2 Chronicles - The Park Forum

December 3, 2019December 1, 2019

The God of Light, in the Dark :: Hope of Advent

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Scripture Focus: John 2.8-9
I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining. Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness.

Reflection: The God of Light, in the Dark
By John Tillman

We may, at times, speak of darkness as an analogy for evil or for sin, and biblical authors do as well. However, actual darkness is not evil in itself. God created light and darkness and rules in each equally. We hide our sins in darkness, but only out of our ignorance. Darkness hides nothing from God. Our sins hidden in the dark, to God, may as well be in a spotlight before the world.

It is God, says the psalmist, who gives songs in the night and through the darkness of the heavens pours forth speech. In this way, the movements of the heavens were chosen by the ancient church as a teaching tool to show us God’s light coming into the world at the time of gathering darkness.

The darkness is not dark to our God. He is moving in the darkness, coming closer to us than we could stand him being. The presence of his glory is too much for us. The knowledge of his holiness is to great for us. The full light of his presence, is blinding to us. So, God draws down the veil of dark at the end of the year. He creeps up to us cautiously and secretly, so that we can be close to him.

The time of Advent, of waiting in the deepening darkness, may seem to us as if we are huddled around the waning light in fear of evil. But the dark is also used by God to herd us close and near, so that he can intimately, softly, and gently reveal himself to us.

This is the glory of the incarnation— that God draws us in and shows us the fullness of who he is and what he is like in the form of a baby. He was hidden in the darkness of the womb, hidden in the darkness of the night of his birth, hidden in the arms of peasants from the eyes of the powerful. He was revealed to the outcasts, the unworthy, the foreigners, and the humble.

So may he be revealed to us. So, may we wait—humble, outcast, huddled in intimacy, hearing God’s approach in the dark. Come, Lord Jesus.

Divine Hours Prayer: A Reading
Jesus said: “For this is how God loved the world: he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. For God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but so that through him the world might be saved… — John 3.16-17

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
2 Chronicles 2 (Listen -3:41)
1 John 2 (Listen -4:04)

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Thanks to our donors, in 2019 we will publish approximately 100,000 words of free, and ad-free devotional content. Without donor support, continuing this ministry would be impossible. As the end of the year approaches, consider whether the Holy Spirit might be prompting you to help support our 2020 content with an end-of-year gift or by becoming a monthly donor. Follow this link to our giving page.

Read more about The Gift of Hope :: Hope of Advent
At the year’s darkest point, humanity waits until the light returns, like a second Easter.

The Gift of Hope :: Hope of Advent

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December 2, 2019November 30, 2019

This We Proclaim :: Hope of Advent

Reflection: This We Proclaim :: Hope of Advent
By John Tillman

What are we waiting for in Advent? A day on the calendar, yes. But there is more.

In Advent we begin with hope. But our hope is not a wispy, wishful, thread. Christmas is sure and expected, arriving steadfastly in boxes checked off on a calendar and boxes packed and opened in times of gift-giving. Eventually, the day will pass, the season will move on and we begin waiting for the day of Christmas all over again. But the day we wait for on the calendar is merely symbolic and is not the actual day we are truly longing for.

Christmas Day is not the day that Jesus was born. Only badly written holiday cards and holiday movies believe that. The ancient church did not fix the celebration of Advent around the winter solstice because of history, but because of pedagogy. Celebrating the birth of Christ as light coming into the world, just at the time at which our world is at its darkest point was not an accident and it wasn’t cultural appropriation. Ancient Christians looked at their understanding of cosmology and saw the maker of the cosmos behind the movements. They measured the observable scientific data of the movements of the heavens and saw an analogy placed there by the maker of those heavenly movements.

At the time when we are farthest from the light, Light itself steps closer to us.
At the time when the world is the darkest, God appears as light.
At the time when all seems to be sinking, God rises and raises us with him.

John, whose gospel is more of an artistic logical argument rather than a historical logical document, leaves us no room to suspect that the events he recorded were fables or myths or legends. In his letters John unequivocally affirms the reality of his account of Christ. He, together with the other Apostles and disciples, touched and saw and heard the intangible, invisible, unknowable God in the person of Jesus Christ.

In Advent, we wait literally for a day on the calendar. In waiting for this day, we are only learning to wait for the return of the tangible, visible Christ. We see now as in a glass, darkly, then we will know face to face. And just as surely as the day on the calendar will return, so will also return, this same Jesus. As we wait, we learn to hope. Come, Lord Jesus!

