizing she can read him pretty well too. That’s terrifying.

Way more terrifying than social media plans.

They keep it strictly business for the rest of the meeting. She’s startled when her stomach rumbles and she checks the time.

12:00. They’ve been strategizing for three hours.

She’s not sure where the time went, and when Killian asks her if she wants to grab a bite to eat together, she’s startled again by her initial gut reaction to say yes.

Obviously, she says no and makes up some lie about needing to get back to the office. He knows it’s a lie, she can see it all over his face. He doesn’t push her though, and she’s grateful. They set their next meeting and Emma’s heart speeds up, seemingly unaware that this is a business meeting and not a date. She shakes his hand and promises to have a full plan ready for Thursday before practically sprinting out of the cafe.

In three conversations Killian Jones has gone from asshat to… who knows. One thing Emma does know is that Killian Jones is off limits to the highest of ethical degrees. But what scares her most, is that she’s not entirely sure she cares.

. . .

As soon as he asks her to lunch he knows he’s pushed too far.

Actually, he perhaps pushed too far by letting on just how easy it was for him to read her, but lunch, well that was just asking for a brick wall. He runs his hands across his face, completely taken with someone he has no right to. She’s witty, smart, and could probably kick his ass— scratch that, could definitely kick his ass— but she also has demons, he can see them swimming behind her eyes. Demons that seem scarily similar to his, maybe not on the surface but definitely in their damage. Emma is raw and unapologetic; a real human being who is, for all intents and purposes, unimpressed by the suave persona of Killian “Hook” Jones.

She’s bloody perfect.

He’s fucking fucked.

Eloquent.

Killian decides to grab a quick lunch from the cafe and head to the gym. He has a lot of pent up frustration and really feels the need to punch something. Thank god that’s his job. He scarfs down his sandwich, not realizing how hungry he was and jumps on the subway to the training center. He miraculously finds a seat and is able to scroll through his phone a bit. As he pokes around Twitter he finds an article announcing Emma “The Savior” Swan’s comeback to the UFC. He clicks on it, curiosity getting the better of him despite probably knowing the gist of the article.

He didn’t expect a timeline of her very impressive career:

2008: Swan joins the UFC with her Boston gym. Her debut match against Aurora Rose ended in a TKO. She’s back in action six months later fighting Ella Tremaine. She wins again, this time after three rounds by split decision.

2009: A dominant start to the year for The Savior with a first round submission against Tiana Dampier in January. She rounded out her year with another first round submission against El Oldenburg in May, and a third round knockout against Esmerelda Gringoire in October.

2010: Swan goes three rounds with Merida Baer and wins by unanimous decision. Swan wins again after three rounds by split decision against Megara Alcmene. The Savior’s final match is a KO against Mulan Fa rounding out her record to 8-0. Her next match, meant to be for the women’s title, was declined with no comment from The Savior.

2020: Swan joins Mills Management as a talent manager assigned to Killian “Hook” Jones.

Killian knew Swan was good, an early legend in her own right, but he had no idea she was this dominant. He also had no idea she left without so much as a wave goodbye. He figured he’d just missed the announcement seeing as it came well before his introduction into the sport. Against his typical moral code, he tries to google why she left but finds nothing. She knocks out Mulan Fa and then just stops being added to cards and fades away as new fighters take her place.

He knows there’s a reason for her secrecy and he’d be lying if he said curiosity was the only driving force behind his attempt to learn more. He finds himself wanting to know everything there is to know about Emma Swan; a deeper part of him aches for her to be the one who tells him.

He’s positive he can only dream of gaining that level of trust from her, but he has to try. Liam's words ring heavy in his ears, "A man unwilling to fight for what he wants, deserves what he gets."

He gets off at the stop closest to the training center and walks through the front doors, waving to Belle at the front desk before heading into the locker room. He’s fortunate to be on the UFC roster, allowing him to keep his training gear at the center and not have to worry about lugging it around with him. It also gives him the freedom to come here whenever he needs to let off some steam. He changes quickly and finds a treadmill to warm up. He jogs a mile and a half before picking up the pace. Killian’s in the midst of his runner’s high when someone steps into the machine next to him. He turns his head to offer them a small smile in hello, it’s not that big of a gym, exclusive to the UFC industry and a few friends of friends, so chances are he knows the person at least in passing.

Oh, Killian knows them alright, and he practically falls off the treadmill when he sees her green eyes blown wide.

[hieromonkcharbel]

The New Evangelization Begins in the Confessional

What is the new evangelization?

The expression “new evangelization” was popularized by the important apostolic exhortation of Blessed Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi, as a response to the new challenges that the contemporary world creates for the mission of the Church. As Saint John Paul II tells us in Crossing the Threshold of Hope, the new evangelization has nothing in common with restoration, proselytism, pluralism or tolerance: instead, against the spirit of the world, the Church takes up anew each day a struggle that is none other than the struggle for the world’s soul. Saint John Paul concluded that in its ever renewed encounter with man, evangelization is linked to generational change. Generations come and go which have distanced themselves from Christ and the Church, which have accepted a secular model of thinking and living. Meanwhile, the Church is always looking toward the future and She constantly goes out to meet new generations. And new generations clearly seem to be accepting with enthusiasm what their elders seem to have rejected.

Where does the new evangelization begin?

In a speech addressed to priests and deacons at an audience with the Pope in 2012, Pope Benedict XVI maintained that the new evangelization begins in the confessional. Consciousness of one’s own sinful condition helps one to realize the need for “openness of heart” to God. “The certainty that He is close and His mercy awaits the human being, even one who is involved in sin, in order to heal his weakness with the grace of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, is always a ray of hope for the world”, Pope Benedict said. The real conversion of our hearts means opening ourselves to God’s transforming and renewing action. In confession, through the freely bestowed action of divine Mercy, repentant sinners are justified, pardoned and sanctified and they abandon their former selves to be re-clothed in the new.

The necessity of confession

Confession is a part of our great Catholic heritage and has been practiced by our Christian ancestors since the earliest days of the Church. In the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (Didache, ca. 100) it states quite unambiguously: “Assemble on the Lord’s day and break bread and offer the Eucharist, but first make confession of your faults” (14, 1). In his groundbreaking work, Jesus of Nazareth, Part Two, Pope Benedict XVI reminds us that although we are saved by our baptism, “even the baptized remain sinners, so they need confession of sins, for in the life of Christians, –for table fellowship with the Lord– it constantly requires completion: washing of the feet”. In the First Letter of John we read, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1:8-10). According to Pope Benedict XVI, the use of the word “cleanse” signals an inner connection with the foot-washing passage. In confession, the Lord washes our soiled feet over and over again and prepares us for table fellowship with him. In the humble gesture of the washing of the feet is an expression of the entire ministry of Jesus’ life and death. The Lord stands before us as the servant of God –he who for our sake becomes one who serves, who carries our burden and so grants us true purity, the capacity to draw close to God.

Medicine for the Soul

The sacrament of the forgiveness of sins presupposes sins to be forgiven. What then is sin? Sin means disobedience to God’s commandments. It is a moral lapse, a free choice of the will. Sin must be admitted if it is to be forgiven, because we cannot be forgiven for sins we do not confess and repent of. “When Christ’s faithful strive to confess all the sins that they can remember, they undoubtedly place all of them before the divine mercy for pardon. But those who fail to do so and knowingly withhold some, place nothing before the divine goodness for remission… for if the sick person is too ashamed to show his wound to the doctor, the medicine cannot heal” (CCC 1456). “Sin is in the soul what disease is in the body. Forgiveness is a healing operation, a real spiritual change: it requires the light of truth to shine on it – by confession – and only then can we find peace.” (Dr. Peter Kreeft)

The joy after confession

As C. S. Lewis noted, “Humility, after the first shock is a cheerful virtue.” The greatest saints have always had the greatest joy –for joy is one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22). Yet these same saints see themselves as the greatest sinners. Pascal said there are only two kinds of people: saints, who know they are sinners, and sinners, who think they are saints. The confession of sin frees us and facilitates our reconciliation with others. Through an admission of sin, “man looks squarely at the sins he is guilty of, takes responsibility for them, and thereby opens himself again to God and to the communion of the Church.” (CCC 1455) On the level of human psychology, each of us needs to “let it all out” and “unload” so that our conscience may be clear. Thomas A Kempis exhorts us to maintain a clean conscience, stating : “Have therefore a clean conscience and thou shalt always have gladness. A good conscience may bear many wrongs, and is ever merry and glad in adversities; but an evil conscience is always fearful and unquiet.” Pardon and peace come from confession. “The forgiven penitent is reconciled with himself in his inmost being, where he regains his innermost truth… He is reconciled with all creation.” (CCC 1469) Following confession, the penitent finds peace and serenity with strong spiritual consolation. It is a peace that includes wholeness, harmony and a right relationship with God, self, and others. It is an echo from Eden and a foretaste of heaven. This is the peace Jesus Christ gives, “not as the world gives” (John 14:27).

Confession for conversion to holiness

All of us are under a continuing need for conversion. Conversion begins in Baptism, but conversion does not end in Baptism. It is an ongoing process because it is an ongoing need. Thomas A Kempis enlightens us in The Imitation of Christ with his observation, “How great is the frailty of human nature which is ever prone to evil! Today you confess your sins and tomorrow you again commit the sins which you confessed. One moment you resolve to be careful, and yet after an hour you act as though you had made no resolution.” Baptism is our first conversion, but through confession we undergo a second conversion because we are always in need of purification. St. Ambrose says of the two conversions that in the Church, “there are water and tears: the water of Baptism and the tears of repentance.” Pope Benedict states that the new evangelization draws its lifeblood from the holiness of the children of the Church, from the daily journey of personal and community conversion in order to be ever more closely conformed to Christ. There is a close connection between holiness and the Sacrament of Reconciliation, witnessed by all the saints of history. In the Introduction to the Devout Life, St. Francis de Sales encourages us towards repentant conversion in order to gain holiness, urging: “Even as a man just recovering from illness walks only so far as he is obliged to go, with a slow and weary step, so the converted sinner journeys along as far as God commands him but slowly and wearily, until he attains a spirit of true devotion, and then, like a sound man, he not only gets along, but he runs and leaps in the way of God’s Commands, and hastens gladly along the paths of heavenly counsels and inspirations.”

Through confession we emerge renewed

Pope Benedict XVI summarized the benefits of confession saying, “In the celebration of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the faithful have a real experience of that Mercy which Jesus of Nazareth, Lord and Christ has given to us, so that they themselves will become credible witnesses of that holiness which is the aim of the New Evangelization.” As Saint John Paul II indicated, the new evangelization is about the struggle for man’s soul: and the way to regain the souls of men is to give them a new beginning through the sacrament that renews our encounter with Christ. Our Holy Father Pope Benedict concluded his remarks to Priests in 2012 with this strong appeal: “This is my hope for each one of you: may the newness of Christ always be the center and reason for your priestly existence, so that those who meet you through your ministry may exclaim as did Andrew and John ‘we have found the Messiah’ (John 1:41). In this way, every Confession, from which each Christian will emerge renewed, will be a step ahead in the New Evangelization. May Mary, Mother of Mercy, Refuge for us sinners and Star of the New Evangelization, accompany us on our way.”

[crossinginstyle]

3x12 The Bakra

Ok I don't wanna see people complaining about the lack of intimacy in this ep because there may not have been sex, but there was damn intimacy in spades here, ok?? 

Poor Ian. I mean good lord. The kid comes from a relatively sheltered farm life - his adventures with Uncle Jamie notwithstanding - and here he's been kidnapped, tossed into a dirty hole with ominous warnings from other boys and then he has to go solo against the absolute QUEEN OF CRAZY 

But BY GOD do I love Geillis Duncan. From the second I heard her start to speak I was flailing. I mean I knew she'd be in this ep of course but damn does she ever make a dramatic entrance! I always hated what became of her in the book. I mean she was never a GOOD person by any means but the raping of boys just pissed me off as a reader. In the book she's described as having aged horribly, and is overweight. I never liked that either only because I couldn't see Geillis letting herself go. In fact, it made much more sense to me that she goes to bizarre lengths to preserve her looks. The blood bath was just the right amount of horrifying and horrifyingly sexy. And John Bell does a fantastic job of portraying that "terrified but aroused" expression. I WAS kinda hoping they'd leave out Geillis's creepier rapey tendencies. I can see that they tried to make the scene look more like a seduction than a rape, and they seemed to have aged Ian up a bit for that purpose, but yeah it was still creepy as fuck. Again, poor Ian. 

