Enter by the narrow gate….Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life…. —Matthew 7:13-14

If we are going to live as disciples of Jesus, we have to remember that all efforts of worth and excellence are difficult. The Christian life is gloriously difficult, but its difficulty does not make us faint and cave in— it stirs us up to overcome. Do we appreciate the miraculous salvation of Jesus Christ enough to be our utmost for His highest— our best for His glory?

God saves people by His sovereign grace through the atonement of Jesus, and “it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Philippians 2:13). But we have to “work out” that salvation in our everyday, practical living (Philippians 2:12). If we will only start on the basis of His redemption to do what He commands, then we will find that we can do it. If we fail, it is because we have not yet put into practice what God has placed within us. But a crisis will reveal whether or not we have been putting it into practice. If we will obey the Spirit of God and practice in our physical life what God has placed within us by His Spirit, then when a crisis does come we will find that our own nature, as well as the grace of God, will stand by us.

Thank God that He does give us difficult things to do! His salvation is a joyous thing, but it is also something that requires bravery, courage, and holiness. It tests us for all we are worth. Jesus is “bringing many sons to glory” (Hebrews 2:10), and God will not shield us from the requirements of sonship. God’s grace produces men and women with a strong family likeness to Jesus Christ, not pampered, spoiled weaklings. It takes a tremendous amount of discipline to live the worthy and excellent life of a disciple of Jesus in the realities of life. And it is always necessary for us to make an effort to live a life of worth and excellence.

Richard Rohr’s Daily …

The Great Turning
Friday, July 7, 2017

Contemplation is no fantasy, make-believe, or daydream, but the flowering of patience and steady perseverance. When we look at the world today, we may well ask whether it can be transformed on the global or even personal level. Our hope lies in the fact that an authentic inner life is going to change the society that we live in, just as we allow it to change us. God seems to patiently participate with us and kindly invite us into a long-term process of growth. Love and life are infinite.
I know the situation in the world can seem dark today. We are seeing theological regression into fundamentalist religions which believe all issues can be resolved by an appeal to authority (hierarchy or Scripture) and so there is no need for an inner life of prayer. In the United States we have seen the rolling back of a compassionate economic system and the abandonment of our biblical responsibility for the poor, the sick, and refugees. Fear and anger seem to rule our politics and our churches. We see these same things in many parts of the world.
The negative forces are very strong, and the development of consciousness and love sometimes feels very weak. But a “Great Turning” is also happening, as believed and described in many ways by such people as Teilhard de Chardin, Thomas Berry, Joanna Macy, and David Korten. There is a deep relationship between the inner revolution of prayer and the transformation of social structures and social consciousness.
The Apostle Paul has a marvelous line: “where sin increased, grace abounded all the more” (Romans 5:20). In so many places, there are signs of the Holy Spirit working at all levels of society. The church might well have done its work as leaven because much of this reform, enlightenment, compassion, and healing is now happening outside the bounds of organized religion. Only God gets the credit.
The toothpaste is out of the tube. There are enough people who know the big picture of Jesus’ thrilling and alluring vision of the reign of God that this Great Turning cannot be stopped. There are enough people going on solid inner journeys that it is not merely ideological or theoretical anymore. This is a positive, nonviolent reformation from the inside, from the bottom up. The big questions are being answered at a peaceful and foundational level, with no need to oppose, deny, or reject. I sense the urgency of the Holy Spirit, with over seven billion humans on the planet. There is so much to love and so much suffering to share in and heal.

The parched ground shall become a pool… —Isaiah 35:7

Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. —Psalm 37:5

Don’t plan without God. God seems to have a delightful way of upsetting the plans we have made, when we have not taken Him into account. We get ourselves into circumstances that were not chosen by God, and suddenly we realize that we have been making our plans without Him— that we have not even considered Him to be a vital, living factor in the planning of our lives. And yet the only thing that will keep us from even the possibility of worrying is to bring God in as the greatest factor in all of our planning.

In spiritual issues it is customary for us to put God first, but we tend to think that it is inappropriate and unnecessary to put Him first in the practical, everyday issues of our lives. If we have the idea that we have to put on our “spiritual face” before we can come near to God, then we will never come near to Him. We must come as we are.

Don’t plan with a concern for evil in mind. Does God really mean for us to plan without taking the evil around us into account? “Love…thinks no evil” (1 Corinthians 13:4-5). Love is not ignorant of the existence of evil, but it does not take it into account as a factor in planning. When we were apart from God, we did take evil into account, doing all of our planning with it in mind, and we tried to reason out all of our work from its standpoint.

