Daily Office Readings for Saturday, of the 3rd Week of Lent: Year 1
Morning Psalm 87 and 90; Evening Psalm 136;
Jeremiah 13:1 to 11; Romans 6:12 to 23; John 8:47 to 59:
“Then the Jews said to him, ‘You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?’* Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.’ So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.” (John 8:57 to 59)
Our Lord Jesus has always said that He is God’s Presence among us. We interpret that as Son of God. We are truly limited in our language. Incarnate literally means, personified or in material form. From the Gospel of Saint John we learn the God is Spirit, (John 4:24). God being Spirit means that God has always been. God was with Abraham and called him from Err. God was with Moses at the burning bush where God declared God’s name to be “I AM.” This is what God in Christ Jesus said to those who challenged him. He said, as God said to Moses at the burning bush, “God said to Moses, “I am who I am.”He said further, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I am has sent me to you.” (Exodus 3:14)
This is the same “I AM,” that speaks to his challengers in our Gospel reading of John for today, who then try to stone him. What a shame. Couldn’t they just believe? Can’t we today, just believe?
Full disclosure, I am more a teaching and healing Jesus than a Jerusalem crucified Jesus. Having been to the Holy Land, I was really fascinated with the walk of Jesus in Israel, northern Israel, the Galilee area. It is in Galilee that our Lord Jesus healed the sick, cast out demons, changed water into wine, raised the dead in Nain, taught the Beatitudes, walked on the waters of Lake Galilee, and called his disciples to follow him. And, Galilee is where our Lord Jesus arranged to meet them after His Resurrection. (Matthew 28:6) Galilee is also where we Christians received the Great Commission. (Matthew 28:19 and 20)
We are still in Galilee, and our Lord Jesus is still calling you to service. Our Lord Jesus, the Great I AM, is calling you through the scriptures, and through your prayers, and through the Saints of God.
Let us hear what the Spirit is saying to, and through, the saints of God, and then ponder anew what the Almighty can do. John
onewhoponders 