RCL – Year B – Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost – August 26, 2012
1 Kings 8:(1, 6, 10-11), 22-30, 41-43 with Psalm 84 or
Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18 with Psalm 34:15-22
Ephesians 6:10-20
John 6:56-69
I am on vacation this week and didn’t want to skip posting. The poem below is from my book, Negotiating the Shadows: Daily Meditations for Lent. Eugene, OR: WIPF and Stock, 2010, pp. 51-52.
The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, sir.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.”
John 8:3-11
The Lord is near to the brokenhearted, and saves the crushed in spirit.
Psalm 34:18
Season Change
Despair wraps around me
like a blizzard
blinding snow
disorienting winds
fierce cold
bringing an isolating darkness
with the threat
of never ending.
What hope will guide my feet
when each step gives way to new loss?
Once, I was sure I heard You calling,
now I hear only stormy silence.
This path under my feet
was supposed to lead to You.
Yet here I am – deep in the wilderness.
She must have felt much the same
when they dropped her at Your feet –
glaringly alone
without much hope, if any,
for her life.
Those who would condemn
turned away as you rocked
their understanding.
Was she able to pick herself up
from despair
to walk back into the life You
restored to her?
No stones were thrown that day . . .
You lifted the weight of condemnation.
Where did it fall?
Back on her,
on those who held rocks at the ready,
or down through the ages to settle into the hearts
of those who pass judgment in Your name?
If I look up from this dreary path,
will I stumble onto You?
When I find myself at your feet,
speak the words
to dismiss the condemnation that echoes
through my life,
heal the heartbreak that binds me to despair,
and allow me to go and sin no more
as wintery blizzards give way to
gentle spring rains.
For more information on Negotiating the Shadows, please click here: http://keefe-sanborne.com/lent.html.
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