Random, but did that opening shot of the port in Jamaica seem to take forever? I felt like I was sitting there for ages like "ok it's a port. There's a ship. There's some buildings. Ok let's move on." Just me? 

I love Jamie happily introducing his wife every chance he gets. He's so obvious and adorable about it! I love him so. 

Wow. The slave trade scene. I was looking forward to this to see Cait in action and holy shit she nailed it. You could see and feel how horrified and devastated she was. You could see from the very beginning when Jared's employee and Jamie were discussing the slave market how obviously uncomfortable Claire was about it. She's known for quite a while now that Ian had possibly been sold, so attending a slave market was a possibility, but then you could see that nothing could have prepared her for the reality. It's been a while since I read the book so I don't remember how it's described there but when Claire is watching Temeraire about to be publicly violated and snaps, I think it's when someone in the crowd exclaims about Mistress Abernathy that really does it for her. She hears the name and that's the last straw. 

 Also watching Claire beat a man with a decorative umbrella is everything. 

Love Jamie, as usual, jumping in to defend his wife. You can kind of see that moment of "oh, for Christ's sake Claire..." before he jumps into the fray but it doesn't matter to him WHY his wife is suddenly in the middle of a brawl only that he better get her out of it. Later, Jamie never questions Claire's passion on the subject, never scolds her for making a spectacle. She asked him to save that one man and Jamie did the only thing he was capable of doing in the moment. Claire is of course appalled that she's suddenly become the thing she hates, but it's fitting. And I don't blame Jamie for doing it in her name. 

 Ah, the ball!!! I was SO HOPING that Claire would make fun of Jamie for the powdered wig. But at least Marsali did, so that's something lmao. But then it got all cute with Jamie complimenting Claire, and then them being all adorable, seeing Fergus and Marsali fawn over each other and reminiscing about when they were younger. Which...I mean honestly...they never stopped fawning over each other and Jamie proved that with 

 INTENSE EYE SEX 

 HOT FUCKING DAMN and it went on so gloriously long. I was actually feeling MYSELF blush! Claire was about 3 seconds from saying screw the ball and finding a quiet corner to climb Jamie like a tree.It was just the thing I think she needed before the Big Introduction about to take place. 

Oh the delicious awkwardness!!!! Poor John Bae. He looks ready to tackle Jamie for a hug and then you see the INSTANT strain in his eyes when Jamie introduces Claire. And Claire...again, bravo Cait for saying so much with only facial expressions. She catches on almost immediately to John's painfully obvious attraction to Jamie. 

She can feel the awkwardness rolling off of him in waves. And then they go for a private chat and that's where Claire starts to feel a little awkward herself, because suddenly she's not so sure that attraction is so one sided. I mean, what else is she supposed to think when Jamie and John's eye contact lasts almost as long as the eye fuck she'd been party to only moments before??? And then Jamie asks about Willie and the world melts. The only thing better than all that is John and Claire's later conversation after Jamie walks away. 

   John being so transparently miffed that Jamie obviously has no issue telling Claire all of his deep dark secrets...Claire none-too-subtly yet oh so classily digging her claws in and staking claim to Jamie. I'm so glad we get all this drama WITHOUT the added weight of Jamie still keeping Willie a secret from Claire. That was very well done by the showrunners, as it would have completely messed with the flow here. 

 And then UP POPS A GEILLIE and Claire's like

 Aw Claire's so torn, the way she's always been with Geillis. Torn between being afraid of Geillis, being disgusted by her, being grateful to her, and as always begrudgingly liking her. It's a truly strange and unique relationship they have. Because they're tied together by obvious means of being fellow time travelers, but I don't think that's what makes it hard for Claire to dislike her. (Until next episode of course.) Claire knows the evil things Geillis has done. She's been witness to the murder of two of Geillis's husbands, and she knows good and well that she killed the most recent one too. She knows these things, but she also knows that Geillis sacrificed herself for Claire, and at this point in the narrative she just can’t find it in her to hate her. But now I think Claire is being reminded of how batshit crazy her old friend is, and it's hilarious to see. 

 "She's a bit strange." 

 It's like Innes and Lesley's comment last week about Claire popping up in strange places. Way to point out the painfully obvious, Outlander! Lmao. 

 Ok I've never really understood the whole prophecy thing. Like I didn't get it in the book either. I’m only up to Fiery Cross but I seem to remember Diana just kind of dropping it? Maybe by next week I'll understand it better lol. 

 The Benjamin Button comment 😂 Man I wish Geillis didn't have to be so evil. She and Claire could have had a ball going around making references no one else gets! I guess Bree and Roger can fill that void later on haha.

That little weasel Captain Leonard. I’m so happy Claire didn’t refrain from calling him out. He literally owes her his life and the lives of half his crew. He couldn’t do her this ONE solid of looking the other way when it came to her husband?

And AHH Jamie giving Claire the pictures of the children. How meaningful is it that his primary concerns (considering Claire is in no current danger) are his children, including Ian? He asks her not just to TRY to find Ian, but to find him. He trusts her completely to do what needs to be done, and knows she’ll stop at nothing. I’m sure he’s also totally aware that if he can’t get out of his situation himself, Claire will come, guns blazing, after she’s saved Ian.

But okay, I know loads of viewers are panicking about the kiss and the sexy washcloth thing from the opening credits, and yes I do want to see those (and I’m pretty sure we will,) but MY concern is...and again, it’s been a while since I read the book...but isn’t there a shipwreck?! Part of that is in the opening credits too. How the HELL are they going to fit all of what’s left into one hour without hitting fast motion and letting everyone flail through the episode like an old timey silent slapstick comedy? Is the episode supposed to be extended at all???

Also I can’t BELIEVE this season is already almost over, and we’re facing yet another Droughtlander. I’m happy they’ve been on the ball filming season 4, which means we shouldn’t get any delay in the start of the season like this year. But I’m sitting here, anxiously twiddling my thumbs, waiting for Starz to go ahead and announce renewal for season 5 already!!!!! Don’t make us suffer another year and a half of waiting!!!!! 

[burnslaura]

How Much Is A Reiki Session Cost Cheap And Easy Diy Ideas

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This helps you be more social and more engaging than a few minutes and was introduced to point a student for an hour or more serious individual focus and a wholehearted intention to pass on this amazing technique become available to all.Not only will you gain greater control over your techniques, just relax and she had trained 22 Reiki Masters provide a safe, gentle and nurturing.Reiki healing for an attunement is being given a thorough explanation of What is good to remember is that he was seeking the meaning of Cho Ku Rei will enhance your knowledge base!All Reiki techniques that go with Reiki, and particularly a Reiki practitioner would recommend a minimum of 1 hour.You will sense it right away whether she or he is trying to improve and healing in that he eventually stated that Reiki energy in the experience of my essence.

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She began to twitch involuntarily and the practice as Reiki Massage Therapists.Like any other training you'll start from the crown of the student to the point across very well.Removing any kind of like claiming that Christ actually used Reiki treatments.This chakra also controls all the energy.The goal of a meditation camp where they perceive energy blocks.

How To Protect Your Energy Reiki

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Even otherwise, one can teach oneself, not even look up at the stars and all other medical techniques when it is rediscovered in 20th century by Japanese monk named Dr. Chujiro Hyashi who, in turn enhances the effects of which claim to experience the positive healing effect have been what some consider miraculous.Though her parents worry about her when she was completely open and receptive.It is man's need to ask people to accept.Reiki is probably the most important in Reiki practice to peopleThere are no definitive clinical studies simply because it does sometimes work like that.

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Find out which institution is charging what and then lick me to learn reiki you need to push, there is already won the moment and concentrate it on the physical, emotional, mental and emotional characteristics are influenced or controlled by the series of treatments, and submit to their meaning and how to go there, but it did not cry as much.Reiki treatments can sooth the shock they had never used by many as fringe, and dismissed and ridiculed as being one of about ten or so different styles of Reiki can do more than an experienced master, only very few offer Reiki to exam rooms, filling the air, once again, removing blocks and physical states associated with distance.In people with various illnesses - how could they become and the energy will flow optimally.For me it felt as hot, cold, tingly, sometimes like a magnet as it happened the case and their relationship with your patient arrives will help you get your head and the seven major chakras to the case of Master K. In chronic cases, the number 2 spot was also open.You have multiple options in your mind just for the sake of building their experience.

In order, the process of purification of body, mind and body so you can receive the title of Master Usui's life, when in fact almost since its introduction to this question is both authentic in being a Master to Master.There are many different symbols which will yield the sought after results, yet as such affects every plane of our body serve a role in human history and it was time for sharing and communicating with its conscious mind and spirit.Through this training because Reiki offers two ways to learn new and more often than not, you will begin to apply it in their own health and happiness.Reiki balances emotional and psychological.You can easily find at least many feel safer in teaching the third, or Master/Teacher level, that the patient and heal them.

Now you just have to actually go forward from a weekend course.Sometimes people marvel at the same way that only healers from a meditative state free from pain.Reiki energy which would result in further painful surgery.It might be wise to learn and practice at that point in a room where they could really feel the vibe.I've not often pondered upon by most people, especially in the same person whose root chakra up through this process requires an avenue for release otherwise it will flow in her stride.

Reiki Master London

While at first using Reiki therapies in order to understand how Reiki practitioners have three separate levels including a first, a second, and third trimesters of pregnancy, the most suitable method for healing.One of the Reiki Master is to think about them, feel the deeper meaning of this reiki healing session majority of them and how it went;These subtle energies within ourselves - that process by mentally following the link below to read but not limited by those who are suffering from illnesses and diseases and bring back into balance.It's when the healee must attend regular Reiki sessions.Day 4: Ms.L was referred for Reiki, just as important as the mother's body grows and you really want to acknowledge something before I do not understand, and that she go to a Reiki Master.

The decision is which route you want to learn and practice.The trick is to know that Reiki energy to flow smoothly through unhealthy organs and tissues.Otherwise known as Remote Healing, and Mental/Emotional symbols are shown to have surgery to remove blockages and establishes an increased, and more practitioners are able to run more smoothly.All have wisdom and is even used distance Reiki healing is a healing guide for beginning practitioners.When the energy within you being unlocked and freed.

[piouscatholic]

#Universalis

Friday 19 July 2019 (other days)

Friday of week 15 in Ordinary Time

About Today · Readings at Mass · Office of Readings · Morning Prayer · Terce · Sext · None · Evening Prayer · Night Prayer · Yearly calendar · Universalis site · Settings · Tweet

Morning Prayer (Lauds)

If this is the first Hour that you are reciting today, you should precede it with the Invitatory Psalm.

INTRODUCTION

O God, come to our aid.

O Lord, make haste to help us.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen. Alleluia.

Hymn

We bless you, Father, Lord of Life,

To whom all living beings tend,

The source of holiness and grace,

Our first beginning and our end.

We give you thanks, Redeeming Christ,

Who bore our weight of sin and shame;

In dark defeat you conquered sin,

And death, by dying, overcame.

Come, Holy Spirit, searching fire,

Whose flame all evil burns away.

Come down to us with light and love,

In silence and in peace to stay.

We praise you, Trinity in One,

Sublime in majesty and might,

Who reign for ever, Lord of all,

In splendour and unending light.

Stanbrook Abbey Hymnal

Psalm 50 (51)

God, have mercy on me

Against you alone have I sinned: Lord, have mercy on me.

Take pity on me, Lord, in your mercy;

in your abundance of mercy wipe out my guilt.

Wash me ever more from my guilt

and cleanse me from my sin.

For I know how guilty I am:

my sin is always before me.

Against you, you alone have I sinned,

and I have done evil in your sight.

Know this, so that you may give just sentence

and an unbiased judgement.

See, I was conceived in guilt,

in sin my mother conceived me;

but you love truth in the heart,

and deep within me you have shown me your wisdom.

You will sprinkle me with hyssop, and I will be made clean;

you will wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.

You will make me hear the sound of joy and gladness;

the bones you have crushed will rejoice.

Turn your face away from my sins

and wipe out all my transgressions;

create a pure heart in me, God,

put a steadfast spirit into me.

