God reveals himself to us (4)

by Fr Ian

(Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here)

'In many ways the 'Spiritual But Not Religious' outlook appears as an outgrowth of affluent western consumer culture: it has a strong element of the modern therapeutic search for personal wellbeing and security and tends towards a rather individualistic, inward-looking and self-serving attitude.'

What I want to look at now is: 

C. Some mistaken ideas about God

Let’s go back to the three central questions I suggested we consider earlier: who is God, what is he like, what, if anything does he ask of us?

God reveals himself to us (3)

by Fr Ian

(Part One here, Part Two here)

God's revelation of the truth about himself is available for us in Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition. Christians must trust these sources above our personal opinions and ideas. God speaks to us, 'not to impart information, but to invite us to share his life and to elicit a response to his invitation'.

Saint Jerome, c. 342–347 – 420, the patron saint of biblical scholars: 

'Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ'

‘I Heard it through the Grapevine’

Jesus the True Vine and His Father the Vinedresser

The grapevine as a metaphor for the course of our lives 

By Raymond Caldwell

'There is one essential gift available to us while we are yet alive and still able to think and make choices, and that is GRACE.'

Christ True Vine, Russia, 19th century, icon, unknown artist

The POSITIVE OPTIMIST and Positive Thinking

By Raymond Caldwell

Are you an OPTIMIST or a PESSIMIST?

Many good books have been written on the power and benefits of positive thinking. We can have a tendency to think either positively or negatively. It is similar to the magnetic field of Planet Earth with north and south poles, or the negative and positive forces of a magnet.

How are you polarised? Which pole are you attracted to? Positive or negative? (There is also attraction and repulsion, but that is another subject.)

God reveals himself to us (2)

by Fr Ian

(Part I here)

First of all then,

A. the fact of God’s self-revelation.

'Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, 

for the place on which you are standing is holy  ground.’ (Exodus 3: 5) 

Picture: fresco by Raphael Sanzio, 1519.

The root meaning of the word ‘revelation’ is the drawing back of a veil so that we can see something that would otherwise be concealed or obscured. 

'Divine Revelation' refers to the fact that God, at various points in the course of human history, instead of leaving us in the dark about his existence and his character, and the purposes that he has written into human existence, has ‘pulled back the veil’ so that we can see him, know him and enter into relationship with him.

God reveals himself to us (1)

Fr Ian reflects on one of the foundations of Christian spiritual life: that the God we are called to know and love has not left us in ignorance about who he is and what he's like, but has revealed his nature and character to us. 

Mark 12: 28–30.

And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, ‘Which commandment is the first of all?’ Jesus answered, ‘The first is, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength”...’.

I think these verses from Saint Mark’s gospel, where Jesus talks about a wholehearted, all-encompassing love towards God as the first or greatest commandment, get to the heart of what we, as Christians, mean when we use the expression ‘the spiritual life’.