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. Psalm 118.23

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
2 Chronicles 1 (Listen -2:47)
1 John 1 (Listen -1:28)

Thank You, Donors!
Thanks to our donors, in 2019 we will publish approximately 100,000 words of free, and ad-free devotional content. Without donor support, continuing this ministry would be impossible. As the end of the year approaches, consider whether the Holy Spirit might be prompting you to help support our 2020 content with an end-of-year gift or by becoming a monthly donor. Follow this link to our giving page.

Read more about Expectation Affects Anticipation :: Hope of Advent
The gifts we anticipate have already been purchased at great cost, and contain more than we can ever hope for.

Expectation Affects Anticipation :: Hope of Advent

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December 29, 2017December 28, 2017

Good News to the Poor :: Epiphany

Scripture: Luke 4.18
…to proclaim good news to the poor…

Luke 1.52-53
He has brought down rulers from their thrones
but has lifted up the humble.
He has filled the hungry with good things
but has sent the rich away empty.

Reflection: Good News to the Poor :: Epiphany
By John Tillman

When Mary sang about filling the hungry with good things, poverty and many other personal tragedies were considered markers of spiritual failure. Faithful Jews would assume that some sin in your life must have occured for you to fall into trouble.

Today we also see poverty as a result of sin. But the God we believe the poor have sinned against is the god of Materialism and the god of Competence. When the pursuit of happiness is enshrined as humanity’s highest good, failing to achieve it is a marker of spiritual or moral poverty.

Whatever the causes of poverty, its outcomes are consistent. Poverty limits access. The poor have little access to good schools, to transportation, to healthcare, to legal aid—the very things they need to break the cycle of poverty.

Christ’s incarnation is about granting access. Access for homeless shepherds. Access for despised Samaritans. Access for excluded foreign immigrants and seekers from other faiths. The Annunciation, the Magnificat, and Christ’s Nazareth sermon all prominently focus on granting access to the poor and the outcast.

It would be easy to read the Magnificat merely as a redistributive command. It is more than that. It would also be easy to infer that Christ is actively cursing or punishing the rich by sending them away. But it is more complex than that.

The hungry aren’t filled with material goods taken from the rich. They are filled with “good things” that will satisfy their hunger. The rich don’t go away empty because Christ is ambivalent toward them or because he is taking punitive action on behalf of the poor.

Like the rich young ruler, the rich who go away empty do so because they came to Jesus clinging to their emptiness and can’t be convinced to give it up. As Christ said, regarding the rich young ruler, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”

Wealthy or not, we must become poor in spirit to receive Christ’s gift of Good News to the Poor. Our manifestation of Christ will be in direct proportion to our acknowledgement of needing him more than we need our comforts, our possessions, our luxuries, or even our daily bread.

Once we are filled with good things, we can now play our part in the Incarnation, passing on what we have been filled with—both physical and spiritual blessings—as a part of the manifestation of Christ.

A Reading
Jesus stood and cried out: “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me! Let anyone who believes in me come and drink!” — John 7:37

– From Christmastide: Prayers for Advent Through Epiphany from The Divine Hours by Phyllis Tickle.

Full prayer available online and in print.

Today’s Readings
2 Chronicles 34 (Listen – 6:23)
Revelation 20 (Listen – 2:49)

This Weekend’s Readings
2 Chronicles 35 (Listen – 5:25) Revelation 21 (Listen – 4:34)
2 Chronicles 36 (Listen – 4:26) Revelation 22 (Listen – 3:59)

December 28, 2017December 27, 2017

The Spirit of the Lord :: Epiphany

Scripture: Luke 4.14
Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside.

Isaiah 61.1
The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,
because the Lord has anointed me…

Reflection: The Spirit of the Lord :: Epiphany
By John Tillman

Jesus, in his Nazareth sermon, began with an affirmation that the Spirit of God was on him. This was a radical claim. The Spirit of God had been absent from Israel for generations. Their prophets fell silent and their senses dulled to God’s voice.

It is no wonder that the religious elite sank so deeply into ritual and legalism. They had no power to do anything else. It is no wonder that Nicodemus—Israel’s teacher—is so ignorant of the Spirit when he speaks to Jesus. Who could have taught him?

We are often no less ignorant than Nicodemus and no less addicted to moralism than the Pharisees, but we do so with fewer excuses.

