Scripture Readings for April 11, 2025

Jeremiah 20:10-13, Psalm 18: 2-7, John 10:31-42

What attracted my attention in today’s readings is the point John is trying to make in the Gospel. The pharisees are picking up rocks to stone Jesus for pretty plainly claiming to be God’s son. Why does this seem strange to me? After all John’s writing a Gospel, literally a story of good news that claims Jesus is God, one with the Father and that makes all the difference for us today. Why should this catch my attention?

I think the point that strikes me is that besides the big religious question of whether Jesus is the Son of God, the pertinent issue for me is these guys are questioning Jesus’ identity. They are challenging who he claims to be and that is very relevant to us today. We are acutely aware, today even more than generations before, of what personal identity means for our happiness and ability to succeed in everyday life.

If we start with personal identity, I think there is an encouraging message these readings have to say to us right now. Jeremiah’s in a very similar situation. People he considers friends are waiting for him to trip up so they can “take … vengeance on him.” They think “any misstep” of his will lead to him being “trapped.”  But Jeremiah says he will trust that God will save him because God knows their “mind and heart” and will put them to shame. This same line in my favorite bible translation, New Jerusalem Bible, is translated as, God the “observer of motives and thoughts.” God knows who everyone is deep in their soul. What does God do in this situation? God “rescued the life of the poor from the power of the wicked.” This is not about economic poverty this is about the fragility of our souls. Who of us has not felt the challenge when friends or loved ones question our motives, our desires, our inner most feelings. It is hard to stay true to oneself when others are dismissive of what we value.

This is exactly what’s happening to Jesus in the Gospel. Even though he is doing lots of good things. People don’t see that as evidence of who he really is. They seek to stone him for who he claims to be. Here is the key to this story in John’s Gospel, “they tried again to arrest him; but he escaped from their power.” He escaped from their power, the power to question his identity. He was strong enough to know who he was and not be intimidated.

As is often the case, today’s Psalm tells us what Jesus knew, what Jeremiah did and what we should do, “In my distress I called upon the Lord, and he heard my voice.” If we believe that Jesus was the presence of God on this earth. Then we can trust that God is active deep within us and available to rescue us from the actions, attitudes and beliefs that can be destructive of our wellbeing.

Scripture Readings for April 9, 2025

Daniel 3:14-20, 91-92, 95, Daniel 3:52-56, John 8:31-42

Today’s readings are about the challenge of living what we believe. Both readings pit the believer against the establishment of the time. For Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego the challenge is the pagan god and statue set up by Nebuchadnezzar. In John’s Gospel, Jesus faces a group of Jews, some of whom think as descendants of Abraham they are automatically God’s children.

What stands out for me in Daniel is the comment of Nebuchadnezzar that these men “yielded their bodies” rather than worship a god other than their own. They acted on their faith. The situation they were in was not some theoretical exercise or test to see if they could answer the catechism questions correctly. They lived their faith by the decision they made in that moment. That’s something that is relevant to us. Do we believe enough in the love and mercy of God to make tough decisions when the prevailing authority wants us to do the opposite?

Jesus faces a similar situation with Jews who think their heritage affords them the privileged position. Today this might look like Christians who know their Bible or Catholics who know all the catechism answers. It’s one thing to know about your faith and another thing to actually trust in God day to day. That’s what Jesus is pointing to when he says, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing the works of Abraham.”

The way John presents this argument Jesus sees these people as slaves of sin and therefore not only not free but as children of the evil one. If they were children of God they would recognize Jesus as the authentic voice of God. Today we probably wouldn’t suggest the same dichotomy between believers and non-believers. But it is fair to remind ourselves that faith exists only to the extent we live it. Faith is not primarily a mental exercise. It is trust in a God who shares our lives, loves us, forgives us, and supports us in ways we often may not recognize. The choices we make may not be as dramatic as Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego facing a fiery furnace but assuredly they are just as important in making us who we are. Sometime we have to, just do it. Because if we believe in Jesus’ loving God then we too must be loving, forgiving and supportive of others even when it may not seem like such a good idea. There is no other way to be a child of God.

Scripture Readings for April 4, 2025

Wisdom 2:1a, 12-22, Psalm 34:17-21, 23, John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30

          These are readings about division and conflict. John’s Gospel was written at a time of division in their community and it’s reflected here in the argument over who Jesus is. Some people wonder if he is the Messiah while others want to kill him. A similar outlook is portrayed in Wisdom. Sinful people are plotting against an upright man, a good person who they despise because he is good and is a challenge by his very life to their behavior. The Psalm voices what God offers, mercy and love regardless of past behavior.

