Faith to live by…

 

  

 

...after all I have been through I could easily renounce the world, go and live in a monastery and pray and be in solitude, but as much as my life’s journey drives me to that, my ‘faith to live by’ will always bring me back to society, for I believe that is where our roots are to be- to Love God and to love the world.

 

I think when John Wesley said ‘the Gospel of Jesus Christ knows no religion but social, no holiness but social holiness’-  he was right;  we can pray and hide and become a self righteous people, but the refining of the heart- the testing of the metal and the pursuit of perfect love, has to be in the relationships with the world.

…it is with pure joy that I have prayed the Covenant prayer…

Saved by grace- the response to that grace is that I can no longer live for myself, I am not my own man, but divinely linked to you, to humanity and to the trinity.  God the creator, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Therefore, to say put me to what you will, is simply to live.  To be ranked wherever God would have me in creation, in whatever I do and whatever I suffer, in times of activity or rest, fullness or emptiness, this is a natural response… for I love God… this is in society…we Love all.

This is a personal prayer- but- it is manifested in society…

For when we yield to the freedom this prayer offers, of being one with all in the universe we enter a unity with all creation, for from dust we are created, and to dust we will return.  But we will be fitted, consecrated, ratified and fulfilled in heaven, lost in wonder, love and praise. 

As I stood at the graveside…

As I stood at the graveside, at the funeral of my brother Brian.  A funeral I had taken. A friend who had come to the funeral said ‘you got your religion, Christ. I got mine, the NA, it’s what gets us through…or we’d be buried by now.’

I nodded, I agreed. That’s timeless. All the fights against addictions we have had throughout our lives made sense here at the grave. Together we could talk of religion in agreement of our shared human experience. I have now studied Theology- doctrine, creeds etc, he has come through the NA, here we may not agree on the incarnation of Christ or say Buddha, and I did not go through the AA or the NA, but our hearts knew the truth as it had been revealed to each of us and in that we could agree…  

I’ve watched 13 friends die through drink and drugs over the years and now a brother.  When we are stripped down to our bare humanity. When all the peripheral stuff is cast aside…it is easy to talk of God and not fall foul to our limited understanding of God in our own denominations and ways…I guess that’s part of experiential religion… staying true to how God has been revealed and made known to us through reason, experience, traditions and scriptures, for me this is primarily in the incarnation of Christ… but being open to interpreting God at work in others…

Son of God, if thy free grace again has raised me up, called me still to seek thy face, and given me back my hope…

In sore temptation’s hour; Save me with thine outstreched hand, and show forth all thy power…                                      Charles wesley