UNBLOCKING THE WELL OF THE LIVING WORD

DAY 11 MORNING  Read Luke 13:31-35

JEREMIAH: JESUS CHRIST THE RIGHTEOUS BRANCH WEEPS LIKE JEREMIAH OVER JERUSALEM

Jeremiah wept for Jerusalem, and Jesus would later weep over Jerusalem. Jeremiah says in 9:1 Oh that my head were waters and my eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day and night for the daughter of my people.”

Jeremiah was called as a young man to be a prophet to the nations, to pluck up, pull down, destroy overthrow build and plant. He was a country lad who desired a simple life but was called to the city. He received a word from God that disaster would come from the North. He described Judah as recklessly choosing a course in defiance of God, like a horse plunging into battle, paying no heed to where it is going. Jeremiah said that just as an Ethiopian could not change its skin and a leopard could not change his spots, so Judah could not change from its rebelliousness. He stressed the terrible consequences of sin – judgement by sword and famine, pestilence and captivity. He said that not even if the mighty intercessors before God, Moses and Samuel had prayed for Judah would there be any difference. There was going to be complete destruction. Jeremiah sees a potter working at his wheel and he asks the question, cannot  “God  do with you as the potter has done?” He can pluck up, break down and destroy. Jeremiah says that though nation’s leaders are like bad shepherds that have scattered their flock, he prophesies the coming of the messiah will come as a Righteous Branch and a Good shepherd. This messiah (Jesus) will come to restore the kingdom of David. He will make a new covenant and he will write his law on his people’s hearts. In chapters 31 and 33, the coming of Jesus’ future kingdom is prophesied. Although God’s people will be scattered throughout the nations of the world, the messiah will gather his people to their land again. The vision of a city whose foundations and builder is God, lives on. Jeremiah’s tears were not in vain. The kingdom of David will be restored and Jesus will reign in the New Jerusalem.  

MISSIONARY MONKS: COLOMBANUS   540-615[1]

When Colombanus was born in the sixth century, Europe was in a state of flux, during a time of collapse of the Roman Empire and attacks by barbarian tribes The example of the African desert fathers inspired many Irishmen and many monasteries were built across Ireland and one of the most famous was Bangor Abbey. Bangor Abbey focussed on mastering grammar and logic and the monks became intellectuals with skills in persuasion. Colombanus left Bangor (a monastery that adhered to a strong ascetic regime), and travelled to Europe, taking with him great scholarship and intense spirituality. With a passion to use his powers of persuasion and living a lifestyle of personal holiness he sought to bring the Gospel to Europe, where there were no Roman emperors, just barbarian kings, Columbanus and his disciples built monasteries in Europe that became beacons of Christian learning throughout the dark ages. From Brittany he travelled to Annegray where he built his first monastery, and after that at Luxeuil and Fontaine. Luxeuil became the hub for over 50 monasteries all over Europe. This Irish form of a monastic way of life captured hearts and minds. He founded his fourth monastery on Bregenz which is in present day Austria and his fifth in Bobbio in Italy. Colombanus and his disciples helped bring back Christianity to Europe.

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CLICK ON BOLD and you will be directed to Joshua Project website with more information for prayer.

PRAY for “the South Asian, general in France the twenty-third largest unreached people group in Europe whose language is Hindi  and whose primary religion is  Hinduism There are 273,000, 4.0% Christian and  0.2% evangelical. ”[2] Just as there were disparate tribes in France during the time of Colombanus, now there are   South Asians in France who left the troubles in Uganda in the early 1970s; Sri Lankans working in Iran who came to France in the late 1970s after the Iranian revolution; then  Tamil refugees who came to France  in the civil war; then in the early 1990s a small Pakistani community came to France. Lord, the intense monastic way of life captured hearts and minds in in the seventh century. Do it again, raise up another discipleship movement in France we pray. 