          Do we face the same challenges today? Can we decide how to act in the face of daily life? Is this about what is hidden? Are there things that block our ability to be honest with ourselves and others, about how we feel and want to act. Maybe this is about false fronts, clever deceptions that mostly fool ourselves. Can we uncover where we are truly coming from. Some people in Jerusalem thought Jesus was just from Nazareth in Galilee. They believed that the Messiah would come boldly from some hidden place. Therefore, this couldn’t be the Messiah. But like the people in our Wisdom reading they were being misled by their own defensive attitudes, jealousy and self-absorption.

“We see him as a reproof to our way of thinking
The very sight of him weighs our spirits down;
For his kind of life is not like other people’s
And his ways are quite different.” (Wisdom 2:14-15)

Jesus was in fact coming from a very hidden place, the divine life of his Father.

 But to accept that takes knowing “the hidden things of God,” hoping for “the reward of holiness,” and believing in “a reward for blameless souls.” (Wisdom 2:22)

          In today’s language, I would say it takes an openness to life and the people who care for us. Facing what we hide, our own failings and fears. That’s the only way to see ourselves honestly and be able to live a life that doesn’t seek to crucify those who are different or simply disagree with us. To recognize that we don’t need to be defensive.

          We need to listen to what our Psalm says, “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted.” It’s just that we have to accept that we too are brokenhearted and need the love and support of all the people around us. That’s how we experience the love of God by getting beneath our facades into our hidden places so we can live the life we were meant to live, one of love, generosity and gratefulness.

Scripture Readings for April 2, 2025

Isaiah 49:8-15, Psalm 145: 8-9, 13cd-14, 17-18, John 5:17-30

These readings are about the basics of our faith, the foundational principles we should never forget. In Isaiah, God is speaking about loving the people of God no matter what, bringing them back to an ideal world. The Psalm is about God’s mercy and how God is always with us. Finally, John’s Gospel makes clear that Jesus is God’s very presence among us doing God’s work.

It’s easy to forget some of this, to let the prescriptive rules of Lent or what was often a church culture that emphasized penance and the examination of our consciences to avoid sin push us down the rabbit hole of doubt, worry and fear. Rather we need to hear today’s readings and take them to heart.

God’s message has always been one of hope, beginning with the idea that we are not left to our own devices. Isaiah uses the extreme example that even if a mother were to abandon her child God will not abandon us. Jesus in John’s Gospel makes clear he does nothing on his own. What Jesus, a living breathing human being from the little town of Nazareth, does is the work God is doing. The person of Jesus is a message to us about how close God is to our lives. We do not operate on our own much as we might think we do. The question is, can we hear what God present in the world around us is trying to say? Can we read Isaiah and accept the possibility of a road, a pathway that cuts through the mountains of challenges, the stacks of worry, the treacherous terrain of life and provides the refreshing spring of water that satisfies our thirst?

Today’s Gospel is filled with statements of how Jesus does what God does, how Jesus can give life just as God gives life, how believing in Jesus takes a person from death to life. This is all about how God’s presence in Jesus, God’s presence in the world, is transformative and can make all things new here in this world, in this life. That is the promise of the Christian faith that we should believe.

In general, the challenge for us is we are often coming from a place where we struggle, falter and fail to live as we have hoped. We can feel guilty for little and big things. It all can become a problem, a burden that feels too big to solve. Which is where today’s Psalm can help remind us of God’s mercy.

No matter how off the path we might go, God, the one as near to us as ourselves, still loves and accepts who are and is ready for us let go of whatever is doing the damage. We can change our way of thinking, our attitudes, and how we feel about ourselves.

It is today’s Psalm that perhaps best captures the message:

The LORD is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of great kindness.
The LORD is good to all and compassionate toward all his works.

To this message of love and mercy we add the element expressed in today’s Gospel, “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.” God is still at work. Jesus is still at work. John is trying to tell us that the world is not finished but still being created by all who live in it. Because it’s a joint project, God and all God’s creation. We, with God, are creating that wonderful world Isaiah foresees and it’s to be done with compassion, graciousness and mercy supplied by God so we can try and try again, do better and find our path to a space of peace and joy.

Scripture Readings for April 1, 2025

Ezekiel 47:1-9, 12; Psalm 46:2-3,5-6,8-9, John 5:1-16

Every time I read this passage from Ezekiel I love the image. The water that flows from the temple gets deeper and deeper, wider and wider and transforms the desert into a place of abundance even changing the salt water in the sea into fresh. It suggests to me the abundance that comes from God. It says abundance is what God wants for us. A place where there is new fresh fruit every month.

