Day 13, Monday, 1 March The amount you measure out

 

RETREAT IN LENT 2021

Day 13, Monday, 1 March 

The amount you measure out

The Old Testament is a story of peaks and troughs, high moments and low. The highs were the calling of Abraham, the formation of a community that would welcome the Messiah when he came, the establishment of Israel in ‘the promised land’ and the return from exile in Babylon. The lows were the rebellions in the desert, the wars, the abandonment of the covenant and the exile. Daniel (9:4-10), in exile, laments these disasters: ‘we have turned away.’

But Daniel also knows the ‘mercy and pardon’ of God and his words are shot through with promise for the future. This promise is revealed in the reading from Luke (6:36-38); ‘your Father is compassionate. Be like him. The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given back’. The words are an echo of the Our Father; ‘forgive us as we forgive others.’

It is so clear that our happiness in is our own hands. We don’t have to be miserable - unless we choose to be! This may sound a ridiculous, even hurtful, thing to say when you consider the terrible lives some people are living. The internet shows us all sorts, for example; the Rohingya refugees adrift in the open seas, fleeing poverty and persecution, vulnerable to unscrupulous traffickers as well as the storms and cyclones and facing an unwelcome reception in the country to which they are fleeing.  And we can think too of the children in our own cities who live on the streets.

Some of our fellow human beings are forced into terrible conditions. Prophets and political leaders liken their experience to the Jews in Egypt or in the Babylonian captivity. Closer to home, we know people who live in stressful circumstances. I know it is easy to say, yet all these human circumstances can be improved or put right. Lent is a reminder that we ‘measure ourselves against the obstacle’ (Antoine de St Exupéry, Wind, Sand and Stars).  It is a time when we rouse ourselves to resist being crushed by circumstances we cannot control. When we do so we bring out the best in ourselves.