New Wineskins

 

    So this morning I think I finally got the message that God was trying to reveal to me in the story of the wineskins. This has always been a challenging reading for me to understand, but the beauty of prayer is that in the faithful reading and reflection of scripture this revelation can eventually happen. It is a day to day, lifelong pursuit.

    I began with today’s readings in the Christian prayer book. The first antiphon was “Create a clean heart in me, O God; renew in me a steadfast spirit. Ephesians 4:23-24 was quoted, “Your inmost being must be renewed, and you must put on the new man”.  Psalm 51 followed. “Have mercy on me, God in your kindness. In your compassion, blot out my offense. O wash me more and more from my guilt and cleanse me from my sin”.

    The canticle was from Tobit 4:14 “Happy are those who love you, and happy are those who rejoice in your prosperity. The last antiphon was “Through the tender compassion of our God the dawn from on high shall break upon us.” And the closing prayer started with Lord, fill our hearts with your love as morning fills the sky” What a beautiful image that is. To let the Lord love us in this way, filling us with complete morning light.

    I then switched over to the readings in the Magnificat. The opening hymns first verse was “With broken heart and contrite sigh, A trembling sinner, Lord, I cry: Thy pardoning grace is rich and free: O God, be merciful to me”. There is a quote from the prodigal son, the story of each one of us who turned away from the Father and chose foolish worldly ways, and this reflection. “Let us never hesitate to return and confess our sins, for we will always find the prodigal’s welcome from a Father who loves us more than we can ever imagine.”

    All these readings when combined together and reflected upon revealed to me as in psalm 32:1  Happy is the man whose offenses are behind him and his hope is in the Lord. Our sins are as far from the east to the west. God doesn’t want us to come to him dragging the entirety of our sin behind us. That is, after all, what confessions is for. To relieve us of these burdens so we can walk in newness of heart, with the newness of Christ.

    
    Carrying our past sins with us continually is like trying to pour new wine into old wineskins. They burst. Just like we would burst trying to carry the weight of our sins around with us all the time. We need to put new wine into new wineskins. Allowing God to renew us mind body and spirit in his love and grace. Piecing those broken parts of our life back together in a new way. Allowing us to see ourselves as God sees us, forgiven, beloved children.

Lift High the Cross

    

    Today is the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. Reflecting on the mass and the readings I had a light bulb moment. The first reading from the Book of Numbers tells the story of the grumblings of the people of Israel. They complained to Moses “Why have you brought us up from Egypt to die in this desert?” 

    Continuing to grumble about the wretchedness of the food and lack of water the Lord sent serpents among the people. In researching saraph serpents I found this explanation: “Saraph simply means “fiery,” a modifier used to indicate the severity of the snake’s venomous bite.” So the Lord didn’t just send snakes, he sent deadly snakes and many whom were bitten died. The people came back to Moses understanding this as punishment for their complaining and said, “Pray the Lord to take the serpents from us.” 

     Then in the gospel reading from John, Jesus was speaking with Nicodemus who came to Jesus at night, under the cover of darkness so as not to be discovered and asked Jesus about his teachings knowing He was a teacher that came from God. Jesus shared his teachings and told Nicodemus “No one has gone up to heaven except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.” 

     And that’s when it clicked. When the Jews asked Moses to pray for the Lord to take away the snakes, he did not. Instead He instructed Moses to lift up the snake, to gaze upon what they feared most and when they looked at the serpent even if they were bitten they would not die, he delivered them from their suffering. Thinking about Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane he also prayed that God take away his suffering, but God did not. Instead what he did, like in Numbers, he gave Jesus the strength to endure the suffering so that by going to what he feared most, the cross, he could be saved through the love, mercy, and grace of the Father. Winning victory over shame, victory over the sins He took on for our sake so that we would not perish and we would have eternal life through the Son, the only one He sent to save us. 

      God doesn’t take away our suffering like some magician. He gives us the strength, the endurance, the faith, hope and love to overcome. On this we can rely, believing and trusting in Jesus’s words “In this world you will have troubles, but take courage! I have overcome the world.”