Hello friends,
Welcome to the 30th episode of Christian Meditation with Anita Mathijs.
I am Anita Mathijs,
A writer,
Memoirist and Christian Meditation teacher,
Living in Oxford,
England.
I'm happy you're here.
Let's begin slowly becoming aware of the presence of Christ,
However you visualize him in the room with you.
Sit straight,
Head over heart,
Heart over pelvis.
Perhaps place your right hand on your heart and your left hand on your belly.
Let's exhale deeply,
Breathing out the stresses of the day.
Now slowly breathe in Christ's gift of peace.
Again,
Exhale out your stress and powerlessness,
Long and slow.
Inhale in God's peace and power,
Deeply.
Exhale out your stress and inability.
Inhale in God's peace.
Let's continue to sit and breathe for two more breaths as our spirits,
Minds,
Emotions and heart rates slow down along with our breath.
And as they do so,
Let's begin to enter the presence of majesty.
The prophet Isaiah wrote about 2,
700 years before Christ.
In the year that King Uzziah died,
I saw the Lord high and exalted,
Seated on a throne.
And the train of his robe filled the temple with glory.
Above him were seraphim,
Each with six wings.
With two wings,
They covered their faces.
With two,
They covered their feet.
And with two,
They were flying.
And they were calling to one another,
Holy,
Holy,
Holy is the Lord God Almighty.
The whole earth is full of his glory.
At the sound of their voices,
The doorposts and the thresholds shook,
And the temple was filled with smoke.
Woe to me,
I cried.
I am ruined.
For I am a man of unclean lips,
And I live among a people of unclean lips.
And my eyes have seen the King,
The Lord Almighty.
Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand,
Which he had taken with tongues from the altar.
With it,
He touched my mouth and said,
See,
This has touched your lips.
Your guilt is taken away,
And your sin atoned for.
Then I heard the voice of the Lord crying,
Whom shall I send?
And who will go for us?
And I said,
Here am I,
Send me.
Your guilt is taken away,
And your sin atoned for.
Let's segue to a reading from the Gospel of Matthew,
Chapter 26.
The Complete Forgiveness of Sins While they were eating,
Jesus took bread,
And when he had given thanks,
He broke it and gave it to his disciples,
Saying,
Take and eat,
This is my body.
Then he took a cup,
And when he had given thanks,
He gave it to them,
Saying,
Drink from it,
All of you.
This is my blood of the new covenant,
Which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
The night before Christ was unjustly killed,
He gave an inexhaustible inheritance to his friends and to all who'd later believe in him,
His words,
His spirit,
Himself.
Drink from it,
All of you,
He said,
Giving them symbolic wine.
This is my blood poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
God,
The judge of all the earth,
Scripture calls him,
Appeared to Moses as flames of fire.
But our hearts have darkness too,
And ice.
God's fire would consume us.
For the iron law of the physical or moral universe is sowing and reaping.
The poison seeds we sow become a dark,
Barren forest,
Blocking out God's life-giving light.
But Christ says,
Father,
Forgive them.
I like them.
So in your just cosmic court,
In which dark deeds have eternal ripples,
I will be the infinite lamb,
Slain instead of them,
To atone for and bear the consequences of their willful failures.
Let my shed blood wash away the guilt of every sin,
Past and future,
Of all who put their faith in me and surrendered to me as Lord of their lives.
As they kneel in repentance at my cross,
Let them step into its perpetual waterfall of cleansing and power.
And now,
Father,
Please accept these believers,
Covered by my blood,
As your children,
Just as you accept me,
And God does so.
And now that Christ was crucified,
Died,
But rose again,
His spirit,
No longer contained within his earthly body,
Is poured out like living water onto all humans at our humble request.
The spirit pours the love of God into us as he reminds us of the words of Jesus and slowly writes Christ's sweet law on our hearts.
This transfusion of grace helps us do hard things we previously couldn't do.
Our dance with the spirit gradually breaks the power of sin over us.
It transforms us.
Now we,
The forgiven,
Protected by the blood of Jesus,
Poured out over us and filled with the spirit who sings within us,
Abba,
Father,
Are adopted by God as his children in his joyful new covenant.
We are cells grafted into the vine of our new family,
Father,
Son,
Spirit,
Who now live in us as we live in them.
As we choose by our thoughts and actions to continue living in the vine of Jesus,
Their energy pulsing through us makes us fruitful.
And now all our prayers,
Which flow in the river of God's good purposes,
Are kindly heard.
Waves of love and power flood from the cross.
Thank you,
Jesus.
Amen.