Don’t plan with a rainy day in mind. You cannot hoard things for a rainy day if you are truly trusting Christ. Jesus said, “Let not your heart be troubled…” (John 14:1). God will not keep your heart from being troubled. It is a command— “Let not….” To do it, continually pick yourself up, even if you fall a hundred and one times a day, until you get into the habit of putting God first and planning with Him in mind.

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Journal DJR
Good Morning Lord,
There he goes again! With the Imperatives. “God will not keep your heart from being troubled. It is a command— “Let not….” Chambers seems to focus on the Imperatives. And imperatives don’t work so well for me or most people. I don’t think you created us that way…(Tell a 5 year old, Don’t touch the cookies) Even the weather man gets better results with “travel advisories” instead of “travel commands” What works best for me is to recieve these “Commands” as advisories or suggestions. I’m seeing that this fits with who you are and how you operate, which is all about Relationship. People in a love relationship don’t thrive by giving each other commands. Both meanings are obviously true. They can be Commands or Suggestions from a Loving Father. I just find it more valuable and motivating to focus on them as advisories from One who has my best in mind.

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Richard Rohr Devotional

Electric Circuits
Wednesday, July 5, 2017

Moses’ experience of the burning bush (Exodus 3:1-6) links action and contemplation as the very starting place of the Judeo-Christian tradition. His encounter is surely an inner one, but it immediately drives him outwardly, as deep inner experience tends to do. It is a transcendent experience, yet note that it is based in nature rather than a synagogue or temple. Often it is in the open spaces of the natural world that the inner world is most obviously recognized, as the Desert Fathers and Mothers and Celtic Christianity remind us.
Immediately after Moses had his heart-stopping experience, YHWH said to him: “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt. Now, go! Tell Pharaoh to let my people go” …..(continue reading…)

Do not fret— it only causes harm. —Psalm 37:8

Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips… —Isaiah 6:5

When I come into the very presence of God, I do not realize that I am a sinner in an indefinite sense, but I suddenly realize and the focus of my attention is directed toward the concentration of sin in a particular area of my life. A person will easily say, “Oh yes, I know I am a sinner,” but when he comes into the presence of God he cannot get away with such a broad and indefinite statement. Our conviction is focused on our specific sin, and we realize, as Isaiah did, what we really are. This is always the sign that a person is in the presence of God. There is never any vague sense of sin, but a focusing on the concentration of sin in some specific, personal area of life. God begins by convicting us of the very thing to which His Spirit has directed our mind’s attention. If we will surrender, submitting to His conviction of that particular sin, He will lead us down to where He can reveal the vast underlying nature of sin. That is the way God always deals with us when we are consciously aware of His presence.

This experience of our attention being directed to our concentration of personal sin is true in everyone’s life, from the greatest of saints to the worst of sinners. When a person first begins climbing the ladder of experience, he might say, “I don’t know where I’ve gone wrong,” but the Spirit of God will point out some definite and specific thing to him. The effect of Isaiah’s vision of the holiness of the Lord was the directing of his attention to the fact that he was “a man of unclean lips.” “He touched my mouth with it, and said: ‘Behold, this has touched your lips; your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged’ ” (Isaiah 6:7). The cleansing fire had to be applied where the sin had been concentrated.

Continuing our practice of juxtaposing two devotional streams… Here is today’s selection from Richard Rohr featuring Shane Claiborne

There’s something powerful that happens when we can connect our faith with the pain of our world. We are concerned not just with going to heaven when we die, but with bringing God’s kingdom down here. That means figuring out how we can be a part of the restoration of our world. As we look at our neighborhood, what does it mean for us to pray the Lord’s Prayer, that God’s kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven? We pray and act for that every day because we believe that God’s kingdom is coming and we want it to come.
There’s a movement in the church to marry action and contemplation, to connect orthodoxy and orthopraxis. We’re not throwing out the things we believe, but we’re also focusing on practices that work out those beliefs. In the past few decades Christianity has primarily been about what we believe. But in Jesus we see an invitation to join our actions with a movement rather than ideas and doctrine.
I’m hopeful because people have grown tired of a Christianity that can say what it believes on paper but doesn’t have anything to show with our lives. Ideologies and doctrines aren’t easy things to love. That’s why I think we need to lift up examples of people who have joined their faith and action, folks like Francis and Clare of Assisi. Mother Teresa has also been a hero of mine.
What I love about Mother Teresa is that her life was her witness. She wasn’t a champion of unborn children because she wore a t-shirt that said “Abortion Is Murder,” but because she welcomed mothers and children. In essence, she said, “If you can’t raise your child, we’ll do it together.” That’s the kind of embodiment that comes as we seek to marry our beliefs to our actions. As Brian McLaren says, “It’s not just are we pro-life or pro-choice, but how are we pro-active?” Are we willing to take responsibility for our ideologies? In my neighborhood that means we’ve got to care for a fourteen-year-old girl and her child together.
Mother Teresa’s message was, “Calcutta is everywhere, if we only have eyes to see.” Pray that God would help us see our own Calcutta: the pain, poverty, loneliness, and ostracizing that happens all over. Each of us encounters situations that demand both prayer and activism. Pray that God would give us the eyes to see the pain of our neighborhoods.

