Moving Closer?
Had a thought yesterday after hearing the Gospel reading...and the sermon. The reading is the one about the leper that tells Christ "If you will, I will be healed". Christ takes pity on him, touches him and heals him.
The point was made in the sermon that leprosy cut that man completely off from God (or so he thought), since he was not only outcast from society, but obviously also from attending services in the Temple, and from offering sacrifices.
No Word of God, since most people didn't have a Bible or a Torah to carry around - and you certainly wouldn't have one if you had no place to live.
No forgiveness of sins, since that only occurred (they thought) when the sacrifice was offered.
He was completely cut off from God. And he had no way to get back. That is, until God - in Christ - came to him.
So here's my thought - to all you people who offer the platitude of "if you feel like God's far away then GUESS WHO MOVED"...ya know what? Sometimes it doesn't farking matter who moved. Sometimes even everything I do does NOTHING to close the gap. Nothing whatsoever. Yes, I know that the whole story about the leper is "supposed to be" about sin and Christ's sacrifice for us etc etc etc.
It's also, however, about the saved Christian. Sometimes there's not a damn thing we can do to "feel closer" to God. Sometimes everything we do, every prayer we pray, every verse we read feels like not one farking thing is making any difference. God's still over there somewhere, doin his thing, and we're out here wondering if the "prayer mic" is even on.
Sometimes, even to the believers, God has to come to us.
We can't do a thing.
Our salvation is assured, because He came to us, and we KNOW THAT...but sometimes we need him to come to us and help us with the day-to-day things, too.
And I swear, I'm gonna want to punch the next person to spout that platitude of "guess who moved" right in the mouth. Look, I know you mean well, but dammit, that sounds SO smug and superior it just pisses me right the hell off.
Yep, I was the one who moved. Fine, whatever, but trying to "move back" doesn't always work so can we put the damn platitudes away now?
The point was made in the sermon that leprosy cut that man completely off from God (or so he thought), since he was not only outcast from society, but obviously also from attending services in the Temple, and from offering sacrifices.
No Word of God, since most people didn't have a Bible or a Torah to carry around - and you certainly wouldn't have one if you had no place to live.
No forgiveness of sins, since that only occurred (they thought) when the sacrifice was offered.
He was completely cut off from God. And he had no way to get back. That is, until God - in Christ - came to him.
So here's my thought - to all you people who offer the platitude of "if you feel like God's far away then GUESS WHO MOVED"...ya know what? Sometimes it doesn't farking matter who moved. Sometimes even everything I do does NOTHING to close the gap. Nothing whatsoever. Yes, I know that the whole story about the leper is "supposed to be" about sin and Christ's sacrifice for us etc etc etc.
It's also, however, about the saved Christian. Sometimes there's not a damn thing we can do to "feel closer" to God. Sometimes everything we do, every prayer we pray, every verse we read feels like not one farking thing is making any difference. God's still over there somewhere, doin his thing, and we're out here wondering if the "prayer mic" is even on.
Sometimes, even to the believers, God has to come to us.
We can't do a thing.
Our salvation is assured, because He came to us, and we KNOW THAT...but sometimes we need him to come to us and help us with the day-to-day things, too.
And I swear, I'm gonna want to punch the next person to spout that platitude of "guess who moved" right in the mouth. Look, I know you mean well, but dammit, that sounds SO smug and superior it just pisses me right the hell off.
Yep, I was the one who moved. Fine, whatever, but trying to "move back" doesn't always work so can we put the damn platitudes away now?
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