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Start here. The best way to learn to pray and read the Bible is to pray and read the Bible. The "..." invites personal prayer. Prayer is about common forms and also about your own voice. The parts at the end are either a quote, or my own response to my time of prayer. May each night and day be a new beginning. Chris Konker
Sunday, February 28, 2021
Sunday Evening
Generosity
Evagrius of Pontus was a very influential early Christian thinker (and practitioner) of prayer. In writing about the sin of avarice, he writes that our need for material goods:
"suggests to the mind a lengthy old age, inability to perform manual labor (at some future date), famines that are sure to come, sickness that will visit us, the pinch of poverty, the great shame that comes from accepting the necessities of life from others." (quoted from Allen, 72)
Diogenes Allen comments:
"These thoughts fill us with anxiety and insecurity, and keep us from being generous. Our minds become so full of the desire to gain enough material goods to make ourselves secure against every possible calamity that we fail to pay sufficient attention to either our neighbor or God. Or if we do consider them, we do so largely in terms of how they may help make us financially secure. One of the fruits of the Spirit, indicative of God's activity in our lives, is that we become like God - namely, generous." (Allen, Spiritual Theology, 72)
Generosity will not come from thinking about our things. Thinking about our things as the fruit of God's activity in our lives - God's things - will help us to think and to live more generously.
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Saturday, February 27, 2021
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Friday, February 26, 2021
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Thursday, February 25, 2021
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Wednesday, February 24, 2021
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Tuesday, February 23, 2021
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Monday, February 22, 2021
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Saturday, February 20, 2021
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Friday, February 19, 2021
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Thursday, February 18, 2021
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Wednesday, February 17, 2021
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Tuesday, February 16, 2021
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Monday, February 15, 2021
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Saturday, February 13, 2021
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Friday, February 12, 2021
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Thursday, February 11, 2021
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Wednesday, February 10, 2021
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Tuesday, February 9, 2021
Unintentional Sin
Leviticus 4 focuses the reader on a variety of unintentional sins. Instructions for the whole Israelite community occur here:
"If the whole Israelite community sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any of the Lord's commands, even though the community is unaware of the matter, when they realize their guilt and the sin they committed becomes known, the assembly must bring a young bull as a sin offering and present it before the tent of meeting. The elders of the community are to lay their hands on the bull's head before the Lord, and the bull shall be slaughtered before the Lord." (4:13-15)
Instructions about the blood follow, as well as instructions about fat. And the passage concludes:
"In this way the priest will make atonement for the community, and they will be forgiven. Then he shall take the bull outside the camp and burn it as he burned the first bull. This is the sin offering for the community." (4:20-21)
Two points moved me as I read this.
1) Atonement is made for the whole community. The tent of meeting refers to the tabernacle, the house that God has given instructions for building throughout the latter portions of Exodus. This tabernacle is the Lord's house. It is based on the pattern of Mt. Sinai, where the Lord resides in a cloud, and the instructions that come to the variety of people who are able to approach - the priests - and those who approach symbolically - the people, approaching symbolically through sacrificed animals. The instructions are all terms of the covenant between the Lord and his people Israel - terms which hold out hope that God and his people will truly be united again beyond the veil, deep within the holy of holies, where God's glory cloud dwells. Atonement shows us God's covenant-keeping heart, the solidity of his word, his intention to make provision for his people in their sin, but not only passing over sin, but through its provisional payment through the death of representative animals, allowing Israel to see themselves passing over into the Lord's presence through the smoke of offerings. Passing over into new unity and fellowship with the Lord. We need to see this today - that God has never not had this heart. God has never not provided an economy for the restoration of all things. This atonement, perfected in Jesus, the representative sacrifice who enters, breaks the veil, and celebrates a new covenant sacrifice of Lord's Supper with his people, is just as clear to be seen in our Old Testament.
2) This is made for unintentional sin. What does this mean? The scripture suggests an unawareness on the community's part. We can deduce a potential sequence: sin has occurred. The community is unaware. They come to realize what has happened. They make atonement according to what God has provided. They didn't intend to sin. They intended to do what is right. But things didn't go according to their intentions. Why does this move me? I'm still not quite sure. Perhaps it's this: I tend to think that sin only "counts" if I meant to do it. If I accidentally break a dish and I apologize, I expect to hear, "That's ok. You didn't intend to do it." But within the economy of a covenantal relationship, my apology functions as atonement and that's the end of it, barring any future accidental breaking of dishes which may change things. Atonement for both intentional and unintentional sin communicates the importance of keeping covenant, that this is the primary shaper of Israel's very identity as a people saved through the Red Sea from captivity.
