Sunday, March 1, 2015

Lenten Meditation XII


inspired by Genesis 2:15-17

Today's first reading is the famous story of Abraham taking his only son up on a mountain to offer him up as a burnt offering to the Lord. The Lord stays Abraham's hand, and instead offers up His own Son for the salvation of Abraham and all his descendants. There is a beautiful symmetry here, and the lesson is that if we withhold nothing from God, then He will withhold nothing from us.

This mirrors yesterday's exhortation from Matthew 5:48 to 'be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.' It would seem that God doesn't require anything of us that he hasn't also required of Himself. There is a kind of validation in that that is not available anywhere else in our human existence. Something to think about during Lent.

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