Celebrating Roy with molasses!

Today we celebrated the life of a friend. Roy! And as we did a story was told of Roy seeking a taste of molasses. His great uncle kept a barrel in his store. One day Roy and a cousin when to the store to help themselves to some of the molasses. They removed the plug and had a good taste of the sweet and heavy molasses. But they could not get the plug to hold in place and the molasses was running on the floor. Roy's uncle kept his rubber boots in the store — and they were filled in an attempt to save some of the precious sweet molasses.

It's easy to point out another's mistakes — but when did you get it all right?

Meditation and the purpose that springs from the resolution

Last night, being Holy Cross Day, I lead the congregation in a meditation of Numbers 21. The following is a quote from Fr David Jenks about the purpose of a resolution in our meditations.

There is more than one purpose in the resolution, and the practice of it ought not to he neglected. It is only needful here to mark that it is a good application of the truth that a meditation is not an end, but a means to an end; meditation is to affect life. When we feel very dissatisfied with our meditations, it is something to know that at least they give us a daily resolution which is to be kept; when we are growing dangerously pleased with ourselves about them, it is a reminder to us of the practical character of the devotion, and a warning not to rely upon our pleasurable experiences.

In small group sharing, be it in Cursillo or a cell group, one of the purposes is to share our struggles and our successes. And in that to share our resolve in faith, whether that be of personal study and prayer, or of some action of faith that one has yet to accomplish.
In prayer and meditation it is vital to resolve to adoration, action, or acts of charity.

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to . . . .

James 1.27

Jenks - FACE - The Sigh of Jesus

The Sigh of Jesus

“He sighed.”—S. Mark vii. 34.

Picture: Jesus Christ in a Gentile district, sighing over this man whose ailment was typical.

Resolve: to share with him this sigh of being in an alien land.

1. —He sighed.
   
   
   
   1. He never lost the power of sympathy through familiarity with physical suffering. He entered into it, bore its sadness, relieved it where he could. It is indifference which deadens the heart to the pathos of familiar sights.
   
   
   2. He sighed now over a sick case which was typical of the spiritual state of the district: they had charity to bring this man to him to be healed, but were unconscious of the spiritual healing which they needed from him.
      Decapolis lay near to Judaea, but felt no need of its religion. Nothing about the world is sadder than its vicinity to the Church, and its natural kindness, together with its ignorance of its real needs.
   
   
   3. He sighed too as he foresaw the crowds which would gather from the disregard of his order of silence (vers. 36, 37; S. Matt. xv. 30, 31). Yet he submitted himself into their hands, healed their sick, preached to the crowds, fed four thousand of them. How contrary to this is the spirit of many of his servants, who are offended because the world is not conscious of thirsting for the sacraments! Should we not rather share his sigh, and then do what we can?


2. —He sighed for the man himself.
   
   
   
   1. His sickness was typical of his spiritual condition: deaf to the voice of God, stammering in speech to him. The impediment in the world’s speech with God is unrecognized and so unconfessed sin. It has not heard the voice of God walking in the garden of life, saying, “Where art thou?”
   
   
   2. He sighed over the coming disregard of his commands. He put a charge of silence on him for his own good, lest the fruits of his healing should be dissipated before they produced eternal benefits. Here too the man is typical of the modern Decapolis, whick looks for revival excitements and religious advertisement, rather than for the deep things of God.
   
   
   3. There was no impatience in the sigh. The man disobeyed, but his diseases did not return to him. The life-long deafness and impediment may be cured, and the man who has found healing in him may yet be very inattentive to his words. Surely the sigh says much to us of God’s patience with ourselves, who often come rather to be healed of the diseases which trouble us than to do his will.
3. —He sighs.
   
   
   
   1. The incarnate God by a human sigh can express to us the mind of God. Study to see the revelation of God in human expression: “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” Not only for the world but for the Church also must God, in the language of our meditation, sigh.
   
   
   2. There is often a weight of depression over his disciples from the sense of impotence. He sighs with us in this, in sympathy with our depression who live in Decapolis; for us also, because we so often bear our depression alone, and forget his sigh. For us, too, because, conscious of our impotence, we do not remember his power. His Church, which “with Babylon must cope,” also sighs: she must represent his mind.
   
   
   3. Let it be an ambition of Christian life to have fellowship with him in his sigh; to be unselfish, to have the mind of Christ. How can we be indifferent to the joys which the world is just missing? or to the contentment with which many Christians rest in their first healing? or to being ourselves strangers to the experiences of the sacred Heart?

Robertson of Brighton

While reading In the Face of Jesus Christ, by David Jenks, I came across the following quote:

But “when we are restless, God remains serene and calm. . . . What God is in himself, not what we may chance to feel him in this or that moment to be, that is our hope.”

(F. W. Robertson.)

Frederick William Robertson is also known as Robertson of Brighton. As Eastport was once called Brighton, I took some interest. And S.U.F. Brighton Lodge is a place we all know in the community. Ninety-four of his sermons are online.
Which sermon, or text, the above quote comes from I have yet to find out.

Jenks - FACE - The Grace of Sacramental Communion

The Grace of Sacramental Communion

“If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever.”—S. John vi. 51.

Picture: the scene, and the conversation about manna.

Resolve: to give greater heed to my communions.

1. —Communion and life.
   
   
   
   1. Seeing what it is, it cannot be other than a blessing. The fathers called it the medicine of immortality. It is life not merely grace, but the giver of grace himself. What S. Paul says is true here, that “I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” “Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life” (S. John vi. 54).
      
