"Worship is the free offering of ourselves to God; ever renewed, because ever imperfect. Worship expresses the consciousness that we are His by right, yet have not duly passed into His hand; that the soul has no true rest but in Him, yet has wandered in strange flights until her wing is tired. 

It is at once the lowliest and loftiest attitude of our nature. Breaking into strains, now penitential, and now jubilant; this twofold aspect of devotion must ever have, pale with weeping, flushed with joy; deploring the past, trusting for the future; ashamed of what it is, kindled by what is meant to be; shadow behind, and light before." 

James Martineau.  

 I don’t want to be a Christian

who forgets how to feel—

who hides behind answers,

quotes verses like shields,

and silences sorrow

with a song.

I don’t want a faith

of romanticized abstraction,

where resurrection is polished

and the cross is theory.

Give me something real—

flesh and blood,

grief and grace.

I want to weep

with eyes wide open.

Tears that speak truth.

Tears that rise

from the ground of compassion,

from the jagged knowledge

that the world is not

as it was meant to be.

I have seen it—

the wounded souls,

the haunted eyes,

the bruises beneath the surface.

I have felt the weight

of injustice

that crushes and isolates,

while the world looks away.

These are not tears of despair—

but of resistance,

of aching love,

of holding the pain

when no one else will.

I want a hope

that isn’t saccharine.

Not hopium.

Not denial in disguise.

But a defiant, dirt-under-the-fingernails

kind of hope—

the kind that walks through the valley,

sits in the ashes,

and still whispers,

“Even here… God.”

I want a gospel

that holds the wound.

A Christ who draws close,

a Spirit who groans,

a God who gathers every tear

in a bottle,

holds every sorrow

like a fragile flame,

and knows

what it is to break.

I want to believe—

not cheaply,

not loudly—

but with trembling trust,

that one day,

every tear

will be wiped away.

Not erased,

but remembered,

redeemed,

and transfigured.

Until then,

let me be the kind

who weeps.

Who walks in holy realism.

Who holds vigil

in the shadow of the cross

and waits,

with aching hope,

for the dawn.

- Rev'd Jon Swales

 

The following quote by James Martineau is written eloquently; his grasp on the English language is amazing; but it makes it hard to understand if you don't read much of it. 

Because of that, I ran it through ChatGPT which helps summarize it because it is so important to the Christian walk. 

Original 

"Our natural faculties and affections are graduated then to objects greater, better, fairer and more enduring, than the order of Nature gives us here. 

They demand a scale and depth of being which outwardly they do not meet, 

yet inwardly they are the organ for apprehending. 

Hence a certain glorious sorrow must ever mingle with our life: 

our actual is transcended by our possible; 

our visionary faculty is an overmatch for our experience: 

like the caged bird, we break ourselves against the bars of the finite, 

with a wing that quivers for the infinite. 

To stifle this struggle, to give up the higher aspirations, and be content with making our small lodgings snug, is to cut off the summit of our nature, and live upon the flat of a mutilated humanity."

 A.I. explanation - 

Our minds and hearts are drawn to things greater and more lasting than what the world offers. Though the outer world falls short, inwardly we’re built to grasp deeper meaning. This creates a beautiful sorrow in life—our reality is outpaced by our potential; 

our imagination exceeds our experience. 

Like a caged bird longing for the sky, we strain against our limits. To stop striving, to settle for comfort alone, is to deny the heights of our nature and live a diminished life.

 

I read that "The average person has about 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day. Of those, 95% are exactly the same repetitive thoughts as the day before." 

Wow! how sad, what a waste of potential, experience, insight and enjoyment. That very night I read this insightful piece by Martineau, about how God has implanted moral admirations and disgusts ready to awaken into power and do homage to the noble, and spurn the evil. History is long and rich, and the lives of the great and good are never far, but lie scattered like gems in biographies and good fiction that bring this various world before the mind, and in doing so it has a great effect on us. Here is how he describes, so eloquently and thought provokingly, its effect on us.  

"The effect of this wider experience is incalculably great. Opening fresh continents of character to mental survey, and throwing the human tones upon the ear in language unheard before, startling the young observer with the sigh of pity and the vow of justice and the prayer of sorrow, in dialect other than the vernacular, it acts upon the judgments of conscience like foreign travel upon those of perception; and imparts a quickness of insight and breadth of view which are unattainable within a narrow circle, and which, by the very presence within the memory of a thousand other scenes of beauty, bathe the home-landscape in a light of new endearment." 

