Balloons and Children

“My time has not yet come.” John 2:4 

I (jcd) once attended a wedding in a beautiful garden setting. After the minister told the groom to kiss the bride, about 150 colorful, helium‐filled balloons were released into the blue sky. Within a few seconds the balloons were scattered, some rising hundreds of feet overhead and others cruising toward the horizon. A few balloons struggled to clear the upper branches of the trees, while the showoffs became mere pinpoints of color in the sky.

Like balloons, some boys and girls are born with more helium than others. They soar effortlessly to the heights, while others wobble dangerously close to the trees. Their frantic folks run along underneath, huffing and puffing to keep them airborne.

Are you a parent of a low‐flying child? Over the years, I’ve worked with hundreds of families whose children were struggling in one way or another. Based on what I’ve seen, let me pass along a word of encouragement to worried parents: Sometimes the child who has the most trouble getting off the ground eventually reaches the greatest height!

Just between us…

• What kinds of balloons do our kids most resemble?
• Do we tend to panic when our low‐fliers drift in the wrong direction?
• Do we love them any less than those who soar?
• How can we avoid prematurely judging how a child will turn out?
• How can we pump more “helium” into our relationship with our low‐flier? 

Heavenly Father, tonight we ask for wisdom and patience as we raise our children. We let go of our own requirements and timelines for their lives. We trust Your providence and grace. Every day, help us obey You in this great calling of being a parent. Amen. 

From Night Light For Couples, by Dr. James & Shirley Dobson
Copyright © 2000 by James Dobson, Inc. All rights reserved.

Trinity Sunday

Trinity Sunday, officially called "The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity," is one of the few celebrations of the Christian Year that commemorates a reality and doctrine rather than a person or event. On Trinity Sunday, Christians remember and honor the eternal God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Trinity Sunday is celebrated the Sunday after Pentecost, and lasts only one day, which is symbolic of the unity of the Trinity. Eastern Churches have no tradition of Trinity Sunday, arguing that they celebrate the Trinity every Sunday. Westerners also commemorate the Trinity at every Eucharist, although they set aside a special feast day for the purpose as well.

Trinity Sunday is celebrated in all the Western liturgical churches: Roman Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, Presbyterian, and Methodist.

The Sundays following Pentecost, until Advent, are numbered from this day. In traditional Catholic usage, the First Sunday After Pentecost is on the same day as Trinity Sunday. In the revised Roman rite, Ordinary Time resumes one week earlier, on the Monday after Pentecost, with the Sundays that would otherwise fall on Pentecost and Trinity Sunday omitted that year. In the Church of England, following the pre-Reformation Sarum use, the following Sunday is the "First Sunday after Trinity", while the Episcopal Church in the United States of America (ECUSA) now follows the Catholic usage, calling it the Second Sunday after Pentecost. The liturgical colour used on Trinity Sunday is white.

In the early Church, no special Office or day was assigned for the Holy Trinity. When the Arian heresy was spreading, the Fathers prepared an Office with canticles, responses, a Preface, and hymns, to be recited on Sundays. In the Sacramentary of St. Gregory the Great (P.L., LXXVIII, 116) there are prayers and the Preface of the Trinity. The Micrologies (P.L., CLI, 1020), written during the pontificate of Gregory VII (Nilles, II, 460), call the Sunday after Pentecost a Dominica vacans, with no special Office, but add that in some places they recited the Office of the Holy Trinity composed by Bishop Stephen of Liège (903-20). By others the Office was said on the Sunday before Advent. Alexander II (1061–1073), refused a petition for a special feast on the plea, that such a feast was not customary in the Roman Church which daily honoured the Holy Trinity by the Gloria Patri, etc., but he did not forbid the celebration where it already existed. John XXII (1316–1334) ordered the feast for the entire Church on the first Sunday after Pentecost. A new Office had been made by the Franciscan John Peckham, Canon of Lyons, later Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1292). The feast ranked as a double of the second class but was raised to the dignity of a primary of the first class, 24 July 1911, by Pius X (Acta Ap. Sedis, III, 351). Since it was after the first great Pentecost that the doctrine of the Trinity was proclaimed to the world, the feast becomingly follows that of Pentecost.

In the Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches, the Sunday of Pentecost itself is called Trinity Sunday (the Sunday after Pentecost is All Saints Sunday). The Monday after Pentecost is called Monday of the Holy Spirit, and the next day is called the Third Day of the Trinity. Though liturgical colours are not as fixed in the Eastern practice (normally there are simply "festive" colours and "somber" or Lenten colours), in some churches, green is used for Pentecost and its Afterfeas.

