The Upper Room Daily Reflections, daily words of wisdom and faith in Nashville, Tennessee, United States "Gratitude and Grief" for Tuesday, 2 August 2016

The Upper Room Daily Reflections, daily words of wisdom and faith in Nashville, Tennessee, United States "Gratitude and Grief" for Tuesday, 2 August 2016

Today’s Reflection:

IT’S A FUNNY THING about grief: healing starts at the very point where we begin to need it; that is, at the beginning of losing the person we love. When we begin to grieve, we begin to heal – even if we don’t want to heal because it seems self-centered and callous.
Speaking from my own experience, we can’t even start to heal if we are doing our best to feel nothing at all or nothing positive at all. Perhaps we tell ourselves that our loss is not so terrible since it is God’s will. Or we try to convince ourselves of our happiness for the one who died because of her vast suffering. In that case, our grieving would actually appear selfish. …
If gratitude ushers in healing, how do we come by it? The gift of gratitude, while wonderful, is exactly that – a gift. None of us can will it into being or perform exercises to make it happen. It is a gift of God, pure grace. …
At times it is harder to long for gratitude than at others. During these times of drought in the heart, we can still make an effort: We can try our best to long to be able to long for it, to long to long, as we hope for hope when hope is hard. “Ask, and you will receive” was spoken for us. It applies right here.[Roberta C. Bondi, Wild Things]
From pages 102-103 of Wild Things: Poems of Grief and Love, Loss and Gratitude by Roberta C. Bondi. Copyright © 2014 by Roberta C. Bondi. All rights reserved. Used by permission of Upper Room Books. http://bookstore.upperroom.org/ Learn more about or purchase this book.
Today’s Question:
What do you think of the statement, “None of us can will it into being or perform exercises to make it happen?”
Today’s Scripture:
The mighty one, God the LORD, speaks and summons the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting.[Psalm 50:1, NRSV]
This Week: pray for those children starting back to school.-------

Did You Know?
In need of prayer? The Upper Room Living Prayer Center is a 7-day-a-week intercessory prayer ministry staffed by trained volunteers. Call 1-800-251-2468 or visit The Living Prayer Center website.
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This week we remember: Basil the Blessed (August 2).
Basil the Blessed

August 02
In Moscow's Red Square stands St. Basil's Cathedral, named after the "Holy Fool," Basil the Blessed who was born in 1468. Trained as a cobbler, Basil soon was known as one who could foretell the future. When he was sixteen he moved to Moscow and began an unusual life. Summer or winter, he walked around Moscow naked, barefoot, praying.
He earned the Holy Fool moniker by acting dramatically to make a spiritual point. He besieged the homes of people he considered insincere with stones, or loudly wept for them. Basil visited taverns to minister to their customers. He obtained help for those too ashamed to ask for it. Basil preached mercy, helped the poor, and hounded the rich into giving alms.
Basil was unafraid of powerful rulers or wealthy people. He was one of the few people brave enough to take on the powerful Ivan the Terrible, who he once criticized for being distracted during prayer. During Lent, when Christians were supposed to refrain from eating meat, Basil gave Ivan a huge slab of raw meat to emphasize the ruler's ruthless killing. The murderous tsar feared the Holy Fool enough to leave him alone.
Basil the Blessed died in 1557.
If Basil had taken the Spiritual Types Test, he probably would have been a lover. Basil is remembered on August 2.

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Lectionary Readings:

Sunday, 7 August 2016
(Courtesy of Vanderbilt Divinity Library)

Isaiah 1:1, 10-20

Psalm 50:1-8, 22-23

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

Luke 12:32-40

Scripture Text for Isaiah 1:1 This is the vision of Yesha‘yahu the son of Amotz, which he saw concerning Y’hudah and Yerushalayim during the days of ‘Uziyahu, Yotam, Achaz and Y’chizkiyahu, kings of Y’hudah:

10 Hear what Adonai says,

you rulers of S’dom!

Listen to God’s Torah,

you people of ‘Amora!

11 “Why are all those sacrifices

offered to me?” asks Adonai.

“I’m fed up with burnt offerings of rams

and the fat of fattened animals!

I get no pleasure from the blood

of bulls, lambs and goats!

12 Yes, you come to appear in my presence;

but who asked you to do this,

to trample through my courtyards?

13 Stop bringing worthless grain offerings!

They are like disgusting incense to me!

Rosh-Hodesh, Shabbat, calling convocations —

I can’t stand evil together with your assemblies!

14 Everything in me hates your Rosh-Hodesh

and your festivals;

they are a burden to me —

I’m tired of putting up with them!

15 “When you spread out your hands,

I will hide my eyes from you;

no matter how much you pray,

I won’t be listening;

because your hands are covered with blood.

