FOOD for MEDITATION

FOOD for MEDITATION, Compiled by Paul Clasper, Dean, St. John’s Cathedral, Hong Kong
(Green Pagoda Press Ltd., Hong Kong, 1986)



SOMETHING MORE THAN FREEDOM

I was not born to be free:
I was born to adore and to obey.

—C.S. Lewis.


When prayer stops

Coincidences stop.

—Archbishop William Temple.


LEARNING TO BEAR THE BEAMS OF LOVE

Look on the rising sun ;
there God does live
and gives His light
and gives His heat away ;

And flowers and trees and beasts and men
receive comfort in the morning
joy in the noon day.

And we are put on earth
a little space,
and we may learn to bear
the beams of love.

—William Blake, in The Little Black Boy.


THE INTERRUPTIONS ARE OUR REAL LIFE

The great thing, if one can
is to stop regarding
all the unpleasant things
as interruptions of
one’s “own” or “real” life.

The truth is, of course
that what one calls the interruptions
are precisely one’s real life —
day by day :

What one calls
one’s “real life”
is a phantom of
one’s own imagination.

—C.S. Lewis,
letter to
Arthur Greeves.


ON NOT BEING POSSESSIVE

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy ;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity’s sun rise.

—William Blake.


HOW NOT TO STAGNATE

It is by
my not denying as false
what I do not yet see to be true,
that I give myself
the chance of
growing in insight.

—Baron F. von Hugel, in Essays & Addresses I


GOD SENDS GOOD DREAMS TO
THE HUMAN RACE

And what did God do?

First of all,
He left us conscience,
the sense of right and wrong.

Secondly,
He sent the human race
what I call good dreams :
I mean those queer stories scattered
all through the heathen religions
about a God who dies, and
comes to life again, and
by His death, has somehow
given new life to men.

Thirdly,
He selected one particular people, and
spent several centuries
hammering into their heads
the sort of God He was —
that there was only one of Him, and
that He cared about right conduct.
Those people were the Jews, and
the Old Testament gives an account
of the hammering process.

—C.S. Lewis,
in
Mere Christianity


ON BEING ALIVE TO LIFE, THE WORLD & GOD

You never enjoy the world aright
till the sea itself floweth in your veins,
till you are clothed with
the heavens and crowned with the stars;
and perceive yourself
to be the sole heir of the whole world,
and more than so,
because men are in it
who are every one sole heirs as well as you.

—Thomas Traherne, in Centuries


THE POWER FOR GOOD OF A WELL-CHOSEN WORD

Appreciate words
are the most powerful force
for good will on earth.

—J. Donald Adams, in The Art of Living


COME, HOLY SPIRIT, COME

Come, Holy Spirit, Come

Come
as the fire and burn;

Come
as the wind and sweep clean;

Come
as the dew and refresh;

Convict, Convert & Consecrate
until we are wholly thine!


A GOOD THOUGHT FOR THE DAY OF PENTECOST

According to
the 8th chapter of the Epistle to the Romans,
there is more hope when one sighs,
COME HOLY SPIRIT, COME
than when he exults
as if the Spirit were already his.

—Karl Barth, in The Word of God & the Word of Man


CARING MATTERS MOST

Christianity
taught us to care.

Caring
is the greatest thing.

Caring
matters most.

—Baron F. von Hugel.


HOW WE SAY ‘I LOVE YOU’

A friendly grin and a hand extended
are sacramental in nature:
outward and visible signs of inward, spiritual grace.
An impulsive hug says,
‘I love you’,
even though the words may come out,
“You old billygoat”.

—Marjorie Shearer, in Love & Marriage


HOW DO WE SAY “I LOVE YOU”

The first duty of love is
to listen.

—Theologian Paul Tillich.


O GOD,
who has made us the creatures of time,
so that every tomorrow is an unknown country,
and every decision a venture of faith,

Grant us,
frail children of the day,
who are blind to the future,
to move toward it with a sure confidence
in your love,
from which neither life nor death can separate us.

—Reinhold Niebuhr.



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FOOD for MEDITATION

Compiled by
PAUL CLASPER

Dean
St. John’s Cathedral
Hong Kong

Pentecost Day 1986

Printed by the Green Pagoda Press Ltd.


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