Psalms 25 * 9, 15; Jeremiah 44:1-14; 1 Corinthians 15:30-41; Matthew 11:16-24Jesus has just finished talking with the disciples of John, and has sent them back to him, instructing them to tell of Jesus' deeds of power: the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are up and about and the poor have been enriched with hope. Jesus then scolded the crowd around him for scorning John and proclaims that John is Elijah returned, for those willing to accept that fact. All of this just before today's selection from Matthew. There is a ramping up in the way Jesus is addressing the crowd, he is getting angry with them for the purposeful dense-ness.
Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds, Jesus says. The crowds scorned John as crazy for his asceticism and they brutalize Jesus for his spending time with those thought of as less than civilized in appropriate society. Jesus is pointing to all the work of healing and curing, all the miracles that took place in the chapters just before these words and saying there is all the proof you need.
Our Gospel selection today is asking us, directing us to examine what in our lives are we blind to because in seeing those things we would be challenged? What is blocking our ability to see and gain the fruits of Wisdom's deeds? For to truly see those deeds, very often, our self-constructed worlds would be inalterably changed. No wonder we don't endeavor to see them.
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Copyright 2011, The Rev. John F. Dwyer. All Rights Reserved.
Photo: Allie, Park Watching, 2008.
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