A Confession and Affirmation of Faith

...based on the second commandment, for our series on the commandments entitled "Experience God Now". In the series we will articulate the positive expression of each commandment:

1. Accept No Substitutes
2. Take God Seriously
3. Take regular breaks with God
4. Submit to God's Authority System
5. Affirm Life.
6. Honor God's View of Sexuality
7. Help others in Need.
8. Be an Encourager.
9. & 10. Be Content.
Summary: Pursue this relationship always.

Anyway, here's the confession / affirmation:

God, you have invited me into the brilliant reality of knowing your name,
of recognizing how separate you stand from all of your creation.

Stone, tree, fish or human –
all of these are categories of what has been made.
But you are creator.

How quickly I forget to set you apart,
how easily I fail to recognize your holiness.
In the things that I have done, or have left undone –
even in the way I think or speak of you –
I treat you as just another thing to check off my list.

But you are Holy.
Your name itself is Holy.
You are truth, purity, and life.
In your presence, in the light of all you are, I recognize my own brokenness.

Yet you do not leave me in brokenness.
You, the God who is above all creation,
came into your creation in Jesus Christ to redeem and save me.

You call me away from the irreverent use of Your name – away from those patterns that minimize the name that is above every name. You invite me to a new way of living, a life in which I can call upon your name in every trouble, praying, praising, and giving thanks to You.

Thank you for the gift of your name. Help me always to remember its holiness.

© 2006 Rick Lindholtz