Monthly Archives: January 2023

January 29, 2023 · 12:00 am

Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany

Walk Humbly with Your God

Micah prophesied that a day was coming when we would walk with God:

In days to come
the mountain of the Lord’s temple
shall be established as the highest of the mountains
and shall be raised up above the hills.
Peoples shall stream to it,
and many nations shall come and say:
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the house of the God of Jacob,
that he may teach us his ways
and that we may walk in his paths.”   (Micah 4:1-2)

God has called all of us to walk with him. God wants our companionship. He wants our friendship. From Micah we read:

He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you

but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?   (Micah 6:8)

There was a time when a walk with God was standard for each day.  We read in Genesis:

They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

Adam and Eve rebelled against God. Yet God still wanted to walk with them. However, Adam and Eve now found their sin would be exposed to God and they hid from him. (We can hide, but God sees everything at all times. Nothing escapes his vision.) Because of their sin, Adam and Eve bore great shame. They did not feel worthy to stand in God’s presence.

The psalmist asked:

Lord, who may dwell in your tabernacle?
who may abide upon your holy hill?

Whoever leads a blameless life and does what is right,
who speaks the truth from his heart.    (Psalm 15:1-2)

To walk with a holy God we must be holy. How does one do that? Are we able to make ourselves holy? Are we able to cleanse ourselves from all our unrighteousness? No! But there is good news. God can do it. We read in 1 John:

 If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.   (1 John 1:9)

Adam and Eve did not have the benefit of the cross. We can approach God because of the atoning sacrifice of his Son Jesus. In Hebrews we read:

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested[a] as we are, yet without sin. 1Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.   (Hebrews 4:15-16)

If we have access to God, are we walking with God? Walking with God is more than believing in God. It has to do with our seeking God. We read in Hebrews:

And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would approach God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.   (Hebrews 11:6)

Do we seek God daily? Do we seek him with all our hearts? Do we desire to be with him more than anything in this life?

You will seek the Lord your God, and you will find him if you search after him with all your heart and soul.   (Deuteronomy 4:29)

Do we seek God daily? Do we seek him with all our hearts? Do we desire to be with him more than anything in this life? Jesus said in his Sermon on the Mount:

Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.    (Matthew 6:33)

Jesus also said in the same sermon::

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.   (Matthew 5:3)

How could people who are poor be rich? They are the people who know that they need God every moment of their lives.

The Apostle Paul wrote:

Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”   (1 Corinthians 1:26-31)

If we boast that we walk with the Lord then we are not walking with him. Micah again reminds us:

He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you

but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?   (Micah 6:8)

Walking with God is being in a friendship with God. Being in fellowship with God is obeying God. Jesus prayed for his disciples:

Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words, and the word that you hear is not mine but is from the Father who sent me.   (John 14:23-24)

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you.   (John 15:12-14)

Have we laid ourselves down? That is the only way we can keep God’s commandments. We cannot do it on our own. The New Covenant with God in Christ is a covenant only God can fulfill. Striving is no longer required. What God asks us to do is what God empowers us to do.

The Apostle Paul asked God to remove a weakness he found in himself. God answered:

but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ, for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.   (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

Shall we walk with the Lord? Shall we abide in his presence? To “abide” is to live, continue, or remain; so, to abide in Christ is to live in Him or remain in Him.

Now by this we know that we have come to know him, if we obey his commandments. Whoever says, “I have come to know him,” but does not obey his commandments is a liar, and in such a person the truth does not exist; but whoever obeys his word, truly in this person the love of God has reached perfection. By this we know that we are in him: whoever says, “I abide in him,” ought to walk in the same way as he walked.   (1 John 2:3-6)

Let us walk the way Jesus walked with the Father. He was never out of touch with God.

