Wed. - A Bitter Cup

15: What will you give me, if I give him up to you? And the price was fixed at thirty bits of silver. Matthew 26

Matthew's Gospel has the gritty detail. He has the cut and dried, how much is it worth to me? Judas is more honest than many betrayers, at least in this portrait. He knows what he wants and asks for the price. When he gets it he delivers.

How many people with power to make decisions are swayed by the financial benefits, to themselves, of deciding in certain ways? How many of us are betrayed by cozy contract awards, convenient job assignments etc.? As a society, we try to regulate things into their proper places. But no matter how dense a forest of regulations the truly self serving can find a way to circumvent them.

It comes down to personal integrity and recognizing when you are being bought.

Tuesday - Contrite Hearts

26: This was the answer Jesus gave: It is the one to whom I will give this bit of bread after I have put it in the vessel. Then he took the bit of bread, put it into the vessel, and gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot.
27: And when Judas took the bread Satan went into him. Then Jesus said to him, Do quickly what you have to do. John 13

Here Judas is given his marching orders. It's not very clear to me how much actual responsibility Judas had for this betrayal. He seems to have been inclined to do it but Jesus really eggs him on here. Pointing him out and sending him off to get it done. Later, in the garden, Jesus greets him as much as Judas greets Jesus. Overall, it needed to be done, we are told, to fulfill the prophecy. I wonder how much re imagining of events the Evangelists did to connect to the various prophecies? We are told that the Holy Spirit guided the choices of the editors of the New Testament several hundred years after all the facts. Truth or even accuracy is a very slippery concept.

Monday - Courage

1: The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? Psalm 27

Here is the opening line of one of the popular Psalms. The speaker describes his relationship to God as to the Lord. It reads as a near perfect description of the classic European Feudal relationship. The 'servant' does as he is told and the 'lord' protects and provides all. It is a relationship that worked reasonably well for a long time of ignorance.

Trouble comes when, in a religious context, one realizes that each person is that 'special servant' to the lord and thus are all equal to each other. Our human instinct is to put ourselves as higher up the importance chain than everyone else and if we are all servants of the lord then we are all equals in his regard.

God has no trouble seeing us as equals to each other. It's we who keep looking for the edge on everyone else.

Just saying

Sunday - Palm Bonus

In the reading of the Passion the crowd plays an important part. They cheer with welcome at the start. Hysterically waving palms and greeting Jesus as he rides into the city. A week later they are back, equally hysterical, demanding his death.

These crowds are enthusiastic and, I would guess, heartfelt, while they praise and condemn the same person with equal vigor and reason. They were not responding to reason either time but to the well chosen words of the agitators. They were putty in the hands of the commentators that they knew and believed. They had no notion of the facts, never wanted or asked to be confused with the facts. They responded to the urgings of people who wanted their voices for their own agendas.

I hope that we can take some wisdom from their woeful experience. We should take care to examine the facts and refuse to be swayed by emotive rhetoric. We need to take note of who is paying the bill as they are likely to be the benefactors.

In the year 33 CE the crowd was wrong. the High Priests got their way and removed a rival but at what cost to the people of Israel?

Sunday - Palm Sunday

7: But he made himself as nothing, taking the form of a servant, being made like men; Philippians 2

Or conversely, he made himself in the form of a human ennobling that natural form beyond all reason.

Sat - Ultimate Scarifice

48: If we let him go on in this way, everybody will have belief in him and the Romans will come and take away our place and our nation.
50: You do not see that it is in your interest for one man to be put to death for the people, so that all the nation may not come to destruction.
51: He did not say this of himself, but being the high priest that year he said, as a prophet, that Jesus would be put to death for the nation; John 11

Politics again. Or maybe, the Evangelist is putting political motives on a jealousy situation between the High Priests & Jesus as an upcoming religious leader outside of the official hierarchy. In any case this is the second day recently when ancient politics has been the basis of the biblical story. It's both comforting and alarming that people have changed so little in a few thousand years.

Friday - Definition

10: For numbers of them say evil secretly in my hearing (there is fear on every side): they say, Come, let us give witness against him; all my nearest friends, who are watching for my fall, say, It may be that he will be taken by deceit, and we will get the better of him and give him punishment. Jeremiah 20

Of course the Lord saves him because Jeremiah is doing his work but aren't the echos of nasty politics from the ancient past eerie?