 Beginning with the second century, the leadership of the Christian church passed to the early Church Fathers. 

They were men of Greek and Roman training and culture. 

Through them not only Greek philosophical ideals but also Greek methods of thought found an increasingly prominent place in Christianity. 

True to their inheritance and training, these great leaders regarded individual belief as far more important than social living. 

The church began to demand of its followers loyalty to a definite creed rather than loyalty to the service of their fellow men. 

As a result, the rank and file of the medieval church were wholly unconscious of the social dynamics which the scripture contain.

The Protestant Reformation put the scriptures again into the hands of the people; but unfortunately, it continued to fix their attention chiefly on the theological and largely ignored the social teachings of the Bible. 

The main emphasis was still on other-worldliness. Religion and practical ethics were regarded simply as the means whereby the individual might secure a title to future blessedness. 

There were a few striking exceptions; but a majority of the Protestant leaders failed to see that the message of historic Christianity is to the living, not to the dead, and that it must express itself in human society as well as in the soul of the individual.

Puritanism, with its splendid emphasis on personal ethics, still largely lacked the social passion. Its leaders, however, were powerfully influenced by the democratic ideals of the prophets and Jesus. Their heroic efforts to found a Christian commonwealth marked the beginnings of a new social consciousness. Until the close of the 19th century, however, a majority of the Protestant churches throughout the world were still under the chilling shadow of the Middle Ages. Even during the last quarter of that century, a prominent Protestant theologian declared: 

“Christianity is not a life: it is a dogma!”  

Charles Foster Kent, PH.D., Litt.D. from “The Social Teachings of the Prophets and Jesus.”  

 

 "But high hearts are never long without hearing some new call, some distant clarion of God, even in their dreams: and soon they are observed to break up the camp of ease, and start on some fresh march of faithful service.

They do the good only to see the better, and see the better only to achieve it; who are too meek for transport, too faithful for remorse, too earnest for repose; whose worship is action, and whose action is ceaseless aspiration." James Martineau.    

 

Each time I go to the Jail to speak I wonder 'what will God do tonight? Will I sense His presence in that miraculous way again? Will hearts be touched, will souls be moved and encouraged along their way?' 

I'm an old man, and as much as I complain about bodily aches and pains, age has its benefits. Jesus said we must become like children to enter the kingdom of God, and sometime I think being a grandfather or father figure helps. 

It always amazes me how my first impression of those who filter in to the meeting room transform after I get to know them. 

Last night a woman, thirtyish, entered first alone and she walked in boldly, but eyes averted from mine. We greeted each other and she was a very "rough cut." Browned skin, her neck completely tattooed; her face had two small tats around each eye, her teeth; suffice to say they were in need of a great deal of work. 

One might think she and I would have little to unite on, to connect with: oh! but when the sweet Spirit begins to descend, this rough cut of a woman changed before my eyes into a little helpless girl. 

For some, my old age reminds them of a caring parent or grandparent, and walls come down quickly, and God uses my age to soften and open hearts. Such was the case last night, this woman watched me, and was captivated by every word we read. She had no Bible knowledge, and would not count herself a Christian, but she did say she's always prayed. She didn't share anything about her past, but it was evident she's gone places she woefully regretted, and here she sat, heart open, mind clear and hungry to learn and find hope. 

I chose a passage beginning in Galatians 5:13 from The Passion Translation, which has a warmth to it that some translations lack. We began reading one verse at a time and discussing each line in depth; it began with,

"Beloved ones, God has called us to live a life of freedom." 

I couldn't help wonder if she ever lived in freedom? Freedom from grief, from oppression and dominance, freedom of spirit, freedom to grow and express herself, advancing spiritually, and as a woman, freedom to seek her aspirations and hopes, and....dreams. 

I can't recall anyone that showed such enthusiasm and delight reading the holy lines we covered; her poor scorched soul drank in every word, with a childlike joy and hunger. What a moment, what a joy, what a privilege to be there!

I don't know if I'll ever see her again, but Jesus met with us last night, and she felt it, saw Him in His word, and I have no doubt it was a divine appointment.