MONDAY MORNING BLOG

Chapter 7

There is a quiet conversation that runs beneath our lives.

“Each individual has his own kind of living assigned to him by the Lord as a sort of sentry post.” Calvin
“Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray.” Rumi
“When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.” Laozi

Somewhere between these voices, we sense it:
Life is not random, and yet it is not fully in our control, we feel a subtle disconnection and something in us remains untouched. The inward vocation begins there, not as a job title, but as the bridge between inner identity and outward impact.

The German word Berufung holds this tension: work and calling as one. A task given, not merely a role chosen. In Western, especially Reformation thinking, calling is rooted in responsibility. Life itself becomes a field of service. Not only the priest, but the farmer, the parent, the worker—all stand on holy ground when they act in faith. In many Eastern perspectives, calling is less about duty and more about alignment. To live well is to move in harmony with what is already given. Not striving first, but attuning.

Vocation, calling; A task to fulfill, or a self to align? We optimize, plan, improve, and present. We build lives that look coherent from the outside while something inside quietly refuses to agree. Not loudly. Just enough to keep us slightly restless. Does the inward vocation begin where the well managed distraction starts to fail?

Even the biblical call resists simple answers; It interrupts. Samuel hears his name in the night. Fishermen leave their nets. “Come, follow me.”

A call is not constructed. It is received. It begins inward, but it leads outward, toward others.

Max Weber observed how this slowly shifted. Work expanded, but meaning shrank. Purpose is not something we invent. It is something we uncover and that takes courage.

In many African perspectives, the self is never isolated: I am because we are. Calling is not just discovered within, but shaped through belonging, obligation, and relationship.

So we stand in a tension:

Between the voice within that calls us uniquely,
and the world around us that claims us relationally.

Too much inward and vocation becomes self-centered.
Too much outward and it loses its soul.
You don’t just have a calling, you are claimed by one.

The inward vocation lives not as a fixed answer, but as an ongoing voice that refuses to be silenced, and the world around us that refuses to be ignored.

A listening within, a responding without, again and again.

The question is not, “Have I found my calling?” Maybe it’s far less comfortable: “What am I avoiding that might be calling me?” Am I listening?

Philemon

Chapter 6

What if we have badly misread the word “sacrifice”? Somewhere in the history of Western piety, it became a word about privation, about grinding loss, about the spiritual merit of going without. But in its oldest meaning, it carries none of that. To sacrifice is to make something sacred, to hand it across the threshold from the ordinary into the holy. It is a gesture of love, not a gesture of pain. The creature who offers is not diminishing themself; they are discovering, in the act of giving, the shape of their own deepest nature. We are made in the image of the Triune God, who is eternally and freely self-giving within the communion that is God’s very being. M. Chironna

When we offer, we are not performing a duty. We are becoming what we were always intended to be. Perhaps this season reminds us that Lent is not meant to be measured by what we give up outwardly, but by how deeply we allow ourselves to be transformed within.

Wishing you a good start to this week!
Philemon

Chapter 5

The dialogue traces a shift from fighting external demons to embracing a far more difficult internal surrender: the art of losing to the Divine.

“One day, I asked Father Makarios, “Do you still wrestle with the devil?”

Father Makarios said, “No. I used to wrestle with the devil all the time. But now I have grown old and tired, and the devil has grown old and tired with me. So I leave him alone and he leaves me alone.”

I asked, “Then life is easy now?”

Father Makarios responded, “Oh, no. Life is much harder now. For now I wrestle with God.”

I exclaimed, “You wrestle with God and hope to win?”

“No,” said Father Makarios, “I wrestle with God and hope to lose.”

Nikos Kazantzakis (1883–1957) Report to Greco

Have a good start with this thought!
Philemon

Chapter 4

As he was scattering or sowing the seed, some fell along the path, or the wayside, so it was trodden down, and the birds came and ate it up. (Matthew 13.4, Mark 4.4 + Luke 8.5)

Matthew emphasises judgment upon unresponsive hearts, echoing Isaiah 6:9’s lament over a hardened generation. In this soil of resistance, only receptive hearts form the “holy seed” remnant, capable of producing a harvest even amid widespread judgment. The prophets of the era repeatedly called Israel to repentance, urging a return to God that could restore what had been lost; the sower in Matthew embodies that divine persistence.

