Category: Devotionals

For the Lord is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favor and honor. No good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless. Lord Almighty, blessed is the one who trusts in you. Psalm 84:11-12

These verses come at the end of a song with the theme of peace. It is a love song, really. Sung not to a human sweetheart, but to the Lord himself. This song celebrates God’s presence, His home, His willingness to bless, and His strength.

David, the composer of this love song, is weak with longing for the courts of the Lord. “Oh, if I could just be like the sparrow, living in a nest built in the eaves of the building,” his heart cries. Or if he could be like the priests who live and work in the house of God, he would finally find satisfaction for his deepest desires. These people have the privilege of staying in the place where God lives. They never have to leave. They get to spend their days in unbroken communion with God, adoring Him and praising Him forever.

David longs for the house of God because then he can always be with God. This is what he wants most. His envy of the priests pushes him so far as to say the lowest, most unimportant job of doorkeeper at the temple would be better than fame and plush luxuries shared with sin.

If he could get near enough to God, then one day in that place would bring him more joy than one thousand days spent anywhere else.

We can hear the fainting, the deep passion of David’s heart, quite appropriate for the most fervent of love songs.

The person who loves God this much receives great blessing from Him. David recognizes this, and compares these blessings to the sun and to a shield.

The sun gives light, offering revelation of the warmth of God’s character, illuminating the best direction for us to follow. A shield protects and defends. In battle, it comes between the soldier and danger blocking the flaming arrows of the enemy. Ephesians chapter 6 uses the image of a shield to describe faith. It helps us stand firm, strengthening us to wait, fortifying us against the powers of darkness and forces of evil. Anyone hidden behind the armor of God is safe, even when the sounds of ammunition surround us. The shield of God offers relief.

Behind this shield, in the light of His presence, we find favor and honor. The poetic style of the Psalm implies that the person standing in God’s light and under his protection receives these things from Him. God not only rescues us from danger, He gives us a special place with Him. He provides dignity and purpose, meaningful work and a good name.

The Psalm goes on to promise that no good thing does God withhold from those whose walk is blameless. What are these good things? They are love, wisdom, patience, steadfast hearts, power, sound minds, close relationship with God, and living forever.

That one word “blameless” is intimidating. There is no way any of us can reach the end of a day without committing some act or saying some hurtful word that is offensive to God. But we have to remember that we are covered by the blood of Jesus. Salvation is both sun and shield, ever shining the light of Christ in our hearts, always covering us from the destruction of sin. Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord Almighty.

Do you want to keep receiving ever increasing amounts of blessing? Learn to love God as much as David. Be intentional about worshipping Him. Find the songs and the Scriptures that help you adore Him and praise Him.

Confessing our sin is also an act of worship. Sometimes we don’t even know when we’ve done wrong to God or to others. Ask for wisdom, one of God’s “good things,” to help you grow more aware of your emotions and of how you come across to others.

Keep on thanking Him as you recognize the increase in your life. By confession and gratitude, we free up more space in our souls for God until we become people who ourselves are living in greater freedom and looking more and more like Him.

Prayer

Lord, I want to love like David loves. I want to worship only you as Lord and King of my life. Cover me with your love and your holiness. Help me walk in the light of your goodness. Amen.

I lift up my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip—he who watches over you will not slumber; indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord watches over you—the Lord is your shade at your right hand; the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all harm—he will watch over your life; the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore. Psalm 121

When I read this Psalm, the items mentioned in the title are the images that come to mind. So often, life feels precarious. Circumstances we didn’t ask for or didn’t see coming can, in effect, pull the carpet right out from under us, and reveal not a solid floor to stand on, but thin air. How do we ever find solid footing in places that offer no stability, but are instead full of turbulence, shifting sands, or mere vapors of broken promises and disappointed expectations?

Life has a way of leading us to believe that we are going crazy. We’ve all seen the pictures of the insane person attempting to walk the tightrope over the roaring and surging Niagara Falls. “I would never do a foolish thing like that. Too risky,” we say to ourselves. And then, overnight, the world can change, and we are left looking out across a vast expanse of nothing. “How do I survive now?” we wonder.

