Existence is from and for God

Psalms 100

1 Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth!
2 Serve the LORD with gladness!
Come into his presence with singing!
3 Know that the LORD, he is God!
It is he who made us, and we are his;
we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
and his courts with praise!
Give thanks to him; bless his name!
5 For the LORD is good;
his steadfast love endures forever,
and his faithfulness to all generations.

The Good wedding

Watched an odd movie last night: Rachel Getting Married. A girl gets out of rehab just in time for her sister's wedding. The story is filmed increasingly real time. Little editing, just footage of people trying to be happy and celebrate while bumping into all kinds of unsolvable problems and weirdness. They all more or less manage, but there is no separating of good and bad, it is all swirled so tightly together that it even shows up in a scene of a dishwasher loading contest.

Is there hope for the genuine removal of all that is wrong, or do we just need to cope? The wedding party presented in the Apocalypse is one without embarrassing toasts, drunken missteps and so on. It is a thoroughly joyous occasion because the perennial question has been dramatically resolved: How can God be both Great and Good in a world like this?

The answer is shown to be that the world is not like this, it is passing from like this to like that. That, an evil-judged world and a goodness restored and flourishing world, is the world that fully reveals the Greatness and Goodness of God. The daunting task now is for those who have tasted that God is Great and Good to live with that confidence even while wading through a world like this, not yet like that.

Revelation 19

^1-3 I heard a sound like massed choirs in Heaven singing, Hallelujah!
The salvation and glory and power are God's—
his judgments true, his judgments just.
He judged the great Whore
who corrupted the earth with her lust.
He avenged on her the blood of his servants.
Then, more singing:
Hallelujah!
The smoke from her burning billows up
to high Heaven forever and ever and ever.

⁴The Twenty-four Elders and the Four Animals fell to their knees and worshiped God on his Throne, praising,

Amen! Yes! Hallelujah!

⁵From the Throne came a shout, a command:

Praise our God, all you his servants,
All you who fear him, small and great!

^6-8Then I heard the sound of massed choirs, the sound of a mighty cataract, the sound of strong thunder:

Hallelujah!
The Master reigns,
our God, the Sovereign-Strong!
Let us celebrate, let us rejoice,
let us give him the glory!
The Marriage of the Lamb has come;
his Wife has made herself ready.
She was given a bridal gown
of bright and shining linen.
The linen is the righteousness of the saints.

⁹The Angel said to me, "Write this: 'Blessed are those invited to the Wedding Supper of the Lamb.'" He added, "These are the true words of God!"

¹⁰I fell at his feet to worship him, but he wouldn't let me. "Don't do that," he said. "I'm a servant just like you, and like your brothers and sisters who hold to the witness of Jesus. The witness of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy."

waiting for 'hesed

Lamentations 3 and the courage to press on for good over bad in me.

But there's one other thing I remember, and remembering, I keep a grip on hope:

^22-24God's loyal love couldn't have run out, his merciful love couldn't have dried up.
They're created new every morning.
How great your faithfulness!
I'm sticking with God (I say it over and over). He's all I've got left.

^25-27God proves to be good to the man who passionately waits,
to the woman who diligently seeks.
It's a good thing to quietly hope,
quietly hope for help from God.
It's a good thing when you're young
to stick it out through the hard times.

^28-30When life is heavy and hard to take,
go off by yourself. Enter the silence.
Bow in prayer. Don't ask questions:
Wait for hope to appear.
Don't run from trouble. Take it full-face.
The "worst" is never the worst.

^31-33Why? Because the Master won't ever
walk out and fail to return.
If he works severely, he also works tenderly.
His stockpiles of loyal love are immense

Loyal love is what one is to wait for when personal doubt weighs heavy. Prayer, silence (not probing for answers), humility about the fact that there is much worse possible. God can be severe, particularly when he seems absent. But wait for a return. Be loyal to him as the source of loyal love. That is where hope lies.

OK, that is what Jeremiah seems to be saying (more or less) as his city sags under the crushing hardship of being besieged. How about just being someone in a world that is neither great nor terrible? Is the same true? Is waiting for God's loyal love, waiting in restrained, prayerful vigilance; is that the best advice? Wait until... what? A feeling of God's loyal love? ('hesed)

Seems to be.