It is difficult to overstate the importance of the Holy Spirit of God to our lives as believers. It is also difficult to understate the time most believers spend developing and refining our connection to the Spirit. Cretan philosopher Epimenides said, and Paul the Apostle agreed, “In him we live and move and have our being,” but if we are living and moving amongst the Spirit of God we seem to often be doing so with senses dulled.

Many people desire the gifts of the Spirit, without recognizing that the Spirit is the gift.

It is through the Holy Spirit that Jesus starts his earthly life in the womb of a virgin girl. It is through the Holy Spirit that he grows and learns. It is through the Holy Spirit that he resists temptation. It is through the Holy Spirit that he healed, taught, cast out demons, and raised the dead. Then he ascends to Heaven to make way for the coming of this same Spirit to his followers, saying that we will “do even greater things than these.”

The growth of Jesus in Mary’s womb symbolizes his growth and gradual manifestation in our lives. Mary lent Jesus DNA, and cells, and tissue—her body knit him together and delivered him into our world. Mary lent his Spirit flesh. Jesus gives our flesh Spirit.

The Holy Spirit, paraklētos, who made Christ’s earthly body, now makes in our individual bodies Christ’s mind and spirit. But more powerfully, we are knit together as a community, The Church. into the physical body of Christ in the world.

We, The Church, are charged as Mary was, to deliver Christ, to manifest him, to the world. The rest of Christ’s sermon at Nazareth will help us see how.

Today the church remembers with sorrow the slaughter of the male infants of Bethlehem. When the world finds it cannot kill Christ, it will often turn to the nearest available victims to dispense its aimless rage. As we manifest Christ to the world, we will find ourselves victimized in his place…”for your sake we are slaughtered…“

The Refrain
Remember, Lord, how short life is, how frail you have made all flesh. — Psalm 89:47

– From Christmastide: Prayers for Advent Through Epiphany from The Divine Hours by Phyllis Tickle.

Full prayer available online and in print.

Today’s Readings
2 Chronicles 33 (Listen – 4:01)
Revelation 19 (Listen – 3:47)

December 27, 2017December 25, 2017

Unwrapping Christ’s Gifts :: Epiphany

Scripture: Luke 4.20-21
The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Isaiah 9.2
The people walking in darkness
have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness
a light has dawned.

Reflection: Unwrapping Christ’s Gifts :: Epiphany
By John Tillman

The Annunciation of the birth of the King of Kings had come quietly to Mary, a young girl in Nazareth, and when that King’s time had come, he announced his kingdom in the same synagogue he studied in as a young boy. Mary’s son chose to announce his true identity to those who knew him best. He chose to proclaim the presence of the kingdom of God in a town from which true Israelites believed nothing good could come.

It should not surprise us that Jesus chose to make one of his earliest and most direct claims to being the Messiah not in a rabbinical school, not in the temple, not in a court of law, nor in the courts of political power.

Jesus consistently chose to minister in out of the way places to people life had pushed out of the way. But here in Nazareth, Jesus wasn’t burying the lead; he was burying a treasure in a field. Those who studied the prophecies knew that the Messianic ministry would dawn like a light in Galilee. Christ’s seeming retreat from more important locations, is actually a marker of his true nature as the foretold Messiah.

Christ’s gifts to us are at first concealed, like gifts under a Christmas tree. They are hidden in plain sight for us to wonder at, to shake, to puzzle over, and ultimately to open and rejoice over. But, after opening, gifts become a part of you when you accept them. Whether it is a tool that is used regularly, an item of clothing that is worn often, or a book, game, or other entertainment that engages our mind and imagination, good gifts integrate themselves into our lives and identities.

Christ’s gifts are meant to become integral to our lives and to become manifestations of himself to our family, friends, and communities. As we approach Epiphany over the next ten days, may we wear Christ’s gifts prominently, like new and well-loved items of clothing. Through the wearing, may we allow them to transform us into the manifestation of the giver.

Today the church celebrates the life of the Apostle John of whom Jesus said, “If I want him to remain alive until I come, what is that to you?” Though John lived a long life—the only Apostle not to be martyred—he did die. Yet Jesus has left “the disciple Jesus loved” here until his second Advent. He leaves us. His well loved and Holy Spirit equipped disciples, the church.

The Refrain
The Lord is my strength and my song, and he has become my salvation. — Psalm 118:14

– From Christmastide: Prayers for Advent Through Epiphany from The Divine Hours by Phyllis Tickle.

Full prayer available online and in print.

Today’s Readings
2 Chronicles 32 (Listen – 5:58)
Revelation 18 (Listen – 4:48)