16 “Wash yourselves clean!

Get your evil deeds out of my sight!

Stop doing evil, 17 learn to do good!

Seek justice, relieve the oppressed,

defend orphans, plead for the widow.

18 “Come now,” says Adonai,

“let’s talk this over together.

Even if your sins are like scarlet,

they will be white as snow;

even if they are red as crimson,

they will be like wool.

19 If you are willing and obedient,

you will eat the good of the land;

20 but if you refuse and rebel,

you will be eaten by the sword”;

for the mouth of Adonai has spoken.

Psalm 50:(0) A psalm of Asaf:

(1) The Mighty One, God, Adonai, is speaking,

summoning the world from east to west.

2 Out of Tziyon, the perfection of beauty,

God is shining forth.

3 Our God is coming and not staying silent.

With a fire devouring ahead of him

and a great storm raging around him,

4 he calls to the heavens above and to earth,

in order to judge his people.

5 “Gather to me my faithful,

those who made a covenant with me by sacrifice.”

6 The heavens proclaim his righteousness,

for God himself is judge. (Selah)

7 “Listen, my people, I am speaking:

Isra’el, I am testifying against you,

I, God, your God.

8 I am not rebuking you for your sacrifices;

your burnt offerings are always before me.

22 Consider this, you who forget God,

or I will tear you to pieces, with no one to save you.

23 “Whoever offers thanksgiving

as his sacrifice honors me;

and to him who goes the right way

I will show the salvation of God.”

Hebrews 11:1 Trusting[Hebrews 11:1 Habakkuk 2:4] is being confident of what we hope for, convinced about things we do not see. 2 It was for this that Scripture attested the merit of the people of old.

3 By trusting, we understand that the universe was created through a spoken word of God, so that what is seen did not come into being out of existing phenomena.

8 By trusting, Avraham obeyed, after being called to go out[Hebrews 11:8 Genesis 12:1] to a place which God would give him as a possession; indeed, he went out without knowing where he was going. 9 By trusting, he lived as a temporary resident in the Land of the promise, as if it were not his, staying in tents with Yitz’chak and Ya‘akov, who were to receive what was promised along with him. 10 For he was looking forward to the city with permanent foundations, of which the architect and builder is God.

11 By trusting, he received potency to father a child, even when he was past the age for it, as was Sarah herself; because he regarded the One who had made the promise as trustworthy. 12 Therefore this one man, who was virtually dead, fathered descendants

as numerous as the stars in the sky,

and as countless as the grains of the sand on the seashore.[Hebrews 11:12 Genesis 15:5–6; 22:17; 32:13(12); Exodus 32:13; Deuteronomy 1:10; 10:22]

13 All these people kept on trusting until they died, without receiving what had been promised. They had only seen it and welcomed it from a distance, while acknowledging that they were aliens and temporary residents on the earth.[Hebrews 11:13 1 Chronicles 29:15] 14 For people who speak this way make it clear that they are looking for a fatherland. 15 Now if they were to keep recalling the one they left, they would have an opportunity to return; 16 but as it is, they aspire to a better fatherland, a heavenly one. This is why God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.

Luke 12:32 Have no fear, little flock, for your Father has resolved to give you the Kingdom! 33 Sell what you own and do tzedakah — make for yourselves purses that don’t wear out, riches in heaven that never fail, where no burglar comes near, where no moth destroys. 34 For where your wealth is, there your heart will be also.

35 “Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit, 36 like people waiting for their master’s return after a wedding feast; so that when he comes and knocks, they will open the door for him without delay. 37 Happy the slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes! Yes! I tell you he will put on his work clothes, seat them at the table, and come serve them himself! 38 Whether it is late at night or early in the morning, if this is how he finds them, those slaves are happy.

39 “But notice this: no house-owner would let his house be broken into if he knew when the thief was coming. 40 You too, be ready! For the Son of Man will come when you are not expecting him.”

The John Wesley's Notes-Commentary for Isaiah 1:1, 10-20

Verse 1

[1] The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.

Vision — Or, the visions; the word being here collectively used: the sense is, this is the book of the visions or prophecies. As prophets were called Seers, 1 Samuel 9:9, so prophecies are called visions, because they were as clearly and certainly represented to the prophets minds, as bodily objects are to mens eyes.

Saw — Foresaw and foretold. But he speaks, after the manner of the prophets, of things to come, as if they were either past or present.

Judah — Principally, but not exclusively. For he prophecies also concerning Egypt and Babylon, and divers other countries; yet with respect to Judah.

The days — ln the time of their reign. Whence it may be gathered, that Isaiah exercised his prophetical office above fifty years altogether.

