Reflections & Prayer

Some of you may realize that The Bookery is based in Nashville. As we begin this week in our Lent 2023 Reading Plan, which is focused on the comfort of the Holy Spirit and Jesus' final words to his followers, news is breaking across the city of a school shooting in our community.

Three children went to school today and won't go home. Three staff members went to work thinking it was a usual day and won't go home.

I don't have children at the school, so the shock and horror for me have some distance, but I know that there are others who are waiting for good news that won't come. And my heart breaks for them.

Words and phrases from the passages of Scripture we will read this week keep coming to mind, so I hope they bring you comfort as you consider them in light of today's unimaginable circumstances.

John 14:18-36

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit

18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I am coming to you. 19 In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Because I live, you will live too. 20 On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you. 21 The one who has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father. I also will love him and will reveal myself to him.”

22 Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, how is it you’re going to reveal yourself to us and not to the world?”

23 Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24 The one who doesn’t love me will not keep my words. The word that you hear is not mine but is from the Father who sent me.

25 “I have spoken these things to you while I remain with you. 26 But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.

John 16:33

33 I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous! I have conquered the world.”

John 17:13-19

13 Now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy completed in them. 14 I have given them your word. The world hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 15 I am not praying that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. 19 I sanctify myself for them, so that they also may be sanctified by the truth.

John 17:20-23

Jesus Prays for All Believers

20 “I pray not only for these, but also for those who believe in me through their word. 21 May they all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I am in you. May they also be[e] in us, so that the world may believe you sent me. 22 I have given them the glory you have given me, so that they may be one as we are one. 23 I am in them and you are in me, so that they may be made completely one, that the world may know you have sent me and have loved them as you have loved me.

Psalm 34:18

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted;

he rescues those whose spirits are crushed.