Psalm 121 tells us to look to the mountain. We must lift up our eyes and place them on the unmovable mountain that is higher than us. Our help will come from there. The mountain is the Lord. He is the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip. In those places and at those times when nothing but a flimsy little thread stretches out before us as the only path anywhere to follow, the Lord not only makes each step secure, he builds the road for us to walk on. One small section at a time. Just wide enough to support our next step.

The Psalm goes on to say that he who watches over you will not slumber. Indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.

Israel was God’s chosen. The man Jacob, renamed to Israel, and the entire nation that grew from his family line, enjoyed God’s favor. They act as a picture to us as the value God places on his children. They are his treasure, his safe full of money, his vault full of jewels. This sort of wealth isn’t treated casually. Rather, it is guarded day and night. While everyone else is sleeping, God is awake, attentive and alert to any potential danger. He is on the job all the time, better than the most experienced security guard stationed at the door of the wealthiest business in the biggest city.

Because God guards our lives so vigilantly, we can rest in him completely. Psalm 131 uses the image of a weaned child, a baby, with its mother. Verse 2 says, “I have calmed and quieted myself. I am like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child, I am content.”

The Lord keeps you from all harm.

He watches over your life.

He watches over you now, in the present, throughout the rest of your life into the future, and even after you die into eternity.

Nothing can snatch you away from his care, and even the most dangerous and precarious situations work for your good.  

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Psalm 46:1

This psalm has always struck me as rather audacious. It makes claims that make me want to sit back and respond with a bit of doubt or skepticism. Does God really do all the things this psalm claims, and if he does, then how do I know, and where can I see it happening?

The psalm starts out talking of the worst events that could possibly happen. Mountains falling. Seas roaring and roaming. It looks like a picture of absolute destruction, of the kind that would follow the overthrow of a government, the disintegration of a nation, the ruin of entire families and cultures, or in our case, a deadly plague. The image is scary, unsettling, and leaves a person feeling small and powerless in the face of so much turmoil and disaster.

 But the psalm makes really bold claims, as if the most terrible situations act as a point of reference for the power of God. Mountains are falling into the sea, you say? Well let me show you how much larger God is, the psalm boasts. The waters roar and foam? They are harmless. They only serve to prove God’s greater strength. Because while turmoil, chaos, and destruction abounds, all God has to do is speak.

When he lifts his voice, the earth melts. No force can stand against him. He is a fortress, a refuge, the exalted King. He is nearer to us than danger, more present to us than friends or family. He lives within. He upholds and strengthens so that we, like the city mentioned in verse 4, will not fall. God will help her. God will help us.

After making these statements, the psalm gloats over one last campaign of its hero. Come and see what the Lord has done, it invites. Look how thoroughly he defeated the enemy. He makes wars cease. He breaks bows, shatters spears, and burns shields. He rules the nations for his people’s good. The destroyer he destroys. The desolator he desolates.

Evil and sin, disease and death are dealt with once and for all. God is King. He is a sovereign ruler, holy warrior, and the obvious champion. We can find our refuge in him.  

Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.” Nehemiah 8:10

The much anticipated day had arrived after long preparation. Nehemiah had been back in Jerusalem for several months making repairs and restoring the government. People moved back home to inhabit the lands and houses of their ancestors after spending several decades as foreigners in Babylon. Finally the day came to assemble in the square to hear Ezra the priest read the precious words of God as recorded by Moses in the Book of the Law.

Ezra opened the book and praised the Lord, the great God. All the people lifted their hands and responded, “Amen! Amen!” Then they bowed down and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground. (Nehemiah 8:5-6).

But as the day progressed and the meaning of the words sank in, the people began to weep. How far they had strayed from these beautiful words of truth. Could they ever return to the harmonious way of life suggested in these commandments that welcomed the habitation of a holy God among them?

