I really was affected by Tozer in grad school. Especially The Pursuit of God. I need to revisit him. As for your larger question, I like to think about what Paul says about the “cloud of witnesses” and the “company of saints.” The tradition is like an enormous fellowship that cheers you on in your journey from across the finish line. But you’re the one making the journey, which is a new experience all its own, not quite like any that came before. That’s why you’re here: to carve out one new path, to reveal one new image of the invisible God.
I was actually just reflecting on something similar on my way home from Mass this morning. I was thinking about how the early Christians lived. That their focus was very "small" so to speak. They knew they had negligible effect on political life and most probably expected their lives to end in some painful and inglorious way, yet they persisted in their BELIEF first followed by small sacrifices and acts of charity. Ultimately God used all these little acts to eventually convert the entire Empire. They had no intention of doing that, it was the result of their cumulative faithfulness. We who live 2000 years later in a post-Christian world have the experience of living in a time where we know things CAN be changed, so we seem to expect them to by our actions more than God's, I think.
Chesterton observed, " The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad." And, these wildly wandering virtues, in his observation, do "more damage." I definitely agree with this. I think there's so much misguided compassion in some areas it actually hurts those it intends to help, and Heaven forbid you point this out because it just shows you somehow to be "unChristian."
I've always thought there is a holy space where God works. It is the space between Him and the person, but He can't work if we fill up the space with ourselves too much. Perhaps if we all tried to live a little more to please God alone, we would free up a little space for Him to actually work in the world in a mysterious but effective way.
I don’t think it’s only filling up that space with ourselves. It’s filling it up at all. I believe we need space, quiet times, times for reflection in our busy lives. Road to Damascus moments are infinitely rare in the entire history of mankind. I believe, instead, the Lord works through whispers, rather than grand gestures.
He surely inspired John Denver’s line, “talk to God and listen to the casual reply.” I trust that is true, because I’ve had answers to come to me, answers I could not possibly know. And they’ve only come in quiet times, when I’ve had the chance to listen to His casual reply. So we need that space, those quiet times, to give the Lord’s messages a chance to get through to us.
I understand the “too easy” part. How many times do we hear the same stories in our church sermons? How often do we actually pause to reflect, “Wait…that dude turned water into wine??” I’m reading through A. W. Tozer right now and I’m struggling with how much of our faith, my personal search for Christ, should be bound up in Sunday morning service and how much in personal exploration of the Bible and what much smarter people than I have said in generations past?
That’s the big question: how do you ACT with agape love in everyday life without following precepts and prescriptions but letting your heart dictate in just the right way? Where is the balance in keeping our “normal” lives going but thinking about others as we go about our business?
Love this letter. As a Unitarian-raised, 60s survivor and born-again Charismatic Jesus freak, it delights me to have such diversity among companions on this Jesus road. Just like snowflakes, there are no two alike in God’s infinite Creation! (I refuse to let certain ideological groups hijack the words “diversity” and snowflakes!” Lol!)
I’m very much affected by this at the moment. Having embarked on a self guided study of the Bible over the last 2 years, alongside a bit of Yoga (which I undertook as part of a Christian practice), and inspired by the Ministry of Sinead O’Connor and Morrissey, and Tom Holland, and CS Lewis and Spencer Klavan, I have decided to return to the Church I was born into (Eatern Orthodox). There I am embarking on a 40 day Lenten fast for the first time. Everything troubles me. The Church rules that seem nothing like Paul’s advice in Romans (“don’t judge a brother who is fasting or not fasting - it’s all G with the Big G” - or words to that effect). The discipline itself which I find is either a kind of vanity (oh aren’t I great I’m fasting for Lent!) or destructive (I’m hangry and do a bad job of acting lovingly as a result). I can hear God saying - this is not what it’s about! Do your best! Love me and love one another! Meanwhile the prayer schedule demands Psalm after Psalm, but the struggles of the Israelites and God’s murderous mood with them, is not what I need right now. I need the Pauline Epistles. I need Jesus. I need love. I haven’t felt worse in my journey to God since coming to church. But it’s only been a week, and it’s Lent so I’ll hang around for a while. I was so looking forward to it but the human brushstrokes are so visible in Church rules and I fear what God wants is sometimes harder to hear through them…
I really was affected by Tozer in grad school. Especially The Pursuit of God. I need to revisit him. As for your larger question, I like to think about what Paul says about the “cloud of witnesses” and the “company of saints.” The tradition is like an enormous fellowship that cheers you on in your journey from across the finish line. But you’re the one making the journey, which is a new experience all its own, not quite like any that came before. That’s why you’re here: to carve out one new path, to reveal one new image of the invisible God.
