Sunday, July 14, 2019

15^th Sunday in Ordinary Time/Proper 10/5^th Sunday after Pentecost

First Reading: Amos 7:7-17
Psalm 52
Second Reading: Colossians 1:1-14
Gospel Reading: Luke 10:25-37

The liturgical color for the day is: Green

Jesus turns to the lawyer and asks him, “Which of the three was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hand of the robbers?  The lawyer responds, “The one who showed him mercy.”

Yes.  The right answer.  Jesus tells him, “Go and do likewise.”

We are not the lawyer.  We are that one on the road.  We are that one who has been left there.  And God is the one who comes along in Christ and through the cross binds up our wounds and takes us in to care for us.  God is the one who saves us.  God is the one who meets us on the road when the rest pass us by and pass us over.

We are the ones who have been rescued.  As such the challenge to the lawyer is the challenge to us too.  “Go and do likewise.”  We are to be that neighbor.

Of such is the call of God.  Of such is the makings of our apostleship in Christ.  It is what it means to be baptized and to be called into faithfulness.  It is what it means to be Christian.

For Amos there was that prophecy of the plumb line.  Things were literally crocked and that which is crocked will not endure.  A structure that is built out of plumb or out of “true” is one that will not last.  We find our “true” not by drawing the line but by realizing that God has so drawn us in that we are rescued on the road.  We are the saved.  We have been drawn on the God side of the plumb line.

Our mission…our opportunity is to “go and do likewise.”

Rev. Dr. Daris Bultena
General Presbyter