Then Nehemiah the governor spoke up. He told the people to celebrate, to share, and to find joy in the Lord. The joy is where their strength would come from. The joy would restore their souls and invite God’s presence among them.

In his book, Nearing Home, Billy Graham writes about the headline of an article that appeared in 2010 on a Tokyo website titled, “A robot suit that gives super strength to the elderly.” Included with the article was a picture of the power suit modeled not by a senior adult but by an athletic youth. The caption stated that the heavy-duty suit weighs sixty-six pounds and will be originally priced at 1 million yen (approximately $12,000). Billy writes that he asked himself, “How many people my age (he was 93 at the time) have the strength to carry around sixty-six pounds for an hour, much less all day, and who could possibly afford such an expense? He says that he was relieved that the article indicated that there were no plans to sell the suits overseas. Billy writes that he is content struggling to get his shoes on each morning.

Billy went on to say that he had to look carefully at the article to discern just how an exoskeleton suit made of metal and plastic could give any strength. The secret was not in the suit but in the eight electric motors and sensors responding to commands through a voice-recognition system, enabling the body to lift and bend without strain to the muscles. While this futuristic invention may never be seen in our department stores, the brainstorming behind it reveals man’s desire for strength and power beyond himself.

Nehemiah had a better idea for finding that strength beyond ourselves. Instead of wearing a heavy suit that costs too much money and relies on motors and sensors, why not look to the Lord for power?

He encourages the people to do this on the day of the reading of the Law. His words are, “This day is holy to the Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.” The day of the reading of the Law was an occasion on which the people were especially to recall God’s past acts of grace and salvation. It deserved celebration, not because of the circumstances the people were in of remembering the wrongs of the past or rebuilding a destroyed hometown, but because of who God was. He gave them protection. He kept his promises. He stayed faithful.

God’s abundance and blessing are the source of true and lasting joy. Nehemiah encouraged the people to rejoice in him, to praise him, and to depend on him. We must do the same. This is the secret to keeping that flame of contentment and pleasure in who God is alive in our hearts.

Joy is a glorious, unending circle. We recognize our needs and weaknesses and look to God. He supplies graciously and generously until his provisions fill our lives and overflow into the lives of others. We can rest in his strength. He helps us when we are weak. He promises to uphold us, to strengthen and protect us.

Praise be to the Lord, for he has heard my cry for mercy. The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and he helps me. My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him. Psalm 28:6-7

Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress, my God in whom I trust.” Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge. His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not fear the terror of night, or the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday. “Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him. I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. He will call on me, and I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation.” Psalm 91:1-6; 14-16

I’ve been trying my best to avoid writing a devotional on the topic of the Coronavirus just because I’ve witnessed some overreaction to the threat and I didn’t want to risk adding to the fears. Neither did anything I was coming up with to say seem fitting. Scripture can start to sound trite in moments of crisis, and since I wanted to make sure and offer only helpful words in my weekly devotionals, I was intending to stay the course and focus only on Lent.

But the situation is changing quickly and affecting us right here at home with the cancellation of our church services, the closing of our schools, and the careful health screening taking place in the organization where I work. The time has come to interrupt our meditation on Lent and focus on the situation facing us.

Psalm 91 makes bold promises. It says God will cover, deliver, protect, answer, rescue, honor, and show salvation. This is a pretty exhaustive list. It affirms and builds on what we learned about God in Psalm 103. He is a good Father, attentive to his children and always at work on their behalf.

One of the reasons I chose Psalm 91 as the Scripture for this crisis-themed devotional is because of the use of the word pestilence. This is what we are dealing with in the spread of destructive disease. Verse 3 says he will deliver from the deadly pestilence. It is mentioned again in verse 6. The psalm says we will not fear the terror of night or the arrows that fly by day or the pestilence that stalks in darkness or the plague that destroys at midday.

This seems a rather outrageous thing to say. Anyone can get sick. Anyone can get shot down by a flying arrow of destruction. When disease seems to be everywhere and spreading out of control, who are we to claim any degree of safety and protection from it?