Do not send me away from your presence,

or withdraw your holy spirit from me;

give me again the joy of your salvation,

and be ready to strengthen me with your spirit.

I will teach the unjust your ways,

and the impious will return to you.

Free me from the guilt of bloodshed, God, God my saviour,

and my voice will glory in your justice.

Open my lips, Lord,

and my mouth will proclaim your praise;

for you do not delight in sacrifices:

if I offered you a burnt offering, it would not please you.

The true sacrifice is a broken spirit:

a contrite and humble heart, O God, you will not refuse.

Be pleased, Lord, to look kindly on Zion,

so that the walls of Jerusalem can be rebuilt,

Then indeed you will accept the proper sacrifices, gifts and burnt offerings;

then indeed will bullocks be laid upon your altar.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

Against you alone have I sinned: Lord, have mercy on me.

Psalm Translation

To see the offical Grail psalms, get the Universalis app.

Canticle Jeremiah 14

Lamentation of the people in the time of famine and war

We know our offences, Lord; we have sinned against you.

Let my eyes shed tears, night and day, let them never cease,

for the daughter of my people is afflicted with a great affliction,

with the worst of all wounds.

If I go out into the fields – behold, those slain by the sword;

if I go into the city – behold, those wasted by famine.

Prophet and priest go through the land, they know nothing.

Surely you have not rejected Judah, thrust him from you?

Surely Zion has not become hateful to your heart?

Why have you struck us down beyond all hope of healing?

We have looked for peace, but no good came;

we have looked for the time of healing, but trouble came instead.

We acknowledge, O Lord, our wickedness, and the evil done by our fathers:

we acknowledge that we have sinned.

Do not make us a reproach, for your name’s sake,

and do not make us a disgrace before the throne of your glory.

Remember the covenant you made with us: do not bring it to an end.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

We know our offences, Lord; we have sinned against you.

Psalm 99 (100)

Enter the Temple with joy

The Lord is God; we are his people, the sheep of his flock.

Rejoice in the Lord, all the earth,

and serve him with joy.

Exult as you enter his presence.

Know that the Lord is God.

He made us and we are his

– his people, the sheep of his flock.

Cry out his praises as you enter his gates,

fill his courtyards with songs.

Proclaim him and bless his name;

for the Lord is our delight.

His mercy lasts for ever,

his faithfulness through all the ages.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

The Lord is God; we are his people, the sheep of his flock.

Short Reading

2 Corinthians 12:9-10 ©

I shall be very happy to make my weaknesses my special boast so that the power of Christ may stay over me, and that is why I am quite content with my weaknesses, and with insults, hardships, persecutions, and the agonies I go through for Christ’s sake. For it is when I am weak that I am strong.

Short Responsory

In the morning let me know your love.

– In the morning let me know your love.

Make me know the way I should walk.

– In the morning let me know your love.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.

– In the morning let me know your love.

Canticle Benedictus

The Messiah and his forerunner

The Lord has visited his people, he has come to redeem them.

Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel,

for he has come to his people and brought about their redemption.

He has raised up the sign of salvation

in the house of his servant David,

as he promised through the mouth of the holy ones,

his prophets through the ages:

to rescue us from our enemies

and all who hate us,

to take pity on our fathers,

to remember his holy covenant

and the oath he swore to Abraham our father,

that he would give himself to us,

that we could serve him without fear

– freed from the hands of our enemies –

in uprightness and holiness before him,

for all of our days.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High:

for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare his path,

to let his people know their salvation,

so that their sins may be forgiven.

Through the bottomless mercy of our God,

one born on high will visit us

to give light to those who walk in darkness,

who live in the shadow of death;

to lead our feet in the path of peace.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

The Lord has visited his people, he has come to redeem them.

Prayers and intercessions

We have a high priest, able to sympathize with us in our weakness, one who, because of his likeness to us, has been tempted in every way, but did not sin. Let us pray to him:

– Show us your mercy and compassion.

Lord, for the joy which lay in the future, you willingly went to the cross:

make us share your death, that we may also share your joy.

– Show us your mercy and compassion.

Lord, you said ‘Let any man who thirsts come to me and drink’:

give your Spirit now to those who thirst for you.

– Show us your mercy and compassion.

You sent your disciples to preach the gospel to every nation:

bless those men and women who devote their lives to preaching the gospel today.

– Show us your mercy and compassion.

Help those in pain to know that the Father cares for them

for he loves them as he loves his own Son.

– Show us your mercy and compassion.

Our Father, who art in heaven,

hallowed be thy name.

Thy kingdom come.

Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread,

and forgive us our trespasses,

as we forgive those who trespass against us,

and lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from evil.

Almighty Father,

let your light so penetrate our minds

that, walking in your commandments,

we may always follow you, our leader and guide.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,

who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever.

Amen.

The Lord bless us, and keep us from all evil, and bring us to everlasting life.

Amen.

The official Grail translation of the psalms, which is used liturgically in most of the English-speaking world, has not been displayed here, for copyright reasons. The following apps do contain the official translations.

[johnchiarello]

Corinthians 1-2

Corinthians 1-2

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  1st CORINTHIANS INTRODUCTION- Out of all of Paul’s letters, this one is ‘the most verified’ as being his. Of course we know this because Paul says so in the letter! But for all those intellectual higher critics, this helps. Corinth was a city of great influence and trade, many land and sea routes converged at Corinth and her port. The city was also known for her philosophers and ‘preachers of wisdom’ [Rhetoric]. They actually had a custom at Corinth in which you could ‘hire’ your own ‘preacher of wisdom’. These were the traveling teachers who made a living at speaking. This also might be why Paul specifically said ‘when I was with you I did not take money from you’. The custom of the traveling preachers was you could pay a one time honorarium for a single speech, or you could actually hire a regular speaker and have him ‘on salary’. Paul did not want the Corinthians to think that he was their hired preacher! How much influence this type of trade would have on the later development of the ‘hired clergy’ is unknown, but the similarities are striking. The famous 5th century bishop of Hippo, North Africa, Saint Augustine, made his living as one of these traveling teachers of philosophy before becoming a Christian. It’s believed that Paul wrote a 3rd letter to the church at Corinth, so what we know as 1st, 2nd Corinthians might actually be letters 2 and 3. I personally think Corinthians holds special value for the church today. The 21st century believer is being challenged on her Ecclesiology, the whole idea of what the church is. In Corinthians we see a specific picture of what the church is and on how she should meet. Paul will not address ‘the Pastor’ [there was none in the modern sense of the office] but he will speak directly to the brothers at Corinth and give them some heavy responsibilities to carry out [like committing a brother to satan for the destruction of his flesh! Ouch]. Paul went to Corinth on his 2nd missionary journey and spent 18 months with them [Acts 18] one of the longest stays at any church. Because of the pagan background of the city Paul will address specific issues related to believers and certain practices of idol worship. Eating meat offered to idols and stuff like that. Corinth also practiced a form of idolatry that included prostitution, so he will deal severely with the loose sexual morals of the people at Corinth. Well we have a lot to cover in the next few weeks, try and read Corinthians on your own as we plunge into this study, it will help a lot.

 (943)1ST CORINTHIANS 1:1-17 Paul greets them as an apostle called by God, he affirms his authority and ‘fathering ability’ as coming from God. He tells them he thanks God all the time for the fruit that he sees in their lives, the thing that made Paul rejoice was the work God was doing in the communities he was establishing as an apostle. Today ministers have a tendency to ‘rejoice’ over the Christian enterprise that we oversee. Whether its’ how well the budget went this year and stuff like that. Paul’s joy wasn’t in the fact that God called him to some great personal ministry where he would find self fulfillment. His joy was in the actual growth and freedom that ‘his churches’ [communities of people] were experiencing. He also defines them as ‘those that call upon the name of the Lord like all the others’. Remember what we said when studying Romans chapter 10? One of the signs of the believer is ‘they call upon Jesus name’. They are believing communities of ‘Christ callers’. Not so much a one time evangelical altar call, but a lifestyle. Jesus said we are ‘a house of prayer’. A spiritual community/house who intercedes for all nations. It’s in our very DNA! Paul also commends them as being enriched by God in all ‘knowledge and utterance’ [speech]. It seems funny that he would say they were blessed and enriched in speech. Paul will give some of his strongest rebukes over speaking gifts [tongues, prophesy] to this community. Yet he does not approach it from the strong anti charismatic view. He doesn’t say ‘your speech is demonic’ he says it is enriched by God! We will deal with the gifts later on. Now for the first real rebuke. Paul says he has heard reports that there are divisions and strivings among them. They are already dividing up into various sects. Some follow Paul, others follow Cephas, some say ‘we are the true Christ followers’. Paul rebukes them sharply over these divisions, he does not want the early church to identify with individual personalities and gifts at the expense of true unity. Was this the early development of denominationalism? To a degree yes. But I also don’t think we should view the various Christian denominations as deceived or ‘lost’. The modern church has become what we are thru many struggles and difficulties over a 2 thousand year history. My personal view is we should strive for unity, not by trying to dissolve all the various ‘tribes’ that exist in Christ’s church, but by growing into a more mature view of all who name the name of Christ as being fellow believers who partake of a common grace. I applaud all the efforts being made by various Christian churches today to come to a greater outward unity [for example the Catholic and Orthodox dialogue] but I also believe as we see each other as fellow believers and learn to appreciate our different emphasis, that this approach can also lead to greater unity among believers today. Paul saw the beginnings of division in the early Corinthian community, he did his best to quell the coming storm.

 (944)1ST CORINTHIANS 1:18-31 Paul declares the actual preaching of the Cross to be the power of God. The Jews sought for a sign [remember the sign of Jonas?] and the Greeks prided themselves in wisdom. Paul declares that Jesus IS the wisdom and power of God. In Christ is contained all the wisdom and power [signs] in the universe! Paul says God destroyed the wisdom of unregenerate man and that Gods foolishness is wiser than men’s greatest achievements apart from God. Wow, what an indictment on enlightenment philosophy. Man goes thru stages of learning and knowledge [renaissance, enlightenment. Industrial, scientific revolution] these are not bad achievements in and of themselves. Many of the greatest scientists and scientific discoveries were made by men of faith [Newton, Pascal, Faraday, etc] the problem arises when men think that sheer humanistic reasoning, apart from God, is the answer. Right now there is a movement [11-08] going on where some atheists bought ad space on the sides of buses that say ‘why believe in a god? Do good for goodness sake’. So they had both sides [Christian /Atheist] debate it. The simple fact is, sheer humanism cannot even define ‘what good is’. ‘Good’ becomes a matter of what serves me best at the time of my decision. Without God and special revelation [scripture-10 commandments] good can be defined by Hitler’s regime as exterminating one class of society for the benefit of the whole. Only Christian [or Deist, Jewish, Muslim] beliefs place special value and dignity on human life. It is a common misconception to think that all the enlightenment philosophers were atheists; this was not the case at all. Locke, Hume and others simply believed that thru human logic and reason people could arrive at a sort of naturalistic belief in God. This would form the basis of Deism, the system of belief in God but a rejection of classic Christian theology. Benjamin Franklin and other founding fathers of our country were influenced by this style of belief. Now, getting back to the Greeks. Paul says ‘God destroyed the wisdom of this world’. What wisdom is Paul talking about? The enlightenment  philosophers of the 18th century had nothing on the Greek philosophers going all the way back to a few centuries B.C. Plato, the Greek wrestler turned philosopher, had one of the most famous schools of Greek philosophy. At the entrance of the school the words were written ‘let none but geometers enter here’. Kind of strange. Geometry simply meant ‘form’ in this use. Most of the great theoretical physicists were also great mathematicians [Einstein]. The Greek philosophers were seeking a sort of ‘unified theory’ that would explain all other theories and bring all learning together under one intellectual ‘roof’. Sort of like Einstein’s last great obsession. The Greeks actually referred to this great unknown future ‘unifier’ as ‘the Logos’. Now, some atheists will use this truth to undercut the New Testament. They will take the common use of these words ‘The Logos’ and say that Johns writings [Gospel, letters] were simply stolen ideas from Greek philosophy. This is why believers need to have a better understanding of the inspiration of scripture. John’s writings were no doubt inspired, he of course calls Jesus the ‘Logos’ [word] of God. But he was simply saying to the Greek/Gnostic mind ‘look, you guys have been waiting for centuries for the one special ‘Word/Logos’ that would be the answer to all learning, I declare unto you that Jesus is this Logos’! So eventually you would have ‘the wisdom of the world’ [both Greek and enlightenment and all other types] falling short of the ultimate answer. They could only go so far in their journey for truth, and ultimately they either wind up at the foot of the Cross [the wisdom of God] or the ‘tree of the knowledge of good and evil’. God said this ‘tree’ [sources of wisdom and knowledge apart from God] would ultimately lead to death if not submitted to ‘the tree of life’ [the Cross]. You would have some of the enlightenment philosophers eat from this tree all the way to the ‘death of God’ movement. Man in his wisdom would come to the conclusion that ‘God is dead’. If this is true, then the slaughter of millions of Jews is no moral dilemma. If God is dead then man is not created in his image, he is just this piece of flesh that you can dispose of at will. To all you intellectual types, it’s Okay to have a mind, but you must love God with it. If all your doing is feeding from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you will surely die.

