Safety

It's been quite a long time since I've posted anything, here... even though I have three or four posts started waiting to be finished. This one, however, is short enough to post now.

After having read God's Will - My Will at the Heart for God blog, I was prompted to post what i wrote in my journal this morning (with slight emendations):


Show me your mercy, Lord, and keep me safe.

As I prayed that antiphon this morning, I looked up at the crucifix that hangs on the wall in the study. (I’m usually facing the crucifix during prayer in the morning.) Safety, for Jesus, was not the avoidance of the cross but the arrival at the destination - the resurrection.

So often I think of being safe in terms of being able to avoid pain, threat of death and even conflict. But, at least in this moment, it seems to me that here is another area in which I need a radical “re-learning.” I need to understand that being kept safe is not about avoiding the cross (any cross!) but arriving at the destination – life with Jesus!


A heart to follow Jesus is God's mercy. It is far safer to follow Jesus even when it leads through flood, fire, famine or even fatality than to follow anyone else... even, and perhaps especially, our own self-serving inclinations.

As Wayne Watson put it in song: I'd rather walk in the darkness with Jesus than to walk in the light on my own.

Or as Jesus put it: Take up your cross and follow me.