Thursday - Annunciation

9: Then he said, See, I have come to do your pleasure. He took away the old order, so that he might put the new order in its place.
10: By that pleasure we have been made holy, by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once and for ever. Hebrews 10

And Christ has been born and died for us. So all will be well with the world.

We never managed to do the old order very well so here's hoping that we manage to live rightly with the new order.

Wed - Cheer

32: And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
42: Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me. John 8

That is the truth attested to in the first line. This information is the key. What do we do with the freedom?

Tues - declaring to all

29: And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him. John 8

This is the only line in the reading that seems to make sense this morning. Maybe I'm being dense but St John's Gospel is sounding like gobbledegook to me today.

So Jesus and the Father are one. this is good news in that we see one we see both. we act like one we act like both. We revere one we revere both.

The passion and Easter rising are coming soon.

Monday - The Word of God

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. Psalm 23

This seems to be the Old Testament version of "Give us this day our daily bread" So, it seems the concept is really embedded in the whole belief system. I continue to rely on God's bounty.

Sunday - Repent

11: And she said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said, Neither do I condemn thee: go thy way; from henceforth sin no more. John 8

Just start fresh. All of us are sinful in one degree or another. We need to be able to put it behind us and move on. And allow other people to move on as well.

Saturday - Viewpoint

41: Others said, This is the Christ. But others said, Not so; will the Christ come from Galilee? John 7

I'm told that Galilee was the ultimate 'wrong side of the tracks'. Supposedly nothing of much good could be expected to come from Galilee. So this is another example of all are included in God's love.

If the ultimate man, the Son of God, could come from there then anyone can be included. I'm guessing that that means me too. That's good.

Friday - St. Joseph

18: Now the birth of Jesus Christ was in this way: when his mother Mary was going to be married to Joseph, before they came together the discovery was made that she was with child by the Holy Spirit.
19: And Joseph, her husband, being an upright man, and not desiring to make her a public example, had a mind to put her away privately.
20: But when he was giving thought to these things, an angel of the Lord came to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, son of David, have no fear of taking Mary as your wife; because that which is in her body is of the Holy Spirit. Matt 1

We hear so much, and correctly so, about Mary's courage in accepting the Holy Spirit at the Annunciation. OTOH Joseph's courage was nearly as large. No the pregnancy did not happen to him personally. No man has ever had that particular challenge/joy but in a culture of extreme rectitude, in a small town, he stayed by his pregnant fiance knowing full well that he was not the father. Line 19 was about the best Mary could hope for in 'normal' circumstances. But Joseph was much better than normal. He followed through with the marriage and was a faithful husband and father. That is hard in any age or circumstance. Joseph did it knowing his buddies were laughing behind his back and his family was probably sort of disapproving too. They could all count to 9 and knew that he had not been into early relations.

I will keep his courage in mind. Sometimes it is better to ignore the local conventions and do what i know in my heart is right.

Thursday - Local Witnesses

How is it possible for you to have faith while you take honour one from another and have no desire for the honour which comes from the only God? John 5

This is a very good question. We spend so much of our lives worried about people's rules and opinions that we have little time or energy to even find out what God wants. We have been given the commandment to love one another as we love ourselves. How we work that out in practical terms in each of our lives takes discernment and listening for God's voice in our hearts. Oh the inadequacy of words!! I can't say it without sounding trite.

Wed - Salvation Appearing

24: Truly I say to you, The man whose ears are open to my word and who has faith in him who sent me, has eternal life; he will not be judged, but has come from death into life. John 5

Mystical Jesus, we have the Gospel of John. There is such hope in this line. No discrimination, all are eligible for eternal life.

Tuesday -Unity

12: And by the edge of the river, on this side and on that, will come up every tree used for food, whose leaves will ever be green and its fruit will not come to an end: it will have new fruit every month, because its waters come out from the holy place: the fruit will be for food and the leaf will make well those who are ill.
Ezekiel 47

There are days that I wonder about the titles of these readings and this is one of them. The list heads it up as Unity so that is what I am using just in case someone else out there reading this has the same reading list. Their brief explanation has to do with one baptism in the Trinity. The only connection I see with that concept and the reading is that they both refer to water. Ez. is talking about a miraculous river that comes from the Holy place. Its banks hold food that never is short or goes stale and the leaves are medicinal. I suppose that in this fortunate location all will be well.

Monday - Story Time

18: But all things are of God, who has made us at peace with himself through Christ, and has given to us the work of making peace; Psalm 30

This morning I am feeling very low indeed. 2 days of coughing and congestion and 2 nights of dubious sleep can lead to that state. I hope that the Psalm is correct and that all bad things pass. There will be joy eventually.