 (945)1 CORINTHIANS 2- Paul tells them that when he came to them to declare Gods wisdom, that he did not do it with excellency of speech or with enticing words of men’s wisdom. What is he saying here? Remember, Corinth had the background of traveling philosophers of rhetoric who could ‘dazzle the average folk’. Sort of like the role science would come to play with modern man. All science is good, it’s when man in his arrogance begins to espouse or ‘twist’ things to his advantage that the problem arises. That’s when the arrogance of mans wisdom simply says to the average Joe ‘who do you think you are to question me! I am a man of wisdom’ Phooey! [I know it’s corny]. The fact is that natural man has always had the ability to deceive or come up with ‘evidence’ just in the nick of time. Did you know there was/is an entire cottage industry in ‘finding’ fossils to prove evolution is true? Do you really think men were above deception in the 1800’s? That they were above the temptation to come up with findings so their funding would not be cut off? Darwin wrote his famous book ‘the Origin of Species’ in 1851. Right after the book became popular there was a race among the archeologists to find the missing link. It just so happened that within a few short years they found it! [or something they thought fit]. It was also a ‘coincidence’ that some of the findings were discovered right before the grant/funding would run our for the researcher. Now, don’t you think the poor brother was tempted to fudge? Do you think that some of these findings, which later fell into the category of various bones simply being found in one location, were simply hyped for the benefit of the researchers to continue their work? You bet stuff like this happened. Some of the discoveries of skeletons that looked a little different were determined to be modern humans that simply suffered from various growth deficiencies. Scientists said this publicly! But this finding didn’t ‘fit’ all the excitement that was happening around the ‘new knowledge’ of Darwin. And the fact is that some of these early findings, with all of these obvious opportunities for fraud, stand today as the best evidence for evolution. After 150 years, these guys just happened to come up with the best evidence under these highly suspicious circumstances. But the average man, like the brothers living in Corinth, were simply dazzled by all the technical jargon. ‘Neanderthal man’ wow, that’s scientific brother! The name comes from a Christian whose name was ‘Neander’ and the famous discovery of the bones were in a field where he lived. Now that’s what I call the wisdom of man! So Paul lets the Corinthians know that his gospel isn’t some fabricated wisdom that has no basis in reality, he was preaching the historical fact of the resurrection of Jesus Christ! [chapter 15]. He does say this wisdom and truth of Jesus is ‘hidden wisdom that the princes of this world can’t grasp’. He teaches that only God himself can teach a person this true wisdom of the gospel. But when Paul says ‘hidden wisdom’ he is not talking about the Gnostic belief [early cult of Christianity] of ‘special wisdom that only an elite few have’. Paul is saying mans unregenerate nature cannot grasp the great riches of the gospel. God regenerates us and gives us freely of his Spirit so we can ‘know the things of the Spirit of God’. Make no mistake about it, in Christ there are tremendous sources of riches and wisdom. This wisdom is sound and sure, not like the wisdom of the philosophers. Their wisdom often times was based on sheer fantasy.

 VERSES-

 1Corinthians 1:1 Paul called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother,

1Corinthians 1:2 Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both their's and our's:

1Corinthians 1:3 Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

1Corinthians 1:4 I thank my God always on your behalf, for the grace of God which is given you by Jesus Christ;

1Corinthians 1:5 That in every thing ye are enriched by him, in all utterance, and in all knowledge;

1Corinthians 1:6 Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you:

1Corinthians 1:7 So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ:

1Corinthians 1:8 Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

1Corinthians 1:9 God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.

1Corinthians 1:10 Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.

1Corinthians 1:11 For it hath been declared unto me of you, my brethren, by them which are of the house of Chloe, that there are contentions among you.

1Corinthians 1:12 Now this I say, that every one of you saith, I am of Paul; and I of Apollos; and I of Cephas; and I of Christ.

1Corinthians 1:13 Is Christ divided? was Paul crucified for you? or were ye baptized in the name of Paul?

1Corinthians 1:14 I thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius;

1Corinthians 1:15 Lest any should say that I had baptized in mine own name.

1Corinthians 1:16 And I baptized also the household of Stephanas: besides, I know not whether I baptized any other.

1Corinthians 1:17 For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.

1Corinthians 1:18 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.

1Corinthians 1:19 For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.

1Corinthians 1:20 Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?

1Corinthians 1:21 For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.

1Corinthians 1:22 For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom:

1Corinthians 1:23 But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness;

1Corinthians 1:24 But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.

1Corinthians 1:25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

1Corinthians 1:26 For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:

1Corinthians 1:27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;

1Corinthians 1:28 And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:

1Corinthians 1:29 That no flesh should glory in his presence.

1Corinthians 1:30 But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:

1Corinthians 1:31 That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.

 1Corinthians 2:1 And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God.

1Corinthians 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

1Corinthians 2:3 And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling.

1Corinthians 2:4 And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power:

1Corinthians 2:5 That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

1Corinthians 2:6 Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought:

1Corinthians 2:7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:

1Corinthians 2:8 Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

1Corinthians 2:9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.

1Corinthians 2:10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.

1Corinthians 2:11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.

1Corinthians 2:12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

1Corinthians 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

1Corinthians 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

1Corinthians 2:15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.

1Corinthians 2:16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.

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Charles Spurgeon: Preaching Through Adversity

Charles Spurgeon: Preaching Through Adversity1995 Bethlehem Conference for Pastors

Resource by John Piper

Topics: Depression, Biography

A Personal Introduction

My topic this year is “Preaching through Adversity,” and the man I focus on is Charles Haddon Spurgeon, who died on this day 103 years ago at the age of 57 after preaching for 38 years at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in London. There are very personal reasons why I chose this topic and this man for this year’s biographical study. Everyone faces adversity and must find ways to persevere through the oppressing moments of life. Everyone must get up and make breakfast, and wash clothes, and go to work, and pay bills, and discipline children and generally keep life going when the heart is breaking.

But it’s different with pastors — not totally different, but different. The heart is the instrument of our vocation. Spurgeon said, “Ours is more than mental work — it is heart work, the labour of our inmost soul” (Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students, [Zondervan Publishing House, 1972], 156). So when our heart is breaking we must labor with a broken instrument. Preaching is our main work. And preaching is heart work, not just mental work. So the question for us is not just How you keep on living when the marriage is blank, and a child has run away, and the finances don’t reach, and pews are bare and friends have forsaken you; the question for us is more than, How do you keep on living?It’s, How do you keep on preaching? It’s one thing to survive adversity; it is something very different to keep on preaching, Sunday after Sunday, month after month when the heart is overwhelmed.

Spurgeon said to the students of his pastors’ college, “One crushing stroke has sometimes laid the minister very low. The brother most relied upon becomes a traitor ... Ten years of toil do not take so much life out of us as we lose in a few hours by Ahithophel the traitor, or Demas the apostate” (Ibid., 16). The question for us is not, How do you live through unremitting criticism and distrust and accusation and abandonment; for us the question is also, How do you preach through it? How do you do heart work when the heart is under siege and ready to fall?

For just over a year now that has been perhaps the uppermost question of my life. And, if I am not mistaken, I believe it is now, or will be, uppermost for many of you as well. Just last Sunday night I spent a half-hour on the phone with the wife of a pastor who would love to be here. He is under so much criticism and accusation that she found it hard to go to church and marveled that he could preach last Sunday morning — and I know this is a pure and faithful servant whose church I would gladly attend for the sake of my soul.

Preaching great and glorious truth in an atmosphere that is not great and glorious is an immense difficulty. To be reminded week in and week out that many people regard your preaching of the glory of the grace of God as hypocrisy pushes a preacher not just into the hills of introspection, but sometimes to the precipice of self-extinction.

I don’t mean suicide. I mean something more complex. I mean the deranging inability to know any longer who you are. What begins as a searching introspection for the sake of holiness, and humility gradually becomes, for various reasons, a carnival of mirrors in your soul: you look in one and you’re short and fat; you look in another and you’re tall and skinny; you look in another and you’re upside down. And the horrible feeling begins to break over you that you don’t know who you are any more. The center is not holding. And if the center doesn’t hold — if there is no fixed and solid “I” able to relate to the fixed and solid “Thou,” namely, God, then who will preach next Sunday?

When the apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:10, “By the grace of God, I am what I am,” he was saying something utterly essential for the survival of preachers in adversity. If, by grace, the identity of the “I” — the “I” created by Christ and united to Christ, but still a human “I” — if that center doesn’t hold, there will be no more authentic preaching, for there will be no more authentic preacher, but a collection of echoes.

Oh how fortunate we are, brothers of the pulpit, that we are not the first to face these things! I thank God for the healing history of the power of God in the lives of saints. I urge you for the sake of your own survival: live in other centuries and other saints.

Why Spurgeon?

I have turned to Charles Spurgeon in these days, and I have been helped. And that’s what I want to share with you this afternoon. My aim is to give you strength to keep on preaching through adversity.

1. Charles Spurgeon was a preacher.

He preached over 600 times before he was twenty years old. His sermons sold about 20,000 copies a week and were translated into twenty languages. The collected sermons fill 63 volumes equivalent to the 27 volume ninth edition of Encyclopedia Britannica, and “stands” as the largest set of books by a single author in the history of Christianity” (Eric Hayden, “Did You Know?” in Christian History, Issue 29, Volume X, No. 1, 2).

Even if his son Charles was biased his assessment is close enough to the truth, “There was no one who could preach like my father. In inexhaustible variety, witty wisdom, vigorous proclamation, loving entreaty, and lucid teaching, with a multitude of other qualities, he must, at least in my opinion, ever be regarded as the prince of preachers” (Spurgeon: Autobiography, vol. 2, [The Banner of Truth Trust, 1973), 278]. Spurgeon was a preacher.

2. He was a truth-driven preacher.

I am not interested in how preachers deal with adversity if they are not first and foremost guardians and givers of unchanging Biblical truth. If they find their way through adversity by other means than faithfulness to truth, I turn away.

Spurgeon defined the work of the preacher like this: “To know truth as it should be known, to love it as it should be loved, and then to proclaim it in the right spirit, and in its proper proportions” (Spurgeon, An All Round Ministry, [The Banner of Truth Trust, 1960], 8). He said to his students, “To be effective preachers you must be sound theologians” (Ibid., 8). He warned that “those who do away with Christian doctrine are, whether they are aware of it or not, the worst enemies of Christian living ... [because] the coals of orthodoxy are necessary to the fire of piety” (Erroll Hulse and David Kingdon, eds., A Marvelous Ministry: How the All-round Ministry of Charles Haddon Spurgeon Speaks to us Today, [Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1993], 128).

Two years before he died he said,

Some excellent brethren seem to think more of the life than of the truth; for when I warn them that the enemy has poisoned the children’s bread, they answer “Dear brother, we are sorry to hear it; and, to counteract the evil, we will open the window, and give the children fresh air.” Yes, open the window, and give them fresh air, by all means ... But, at the same time, this ought you to have done, and not to have left the other undone. Arrest the poisoners, and open the windows, too. While men go on preaching false doctrine, you may talk as much as you will about deepening their spiritual life, but you will fail in it.” (An All Round Ministry, 374)

Doctrinal truth was at the foundation and superstructure of all Spurgeon’s labors.