Mark’s account stresses urgency and responsibility—“He who has ears, let him hear”—reminding us that hearing the Word is not passive but demands attentive engagement. Luke, meanwhile, highlights practical fruitfulness, the endurance necessary for growth. These variations are not contradictions; they are complementary witnesses, each revealing a facet of the Kingdom: Mark preserves the raw immediacy of Jesus’ message, Matthew situates it in covenantal context, Luke underscores perseverance in daily life. The message is clear: the Word of the Kingdom requires hearts willing to receive, nurture, and produce.

Like ancient paths trodden by countless feet, our hearts often become hardened by the repetitive “ploughing” of daily life—work, worries, endless scrolling, and distractions. Yet, just as the sower of old did not give up, scattering seeds where many fell to waste, Jesus continues to sow lavishly today. The Word falls freely, generously, and repeatedly, calling each heart to wake, to open, receive, and bear fruit. God’s grace is persistent; His kingdom labour is patient, yet it calls for faithful cultivation.

The wayside soil is not a verdict; more a call to awareness. Even when the seed seems lost, God’s patience and the continual sowing of His Word invite renewal and eventual fruitfulness. In the divine economy, no space is beyond reach, no heart too hardened, if it is turned toward the Sower.

It fell by the wayside, even paths hardened are not beyond God’s transforming touch.

Philemon

Chapter 2

What a Word

My current favorite word for our time is one that increasingly struggles to endure ambiguity or perhaps no longer wants to. A time in which the longing for clarity and simple answers is growing. And yes: clarity sells well.

It is so clear and provides stability; it is so simple in a time when nothing seems simple anymore.

Like a number.
A number has a fixed value.
After all, everything has its price.
A number is incorruptible.
It is strong and clear and magnificent.
But is that really so?
Does everything have to have a price?

Does everything have to be unambiguous?

Are it not often the ambiguous things in life that make our lives truly valuable?
To be loved.
To experience recognition.
Or even to be able to believe.
Things that cannot be bought.

That is what sometimes makes life hard to endure.
That is what challenges me.
That is what must be endured.

Tolerance of ambiguity, enduring contradictions without resolving them immediately.
Tolerance of ambiguity is the dance between chairs and opinions.
Tolerance of ambiguity is also the dance of faith.

Because faith is always full of tension.
God speaks — clearly? Not really.
Sometimes through donkeys, through trees, and sometimes through me.
Understandable and unambiguous?

Sometimes I have to endure it; the tension between the Holy Spirit and my own quirks.
Sometimes the tension between faith and doubt.
Sometimes the tension between how things are now and how they will become.
Sometimes the tension between hoping and not knowing.

Tolerance of ambiguity is the dance of faith.
Hearing the music of the future — and already dancing to it now.
But what holds us in this tension?
What holds this tension together?

It is not theology that holds us together. It is Christ.
It is not the right kind of piety — no, it is Christ.
It is not the right ethics — it is Christ.
It is not the power of the mighty, nor the misery of the poor;
not the humblest humility or the most fiery faith;
not the greatest knowledge or the most sophisticated arguments.

No — it is Christ alone.

When everything begins to tip over,
call one name: Christ.

It is Christ who saves.
It is Christ who holds everything together.
Christ is the foundation of our tolerance of ambiguity.

Dare More Tolerance of Ambiguity
https://tobiasfaix.de/2022/09/mehr-ambiguitaetstoleranz-wagen/
Tobias Faix, 22 September 2022

ambiguity; the quality or state of allowing more than one interpretation : the quality or state of being ambiguous. A word or expression that can be understood in two or more possible ways : an ambiguous word or expression. Ambiguity (“uncertainty”) and ambidextrous (“using both hands with equal ease”) are connected. Ambiguity (and ambiguous) comes from the Latin ambiguus, which was formed by combining ambi- (meaning “both”) and agere (“to drive”).
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ambiguity

Chapter 1

“Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.” — Mark 13:31

As we step into this new year, we often carry a heavy, silent inventory: Am I doing enough? Am I faithful enough? Am I living “rightly” yet?

