What Kind of God Is This?
August 20, 2025
Fr. John Riccardo
Brothers and sisters, You have forgotten the exhortation addressed to you as children: "My son, do not disdain the discipline of the Lord or lose heart when reproved by him; for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines; he scourges every son he acknowledges." Endure your trials as "discipline"; God treats you as sons. For what "son" is there whom his father does not discipline? At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it.
So strengthen your drooping hands and your weak knees. Make straight paths for your feet, that what is lame may not be disjointed but healed (Hebrews 12:5-7, 11-13).
As we turn the page in the lectionary, I’m still stuck on a verse from last week’s 2nd Reading: ”For the sake of the joy that lay before him he endured the cross, despising its shame, and has taken his seat at the right of the throne of God.”
What does it mean when the author says, “For the sake of the joy that lay before Him?” What exactly is the joy that’s being referred to? As we get ready for the shocking and stunning answer, let’s back up a minute. The One we’re talking about here is the eternal Son of God, the second Person of the Holy Trinity, the One through whom and for whom all things were made. He is infinitely happy, lacking in nothing. This eternal Being, who exists outside of time, at a certain moment in history, stepped into time and began to grow inside the womb of a woman He created. He whom the universe cannot contain is confined to a womb!
Why? Because the creature fashioned in God’s image and likeness had been deceived by an enemy, someone who had been created good (for God only creates good). This enemy envied the destiny of our race and so rebelled against God and went to war against us, desiring to enslave and degrade us. The result of our first parents succumbing to the deception of this creature was that we sold ourselves into slavery to the powers of Sin and Death. We had no way out.
So God — God! — came to our rescue. Personally. He didn’t wave a magic wand. He didn’t send an angel. He came Himself. As a man. And the rescue happened by His going to the cross, a most shameful, humiliating and painful way to die. What looked like a defeat was in fact a victory, because Jesus on the cross isn’t just a victim, He’s the aggressor; He’s not just hunted, He’s hunting. Our enemy. And the resurrection on Easter Sunday is the announcement that Good Friday was a victory. We’ve spoken about this many times before in this blog.
But here’s what that verse in Hebrews is highlighting: God did this because of the joy that lay before Him. What joy?
You. Me. Being delivered from the power of Sin and Death. Delivered from the hands of a cruel tyrant. Delivered from futility and hopelessness.
Are you kidding me? Do we seriously grasp what’s being revealed here? God’s delight in and desire for you and me by name — indeed for every human person who has ever lived — is so real, so intense, so great that He endured the cross, even to the point of despising the shame, because He thought you and I were worth it!
I am increasingly finding myself in prayer, especially when I pray with passages like this, closing my Bible and my eyes, and muttering to the Lord, “Who are You?! Why would You do this?! How can it be that we mean so much to You?!” And yet we do. That’s what Hebrews reveals. That’s what the cross reveals.
Deep within each one of us is a desire to know, a need to know, that we matter, we’re seen, we’re loved, that Someone cares about us, that there’s a point to our life. These are all true. Let us beg the Holy Spirit this week to know this more deeply. Let us marvel at the God who created and rescued us. And let us strive to love Him more sincerely, and every person we encounter this week, mindful that what’s unimaginably true for us is also true for them.
ACTS XXIX Prayer Intentions
AUGUST 2025
For Pope Leo XIV and all his intentions.
For all our efforts with Lorraine Cross Media, that all God is inviting us to create and offer will bear great fruit as we seek to bring hope and encouragement to the world and the Church hungry for such things.
For wisdom, courage and protection upon Fr. John Riccardo and the ACTS XXIX missionaries, as we lean into an exciting fall with many opportunities to pour into clergy and lay leaders.
For our Board of Directors, our Episcopal Advisory Council, and our faithful partners, that God would continue to reveal Himself ever more deeply to them as they seek to build for His Kingdom in their lives and vocations.