strong enough to endure ....your grace

In our last episode, Jesus was standing in the wilderness salivating over a collection of stones.  He was hungry.  He could turn the stones into bread.  He didn't.  I think that the more we know about Jesus, the less we understand.

This week my colleagues and I have been using a poem/prayer by Ted Loder to guide our prayers for one another.  Here it is

Lead Me Out of My Doubts and Fears

Eternal God,

lead me now

    out of the familiar setting

          of my doubts and fears,

     beyond my pride and my need to be secure

into a strange and graceful ease

    with my true proportions

    and with yours;

that in boundless silence

  I may grow

    strong enough to endure

       and flexible enough to share

            your grace.*

I can't but hear this prayer as I read about Jesus in the wilderness 

and wrestle with how I am to live as a follower of this Jesus.  

Lead me out of the familiar setting............where I am too comfortable, too blind and deaf to the details

....of my doubts and fears.............oh, that kind of familiar place.  I think I am too comfortable there as well

beyond my pride.......................I can do this.  I will work harder.  I will be the best

and need to be secure...............with food in the cupboard and money in the bank

into a strange and graceful ease.........I am never graceful, stumbling around, uncertain.  There is no ease

with my true proportions.......... a true picture of the true me, with gifts and limits

and with yours.........................beyond all my imagining, and most days beyond even my believing, 

                                                            the eternity of you

that in boundless silence I may grow........silence is the rarest commodity in my life

strong enough to endure...........yes, I expected that I'd have to endure... suffering....and what else?

and flexible enough to share..................What is this?  Sharing what?  With whom?

...........your grace.

Now I am driven to my knees, watching, listening in the wilderness as you as God take up the frailness of my humanity and wrap it in the power of the Creator....out of love.

Grace too much to bear.  

Today we read about the temptations Jesus endured in the wilderness and wonder what are we to learn from this?  How are we to grow as disciples?

Could it be our temptation to turn the Divine Grace into a 12 step self improvement program instead of allowing it to be the enormous gift it is?

*Ted Loder, Guerrillas of Grace