Look at the Psalm a little closer. It is written to a certain group of people. That group includes those who live in the shelter of the Most High, who abide in the shadow of the Almighty, and who find refuge in God. These are the ones who are assured, as verse 15 states, that God will be with them in trouble.

If we look further, we discover that there is one more phrase on which all the deliverance and all the protection depends. It is in verse 4: His faithfulness is a shield and rampart. There it is. We can take refuge in God and trust in him because his faithfulness shields us. The verse uses the word rampart together with the word shield. A rampart is an elevated mound of land with a fortress built on it for the purpose of defense. God is our shield, and he is our defense. He is faithful. We can rest and be at peace behind these layers of protection.

If you are wondering today how to make sure you are living in the shelter of the Most High, and want to continue to remain in his shadow, here are some ways to enter in for the first time, or to stay in that place and not wander away from God’s care:

Spend time reading the psalms. If you are like me, this book of poetry has been bred into you from a young age through song and prayer. I find that the words that surface in times of anxiety are words from the Psalms. If you are new to the Psalms, it is never too late to learn to love them and find comfort in them. Here are some Psalms to consider reading over the next weeks: Psalm 23, Psalm 46, Psalm 84, Psalm 91, and Psalm 103.

Practice generosity. Find ways to share, to support others, and to give away. Those who find refuge in God are rich in so many ways that a frightened, anxious world needs. We can be examples of strength and peace, the very things so many others are searching for.

Continue with the Lenten practices of confession and prayer. This opens up greater capacity in our lives to trust God more deeply.

His faithfulness shields you. It sustains you in times of trouble, and it gives you a safe place to rest.

Prayer

Eternal God, your Son is the healer of our sickness. We pray for those who are ill or who are passing through difficult times, that they know the love of friends to support them. May we all live in the power of Christ that sustains us. Amen.

Bless the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget all his benefits—who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the Pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good as long as you live, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s. Psalm 103:2-5

Isn’t that a wonderful description of God? He forgives, he heals, he redeems, he crowns, and he satisfies. How good it feels to know we have such a Father. We can go to him with anything.

These qualities listed in Psalm 103 declare God’s abilities while also implying our needs. Our iniquities need forgiven. Our lives would slip into a pit of God didn’t rescue us and pull us out. We’d have no sense of our value if God didn’t crown us. Our lives would fill with chaos and cruelty if he didn’t anchor us in steadfast love and mercy. We’d never develop the taste for heavenly delicacies if God didn’t first prove himself satisfying. The energy and strength of our souls would waste away if God wasn’t there to sustain us over and over again.

In this season of Lent, we have the great privilege and honor to spend time with our Heavenly Father making these divine exchanges. If your life harbors sin, confess it to him. He will replace it with forgiveness. If you are sick and struggling with your health, surrender it to him and he will heal you. If you’ve slipped into a pit of despair, discouragement, or shame, call out to him and he will redeem you. If your life is filling up with chaos or mistreatment, stand before the throne and await your new identity. If you’ve looked everywhere and tried everything in your search for contentment, release those desires to the Lord and let him fill those places with good things.

Lent is a time of change. This season is a grace allowed to us for healing, redemption, and forgiveness. Take the step of faith today to give to the Father that one struggle or that great pain that weighs you down and hinders your ability to get ahead. The Lord may have allowed it into your life for just this kind of a moment. He wants you to see what he can give. He wants you to understand how much greater are his resources and love than your needs and limitations. Call out to him. Stand before him. He’s waiting for you.

Prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father, I take the step of faith today to let you see into a deeper corner of my heart. I stand in need of your forgiveness, your healing, and your redemption. Help me to receive these things from you. Amen.

I come to the end—I am still with you. Psalm 139:18

Psalm 139 is a lovely meditation on God’s creation of his children and his care for them. In the middle of the psalm is a section dedicated to the formation of a life (verse 13-18). At the end of this section the psalmist marvels at the weight and the number of God’s thoughts. He closes by saying, “I come to the end, and I am still with you.”

