This week there has been a lot of thinking about our prayer, the collect, which always seemed to me to be only fitting for when we read John 5 about Jesus feeding the crowd. We stay on that theme for weeks in that year and I've wondered why we have this collect which says this, "Gracious Father, whose blessed Son Jesus Christ came down from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the world: Evermore give us this bread, that he may live in us, and we in him; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen." What in the world does the man born blind have to do with the bread Jesus gives?
The only thing to do is to sit in the text. Now what does this mean. Look at it. Read it over and over (which I've done for two weeks). Then ask questions of it. Where is the bread? What feeds us about this passage? What is the heart of the matter?
So stop here and take time to read the passage. Then just sit. Don't ask the questions yet. Sit with it until it becomes familiar. What has drawn your heart?
Pause---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Listen, what do you hear ringing true for you?
Pause---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Take that verse and read it again. Let it live and breath in you for a bit.
Pause---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How have you been fed?
Pause---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Take the time to be still with God. Each pause is meant to be a silent time filled space. It doesn't mean you quiet your inside voice, you know the one that keeps popping into the stream. Just recognize it but don't get stuck on it. Find a place where you can take that time today and see what comes. Have you been fed?
Comments
Post a Comment