Monday, November 17, 2008

Daily Office Reflection: Winding Down

Psalms 89:1-18 * 89:19-52; Habakkuk 2:1-4,9-20; James 2:14-26; Luke 16:19-31

In church-land we are winding down our calendar year. We have one more Sunday in the Season of Pentecost and then the new church year begins the following Sunday with the First Sunday of Advent. We do things a mite early in church-land. This coming Sunday will be the Feast of Christ the King, the last Sunday of Pentecost and the ending week of Year Two in the Daily Office Lectionary, and the end of Year A for the Sunday lectionary. We are winding down in both lectionaries, getting ready for a shift, a change.

Perhaps that is why the readings seem so harsh...the lessons so pointed. It is almost as if the lectionary is saying, okay, you've had all year (Year A on Sunday, Year Two in the Daily Office) to get it....NOW we're going to clobber you over the head to make sure the message gets through.  I certainly feel that way with the offering from Luke today, and from James and from Habakkuk. Change....change.....change the way we operate, the way we think, the way we interact with the world. Be awake, pay attention to those in need. get ready! Instead of a soft entrance into Advent it seems like a very hard push into Advent, the season of preparing. So we're winding down the church calendar, but the readings are certainly ratcheting it up.
jfd+

Copyright 2008, John F. Dwyer. All Rights Reserved.

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