A Moment Aside ---- 27 July 2020

A Moment Aside ---- 27 July 2020

      The picture at the top of the page is of a man, a bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church (called a “Metropolitan”), who wrote a book I cannot recommend highly enough. It’s called Beginning to Pray. I’m sure it’s available in various places.

     In any event, the quote from Metropolitan Anthony reminds us of a few things:

·        First, only God saves and we cannot save ourselves

·        Second, God can save us and bring us to Godself despite our sins. Paul writes in his first letter to Timothy: The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners… (1 Timothy 1: 15) This is what we count on.

·        Third, what God cannot save is the false self we pretend to be – whatever that may be. Metropolitan Anthony says we pretend to be saints, but that is who we are. Our pretense, our false self, the “strawman” we want others to see us as is un-savable. No matter how we build it up, it just isn’t real.

·        Fourth, God deals with what is real. We may want to be saints and we may not want to be sinners. The question is which one is the reality. It is the real us that God can work with. No pretense, no camouflage, the real thing in the harsh light of day. God can heal, but a person needs to know that they are sick first. God can forgive, and a person first need to know that they need to be forgiven. That is one hard lesson.

     So there we have it. This is how we stand before God and how we receive the grace and mercy of God. How blessed we are!

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.  

(John 3: 16-17)