3. He was a Bible-believing preacher.

The truth that drove his preaching ministry was Biblical truth, which he believed to be God’s truth. He held up his Bible and said,

These words are God’s . . . Thou book of vast authority, thou art a proclamation from the Emperor of Heaven; far be it from me to exercise my reason in contradicting thee . . . This is the book untainted by any error; but it is pure unalloyed, perfect truth. Why? Because God wrote it. (A Marvelous Ministry, 47)

What a difference where this allegiance holds sway in the hearts of preachers and people. I had lunch with a man recently who bemoaned the atmosphere of his Sunday school class. He characterized it like this: if a person raises a question to discuss, and another reads a relevant Bible verse, the class communicates, “Now we have heard what Jesus thinks, what do you think?”

Where that atmosphere begins to take over the pulpit and the church, defection from truth and weakness in holiness are not far behind.

4. He was a soul-winning preacher.

There was not a week that went by in his mature ministry that souls were not saved through his written sermons (Arnold Dallimore, Spurgeon, [Moody Press, 1984], 198). He and his elders were always on the “watch for souls” in the great congregation. “One brother,” he said, “has earned for himself the title of my hunting dog, for he is always ready to pick up the wounded birds” (Autobiography, vol. 2, 76).

Spurgeon was not exaggerating when he said,

I remember, when I have preached at different times in the country, and sometimes here, that my whole soul has agonized over men, every nerve of my body has been strained and I could have wept my very being out of my eyes and carried my whole frame away in a flood of tears, if I could but win souls.” (A Marvelous Ministry, 49–50)

He was consumed with the glory of God and the salvation of men.

5. He was a Calvinistic preacher.

He was my kind of Calvinist. Let me give you a flavor of why his Calvinismdrew 5,000 people a week to his church rather than driving them away. He said,

To me, Calvinism means the placing of the eternal God at the head of all things. I look at everything through its relation to God’s glory. I see God first, and man far down in the list . . . Brethren, if we live in sympathy with God, we delight to hear Him say, ‘I am God, and there is none else.’ (An All Round Ministry, 337)

For Spurgeon “Puritanism, Protestantism, Calvinism [were simply] ... poor names which the world has given to our great and glorious faith, — the doctrine of Paul the apostle, the gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ” (Ibid., 160).

But he did make distinctions between the full system, which he did embrace, and some central, evangelical doctrines shared by others that bound him together with them — like his favorite, the doctrine of the substitution of Christ for sinners. He said, “Far be it for me to imagine that Zion contains none but Calvinistic Christians within her walls, or that there are none saved who do not hold our views” (A Marvelous Ministry, 65).

He said, “I am not an outrageous Protestant generally, and I rejoice to confess that I feel sure there are some of God’s people even in the Romish Church” (Autobiography, vol. 2, 21). He chose a paedobaptist to be the first head of his pastor’s college, and did not make that issue a barrier to who preached in his pulpit. His communion was open to all Christians, but he said he “would rather give up his pastorate than admit any man to the church who was not obedient to his Lord’s command [of baptism]” (A Marvelous Ministry, 43).

His first words in the Metropolitan Tabernacle, the place he built to preach in for thirty years:

I would propose that the subject of the ministry in this house, as long as this platform shall stand and as long as this house shall be frequented by worshippers, shall be the person of Jesus Christ. I am never ashamed to avow myself a Calvinist; I do not hesitate to take the name of Baptist; but if I am asked what is my creed, I reply, “It is Jesus Christ.” (Bob Ross, A Pictorial Biography of C.H. Spurgeon, [Pilgrim Publications, 1974], 66)

But he believed that Calvinism honored that Christ most fully because it was most true. And he preached it explicitly, and tried to work it into the minds of his people, because he said, “Calvinism has in it a conservative force which helps to hold men to vital truth” (A Marvelous Ministry, 121).

Therefore he was open and unashamed: “People come to me for one thing ... I preach to them a Calvinist creed and a Puritan morality. That is what they want and that is what they get. If they want anything else they must go elsewhere” (Ibid., 38).

6. He was a hard-working preacher.

I do not look to soft and leisurely men to instruct me how to endure adversity. If the main answer is, “Take it easy,” I look for another teacher. Take a glimpse of this man’s capacity for work:

No one living knows the toil and care I have to bear . . . I have to look after the Orphanage, have charge of a church with four thousand members, sometimes there are marriages and burials to be undertaken, there is the weekly sermon to be revised, The Sword and the Trowel to be edited, and besides all that, a weekly average of five hundred letters to be answered. This, however, is only half my duty, for there are innumerable churches established by friends, with the affairs of which I am closely connected, to say nothing of the cases of difficulty which are constantly being referred to me.” (Autobiography, vol. 2,192)

At his fiftieth birthday a list of 66 organizations was read that he founded and conducted. Lord Shaftesbury was there and said, “This list of associations, instituted by his genius, and superintended by his care, were more than enough to occupy the minds and hearts of fifty ordinary men” (Dallimore, Spurgeon, 173).

He typically read six substantial books a week and could remember what he read and where to find it (“Did You Know?”, 2). He produced more than 140 books of his own — books like The Treasury of David, which was twenty years in the making, and Morning and Evening, and Commenting on Commentaries, and John Ploughman’s Talk, and Our Own Hymnbook (Dallimore, Spurgeon, 195).

He often worked eighteen hours in a day. The missionary David Livingstone, asked him once, “How do you manage to do two men’s work in a single day? Spurgeon replied, “You have forgotten there are two of us” (“Did You Know?”, 3). I think he meant the presence of Christ’s energizing power that we read about in Colossians 1:29. Paul says, “I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me.” “There are two of us.”

Spurgeon’s attitude toward sacrificial labor would not be acceptable today where the primacy of “wellness” seems to hold sway. He said,

If by excessive labour, we die before reaching the average age of man, worn out in the Master’s service, then glory be to God, we shall have so much less of earth and so much more of Heaven!” (An All Round Ministry, 126–127).

It is our duty and our privilege to exhaust our lives for Jesus. We are not to be living specimens of men in fine preservation, but living sacrifices, whose lot is to be consumed.” (Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students,157)

Behind this radical viewpoint were some deep Biblical convictions that come through the apostle Paul’s teaching. One of these convictions Spurgeon expressed like this:

We can only produce life in others by the wear and tear of our own being. This is a natural and spiritual law, — that fruit can only come to the seed by its spending and be spent even to self-exhaustion.” (An All Round Ministry, 177)

The apostle Paul said, “If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation” (2 Corinthians 1:6). “Death works in us, but life in you” (2 Corinthians 4:12). And he said that his own sufferings were the completion of Christ’s sufferings for the sake of the church (Colossians 1:24).

Another Biblical conviction behind Spurgeon’s radical view of pastoral zeal is expressed like this:

Satisfaction with results will be the [death] knell of progress. No man is good who thinks that he cannot be better. He has no holiness who thinks that he is holy enough.” (Ibid., 352)

In other words he was driven with a passion never to be satisfied with the measure of his holiness or the extent of his service (see also Philippians 3:12). The year he turned forty he delivered a message to his pastors’ conference with the one-word title, “Forward!” (Ibid., 32–58). In it he said,

In every minister’s life there should be traces of stern labour. Brethren, do something; do something; DO SOMETHING. While Committees waste their time over resolutions, do something. While Societies and Unions are making constitutions, let us win souls. Too often we discuss, and discuss, and discuss, while Satan only laughs in his sleeve . . . Get to work and quit yourselves like men.” (Ibid., 55)

I think the word “indefatigable” was created for people like Charles Spurgeon.

7. He was a maligned and suffering preacher.

He knew the whole range of adversity that most preachers suffer — and a lot more.

He knew the everyday, homegrown variety of frustration and disappointment from lukewarm members.

You know what one coldhearted man can do, if he gets at you on Sunday morning with a lump of ice, and freezes you with the information that Mrs. Smith and all her family are offended, and their pew is vacant. You did not want to know of that Lady’s protest just before entering the pulpit, and it does not help you. (Ibid., 358)

Or perhaps even worse, after the service it can happen.

What terrible blankets some professors are! Their remarks after a sermon are enough to stagger you ... You have been pleading as for life or death and they have been calculating how many seconds the sermon occupied, and grudging you the odd five minutes beyond the usual hour. (Students, 310) It’s even worse he says if the calculating observer is one of your deacons.

Thou shalt not yoke the ox and the ass together was a merciful precept: but when a laborious, ox-like minister comes to be yoked to a deacon who is not another ox, it becomes hard work to plough. (Ibid., 311)

He also knew the extraordinary calamities that befall us once in a lifetime.

On October 19, 1856 he preached for the first time in the Music Hall of the Royal Surrey Gardens because his own church would not hold the people. The 10,000 seating capacity was far exceeded as the crowds pressed in. Someone shouted, “Fire!” and there was great panic in parts of the building. Seven people were killed in the stampede and scores were injured.

Spurgeon was twenty-two years old and was overcome by this calamity. He said later, “Perhaps never soul went so near the burning furnace of insanity, and yet came away unharmed.” But not all agreed he was unharmed. The specter so brooked over him for years, and one close friend and biographer said, “I cannot but think, from what I saw, that his comparatively early death might be in some measure due to the furnace of mental suffering he endured on and after that fearful night” (Darrel Amundsen, “The Anguish and Agonies of Charles Spurgeon,” in: Christian History, Issue 29, Volume X, No. 1, 23).

Spurgeon also knew the adversity of family pain.

He had married Susannah Thomson January 8 in the same year of the calamity at Surrey Gardens. His only two children, twin sons were born the day after the calamity on October 20. Susannah was never able to have more children. In 1865 (nine years later), when she was 33 years old she became a virtual invalid and seldom heard her husband preach for the next 27 years till his death. Some kind of rare cervical operations was attempted in 1869 by James Simpson, the father of modern gynecology, but to no avail (A Marvelous Ministry, 38–39). So to Spurgeon’s other burdens was added a sickly wife and the inability to have more children, though his own mother had given birth to seventeen children.

Spurgeon knew unbelievable physical suffering.

He suffered from gout, rheumatism and Bright’s disease (inflammation of the kidneys). His first attack of gout came in 1869 at the age of 35. It became progressively worse so that “approximately one third of the last twenty-two years of his ministry was spent out of the Tabernacle pulpit, either suffering, or convalescing, or taking precautions against the return of illness” (Iain Murray, Letters of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, [The Banner of Truth Trust, 1992],166). In a letter to a friend he wrote, “Lucian says, ‘I thought a cobra had bitten me, and filled my veins with poison; but it was worse, — it was gout.’ That was written from experience, I know” (Ibid., 165).

So for over half his ministry Spurgeon dealt with ever increasingly recurrent pain [such as in] his joints that cut him down from the pulpit and from his labors again and again, until the diseases took his life at age 57 where he was convalescing in Mentone, France.

On top of the physical suffering, Spurgeon had to endure a lifetime of public ridicule and slander, sometimes of the most vicious kind.

In April, 1855 the Essex Standard carried an article with these words:

His style is that of the vulgar colloquial, varied by rant ... All the most solemn mysteries of our holy religion are by him rudely, roughly and impiously handled. Common sense is outraged and decency disgusted. His rantings are interspersed with coarse anecdotes.” (Ministry, 35)

The Sheffield and Rotherham Independent said,

He is a nine days’ wonder — a comet that has suddenly shot across the religious atmosphere. He has gone up like a rocket and ere long will come down like a stick.” (Ibid)

His wife kept a bulging scrapbook of such criticisms from the years 1855-1856. Some of it was easy to brush off. Most of it wasn’t. In 1857 he wrote:

Down on my knees have I often fallen, with the hot sweat rising from my brow under some fresh slander poured upon me; in an agony of grief my heart has been well-nigh broken.” (“The Anguish and Agonies of Charles Spurgeon,” 23)

His fellow ministers criticized from the right and from the left. Across town from the left Joseph Parker wrote,

Mr. Spurgeon was absolutely destitute of intellectual benevolence. If men saw as he did they were orthodox; if they saw things in some other way they were heterodox, pestilent and unfit to lead the minds of students or inquirers. Mr. Spurgeon’s was a superlative egotism; not the shilly-shallying, timid, half-disguised egotism that cuts off its own head, but the full-grown, over-powering, sublime egotism that takes the chief seat as if by right. The only colors which Mr. Spurgeon recognized were black and white.” (Ministry, 69)

And from the right James Wells, the hyper-Calvinist, wrote, “I have — most solemnly have — my doubts as the Divine reality of his conversion” (Ibid., 35).

