NACR Daily Meditation for Sunday, Mar 7, 2004

7 Mar 2004 08:00:01 -0000

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NACR Daily Meditation for Sunday, Mar 7, 2004

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I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth,
for in these I delight.Jeremiah 9:24

God delights in kindness, justice and righteousness. None of this is easy
for us to believe. 

Kindness is difficult for some of us to imagine because we do not have extensive
personal experience with kindness. We can imagine God as a weak, codependent,
ineffective being whose specialty is being relentlessly nice to people.
But what of the God who exercises kindness? What would that look like? 

Justice is difficult for some of us to imagine because we have not had extensive
personal experience with justice. In dysfunctional families justice is either
chaotic or completely absent. But what of the God who exercises justice?
What would that look like?

Righteousness is difficult for some of us to imagine because we have not
had extensive personal experience with righteousness. We do not have instincts
for doing what is right, we do not delight in doing righteousness, we expect
it to be boring, dreary and out-of-date. We may delight in caretaking and
codependent niceness, but is that the same as delighting in righteousness?
Probably not. So, what of the God who exercises righteousness. What would
that look like?

God is capable of delight. God is not the Unmoved One. God is the Most Moved
of us all. God's compassion and kindness are free and full. God's commitment
to justice is beyond all our imaginations. God pursues righteousness.

Learning to share in God's struggle for kindness, justice and righteousness
will require significant changes for us. It cannot be done in a one time
event. It will be a life-time quest. We will forget and remember again.
We will run away and come back again. But each day in the struggle we will
grow in our capacity for delight. Until, in the end, when God's purposes
are complete, we will be filled with delight at the triumph of God's kindness,
justice and righteousness 

God of kindness, I want to understand you better.
God of justice, I want to live in solidarity with you.
God of righteousness, help me to delight in what pleases you.
Increase my capacity for delight, Lord.
Let me discover you afresh today.
Amen.

Copyright 1991 Dale and Juanita Ryan

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