2104AFC012221 – An Echo in the Dark
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Jonah 3:10 – 10 When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it.
Joel 2:12-13 – 12 Yet even now, says the Lord,
return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
13 rend your hearts and not your clothing.
Return to the Lord, your God,
for he is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love,
and relents from punishing.
Mark 1:14-15 – 14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news*.” [*Gospel]
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you, and may prodigious, incredible, and astonishing Peace rule in your hearts. Belovéd, there’s a lot going on in the world right now – as you well know – but let me outline a few things to which I hope we will give detailed attention.
- The Inaugurations of Joseph P. Biden and Kamala Harris – January 20
- The Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of Unborn Children is on January 22
- The Sunday of the Word of God – the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time – is January 24
- We commemorate the conversion of the Apostle Paul on Monday, January 25
- We celebrate the feasts of Saint Timothy and Saint Titus – Bishops in the early church, and men who received their initial training in The Way from the Apostle Paul on Tuesday, January 26. It is also the day when the Todd family commemorates the Dedication of Timothy Olin Todd as a Servant of God and Son of the Father.
- The Memorial of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Priest and Doctor of the Church is on Thursday, January 28
I would love to write to you about each of these momentous events, but I am told my posts are already way too long. I started working on this post on Saturday, January 16, 2021. I expect that as I continue to work on it – the date is Tuesday, January 19, 2021 – and things are heating up, it may change. I’d like to stick close to the Key Verses for today, but it may be that intervening current events require attention. Let’s get into the Word right now.
In 2019, Pope Francis I designated the Third Sunday in Ordinary time as the Sunday of the Word of God; it is a way to celebrate and focus on the Gift of Scripture. In a special way, this for me is in itself a wonderful Gift. I make no bones about the fact that I love Scripture; I love The Word as my Lord and Savior – he is indeed the Way, the Truth, and the Life, but above all in my heart, and mind, and spirit he is The Word (↔ Click Link). Without him I am not worth a tinker’s dam. With him I am only a small voice whispering in this present darkness, but that whisper echoes like thunder on the mountain when he accepts it as my Gift of adoration, thanksgiving, and praise. What I find in Scripture through his guidance is what I am given to share with you. It is a paltry gift in comparison with the magnitude and excellence of his Gift to all of us, but my little mite may be a treasure for someone someday through the works of the Holy Spirit.
From time to time I refer you to previous posts, and today I invite you to find 2023AFC060520 – Let’s WIN this thing! In that post, there’s quite a lot of what I want to tell you today. I started off like this:
I am going to share with you some thoughts about what we’ve been through this year and especially about what is happening NOW. The Spirit of Evil, the Destroyer, the Ha-Satan – “Accuser” – is running the show. As a Nation, we are divided about whom or what is responsible. Is it race? Is it politics? Is it history? Is it really my fault? How could it possibly be your fault? Surely it must be OUR fault?
Most of the six events listed above are related to living as a Christian Catholic American. I am immensely pleased to claim all of those descriptors. A few of you may have experienced, as I have, that some folks like to expand that list with descriptors like deplorable, hypocrite, sycophant, and white-male-rubbish. I expect that, perhaps even welcome and understand how and why that is piled on; I know who I am, and I know because God himself told me – I am his child (↔ Click Link) because I have received him – not just once but over and over and over because he keeps giving me second chances (↔ Click Link). I get more chances than even Jonah got! You remember the story, how Jonah had to give up his life to save the mariners on the ship he boarded to try to run away from God’s command to prophesy in Nineveh. (See Jonah 2:1-3, where he says, ” … out of the belly of Sheol I cried.”) not many people know this – I don’t talk about it much – but I know a little about that kind of NDE, Near Death Experience. As best as I can recollect, I’ve made at least three “round-trips” down that tunnel; I got sent back all three times, but I would have gladly stayed. Jonah’s experience was definitely more memorable and much more effective! He pulled himself together and got serious about warning the Ninevites. He must have made quite an impression; as you probably recall, he was barely halfway through the city and they started repenting. Ironically, that made Jonah angry because he was hoping they’d be severely punished! He found it difficult to accept the fact that God really does want to give everyone a second (or 4,357 extra) chance.