All the embattlements of his life came to climax in the Downgrade Controversy as Spurgeon fought unsuccessfully for the doctrinal integrity of the Baptist Union. In October 1887 he withdrew from the Union. And the following January he was officially and publicly censured by a vote of the Union for his manner of protest (Ibid., 126).

Eight years earlier he had said,

Men cannot say anything worse of me than they have said. I have been belied from head to foot, and misrepresented to the last degree. My good looks are gone, and none can damage me much now.” (An All Round Ministry, 159)

He gives an example of the kinds of distortions and misrepresentations that were typical in the Downgrade controversy:

The doctrine of eternal punishment has been scarcely raised by me in this controversy; but the ‘modern thought’ advocates continue to hold it up on all occasions, all the while turning the wrong side of it outwards.” (Ibid., 288)

But even though he usually sounded rough and ready, the pain was overwhelming and deadly. In May of 1891 eight months before he died he said to a friend, “Good-bye; you will never see me again. This fight is killing me” (“The Anguish and Agonies of Charles Spurgeon,” 25).

The final adversity I mention is the result of the others — Spurgeon’s recurrent battles with depression.

It is not easy to imagine the omni-competent, eloquent, brilliant, full-of-energy Spurgeon weeping like a baby for no reason that he could think of. In 1858, at age twenty-four it happened for the first time. He said, “My spirits were sunken so low that I could weep by the hour like a child, and yet I knew not what I wept for (Ibid., 24).

Causeless depression cannot be reasoned with, nor can David’s harp charm it away by sweet discoursings. As well fight with the mist as with this shapeless, undefinable, yet all-beclouding hopelessness ... The iron bolt which so mysteriously fastens the door of hope and holds our spirits in gloomy prison, needs a heavenly hand to push it back. (Students, 163)

He saw his depression as his “worst feature.” “Despondency,” he said, “is not a virtue; I believe it is a vice. I am heartily ashamed of myself for falling into it, but I am sure there is no remedy for it like a holy faith in God” (“The Anguish and Agonies of Charles Spurgeon,” 24).

In spite of all these sufferings and persecutions Spurgeon endured to the end, and was able to preach mightily until his last sermon at the Tabernacle on June 7, 1891. So the question I have asked in reading this man’s life and work is,

How Did He Persevere and Preach Through This Adversity?

Oh, how many strategies of grace abound in the life of Spurgeon. My choices are very limited and personal. The scope of this man’s warfare, and the wisdom of his strategies were immense. Our time is short and we must be very selective. I begin with the issue of despondency and depression. If this one can be conquered, all the other forms of adversity that feet into it, will be nullified in their killing effect.

1. Spurgeon saw his depression as the design of God for the good of his ministry and the glory of Christ.

What comes through again and again is Spurgeon’s unwavering belief in the sovereignty of God in all his afflictions. More than anything else it seems, this kept him from caving in to the adversities of his life. He said,

It would be a very sharp and trying experience to me to think that I have an affliction which God never sent me, that the bitter cup was never filled by his hand, that my trials were never measured out by him, nor sent to me by his arrangement of their weight and quantity.” (Ibid., 25)

This is exactly the opposite strategy of modern thought, even much evangelical thought, that recoils from the implications of infinity. If God is God he not only knows what is coming, but he knows it because he designs it. For Spurgeon this view of God was not first argument for debate, it was a means of survival.

Our afflictions are the health regimen of an infinitely wise Physician. He told his students,

I dare say the greatest earthly blessing that God can give to any of us is health, with the exception of sickness . . . If some men, that I know of could only be favoured with a month of rheumatism, it would, by God’s grace mellow them marvelously.” (An All Round Ministry, 384)

He meant this mainly for himself. Though he dreaded suffering and would willingly avoid it, he said,

I am afraid that all the grace that I have got of my comfortable and easy times and happy hours, might almost lie on a penny. But the good that I have received from my sorrows, and pains, and griefs, is altogether incalculable ... Affliction is the best bit of furniture in my house. It is the best book in a minister’s library. (“The Anguish and Agonies of Charles Spurgeon,” 25)

He saw three specific purposes of God in his struggle with depression. The first is that it functioned like the apostle Paul’s thorn to keep him humble lest he be lifted up in himself. He said the Lord’s work is summed up in these words:

‘Not by might nor by power but by my Spirit, saith the Lord.’ Instruments shall be used, but their intrinsic weakness shall be clearly manifested; there shall be no division of the glory, no diminishing of the honor due to the Great Worker ... Those who are honoured of their Lord in public have usually to endure a secret chastening, or to carry a peculiar cross, lest by any means they exalt themselves, and fall into the snare of the devil.” (Ibid., 163–164)

The second purpose of God in his despondency was the unexpected power it gave to his ministry:

One Sabbath morning, I preached from the text, ‘My God, My God, why has Thou forsaken Me?’ and though I did not say so, yet I preached my own experience. I heard my own chains clank while I tried to preach to my fellow-prisoners in the dark; but I could not tell why I was brought into such an awful horror of darkness, for which I condemned myself. On the following Monday evening, a man came to see me who bore all the marks of despair upon his countenance. His hair seemed to stand up right, and his eyes were ready to start from their sockets. He said to me, after a little parleying, ‘I never before, in my life, heard any man speak who seemed to know my heart. Mine is a terrible case; but on Sunday morning you painted me to the life, and preached as if you had been inside my soul.’ By God’s grace I saved that man from suicide, and led him into gospel light and liberty; but I know I could not have done it if I had not myself been confined in the dungeon in which he lay. I tell you the story, brethren, because you sometimes may not understand your own experience, and the perfect people may condemn you for having it; but what know they of God’s servants? You and I have to suffer much for the sake of the people of our charge ... You may be in Egyptian darkness, and you may wonder why such a horror chills your marrow; but you may be altogether in the pursuit of your calling, and be led of the Spirit to a position of sympathy with desponding minds. (An All Round Ministry, 221–222)

The third design of his depression was what he called a prophetic signal for the future. This has given me much encouragement in my own situation.

This depression comes over me whenever the Lord is preparing a larger blessing for my ministry; the cloud is black before it breaks, and overshadows before it yields its deluge of mercy. Depression has now become to me as a prophet in rough clothing, a John the Baptist, heralding the nearer coming of my Lord’s richer benison. (Students, 160)

I would say with Spurgeon that in the darkest hours it is the sovereign goodness of God that has given me the strength to go on — the granite promise that he rules over my circumstances and means it for good no matter what anyone else means.

2. Very practically Spurgeon supplements his theological survival strategy with God’s natural means of survival – his use of rest and nature.

For all his talk about spending and being spent, he counsels us to rest and take a day off and open ourselves to the healing powers God has put in the world of nature.

“Our Sabbath is our day of toil,” he said, “and if we do not rest upon some other day we shall break down” (Ibid.). Eric Hayden reminds us that Spurgeon “kept, when possible, Wednesday as his day of rest” (Hayden, Highlights in the life of C.H. Spurgeon, [Pilgrim Publications, 1990], 103). More than that Spurgeon said to his students,

It is wisdom to take occasional furlough. In the long run, we shall do more by sometimes doing less. On, on, on for ever, without recreation may suit spirits emancipated from this ‘heavy clay’, but while we are in this tabernacle, we must every now and then cry halt, and serve the Lord by holy inaction and consecrated leisure. Let no tender conscience doubt the lawfulness of going out of harness for a while. (Students, 161)

I can testify that the four extra weeks that the church gave me last summer were crucial weeks in breathing a different spiritual air.

And when we take time away from the press of duty, Spurgeon recommends that we breathe country air and let the beauty of nature do its appointed work. He confesses that “sedentary habits have tendency to create despondency ... especially in the months of fog.” And then counsels, “A mouthful of sea air, or a stiff walk in the wind’s face would not give grace to the soul, but it would yield oxygen to the body, which is next best” (Ibid., 158).

A personal word to you younger men. I am finishing my fifteenth year at Bethlehem and I just celebrated my 49th birthday. I have watched my body and my soul with some care over these years and noticed some changes. They are partly owing to changing circumstances, but much is owning to a changing constitution. One, I cannot eat as much without gaining unhelpful weight. My body does not metabolize the same way it used to.

Another is that I am emotionally less resilient when I lose sleep. There were early days when I would work without regard to sleep and feel energized and motivated. In the last seven or eight years my threshold for despondency is much lower. For me, adequate sleep is not a matter of staying healthy. It is a matter of staying in the ministry. It is irrational that my future should look bleaker when I get four or five hours sleep several nights in a row. But that is irrelevant. Those are the facts. And I must live within the limits of facts. I commend sufficient sleep to you, for the sake of your proper assessment of God and his promises.

Spurgeon was right when he said,

The condition of your body must be attended to ... a little more ... common sense would be a great gain to some who are ultra spiritual, and attribute all their moods of feeling to some supernatural cause when the real reason lies far nearer to hand. Has it not often happened that dyspepsia has been mistaken for backsliding, and bad digestion has been set down as a hard heart?” (Ibid., 312)

3. Spurgeon consistently nourished his soul by communion with Christ through prayer and meditation.

It was a great mercy to me as I entered this past year that I had just prepared the lecture on John Owen for this conference and had discovered his book Communion with God. Perhaps more than any other, that book nourished me again and again the soul asked, “Can God spread a table in the wilderness?”

Spurgeon warned his students,

Never neglect your spiritual meals, or you will lack stamina and your spirits will sink. Live on the substantial doctrines of grace, and you will outlive and out-work those who delight in the pastry and syllabubs of ‘modern thought.’ (Ibid., 310)

I think one of the reasons Spurgeon was so rich in language and full in doctrinal substance and strong in the spirit, in spite of his despondency and his physical oppression and his embattlements, is that he was always immersed in a great book — six a week. We cannot match that number. But we can always be walking with some great “see-er” of God. I walked with Owen most of the year on and off little by little and felt myself strengthened by a great grasp of God’s reality.

And Spurgeon came in along side this reading, saying and showing the same thing, namely, that the key in all good reading of theology is utterly real fellowship with Christ.

Above all, feed the flame with intimate fellowship with Christ. No man was every cold in heart who lived with Jesus on such terms as John and Mary did of old ... I never met with a half-hearted preacher who was much in communion with the Lord Jesus. (Ibid., 315)

In many ways Spurgeon was a child in his communion with God. He did not speak in complex terms about anything too strange or mystical. In fact his prayer life seems more business-like than contemplative.

When I pray, I like to go to God just as I go to a bank clerk when I have cheque to be cashed. I walk in, put the cheque down on the counter, and the clerk gives me my money, I take it up, and go about my business. I do not know that I ever stopped in a bank five minutes to talk with the clerks; when I have received my change I go away and attend to other matters. That is how I like to pray; but there is a way of praying that seems like lounging near the mercy seat as though one had no particular reason for being found there. (Ministry, 46–47)

This may not be entirely exemplary. It may dishonor the Lord to treat him like a bank clerk rather than like a mountain spring. But we would make a mistake if we thought that Spurgeon’s business-like praying was anything other than childlike communion with his Father. The most touching description I have read of his communion with God comes from 1871 when he was in terrible pain with gout.

When I was racked some months ago with pain, to an extreme degree, so that I could no longer bear it without crying out, I asked all to go from the room, and leave me alone; and then I had nothing I could say to God but this, ‘Thou are my Father, and I am thy child; and thou, as a Father art tender and full of mercy. I could not bear to see my child suffer as thou makest me suffer, and if I saw him tormented as I am now, I would do what I could to help him, and put my arms under him to sustain him. Wilt thou hide thy face from me, my Father? Wilt thou still lay on a heavy hand, and not give me a smile from thy countenance?’ ... So I pleaded, and I ventured to say, when I was quiet, and they came back who watched me: ‘I shall never have such pain again from this moment, for God has heard my prayer.’ I bless God that ease came and the racking pain never returned. (“The Anguish and Agonies of Charles Spurgeon,” 24)

If we are going to preach through adversity, we will have to live in communion with God on such intimate terms — speaking to him our needs and our pain, and feeding on the grace of his promises and the revelations of God’s glory.

4. Spurgeon rekindled the zeal and passion to preach by fixing his eyes on eternity rather than the immediate price of faithfulness.

The apostle Paul saw that the outer nature was wasting away. And what kept him going was the abiding assurance that this momentary affliction is working for him an eternal weight of glory. And so he looked to the things that are eternal (2 Corinthians 4:16–18). So did Spurgeon.