Journal DJR
Good morning Lord, Since we have been looking at two devotionals, we have asked ourselves, “How are these the same?” Or different? And if they are different, can we hold the seeming contradiction and find truth in each.

Today the message of similarity is to get specific and get going… rather than staying conceptual. Chambers says get specific about our sin and God will cleanse it. Rohr’s guest author, Claiborne says get specific about joining actions to our compassion and your “kingdom will come on earth as it is in heaven”

In looking at both my sins and my opportunities for action… I see overwhelmingly more than I can deal with. So I need your help. Focus me.

You are right. Your sins and your opportunities are massive. But rest, I will focus you, and sustain you. Know that I have paid for all your sin. It is all paid for as a free gift. You only need to wake up to it and receive it and walk in the freedom and newness. I know that’s foreign to your analytical way of thinking but I have sent the Helper, Holy Spirit to show you the way. Know that I am Love and my motivation is love. In dealing with you and all of my creation. I love it all. I love them all. But for now, you must know that I love you and will lead you and strengthen you both in dealing with your leftover sins and being a conduit to pour my love and grace into the world. In both areas we’ll only focus on one thing at a time. Or you will wear out. Just like I had Jethro say to Moses. …If you follow this advice, and if God commands you to do so, then you will be able to endure the pressures, and all these people will go home in peace.” Ex 18:23

Agree with your adversary quickly… —Matthew 5:25

In this verse, Jesus Christ laid down a very important principle by saying, “Do what you know you must do— now. Do it quickly. If you don’t, an inevitable process will begin to work ‘till you have paid the last penny’ (Matthew 5:26) in pain, agony, and distress.” God’s laws are unchangeable and there is no escape from them. The teachings of Jesus always penetrate right to the heart of our being.

Wanting to make sure that my adversary gives me all my rights is a natural thing. But Jesus says that it is a matter of inescapable and eternal importance to me that I pay my adversary what I owe him. From our Lord’s standpoint it doesn’t matter whether I am cheated or not, but what does matter is that I don’t cheat someone else. Am I insisting on having my own rights, or am I paying what I owe from Jesus Christ’s standpoint?

Do it quickly— bring yourself to judgment now. In moral and spiritual matters, you must act immediately. If you don’t, the inevitable, relentless process will begin to work. God is determined to have His child as pure, clean, and white as driven snow, and as long as there is disobedience in any point of His teaching, He will allow His Spirit to use whatever process it may take to bring us to obedience. The fact that we insist on proving that we are right is almost always a clear indication that we have some point of disobedience. No wonder the Spirit of God so strongly urges us to stay steadfastly in the light! (see John 3:19-21).

“Agree with your adversary quickly….” Have you suddenly reached a certain place in your relationship with someone, only to find that you have anger in your heart? Confess it quickly— make it right before God. Be reconciled to that person— do it now!

If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. —Matthew 5:30

I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. —Philippians 3:12

Never choose to be a worker for God, but once God has placed His call on you, woe be to you if you “turn aside to the right hand or to the left” (Deuteronomy 5:32). We are not here to work for God because we have chosen to do so, but because God has “laid hold of” us. And once He has done so, we never have this thought, “Well, I’m really not suited for this.” What you are to preach is also determined by God, not by your own natural leanings or desires. Keep your soul steadfastly related to God, and remember that you are called not simply to convey your testimony but also to preach the gospel. Every Christian must testify to the truth of God, but when it comes to the call to preach, there must be the agonizing grip of God’s hand on you— your life is in the grip of God for that very purpose. How many of us are held like that?

Never water down the Word of God, but preach it in its undiluted sternness. There must be unflinching faithfulness to the Word of God, but when you come to personal dealings with others, remember who you are— you are not some special being created in heaven, but a sinner saved by grace.

“Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do…I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13-14).

Journal, DJR

Good Morning Lord,
We continue to look at two streams of devotional literature and compare the truths that are contained in each. It’s a process of sorting, and comparing and even rejecting some of what we find. The authors, after all are imperfect humans caught in the space and time of their own culture… just as we are. Sometimes, understanding the context that the author wrote in helps, just as it is essential to understand the context that the scriptural authors wrote. And sometimes you’ve shown us concepts that help bridge differences and answer seeming contradictions. The bolded quote above… “when you come to personal dealings with others, remember who you are— you are not some special being created in heaven, but a sinner saved by grace.” … depends on the “either – or” dualistic thinking context. Which we are coming to reject. To us, it really helps to see and state that both are true. We are special beings, created in heaven…. and also sinners saved by grace.

Another line that we see as true, but we see it differently is, Never water down the Word of God, but preach it in its undiluted sternness. What Chambers and some of today’s polarized folks in politics as well as religion fail to include are the clear scriptures on Love and Grace and Mercy. We must not water those down either. When they are “preached with undiluted sternness” we have a delicious tension that only reliance on your Holy Spirit can resolve. Until he does, for us specifically, in a specific situation, it seems that the only safe way to stand is holding both of the seeming opposites in an “open palm”… ready to hear, ready to be instructed, ready to see thru a new lens. Help us Lord to live like that.

Field Hospital on the Edge of the Battlefield (Daily Devotional from Richard Rohr)
Wednesday, June 28, 2017

Francis of Assisi taught us the importance of living close to the poor, the marginalized, the outcasts in society. The outer poverty, injustice, and absurdity around us mirror our own inner poverty, injustice, and absurdity. The poor man or woman outside is an invitation to the poor man or woman inside. As you nurture compassion and sympathy for the brokenness of things, encounter the visible icon of the painful mystery in “the little ones,” build bridges between the inner and outer, learn to move between action and contemplation, then you’ll find compassion and sympathy for the brokenness within yourself.
Each time I was recovering from cancer, I had to sit with my own broken absurdity as I’ve done with others at the jail or hospital or sick bed. The suffering person’s poverty is visible and extraverted; mine is invisible and interior, but just as real. I think that’s why Jesus said we have to recognize Christ in the least of our brothers and sisters. It was for our redemption, our liberation, our healing—not just to “help” others and put a check on our spiritual resume.
I can’t hate the person on welfare when I realize I’m on God’s welfare. It all becomes one truth; the inner and the outer reflect one another. As compassion and sympathy flow out of us to any marginalized person for whatever reason, wounds are bandaged—both theirs and ours.
Thomas, the doubting apostle, wanted to figure things out in his head. He had done too much inner work, too much analyzing and explaining. He always needed more data before he could make a move. Then Jesus told Thomas he must put his finger inside the wounds in Jesus’ hands and side (John 20:27). Then and only then did Thomas begin to understand what faith is all about.
Pope Francis is encouraging a church of doubting Thomases when he tells us that “the church seems like a field hospital” [1] on the edge of the battlefield (as opposed to a country club of saved people) and the “clergy should smell like their sheep” (rather than thinking they smell better). [2] If this could happen, it would change just about everything that we have called church up to now.

Gateway to Silence:
Be still and still moving.

“…I am with you to deliver you,” says the Lord. —Jeremiah 1:8

We…plead with you not to receive the grace of God in vain. —2 Corinthians 6:1

The grace you had yesterday will not be sufficient for today. Grace is the overflowing favor of God, and you can always count on it being available to draw upon as needed. “…in much patience, in tribulations, in needs, in distresses”— that is where our patience is tested (2 Corinthians 6:4). Are you failing to rely on the grace of God there? Are you saying to yourself, “Oh well, I won’t count this time”? It is not a question of praying and asking God to help you— it is taking the grace of God now. We tend to make prayer the preparation for our service, yet it is never that in the Bible. Prayer is the practice of drawing on the grace of God. Don’t say, “I will endure this until I can get away and pray.” Pray now — draw on the grace of God in your moment of need. Prayer is the most normal and useful thing; it is not simply a reflex action of your devotion to God. We are very slow to learn to draw on God’s grace through prayer.

“…in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors…” (2 Corinthians 6:5)— in all these things, display in your life a drawing on the grace of God, which will show evidence to yourself and to others that you are a miracle of His. Draw on His grace now, not later. The primary word in the spiritual vocabulary is now. Let circumstances take you where they will, but keep drawing on the grace of God in whatever condition you may find yourself. One of the greatest proofs that you are drawing on the grace of God is that you can be totally humiliated before others without displaying even the slightest trace of anything but His grace.

