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MEDITATION:

Written by N.T. Wright, a contemporary theologian, author, and former Bishop of Durham.  This is an excerpt from his book “Reflecting the Glory: Meditations for Living Christ’s Life in the World.”

God’s “glory:” the phrase means, no doubt, that when people eventually see God the sight is astonishingly bright and dazzling. But beyond that it also means that it is surpassingly lovely and beautiful. We don’t talk as much about the beauty of God as we do about the glory of God, but glory surely embraces beauty, and a sense of awe and delight, as well as simply a sense of utterly dazzling light. And this is because God’s glory, ultimately, is the revelation, the shining of who God actually is. In the gospel we discover that God is at Heart the God of total self-giving love. The experience is a bit like traveling alone, away from the people we love, and having nobody around with whom we can relax, with whom we can be friendly. And then somebody we know comes to meet us, in an airport or railway station, or when we finally arrive back home. Our hearts are warmed, deeply comforted, by this sudden presence of somebody with whom we can be truly ourselves. someone who will give themselves to us.

That is a very pale illustration of what it’s like when you are away from God, not knowing who you are, not knowing who God is, and then you discover that the God who made the world is the God of utter self-giving love who longs to be there for you; to give himself to you and help you discover who you are. All of this is contained in the remarkable claim that “God has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.” We can know God deeply inside ourselves, in the face of Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen one. When Paul says the word “Jesus,” he never forgets that this is the Jesus who died on the cross. If we want to know who God really is, we don’t discover it by forgetting that Jesus died on the cross, by skipping past that and going on to what, seems to obviously like “glory.” We discover it as we look at the face which is crowned with the crown of thorns.

PRAYER:

Written by Patrick (AD 385-461), a Christian missionary and bishop who served in Ireland.

Lord, be with us this day,

Within us to purify us;

Above us to draw us up;

Beneath us to sustain us;

Before us to lead us;

Behind us to restrain us;

Around us to protect us.