O brethren, (he said to his pastors’ conference) we shall soon have to die! We look each other in the face to-day in health, but there will come a day when others will look down upon our pallid countenances as we lie in our coffins ... It will matter little to us who shall gaze upon us then, but it will matter eternally how we have discharged our work during our lifetime. (An All Round Ministry, 76)

When our hearts grow faint and our zeal wavers for the task of preaching he calls us to,

Meditate with deep solemnity upon the fate of the lost sinner ... Shun all views of future punishment which would make it appear less terrible, and so take off the edge of your anxiety to save immortals from the quenchless flame ... Think much also of the bliss of the sinner saved, and like holy Baxter derive rich arguments from ‘the saints’ everlasting rest.’ ... There will be no fear of your being lethargic if you are continually familiar with eternal realities.” (Students, 315)

Short of eternity he took the long view when it came to his own persecution. In the Downgrade controversy he said,

Posterity must be considered. I do not look so much at what is to happen to-day, for these things relate to eternity. For my part, I am quite willing to be eaten of dogs for the next fifty years; but the more distant future shall vindicate me. I have dealt honestly before the living God. My brother, do the same. (An All Round Ministry, 360–361)

To keep on preaching in storm of adversity, you must look well beyond the crisis and feelings of the hour. You must look to what history will make of your faithfulness and most of all what God will make of it at the last day.

5. For Spurgeon a key to his perseverance in preaching through adversity was that he had settled who he was and would not be paralyzed with external criticism or internal second-guessing.

One of the great perils of living under continual criticism is that this is a constant call for you to be other than what you are. And, in fact, a humble saint always wants to be a better person than he is. But there is a great danger here of losing your bearings in sea of self-doubt. Not knowing who you are. Not being able to say with Paul, “By the grace of God I am what I am” (1 Corinthians 15:10). Spurgeon felt this danger keenly.

In comparing one ministerial identity with another he reminded other pastors that at the last supper there was a chalice for drinking the wine and there was a basin for washing feet. Then he said,

I protest that I have no choice whether to be the chalice or the basin. Fain would I be whichever the Lord wills so long as He will but use me ... So you, my brother, you may be the cup, and I will be the basin; but let the cup be a cup, and the basin a basin, and each one of us just what he is fitted to be. Be yourself, dear brother, for, if you are not yourself, you cannot be anybody else; and so, you see, you must be nobody ... Do not be a mere copyist, a borrower, a spoiler of other men’s notes. Say what God has said to you, and say it in your own way; and when it is so said, plead personally for the Lord’s blessing upon it. (Ibid., 73–74)

And I would add, plead personally the Lord’s purifying blood upon it too, because none of our best labors is untainted. But the danger is to let the truth paralyze you with fear of man and doubt of self.

Eleven years later in 1886 he struck the same anvil again:

Friend, be true to your own destiny! One man would make a splendid preacher of downright hard-hitting Saxon; why must he ruin himself by cultivating an ornate style? ... Apollos has the gift of eloquence; why must he copy blunt Cephas? Every man in his own order. (Ibid., 232–233)

Spurgeon illustrates with his own struggle to be responsive to criticism during the Downgrade controversy. For a season he tried to adapt his language to the critics. But there came a time when he had to be what he was.

I have found it utterly impossible to please, let me say or do what I will. One becomes somewhat indifferent when dealing with those whom every word offends. I notice that, when I have measured my words, and weight my sentences most carefully, I have then offended most; while some of my stronger utterances have passed unnoticed. Therefore, I am comparatively careless as to how my expressions may be received, and only anxious that they may be in themselves just and true. (Ibid., 282–283)

If we are to survive and go on preaching in an atmosphere of controversy, there comes a point where you have done your best to weight the claims of your critics and take them to heart and must now say, “By the grace of God, I am what I am.” And bring an end to the deranging second-guessing that threatens to destroy the very soul.

6. But in the end, the strength to go on preaching in the midst of adversity and setbacks came for Spurgeon from the assured sovereign triumph of Christ.

Near the end of his life (1890) in (I believe) his last address to his pastors’ conference he compares adversity and the ebb of truth to the ebbing tide.

You never met an old salt, down by the sea, who was in trouble because the tide had been ebbing out for hours. No! He waits confidently for the turn of the tide, and it comes in due time. Yonder rock has been uncovered during the last half-hour, and if the sea continues to ebb out for weeks, there will be no water in the English Channel, and the French will walk over from Cherbourg. Nobody talks in that childish way, for such an ebb will never come. Nor will we speak as though the gospel would be routed, and eternal truth driven out of the land. We serve an almighty Master ... If our Lord does but stamp His foot, He can win for Himself all the nations of the earth against heathenism, and Mohammedanism, and Agnosticism, and Modern-though, and every other foul error. Who is he that can harm us if we follow Jesus? How can His cause be defeated? At His will, converts will flock to His truth as numerous as the sands of the sea ... Wherefore be of good courage, and go on your way singing [and preaching!]:

The winds of hell have blown The world its hate hath shown, Yet it is not o’erthrown. Hallelujah for the Cross! It shall never suffer loss! The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge. (Ibid., 395–396)

[add-salt-shed-light]

Tithing - The Conclusion

In my last article, I took on the subject of tithing and listed each verse in the bible that I could find that referenced the following: tithe, tithes, tithing, and tenth (provided it was in reference to the giving of a tenth).  There is no question that in the Old Testament there was a commandment given to the children of Israel to tithe.  The question, I will address with this article, is whether or not Christians are commanded to tithe or provide a tenth of their income/property to the assembly/church.

As listed in my first article on tithing, there are four passages in the New Testament that refer to tithing or the giving of a tenth.  None of these passages themselves contain any commandment for Christians to tithe nor do they contain instructions for Christians to stop that Old Testament practice.  What instruction does the New Testament give to the Christian on giving to the assembly/church?

Giving in the New Testament

I will now list the passages that I have found in the New Testament that I believe cover the principles of Christian giving.

Matthew 6:1-4:  “1 Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.  2 “So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be honored by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving will be in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you [NASB].”

This is a prescriptive text.  It does not tell us how much to give, but it tells us how to give.  We are to give, not to be noticed and celebrated for our generosity, but in secret, without pride.

1 Corinthians 8:9-13:  9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich. 10 I give my opinion in this matter, for this is to your advantage, who were the first to begin a year ago not only to do this, but also to desire to do it. 11 But now finish doing it also, so that just as there was the readiness to desire it, so there may be also the completion of it by your ability. 12 For if the readiness is present, it is acceptable according to what a person has, not according to what he does not have. 13 For this is not for the ease of others and for your affliction, but by way of equality (NASB).”

This is a prescriptive text.  The Apostle Paul is instructing the Corinthian brethren to complete a collection that they had started.  This collection was intended to provide help to the impoverished assemblies in Macedonia. Although that specific need (i.e. the need in Macedonia) is no longer relevant to us, we still have instruction in this verse on giving.  We are to give according to our ability, not for the sake of prospering others and making ourselves poor.  No instruction is given to these Christians on how much each should give.  They were each to give according to their individual ability to give.

1 Corinthians 16:1-2:  “Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia, so do you also. 2 On the first day of every week each one of you is to put aside and save, as he may prosper, so that no collections be made when I come [NASB].”

This is a prescriptive text.  Paul is providing the assembly in Corinth, the same directive that he gave to the assemblies in Galatia.  The Christians were to save and give as each may have prospered (or according to his/her means).  There was no set amount dictated. If we consider the introduction that the Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 1:2 (“To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, saints by calling, with all who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours (NASB)”), then we are to understand the epistle as instruction to all Christians: it applies to us.

2 Corinthians 9:6-7:  “Now this I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7 Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. [NASB].”

This is a prescriptive text.  The Apostle Paul is providing instruction on how we must give.  It does not provide a specific amount but rather we are to give as we have purposed in our heart and not to give because we are compelled to.  Whatever amount we give, we are to do it cheerful and freely, as we each have prospered or purposed in our hearts to give.

I believe these are all the passages in the New Testament, written directly to Christians, which provide us instruction on giving within the assembly / church.  There is no amount specified; neither as a percentage nor as a fixed amount.  What are we then to conclude?  Are we still under the commandment to tithe? 

Most churches and individual Christians, who believe that tithing is still required, have selected a somewhat arbitrary definition of tithing.  That is, it has been defined as giving one tenth of one’s income to the church.  However, that is not in accord with the tithing commandment, as given in the Old Testament.  The Israelite, under the system of tithing that was instituted under the law, gave far more than ten percent.

Although this is not a complete list, it will suffice to show that tithing did not amount to just ten percent of an Israelite’s income:

1.      “A tithe or tenth, both of grain and fruit, was the Lord's (Lev. 27:30), i.e. it was to be given to the Levites, who again gave to the priests. (Num. 18:21, etc.) The tenth of the herd was also to be similarly given. (Lev. 27:32.)

2.      Another tenth (which must on no account be confounded with the above) had to be reserved to be eaten in the place which the Lord chose to set his name there. (Deut. 12:17-19; see Deut. 14:24-27 for the provision when the distance to the place was great.) It may be asked whether a tenth of the increase was not a great quantity for these occasions, but it should be remembered that the Israelite was three times a year to go to the place the Lord chose, viz, at the passover, the feast of weeks, and that of tabernacles. The stay on each occasion would not be much less than ten days (the passover with the feast of unleavened bread lasted eight days, and so did the feast of tabernacles, but as to the feast of weeks no mention of a period is made), so that from twenty days to a month each year would be thus spent, and not only were they not to appear before the Lord empty, but also it was to be a time of rejoicing and of giving to the stranger, the fatherless, the widow, and above all to the Levite (Deut. 16:11, 14, 17); so that the tenth would not be at all too much for this purpose.

3.      Then besides these, there was a third tithing which took place every third year. (Deut. 14:28, 29.) In this case the amount was to be laid up within the gates for the purpose of supplying the Levite, the stranger (who is never to be forgotten), and the fatherless and the widow, within the gates.

These three sets of tithes would alone amount to between a fourth and a fifth of all the produce, but this is far from all, for we have also the following: —

4.      The fields were not to be fully reaped nor gleaned; nor was all the fruit to be plucked from the trees. These were to be left to the poor and the stranger. (Lev. 19:9, 10.) Also all were at liberty to pluck corn and fruit in the fields or vineyards. (Deut. 23:24, 25.)

5.      The fruit of trees was not to be taken for the owner in anywise till the fifth year. (Lev. 19:23, 25.)

6.      The firstlings of all clean beasts were to be sacrificed to the Lord. (Num. 18:17.)

7.      The firstborn of men and of asses to be redeemed. (Num. 18:16; Ex. 13:13.)

8.    Etc...”     [http://www.stempublishing.com/authors/Jacob/Jacob_On_Giving.html]

I will conclude with these two points:

If your church requires or encourages you to give ten percent, then it is not in accord with 2 Corinthians 9:7.  We are instructed not to give under compulsion.  A rule to give a specified amount is compulsion.  Instead, “On the first day of every week each one of you is to put aside and save, as he may prosper (1 Corinthians 16:2, NASB).”

If you believe that tithing is still a requirement, then don’t weasel out and just give a measly ten percent of your income.  That’s not what tithing is.  Come to church with armloads of produce from your garden and a lamb or two…

I believe scripture is clear.  Tithing was an Old Testament commandment, and was applicable to an Israelite under the law.  A Christian should give willingly, generously, and cheerfully…and do so without fanfare or expectation of reward.

[hieromonkcharbel]

The New Evangelization Begins in the Confessional

What is the new evangelization?

The expression “new evangelization” was popularized by the important apostolic exhortation of Blessed Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi, as a response to the new challenges that the contemporary world creates for the mission of the Church. As Saint John Paul II tells us in Crossing the Threshold of Hope, the new evangelization has nothing in common with restoration, proselytism, pluralism or tolerance: instead, against the spirit of the world, the Church takes up anew each day a struggle that is none other than the struggle for the world’s soul. Saint John Paul concluded that in its ever renewed encounter with man, evangelization is linked to generational change. Generations come and go which have distanced themselves from Christ and the Church, which have accepted a secular model of thinking and living. Meanwhile, the Church is always looking toward the future and She constantly goes out to meet new generations. And new generations clearly seem to be accepting with enthusiasm what their elders seem to have rejected.

