What Does It Mean To Speak In Love?

This morning I am asking you to think about what the Apostle Paul might have meant when he wrote these words to the Ephesian: to speak “the truth in love” so that “your words may give grace to those who hear.”

I ask you to think about this because, in many ways, it is a request that sums up all of the lessons that Jesus came to teach us about living in peace and grace with each other.  

I am thinking that it might be helpful to me, and others, if I had other perspectives than my own. 

So I invite you to reflect on:  What would it look like or feel like, to you, to practice this simple request?  And how do you think it would change the dynamics of the environment in which you live?

Now remember, this is not just when everything is  nice and going well.  This would also be in tough time, or in very present conflict.  Conflict like family feuds, or with co-workers, or as we are all facing, political advertising for a coming election, or in social settings.

But as in all of my wondering, I appreciate it when folks keep the question on a personal level. That is, on how and what it would be for you to speak in love bring grace to those who hear your words. Not pointing fingers at the behavior of others.

We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming. But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knitted together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love……Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear. (Eph. 4:14-16 & 29)

Intuition or Spirit?

I received this question in my email yesterday morning:

“Do you think there’s a connection, a relationship, or commonality between notion of intuition and guidance from the spirit?”

My immediate thought was yes.  And after a little more thought I still will respond yes.

I’ll say that God’s Spirit is able to use any part of us to communicate. 

We hear/feel God's message in nature.  

And we are told in scripture that God speaks to us is dreams and visions.  That is written about thought out the Bible, Old and New Testament alike.

I am thinking that God’s voice, the Spirit, is not always verbal.  That is in words we can actually perceive.

We receive God’s messages in all of our senses, through a touch, an action, a sight.

God’s voice came to the Disciple’s in tongues of fire and a mighty wind on the day of Pentecost. (Act. 2)

He spoke to Elijah in sheer silence.  

Paul tells us this:

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.(Rom. 8)

And again in 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 Paul tells us something quite amazing:

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?…. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.

God's Spirit -- God's breathe -- reside inside of each of us.

So if thats true, and I believe it is, then there is no limit to how, when or where God’s Spirit can communicate with us.

I hope that helps.

Where Can We Find Peace And Calm?

I was talking with a friend yesterday about finding peace.  He is finding it difficult to find peace, these days, with all the past “sins” that he has placed on himself.  He was wondering how to find peace and calm.

It is not an uncommon wonder.  I would guess that we have all experienced that wish, to find peace, from time to time. 

After talking to my friend I read, the Old Testament reading for the day, from 1 Kings 19:

He (Elijah) got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food for forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God. At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there.

Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He answered, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.’

He said, ‘Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.’ Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He answered, ….Then the Lord said to him, ‘Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus;…….(1Kings 19) 

And I began to wonder if this inability to feel the peace,  the peace that God offers, is our own inability to believe that God actually forgives us when we ask.  

In my years of doing First Communion retreats with grade school children; or with older confirmation kids,  we would talk about this issue of feeling forgiven.    Believing, not just knowing, that God forgives us even if we don’t feel worthy enough to be forgiven.

The little kids have no problem with feeling forgiven.  Their little minds are so clear.  Yes God forgives me.  Is the normal response.  If God says he forgive me then I am forgiven.  After all Jesus loves me, this I know for the Bible tells me so, sort of thing.  

Little children are so open and willing to believe.  Their minds have not yet been cluttered with all the world’s expectations yet.

However, as they grow older and life becomes more complication.  And their  little blunders become more serious.  And they realize that they have affected others in bigger ways.  Forgiveness become a more unmanageable in their limited minds. 

You can tell a burdened person, until you are blue-in-the-face, that God is understanding and knows that they are sorry for what they have done.  And that God does forgives them.  But for them to actually believe it is a whole other ball of wax.  

Because,  we can’t forgive ourselves. It seems doubly impossible to believe that God can.

That is the great divide between the human mind and God.  We don’t give God credit for being bigger and wiser and more gracious then we are.  

That is where we are completely, absolutely, incorrect about God.  Because we are told more than once that God’s thoughts and ways are higher, and mightier, and wider, and much further away from the human mind’s capability to allow.  Could ever imagine.

‘Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.’ Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’

How do we hear God? 

It is not in the turmoil of our mind — the mighty wind that blows.

It is not in the not in the broken areas of our being — the earthquakes.

It is not in the damaging activity that destroys completely — fire.

It is in the silencing of our own blaming and arguing.  When we stop, shut-up, and let God into our muddled brains.

It is only in the sound of sheer silence.

It is only when we finally allow our minds to quit.  Quit shouting over the wind, earthquakes, and fire.  Quit playing the victim, poor me, game.  When we quit beating ourselves up.   Only then can we begin to listen in the precious silence in which God’s voice comes to us.  

Then the peace of God is made possible.