Verse 10

[10] Hear the word of the LORD, ye rulers of Sodom; give ear unto the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrah.

Of Sodom — So called for their resemblance of them in wickedness.

The law — The message which I am now to deliver to you from God, your great lawgiver.

Verse 11

[11] To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the LORD: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats.

To me — Who am a spirit, and therefore cannot be satisfied with such carnal oblations, but expect to have your hearts and lives, as well as your bodies and sacrifices, presented unto me.

Blood — He mentions the fat and blood, because these were in a peculiar manner reserved for God, to intimate that even the best of their sacrifices were rejected by him.

Verse 12

[12] When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, to tread my courts?

To appear — Upon the three solemn feasts, or upon other occasions.

Who required — The thing I commanded, was not only, nor chiefly, that you should offer external sacrifices, but that you should do it with true repentance, with faith in my promises, and sincere resolutions of devoting yourselves to my service.

Verse 13

[13] Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.

The solemn meeting — The most solemn day of each of the three feasts, which was the last day.

Verse 15

[15] And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.

Blood — You are guilty of murder, and oppression.

Verse 16

[16] Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil;

Wash — Cleanse your hearts and hands.

Verse 17

[17] Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.

Learn — Begin to live soberly, righteously, and godly.

Judgment — Shew your religion to God, by practising justice to men.

Judge — Defend and deliver them.

Verse 19

[19] If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land:

If — If you are fully resolved to obey all my commands.

Shall eat — Together with pardon, you shall receive temporal and worldly blessings.

Psalm 50:1-8, 22-23

Verse 1

[1] The mighty God, even the LORD, hath spoken, and called the earth from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof.

Called — All the inhabitants of the earth, from one end to the other: whom he here summons to be witnesses of his proceedings in this solemn judgment, between him and his people, which is here poetically represented. For here is a tribunal erected, the judge coming to it, the witnesses and delinquents summoned, and at last the sentence given.

Verse 2

[2] Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined.

Zion — The place where he was supposed to reside, and where he would now sit in judgment.

The perfection — The most amiable place of the whole world, because, of the presence and worship, and blessing of God.

Shined — Hath manifested himself in a glorious manner.

Verse 3

[3] Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence: a fire shall devour before him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about him.

Our God — The prophet speaks this in the persons of the worshippers of God. Though he be our God, yet he will come to execute judgment upon us.

Cease — Or delay to sit in judgment.

Tempestuous — This is a farther description of that terrible majesty, wherewith God would clothe himself when he came to his tribunal.

Verse 4

[4] He shall call to the heavens from above, and to the earth, that he may judge his people.

Call — To the inhabitants of them, all angels and men, whom he calls in for witnesses of the equity of his proceedings.

Verse 5

[5] Gather my saints together unto me; those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.

Gather — O ye angels, summon and fetch them to my tribunal. Which is poetically spoken, to continue the metaphor, and representation of the judgment.

My saints — The Israelites, whom God had chosen and separated them from all the nations of the earth, to be an holy and peculiar people to himself, and they also had solemnly devoted themselves to God; all which aggravated their apostacy.

Those — Who have entered into covenant with me, and have ratified that covenant by sacrifice. This seems to be added, to acquaint them with the proper nature, use and end of sacrifices, which were principally appointed to be signs and seals of the covenant made between God and his people; and consequently to convince them of their great mistake in trusting to their outward sacrifices, when they neglected the very life and soul of them, which was the keeping of their covenant with God.

Verse 6

[6] And the heavens shall declare his righteousness: for God is judge himself. /*Selah*/.

Declare — God will convince the people of his righteousness, and of their own wickedness, by thunders and lightnings, and storms, or other dreadful signs wrought by him in the heavens.

Himself — In his own person. God will not now reprove them, by his priests or prophets, but in an extraordinary manner from heaven.

Verse 7

[7] Hear, O my people, and I will speak; O Israel, and I will testify against thee: I am God, even thy God.

Hear — Having brought in God, as coming to judgment, he now gives an account of the process and sentence of the judge.

Testify — I will declare my charge against thee.

Thy God — Not only in general, but in a special manner, by that solemn covenant made at Sinai; whereby I avouched thee to be my peculiar people, and thou didst avouch me to be thy God.

Verse 8

[8] I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices or thy burnt offerings, to have been continually before me.

I will not — This is not the principal matter of my charge, that thou hast neglected sacrifices which thou shouldst have offered.

Verse 23

[23] Whoso offereth praise glorifieth me: and to him that ordereth his conversation aright will I shew the salvation of God.

Glorifieth — He and he only gives me the honour that I require, and not he who loads my altar with sacrifices.

Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

Verse 1

[1] Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

The definition of faith given in this verse, and exemplified in the various instances following, undoubtedly includes justifying faith, but not directly as justifying. For faith justifies only as it refers to, and depends on, Christ. But here is no mention of him as the object of faith; and in several of the instances that follow, no notice is taken of him or his salvation, but only of temporal blessings obtained by faith. And yet they may all be considered as evidences of the power of justifying faith in Christ, and of its extensive exercise in a course of steady obedience amidst difficulties and dangers of every kind.

Now faith is the subsistence of things hoped for, the evidence or conviction of things not seen — Things hoped for are not so extensive as things not seen. The former are only things future and joyful to us ; the latter are either future, past, or present, and those either good or evil, whether to us or others. The subsistence of things hoped for - Giving a kind of present subsistence to the good things which God has promised: the divine supernatural evidence exhibited to, the conviction hereby produced in, a believer of things not seen, whether past, future, or spiritual; particularly of God and the things of God.

Verse 2

[2] For by it the elders obtained a good report.

By it the elders — Our forefathers. This chapter is a kind of summary of the Old Testament, in which the apostle comprises the designs, labours, sojournings, expectations, temptations, martyrdoms of the ancients. The former of them had a long exercise of their patience; the latter suffered shorter but sharper trials.

Obtained a good testimony — A most comprehensive word. God gave a testimony, not only of them but to them: and they received his testimony as if it had been the things themselves of which he testified, Hebrews 11:4,5,39. Hence they also gave testimony to others, and others testified of them.

Verse 3

[3] Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

By faith we understand that the worlds — Heaven and earth and all things in them, visible and invisible.

Where made — Formed, fashioned, and finished.

By the word — The sole command of God, without any instrument or preceding matter. And as creation is the foundation and specimen of the whole divine economy, so faith in the creation is the foundation and specimen of all faith.

So that things which are seen — As the sun, earth, stars.

Were made of things which do not appear — Out of the dark, unapparent chaos, Genesis 1:2. And this very chaos was created by the divine power; for before it was thus created it had no existence in nature.

Verse 8

[8] By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.

Genesis 12:1,4,5

Verse 9

[9] By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise:

By faith he sojourned in the land of promise — The promise was made before, Genesis 12:7.

Dwelling in tents — As a sojourner With Isaac and Jacob - Who by the same manner of living showed the same faith Jacob was born fifteen years before the death of Abraham.

The joint heirs of the same promise — Having all the same interest therein. Isaac did not receive this inheritance from Abraham, nor Jacob from Isaac, but all of them from God. Genesis 17:8

Verse 10

[10] For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.

He looked for a city which hath foundations — Whereas a tent has none.

Whose builder and former is God — Of which God is the sole contriver, former, and finisher.

Verse 11

[11] Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.

Sarah also herself — Though at first she laughed at the promise, Genesis 18:12. Genesis 21:2.

Verse 12

[12] Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable.

As it were dead — Till his strength was supernaturally restored, which continued for many years after.

Verse 13

[13] These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.

All these — - Mentioned Hebrews 11:7-11.

Died in faith — In death faith acts most vigorously.

Not having received the promises — The promised blessings.

Embraced — As one does a dear friend when he meets him.

Verse 14

[14] For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.

They who speak thus show plainly that they seek their own country — That they keep in view, and long for, their native home.

Verse 15

[15] And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.

If they had been mindful of - Their earthly country, Ur of the Chaldeans, they might have easily returned.

Verse 16

[16] But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.

But they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly — This is a full convincing proof that the patriarchs had a revelation and a promise of eternal glory in heaven. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: seeing he hath prepared for them a city - Worthy of God to give.

Luke 12:32-40

Verse 32

[32] Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

It is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom — How much more food and raiment? And since ye have such an inheritance, regard not your earthly possessions.

Verse 33

[33] Sell that ye have, and give alms; provide yourselves bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth corrupteth.

Sell what ye have — This is a direction, not given to all the multitude: (much less is it a standing rule for all Christians:) neither to the apostles; for they had nothing to sell, having left all before: but to his other disciples, (mentioned Luke 12:22, and Acts 1:15,) especially to the seventy, that they might be free from all worldly entanglements. Matthew 6:19.

Verse 35

[35] Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning;

Let your loins be girt — An allusion to the long garments, worn by the eastern nations, which they girded or tucked up about their loins, when they journeyed or were employed in any labour: as also to the lights that servants used to carry at weddings, which were generally in the night.

Verse 37

[37] Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching: verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them.

He will come and serve them — The meaning is, he will show them his love, in the most condescending and tender manner.

Verse 38

[38] And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants.

The Jews frequently divided the night into three watches, to which our Lord seems here to allude.

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