I believe the challenge for us to recognize the gift and appreciate the source. Clearly according to the Gospel not everyone is willing to rejoice over good things. A man who has been lame for 38 years is cured but Pharisees are angered because he picks up his mat on the Sabbath. It makes me wonder if there are good things that we miss because we’re too focused on something else. Are there things we decide are wrong, over react to, while good stuff escapes our notice? I know my personal issue is poor driving behavior. I can become obsessed with other drivers for not following the rules of the road. This includes when people stop the flow of traffic to let others in or let other cars turn into traffic before making their left turn off the road. They are probably trying to be nice. Sometimes I can let it go but other times I find myself upset that they are making up their own rules. So this is a very odd little example but I want to suggest that we all have things that we think of as right. We would say this is the way it’s supposed to be and that righteous attitude blocks our ability to actually experience the fullness of what is happening at the time. I suspect we all have some attitudes like that. The question is, if we can box ourselves in with petty little concerns like that, could we also be missing the big picture? When do our pre-conceptions interfere with what else might be happening. More simply, are we too quick to judge. Do we need to be more open?

I know of only one way to go after this kind of thing. Prayer. Praying to God about all of our life and its experiences. Talking to God and then listening to God’s response. We’re in Lent so this is a great time to put aside some additional time to spend in prayer. Maybe a kind of prayer we haven’t tried before. If you are a rosary person try praying with scripture. If you are great with scripture start examining your everyday experiences and talking to God about them. If you do lots of conversational prayer try the rosary as a meditation. In the end, it is about spending time with God so we can see the world in which we live as a person who has a deep trust in God’s involvement in our life and the lives of everyone around us.

If we’re going to get better at recognizing this world in all its aspects as something God gives us every day we have to spend more time deepening our relationship with God. Because on our own we’ll just reinforce our own prejudices. We’re like the lame man by the pool for 38 years, until Jesus comes along he can’t make it to the healing water in time. Jesus is the one who can heal us. Time spent in prayer is the flowing water that will wash us, heal us and quench our thirst.

Scripture Reading for Thursday March 27, 2025

Jeremiah 7:23-28, Psalm 95:1-2, 6-9, Luke 11:14-23

            Today’s readings are amazing examples of the deeply personal relationship God wants to have with us. I think too often we believe that life on this earth is some test God has given us so we can earn our reward in heaven. Today’s readings say otherwise.

            First, we hear God complaining to Jeremiah that his people aren’t listening to what God is saying. It sounds a bit like whining to me. Can you imagine? God whining? Well, at least complaining. Notice this section, “From the day, your ancestors left Egypt until today I have sent you all my servants, the prophets, persistently sending them day after day. But they have not listened to me, have not paid attention; they have deliberately resisted, behaving worse than their ancestors.”  This is somebody who is seriously frustrated with another’s behavior. What does God want? “My one command to them was this … Listen to my voice. … But they did not listen…” Sounds a little like a parent frustrated with their child, doesn’t it?

            But as with any loving parent there’s a good reason to be worried about what will happen if people won’t listen. That’s what Luke’s Gospel is about. Jesus is driving out the devil who has held a person captive as dumb.  But once the man can speak the Pharisees fail to recognize the power of God in their midst. Just like the ancestors from Jeremiah’s time they aren’t listening or in this case seeing what’s right in front of them. God is here, present, rescuing God’s people, freeing a person from the evil that had held him captive.

            That’s what God is trying to tell us all. There is evil in this world that can take us where we don’t want to go. Evil can be like a strong man who guards his home, bad things can be very powerful and destroy who we were meant to be. God wants only to keep us from what will lead to our destruction. God says listen to me and what I say because otherwise you risk your very life. It’s why Jesus draws the line so sharply, “Anyone who is not with me is against me; and anyone who does not gather with me scatters.” This is meant to be black and white. God wants us to live a life of love and happiness. It’s not a test. It’s an opportunity freely given and God has been worried from the beginning that we won’t listen or see what is offered and instead end up a captive to everything that harms us.

            That’s why the response to today’s Psalm is, “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts,” that is, listen, really listen!

Scripture Readings for March 21, 2025

Genesis 37:3-4, 12-13a, 17b-28a, Psalm 105:16-21, Matthew 21:33-46

            Let’s begin with the story in Matthew’s Gospel. This parable is an allegory of salvation history. God is the landowner who builds a vineyard. The tenants are the Hebrew people who are given charge of the vineyard in order to produce a good crop of grapes for the owner. The servants are the prophets God sends to collect the produce at the harvest. The son is Jesus who finally comes to get what the tenants have refused to hand over. The death of the son leads to God taking away the care of the vineyard from the original tenants and handing the vineyard over to new tenants who will respect the owner and the responsibility he has given them. For Matthew this was a story to explain how the Jewish leadership had failed to do what was expected of the chosen people.