But this is still not quite what moves me about it. Let's shift from focusing on 'intentional' to focus instead on 'realize.' I've noticed for a few years that every time I think I have a full understanding of the magnitude of the nefariousness and pervasiveness of sin, I realize somehow that it's worse than I thought. Worse on multiple levels: for instance the vile things humans are capable of out there, and the vile things I'm complicit in from within my soul. Julie Clawson's book Everyday Justice: The Global Impact of Our Daily Choices illustrates global impacts of the way I treat, for instance, chocolate, coffee, cars, clothes, and more. Now I didn't say I'd read it. Dare I read this book? Dare I uncover sin that, however unintentional, is still real? Let's go further. Jessica Trounstine's book Segregation by Design: Local Politics and Inequality in American Cities details how cities have segregated along racial lines according to certain zip codes with considerable economic ramifications. Again, dare I? Now I didn't intend any of this, but if I find that the world I live in is much different than the world I would desire, and then a few years and a few books later, I find that the world is even more different than the world I desire, than I sort of have a choice. I can either deaden my desires and forget the greater world and city I desire. Or, I can enter more vigorously into a yearning to see the Lord bridge the distance between the new creation to come and the world we see now. And that entering must be something like what Leviticus 4 means by 'realize'. And, frankly, that's the entering I'd rather do.
The atonement Jesus has already made is a once and for all holy of holies for us all to be endlessly renewed in God's presence. It is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. The unintentional sin that I realized 10 years ago may be different from the unintentional sin I discover tonight, or 10 years from now. But Christ's death, resurrection, and enthronement over all is quite sufficient for all sin, past or yet to come, intentional, unintentional, discovered, repented, or willfully ignored and covered up. I think ultimately what moves me about this is that I don't need to obfuscate, bowdlerize, or deny my complicitness in the brokenness of this world. I really have nothing to lose precisely because of the generosity of 'once and for all' salvation from Jesus. This is a much happier way to live because the Lord's covenant love drives out my fear of adverse punishment from any rumor of my attachment to nefarious goings-on. In driving out this fear, he also drives out my sleepy complacency and contentment to just be 'getting on' with life. I'm reinvigorated to call out to God to drive out any wicked way in me.
Intentional or otherwise.
So don't worry. Sin - whether intentional or unintentional in your life - is probably much greater than you realize. Let it drive you deeper into the arms of the Lord who has only ever met us, redeemed us, and loved us as mere, dirty, rotten sinners.
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Monday, February 8, 2021
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Saturday, February 6, 2021
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Friday, February 5, 2021
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Thursday, February 4, 2021
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Wednesday, February 3, 2021
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How the Body of Christ Prays
The Lord's words to Moses on Mt. Sinai conclude like a new creation. As the Lord breathes his Spirit into his human creation for image-bearing in God's world in Genesis 1 and 2, so the Lord breathes his Spirit into Bezalel for God's image-bearing in his new tabernacle world (Exodus 31). As the Lord concluded his original creation in Genesis by establishing a sabbath rest space, so we find reminders for sabbath observance at the close of Exodus 31. All is completed, and just as in Genesis, God will truly dwell with his people.
But just as with the original creation, God's creating precedes a fall. Here the fall takes the form of the making of the golden calf. As Eve gives the fruit to a willing Adam, so the Israelites call on a willing Aaron to create a monstrosity - a false god out of the very gold they had given so willingly to the tabernacle construction project. The gold they give 'from their hearts' represents their hearts. As the gold is melted to take on the image of a false god, we see the heart of darkness at the center of God's creation.
Moses plays the part of God's servant, which will be reprised throughout the biblical canon, most notably and representatively in Jesus. Moses intercedes for his people:
"But Moses sought the favor of the LORD his God. "LORD," he said, "why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, 'It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth'? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people. Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: 'I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever.'" Then the LORD relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened." (Exodus 32:11-14)
Isn't that magnificent? I find this to be an enviable prayer for a few reasons:
1) he didn't separate himself from the evildoers. When he speaks of 'your people,' he includes himself. How easy is it to pass the buck? Moses doesn't allow himself to think of himself as separated from his people. He speaks to God on behalf of those to whom he is joined, and indeed he does this at...well, let's just call it a low point for Israel.
2) he tracks the larger narrative. There's always a bigger story than what is going on in the moment. Moses imagines a scenario where the Egyptians get the last word, remarking on the ridiculous deity who delivered his people from slavery only to destroy them in righteous indignation. Of course this could never be. It is a farcical version of the grand narrative of deliverance and new creation.
3) he recalls to God his yet-to-be-fulfilled promises. See the advisory, royal ambassador relationship Moses inhabits with the Lord, displaying command of the major threads of God's redemptive story arc. He's seen the Lord's mighty hand rise against the obstinate, carrying forth everything he has said. When Israel appears singularly unworthy of God's continued care, Moses trusts God's promise and word, as yet unfulfilled. He hadn't "received what had been promised." (Hebrews 11:39) But he displays faith, reliance, trust, allegiance to God's promise to make a people, to make descendants.
Oh, if the body of Christ prayed like this! We would each pray as prophets, as priests, as kings and queens, making intercession for our fellow members, those who stand in esteem and those who are fallen in shame! We have promises to claim. We have a wonderfully complete larger narrative we are part of. Most importantly of all, we have no need to scapegoat those around us, but pray to God from the top of the mountain, from within the veil, from within Christ, as though we were standing at the foot of the mountain, out among the broken idolatrous nations, as though we were among the greatest sinners. This is how Moses prays. This is how Jesus prays. This is how the body of Christ prays.
Wednesday Morning
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Tuesday, February 2, 2021
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Monday, February 1, 2021
Monday Evening
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