Seventh Sunday after Pentecost
Reading – Hosea 1: 2-10; Psalm 85; Colossians 2: 6-19; Luke 11: 1-13
Let’s return to our appointed collect for today.
O God, the protector of all who trust in you, without whom
nothing is strong, nothing is holy: Increase and multiply upon
us your mercy; that, with you as our ruler and guide, we may
so pass through things temporal, that we lose not the things
eternal; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns
with you and the Holy Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.
May we pass through things temporal, that we lose not those things eternal… So, as we go about our daily lives, may we not lose sight of the larger picture, of the Holy Picture, of the things that are eternal, that are of God.
Again, drawing on this prayer, Increase and multiply upon us your mercy… At first reading this seems to be asking for God’s mercy on us. However, on a second reading, I think it is also a request for us to be mercy full. The sign by our Market Street double doors, Be Kind, is a level more easily achieved. To be mercy full goes beyond kind. It is to live a Good Samaritan life. It is to live like Jesus. In the proper collect we pray to live mercy full, even in our tough, challenging, unmerciful times. People, men, women, children and infants, are starving in Gaza. This is not mercy.
Health care workers are being recalled from around the world. This is not mercy. Vaccines and medicines are being destroyed, not distributed. This is not mercy.
I am praying for those impacted, and I trust you are, too. These prayers open our hearts, our minds and our eyes to people closer to home that also need adequate health care, to people closer to home that also need vaccines and medicines, to people closer to home that also are living with food insecurity. Those closer to home we can reach with mercy, to them we can be mercy full as God is mercy full. Prayer can open our hearts, our minds, and our eyes to extend our arms of mercy. Our arms of mercy are extended in concert with Jesus. We are mercy full as Jesus is mercy full. We work for God’s kingdom of mercy in partnership with Jesus.
As we work for God’s kingdom, we walk with Jesus into places we would not go on our own. In 23rd Psalm language, we walk through valleys of the shadow of death. In Good Samaritan language, we cross to the other side of the road, we comfort, we bandage, we anoint, we carry, we house, we fund, we care for strangers that have been bruised, beaten, and discarded for dead.
Our prayers mold us for action in new and perhaps dangerous mercy full actions.
Sometimes in our praying we ask, and it is not given. Unlike the passage from the Gospel according to St. Luke, we ask, we search, we knock, and it does not seem to go our way. We may wonder if this is a failure on our part, or is it a failure on God’s part. I believe our requests to God are always heard. Yet, God understands our ask, our search, our knock, better than we do. If we do not discover the request as we anticipate, it is because God has something better for us. There is no such thing as an unanswered prayer. Yes, the answer may not be the desired answer, or the expected answer, or the understood answer, but it is always an answer of the love God that we know best through Jesus Christ.
So, let us continue to say our prayers for they shape us, they transform us, they grow us, especially in tough times, through the valleys of the shadow of death. As the people of God, God calls us to be mercy full people.
Psalm 85, verse 7– “Show us your mercy, O Lord”, and we shall follow, for you are always the Way and the Truth and the Life.
Psalm 85, verse 12— “The Lord will indeed grant prosperity”.
Amen
