Do we hunger to see people given what they are owed (not only rights, but also spiritually for respect, and honour?), or do we walk about ignorant? washing our hands of it?
- Do we notice what someone is owed and hunger for them to receive that?
- These include all the major fights for justice we know about – fighting for life, and for freedom, against enslavement of all kinds in countries where it’s obvious the vulnerable are held to work and do things against their will, and in the western world, the vulnerable secretly held trapped in certain life styles resulting from human trafficking
- What about spiritually? Do we hunger and thirst to see our brothers and sisters receive in abundance from God? and do we yearn to see those who have fallen away, and do not know Christ come to him?
- Do we hunger and thirst to see people nourished or do we spend most of our time thirsting for what we need? Are we other centred?
- Gratitude also comes into play here – Gratitude is a response to a moral debt that is owed by the generosity of another. When someone does something kind for us? Do we yearn to give them gratitude, regardless of whether we can pay them back in kind or not? Or are we indifferent, as if this was something that was always ours?
- What does our disposition of gratitude towards;
- Our neighbour look like?
- Our church and wider community?
- Our family, and those we live with?
- Those we work alongside?
- What is our disposition towards God’s generosity? One we can never repay, are we indifferent, or moved to generosity?
- Looking at these doesn’t mean we expend ourselves to burn out trying to express gratitude by offering them something of equal or greater monetary or economic value. I think we get that impression from our materialistic world, that a gift given needs to ALWAYS be returned in equal or greater material value. Instead, what it means is remembering the 3rd Beatitude, to be meek, and humble AND to give thankfulness. Remembering we’re not talking here about a financial or economic debt that requires us to necessarily perform certain tasks, or pay a certain amount but or a moral debt of gratitude that means we owe them our disposition of thankfulness.
- What does our disposition of gratitude towards;
This beatitude is linked to the 3rd commandment. Piety and religion is part of justice. To give justice to others there are some home truths i have to be aware of.
- Firstly, that God has made me out of nothing from the depths of his own goodness, and is owed worship and thanks. This is even greater when we consider from this same storehouse he has redeemed me.
- Secondly, if we are to be just to others i need to be aware that I am made in the image and likeness of God. Unless i see this in myself I cannot give justice to others.
Therefore to hunger for righteousness is to know the goodness of God and of his creation and to render appropriate action and worship in accordance with the 3rd commandment.
God then goes on to promise that it will be filled – in the previous 3 beatitudes Jesus says we will find blessedness in being meek, poor in spirit and in mourning, in the empty and detached. Now, he tells us that hunger and thirst for righteousness will see us satisfied. Fulfilled.
TBG
Padre – Saw family.
Stina – Springtime + Mary Magdalene at the tomb – The gardener (John’s gospel) – this season matches my spiritual season at the moment of having had the gardener prune the garden of my heart, the areas that have been tended to are being watered and other areas are continuing to be pruned – It’s both painful and beautiful all at the same time.
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