The psalmist recognizes that God determines the beginning of a life. He also orchestrates the end of it. Life and death. Beginning and ending. Creation and elimination. God knows when an ending will come before the beginning even starts. This may sound unsettling, but to the psalmist, it is comforting. He welcomes endings because of the one fact that through it all, he is still with God.

He knows that nothing can separate him from God’s love. Romans 8:35 says that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, not trouble, or hardship, or persecution, or famine or nakedness, or danger or sword. All of these conditions have the power to put an end to something, but even if they succeeded, God would still be there.

This is due to his great faithfulness. Psalm 91 calls his faithfulness a shield (verse 4). Nothing can penetrate it, and attacks can’t destroy it. God is present, and he has made the commitment to stay present to those whom he has chosen (Romans 8:33), to those who abide in him (Psalm 91:1), and to those who love him (Psalm 91:14).

Endings are not traumatic to God. He sees them as times to enlarge our souls, to create new things, and to bring us to an awakening. Most translations use the word “awake” in this verse. In the NIV, for example, verse 18 reads, “when I am awake, I am still with you.” Awakening implies that a person has been asleep. In the psalmist’s interpretation of beginnings and endings, he interprets awakening as the entrance into eternity. God formed him on earth, determined his last day, and woke him into forever.

We can find great comfort in this interpretation too. Everyone faces endings. A loved one’s life will someday end. The career will someday end. A cherished relationship will someday end. But we won’t lose. We will only gain.

Romans 14:8 says, “If we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s.”

We come to the end, and we are still with God. If Romans 14 and Psalm 91 and Psalm 139 are true, then the only option left to us when we arrive at an ending is new life. God creates where nothing yet exists. He resurrects when all we see is loss. He gives new life when the old way of doing things has worn out.

Look at your own life. Pay attention to those places where you’ve come to an end. God just might be gathering energy and provisions to bless you with a rich, new life.

Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Psalm 37:3

Saturday afternoon, I was in conversation with someone about an area of our life together as a nation that seems to be growing increasingly volatile and unstable. Many of our thoughts in this discussion began with “what if?” Other times, we admitted that we don’t know what to do. Neither could we think of anyone who had the answers.

Psalm 37 was written for times like these. It starts off with the admonishment not to fret. Don’t worry. We might witness people making foolish decisions, and we might feel the tension that results from wrongdoing, but the psalm reminds us that every person has their limitations. Like grass that flourishes for a season, the day comes when agendas and grasps at power cease. Strength wilts. Ill intentions die away.

The person living in trust of the Lord has no reason to fear. Later in the psalm, the statement is found in verses 18 and 19, “the blameless spend their days under the Lord’s care, and their inheritance endures forever. In times of disaster, they will not wither. In days of famine, they will enjoy plenty.”

The evil person withers but the person under the Lord’s care does not. That is because the Lord himself helps them and delivers them. He is their stronghold in time of trouble.

The message of Psalm 37 carries an undertone of justice. It says that the righteous will receive reward and vindication. It also says that evil has limits. It may flourish for a while, but it doesn’t bother God. His precepts are set. His word stands unchanging, righteous, and holy. His people can take great comfort in that.

Psalm 37 lays out a course of action a person can take to make sure they dwell in the land of the safe pasture verse 3 speaks of, starting with the encouragement to not worry. The Lord sees all that happens. He will take care of those who trust in him.

Take delight in the Lord. When we do this, he will give us the desires of our hearts.

Commit your way to him. When we are intentional about handing control of our lives over to God, he fights our battles for us. We can rest in the outcome because a wise and perfect Heavenly Father is on our side striving for our victory.

Wait patiently for him. Pain is uncomfortable, but if we have the endurance to keep waiting and trusting, we will receive what he has promised.

Refrain from anger. According to verse 8, anger is a result of fretting, which is another word for worry. Stay calm and trust. Let the Lord move. Give him time to bring circumstances to pass according to his plan.

