Category: Lectio Divina

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Invitations and conversations.

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As I’ve listened to the Sunday Gospels over the past few weeks I’ve been struck by the themes of revelation and recognition that have gone hand-in-hand. As the stories of the Samaritan woman, and the blind man unfolded it seemed to me that this process has come about through challenging and honest conversations between Jesus and those he encounters. Those conversations required deep thought, honest reflection and an openness to change.

This week, as we encounter Martha grieving for her brother, that pattern continues. Martha, a follower of Jesus already, is clearly a woman of faith, used to the theological reflection and conversation.

She is capable of standing her ground with Jesus, and even of questioning him. She is also capable of allowing his response to transform her whole life. It is through their hard, challenging conversation that Jesus is both revealed and recognised as Christ:

“I am the resurrection and the life. If anyone believes in me, even though the day they will live, and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.”

Central as this revelation is it is not enough by itself, and he requires a response from Martha, asking her:

“Do you believe this?”

The recognition of her response completes the revelation as she proclaims:

“Yes Lord… I believe that you are the Christ, the son of God, the one who was to come into this world.”


I’m left wondering about the implications of this for our own conversations with Jesus. If we are to come to the life changing recognition that Jesus is the Christ we too have to risk engaging in challenging conversations with him, acknowledging our uncertainties and allowing his revelation to transform our lives.

Where is Christ calling you into conversation with him this Lent?

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Celebrating St Benedict

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Today we’re celebrating the feast of the passing of St Benedict. This post from the archives takes me back to the heart of the Rule, the call to listen…

Lent is the time for turning back to God. It encourages us to reassess our practices and to recommit ourselves to those that will draw us closer to God. With this in mind I’m reflecting on this from the prophet Jeremiah:

“Listen to my voice, then I will be your God and you shall be my people. Follow right to the end the way I mark out for you, and you will prosper.”

His words take me back to the Rule of St Benedict. He begins his rule by saying:

“Listen carefully to the master’s instructions and attend to them with the ear of your heart.”

We all know that listening is central to our faith. We also know how that in the hubbub of challenges and anxieties that make up daily life we can easily miss that gentle voice of God calling us. St Benedict and Jeremiah both call us to take the time to tune the ear of our hearts to resonate with that gentle call.

Lent is certainly a good time to practice this listening, but there’s more to it than that. The listening that they require is a life changing experience. It starts with the attentive listening with the ear of our heart and moves on to action that affects every part of our life.

St Benedict carries on saying that having listened to the master’s instructions we are to “faithfully put into practice” what we hear.

Jeremiah’s call to listen and follow makes the same point. The listening we are called to is to is to shape how we live. The way we treat one another, the way we work, the way we treat our tools and utensils are all to be formed by this attentive listening to God in every circumstance.

As we move through Lent what are you being called to faithfully put into practice?

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St Joseph

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Today is the feast of St Joseph. On the surface he seems a shadowy figure. A background figure in the gospel who supports Mary and the child Jesus and brings stability and respectability to an otherwise difficult situation. Yet, if we look beyond that image we find a different story. I’m reflecting on these words from a hymn for his feast:

“His love was humble, flame of God’s own fire,
A light to guide the path he trod alone;
Like Abraham, like Moses he believed,
And went in faith to find a land unknown.”

They speak not of a shadowy figure, but of a man of great faith, courage, humility and trust. He follows in the line of Abraham and Moses who left everything to follow God into the unknown.

When we think of the blessing of welcoming, we think in positive terms. St Joseph shows us that we’re sometimes called to welcome circumstances that are difficult or challenging. Drawing on the faith of his ancestors when his life and expectations are completely turned upside down St Joseph is able to put himself in God’s hands, trusting that God will lead and guide him. It can’t have been an easy choice, it will have required both humility and courage.

It’s impossible to think of this without reflecting on the seemingly insurmountable challenges our world faces today, both at home and abroad. As we see lives disrupted and communities destroyed by war St Joseph becomes a valuable role model.

He reminds us that however dark and uncertain our lives, we are called to put ourselves into the hands of God who will lead us through the darkness into the light of his love.

What gives you the courage to trust yourself to God today?

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Christ on the margins

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This week I’m reflecting on the blessing of welcoming. I’m aware of how often we’re called to recognise Christ by welcoming what we consider marginal. We see that in today’s gospel. It’s a man who is outcast, ignored and undervalued who recognises and proclaims Christ to his people.

