Last Nun Standing (a Reality Check)...

The most popular news story on bbc.co.uk at the moment is this one - a pretty comic tale of a three-woman strong convent that has now been reduced to one remaining member after the other two attacked her. I suppose the reason that it's heavily clicked on is because it's funny, unusual, and pretty ironic.

The article dubs the nuns as from 'the most austere order of the Roman Catholic Church, devoted to a life of prayer, penance and quiet contemplation.' The theory of a special sacred life may look nice and spiritual but the practice, three nuns not being able to get on without physically attacking one another, kind of shows up what life, and even the Christian life, really looks like. You can live in a convent for 44 years but you can't escape the flesh, the world, and the devil.

I reckon the temptation's there for all of us - especially with blogs - I want to point out the sacredness of my routine, the holiness of my actions, but in reality I'm only kidding myself. I might not use the garble of 'devoted to a life of prayer, penance, and quiet contemplation', but I'm equally as likely to spin on about how often I'm captivated by God, ham up the prayerletter to make my exploits look extra devout. Maybe the balance is hard to strike - we are pressing on towards the goal, trying to let go of every hinderance, and we are living in hope that day by day we are being changed by God, and made more like his Son. But with that comes the brutal truth that we are sinners crying out for rescue.

Back to the nuns' story... now the local Archbishop has got involved and written to the Pope to get his permission to call the bailiffs in to force the last nun to take down the barricades. The remaining nun's response? "She has written to the Pope telling him she will only leave when God decides it is time to go." Can't leave this story without questioning the seeming madness of that comment (if the press quotation is accurate).

She's nailed the issue in one sense; God is sovereign and when He decides it's time to go, then it definitely will be (and that could be in the shape of the local authorities banging on the door and forcing her out!). But the manner in which she seems to be using that phrase gives me the creeps. Maybe I'm taking her out of context, but I reckon it's symptomatic of what Christianity looks like all too often in our culture - all too easily reckoning God's will is this or that without giving much time to what God has declared his will to be in his written word. We have to rescue the foundational truth that God has ordained what pleases him and what doesn't. Without even getting into whether or not being a nun is a good thing to do, the point in question seems to be whether I can defend my actions on the basis of what God has said to me personally, with little thought to what's he's spoken in Scripture.

Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!

We celebrated the Lord's Supper tonight at church, remembering the Lord Jesus' saving death that brings us life, the blood of the Lamb that makes us white. We looked at the picture John's Revelation gives us of what it will be like when we're gathered around the Lord in the new creation. It is mighty that it is our God who holds salvation - for it is He who sits on the throne!

9After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10and crying out with a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!" 11And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12saying, "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen."

13Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, "Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?" 14I said to him, "Sir, you know." And he said to me, "These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

15"Therefore they are before the throne of God,
and serve him day and night in his temple;
and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence.
16They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore;
the sun shall not strike them,
nor any scorching heat.
17For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd,
and he will guide them to springs of living water,
and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."

Rev 7. 9-17