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"What is unseen is eternal"
Hi Mary,
Thank you again for your post. I have been preoccupied in part by health challenges as not unusually and by the need to prepare a lesson at church which I was asked to do to fill in while others are away in summer.
Some of what you relate seems strange to me, but other parts--or perhaps the whole also--strangely familiar even if sometimes in other garb, and indeed I wonder if your experience is not fairly common among Christians even if with variations. Or at least I do not think you are alone even if you are an individual--I mean looking across not only space on the globe but time, the history of the church.
Part of my immediate interest in preparations for church has been the Lukan theme of Jesus going up to Jerusalem for His death-resurrection-ascension event (considered as a package) and how this contrasts with His disciple's question posed to Him: "Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume" (9:54) the Samaritan villages that would not receive Him because they heard He "set His face to go to Jerusalem" (v. 51)--which led me back to the history of the Samaritans and northern kingdom. Cf. e.g., Elijah calling down fire from heaven which consumed Ahaziah's soldiers sent to capture him, 2 Kings 1, for example.
A bit of a digression, I realize, and one I will not develop fully here, but one that has led to my wrestling again with God's justice and mercy--for the latter, the tenderness and mildness, if you will, of God (Matt. 11:29?). At least I understand, or think I do, that "the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost" (Lk. 19:10) even among Samaritans (cf. John 4, Acts 8 ... because God the Father so loved the wicked world, cf. John 3:16).
And as not uncommonly, salvation of such dubious characters as Samaritans (they have their significant sins and problems as I could relate) may require patience (as Jesus demonstrated) and sometimes bearing the brunt of apathy or antipathy: "Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of heaven" Paul exhorts the believers at Lystra, Iconium and (Pisidian) Antioch, Acts 14:22 in summary and (to author Luke) thematic fashion, for disciples of Jesus in some sense mimic Jesus in His suffering for righteousness sake.
I doubt that Lady Wisdom would disagree, though I recall also her saying that at the end of the day, "all who hate me love death." No, I don't think God has any pleasure in the death of the wicked either (cf. Ezek. 18:23, 33:11), but by destroying Ahaziah's soldiers, God not only delivered His prophet from probable death but also did what His nature requires: protract just judgment. Wisdom at the end of the day must agree with her Creator in that too. Or on the flip side again as you wrote, in the Eucharist and other reflection, the tenderness and mildness of the Great, Awesome, Thrice Holy Living God forms rather a striking (and encouraging) contrast.
May the Lord lead you in paths of righteousness for His name's sake and give you peace even while you feel as a prophet (de?)crying in the wilderness (i.e., alone), as Lady Wisdom must often feel, to judge from history.
Thank you again for your post. I have been preoccupied in part by health challenges as not unusually and by the need to prepare a lesson at church which I was asked to do to fill in while others are away in summer.
Some of what you relate seems strange to me, but other parts--or perhaps the whole also--strangely familiar even if sometimes in other garb, and indeed I wonder if your experience is not fairly common among Christians even if with variations. Or at least I do not think you are alone even if you are an individual--I mean looking across not only space on the globe but time, the history of the church.
Part of my immediate interest in preparations for church has been the Lukan theme of Jesus going up to Jerusalem for His death-resurrection-ascension event (considered as a package) and how this contrasts with His disciple's question posed to Him: "Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume" (9:54) the Samaritan villages that would not receive Him because they heard He "set His face to go to Jerusalem" (v. 51)--which led me back to the history of the Samaritans and northern kingdom. Cf. e.g., Elijah calling down fire from heaven which consumed Ahaziah's soldiers sent to capture him, 2 Kings 1, for example.
A bit of a digression, I realize, and one I will not develop fully here, but one that has led to my wrestling again with God's justice and mercy--for the latter, the tenderness and mildness, if you will, of God (Matt. 11:29?). At least I understand, or think I do, that "the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost" (Lk. 19:10) even among Samaritans (cf. John 4, Acts 8 ... because God the Father so loved the wicked world, cf. John 3:16).
And as not uncommonly, salvation of such dubious characters as Samaritans (they have their significant sins and problems as I could relate) may require patience (as Jesus demonstrated) and sometimes bearing the brunt of apathy or antipathy: "Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of heaven" Paul exhorts the believers at Lystra, Iconium and (Pisidian) Antioch, Acts 14:22 in summary and (to author Luke) thematic fashion, for disciples of Jesus in some sense mimic Jesus in His suffering for righteousness sake.
I doubt that Lady Wisdom would disagree, though I recall also her saying that at the end of the day, "all who hate me love death." No, I don't think God has any pleasure in the death of the wicked either (cf. Ezek. 18:23, 33:11), but by destroying Ahaziah's soldiers, God not only delivered His prophet from probable death but also did what His nature requires: protract just judgment. Wisdom at the end of the day must agree with her Creator in that too. Or on the flip side again as you wrote, in the Eucharist and other reflection, the tenderness and mildness of the Great, Awesome, Thrice Holy Living God forms rather a striking (and encouraging) contrast.
May the Lord lead you in paths of righteousness for His name's sake and give you peace even while you feel as a prophet (de?)crying in the wilderness (i.e., alone), as Lady Wisdom must often feel, to judge from history.
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