He is the last person anyone would have expected to speak and reflect theologically. We see this in the response of his neighbours, who no longer recognise him, and in the Pharisees who refuse to accept someone so marginal can presume to teach them anything about God.

The man doesn’t crumble under their badgering questions, instead he faces them confidently, reflecting on his experience with Jesus in the light of his Jewish faith, saying to them:

“We know that God doesn’t listen to sinners, but God does listen to people who are devout and do his will. Ever since the world began it is unheard-of for anyone to open the eyes of someone who was born blind: if this man were not from God he couldn’t do a thing.”

As the man moves from claiming that he only knows Jesus’ name to proclaiming and worshipping him as Christ he welcomes him with a truly open heart. It may be that his marginal position helped him to recognise Jesus as the Christ, and give him the freedom to worship him.

This gospel challenges me to be attentive to those parts of myself that I push aside, allowing them to point me towards Christ in ways that I might not expect or be entirely comfortable with.

It also challenges me to be attentive to the people we marginalise today, leaving me with an uncomfortable question, would we respond any better than the Pharisees should any of them proclaim Christ to us?

How is Christ calling you welcome the marginal in your life today?

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In need of mercy.

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Today’s gospel presents a stark contrast between two men who have gone up to the temple to pray. The first is a Pharisee, the second a tax collector. The Pharisee is confident and sure of himself. He is aware of his position in the community and in his faith.

He is certain that his religious practices place him in good standing with God. He expects his prayers to be heard and responded to. He is completely unaware of any sin or failing in himself or his life

The tax collector, on the other hand, is all too aware that his job makes him a bit of an outcast in his community. He knows that it leaves him in situations that can sometimes be morally ambiguous. Unlike the Pharisee, he comes to prayer all too aware of his failings and his sin saying:

“God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

Jesus is very clear that it was the tax collector, who knew his failings and his need of God who went home at right with God.

In telling the story to an audience that is sure of its virtue Jesus is presenting a challenge. He’s inviting them, and us, to develop a new attentiveness. He is challenging us to look beyond the surface of our religious practices.

He is asking us to be attentive to how those practices enable us to develop a more compassionate and kind heart.

How are your lent practices helping you to grow in compassion and kindness?

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Attentive to the call of love

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Today’s gospel, the conversation between Jesus and one of the Scribes, is a call to be attentive to the real essentials in life. That’s an important message for us living as we do in times of distraction and shortening attention spans. It highlights two essential aspects of faith that we’re called to be attentive to, love and respect for others.

It’s not clear if the scribe is trying to catch Jesus out on this occasion, or if he is genuinely seeking understanding. Either way, Jesus decides to take the question at face value, treating it a genuine request for greater understanding, and giving the scribe the benefit of the doubt. Having being asked by the scribe about the first of the commandments he replied:

“You must love the Lord your God with all your heart…You must love your neighbour as yourself.”

It takes us back to the heart of the gospel and reminds us that love is the core of our faith. Jesus responds with love to the scribe’s question, answering sincerely and respectfully, and ending the conversation by saying:

“You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

Our challenging times make it very easy to hear a criticism in every question and to respond with defensiveness or even aggression so that we lose sight of love and the relationship falters.

This draws us away from the call to love that is the heart of the gospel. Jesus shows us another way to respond, keeping his attention focussed on loving and respecting the scribe.

Where are you being called to be attentive to the call of love this Lent?

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Listen with the ear of your heart.

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In the first reading the prophet Jeremiah calls the people to listen attentively to God’s voice and to follow God’s teaching. He writes:

“Listen to my voice, then I will be your God and you shall be my people. Follow right to the end the way that I mark out for you, and you will prosper.”

These words can only fill us with hope, and our hearts recognise that they have the potential to lead us in the way of life. Yet, even knowing that, we don’t, as Jeremiah points out, actually do it. He goes on to describe what happens to the people when they don’t listen attentively to God. Of the things he describes the one that struck me most was:

“Sincerity is no more, it has vanished from their mouths.”

It surprised me, I would never have thought of lack of sincerity as being a sign of not being attentive to the voice of God. Yet, it is undeniably an issue in our contemporary world.