Take a look at that passage from Joel up there – Joel was also a Prophet in Judah during the reign of King Joash (835-796 BC) called by God to bring a message of the necessity for repentance. Jonah came along “a generation later” during the reign of Jeroboam II (793-753 BC). Jeroboam II was a really evil dude in great need of repentance! Now, Belovéd, let me ask you if you have noticed a familiar topic in this message. In the AFC archives, you’ll find that the words “repent” or “repentance” come up in over 200 posts. That’s about 25% of the current collection. I may sound like a repeater pencil, but there’s a reason I keep echoing that idea. IT IS IMPORTANT. Over and over again God – our Creator, our Savior, our Father, our Brother, our Guide and Companion – says to us “Turn to me.” (↔ Music Link) Ahhhh, mes amies, sometimes we end up turning so many times in a single day that we could get dizzy. And yet we hear him, we hear his voice, we even see his face in the lives of others. We Have Been Told (↔ Music Link), we have been called (↔ Music Link) and that call echoes through the millennia. We are called to repent and believed the Gospel. We echo that call, even in this present darkness, so we can be Light and Salt. The Apostle Paul told the Church in Ephesus 12 For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. (See Ephesians 6:12) The darkness is gathering, and even the 100,000,000 points of light among us are dimmed by the cosmic powers that are flooding across us as a tsunami of evil. January 22, 2021, you and I have an opportunity to combat that darkness a bit. We have an opportunity to echo the Words of the Prophets – REPENT AND RETURN TO GOD. The declaration that we have heard regarding the intensifying of the culture of death by murdering millions more babies and calling it “LEGAL” must NOT stand!
Joel’s call to repentance must not go unheeded – now or ever. We need to “return to the Lord,” with “fasting, weeping, and mourning;” We must echo that warning even in this fearsome, dark hour. Perhaps others will see the Power of God’s Mercy and the Greatness of his Grace; and having seen, they, too, will turn to him with humbled and contrite hearts. We see so many hearts of stone, hearts so hardened that it seems not even Love can penetrate them. But our echo of faith, our echo of the words of the prophets, our echo in the darkness may yet prevail.
An echo is a returning sound that is repeated because the sound waves are reflected back to the origin of the sound. Sound waves can bounce off smooth, hard objects much like the way a small Zectron ball bounces off the ground. It seems to the listener – the originator – that the direction of the sound changes. More importantly the echo sounds the same as the original sound. The echo of prophecy might bounce off those hardened hearts, and it might sound like it’s coming from several directions, BUT it will sound the same as the original! The sweetness of that sound can break those hearts of stone and replace them with hearts for love alone – for we are called.
In Galatians 5:22-23, Paul states “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” God’s unconditional love has always been on public display. How can we NOT see it? Have you ever known someone who is so filled with Christ that s/he radiates that agape love every moment of his/her life? That is visible to you because such a person sees you as Jesus would see you. Love is seen because love is an action, not a feeling. Love does, Love is, and Love is self-evident because Love changes everything and everyone it touches. Love is the Beauty of Jesus. Love is the refreshment of the soul, the water in the desert of our self-imposed solitude in the wasteland of tribulation. Love is the demolition of contention and strife.
I want to make my life a Servant Life (↔ Music Link), and Here am I, (↔ Music Link) (See Ezekiel 36:26) ready for today’s walk. So Let the Beauty of Jesus (↔ Music Link) Be Seen in Me.
Belovéd, what is the Word we echo, what is the prophecy we share? It is this: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news*.” [*Gospel] THAT is our Light in this present darkness. In that Light we can send an echo in the dark – Light echoing Light. Remember – 10 When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it.
National Repentance and Truth Prayer (↔ Click Link)
Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!
Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.
Unless otherwise indicated, all scripture passages are from the New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE) New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
