Abba, Father!
James Cathcart
September 16, 2024
Add to Favourites
Listen to this daily worship
Galatians 4: 6 (NRSVA)
6 Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.”
The Spirit moves within us, helping us to recognise and reach for God. It is significant that in this letter, written in Greek, the word Abba for ‘dad’ is rendered in Aramaic, as Jesus would have said it himself. Several centuries and languages later the immediacy of the heart cry: Abba still leaps off the page. It is a recognisable longing. Paul is saying to the churches in Galatia that the cries deep in their hearts that yearn for God, that yearn for more, that yearn to belong, that yearn to be part of something are not empty cries in vain.
Our bodies are constantly telling us things about our environment, our emotional state, and about those around us. Our bodies with their gut reactions, knee jerks and jaw drops are phenomenally tuned sensors to the world. We are always picking up on sound, temperature, texture, light, colour, energy, balance, hunger, mood, longing, safety, comfort, proximity.
Paul wants the Galatians to know that faith isn’t an academic exercise! It is something new, ever-new, an ongoing dynamic relationship that’s built into us that’s woven into the fabric of our being. The way we long for shelter, for food, for belonging, for meaning — we long for connection, deep in our hearts. To be human is to have cries deep in our heart that we long to be heard.
Pray:
Holy Spirit,
Ready us for new encounters with old texts
Startle and revive us,
show us what is new today about being a child of God.
When we instinctively reach for stale solutions
show us instead what’s new in Galatians.
Amen.
Login to comment.