Category: Soul Awe

Paskha (Passover) 

That’s what the Orthodox Church calls Easter on this side of the world since it is the event that links the first Jewish Passover where the lamb’s blood saved them from death

to Jesus our Passover Lamb whose blood saves us from death (1 Corinthians 5:7). (The term “Easter” is a carry-over from a pre-Christian spring festival that celebrated new life.)

So, in the spirit of seeing the journey from the Passover in Egypt to the battles and freedom of the promised land as a metaphor for our Christian life, I offer this “chant”.

 For sending the Lamb of God to keep us from the angel of death, we thank You.

For freeing us from enemy voices that drive and demean us, we thank You.

For providing for us and deepening our understanding of You in the wilderness of life, we thank You.

For Your jealousy for us and our children to live well in the land, we thank You.

For Your mercy and instruction when we turn away from You, we thank You.

For equipping us with Your might to fight battles within and without, we thank You.

For living among us and within us to take up our burdens, we thank You.

For opening a way and conquering through us the things that are giants in our lives, we thank You.

For wisdom, strength and love to live in Your ways among people of other ways, we thank You.

For discernment to walk through all things with You and not to dilute Your message, we thank You.

For letting our own sin’s consequences draw us back to Your wholeness, we thank You.

For forgiving us and taking away our shame, we thank You.

For conquering death and the power of fear, anger and worry, we thank You.

For the invitation to join You in our own transformation and that of others, we thank You.

For Your pursuit of us and the hope of full transformation at Your return, we thank You!

                                                                                                                                photo-Ariana Scott

“…meditate upon all his wondrous works” Ps. 105:2

Traveling…on the road again, it’s easy to put things on hold, to get out of the habit of pausing.  Because of

• wonderful people to meet with
• wanting to be present with them
• not wanting to wear out our welcome where we’re staying
• hearing of and carrying heavy burdens along with family and friends
• recognizing in the flurry my own dullness to hear and slowness to love
• moments of awkwardness
• the news from colleagues of conflicts within and dangers without
• precious celebrations with fascinating people
• awe at our God’s creation in nature and people, ideas and adventures

Somehow, we’ve got to fit in pause.

A pause where you stop, look and listen; where you take in the wonder, the beauty, the transcendence of life that reminds you that this life is not about this life. It’s about something much bigger. The vast depths and heights of God’s love and provision that has infiltrated our souls. So, we pause and wonder and take in.  And maybe it will inform us, change us, move us to new strength, wisdom and grace.  Thank you to all who are pausing with us.  For putting your lives on pause and celebrating God’s beauty and design in creation and relationship.  His beauty in the union of David and Rachel, and later this month Kelvin and Stephanie and in December Luke and Megan!  We’re also celebrating Brad and Ariana’s 5 sweet years and Dan and my 35 adventurous and transoceanic years!  Wow.

We are pursued by His goodness and mercy.  We are realigned at the core of our being.

“God does great things beyond our understanding…”  Job 37:5

Jesus – right before the horror.

Guest post by Rachel P. Scott

In “the Passion Week story right after the last supper, Jesus and his disciples are likely on their way to the garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus knows he will be betrayed by one friend and abandoned by the rest. Into this heavy context, He speaks final commands, final wisdom to his disciples.

What will He say?

Our hearts and ears are open, Lord.

“Abide in me… Abide in my love.”

That’s the message? He’s about to die!

And yet His charge to His disciples, to us, is to abide in His love. To abide; to make one’s home in. He speaks of fruit too, but only to say that we are powerless to produce it without Him. He also speaks of obedience to commands that He knows will result in our fullness of joy.

Both of these things, producing fruit and obeying commands, tend to bring out the part in each of us that wants to earn love.

And yet these two are immersed in, surrounded by, the much stronger thrust of the whole passage – to remain in His love.  If we don’t want to be like branches that are  “thrown away and burned”, the answer is NOT working harder to produce more!

We hear Him speaking to our hearts, “Let your heart feel at home in my love. Let my love be your security; let my love be your resting place. This is the work you must do. Yes, there will be fruit, much fruit, abiding fruit! But the fruit is my responsibility. You cannot do it. You remain connected to my love; I will produce the fruit.”  As Jesus was the True Servant that Israel could not be, He is the True Vine, producing the fruit that we cannot. And yet He still wants us to be a part! We cannot do it, but He made a way. Connected to Him, branches to the vine, we get to be fruitful participants in His Garden.

Incredible love. Jesus is taking steps, passing buildings and trees, each of which brings him closer to the greatest pain a human has ever borne – the full weight of eternity’s suffering, sorrow, ugliness, evil – and all of this faced alone. He could have sought comfort, or rebuked the disciples for their upcoming abandonment, or frantically explained his Messiah-ship again, hoping the disciples would finally get it.

He didn’t.

Instead, He urged them to remain, abide, not WITH Him as they had been doing for the last 3 years, but IN Him. He urges us to do the same. We have no insecurity in His love – He chose us, we didn’t choose Him! As we walk through this Holy Week, may our hearts be broken and overjoyed by the love of Christ, that His greatest pain and His greatest sacrifice offer a home and a hope for us.”

How are you learning to abide in this Love?