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Lord’s Prayer

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.

Prayer of St. Richard of Chichester (1230 A.D.)

Thanks be to thee, my Lord Jesus Christ,
For all the benefits thou hast won for me,
For all the pains and insults thou hast borne for me.

O most merciful Redeemer, Friend, and Brother,
May I know thee more clearly,
Love thee more dearly,
And follow thee more nearly
For ever and ever.

To Strive for Health

Oh Lord God, who has told us that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, and that we should honor you with our bodies, I confess that I have not been doing as good a job as I might. Perhaps I sometimes eat and drink that which is not healthy, or in excess. Perhaps I do not get enough exercise; perhaps I do not get enough rest. Perhaps I allow the anxieties of the world to disturb my thoughts, which causes me physical stress. Perhaps I do things with my body that I know I should not do.

I pray that you will lead me to listen to the Holy Spirit, and not to my own urgings or those of the world, in matters of physical and mental health. Direct my eye, my ear, and my activities to holiness, that I might honor You the best I can, in my body and my mind.

Mason Barge 8/19/2017

Meditation

“In your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect.“

~ 1 Peter 3:15

Dedication

Lord, in utter humility I thank you and glorify you, that you might hear the prayer of one so small as myself, amidst the billions of souls among billions of stars in one of billions of galaxies in your universe. Let me go forth in your peace, keeping your Spirit always in my mind; and bless me, I pray, that I might always follow your will and live in the radiance of your blessing.

Think of the day ahead in terms of God with you, and visualize health, strength, guidance, purity, calm confidence, and victory as the gifts of His presence.

Saint Peter and Saint Paul by El Greco, ca. 1597.

The Temple Veil

Galatians 3:2-5 (BSB)

would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by hearing with faith? 3 Are you so foolish? After starting in the Spirit, are you now finishing in the flesh? 4 Have you suffered so much for nothing, if it really was for nothing? 5 Does God lavish His Spirit on you and work miracles among you because you practice the law, or because you hear and believe?

DP Parallel Bible (3-Column) - Galatians 3

Notes on the Scripture

Now that we have sensitized ourselves to the dangers of “eisegesis” — reading our own thoughts into the Bible — we can examine instances where we can correctly extend the meaning of a teaching beyond its literal limits. Oddly, as we see in Galatians 3, a question is not generally such an opportunity. There is only one correct answer to each of Paul’s five “rhetorical” questions in this passage.

But we must be able to extend the meaning of the term “in the flesh,” because it immediately evokes Judaism’s most vivid symbol: circumcision. On a broader level, flesh symbolizes an act of a human being living in the physical world; Jews seek to obtain righteousness before God by complying with the law, and compliance with the law consists of physical acts. So “in the flesh” signifies actual circumcision — there were people trying to get Gentile converts to be circumcised after they had already received the Spirit. But it also signifies a broader principle, trying to become justified by following the law, or even more broadly, “by relying on ourselves.”

People do get the answer wrong, at least in practice, today as then. We recognize at our baptism, or confirmation, or whenever we become fully convicted, that we receive the Holy Spirit by our faith in Christ. And thereafter, we certainly try to avoid sin. But in trying to avoid sin, we must not fall into the trap of thinking that how well we behave is the source of our salvation.

The path is narrow. On the one side, we have the error of thinking that our good deeds will get us into heaven; and on the other side is the error of “cheap grace,” the attitude that once we are saved we can slack off and simply rely on the atonement of our sins.

Getting back to our passage, Paul finishes his argument with a rhetorical question that encapsulates the major theme of Galatians: We are saved from our sin by hearing and believing, not by following the law.

Meditating on this can bring us to a remarkable insight. Say we have a problem with pornography and lust, or with buying expensive things we don’t need. The answer is not simply to try to stop our activity and put it out of our mind. It is not even fully answered by praying to God, to send us a spirit to help, as he promises He will do (1 Cor. 10:13).

We must resort to the gospel itself; ultimately our problems with sin have a spiritual nature and therefore require a spiritual healing.

When we sin, there is something in us, some need, that we feel is not being fulfilled. If we are watching dirty movies, or have a hundred pairs of expensive shoes but want to go shopping for more, there is something missing in our lives. We are looking to the world to save us from something: and the path to overcoming persistent sin is to know more fully the true source of our salvation and joy, the crucified Christ.

Daily Inspiration

“Disputable Matters”

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