when righteousness perseveres

“Man approaches God most nearly when he is in one sense least like God.
For what can be more unlike than fullness and need, sovereignty and humility,
righteousness and penitence, limitless power and a cry for help?”
C.S. Lewis

“Righteousness acts never in its own interest,
but in the interest of fellow men.”
Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica

(The Rev. Samuel Leighton Green)

Say what you will about battles, conflicts and wars…
…such that there is no such thing as a just war.

And that may very well be true…

For historians still question the necessity of such wars as WWI
yet concede to the fundamental importance and necessity of WWII.

Yet both wars were some of humankind’s bloodiest conflicts…
with each resulting in a catastrophically global loss of life.

While at the same time each war has helped to shape the world, for both good and bad,
as you and I know it today.

And as is the case with history…
importance becomes more real, more relevant and more personal when it is
picked apart and examined individually…
by each single person after person, after person…
for it is in the details of each participant that we begin to see things
more narrowly verses that of a generic and sweeping panoramic view of
the statistical and numerical.

The following link is to a story found on the BBC regarding
the Reverend Samuel Leighton Green.
Green was one of a special group of men who served during the brutal
trench warfare of WWI.

As a member of the clergy, he was exempt from the mandatory draft,
yet volunteered anyway as he knew someone would have to tend to those
“fighting lads” spiritual needs.

Green also felt a moralistic sense of justification to the war’s necessity.

He served with the “blasphemous and foul-mouthed” 1/4th (City of London)
Battalion–the Royal Fusiliers.
Green served alongside this brave group of men throughout the duration of the war.

Green was awarded the Military Cross not once but twice for his bravery under fire.

It would behoove us to uncover more of these stories of such selfless souls…
those brave men and women who remain a part of the “Constant” to which mankind so
clings during the chaotic…

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-norfolk-37377025

Necessity is the mother of all invention~~Plato

A faith is a necessity to a man. Woe to him who believes in nothing.
Victor Hugo

(Image of abandoned bird nest in Julie’s yard / 2014)

The bird believes he can build a nest.
Building a nest, to the bird, is a necessity.
The bird believes he can find what he needs in order to build that nest—be it twigs, leaves, or in the case of this particular bird, plastic.
There is no worry nor concern as to whether the materials will be available.
The bird does not fret.
If there are not the twigs, there is the plastic.

What of you?
What is your worry, your concern?
Do you believe or do you fret?
Do you have what you need or do you complain and lament?

The bird makes do because he doesn’t know any difference. He must have a nest and therefore whatever is available must simply do.
Man on the other hand frets and worries because he does know the difference.
Man bemoans what he does not have.
It is not always easy to adjust or make do.
Man worries.

Faith equates trust.
Worry negates both.

Our faith, the faith which so many toy with, discredit, scorn, scoff. . . tells us to be not anxious about anything. We are extolled to offer everything in prayer and supplication, doing so with thanksgiving. We are to make all requests known to God. Not just some requests, but all requests, all concerns all worries, all frets. . .

We are confidently reminded that the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard our hearts and our minds—all of which is to be in Christ Jesus.

Therefore as the bird, we must believe that we will have what we need, when it is needed.
We must not fret.
We must not worry.
It will all be there, whatever it is, it will be there exactly when we need it, that is, if we need it.

To have Faith.
To Believe.
To have Hope.
Trusting in what is unseen.
Needs will be filled.
The necessary will be made available.

Can you?
Should you?
Will you?

Believe.

Woe to those who do not believe.