“Choosing Blessings” by Beth DeCristofaro
I call heaven and earth today to witness against you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the LORD, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him. (Deuteronomy 30:19-20)
Then he said to all, "If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. (Luke 9:23-24)
Piety
Lord,
Let everything I do this day and in this season of Lent come from you, be inspired by you.
Let everything I do this day and in this season of Lent come from you, be inspired by you.
I long to be closer to you.
Help me to remember that nothing is important in my life unless it glorifies you in some way. …
Help me to remember that nothing is important in my life unless it glorifies you in some way. …
Heal me, Lord, and help me to find you in the darkness of my life.
Let me reach out in this darkness and feel your hand and love there to guide me.
Let me reach out in this darkness and feel your hand and love there to guide me.
May the Lord bless us, protect us from all evil and bring us to everlasting life. Amen.
(from Creighton U. “Daily Lent Prayer”)[i]
Study
Today’s alternate memorial is the feast of Saints Perpetua and Felicity who chose martyrdom over freedom, refusing to renounce their Christianity in first century North Africa. The martyrs choice was to submit or die. It gives me pause to consider that Moses’ clarified for the Israelites their choice of blessing or curse as they (figuratively) looked over the Promised Land they were to enter. Jesus’ sacrifice gave us the choice of a blessed life eternal. As with His choice to give glory to his father, sacrifices are essential he warns us. Lent gives us the chance to consider God’s blessings and repent from choosing curses. He offers us life eternal but it is not without a struggle.
Theology and Religious Studies Professor Jessica Coblentz writes, “In Jesus’ clear-eyed account of discipleship, the difficulties and comforts of Christian life are bound up together. Our hope for the life to come does not protect us from changes but spurs us to love our enemies. It does not shield us from God’s difficult calling but emboldens us to live humbly and resist what hinders the reign of God today.” [ii]
Perpetua demonstrated that she realized blessings even in catastrophe. She is said to have been cheerful even as she was murdered. A blessing we receive in choosing Jesus is that his joy permeates even pain, disappointment, failure, and death if we look into the Promised Land which is not out there or above in the sky but is written in our hearts by his Grace.
Action
What cross are we refusing or neglecting? Ask Moses, Perpetua, Felicity to help us pick up our cross with humility and the sincere desire to be one with Jesus.
[ii] Give us this Day: for Daily Living, “A Tough Call”, Jessica Coblentz, Liturgical Press, March 6, 2019.
No comments:
Post a Comment