Matthew under the arm 61
[I'm back on the pilgrimage...! Hope to catch up with you somewhere along the route.]
As I started out again on the pilgrimage this morning, I came across a young woman walking by herself. She had the most wonderful sandles on her, which I envied. 'I want ones like that'. But of course, I couldn't afford them and who was going to make them anyway? All morning I tried to suggest to Columba that he might lend me some of his money to go into a town and have sandles like that made. He looked at my feet and then at his own. He didn't say anything. He didn't have to. What's wrong with the ones I have? - was the question in his eyes. Maybe the pilgrimage would be better, easier, more comfortable. The blisters would go and I would be happier. 'I tell you what!', he suggested. 'Why don't you go and learn to make sandles; pull out of the pilgrimage and then you will eventually be surrounded by the sandles you love.' 'But I want them now for the pilgrimage.' So Columba, catching up with the young woman, asked if he could buy her sandles. 'We could stretch them for you', he mocked. At least, my mind is back on the pilgrimage. Humiliated? You bet!
Matthew 13:44-46….
In the two parables about the treasure hidden in a field and the pearl of great value, there is a hunger to expend everything in order to have a single desire met. If we come clean about what we really want, two things happen. One is that we discover we don’t want it quite as much as we thought. Second is that we are not really prepared to give all in order to have our desire met. The desire for God is that which ‘costs nothing less than everything’. God wants us and pays everything including death. Unity with God is the mystery of the universe. What is our response?
I would have my desire to realise Your Presence of Light with me strengthened
Begin by asking yourself what you really want? Are you prepared to give everything for it? Then allow yourself to feel the desires that so often get in the way of your being free. You may choose to have a conversation about this with someone you trust and respect. What is the image of God that you desire? Perhaps write it down or draw it…. Create some symbol of it. Begin the exercise with the sentence so that your heart and mind are open. Take the sentence with you throughout the day and notice how other desires are noticed as a result.
+Martin
Argyll and The Isles
Labels: Desire
posted by Martin at 9:15 pm
1 Comments:
The day before yesterday, was a joyful day yet a sad one. We said good bye to the son of someone we had buried a couple of weeks ago, both of them drowned in an accident at sea. His next waking moment was the most joyful he ever knew, it was to see the risen and ascended Lord Jesus Christ.
On his short pilgrimage my wife had taught him in Sunday school and his mother, standing by his graveside had, with his now dead father, taught him the same things. On his pilgrimage he had learned that it wasn’t presumptuous to know and say where he would spend eternity. He (and his dad) had believed the words of Jesus that there is only one way to heaven (John 14 v 6). They both had taken to heart the words of Jesus in Luke 9 v 26 and rejected all other religions as man made. This 12 year old boy, the day he died, found the promise to be true recorded for us in Luke 23 v 43, “I promise you that today you will be in Paradise with me “.
Many years ago the boy’s father & mother had separately come across the (heavenly) treasure by accident and had given up everything for it. Years later the boy had been shown the pearl of great price and had given everything to gain it. Father and son knew that to bow in church when Jesus name was mentioned was just a minute piece of the meaning of Philippians 2 v 10. They knew it meant surrendering to Jesus everything, they knew and wanted to believe everything Jesus said, they served Jesus Christ as their Lord, that was their desire.
The son and the father did not know when their pilgrimages would end. Both had found and been offered eternal life by believing the promises of Jesus as recorded in the Bible. The sons pilgrimage was very short but he was ready for it to end at any time.
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