We live in an openly “post truth” society that often seems to value appearances over either accuracy or trust. In every area of our lives it’s extremely difficult to work out what is true and what isn’t.

Sincerity doesn’t seem to be an attribute we value very much any more. It’s easy to assume that we can do nothing to change this, it’s simply the way the world is.

Jeremiah suggests that’s not the case, suggesting that we can grow in sincerity by listening attentively to the voice of God in all the circumstances of our lives. I can’t help wondering how that would alter our post truth society.

Where is God calling you to listen attentively for his voice this Lent?

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Attentive to forgiveness

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Today’s readings call us to be attentive to our relationships. The first reading, from the book of Daniel, call us to reflect on our relationship with God. It encourages us to be attentive to our need of God, and especially to our need for God’s mercy and compassion.

The people, having wandered far from God have realised their need of God, and return to God aware that all they have to offer is their humility and neediness. He writes:

“And now we put our whole heart into following you, into fearing you and seeking your face once more. Do not disappoint us; treat us gently, as you yourself are gentle and very merciful.”

The gospel calls us to be attentive to our relationships with one another. We soon recognise that our relationships with one another are often broken. Whatever our best intentions we end up wounding each other in a myriad of ways throughout the day. We have a real interest in Peter’s question about the limits of forgiveness.

If we’re honest, like Peter, we’d like a limit put on that forgiveness. We’d like to know there’s a point at which we can close the door on a troublesome situation. But Jesus’ response extends the limits of forgiveness, saying:

“‘Not seven, I tell you, but seventy-seven times.”

He goes on to tell a story that highlights the ways we might subvert the challenging work of forgiveness. He ends by calling us to learn to forgive as God does, from the depths of our hearts:

“Forgive your sister or brother from your heart.”

The blessing of attentiveness invites & challenges us to recreate our relationships in ways that reflect the love and compassion that God lavishes on us.

Where is Christ calling you to be attentive to your relationships this Lent?

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Called to be peacemakers

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As we come to the end of International women’s Day we’ve begun our celebration of one of our congregation’s saints, St Frances of Rome. She is one of a very small number of married women who are saints. She brought up a large family and did a great deal to help the poor and the sick of Rome.

This week I’m reflecting on the blessing of attentiveness. It seems to me that St Frances’ life shows us how the practice of attentiveness to God changes everything. It’s through her attentiveness to God that she’s able to see God’s presence in the people she helps.

That’s especially true in the great care she took of the poor, wrapping their clothes in lavender after she’d washed and mended them. In her role as peacemaker and reconciler shows another aspect of attentiveness. It’s written of her that:

“God gave her such an abundance of loving-kindness that those who had dealings with her immediately felt themselves captivated by love and admiration for her and were ready to do whatever she wished.”

Frances dealt with many difficult and, sometimes, violent situations. Even in those situations she was able to persuade people to change their behaviour by recognising Christ dwelling in them regardless of appearances.

As we watch our world torn apart by war Frances is an important role model. She reminds me that we are all called to pay attention to the call to be peace makers. Her example shows us that even in the most challenging situations, love and kindness have the power to change hearts, minds and lives.

Where is God calling you to be attentive to the call to be a peacemaker this Lent?

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An attentive heart

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This week I’m reflecting on the blessing of attentiveness. We all recognise it as essential for a life centred on seeking God. Learning to live attentively can be difficult. We have to step back from the multitude of demands and distractions that we live among on a daily basis.

While, in the midst of a busy life, that can seem an attractive idea, the reality is much harder. When we step back from those external distractions we are swamped by a multitude of inner distractions that often prove much more challenging than the external ones could ever be.

Reflecting on all of this I especially struck by the response to today’s psalm:

“O that today you would listen to his voice! Harden not your hearts.”

It’s the first psalm verse that we sing on Ash Wednesday and sets the tone for all of Lent. It gives us the opportunity to acknowledge that time and experience have hardened our hearts. It invites us to begin to let that hardness crack and fall away by paying attention to where the voice of God might be speaking to us in our lives.

Of course, we can expect to discover that voice in our prayer. If we actively seek this blessing of attentiveness, giving all our attention to the tasks we are engaged in and to the people we meet we will also find that God speaks to us in every situation, in the midst of every task and in every encounter.

Where are you being invited to be attentive this Lent?