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January 25, 2023 · 12:00 am

Conversion of Saint Paul

the-conversion-of-saint-paul-bartolome-esteban-murilloFrom Darkness to Light

Saul was on the road to Damascus to arrest Christian believers. While en route he experienced one of the most dramatic conversions recorded in the Bible. In his own words:

“I was traveling to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests, when at midday along the road, your Excellency, I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me and my companions. When we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, `Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It hurts you to kick against the goads.’ I asked, `Who are you, Lord?’ The Lord answered, `I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. But get up and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you to serve and testify to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you. I will rescue you from your people and from the Gentiles– to whom I am sending you to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’ ”  (Acts 26:12-18)

Well, that was Saul. He was persecuting Christians. Do we have any zealous people in the Church today who are crushing their fellow parishioners? Well, that is another story.

What about those who have grown up in the Church? Do they need a conversion experience? We need to understand that the Apostle Paul did grow up in the Church. He grew up in Judaism which was the only church in his day. The rest of the world was pagan. He was living by the rules. He was educated in the best rabbinic tradition. Here is how he described himself:

Circumcised the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless.  (Philippians 3:5-6)

I was advancing in Judaism beyond many Jews of my own age and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers.  (Galatians 1:14)

We understand, of course, that this was the way Saul described himself before his conversion. How did he express himself after his conversion?

I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.  (Romans 7:15-19)

Paul goes on to say:

Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!   (Romans 7:24-25)

Conversion opened Saul’s eyes to reality. His religion had failed him. He needed more than religion. His Lord Jesus Christ did not fail him:

But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.  (Philippians 3:7-11)

Saul became the great Apostle Paul who wrote two-thirds of the New Testament. Does his testimony speak to us today? What is our testimony? Are we merely rules enforcers or are we ambassadors for Christ? The lost in this world are counting on us to witness the love and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Paul was a rules enforcer who grew to understand God’s mercy and loving-kindness. He prayed for the Church in Ephesus:

I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.   (Ephesians 3:16-19)

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January 22, 2023 · 12:00 am

Third Sunday after the Epiphany

The Light of Christ

The theme of the Season of Epiphany is moving from darkness to light. From today’s appoint4ee prophecy in Isaiah:

The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;

those who lived in a land of deep darkness–
on them light has shined.

You have multiplied the nation,
you have increased its joy;

they rejoice before you
as with joy at the harvest,
as people exult when dividing plunder.

For the yoke of their burden,
and the bar across their shoulders,
the rod of their oppressor,
you have broken as on the day of Midian.   (Isaiah 9:2-4)

Light brings freedom. The One who restores our freedom was coming into the world:

When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, so that what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:

“Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali,
on the road by the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles—

the people who sat in darkness
have seen a great light,

and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death
light has dawned.”

From that time Jesus began to proclaim, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”   (Matthew 4:12-17)

The light had dawned. The prophecy was being fulfilled by Jesus. Only Jesus was qualified to fulfill the prophecy because Jesus was and is the light. In him, there is no darkness at all.

We can better understand the person and ministry of Jesus when we examine biblical passages extolling the light. The world was formed by light. We read in Genesis:

When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness.   (Genesis 1:1-4)

Light is the only reality. Darkness is just the absence of light. All that God has created has come from light. We are beings of light. Let us look at the prologue of the Gospel of John:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it.   (John 1:1-5)

Jesus was with God from the beginning. He was the agent of creation. Hs light is our life. Darkness is death. Satan, Lucifer, the light bearer, wanted to set himself above light, but it was impossible. His attempt cast him into a dark prison.

Humankind has sinned and succumbed to darkness. Satan duped us into thinking that we could live outside of God’slight. As did Satan, we rebelled against God. This has greatly diminished our light. When our light is diminishing we are dying.

We could only be restored by the refreshment of light. Reading further from John:

There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.     (John 1:6-9)

Jesus is the light that enlightens everyone. He gives life to everyone. The psalmist wrote:

The Lord is my light and my salvation;
whom then shall I fear?
the Lord is the strength of my life;
of whom then shall I be afraid?   (Psalm 27:1)

Jesus is calling us to himself. He is calling us to the light. How do we respond? We either come to the light or hide in darkness. In John’s Gospel, we read:

And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.   (John 3:19-21)

When we hide in darkness we are hiding from the truth. That makes us in bondage to darkness. Dark thoughts rule us. They govern our lives. And they steal our joy because they make us feel ashamed and isolated. This is how Satan wants us to feel. In this way, he can control, manipulate, and discourage us.