“…having nothing….” Never hold anything in reserve. Pour yourself out, giving the best that you have, and always be poor. Never be diplomatic and careful with the treasure God gives you. “…and yet possessing all things”— this is poverty triumphant (2 Corinthians 6:10).

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Journal DJR
Good morning Lord, I’ve been traveling for the last few weeks and have missed many days here with you and JD. I’m almost home and look forward to getting more regular in our times together. One thing that JD and I have discussed often and more regularly over the last year is our regular differences with the daily selection from Oswald Chambers. Usually the selection is a mixed bag…. some of it we agree with, some of it we take issue with, and see differently. It’s been good for us to think about what you are saying to us and what we really believe for ourselves. This year, we have also each day looked at Richard Rohr’s daily meditation. The juxtaposition of the two writers has been interesting and an exercise in “iron sharpening iron.” The last line in Chambers’ devotional today, for example, fits with Rohr’s Franciscan theology like a hand in a glove. Other points, not so much.

One of the things that we have been learning is not to polarize, but rather to look for truth in all perspectives and suspect that a “third path” will open up somewhere different than at the polarized ends of any spectrum. How great would it be if our politicians could learn this! In my travels, I met with some old friends who reminded me how we had worked together to free people from addiction by identifying and helping them dismantle one of the root causes…. “Imperative Thinking” This all or nothing, black and white, right or wrong, approach is what keeps addicts coming back to their addiction… as well as what keeps our politics so divisive. Over the years, Imperative Thinking is one of the things you have been removing from JD’s and my lives… and that’s still a work in process. Which brings me to today’s thinking on what to include in our CO2MannaToday output. Chambers ALWAYS has some nuggets of truth … but also, we are seeing so much Imperative Thinking, with “Guilt Hooks” and Sin Management, that I no longer want to put it out without comment or “counterpoint” Today, I’m including both devotionals. Perhaps that’s too much, too long. Or maybe our readers will enjoy seeing them both and joining us in the “iron sharpening iron” that we experience by daily comparing the voices… and finding our own that you are speaking to us.

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So here is today’s devotional from Richard Rohr. and here is a link which takes you to his site. The 8 minute introductory video is helpful. If you like it, feel free to sign up to have his daily devotionals come in your email. http://email.cac.org/t/d-l-kiudft-ulluljtiy-i/

Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditation Monday, June 26, 2017

The words action and contemplation have become classic Christian terminology for the two dancing polarities of our lives. Thomas Aquinas and many others stated that the highest form of spiritual maturity is not action or contemplation, but the ability to integrate the two into one life stance—to be service-oriented contemplatives or contemplative activists. By temperament we all tend to come at it from one side or the other.
This full integration doesn’t happen without a lot of mistakes and practice and prayer. And invariably, as you go through life, you swing on a pendulum back and forth between the two. During one period you may be more active or more contemplative than at another time.
I have commonly noticed a tendency to call any kind of inner work contemplation, and this concerns me. Inner work might lead you to a contemplative stance, but not necessarily. We shouldn’t confuse various kinds of inner work, insight-gathering, or introspection with contemplative spirituality. Contemplation is about letting go of the false much more than just collecting the new, the therapeutic, or the helpful. In other words, if you and your personal growth are still the focus, I do not think you are yet a contemplative—which demands that you shed yourself as the central reference point. Jesus said, “Unless the single grain of wheat dies, it remains just a single grain,” and it will not bear much fruit (John 12:24).
We must guard against our “innerness” becoming disguised narcissism, navel-gazing, and overly self-serving. I am afraid this is not uncommon in the religious world. An exalted self-image of “I am a spiritual person” is far too appealing to the ego. Thomas Merton warned against confusing an introverted personality with being a contemplative. They are two different things.
Having said that, I’ll point out the other side of the problem. Too much activism without enough inner work, insight, or examination of conscience inevitably leads to violence—to the self, to the project at hand, and invariably to others. If too much inner focus risks narcissism and individualism, I guess too much outer focus risks superficiality, negativity passing for love of justice, and various Messiah complexes. You can lack love on the Right and you can lack love on the Left—they just wear two different disguises.
We need both inner communion and outer service to be “Jesus” in the world! The job of religion is to help people act effectively and compassionately from an inner centeredness and connection with God.

Gateway to Silence:
Be still and still moving.