Devotion for December 6 (LCMS Daily Lectionary)

Above:  Mounds at the Site of Ancient Nineveh, 1932

Image Source = Library of Congress

Judgment and Patience

DECEMBER 6, 2023

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:

Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them,

that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life,

which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ;

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

—The Book of Common Prayer (1979), page 236

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The Assigned Readings:

Isaiah 14:1-23

Psalm 18:1-20 (Morning)

Psalms 126 and 62 (Evening)

2 Peter 3:1-18

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The threat of judgment runs through Isaiah 14 and 2 Peter 3.  Assyria, relabeled Babylon by a subsequent editor, will fall.  The text even provides a song of gloating for the exiles to sing on that day.  For Assyria/Babylon there will be no remnant.

Judgment will fall one day, 2 Peter 3 tells us.  The delay indicates divine patience, an opportunity for salvation.  The Day of Judgment was more distant than the author of 2 Peter imagined, for it remains in the future tense.  And, as the author of 2 Peter 3 reminds us, God is being patient now.  May we not try this patience.  Rather, may we seek (and succeed, by grace) to love God fully and our neighbors as yourselves, for that is the summary of the divine law.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

DECEMBER 10, 2011 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT JOHN ROBERTS, ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST AND MARTYR

THE FEAST OF KARL BARTH, SWISS REFORMED THEOLOGIAN

THE FEAST OF THOMAS MERTON, ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST AND MONK

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

http://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2012/08/05/judgment-and-patience/

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Advertisement