To gain freedom from this bondage we must stand fully in the light. We must stand naked before God. We need to surrender everything to God. In doing so, everything about us will be exposed. We will. e standing before the Word of God. Jesus is the light, but he is also the Word-made-flesh. God’s Word is truth. Jesus prayed to the Father for his disciples:

Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.   (John 17:17)

Standing fully in the light, we see all of our faults. We see all that is in our hearts and souls. What God sees he must judge. How do we dare to stand there? But stand there we must if we want to be set free.

The good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that he stands in our place, for all who have come to the light. God, the Father, looks at Jesus and not us. That is how we stand in the light. We need to blood of Jesus to cleanse us from all our sins. The Apostle Paul wrote:

For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.   (1 Corinthians 1:18)

We need the power of God. Returning to the prologue from John’s Gospel:

 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own,[ and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.   (John 1:10-13)

Light is life. Light is power. To receive that power we must continually stand before the Lord. We must continually stand in the light. Whatever God exposes in us he transposes. He takes care to do what we cannot do. The Apostle Paul wrote:

 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.   (2 Corinthians 4:6)

Let us not look at our circumstances in life. Let us look on the face of Jesus.

Our ministry is to reflect the light of Christ to the world. Jesus said:

“You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.   (Matthew 5:14-16)/blockquote>

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January 18, 2023 · 12:00 am

Confession of Saint Peter

The All-Important Question

In today’s readings, we examine the most important question in the world. From the Gospel of Matthew:

When Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”   (Matthew 16:13-16)

How fitting it is to have the Confession of Peter observed within the Season of the Epiphany. Peter was the first among the apostles to confess that Jesus is the Messiah. The Apostle Peter’s earthly testimony compliments the heavenly one. At the baptism of Jesus God, the Father, spoke from heaven, testifying that Jesus is His beloved Son.

Peter’s testimony was quite remarkable. At a time when there was much confusion and speculation about who Jesus was, Peter had come to a clear and concise conclusion about Jesus’ identity. He did not do so by his own reasoning alone, however:

And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.  (Matthew 16:17)

We remember that Peter not only confessed Jesus as the Messiah but later he also denied Jesus. Just before the crucifixion, Peter proclaimed that he would never leave or forsake Jesus. But Jesus knew better. He understands the frailties of human beings:

Jesus answered, “I tell you, Peter, before the rooster crows today, you will deny three times that you know me.”  (Luke 22:34)

Jesus gives us this warning concerning our confession:

Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.  (Matthew 10:32-33)

Peter discovered that he could not continue in the Faith on his own strength. He needed the strength that only God could provide. We remember that Jesus forgave Peter and restored him after the resurrection.

Throughout his ministry Peter’s testimony was bold and clear:

“There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.”  (Acts 4:12)

Today many people are confused about who Jesus is and what may be His place in history. Many biblical “scholars” have disputed the person and the ministry of Jesus. Yet, we have God’s testimony, Jesus’ testimony, and Peter’s confession recorded in Holy Scripture.

What will be our recorded confession? Our confession is all-important in keeping the faith. Even more, our continued confession is all important. From the Book of Revelation:

 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, proclaiming,

“Now have come the salvation and the power
    and the kingdom of our God
    and the authority of his Messiah,
for the accuser of our comrades[b] has been thrown down,
    who accuses them day and night before our God.
But they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb
    and by the word of their testimony,
for they did not cling to life even in the face of death.   (Revelation 12:10-11)

At a time when Christians are being persecuted, we will need God’s help to build and strengthen our faith as He did for Peter. This will be all the more true for the troubling days ahead. But with God’s help, we will remain faithful to our testimony. Just as we have benefitted from Peter’s bold testimony, so many others may benefit from ours. Salvation is at stake.

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