Friday January 27 Epiphany 3
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Psalm 40
All my life God lifted me up and I rejoiced in God’s care. But now my own sin, and my enemies, have nearly destroyed me. Do not wait any longer, God!
Psalm 54
I am in dire straights. Put everything back to right, God. I praise you, because you have done that.
Isaiah 50.1-11 What’s Isaiah about?
The people are rejecting Isaiah’s proposal that God is merciful and is rescuing them, and they accuse God of abandoning them and selling them into slavery in Babylon and of having abandoned their mother (Jerusalem).
In response God replies that it was the people’s abandoning of justice and dignity that has resulted in their slavery. It’s not God’s fault because there are no legal documents of God divorcing Jerusalem or receipts for their sale.
Isaiah then describes the abuse he has taken for insisting that God cares and will rescue the people, and that it was their fault that they have been conquered.
Mark 6: 47-56 What’s Mark about?
Jesus walks over the water during a storm. This is another miracle with a meaning. Walking on the water in a storm (not walking across a swimming pool!) means that God is king over all storms. The original readers would have understood this story to be a reference to the Spirit hovering over the original chaos in the first chapter of Genesis.
Mark tells this story because storms are starting to arise around Jesus—he was accused of being the devil, his hometown turned against him, and Herod executed his cousin. Yet Herod’s violence cannot prevent Jesus creating a feast for five thousand people from the few fish Herod hasn’t taken, and Jesus is clearly seen to be the calmer of all storms. We, too, can be calm because God in Jesus can walk safely through the storms in our lives.
This week’s collect:
Almighty God,
by grace alone you call us
and accept us in your service.
Strengthen us by your Spirit,
and make us worthy of your call;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.
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