Mark 12:28-34
Proper 26 (31) - Year B
Lou and Peter Berryman, Wisconsin accordion and guitar song writing and performing team, have a wonderful song on their House Concert CD (actually it is one of several great songs).
So there's 65 miles to go, to get to my sweet prairie flower The speed limit's now 65; it should take me exactly an hour Only 65 miles to go, but when 10 miles further I drive I notice with dread there's a sign up ahead saying Speed zone, slow down, 55 [repeat with new figures]
and so it goes the "kingdom of God," one's "sweet prairie flower," is not far, only an hour away.
At least one question that might have been asked if only one had dared, "is not far a good thing?" Check out John Wesley's sermon, "The Almost Christian" that concludes with comments about the altogether Christian.
"...do good designs and good desires make a Christian? By no means, unless they are brought to good effect."
"Remember 'always to pray and not to faint', till thou also canst lift up thy hand unto heaven and declare to him that liveth for ever and ever, 'Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.'
"May we all thus experience what it is to be not almost only, but altogether Christians! Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Jesus, knowing we have peace with God through Jesus Christ, rejoicing in hope of the glory of God, and having the love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost given unto us!"
Let's not end with recognizing good words. Let's apply them in our lives and world.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/november2003.html
Why continue running in the same circle of people? Why leave for another circle?
Inasmuch as we have multiple options of where to be and with whom, these are on-going questions. We also have differing needs, some of which come to the fore for a time and some that wait for another occasion. Sometimes we respond with very practical considerations of income and retirement? Sometimes our emotional well-being overrides any other issue. There are times when an internal hope or conversation with G*D will move us past either or these or anything else we have previously used to decide. Always there is inertia or lack of imagination that can come into play.
Whether practical, emotional, hopeful, or habitual, we are responding to where we see the nearness of the "freedom" of G*D and whether we are a part of a freedom to invest in life, to love, here or there, this circumstance or that, these ones or those. The more basic our freedom, the easier it is to say "both" at the same time or sequentially.
= = =
moments of import
heighten all our senses
hearts hearing calls
mind's eyes seeing options
ties that bind touch our souls
such moments
come one per lifetime
and several
are present right now
for amusement and signifying
in this moment
we honor our ancestresses
Orpah and Ruth
both doing their best
in their every-day days
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_10_01_archive.html
Right theology is seldom the point, though it is helpful in easing an arrival at harmony between one's insides and outsides.
Folks with an abominable way of understanding G*D can and do come through with compassion.
Folks who are right on target with their articulation of the expansive and expanding love of G*D can and do falter in living their conviction.
What additional question can be asked or responded to in the face of this great mystery: "Good answer; now are you going to live it?"
A happy week of congruency to you.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2009_10_01_archive.html
It is always tempting to cut to the chase. What is the most important commandment? What is the main thing that is supposed to be the main thing? What’s the basic principle here?
Unfortunately there is nothing that is singular. Note this from an article about Gravitational Singularity: “The two most important types of spacetime singularities are curvature singularities and conical singularities. Singularities can also be divided according to whether they are covered by an event horizon or not....”
There may be no other commandments greater than “loving” G*D and Neighb*r, but there will be those that will be similar to them in particularity instead of generality. After all loving Neighb*r looks quite different through the lens of Obama or Romney or you or me. And so it is with some generalized love of G*D.
The most that perhaps can be said here is that physical symbols and decision-making processes cannot take the place of relationships. When we base our interactions on some form of power, we have missed something “more important”.
May you continue to question your religious tradition about what in the world general commandments mean in a particular situation you are facing.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2012/10/mark-1228-34.html