Hope in the Lord. Keep his way. Don’t waver in your confidence of his care for you. Conditions can get really bad, and they might stay that way for an indefinite amount of time, but it doesn’t mean God has changed, or that he has forgotten. His love for us will eventually win the day. Every time.

If I had the chance to go back in time and redo that Saturday conversation, instead of joining in the biting of nails and the trembling of knees while asking “what if?” or “what should we do?” I would say, “Wait on the Lord. Trust in him. Delight in him. Look to him for strength and refuge.” This is the key to safety. When we don’t know what will happen and we are tempted to fear the worst, we can stand on the facts of who God is. The inheritance that comes from his lasts forever. The pasture with him as the fence as well as the gate is the safest place, and we are welcome to stay, and to abide there.

In this season of Thanksgiving, we are called to step away from the battle, the crisis, the tension, and remember.  Where has God been fighting a battle for you? Where has he shown himself faithful as refuge and stronghold? How has he satisfied the desires of your heart? Consider taking time in prayer this week to thank him for these things, even as you continue to wait and trust, to hope and to endure.

Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. Luke 6:27-28

A true tragedy, larger and sadder even than any of the social issues that concern us today, is a heart with no room to take in the good. I wonder if this tragedy might actually be at the root of the other things in our world that seem to always be going wrong.

In pondering Jesus’ words in Luke 6, I found myself asking if perhaps I was on the other side of the command. From our first days in Sunday school, we hear the admonishment to love our enemies. To do good. To bless. To pray, and to turn the other cheek. If I were to evaluate my success at following Jesus’ teaching, I would have to confess that I would receive a failing grade. Less than 50 percent of the instruction is followed less than 50 percent of the time. An F. That doesn’t look so good on the saintly report card.

If I, if you, if we, fail to love and bless and pray, then does that lead to the conclusion that perhaps I am the enemy, the hater, the one doing the cursing, the one mistreating someone else? Hmm. How do we know which side of Jesus’ instruction we stand on? Is it possible to raise our grade in the class of compassion and live in such a way that even though we may not feel like doing these things, we recognize the situations in which they are needed and we are at least willing to follow the teaching?

No one will do it perfectly. Everyone struggles to love enemies or to remember in prayer the person who knows how to make life miserable over and over again.

But there are ways to grow in love.

We must empty the heart of pride so that we can give as well as receive. Then we must decide with God what doing good looks like, and remember that standard so that negative responses don’t cause us pain.

Use written prayers to pray in those times when we don’t know how to pray for a difficult person, or when we don’t feel like praying. Let the written prayer speak for us before the throne of God.

Remember the golden rule. This sounds trite, but it works. Do to others as you would have them do to you. When that angry retaliation wants to slip from your mouth, clamp your teeth together and pause. If you wouldn’t want to hear the words pressing on your tongue, then you’d better not say them to anyone else, either. But, if you would be helped or made to feel special, knowing you are blessed and prayed for, then you should try to also give those gifts away. What joy flows from knowing we were loved by someone in this way even though we can recall from the past ways we hurt them. This is what grace looks like, and it spreads when we choose to give.

Forget. The wrongs from last year, last week, or even an hour ago have no place in the present. Let them roll off. We belong to a Lord who loves us deeply, so any lack of respect or heartless treatment has no power to define us or determine our response. We can live as people who shine with grace and love all the time because he who is in us is greater than he who is in the world (I John 4:4).

After attempting to practice these things, what is the good that we start to receive? It can be called so many things such as higher levels of compassion, patience, a deeper sense of confidence that we are taken care of, and a stronger desire to share these good things with others. We can’t do it if we are full of pride or holding onto grudges. Take courage and forgive, let go, and bless the others around you. Then our hearts will be good, and they will be full of good.

