Prayer

Shepherd of Israel,
may Jesus, Emmanuel and son of Mary,
be more than just a dream in our hearts.
With the apostles, prophets, and saints,
save us, restore us,
and lead us in the way of grace and peace,
that we may bear your promise into the world. Amen.

Scripture

Isaiah 33:17-22

Your eyes will behold the king in his beauty;
they will see a land that stretches afar.
¹⁸ Your heart will muse on the terror:
“Where is he who counted, where is he who weighed the tribute?
Where is he who counted the towers?”
¹⁹ You will see no more the insolent people,
the people of an obscure speech that you cannot comprehend,
stammering in a tongue that you cannot understand.
²⁰ Behold Zion, the city of our appointed feasts!
Your eyes will see Jerusalem,
an untroubled habitation, an immovable tent,
whose stakes will never be plucked up,
nor will any of its cords be broken.
²¹ But there the Lord in majesty will be for us
a place of broad rivers and streams,
where no galley with oars can go,
nor majestic ship can pass.
²² For the Lord is our judge; the Lord is our lawgiver;
the Lord is our king; he will save us.

Meditation

I love food and because of that I love restaurants.  I love to go on opening night.  I love to know who the proprietor is and who the chef may be.  I find favourites or some become sentimental because of events or conversations or great meals that have taken place in them. The thing with restaurants is that many do not survive.  Since moving across the world I keep track of restaurants in Indianapolis even as I am discovering new places in Fremantle and Perth to enjoy and make memories in.  When I read that one of my sentimental favourites, City Café, had closed its doors I was put into a spin. What do you mean I won’t be able to walk in and get my favourite breakfast burrito in the city when I come to visit?  What do you mean no more biscuits and gravy on the side of said burrito (don’t judge) when I am back in town.  Things change and that can be hard.

In the in between, the now and not yet, we can feel as though things are always in flux, shifting and changing so much that we can’t get our bearings.  Jobs change or end, relationships get fractured, even small things like our sentimental restaurant closing serve to remind us that every things changes.

But we have hope in the immovable tent.  A place that the Lord has secured and is ever present; it is in this place where He will judge with truth and mercy.  He is king and saves us. And this place is not just in the future, we are its inhabitants now.  In Christ we reside and see His beauty.