Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“I make a decree, that in all my royal dominion people should tremble and fear before the God of Daniel:
For he is the living God,
enduring for ever.
His kingdom shall never be destroyed,
and his dominion has no end.”
NL Daily Devotion for Saturday, August 24, 2024
by R. M. Fergus, Clergy Stuff
Even kings can change. While Darius couldn’t, in good faith, rescind his decree in order to prevent Daniel from being thrown to the lions, once the miraculous delivery of Daniel from said lions had occurred, he had the clear excuse he needed to take it back. I mean, God kept hungry, wild animals from eating someone. That’s a pretty clear sign that Daniel was “right” and Darius was “wrong.”
For some of us, it takes that massive of an event in order for us to change. I can tell you that the year before I came into recovery for food addiction, I was on an emotional rampage. My entire life was out of control despite my best efforts to force control on everyone and everything around me. I was so overwhelmed by circumstances that I was passively suicidal. And, of course, everything was everyone else’s fault.
I wandered into recovery in order to get thin (since, delusionally, I believed this would solve all my problems). What ended up happening was an entire transformation of my heart, soul, mind, and strength which utterly transformed my life and the way I was living it. Eighteen months food sober, I had the epiphany that absolutely none of the circumstances in my life that had driven me to eat compulsively (and want to drive my car off the freeway) had changed, yet I was experiencing genuine serenity and even joy.
In my youth, I was unhappy with myself, but I had no idea how to change. So I decided at some point that it wasn’t possible to change. I just was who I was and I and everyone else just needed to accept it. Um. No. Self-acceptance is key, and we all need to start there, but it comes with an AND. I accept myself as I am (imperfect but loved) AND I can do better and be better with God’s help. I can’t begin to express my gratitude for God’s radical change in my heart, and the life I get to live now because of it.
Do I think I need to change? Do I have any idea how to change? How can God help me?