The Daily Readings for May 22, 2016 - Trinity Sunday

Proverbs 8:1-4, 8:22-31
Does not wisdom call, and does not understanding raise her voice? On the heights, beside the way, at the crossroads she takes her stand; beside the gates in front of the town, at the entrance of the portals she cries out: "To you, O people, I call, and my cry is to all that live. The LORD created me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of long ago. Ages ago I was set up, at the first, before the beginning of the earth. When there were no depths I was brought forth, when there were no springs abounding with water. Before the mountains had been shaped, before the hills, I was brought forth-- when he had not yet made earth and fields, or the world's first bits of soil. When he established the heavens, I was there, when he drew a circle on the face of the deep, when he made firm the skies above, when he established the fountains of the deep, when he assigned to the sea its limit, so that the waters might not transgress his command, when he marked out the foundations of the earth, then I was beside him, like a master worker; and I was daily his delight, rejoicing before him always, rejoicing in his inhabited world and delighting in the human race.

Psalm 8 Domine, Dominus noster
1   O LORD our Governor, how exalted is your Name in all the world!
2   Out of the mouths of infants and children your majesty is praised above the heavens.
3   You have set up a stronghold against your adversaries, to quell the enemy and the avenger.
4   When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars you have set in their courses,
5   What is man that you should be mindful of him? the son of man that you should seek him out?
6   You have made him but little lower than the angels; you adorn him with glory and honor;
7   You give him mastery over the works of your hands; you put all things under his feet:
8   All sheep and oxen, even the wild beasts of the field,
9   The birds of the air, the fish of the sea, and whatsoever walks in the paths of the sea.
10   O LORD our Governor, how exalted is your Name in all the world!

Romans 5:1-5
Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.

John 16:12-15
"I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

Forward Day by Day Meditation for Sunday, May 22, 2016 - Trinity Sunday

Canticle 2 Blessed art thou, O Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; praised and exalted above all for ever.

Several of my clergy friends jokingly call this day “Heresy Sunday” for all the heresy preached by clergy attempting to explain the Holy Trinity. We try to use analogies, metaphors, and other explanations to explain something about aspects of God and God’s relationship to Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit that, quite honestly, is not explainable. I think the best explanation is that the Holy Trinity is indeed a Holy Mystery, a very real reminder that there are many things about God that are not easily understandable or logically explained.

Too often we spend our time rationalizing God, explaining God, and speaking for God. We spend more energy rationalizing God into manageable spiritual paragraphs than standing in awe of the endless narrative that is God.

Perhaps this Sunday we can be in awe of God, who is utterly known and unknown, who threw the stars across the heavens and breaks bread with us, who is holy mystery.
 

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OVERCOME EVIL WITH GOOD

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Romans 12:21

Colleague Ron Boyd-MacMillan shares part two of his experience in China:

The Chinese house church pastor put it this way, “Confront the defining evil in your area or your society–that will bring persecution. For us, the evil is obvious; for you, it may be more subtle.” You won’t necessarily be persecuted if you speak out against evil. You won’t necessarily be persecuted if you write an article about the evil. You won’t necessarily be persecuted if you organize a prayer meeting to pray against it. But you will be persecuted if you become a threat to the evil.

One pastor went back to his church in an inner city area of London. He asked the question, what’s the defining evil of this area? He became convicted that the youth gangs were the defining evil in the area, especially as they were going on killing sprees and starting to become drug pushers.

He began prayer meetings, and outreaches to the gangs. He even became a chaplain to a particularly violent gang. After a while, he saw fruit, but he also got a visit from a local gun runner,

“Leave the kids alone, or else” he said, “You’re bad for business.”

One night, six months later, a bullet came through the window as the church baptized five converted gang leaders. The reaction of the pastor could have come from the mouth of the Chinese house church leader. He said, “It was a beautiful bullet…because now we knew we were making a difference.”

That pastor had joined the persecuted church, and led his congregation into a greater awareness of the worldwide persecuted church. They wanted to know about their brothers and sisters in Eritrea, China, North Korea and Iran not just because the Christians there needed their prayers and their money, but because they were one in the same battle. Christians in the West need the insights and prayers of suffering Christians around the world to fight their own battles better.

The other pastor returned to his church in a very upscale, business district. After praying with his elders, they came up with the defining evil or idol of the area, which they called “The Lie—get rich; be free.” This was the besetting idol, they felt, and began to model a downsizing lifestyle in the community that reversed consumerist expectations.

The pastor confesses, “I’m facing almost weekly votes of confidence from my elders because they don’t think I am teaching people enough about how to be successful.” But he also says, “I feel so much better, because I’m not such a hypocrite in the pulpit anymore.”

RESPONSE: Today I will respond to the defining evil around me and overcome it with good.

PRAYER: Lord, I need Your power and strength to effectively overcome the evil I experience. Help me stand strong in my opposition to the evil one.

Verse of the Day - May 22, 2016

Galatians 5:13 (NIV) [ Life by the Spirit ] You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.

Read all of Galatians 5