Daily Office Readings for Friday of Proper 21: Year 2
Morning, Psalm 102; Evening, Psalm 107:1 to 32;
Hosea 10:1to15; Acts 21:37 to 22:16; Luke 6:12 to 26
“Just as Paul was about to be brought into the barracks, he said to the tribune, ‘May I say something to you?’ The tribune replied, ‘Do you know Greek? Then you are not the Egyptian who recently stirred up a revolt and led the four thousand assassins out into the wilderness?’ Paul replied, ‘I am a Jew, from Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen of an important city; I beg you, let me speak to the people.’ When he had given him permission, Paul stood on the steps and motioned to the people for silence; and when there was a great hush, he addressed them in the Hebrew language, saying:” (Acts 21:37 to 40)
This passage gives us insight into the education of Paul. He is fluent in both Hebrew and Greek and yet thought to be Egyptian by the Roman tribune who arrested him. When permitted to speak Paul tells the people who he is and he tells how the Risen Lord met him while on his way to Damascus.
We know that God does not necessarily call the qualified, but rather, qualifies the Called. Even so, at least in Paul’s case, God, in Christ Jesus, reaches into the life of some well educated, albeit misguided people who have strong faith and then redirects them. Paul, like too few of us, was blessed to have been afforded an education. Too often however education can squeeze out God. Ironically, people can get too smart for God, or so they think. Paul was such an educated man but he was misguided. The one thing he had going for him was his faith in God. Everything in the scripture supports Saul or Paul as being a Pharisee, zealous for God as he understood God to that point. Learning should never stop. Just when Paul thought he knew everything, our Lord Jesus stopped him in his tracks. He had a, “wake-up” call. God in Christ Jesus uses our faith as the path to our hearts. If we first believe in God, God will come to us in revealing ways. We will have our own conversion story. And, like Paul, we should tell it as often as we can.
Today our Church remembers Saint Francis of Assisi, Friar (1226) and can be found at Francis of Assisi (satucket.com).
“Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all their multitude. And on the seventh day God finished the work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all the work that he had done” (Genesis 2:1 and 2). So, for this evening and tomorrow day my friends, Shabbat Shalom.
What is Shabbat? Intro to the Jewish Sabbath – YouTube
Please keep up your thoughts and prayers and hopes for Ukraine and Russia; Israel and Palestine, and our schools. And, as we listen to what the Spirit of God is saying to us, let us live to love and serve, and to teach others to love and serve, while pondering anew what the Almighty can do. John
Let us pray: and, as we remember Saint Francis today: A Prayer attributed to St. Francis (BCP 833)
Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.
onewhoponders 