Lorica

Episode Notes Jesus warns us in the gospel this morning that there is a great tribulation coming. Whether he speaks of something yet to happen or something that has already happened- there will be tribulations until the end. He promised us in the world you will have tribulation. Why? He is God, He is good and wants us to be happy, I mean he created us for the express purpose of being filled with d...

Episode Notes A phrase from St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians caught my attention this morning. He tells the Ephesians to redeem the time because the days are evil. The days are evil… It’s hard to image something written 2K years ago that could sound more contemporary. We are likely in the beginning throws of the collapse of a civilization. It has happened before, and if Jesus tarries it will hap...

Episode Notes When we study Jesus' life in the Scripture he appears as many things, he is a shepherd carrying for his sheep, a vintner growing and tending his vine, a creator bringing things into existence, a teacher showing the way, a miracle worker setting people free, a destroyer of death, a redeemer who offers his life to pay the price of our salvation and deliverance from enslavement to the e...

Episode Notes The temptation of any heresy is to choose. That's what heresy means, to choose. The tension between truth and love, the seeming tension, as if somehow we need to "strike a balance", is a false dichotomy. And whenever a choice is made, in choosing that thing that is chosen, the choice becomes something other than it is, when it is left without its partner. Things that are go...

Episode Notes God has not predestined anyone to perdition- that notion is an obscenity to be denounced and rejected. We are not trapped in a hopelessly irreversible trajectory towards our fate. You can choose the good and the beautiful or you can do nothing in which case by tragic default you will succumb to the powers of this fallen state, the overlords of corruption and atrophy. These harsh task...

This is a test of keeping your bearings, of good judgment and discernment about what is true, about what matters, about who butters your bread, about what kingdom you belong to, where do you draw your breath, what is the source of your life? Whose your mother? Everything that can be shaken is shaking right now, are you shaken? Confused and destabilized? This world will burn, the kingdom of God alo...

In times like these when everything has been thrown into disorder and chaos, when our lives have been disrupted by threat of sickness and death and loss of property and comfort we must be courageous and steady in our faith and in our living as well. There is no more important time than in this to live orderly. We shall go on living- if you are a follow of Christ that is what you shall do, you shal...

The symbolism of ashes goes all the way back to Genesis chapter 3 where God is telling Adam the consequences of his sin. He tells him that the ground, the earth has been cursed and now since Adam broke the fast and ate the forbidden fruit his eating from now on –all the days of your life- will be in sorrow. He goes on: Through thorns and thistles and sweat and toil and pain will Adam eat and to ma...

When you said I will fast and I will pray, and I will deal with my besetting sins over the next 40 days you picked a fight. And whatever this confrontation may mean we must not remove the demonic element from this discussion. And we can be valiant because we have been armed with the ashes of penitence. Our foreheads have been sealed with the mark of Christ, we have been branded as his own and our...

The life of Jesus of Nazareth did not unfold before the eyes of God, it was all of it- always present before Him, His Birth, Passion and Glorious Resurrection the whole life fully present, His glory was present in his birth and in his death, there was no uncertainty about how things would end up. Your life too- for all the doubt, uncertainty and vacillation, for all the weariness and wandering- yo...

One of the most basic fundamental duties of a Christian soldier is to be attentive to their thoughts. This is where the battle will be won or lost. We are admonished to take every thought captive. It is astonishing to realize how many people do not understand the critical battle ground of our thoughts. If you do not do something about your thoughts, if you do not take this seriously and address th...

Whether you know it or not everyone here today is a runner, a boxer, an entrepreneur, a vineyard worker, this is what you are, it is what God made you to be and you will never be happy until you start running, boxing, buying and investing, pruning and harvesting. Now the good news is this- if you run you will win, if you box you will overcome, if you buy you will get rich, if you prune you will re...

Jesus does not provide the answer that so many are demanding of God on their own terms, shaking their silly little fists in the face of the one who died for them. But he does give an answer, he gives the only answer that will enable man to endure and make it safely through this stormy trip. It is up to us whether we will hear what Jesus tells us with faith and love, and trust because we know Him,...

If you are a Christian you have declared your allegiance to this kingdom. You are no longer a member of the world kingdom, even though you physically still exist in this world you are not of it, you are from above, your citizenship is in the kingdom of God and you are a member of the Family of God. And our society has different rules and a different way of life. We live here in God’s house.

Life is in the temple because Jesus is in and is the Temple and that temple as far as we are concerned is the liturgically gathering Apostolic Eucharistic Church. This is where we fulfill the very meaning of our existence, to offer ourselves to God in sacrificial worship as a community. We do this for one reason only because it is right, this is the only reasonable response of the creature to His...

The mother of Jesus said to Him, “They have no wine.” Jesus does not respond, there is only silence and yet there is so much for us to lean in that space of silence. Her confidence, her trust and faith ring out in the silence. In the empty pause when the Word did not speak - the Woman without much ado confidently gives a command that has echoed throughout the ages. With this command and her fiat s...

The family becomes a true reflection of the divine society only in as much as they flourish in the Church, otherwise they can become a stumbling block to salvation. Jesus makes it clear in this story that his earthly mother has no rights over him which are at odds with His heavenly Father. The family is a sacramental union of divine life but only if it is subservient to the Church, to the Family o...

Typically when a husband and wife have a baby they have the privilege to choose a name for their child. In the case of the naming of Mary’s baby things went a little different than usual. As far as I am aware this is the only known case in history where the baby… actually named himself.

What a glorious faith we have that mocks the fruitless foe that can do nothing to hurt God’s children; the more we are assailed the more we are blessed who trust in God if only we become like these innocent babes.

This is the irony of it. The immaterial God who cannot be seen has made himself known by becoming a man. In olden times he manifest himself in fire, smoke, or a burning bush, He hid in the rock and behind a thick curtain. But now he comes and is, Jesus of Nazareth, Mary’s boy. And yet- while He makes himself so very accessible and vulnerable he becomes more hidden. His manifestation in the flesh b...

“For while all things were in quiet silence, and the night was in the midst of her course, Thy almighty word leapt down from heaven from Thy royal Throne, as a fierce conqueror into the midst of the land of destruction.”

There is only one power and force in this world which can keep me from being close to Jesus and that is me. And I know what I must do. I must stop looking for someone to blame. I must stop looking to temporal things to make me happy, I must repent.

We are still in Babylon preparing to enter the eternal city. The sooner we embrace this reality the sooner we can find Christ in the midst, the sooner we can experience the comfort of the comforter.

Maranatha! is the bold cry of the Christian who is ready and desirous of the coming of the Lord. Why bold? Because he knows full well that that coming means judgment, but his conscience is clean, he is ready and anxious for the judgment because for those who love God the judgments means eternal joy, final deliverance, absolute perfection. The early Christians did not utter Maranatha with a tepid w...

The Penitential fasting season of Advent (not as severe as Lent) uses the theme of the second coming and calls for repentance to prepare the soil of our hearts to fully embrace the seed of Christmas joy. We cannot fully embrace the holy babe if we do not adequately fear the judgment.