These questions reveal how deeply we’ve been colonized by a world of moral symmetry. We are trained to believe in a life of balance—where effort equals reward and failure demands compensation. We try to apply this “moral math” to God, assuming His love operates on a ledger.

Yet, the Gospel offers a holy disruption: “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

Grace does not wait for alignment. Grace is not a paycheck for a job well done; it is the ground upon which any goodness grows.

The prophetic tension, many of us believe in grace intellectually, but we live as if God relates to us through performance. We treat blessing as a reward and distance as a punishment. When we do this, faith slowly turns into pressure, and discipleship into a quest for self-justification.

Paul’s words in Galatians 2:16 reorder our entire reality: “A person is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ.” This doesn’t weaken our call to holiness—it liberates it. Obedience is no longer a currency we spend to get God’s attention; it is a response to the attention He has already given. Justice and compassion are no longer ways to secure favor, but ways to mirror the light we’ve already received.

This year, stop measuring. Stop balancing your worth against your failures. Return to the word that does not pass away—the word that names you beloved long before you are ever transformed.

To a year of living in the smile of God’s asymmetry.
Philemon

Chapter 34

This morning, I was leafing through The Marriage of Heaven and Earth by Marlin Watling, a visual guide to the theology of N. T. Wright. Four key ideas stood out to me, ideas Wright articulates with a clarity and coherence that few others manage.

First, Wright connects the entire Bible into one unfolding story. Scripture is not a loose collection of moral lessons or spiritual ideas, but a single narrative of God’s faithfulness to creation.

Second, he places Jesus back at the very center of that story and rescues him from being reduced to an “option” among many possibilities. While many today are drawn to faith because of its perceived benefits, eternal life, forgiveness, meaning, acceptance, the apostles understood Jesus differently. They proclaimed him as King. The gospel was not primarily advice or self-help; it was news.

Third, Wright reframes the kingdom of God as new creation—a reality that began decisively with the resurrection. God’s future has already broken into the present. The resurrection is not an escape from the world but the start of its renewal.

Fourth, he opens a fresh perspective on morality. Being created in God’s image and called to be stewards of his world invites us beyond a simple right-and-wrong framework. Instead, we are asked to live as redeemed people within a still-fallen world, shaped by God’s future rather than merely reacting to present brokenness.

Wright repeatedly links this vision to resurrection life. What we do now—acts of justice, creativity, beauty, and faithfulness matters. These are not temporary distractions or spiritual side projects; they are real contributions toward God’s coming kingdom. In Simply Christian, Wright shows how worship, art, and mission serve as bridges between heaven and earth, affirming the goodness of creation while anticipating its healing. This reflects his broader emphasis on embodied hope, rather than a disembodied heaven.

He captures this tension beautifully:

Made for spirituality, we wallow in introspection.
Made for joy, we settle for pleasure.
Made for justice, we clamor for vengeance.
Made for relationship, we insist on our own way.
Made for beauty, we are satisfied with sentiment.
But new creation has already begun. The sun has begun to rise. Christians are called to leave behind, in the tomb of Jesus Christ, all that belongs to the brokenness and incompleteness of the present world … That, quite simply, is what it means to be Christian: to follow Jesus Christ into the new world—God’s new world—which he has thrown open before us.

Wishing you a good start to the week, trusting in the promise of God’s renewal.

Philemon

Chapter 33

There’s a moment in Mark’s Gospel that is one of the saddest lines in the Bible ..
yet this sentence matters!

A young man — sincere, moral, eager — runs to Jesus and asks THE question:
“What must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Jesus looks at him, really looks at him, and loves him. And love, in this case, meant telling him the truth. Jesus put his finger right on the one thing that the man couldn’t surrender:
his wealth. “Go, sell what you own, give it to the poor, and you’ll have treasure in heaven. Then come and follow me”. “Let it go… then come, follow Me.”

It was an invitation not into poverty, but into freedom, not into loss, but into life. But the young man’s can’t do it.

And he walks away.

What moves me most is that Jesus doesn’t chase him. No bargaining. No softer offer. No desperate plea. Jesus love never manipulates. Jesus love invites… and then leaves us room to choose.

This story sits in Scripture like a mirror. Is Jesus trying to free us from what takes life out of us?

What is your “one thing“?

Let’s pause long enough to hear His invitation.

