…

Enveloping condensation, are you up for conversation?

Past the trees, through the green.

Emblazoned forests.

Embracing fog. [ii]

Connected reflection:

Dietrech Bonhoeffer, 3rd Tuesday of Lent, 1929:

‘When we have fully renounced making something of ourselves, we fall completely into God’s arms and what I call this-worldliness, namely, living in an abundance of tasks, questions, successes and failures, experiences, and helplessness.

We then take seriously no longer our own suffering, but the suffering of God in the world. We watch with Christ in Gethsemane. This, I think, is faith.

One thing remains clear or at least sensed; doubt and temptation about the meaningfulness of being cast to and fro, of being at the mercy of things, will not cease as long as we remain focused on ourselves, as long as in one form or another “the Other” does not step into our lives’  [ii]

With the way things have been for me and my family lately I haven’t had a whole lot of time to keep up with my Bonhoeffer readings for Lent. I’ve also been focusing a lot on taking our home schoolers through the gospel of Luke for home-school, hoping to complete the journey by the end of term one. So, believe it or not, I kind of landed on this third-Tuesday-of-Lent reflection perfectly.

I like a lot of what Bonhoeffer has to say here.

He is pushing through the worthlessness of things that we seem to take our worth from. Encouraging us to look towards the “Other”. Loving neighbour, not as another god, but loving through God. The latter who, through his constant covenants and promises, emboldens us in His revelation emblazoned in Jesus Christ. Here God proves His worthiness (not that He too, but chooses as Barth says, ‘decisively’ to do so) and thus becomes the only true living source of worth and worthiness for us.

[i] RL2015

[ii] Bonhoeffer, D. Third Tuesday of Lent in Reiss, J. (Ed.) 2012 God is on the Cross Westminster John Knox Press, (pp.46-47)