Ordinary Time
Monday, October 5
Morning
Read/Sing:
Psalm 5; 145
Read:
Hosea 6:7-7:7
Acts 22:30-23:11
Luke 6:39-49
Pray:
We praise you, God our creator, for your handiwork in shaping and sustaining your wondrous creation. Especially we thank you for
the miracle of life and the wonder of living...
particular blessings coming to us in this day...
the resources of the earth...
gifts of creative vision and skillful craft...
the treasure stored in every human life...
We dare to pray for others, God our Savior, claiming your love in Jesus Christ for the whole world, committing ourselves to care for those around us in his name. Especially we pray for
those who work for the benefit of others...
those who cannot work today...
those who teach and those who learn...
people who are poor...
the church in Europe...
The Lord's Prayer
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven
Give us this day our daily bread
And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors
Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil
For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.
Lesson
In Luke, we find the story of the wise and foolish builders, but unlike in Matthew 7, here we get a phrase - the wise builder "dug down deep" to build his house on the rock. This phrase suggests that to reach the rock where building is safe, one must be prepared to dig.
'Building on the rock' equates to putting Jesus' words into practice. Why might this require digging? If digging means working hard to be committed, then its important because of the difficulty and unpredictability of life. Putting Jesus' words into practice isn't like making a recipe when its dinnertime. Putting Jesus' words into practice is for when we are hungry or full, for the morning or evening, when we want to, or when we don't Accounting for the topsy-turvydom of life and putting Jesus' words into practice nonetheless is what we may say is meant by this man digging down deep.
Do we not see a splendid example of this in today's Acts reading? We see Paul suffering. He's in court. His trial turns out to be something like a trial on his accusers. We see here that Acts tells the story of a church that follows the story of its Lord, as told in Luke. Paul's life is so entrenched, so enlisted, so 'dug down deep' into the life of Jesus, that his words and his life alike are a testimony to Jesus. (Acts 23:11)
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