GOOD & evil

Lamentations 3:

^22-24God's loyal love couldn't have run out,
his merciful love couldn't have dried up.
They're created new every morning.
How great your faithfulness!
I'm sticking with God (I say it over and over).
He's all I've got left.

^25-27God proves to be good to the man who passionately waits,
to the woman who diligently seeks.
It's a good thing to quietly hope,
quietly hope for help from God.
It's a good thing when you're young
to stick it out through the hard times.

The reality of good and the reality of evil exist simultaneously, but not equally. The cynic is crushed by evil, wrong and hardship and has contempt for the claims of goodness. The delusional filters everything through wishful thinking and willfully optimistic distortion. The one who trusts in God, in ways that are affirmed in Scripture, know of evil and of good. They are alert to them both. They are optimistic, not because they avoid looking at suffering and hardship, rather, because they have seen the depth of goodness and bet on it.

The recurring rise of goodness out of conflict with wrong shows glimpse of God's deep goodness. Jeremiah laments the hardship of the siege of Jerusalem but framed with anguish is the central perspective: God's covenant mercy doesn't stop. It is the ultimate reality.

And now? What about in our time? The hints in the past where articulated emphatically in the crushing of the Messiah followed by his resurrection to life. Evil is real but good is greater. Now? We should look at life with a resolve: the pain and difficulties in and around us may be faced without capitulation to despair. Christ is victorious, center our lives in Christ and we can know the triumph of goodness, hinted at in our lives now, certain in the completion to come.

troubled tuesday - a good world gone wrong

Goodness can be such that we don't even bother to notice wrongness. At other times we notice things that aren't right, but there is such a confidence in goodness that the wrongness becomes a display for the power of good. But there are other times. Times when the spirit cannot muster goodness. Times when wrongness weighs heavy.

A healthy spirit conquers adversity, but what can you do when the spirit is crushed? Proverbs 18:14 (The Message)

When one is crushed in spirit, there is at times a need that proceeds marshaling the forces of good, and optimism, and radiant cheerfulness. There may be a need to just acknowledge the problem. Scripture does that.

Lamentations 3:^19-21

I'll never forget the trouble, the utter lostness,
the taste of ashes, the poison I've swallowed.
I remember it all—oh, how well I remember—
the feeling of hitting the bottom.
But there's one other thing I remember,
and remembering, I keep a grip on hope:

There is a time for laughter, and a time for sorrow. There is a time to cheer up, and a time to just wait and notice: life can really hurt.

Traumatic Tuesdays - crushed

A healthy spirit conquers adversity, but what can you do when the spirit is crushed? Proverbs 18:14 (The Message)

The goodness of life competes with wrongness. At times we have enough goodness flowing through us to just overcome. At other

Monday - back to basics. Good is, because God is

My phone got soaked. I was filling in at football training and there was a downpour. When the game ended, my phone was ended as well. I'm using a knock-off Nokia from China right now. I can tell it isn't quite right; the way the back doesn't snap in when I inserted my SIM was one hint. More obvious is the double images on the screen. It will work, but it isn't what it should be.

I feel that way. The series of shifts over the last stretch of time (I'm not sure when it started but I'm afraid it is not over) have been modifications on top of modifications such that it is difficult to feel very solid and assured. There are too many double images; too many pieces that don't 'click'.

So what should I do? Stop and find good. So I do. I look up and see a leaf and choose to notice the way it stretches out with veins delivering goodness to the tips of the plant and bringing goodness back. It is a system of goodness. How and why? I believe that lesser things came from greater, not greater from lesser. Life, order, goodness is a lesser display of the ultimate goodness. The personal Being who gives existence to all else. It is something I say and think so often that it could just roll of my fingertips, but that does not help me. I need help. I need the core of me to take in goodness from what is out beyond me and intentionally acknowledge it. I cannot borrow copies of things thought or spoken previously. I need to choose to observe and process today. I do, and it gives me rest in goodness.

Hebrews 4

¹Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it...

⁴For somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day in these words: "And on the seventh day God rested from all his work."...

⁹There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; ¹⁰for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. ¹¹Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.

God created and rested. Creation reminds me of him and his completion. I must not allow my heart to harden. I must use what I can to remember him and his promises. When I do, I can faithfully enter into the rest I need.

shalom