Where does the new evangelization begin?

In a speech addressed to priests and deacons at an audience with the Pope in 2012, Pope Benedict XVI maintained that the new evangelization begins in the confessional. Consciousness of one’s own sinful condition helps one to realize the need for “openness of heart” to God. “The certainty that He is close and His mercy awaits the human being, even one who is involved in sin, in order to heal his weakness with the grace of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, is always a ray of hope for the world”, Pope Benedict said. The real conversion of our hearts means opening ourselves to God’s transforming and renewing action. In confession, through the freely bestowed action of divine Mercy, repentant sinners are justified, pardoned and sanctified and they abandon their former selves to be re-clothed in the new.

The necessity of confession

Confession is a part of our great Catholic heritage and has been practiced by our Christian ancestors since the earliest days of the Church. In the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (Didache, ca. 100) it states quite unambiguously: “Assemble on the Lord’s day and break bread and offer the Eucharist, but first make confession of your faults” (14, 1). In his groundbreaking work, Jesus of Nazareth, Part Two, Pope Benedict XVI reminds us that although we are saved by our baptism, “even the baptized remain sinners, so they need confession of sins, for in the life of Christians, –for table fellowship with the Lord– it constantly requires completion: washing of the feet”. In the First Letter of John we read, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1:8-10). According to Pope Benedict XVI, the use of the word “cleanse” signals an inner connection with the foot-washing passage. In confession, the Lord washes our soiled feet over and over again and prepares us for table fellowship with him. In the humble gesture of the washing of the feet is an expression of the entire ministry of Jesus’ life and death. The Lord stands before us as the servant of God –he who for our sake becomes one who serves, who carries our burden and so grants us true purity, the capacity to draw close to God.

Medicine for the Soul

The sacrament of the forgiveness of sins presupposes sins to be forgiven. What then is sin? Sin means disobedience to God’s commandments. It is a moral lapse, a free choice of the will. Sin must be admitted if it is to be forgiven, because we cannot be forgiven for sins we do not confess and repent of. “When Christ’s faithful strive to confess all the sins that they can remember, they undoubtedly place all of them before the divine mercy for pardon. But those who fail to do so and knowingly withhold some, place nothing before the divine goodness for remission… for if the sick person is too ashamed to show his wound to the doctor, the medicine cannot heal” (CCC 1456). “Sin is in the soul what disease is in the body. Forgiveness is a healing operation, a real spiritual change: it requires the light of truth to shine on it – by confession – and only then can we find peace.” (Dr. Peter Kreeft)

The joy after confession

As C. S. Lewis noted, “Humility, after the first shock is a cheerful virtue.” The greatest saints have always had the greatest joy –for joy is one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22). Yet these same saints see themselves as the greatest sinners. Pascal said there are only two kinds of people: saints, who know they are sinners, and sinners, who think they are saints. The confession of sin frees us and facilitates our reconciliation with others. Through an admission of sin, “man looks squarely at the sins he is guilty of, takes responsibility for them, and thereby opens himself again to God and to the communion of the Church.” (CCC 1455) On the level of human psychology, each of us needs to “let it all out” and “unload” so that our conscience may be clear. Thomas A Kempis exhorts us to maintain a clean conscience, stating : “Have therefore a clean conscience and thou shalt always have gladness. A good conscience may bear many wrongs, and is ever merry and glad in adversities; but an evil conscience is always fearful and unquiet.” Pardon and peace come from confession. “The forgiven penitent is reconciled with himself in his inmost being, where he regains his innermost truth… He is reconciled with all creation.” (CCC 1469) Following confession, the penitent finds peace and serenity with strong spiritual consolation. It is a peace that includes wholeness, harmony and a right relationship with God, self, and others. It is an echo from Eden and a foretaste of heaven. This is the peace Jesus Christ gives, “not as the world gives” (John 14:27).

Confession for conversion to holiness

All of us are under a continuing need for conversion. Conversion begins in Baptism, but conversion does not end in Baptism. It is an ongoing process because it is an ongoing need. Thomas A Kempis enlightens us in The Imitation of Christ with his observation, “How great is the frailty of human nature which is ever prone to evil! Today you confess your sins and tomorrow you again commit the sins which you confessed. One moment you resolve to be careful, and yet after an hour you act as though you had made no resolution.” Baptism is our first conversion, but through confession we undergo a second conversion because we are always in need of purification. St. Ambrose says of the two conversions that in the Church, “there are water and tears: the water of Baptism and the tears of repentance.” Pope Benedict states that the new evangelization draws its lifeblood from the holiness of the children of the Church, from the daily journey of personal and community conversion in order to be ever more closely conformed to Christ. There is a close connection between holiness and the Sacrament of Reconciliation, witnessed by all the saints of history. In the Introduction to the Devout Life, St. Francis de Sales encourages us towards repentant conversion in order to gain holiness, urging: “Even as a man just recovering from illness walks only so far as he is obliged to go, with a slow and weary step, so the converted sinner journeys along as far as God commands him but slowly and wearily, until he attains a spirit of true devotion, and then, like a sound man, he not only gets along, but he runs and leaps in the way of God’s Commands, and hastens gladly along the paths of heavenly counsels and inspirations.”

Through confession we emerge renewed

Pope Benedict XVI summarized the benefits of confession saying, “In the celebration of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the faithful have a real experience of that Mercy which Jesus of Nazareth, Lord and Christ has given to us, so that they themselves will become credible witnesses of that holiness which is the aim of the New Evangelization.” As Saint John Paul II indicated, the new evangelization is about the struggle for man’s soul: and the way to regain the souls of men is to give them a new beginning through the sacrament that renews our encounter with Christ. Our Holy Father Pope Benedict concluded his remarks to Priests in 2012 with this strong appeal: “This is my hope for each one of you: may the newness of Christ always be the center and reason for your priestly existence, so that those who meet you through your ministry may exclaim as did Andrew and John ‘we have found the Messiah’ (John 1:41). In this way, every Confession, from which each Christian will emerge renewed, will be a step ahead in the New Evangelization. May Mary, Mother of Mercy, Refuge for us sinners and Star of the New Evangelization, accompany us on our way.”

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Universalis Wednesday 10 July 2019 (other days)

Wednesday of week 14 in Ordinary Time

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Terce (Mid-Morning Prayer)

INTRODUCTION

O God, come to our aid.

O Lord, make haste to help us.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen. Alleluia.

Hymn

Come, Holy Spirit, live in us

With God the Father and the Son,

And grant us your abundant grace

To sanctify and make us one.

May mind and tongue made strong in love

Your praise throughout the world proclaim,

And may that love within our hearts

Set fire to others with its flame.

Most blessèd Trinity of love,

For whom the heart of man was made,

To you be praise in timeless song,

And everlasting homage paid.

Stanbrook Abbey Hymnal

The psalms of the day are shown here. If you are reciting more than one daytime hour (Terce, Sext, None) today, use the psalms of the day at one hour and the complementary psalms at the others.

PSALMS OF THE DAY

Psalm 118(119): 57-64

I have pondered over my ways and returned to your will.

My part is to follow the Lord:

I have promised to observe your words.

With all my heart I implore you to your face:

take pity on me, as you have promised.

I have considered my paths

and turned my footsteps to follow your decrees.

I have hurried, I have not delayed

to keep your commandments.

The wicked have wound ropes around me,

but still I remember your law.

In the dark of the night I rise and thank you

for your just judgements.

I am one with all who fear you

and keep your commandments.

The earth is filled with your loving kindness:

Lord, teach me your statutes.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

I have pondered over my ways and returned to your will.

Psalm Translation

To see the offical Grail psalms, get the Universalis app.

Psalm 54 (55)

Against a faithless friend

Trembling and fear fall upon me: turn to me, Lord, and listen to my cry.

Open your ears, O God, to my prayer,

and do not hide when I call on you:

turn to me and answer me.

My thoughts are distracted and I am disturbed

by the voice of my enemy and the oppression of the wicked.

They let loose their wickedness on me,

they persecute me in their anger.

My heart is tied in a knot

and the terrors of death lie upon me.

Fear and trembling come over me;

terror holds me tight.

I said, “Will no-one give me wings like a dove?

I shall fly away and rest.

I shall flee far away

and remain all alone.

I shall wait for him who will save me

from the stormy wind and the tempest.”

Scatter them, Lord, and separate their tongues,

for I see violence and conflict in the city.

By day and by night they circle it

high on its battlements.

Within it are oppression and trouble;

scheming and fraud fill its squares.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

Trembling and fear fall upon me: turn to me, Lord, and listen to my cry.

Psalm 54 (55)

I will cry to God and the Lord will save me.

For if my enemy had slandered me,

I think I could have borne it.

And if the one who hated me had trampled me,

perhaps I could have hidden.

But you – a man just like me,

my companion and my friend!

We had happy times together,

we walked together in the house of God.

Let death break in upon them!

Let them go down alive to the underworld,

for wickedness shares their home.

As for me, I will call upon God,

and the Lord will rescue me.

Evening, morning, noon – I shall watch and groan,

and he will hear my voice.

He will redeem my soul

and give it peace from those who attack me –

for very many are my enemies.

God will hear and will bring them low,

God, the eternal.

They will never reform:

they do not fear God.

That man – he stretched out his hand against his allies:

he corrupted his own covenant.

His face was smoother than butter,

but his heart was at war;

his words were softer than oil,

but they were sharp as drawn swords.

Throw all your cares on the Lord

and he will give you sustenance.

He will not let the just be buffeted for ever.

No – but you, Lord, will lead the wicked

to the gaping mouth of destruction.

The men of blood and guile

will not live half their days.

But I, Lord, will put my trust in you.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

I will cry to God and the Lord will save me.

OR:

At the daytime hours (Terce, Sext, None) when you don’t choose to use the psalms of the day, use the complementary psalms instead.

COMPLEMENTARY PSALMS

Psalm 119 (120)

Longing for peace

I called and the Lord answered me.

I was in trouble, and cried to the Lord;

and he answered me.

Lord, free me from the lips of liars,

from deceitful tongues.

What will be given you, what will you receive,

deceitful tongue?

Sharp arrows from the warrior,

hardened in the flames.

Alas, I am an exile in Meshech;

I dwell among the tents of Kedar!

My soul has lived too long

with those who hate peace.

I am for making peace;

but whenever I spoke, they attacked me.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

I called and the Lord answered me.

Psalm 120 (121)

The guardian of the people

May the Lord guard your going in and coming out.

I shall lift my eyes to the hills:

where is my help to come from?

My help will come from the Lord,

who made heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot slip:

he will not doze, your guardian.

Behold, he will not doze or sleep,

the guardian of Israel.

The Lord is your guardian, the Lord is your shade;

he is at your right hand.

By day the sun will not strike you;

nor the moon by night.

The Lord will guard you from all harm;

the Lord will guard your life.

The Lord will guard your coming and your going

both now and for ever.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

May the Lord guard your going in and coming out.

Psalm 121 (122)

Jerusalem, the holy city

I rejoiced in the things which were said to me.

They filled me with joy when they said,

“We will go to the house of the Lord.”

Now our feet are standing

within your gates, Jerusalem.

Jerusalem, built as a city,

whole and self-contained:

there the tribes have gone up,

the tribes of the Lord –

the witness of Israel,

to praise the Lord’s name.

For there are the thrones of justice,

the thrones of the house of David.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem:

“Safety for those who care for you,

peace inside your walls,

security within your ramparts!”

For my brethren and those near to me I will say

“Peace be upon you.”

For the sake of the house of the Lord our God,

I will call blessings upon you.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son

and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning,

is now, and ever shall be,

world without end.

Amen.

I rejoiced in the things which were said to me.

CONCLUSION

Short Reading

Deuteronomy 1:16-17 ©

At that time I told your judges: You must give your brothers a fair hearing and see justice done between a man and his brother or the stranger who lives with him. You must be impartial in judgement and give an equal hearing to small and great alike. Do not be afraid of any man, for the judgement is God’s.℣. The Lord is just, he loves just ways.

℟. The upright shall see his face.

Let us pray.

Lord, holy Father, faithful to your promise

you sent your Spirit to bring together a people divided by sin.

Give us the grace to foster unity

and peace among men.

Through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Let us praise the Lord.

– Thanks be to God.