Dear Ones,
Hope you had a lovely weekend and kept cool!  This morning I plan to bake cookies and go to Aldi’s and Exercise class. The question for this week is, how meaningful are the sacraments to you? Have there been times that you have grasped the meaning of them in a special way and experienced God’s grace in a transforming sense?
‘Devotions from Judy’s heart
There are many things we may not be able to explain, but God uses tangible concrete things to get across spiritual truths.  Back in Medieval days the church was sacramental. The primary way believers came to know the Lord was not so much through preaching, because worship was in Latin and for most people it was not understood. There were beautiful cathedrals that provided a place to convey sacredness and the heart of tangible faith was when the sacraments were administered. Gerald Sittser, professor of theology at Whitworth University in WA wrote that “The sacraments are a source of genuine spiritual life and an objective means of grace. The tangible, concrete, material nature of the sacraments reminds us of the reality of Christ’s saving work.”

Most all of your reading this have experienced communion or the Eucharist which means thanksgiving. When we take the bread the priest or pastor says, “The body of Christ broken for you.” Then either the bread is dipped in wine or we are given a tiny cup of wine to drink and the pastor says, “The blood of Christ shed for you.” God is then doing a cleansing work within us, renewing us and transforming us as we partake and we may say “thanks be to God.” Something tangible is being taken in to help us grasp the spiritual reality of being forgiven and cleansed. We are experiencing the physical world connecting with the sacred. Jesus uses this physical means to help make God known to us in a visible, tangible and accessible way. We don’t know exactly how to explain how God uses the sacraments as a means of grace and it will always remain a mystery. Our part is to receive them and the grace that God promises us through them. It is important that we don’t miss what God is desiring to do within us and just casually dismiss it. Jesus suffered and died in our place to give us forgiveness and to transform us to be more like Him.

Let us not forget that Jesus came to reveal to us God in material form. He wants to share His life with us and it says in John 10:10, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” Let us live in faith as we experience the mystery and the promise.

Challenge for today: Prepare your heart before taking the bread and the wine and thank the Lord for his grace to you.
Blessings on your week and prayers and love, Judy