Save us from weak resignation

Above:  The Temptations of Jesus

Image in the Public Domain

Faithful Servants of God, Part II

JANUARY 15, 2023

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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 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

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Ecclesiastes 2:11-26 or Ezekiel 2:1-3:4

Psalm 1

Galatians 1:1-24

Matthew 4:1-11

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The theme of fidelity to God unites these readings.

Fools and wise people die.  One works hard then dies; others inherit.  At least one can be faithful to God and enjoy one’s work during one’s life filled with pain.  That description certainly applies to Ezekiel, Jesus, and St. Paul the Apostle.  Relying on God while surrounded by faithless people, as well as away from the faithless, maddening crowd, one can resist the temptations to seek the easy way out, to be spectacular, to glorify oneself, not to depend on God, to serve evil, to make peace with injustice, et cetera.

As Harry Emerson Fosdick wrote in 1930,

To the evils we deplore;

Let the search for Thy salvation

Be our glory evermore.

Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,

Serving Thee whom we adore,

Serving Thee whom we adore.

Amen.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

MARCH 19, 2018 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT JOSEPH OF NAZARETH, HUSBAND OF MARY, MOTHER OF GOD

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https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2018/03/19/faithful-servants-of-god-part-iv/

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Above:   Ezekiel

Image in the Public Domain

Hearing and Listening

FEBRUARY 12, 2023

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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 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

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Ezekiel 2:6-3:4

Psalm 3

Revelation 10:1-11

Matthew 13:10-17

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LORD, how many adversaries I have!

how many there are who rise up against me!

–Psalm 3:1, The Book of Common Prayer (1979)

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Do not be afraid of their words and do not be dismayed by them, though they are a rebellious breed; but speak My words to them, whether they listen or not, for they are rebellious.

–Ezekiel 2:6b-7, TANAKH:  The Holy Scriptures (1985)

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The imagery of eating a scroll indicates accepting a prophetic call from God.  Often the vocation of the prophet entails being unpopular, for speaking uncomfortable truths leads to that result.  Also, speaking such truths might place the life and liberty of the prophet at risk.

For some time the passage from Ezekiel has haunted me, so to speak.  The imagery of the bitter scroll tasting as sweet as honey, indicating Ezekiel’s glad acceptance of his commission, has come to mind often.  This imagery, echoed in Revelation 10, has reminded me of the mix of the bitter and sweet lives in while following God.  It has challenged me to accept bitterness as sweetness in the service of God.  I have not lived fully into that challenge yet.

The passage in Luke 13 reminds us of the difference between hearing and listening.  We might hear, but we might not listen.  Listening is much harder work, after all.  And, assuming that we do listen to the prophetic words of God via Ezekiel, Jesus, or anyone else, we might not like them.  How we respond or react to them is spiritually telling.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

MAY 3, 2017 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT MARIE-LEONIE PARADIS, FOUNDER OF THE LITTLE SISTERS OF THE HOLY FAMILY

THE FEAST OF WILLIAM WHITING, HYMN WRITER

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https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2017/05/03/hearing-and-listening/

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Above:  Peter’s Vision of the Sheet with Animals

Image in the Public Domain

The Clean and the Unclean

FEBRUARY 28, 2022

MARCH 1, 2022

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The Collect:

Holy God, mighty and immortal, you are beyond our knowing,

yet we see your glory in the face of Jesus Christ.

Transform us into the likeness of your Son,

who renewed our humanity so that we may share in his divinity,

Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you

and the Holy Spirit,one God, now and forever.  Amen.

—Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), page 26

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The Assigned Readings:

Exodus 35:1-29 (Monday)

Ezekiel 1:1-2:1 (Tuesday)

Psalm 35:11-28 (Both Days)

Acts 10:9-23a (Monday)

Acts 10:23b-33 (Tuesday)

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[Jesus] said to [his Apostles], “Even you–don’t you understand?  Can’t you see that nothing that goes into someone from the outside can make that person unclean, because it goes not int the heart but into the stomach and passes into the sewer?” (Thus he pronounced all foods clean.)  And he went on, “It is what comes out of someone that makes that person unclean.  For it is from within, from the heart, that evil intentions emerge:  fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, malice, deceit, indecency, envy, slander, pride, folly.  All these evil things come from within and make a person unclean.

