Thought for the Week - 19th & 26th December 2021

 

Dear Friends, 

O come, let us adore him, O come, let us adore him, O come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord! so goes the Christmas carol, O come, all ye faithful. In the Archbishop of York’s Advent Book for 2021, Music of Eternity – Meditations for Advent with Evelyn Underhill, the author writes, ‘for Evelyn, the starting point of the spiritual life is adoration. She reminds us that when we encounter God in His majesty and loveliness, adoring worship is our natural response’. Nearly 400 years ago a group of Puritan preachers and elders came together and produced The Westminster Shorter Catechism, a short document in the form of questions and answers used to teach the basic doctrines of the Christian faith. The first question is, ‘What is the chief end of man?’ to which the answer is ‘Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever’. In other words this is our purpose, this is what we have been created for, this is what the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross has saved us for, to glorify God and enjoy him forever. Centuries before this, the Psalmist was helping his audience to realise their reason and purpose for life with examples like, ‘God is higher than anything and anyone, outshining everything you can see in the skies. Who can compare with God, our God, so majestically enthroned, surveying his magnificent heavens and earth?’ (Psalm 113:4-5 The Message) and ‘Worship God in adoring embrace, celebrate in trembling awe.’ (Psalm 2:11 The Message). Underhill writes, ‘Consider what the word ‘adoration’ implies: the upward, outward look of humble, joyful admiration; awestruck delight in God’s splendour, beauty, action and being, in and for himself alone, as the very colour of life’. For the adoration of God is our first and foremost duty as followers of Jesus Christ. It is from this love for God, as commanded by Jesus in the greatest commandment to ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind’ (Matthew 22:37) that everything else we are and do as disciples of Jesus springs. That is why this is the first and greatest commandment, but then Jesus says, ‘And the second is like it: Love your neighbour as yourself’ (Matthew 22:29). It is only from our love for God, our adoration of God, that we are able to serve him in acts of kindness and generosity, to love and forgive others, and to be truly the people God has created and intended for us to be, to have the reason for our very existence which is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.   

A Prayer: Lord, to you belong all glory, honour and power. Show me how to adore you! Increase my love and understanding as you reveal to me more of who you are, and may I praise you with my whole heart, for ever and ever. Amen.

Grace and peace,

Neil


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