Written prayers from the Book of Common Prayer

O God, you made us in your own image, and you have redeemed us through your son Jesus Christ. Look with compassion on us all. Take away the arrogance and hatred which infect our hearts. Break down the walls that separate us. Unite us in the bonds of love, and work through our struggles and confusion to accomplish your purposes. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

 

Merciful Savior, you loved Martha and Mary and Lazarus, hallowing their home with your sacred presence. Bless my home, I pray, that your love may rest upon us, and that your presence may dwell with us. May we all grow in grace and in the knowledge of you, our Lord and Savior. Teach us to love one another as you have commanded. Help us to bear one another’s burdens, O blessed Jesus, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit live and reign, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

 

 

The expert of the law replied, “The one who has mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.” Luke 10:37

The parable of the Good Samaritan is an easy story to interpret as a lesson on offering charity and practicing kindness. Those insights are perfectly true and stand as concepts we should take away from the parable. And yet there is something much deeper Jesus wants the well-educated expert of the law to understand. This lawyer had all the right answers. His head knowledge was impeccable. But the condition of his heart remained unknown, and his heart is what Jesus is addressing.

This story opens up to us the sharpest of ironies. The priest, the man who had just fulfilled his two-week shift at the Jerusalem temple ushering worshipers into God’s presence, is the assumed choice for lending aid in the story. But what does the priest do? He swerves the donkey he is riding out of the way of the man in need. The priest actually goes to a lot of work to avoid the injured man. Why? Because the priest must follow a long list of rules in order to stay ritually clean enough to keep his job. If the man in the ditch were dead, and if the priest were to touch him, then a complicated and time-consuming process faced the priest before he could again serve as mediator between God and the people.

The Levite, as assistant to the priest, was in a similar situation. He must maintain cleanliness according to the law in order to serve at the temple. He probably saw the priest, his boss on the job at the temple, ignore the man in the ditch and knew that he, too, must ride on without stopping or his cleanliness would be compromised and the reputation of his boss damaged. The Levite knew that if the priest, as the highest authority didn’t stop, then he as the subordinate shouldn’t either or his actions might bring humiliation on the priest.

We can follow this reasoning well enough and perhaps even excuse the temple staff for their apparent hard-heartedness. But in reality, the lack of compassion on the part of the priest and the Levite landed them in the same class with the robbers. These leaders stole from the injured man. While the robbers took his money and clothes, the priest and Levite deprived him of dignity and the opportunity to receive practical assistance. They were riding donkeys which meant that if they would have stopped for this man, they could have provided him with instant security as well as the time saved in travel to the nearest shelter.

But they were too concerned about keeping the rules. The thieves were bound by greed. The priest and Levite were bound by legalism. The first irony Jesus exposes is the fact that in order to show mercy, a heart must already live with a degree of freedom. Compassion doesn’t flow out of bondage to whatever selfish pursuit has power over us. It flows from a heart that is free.

To build on that, the Samaritan illustrates the second irony. True mercy, true compassion, requires sacrifice. Only the free heart has the capacity to give anything away. Sacrifice asks for the path to change. Not to go out of the way to avoid the inconvenience and discomfort of showing mercy, but to alter the course so that it leads right to the place of suffering.

The Samaritan took a great risk to help the man on the side of the road. Dismounting from his donkey put him in danger of becoming the next victim of a robbery. Taking this man into the next town inhabited by full-blooded Jews who viewed him, a half-breed Samaritan, as an enemy, put him in danger of getting beat up and coming out the loser of a brawl, or getting run out of town completely.

This example of the Samaritan leads to the third irony. In full knowledge of the danger, the Samaritan cared for the man anyway. He loved past the point of pain. Sacrifice and giving of ourselves can be painful. But as this story illustrates, if we are willing to do that we reach a new level of love spacious in its freedom and rewarding in its ability to give.

How do we achieve these levels of compassion and freedom? They come from the measure of God’s love residing in us.

Push past selfishness. Push past keeping all the rules and knowing the right answers. Love past the point of pain. In the end the love of God absorbs the pain leaving us with hearts living in freedom and full of mercy.