Christ the Lord: the Road to Cana and Swordplay

Christ the Lord: the Road to Cana

Still enjoying the afterglow of Anne Rice’, Christ the Lord: the Road to Cana. I feel like, through her, the Lord gave me some idea of what might have been going on in his head in those early days as he struggled to comprehend and accept the reality of who he really was. I loved him as I read it. I was brought to tears as John baptized him in the Jordan. Rice’s imaginative take on the wedding at Cana and how Jesus came to be there is brilliant. Wonderful.

Kingdom Swordplay

Camping in Psalm 18 this week with A Guide to Prayer. It’s the “by my God I can leap over a wall” psalm. “He trains my hands for war (v32),” writes David. “I pursued my enemies and overtook them (v37)…I thrust them through, so that they were not able to rise; they fell under my feet (v38).” I can’t imagine thrusting someone through with a sword. David’s world was also one in which what he was called to do exposed him to the risk of being thrust through himself. It’s foreign to me except in some sort of allegorical, “spiritual warfare” kind of way, not to mention being seriously incorrect politically.

Still, it is God’s upright and true Word of Life.

Jesus has something to say about swords:

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. (Mt 10.34)

and

But now let the one who has a moneybag take it, and likewise a knapsack. And let the one who has no sword sell his cloak and buy one. (Lk 22.36)

But on the other hand,

Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword. (Mt 26.52)

What Are My Hands Trained For?

How does one apply that to life and ministry in twenty-first century Medicine Hat? What have You—do You—train my hands for? Who, or what, must I (figuratively, I presume, I hope!) pursue, overtake and thrust through so they are unable to rise and will fall beneath my feet?