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Morning Devotion for the Season after Pentecost
October 18, 2024
Ignatius of Antioch, 115 CE
Reading: Romans 8:18-25
I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God, for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its enslavement to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning together as it suffers together the pains of labor, and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope, for who hopes for what one already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Meditation - Peter Vanderveen
I sometimes find that it is increasingly difficult for me to pray.
I was going to start this meditation with a lighter statement, something a little less direct. One of my obligations is to choose prayers for liturgies and other public uses. I could have said simply that it’s becoming more challenging to find prayers that are satisfactory, much less edifying – which is true. I have multiple compendiums of collected prayers for all occasions, hundreds of pages to peruse. I’m inspired by few of them. Most are petitions. And most of these ask, in one way or another, for more strength for us to do something. They presume that we all have tasks, that we live under the stress of having to make things better, and that, with divine assistance, we’ll be able to be more productive. God’s intervention will give us a boost. And we’ll be able, then, to seriously reduce or even solve the problems of the world, things like hunger, inequality, injustice, violence and war.
Here’s the problem, however: for me it’s become harder to muster enough conviction to believe that this is true. And for most of the world, solving these vast problems isn’t a matter of applying more prayer or faith; science and technology seem far more promising. We enthusiastically put our confidence there. Nonetheless, our problems have an uncanny way of resisting our solutions. And as a result, many prayers can strike me as just so many words thrown up against an inherent futility.
“Futility” is an uncompromising term. It allows no wiggle room. And Paul, strikingly, inserted this word as deep as one could, at the very core of the world. And even more emphatically, he said that the world’s subjection to futility was God’s own intention. This intent is something rarely contemplated or given a significant place within our understanding of faith. But Paul is also clear that God did this not so that we should have to work our way out of its troubles, earning our salvation, but, rather, so that we could come to see the fullness of the grace of God. Such grace as God’s is not a nicety. It is the power of God to overcome every form and instance of futility. And, according to Paul, it is this that we wait upon – in hope. And this is the dimension of the faith that goes missing when we’re dead-set on simply trying to fix things. We lose God in the weeds, and hope slips away into a kind of willful optimism.
I look, more and more now, for prayers that reflect the futility that Paul describes, that relieve us from thinking that we should be the saviors of the world. I look, instead, for prayers steeped in hope, that provide us space to live wholly within the providence of God. Such prayers, like that below, I can pray without ceasing.
Prayer
Our Father, who is there, wherever it may be – who is really there,
hallowed be thy name,
thy kingdom come, thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, and the power,
and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen
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