Prayer:
Merciful God, teach us to live in paradox – give up so that we can receive, lose in order to find, to die so that we might live – for it is only when you run our lives that we are saved. Amen.
Bible Reading:
John 13:1-17
Silence:
One to two minutes
Reflection:
Do you know English grammar? “i” before “e” except after “c” or sounded like “a” in neighbor and weigh? Subject, verb, predicate? Etc. Of course you do, or else you would be pretty hard pressed to carry on a conversation or write a letter or read a newspaper. But are the rules, principles right there on your lips? I dare say, unless you’re unique, not very distinctly. No matter, you know the rules of grammar by their use. The Christian faith is like grammar, it’s the form and structure of a faithful life, it makes the Christian life able to be communicated. We learn from our Christian nurture the “rules”, the “principles”, the “forms” of the Christian life, and then in our day to day lives we let these “rules” shape the way we live, talk, feel, understand, respond. The necessity here, of course, is that we really have access and appreciation for the “grammar” of the faith. Mediation, prayer, bible reading, worship, and study are the means of “getting the grammar rules”, how we live our Christian life depends on how well we “get” the rules.
Action – Repentance and Creation:
Review the Apostles’ Creed, and think of it in terms of “grammar”. If we were to structure our lives on the “rule” that God is the Creator, how would we live our lives out as Christian, or if “Jesus is Lord, in what light would we hold our bosses”?