I was actually just reflecting on something similar on my way home from Mass this morning. I was thinking about how the early Christians lived. That their focus was very "small" so to speak. They knew they had negligible effect on political life and most probably expected their lives to end in some painful and inglorious way, yet they persisted in their BELIEF first followed by small sacrifices and acts of charity. Ultimately God used all these little acts to eventually convert the entire Empire. They had no intention of doing that, it was the result of their cumulative faithfulness. We who live 2000 years later in a post-Christian world have the experience of living in a time where we know things CAN be changed, so we seem to expect them to by our actions more than God's, I think.
Chesterton observed, " The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad." And, these wildly wandering virtues, in his observation, do "more damage." I definitely agree with this. I think there's so much misguided compassion in some areas it actually hurts those it intends to help, and Heaven forbid you point this out because it just shows you somehow to be "unChristian."
I've always thought there is a holy space where God works. It is the space between Him and the person, but He can't work if we fill up the space with ourselves too much. Perhaps if we all tried to live a little more to please God alone, we would free up a little space for Him to actually work in the world in a mysterious but effective way.
I don’t think it’s only filling up that space with ourselves. It’s filling it up at all. I believe we need space, quiet times, times for reflection in our busy lives. Road to Damascus moments are infinitely rare in the entire history of mankind. I believe, instead, the Lord works through whispers, rather than grand gestures.
He surely inspired John Denver’s line, “talk to God and listen to the casual reply.” I trust that is true, because I’ve had answers to come to me, answers I could not possibly know. And they’ve only come in quiet times, when I’ve had the chance to listen to His casual reply. So we need that space, those quiet times, to give the Lord’s messages a chance to get through to us.
I understand the “too easy” part. How many times do we hear the same stories in our church sermons? How often do we actually pause to reflect, “Wait…that dude turned water into wine??” I’m reading through A. W. Tozer right now and I’m struggling with how much of our faith, my personal search for Christ, should be bound up in Sunday morning service and how much in personal exploration of the Bible and what much smarter people than I have said in generations past?
That’s the big question: how do you ACT with agape love in everyday life without following precepts and prescriptions but letting your heart dictate in just the right way? Where is the balance in keeping our “normal” lives going but thinking about others as we go about our business?
Love this letter. As a Unitarian-raised, 60s survivor and born-again Charismatic Jesus freak, it delights me to have such diversity among companions on this Jesus road. Just like snowflakes, there are no two alike in God’s infinite Creation! (I refuse to let certain ideological groups hijack the words “diversity” and snowflakes!” Lol!)
I’m very much affected by this at the moment. Having embarked on a self guided study of the Bible over the last 2 years, alongside a bit of Yoga (which I undertook as part of a Christian practice), and inspired by the Ministry of Sinead O’Connor and Morrissey, and Tom Holland, and CS Lewis and Spencer Klavan, I have decided to return to the Church I was born into (Eatern Orthodox). There I am embarking on a 40 day Lenten fast for the first time. Everything troubles me. The Church rules that seem nothing like Paul’s advice in Romans (“don’t judge a brother who is fasting or not fasting - it’s all G with the Big G” - or words to that effect). The discipline itself which I find is either a kind of vanity (oh aren’t I great I’m fasting for Lent!) or destructive (I’m hangry and do a bad job of acting lovingly as a result). I can hear God saying - this is not what it’s about! Do your best! Love me and love one another! Meanwhile the prayer schedule demands Psalm after Psalm, but the struggles of the Israelites and God’s murderous mood with them, is not what I need right now. I need the Pauline Epistles. I need Jesus. I need love. I haven’t felt worse in my journey to God since coming to church. But it’s only been a week, and it’s Lent so I’ll hang around for a while. I was so looking forward to it but the human brushstrokes are so visible in Church rules and I fear what God wants is sometimes harder to hear through them…
When did we feed you?” They were so consumed in the hungry human face across from theirs that they didn’t even realize it was also God’s.
Such a beautiful, profound point!
If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
Unless you become like little children. . . .
My cat’s breath smells of cat food.