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DAY 11 EVENING Read Psalm 51-60. Re-read Psalm 51

PSALM  51: AVOID SIN… AND THROUGH A SACRIFICE OF PRAISE, CHRIST THE WAY OF SALVATION WILL BE REVEALED

Psalm 51: 15-17 “Open my lips, Lord, and my mouth will declare your praise. You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.” Craig Carter [3] said “A number of years ago I learned an interesting fact about Benedictine spirituality in reading ‘The Rule of St.Benedict.’ I discovered that the monks have traditionally chanted the entire Psalter in worship every week. “Why the Psalms?”… Why not the Gospels? Why not Romans? Why not the Bible as a whole? It is because for Augustine both Christ and the church speak frequently in the Psalms.” Augustine and the church fathers read the psalms prophetically. Belief in [4] divine inspiration is what allowed the church fathers to read the book of Psalms prophetically. The notion that the psalter is a book of prophecy is perhaps one of the distinguishing characteristics of patristic exegesis. Augustine often referred to the psalmist as “the prophet.” [5] In his introduction to his exposition of the Psalms, five kinds of patristic Christological interpretation are outlined (i) a word to Christ (ii) a word about Christ (iii) a word of Christ spoken by him (iv) a word about the church (v) a word of the church, spoken by the church. Psalm 51 is a word of the church spoken by the church, where we as the church can identify with David in his repentance. This is an exhortation for us to avoid sin. How seriously do you and I take sin as an offence against God? [6] David’s confession of sin is his response to adultery with Bathsheba, and is narrated in 2 Samuel 11- 12. David’s confession is genuine and he throws himself completely on God and does not try to make excuses. He realizes that his sin goes deep and has been long-standing and he realizes that he is by nature sinful. The church can pray these words and identify with David. [7]Psalm 51 may be the purest and most profound plea for God’s mercy in all of scripture.[8]

For Augustine this psalm carries a double grace, both as an exhortation to avoid sin but also as a means to find the grace of Christ. It is through a sacrifice of praise that we will be shown the way of salvation of God through Christ.  Through a sacrifice of praise and through singing the psalms, the Fathers believed that the church could grow in virtue. The church fathers actually believed that inhabiting the world view of the psalms and through harmonious reading of them ( eg singing and chanting ), virtue would be instilled and  [9] they were quick to ask how the biblical text could instill virtue. [10]Saint Gregory believed that the aim of the Psalter is to reshape us by means of virtue into the divine likeness so that Christ might be formed in us. The historical order of the text however was not of significance to church fathers like Saint Gregory.  Several times Gregory draws attention to the fact that the psalms do not always follow historical sequence. Psalms 51 and 52 present the most obvious example of the difficulty. The former is connected with David’s sin against Bathsheba and Uriah (2 Samuel 11) and the latter with the incident involving Doeg the Edomite.’ Gregory notes that if chronology had been important then the psalms would be in reverse order. There is a crisis in hermeneutics currently [11]. Why? Maybe it is because we have elevated the importance of historical context and we have had an almost exclusively rational approach to the Scripture rather than seeing Scripture as sacred texts, that both reveal Christ and texts that the Holy Spirit has inspired to help us lead a more virtuous life. Is it time to restore the hearts of the Church Fathers to the sons, and return to reading Scripture as a Sacred text?

PRAYER    Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

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[1] How Colombanus united a bitterly divided Europe https://youtu.be/fd4jj1XyLGs

[2] Data provided by Joshua Project https://joshuaproject.net/people_groups/19211/FR

[3]Carter, C.A.  Interpreting Scripture and the Great Tradition, Baker Academic, 2018, Summary, 201- 205.

[4] Boersma, H. Scripture as Real Presence, Baker Publishing, 2017151.

[5] Boersma, H. Scripture as Real Presence, Baker Publishing, 2017148.

[6] Drawn from Tidball, D. Signposts, Psalm 51, IVP, 2019.

[7] Drawn from https://psaltermark.com/2021/01/30/psalm-51-and-saint-augustine/

[8] Tidball, D. Signposts, Psalm 51. It is in the middle of 7 penitential Psalms 6, 32, 38, 51, 102, 130 and 143,  IVP, 2019.

[9] Boersma, H. Scripture as Real Presence, Baker Publishing, 2017145.

[10] Boersma, H. Scripture as Real Presence, Baker Publishing, 2017157.

[11] Carter, C.A.  Interpreting Scripture and the Great Tradition, Baker Academic, 2018, 1.