Sunday, August 29, 2021 – 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

The Revised Common Lectionary passages for the Lord’s Day are:
– First Reading: Song of Solomon 2:8-13
– Psalm 45:1-2, 6-9
– Second Reading: James 1:17-27
– Gospel Reading: Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

The liturgical color for the day is: Green

“The voice of my beloved.”  It is interesting that the ancient writer points out the truth that you hear that beloved one coming even before you see that beloved one.  It is about listening.  Do we listen to how we are living?  Do we hear the sounds of our life?  To listen one has to stop and one has to cease other activity in order take in the sound. 

I think such listening was the problem of the gospel lesson.  In the text, they were accusatory toward Jesus and his disciples for how they were eating.  They had not observed the purification rules as they should have before eating.  And Jesus tells them that it not what goes in a person that defiles that person but what comes out of that person.

It is easy for us to get so caught up in the minutia of life that we miss listening for the meaning of life.  It is so easy for us to only attend to what’s on the surface of how things are that we never attain any depth.  Whenever something happens if we draw a quick conclusion and are then convinced that this is how it is without looking (or listening) deeper—we risk the reality of not listening for what is really there for us.

To do so is to face the challenge of the Pharisee in Jesus’ day who wanted to make it about what he and his disciples had or had not done and in so doing missed the larger reality of who Jesus was with and why he was with them. 

Had they looked at that they would have seen his compassion and his passion for the poor and the downtrodden.  They were so busy only seeing the surface that they could not see the place where God was breaking into humanity.  They missed it because they did not see, and they surely did not listen for God.

Are we listening for the voice of God?

—

Rev. Dr. Daris Bultena
General Presbyter and Stated Clerk