Sunday -The Best you can be

18: But all things are of God, who has made us at peace with himself through Christ, and has given to us the work of making peace; 2 Cor 5

The peacemakers. The best way for us to be. We each make Peace or war daily in our lives. Does it affect the rest of the world? Does a pebble thrown into the pond affect the whole pond? Small changes are still changes. So let's make Peace.

Sat - Bowing

13: The tax-farmer, on the other hand, keeping far away, and not lifting up even his eyes to heaven, made signs of grief and said, God, have mercy on me, a sinner.
14: I say to you, This man went back to his house with God's approval, and not the other: for everyone who makes himself high will be made low and whoever makes himself low will be made high. Luke 18

The Pharisee got nowhere because he thought that he had it all. The tax farmer got it all because he knew that he was in need of forgiveness. For some reason God does not seem to make a difference between what people would call little things and big things. They all need forgiving. So we should get over ourselves, however correctly we try to live our lives, and ask for that forgiveness. God has promised it to us if we ask for it. So what are we waiting for?

Friday - Priceless

31: And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these. Mark 12

And if we could all do this there would be heaven on earth. We can but try.

Thursday - More Powerful

23: He who is not with me is against me, and he who will not give me help in getting people together is driving them away. Luke 11

What is with him? With whom? with God? No one on earth, or in the material world is completely with God. Does that mean we are against God? I don't think so. My opinion of this phrase is that it got mis-translated or in it's original it had some colloquial meaning lost to us today. The stark, you do all I say or you are anathema is so out of sync with the balance of the Gospels that there must be a misunderstanding somewhere.

Wed - He is Timeless

17: Let there be no thought that I have come to put an end to the law or the prophets. I have not come for destruction, but to make complete. Matthew 5

Come to make complete. Does that mean whole, unified, singular? Is this a cross-link to the Eastern concepts of Tao? I wonder.

The rules and laws of a religion may be but the finger of the Sage pointing to the moon in the sky. We should not get too caught up in looking at the finger in our search for the 'moon', knowledge of and participation in the all-in-all, the one-who-is.

But that finger is still there, meaningful and, in line with the parable, aiming accurately at the moon.

Tuesday - Each & Every Time

21: Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?
22: Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven. Matthew 18


This idea that we need to forgive each other is really persistent. After all, it can get tiring, all that forgiving. sooner or later I want to say enough! Just do what your supposed to already. Most of the time I go along and deal with whatever people have done or not done and get over it. But it's very tempting to get mad at people who miss deadlines, forget appointments etc. (can you tell it's been a frustrating registration season? & it's about to start all over)

Back to forgiving, the Bible is very much for it. So are the psychologists funny enough. Holding on to grudges, giving the anger or frustration 'space in your head' sort of takes up room for better things. Peace, fun, relaxation, harmony. None of these are really available when one is all tied up with anger and grudges.

Monday - Simplicity

9: So Naaman came with his horses and with his chariot, and stood at the door of the house of Elisha. 2 Kings

This line is in the middle of the story of the important man Naaman who ended up following directions of a foreign prophet (who wouldn't even see him in person). These directions cured him of a long term skin affliction. He went home happy and praising the God of Israel.

Naaman was very skeptical of the directions, just wash 7 times in the Jordan?! How many times have we tried to make something harder than it is because we think that things need to be difficult, expensive or complicated to be good. Lots of complicated things (computers, cameras, etc) are good. But plenty of very good things are very simple, sunshine, good food.

We could do far worse than to focus on the simple clear things that we can do that make life nicer. Smile, say hi, just pick up whatever is lying around looking untidy. Let's see how well this week goes when I try that.

Sunday - Gardening

4: Or those eighteen men who were crushed by the fall of the tower of Siloam, were they worse than all the other men living in Jerusalem?
5: I say to you, It is not so: but if your hearts are not changed, you will all come to an end in the same way. Luke 13

This is the middle of three little stories in which something bad either happens(to the people) or is threatened (the non fruit bearing fig tree). The question is if the bad things happened because the people were bad or even worse than the rest of the people. It's one the bible stories I find really confusing. On one hand Jesus implies that the people who had been killed were no worse than the rest of the people in town. The tower didn't fall on them for being really bad or evil or something. But then He goes on to imply that if they don't get better at living better that bad things would happen. ie. the fig tree gets another chance to bear fruit before it gets chopped.

