E&W 4-20-14

Sacred Story

Encouragements & Wisdom: April 20, 2014

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Encouragements and Wisdom: April 20, 2014 (PDF).

E & W reflections are additional helps for your Sacred Story prayer journey. Reflect on them at week’s beginning or outside of your 15-minute prayer periods.

The Affirmations

I alone control Christ’s ability to transform my life into a Sacred Story.

It is a fact that love is only possible if it can be freely rejected. Without the freedom to reject love, every relationship would be one of slavery. But since we are made in God’s image and likeness, the freedom to love (or not) is our very birthright.

It is vital to remember this freedom. Ultimately the choice is ours, whether we will allow Christ to transform our lives into Sacred Story or not. Christ will never force us to allow Him into our hearts. Not to invite Love into our lives is sure death, but it is up to us to decide. Because we are made in Love’s image and likeness, we will never be happy apart from a relationship with God but we can say “no” to it.

We also have the freedom to make that “no” definitive. We know this because Jesus said that to willfully sin against the Spirit is a sin that cannot be forgiven (Mk 3: 28-29; Mt 12: 30-32). This willful hardening of one’s heart was something that Jesus noticed not in the tax collectors and sinners but in the religious leaders—the scribes and the Pharisees. Their hardness of heart manifested itself in their assertion that the mighty works of Jesus came from Satan.

Let us affirm that we hold the power over what happens in our lives and that we have the power to allow Christ to enter our hearts and by His grace, turn all sadness, darkness, sin and death into life—Sacred Story. Let us daily say “yes” to Christ so that in all things we can participate with Him in
Creation, Presence, Memory, Mercy and Eternity.

“The right hand of the LORD has struck with power;
the right hand of the LORD is exalted.
I shall not die, but live,
and declare the works of the LORD.”
The stone which the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone.
By the LORD has this been done;
it is wonderful in our eyes.

(Psalm 118: 16-17, 22-23)

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