The Invitation or the Temptation

In the midst of vexing troubles, we encounter an invitation to nurture a persistent steadiness, an unflinching commitment to stick with a conviction or just cause that expands our life and calls us forward with joyful (while dogged) faithfulness and openness (a generosity toward those who are our friends as well as toward those who are not so much our friends). And in the midst of these same troubles, we encounter a temptation to feed an always-on-the-prowl fixation that, while wrapped in righteous rhetoric, camouflages a fearful heart, an angry or reactionary vengeance, a restless perfectionism, an inability to sit with ambiguities long enough to grapple with the long demands of love or the cost of our absolutist posture.

These two ways of being in the world need to be distinguished. The former is the fruit of a wide and hopeful vision. The second is an exhausting failure of our imagination, a signal we have not yet been undone by that unbounded provocateur: mercy.

5 Replies to “The Invitation or the Temptation”

  1. “an exhausting failure of our imagination….not yet undone by mercy. Powerful. True. The nagging, but loving reminder of our heart’s need (and our knee’s) to bend willingly – if oh so humanly – to the invitation of “the former.” Thanks for making me think , and feel, this morning.

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