So which is it. Are bad things just chance? Does God make bad things happen to bad people or only to bad people who haven't changed for the better? How much better do we need? If the tree bears one fig next season does it get chopped anyway. 5? 25? This sort of calculus can drive me nuts. My usual response is to give up trying to figure it out and hope for the best.

I guess that the priest who said the Mass I went to today didn't know where to go with this reading either since he spoke a homily on Moses & the burning bush or calls to conversion. Which was another reading today.

Sat.- Come Home

31: And he said to him, Son, you are with me at all times, and all I have is yours.
32: But it was right to be glad and to have a feast; for this your brother, who was dead, is living again; he had gone away and has come back. Luke 15

This summation is the crux of the Prodigal son story for me. Both sons are honored, the one who was faithful all his life and the one who went away and came home again.

As a parent I know that it's so easy to take for granted the efforts of whoever is consistent and make a fuss when someone does something special for them that may be average behavior for a sibling.

There is value in making the effort to move to better ways of living as well as to keeping to those ways.

Friday - Egypt's King

27: Let us give him to these Ishmaelites for a price, and let us not put violent hands on him, for he is our brother, our flesh. And his brothers gave ear to him.
28: And some traders from Midian went by; so pulling Joseph up out of the hole, they gave him to the Ishmaelites for twenty bits of silver, and they took him to Egypt.
Gen. 37

Ok here it is in the beginning of the Bible. Brothers are selling brothers into slavery. Things can only improve from here. At least these days we feel some guilt about slavery or even wage slavery which could be worse in many ways than the classical kind.

The message for me is double. 1st don't count on decent treatment. 2nd even when awful things are done you can still make good from them. We know that Joseph prospers in Egypt and even saves the family from starvation a few years later.

Thursday- Charity

30: And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent.
31: And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead. Luke 16

These lines are at the end of the story where Lazarus & the 'rich man' have opposite fortunes in the after life than they had in the regular one. It's not really clear that the 'rich man' could have avoided his fate but there is an implication that if the rich one had opened his gate to the poor man that they both might have fared well in life and death.

These final lines read, to me, as a little sarcastic. Well, God has sent the prophets and the rich man & his brothers never listened how about sending someone risen from the dead?

We know how well that has worked as well. We still have poor people although I don't believe that their fate is quite as dire these days as they are described in Luke. Even slums in the US are not quite as bad as they used to be. There have been lots of wealthy people paying attention to the poor. Maybe the message is sinking in.

This time of year is good to assess our charitable habits as well as the rest of our habits. 40 days gives time to cover lots of topics. Not many of them comfortable :)

Wed. - Divine Sacrifice

26: Let it not be so among you: but if anyone has a desire to become great among you, let him be your servant;
27: And whoever has a desire to be first among you, let him take the lowest place:
28: Even as the Son of man did not come to have servants, but to be a servant, and to give his life for the salvation of men. Matthew 20

Again we have an instruction to avoid our usual status hunting behavior. We need to show 'greatness' by humility. this almost stands the very concepts on their heads. Difficult, difficult, difficult.

Tuesday - Rabbi

8: But you may not be named Teacher: for one is your teacher, and you are all brothers.
9: And give no man the name of father on earth: because one is your Father, who is in heaven.
10: And you may not be named guides: because one is your Guide, even Christ.
11: But let the greatest among you be your servant.
12: And whoever makes himself high will be made low, and whoever makes himself low will be made high. Matthew 23

So we are all equal in Christ whatever our specific job or role. That is great in principle. In practice,it doesn't seem to happen much. We need to stay focused on equal standing.

I don't think this means that we need to disrespect anyone, especially anyone who thinks they are of 'greater' worth. They are still due respect. But we need to respect each and every person we see & speak to. We can hope for respect in return. (I am not holding my breath)

Monday- A Bargain

36: Be full of pity, even as your Father is full of pity.
37: Be not judges of others, and you will not be judged: do not give punishment to others, and you will not get punishment yourselves: make others free, and you will be made free:
38: Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, crushed down, full and running over, they will give to you. For in the same measure as you give, it will be given to you again. Luke 6

Another favorite quote. Challenging. We are back to getting what we give out. It's easy to want things but sometimes hard to give the mercy, the care, the goods and non-judgemental attitudes. I try, I really do at times. Other times I just can't be bothered. It's a little like my never ending quest for a 'healthy' weight. I usually try to be moderate but I get so frustrated at times that I just don't care what I eat. It's all of a piece. It's hard to be consistent.