Friday November 15 Pentecost 25
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Psalm 88
A lament that I have been crushed and am beyond hope. When I am dead, there is nothing left, there is no life beyond the grave. Astonishingly, to be fully with us, Jesus enters completely into such a death.
This psalm is appropriately read on a Friday as Jesus is placed in the grave. Only God’s act, on Saturday night—the eve of the resurrection—can reverse death—even Jesus’ death. That’s the only hope there is.
Joel 2.28-3.8 What’s Joel about?
God is incensed that other more powerful countries have abused God’s people, and God describes how God, with great power, will put things right again—those countries that caused evil will have to face the consequences. The poet is saying that despite what goes wrong in life, in the end there is a fairness and goodness that is in charge. From our modern view-point God seems vindictive against other cultures, but from the view-point of those who were enslaved and abused by them this would have been experienced as the action of a just and good and fair God, especially when things had seemed so unfair.
Luke 16.1-9 What’s Luke about?
Jesus tells a story about an administrator who is about to be fired for misappropriating funds. The administrator then shows his friends how to falsify their purchase contracts so they will be obligated to assist him after he is fired. The owner then praises the administrator for his cleverness. Jesus may then be suggesting that his followers should be equally determined to act in just ways. Or it may be that Jesus is ironically recommending that we should make money dishonestly so that when our money is gone we will at least have friends who will welcome us into even greater dishonesty! Jesus is satirically condemning the widespread affirmation of dishonest cleverness over honest care, a mistaken priority that is just as widespread in our day.
This week’s collect:
Eternal God,
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 Saviour Jesus Christ,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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