   
   
   2. Life is spiritual: a mechanical interpretation of human life is impossible, And the special purpose of the Holy Communion is the sustenance of life it is the daily bread of life. Other sacraments are provided for the gift and renewal of life; but if the soul be unconsciously in mortal sin, the sacrament of the Body of Christ faithfully received will be for the remission of sins.
      
   
   
   3. It is unfaithful to doubt the benefit. The food is the Blessed Sacrament. Do not trust your own faith rather than the Blessed Sacrament. Nevertheless, because spiritual, the particular benefit received will be adapted to our capacity to receive it. This is a great consolation: we are not made judges of what is best for ourselves, but he gives just that which is best for us.
      
   
   
   
   


2. —Communion and grace.
   
   
   
   1. Grace is the fruitfulness of the communication of Jesus Christ himself. Hence the Blessed Sacrament is the supreme means of grace for the Christian. All that Jesus Christ is, he is for us, and in this hallowed gift he gives himself.
      
   
   
   2. The normal grace of a good communion is the strengthening of perseverance. It is this by closer union with himself. Is not this enough to call forth our deepest devotion to this sacrament? Is it not unspeakably faithless when we are moved in our attachment to this great gift by the variableness of feeling? We have no more right to demand specially realized experiences than we have to feel better and stronger after each natural meal.
      
   
   
   3. But particular graces are acquired herein, as he sees our need of them and our capacity to receive them. “All things are yours, and ye are Christ’s,” is true in relation to this sacrament. Bring hither, therefore, your poverty, your sorrow, your weakness, your desire; but not in the spirit of those who sought for a sign from heaven, tempting him.
      
   
   
   
   


3. —Grace, and capacity to receive it.
   
   
   
   1. The degree of benefit is proportioned to one’s capacity to receive. This consideration is a great stimulus. A genuine belief in the Blessed Sacrament is a great incentive to progress. Mortification, self-denial, and other virtues, duly exercised, qualify for the reception of greater benefit in communion. They are fruits and preparation alike.
      
   
   
   2. There is also particular preparation: do not be so proud as to despise this. The whole life may be the ideal preparation; but your life cannot afford to neglect the special preparation of examination, contrition, prayer, and devotion. Study therein to desire the Blessed Sacrament more, and especially by meditation.
      
   
   
   3. And a most valuable preparation for communion is the thanksgiving which follows it. Some, not hindered by time, leave church after communion at the earliest moment, having already made a technical thanksgiving. But stay to realize your gift, renew your resolution, make your colloquies with Jesus in the heart.
      
   
   
   
   

Jenks - FACE - Above all, in all, through all

Above all, in all, through all

“Over all and through all and in all.”—Eph. iv. 6 (R. V.).

Picture: the whole world as God’s family.

Pray: for a larger heart.

1. —The words.
   
   
   
   1. It is very tempting to interpret directly of the Holy Trinity. Yet the preceding words, “One God and Father of all” must make us hesitate, if not more than that. At any rate reflect that the Father is the source of life in the Blessed Trinity. One may concede so much as that he is revealed through and approached through the Word and the Spirit. These words of S. Paul will check any tendency to tritheism in our idea of the Blessed Trinity, such as may arise through carelessness in thought, and is of course irreverent.
      
   
   
   2. Are the words used in reference to Christians only? This becomes more urgent when the word “you” is rightly omitted. There is no doubt that the apostle’s words have taken rise from the unity of the Church; but it looks as if in the climax he has burst the bonds of his thoughts, and sees in the Church the fulfilment of the whole purpose of God, who rules, pervades, and sustains all.
      
   
   
   3. And if this be so, the last difficulty of interpretation will be solved, and we shall not confine the “all” to human life. He is over all things and events, he pervades all that truly is, and he sustains all things, unifying the variety of things, and giving them the cohesion of purpose.
      
   
   
   
   


2. —A more simple reflection.
   
   
   
   1. He is over all. It should inspire us with great confidence, if we live morally in this belief. Faint-heartedness in Christians comes from a partial glimpse of God; a clearer sight of him encourages. Both the world and the Church are under his rule, and he is not to be thwarted or defeated. He is working out his purposes.
      
   
   
   2. He is through all. A lesson of reverence both in prayer and in thought. It is so easy to be secular, and to forget that he is moving and acting through all the issues and events of life and history. It is so easy and so irresponsible to say that God does everything, when we know that there is a great deal that is wrong with the world. But do we with patience wait to see in what way God is acting through the movements which are so complicated?
      
   
   
   3. He is in all. What a solemn reminder of respect for the individual, for the opinion which differs from mine, for the liberty of another which limits my liberty! How unbelieving it is to be self-assertive, aggressive, domineering, intolerant, and the like. And we heighten the effect of these words if we remember that S. Paul does not merely say that God is in all. but God the universal Father. And see iii. 14, 15.
      
   
   
   
   


3. —In reference to the Church.
   
   
   
   1. The words form a climax to the description of the one Body, animated by one spirit, stimulated by one hope. Over it all is the great and good Father; Father of the Church doubly, for Father of all. It is the trumpet call to the Church in its relation to a world which denies his Fatherhood and the Church’s sonship. But the Church may not forget that he is the universal Father; it is her encouragement to remember it in her mission to the world.
      
   
   
   2. And what sense of fellowship and corporate union in the Church! And how must one strive to get at this in actual realization, until the Church gives the world an illustration of corporate unity, and convinces her of the only way in which the brotherhood of man is to find realization!
      
   
   
   3. In all. Apply again to Church life, and may the truth of it in prayer and fellowship help to break down the ugly narrownesses and littlenesses of partizan spirit, spiritual rivalry and petty exclusiveness. God is not only in you. And seek the prayers of others, and be not too proud to be helped by the sympathy of others. God is in them also.