the bearers of the message

I have always loved this passage of Jesus standing up in the temple and speaking to the people. I have sort of identified with the message of justice and of love. but there have always been a bit of a danger in the message if wee take it that he is the only one bearing it. Yes, Jesus was a special bearer of the message of God's love and Justice, but he also came with the challenge to all of us to carry that mantle.

There are a few in this world who try to make out that God is the property of some and not others, or that attaining god-likeness is possible for only a few. Neither of these things are true. If God is love, then God cannot be possessed by one or even a few. It is a free gift to be shared and not owned. And to be like God we only need to love one another. This is the simple truth that Jesus so desperately tired to convey in his life. Time spent living is never wasted time. And this is not a complicated concern. Any little bit is still real love. Loving our partner or children or friends, does count. Showing some compassion to God’s world also counts. A moment lost in contemplation of the astounding beauty of God’s world is loving time. Being attentive to another is living in love. We do not have to become more wise or more strong we only have to accept the truth of the Kingdom of God that dwells in us. to quote Paul Tillich.

          "... the truth of life is in us ,with an illuminating certainty, uniting us with ourselves, giving us a great and restful happiness. And the good ,the ultimate good ...has grasped us...We have not become more moral or more saintly ; we still belong to a world which is subject to evil and self-destruction. But the good of life is in us, uniting us with the good of everything, giving us the blessed experience of universal love."

          Last night I was lying in my bed trying to think of an example to make this abstract idea come alive. You see I am sick of using Ghandi and Martin Luther King or Mother Teresa as examples. Then I realized that as I stood here today the examples of this love, this compassion, would be sitting in front of me listening to me. The person sitting here who gives part of her week every week in volunteer work . the people who work in jobs caring for others. Not because its just a job, but because that is what you have chosen to do. The people who make an active effort in whatever they do to do that bit extra in caring for others. I know most of you pretty well and I could go through you one by one and point out your compassion. I won’t do that, instead I pray that god will open your eyes, just a bit, to the work of God in you. You, in your actions are working the God-like transforming power of love. The love you show is the love of God.

not religion as we know it!

" This is not religion as we know it. Not nostalgia for the past, nor a fantasy of the future. It’s not centered in memory or anticipation: next year I’ll do this; in the old days we did that, someday God will set things right.

       ......          This reading from Luke cuts off rather abruptly, so that we don’t hear what happens next: the outrage of the people and their rejection of Jesus. We don’t see the scandalized lynch mob gathering, though the passage is clearly meant both to echo the prophets and prefigure the crucifixion. Jesus pulls together Isaiah’s words with hints of his own coming glorification — that is, his own torture and death at the hands of people very much like his listeners in the synagogue of Nazareth. Yet when he sits down to preach he simply says to them: Today. Today in your very hearing this text is fulfilled. I AM"

http://www.journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20100118JJ.shtml