Day 7, Tuesday, 23 February It will succeed

 

RETREAT IN LENT 2021

Day 7, Tuesday, 23 February

It will succeed

Great news that a one-ton vehicle that looks like a tractor with many gadgets attached has landed on Mars intact. But up to the last second the hundreds of scientists who got it there were on edge. All our efforts may succeed – but they may also ‘fail’. What our readings today say is there is no such thing as ‘failure’ in God’s plan or reign. Isaiah (55:10-11) gives a brief parable. Rain falls enabling plants to grow and life to flourish. That is certain. So it is with God’s great plan for his creation. It won’t fail – despite wars, viruses and climate change. But it may not succeed in the way we expect.

Let’s take that no further now. The point here is, whatever our personal circumstances – unemployment, sickness, homelessness, loneliness – our prayer and our union with God through Jesus and in the Spirit guarantees success in the most basic thing, our life. I have – and I am sure you have – known people whose lives seem to have been a wreck. Nothing seems to have gone right for them. Yet they died with a smile on their face. But this probably only comes if one is at peace with oneself, despite the wreckage, and able to see beyond the visible evidence of ‘failure.’  

Today’s readings speak of prayer and prayer lifts us above visible evidence to what we call hope. Hope is not a wish for success. ‘I hope the weather will be fine.’ ‘I hope my daughter passes her exams.’ Hope is a certainty about things unseen. It sounds like a contradiction. How can you hope for something that will certainly happen? The Christian view is; you can. What makes it hope is that you have not got it yet. But you certainly will. Hope stretches our hearts as football stretches our skills.

In Matthew 6:7-15 we have the version of the Our Father we are most familiar with. It is all about hope. ‘Your kingdom come! Your will be done! Give us today our daily bread.’ If we believe – and this is not something we can switch on – we will know these things are certain. We can note that the word ‘bread’ appears in both our readings and this alerts us to what we are considering. If we have rain and do the required work, we will have bread. If we have the Word in our heart and do the required work (prayer), we will have our ‘daily bread’. This is not just food for the body but reverence and love for others and for the planet, and courage to promote the best in both.