            The question I have is what value does this story have for us today? The simplest approach would be to say that we are to be those new tenants of God’s vineyard. We are to bring about good fruit and at the proper time be able to give this produce, our lives on earth, to God as a product of our fidelity for God’s gifts. Gifts frankly that are supposed to be our salvation both here and in the eternal future. I think that’s a good understanding of this parable.

            However, that approach leaves out any consideration for the first reading from Genesis.  The Isaiah quote in the middle of the Gospel allegory caught my attention, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone …” What’s with this stone? The rejected stone is a theme that relates to salvation, the rebuilding of the temple, and the chosen people entering heaven or whatever form of final happiness you want to imagine. It’s the rejected stone that made me think.

So now consider that Joseph was Israel’s favorite son. His brothers want to do away with him. They sell him to traveling merchants who take him to Egypt. The brothers are rejecting Joseph. The same brother who years later will save his family from starvation by welcoming them to Egypt and the abundance he helped create.

            In the same way Jesus is rejected by the Jewish leadership of his time. In the Gospel the tenants say explicitly “This is the heir. Come on, let us kill him and take over his inheritance.” Jesus is the rejected heir who is killed for his inheritance.

            We have parallel rejections. Both Joseph’s brothers and the tenants of the vineyard can’t see the good that is right in front of them. Joseph’s brothers are jealous of this dreamer, the tenants want more than they have a right to. They’re both willing to throw away what they have so they can get something they think will be more or better. The brother’s want their father’s favor and the tenants want all the profits or even the vineyard itself. I think together, today’s readings are about the failure to recognize the good we have right now in our own lives. Nurturing, loving and appreciating those gifts, the life we have. Let’s not let the very life we are leading become its own stumbling stone to happiness. A happiness now that could well be the path to eternal happiness. Happiness that may all be part of the same larger reality.

Scripture Readings for March 18, 2025

Isaiah 1:10, 16-20, Psalm 50:8-9, 16-17, 21, 23, Matthew 23:1-12

When I first read today’s readings my reaction was, boy this is really heavy Lenten stuff. The readings present a clear challenge of turning our lives around. Turning from bad behavior to good behavior. But then I got defensive about it, I don’t know that my behavior is all “that bad”. I don’t think I have lots of really crimson sins or scarlet letters that need wiping away. Getting defensive kind of stopped me. Then after a little bit of time I read it again.

This time I noticed the very first words of Isaiah, “Hear the word of the Lord” and I noticed that what the Lord was saying was, “Come now, let’s set things right.” I realized that the readings weren’t so much about us and what we may or may not have done in the past. These readings are about moving forward and how God views our lives. When Isaiah talks about crimson red becoming white as snow or scarlet becoming white as wool it seems to me he is talking about the change itself. The subject is who we are now and not what we have done in the past. It suggests that what is important is our responding to God in this moment regardless of past behavior. That’s why even the worst of sins, those crimson and scarlet things, can become white as snow, because God wants us to be part of God’s plan, part of God’s life right now and going forward.

I think the message here is God doesn’t carry a grudge but makes all things new in this moment. We simply have to listen to God’s instruction today and respond. To do otherwise is to give past behavior power over our present. Worry and guilt about what we’ve done or should have done creates a burden God doesn’t see. It’s why Jesus in the Gospel is so hard on Pharisees and Scribes because they had gotten all caught up in what is required, rules that meant listening more to other people’s expectations instead of God. As leaders they worried about what other leaders would say, they looked for approval from others and therefore became more concerned about how things looked than for the real needs of other people. They were being hypocrites, betraying their tradition by letting the past tradition supplant what God was doing in the current moment, what people needed right now.

So Jesus’ advice is that we simply work together as servants of each other to help where we can, since none of us has the final answer or the ultimate truth. Our challenge is to “hear the word of the Lord”. That word can come to us in lots of ways: a reading from Scripture, a surprising family situation, a person in need, a friend offering to help. Life itself presents God’s word to us and we have to be ready to grasp it and respond. We have to do what the Psalm says, “Go the right way” and I would add, do it right now. Go the right way, right now. In the present moment respond to what God is asking of us and don’t worry about what came before. When we do that it will be like we wash ourselves clean and as our Psalm says, encounter “the salvation of God.”