Devotion
I Delight To Do Your Will
Frances Taylor
When we pray the Lord's Prayer, we say "thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." In this psalm, we pray that we delight to do God's will. I wonder if we really mean what we pray, or if we just say the words. First, we need to think about what God's will really is. When we read the Scriptures we see certain themes – justice, peace, and especially, love. These themes run through the Old Testament as well as the New. We are told to take care of the poor, the most vulnerable in our society. We are asked to remember that we were once strangers in the lands we now occupy. We are told to treat others the way we want to be treated, to forgive. These are not easy tasks and sometimes we do not "delight" in doing them. We want justice but not if it interferes with our comfort. We want peace, but our speech is often loaded with violence. We say we want to be forgiven but find it hard to forgive. We don't always welcome the stranger, and we sometimes suspect the poor of being responsible for their situation. When we continue to read this psalm, we read a confession of sorts admitting that we often fail in doing the will of God. We also hear the author asking for God's mercy and faithfulness. We need to look at ourselves with honesty and see how we can work better to bring about God's will on earth as it is in heaven.
Prayer
Lord, you are my help, do not delay! Amen.
Devotion
Abraham is Father of All
Frances Taylor
There are questions in every age about the importance of the Old Testament for Christians. Abraham is considered to be the Father of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims. We forget that it was Abraham who believed in the doctrine of only one God. It is through him and his descendants that this tradition comes down to us. Another fact that we can overlook is that Jesus was Jewish. He was born a Jew, lived as a Jew, died, rose and ascended into heaven as a Jew. Because we believe that he was the Messiah, the Christ, and we follow him, we are called Christian. Without the Old Testament, we wouldn't understand the promise of salvation; we wouldn't understand why it was important for Jesus to be of the family of King David. We would not understand his teaching either, because Jesus quoted from Scripture – the Old Testament – frequently. He told us that he came to fulfill the Scriptures, not to abolish them. In the same way, we can ...
