"You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all; and you show that you are a letter of Christ, prepared by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.
Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are competent of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our competence is from God, who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of letter but of spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." (2 Cor 3: 2-6)
The title of this posting comes from an old hymn that I read in the breviary today, and the line "inscribed upon our hearts" really touched me. It reminded me of the Book of Isaiah relaying to me how my name has been written in the palms of God's Hands. What an image of God's personal and intimate love for me, for each of God's children!
So I couldn't stop there and went looking through Paul's epistles to find where he wrote of how we can inscribe God onto our hearts - and found the above letter to the church in Corinth. Paul's message is remarkably written - full of promise, filled with hope, in Christ. He reminds us that Jesus became incarnate to bring a new covenant and a new way to look at the laws. We are called to go beyond the laws of Moses written in stone - unafraid to see beyond the veil because of and only with Christ.
Paul points out that we can do nothing without the Spirit of God guiding us forward in our call to be His. It is only through God's mercy that we are able to live out our purpose. God fills in the gaps of our humanity with this mercy. God puts us in right order. And as we become one with the Holy One - we are, and even become for others, the image and likeness of God.
We may struggle with temptation and even fall into sin at times, but as Paul writes, we are "being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit." (2 Cor 3: 18) In Christ, we are reconciled to God. There is our hope! So we persevere in our prayer life; we go deeper in our relationship with Christ; we search for the person God created us to be and then BE it! Strive daily to live as if our Lord's love and teachings are already inscribed upon your very heart.
Help us, O Lord, to learn
the truths thy word imparts:
to study that thy laws may be
inscribed upon our hearts.
Help us, O Lord, to live
the faith which we proclaim,
that all our thoughts and words and deeds
may glorify thy name.
Help us, O Lord, to teach
the beauty of thy ways,
that yearning souls may find the Christ,
and sing aloud his praise.
William Watkins Reid (1959)
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