Living and Loving on Borrowed Belief & Time

Day 20:

Friday, January 21 

Read:

“Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead… (Philippians 3:13).

Devote:

When Paul wrote this letter, no doubt the fellow disciples of Jesus had their own tension over issues of faith and common life. Paul wanted them to know then, and he wants us to know now that we live and die in the life and death of one who holds our stories in a larger drama.

Paul writes this letter from prison and on the surface it looks like he might go the way of every other human on this earth. What will become of him, if instead of acquittal, he is convicted? What is different for the believer in Jesus? He says it in this simple phrase, “Living is Christ and dying is gain.”

Journal:

Write about how this week’s reflections have deepened your faith to trust/believe again.

Reflect:

When we realize the struggles of martyrs like Paul, Peter, Bonhoeffer, and King do we believe ourselves into practicing radical commitment or do we practice ourselves into strong belief?

Pray:

O Lord, support us all the day long, until the shadows lengthen, and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Amen.

Author:

Revisit selections from Why We Can’t Wait  by Martin Luther King, Jr.