From the Rector’s Study

There is a story of a homeless man who was sitting across the street from an artist’s studio. The artist saw him and thought he would make an interesting portrait study and, from a distance, he painted the defeated-looking man whose shoulders drooped and whose eyes were downcast and sad. When he was finished, he took the portrait over to the vagrant so he could look at it.

Has anybody noticed that the readings are getting longer and longer? Maybe it’s preparing us for the long Gospel on Palm/Passion Sunday and Good Friday. With that in mind, I could say quite a bit about the readings today, but one part comes to mind. To worship the Lord in spirit and in truth.

Last week I talked about giving up control, to love God and others is to trust. This week there is an element of giving up control as well. When Jesus talks about the wind and where it comes from and where it goes no one knows. That feels like control issue as well. But Jesus also talks about being born again, born anew.

Jesus and the 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness. The words associated with wilderness as a metaphor are darkness, alone, hopelessness, depression. What is the temptation? To give up and to blame others this can be a chance and opportunity to grow, or we can shut down and find an escape the choice is ours that although our thoughts and actions may not be perfect with help the wilderness can show us a way out and a strong way forward.

The gospel today talks about alms, prayers, and fasting. And to do them in secret. Why then do we have ashes today on Ash Wednesday? The obvious answer is because it is Ash Wednesday. But why something which goes against doing something in secret?

There are a lot of things people are afraid of, causing great anxiety to the sufferer when they are exposed to the source of the phobia. I am sure you have heard of claustrophobia – the fear of closed spaces or acrophobia – the fear of heights. There are some unusual phobias that, perhaps, you haven’t heard of

This gospel is basically in four parts, four themes. Anger, adultery, divorce, and oaths. The first two are primary then perhaps inform the other two. It seems unfair equating anger and lust with murder and adultery. These feelings are normal, anger and lust and all of us if we are honest will have those feelings.

Jesus says in the gospel today; do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. And yet we read in Isaiah; look you fast only to quarrel and to fight but is not this the fast that I choose to loose the bonds of injustice to undo the thongs of the yolk. Is it not to share your food with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house and so forth then your light shall break from like the dawn.

One Sunday as they drove home from church, a little girl turned to her mother and said, “Mommy, there’s something about the preacher’s message this morning that I don’t understand.” The mother said, “Oh? What is it?” The little girl replied, “Well, he said that God is bigger than we are. He said God is so big that He could hold the world in His hand. Is that true?”