Philemon

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Chapter 32

Monday reflections — it’s been quite a long pause …

Each week offers a new reason to fear, a new reason to divide.
But every so often, a story appears that quietly asks:
Have we forgotten the Jesus we claim to follow?

This past week, two very different stories crossed my path.
The first, a BBC report celebrating a young, vibrant man, the first Muslim and African-born mayor of his city.
The second, a Christian post declaring that New York had chosen the antichrist.

The contrast was jarring and it made me pause.
How quickly fear finds a microphone, and how easily faith forgets its own language.

Somewhere, between our certainties and our screens, we have learned to see threat before we see a person. We react before we listen. We defend “our” Jesus more fiercely than we follow the real one.

Yet the Jesus of the Gospels moved through the world differently.
He crossed boundaries others avoided. He spoke with those others feared.
He did not teach fear — He taught love.

“Love your neighbour as yourself.” — Mark 12:31

Such a simple command — and yet it undoes the entire machinery of fear if we dare to take it seriously.

When I think of that, I realise how often we forget Him, not the name, not the rituals, but the heart, the manner, the courage of His love.

The new mayor of New York is not a warning sign or a coded prophecy.
He is a person, seeking to serve, to lead, to navigate a city of impossible complexity.
When we reduce him to an idea — or worse, a danger — we reveal something broken not in him, but in ourselves.

Jesus never called us to protect the gospel with suspicion.
He called us to embody it with grace. Fear has never preserved faith; it has only made it smaller.

The Jesus we forget;
the one who saw people before labels,
who met differences with curiosity,
who broke bread instead of building walls.

Not the Jesus of panic and possession,
but the Jesus who trusted love more than fear.

To remember Him is not to recall a doctrine, but to re-enter a way of being —
to let His mercy shape our seeing.

And when we remember the Jesus we forget,
we might, at last, remember ourselves.

Philemon
(Inspired by Dan Foster )

Chapter 31

John 2:1–11

There was a wedding in Cana — full of laughter, dancing, and joy — until someone noticed a problem: the wine had run out. In that culture, this wasn’t a small issue. Wine represented joy and blessing, and to run out was a public embarrassment. The celebration was about to collapse into shame. Mary saw it first. She turned to Jesus and said, “They have no more wine.” He hesitated, saying His time had not yet come. But she simply told the servants, “Do whatever He tells you.” Nearby were six large stone jars used for ceremonial washing. Jesus told the servants to fill them with water. They did, no flash of light, no sound from heaven, just obedience in the ordinary. Then, as the water was poured out, it became wine — and not just any wine, but the best of the night. The host was amazed. The party went on. Most guests never even knew a miracle had happened.

The miracle at Cana wasn’t loud or dramatic. It happened quietly, behind the scenes, before anyone knew there was a problem. It was just the quiet fix!

So much of God’s work in our lives looks the same way — quiet, unseen, and deeply faithful. Someone forgives. Someone prays. Someone gives when no one is watching. The jars get filled before the joy runs dry. It’s a reminder that the holiest work often looks like ordinary care. The world doesn’t hold together through grand gestures but through small, faithful acts of love. Sooner or later, the wine runs out again — not just at weddings, but in life. The energy fades. The joy drains away. Faith feels thin. We keep smiling, hoping no one notices how empty we feel inside. But the miracle at Cana tells us something beautiful: the jars had to be empty before they could be filled again. Renewal begins in the emptiness — when we stop pretending, admit the shortage, and bring it to Jesus. “There is no more wine” becomes the prayer that opens the door to transformation.

Every act of love, every quiet “yes” to God in hard seasons, is its own kind of miracle. Love runs out, and yet we keep showing up. Faith feels small, and yet we keep trusting. Somehow, God keeps refilling what we thought was empty.

That’s the promise of Cana — that Jesus still fills our jars.

Not always dramatically, not always instantly, but always faithfully.

And somewhere between the pouring and the tasting, the water becomes wine again.

If the quiet fix is often the best one, what empty jar are you willing to offer up for transformation this week?

And where in your own life might you be the “servant”—performing a small, ordinary act of obedience that leads to someone else’s unnoticed miracle?

Wishing you a good start to this new week 42 of 2025!

Philemon