–Mark 7:18-23, The New Jerusalem Bible (1985)

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Ritual purity has long been a religious concern.  Separating oneself from the world (not always a negative activity) has informed overly strict Sabbath rules and practices.  (Executing a person for working on the Sabbath, per Exodus 35:2b, seems excessive to me.  I am biased, of course, for I have violated that law, which does not apply to me.)  Nevertheless, the Sabbath marked the freedom of the people, for slaves got no day off.  Ezekiel, living in exile in an allegedly unclean land, the territory of the Chaldean/Neo-Babylonian Empire, experienced a vision of the grandeur of God before God commissioned him a prophet.  Perhaps Ezekiel had, suffering under oppression, prayed in the words of Psalm 35:23,

Awake, arise to my cause!

to my defense, my God and my Lord!

—The Book of Common Prayer (1979)

Those who took Judeans into exile and kept them there were unclean and not because they were Gentiles but because of their spiritual ills, on which they acted.  As St. Simon Peter learned centuries later, there is no unclean food and many people he had assumed to be unclean were not really so.

The drawing of figurative lines to separate the allegedly pure from the allegedly impure succeeds in comforting the former, fostering more self-righteousness in them, and doing injustice to the latter.  May nobody call unclean one whom God labels clean.  May no one mark as an outsider one whom God calls beloved.  This is a devotion for the last two days of the Season after the Epiphany.  The next season will be Lent.  Perhaps repenting of the sins I have listed above constitutes the agenda you, O reader, should follow this Lent.  I know that it is one I ought to follow.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

OCTOBER 29, 2015 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF PAUL MANZ, DEAN OF LUTHERAN CHURCH MUSIC

THE FEAST OF JOHN BUCKMAN WALTHOUR, EPISCOPAL BISHOP OF ATLANTA

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https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2015/10/29/the-clean-and-the-unclean/

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Above:  The Prophet Ezekiel

Whether They Listen Or Not

 JANUARY 8, 2024

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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

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The Assigned Readings:

Ezekiel 2:1-3:11

Psalm 42 (Morning)

Psalms 102 and 133 (Evening)

Romans 1:18-32

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One of the surest ways to misread a text–especially one from the Bible–is to read anachronistic assumptions into it.  The modern psychiatric category of homosexual orientation is modern, so it could not have been an issue for Paul.  So, what was “unnatural” sexual  behavior?  One aspect could have been the impossibility of conceiving a child.  If we accept this explanation, what about the sexual lives of older couples?  And, if we read the text from Romans as referring to homosexual acts yet not orientation, then those acts are unnatural for the people involved.

I chose to address that aspect of Romans 1 first because I wanted to get it out of the way and move my focus to the main idea which links the Romans and Ezekiel lessons.  God commanded the prophet to speak divine pronouncements regardless of  whether people listened or not, “for they are rebellious” (Ezekiel 2:7).  And, in Romans, those who have rejected God behave in ways (mostly non-sexual; read the list) destructive of themselves and others.  Their rebellious deeds flowed from their rejection of God; those deeds did not separate them from God.

Nothing can separate us from the love of God.  Sometimes divine love becomes tough love, but is love nevertheless.  My prayer for you, O reader, and for myself is that we–you and I–will not try the love of God very often.  May we reciprocate instead.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

MARCH 14, 2012 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT MATHILDA, QUEEN OF GERMANY

THE FEAST OF KEREOPA AND MANIHERA OF TARANAKI, ANGLICAN MARTYRS

THE FEAST OF PAVEL CHESNOKOV, COMPOSER

THE FEAST OF PETER GRAVES, ACTOR

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http://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2012/08/14/whether-they-listen-or-not/

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