15 June 2026 - understanding the assignment

Today's Readings
(Audio)

You have heard that it was said,
An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

Laws that were meant to prevent an escalation of violence in the public sphere were not to be used to justify revenge in private life. It was not the case that because it was the maximum permitted that one should take it as the minimum to be accepted. Maximums exist because of the necessity of maintaining society, which is only possible with consequences that deter bad actors. But they do not exist for us to indulge our own personal animosity toward others. If we are meant to be a people of peace and forgiveness we must understand the necessity of law and order but to try and to personally live a higher standard.

But I say to you, offer no resistance to one who is evil.
When someone strikes you on your right cheek,
turn the other one to him as well.

In the civil sphere the government must at least provide the possibility of resistance against those who are evil. But insofar as we can, without dismantling that protection, we are called to not personally impose or call for that resistance. We are instead called to a standard of nonviolence like that which was practiced by Jesus himself. This may include foregoing seeking legitimate legal protection or satisfaction. But we do not do this because we lack self-esteem or to make easy targets for evil people. We do so because our union with Christ makes it possible for us to absorb evil and transform it. We ourselves benefit by not encouraging a spirit of vengeance within our own hearts. And the other person benefits because they experience what it is like to be loved even when it would seem they have not earned it. While we were yet sinners Christ died for us. And while our enemies are still our enemies we must do our best to love them. After all, this is the only way the cycle of violence and retribution can ever truly be broken.

If anyone wants to go to law with you over your tunic,
hand him your cloak as well.

When we are required to respond out of obligation we tend to content ourselves with the bare minimum. There is no sense of compassion for the other, since they seem to be imposing their own will without regard for us. But we must not lose sight of the fact that even they are individuals created in the image and likeness of God. They are among the ones whose good we should desire for God's sake. And thus, our response should not be about what we can get away with ourselves so much as what the call of love would have us do for the other.

Should anyone press you into service for one mile,
go with him for two miles.

It is possible that we can so change the context of how we are seen by oppressors that they no longer feel able to sustain their hostility. Slogans, protests, shouting, and violence may cause an oppressor to think twice and wonder if hostility is worth the trouble. But they are unlikely make a convert out of him. They are unlikely to help him see the shared humanity of the oppressed. But if we love him we can transcend these limits. We can help reveal the artificiality of the barriers that divide us from each other, and point to the fact that we are meant all meant to be united in the one family of God.

When we first encounter the beatitudes they typically seem impossible, and then unreasonable. But eventually, when we understand the assignment, they become our privilege. We are invited to live like Jesus, to love like him, and to watch that love transform the world.

Give to the one who asks of you,
and do not turn your back on one who wants to borrow.

Hillsong Worship - To Be Like You

 

14 June 2026 - the chosen

Today's Readings
(Audio)

Therefore, if you hearken to my voice and keep my covenant,
you shall be my special possession,
dearer to me than all other people,
though all the earth is mine.

God chose the people of Israel in spite of the fact that they were far from the most impressive nation. It wasn't based on their merits that God desired them to be his special possession. It was on the basis of his choice, their election, that they were meant to be dearer to him than all other nations. There was a thread throughout the Old Testament of people who wanted to make a name for themselves, the instance of the Tower of Babel being among the most memorable. But God was not interested in helping with such projects. He rather chose the weak to shame the strong, even in the Old Testament before we really establish that as his primary MO. The instance of Gideon's army was just one such example. God desired to make clear that it was the strength of his arm and not the might of the soldiers that led to their salvation.

But God proves his love for us
in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

We were chosen not only in spite of the fact that we weren't particularly impressive in a worldly sense, but even in spite of the fact that we weren't particularly good. It wasn't as though God decided to forego the strong people and select the nice ones. It was rather his love that caused him to save us before we took even so much as a thought for him. When we were wrapped up in self-love he was imagining how he could bring each of us to realize his love for us. He did so with such a shocking display of gratuitous compassion that even the most self-centered of us would have no choice but to take notice. 

Indeed, if, while we were enemies,
we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son,
how much more, once reconciled,
will we be saved by his life.

God does not desire to leave us as he finds us, and it is for this reason that John Paul the Great said, "We are not the sum of our weaknesses and failures, we are the sum of the Father's love for us and our real capacity to become the image of His Son Jesus". The love of God genuinely transforms us. It is more than snow covering dung or a garment concealing the filth underneath. We actually become the righteousness of God (see Second Corinthians 5:21) and grow in our ability to participate in the life of grace, which is  God's own divine life. This is ultimately what is meant by salvation. It is through this gift that we finally become the "kingdom of priests" and "holy nation" that we were always meant to be.

At the sight of the crowds, Jesus’ heart was moved with pity for them 
because they were troubled and abandoned,
like sheep without a shepherd.

What Jesus saw in the crowd was reflective of the condition he saw throughout the world. His heart for others was so big, but his reach was limited to the people who could encounter his physical presence on earth. Thus he wanted to expand his reach but using his disciples as his hands and feet. And he not only wanted to do so, but wanted us to want it. We were not meant to take for granted that there would be laborers, but to join Jesus in pleading with his Father that they be sent. We were to have the same heart of compassion for the world, often in spite of itself, that Jesus demonstrated. 

Jesus also want those who interceded for this purpose to be open to the fact that they might be among those God called, indeed, in one sense or another they would be. But it wasn't necessarily because there was a fit between natural predispositions and the work at hand. It wasn't as everyone thought about himself and saw how natural of a fit he would be to undertake the mission and decided to do so on that basis. Rather, a person would first see the need, then desire that it to be filled, and then be delighted when the call of Jesus made it possible for him to participate in some way. The compassion and the call came first. Then Jesus himself equipped and qualified the ones he called for their specific part of his mission. They were never meant to undertake it on their own abilities alone, any more than Peter could walk on water without the call of Jesus telling him to come.

The names of the twelve apostles are these:
first, Simon called Peter, and his brother Andrew;
James, the son of Zebedee, and his brother John;
Philip and Bartholomew, Thomas and Matthew the tax collector;
James, the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddeus;
Simon from Cana, and Judas Iscariot who betrayed him.

If Jesus was able to start a Church that has endured through the ages into our own time using such a ragtag band as the pillars on which it was founded then we have no excuses for excusing ourselves from his call in our own lives, however great or small, public or hidden, that call may be. No matter how challenging it may seem, or how outnumbered we feel, the one thing necessary for success is to be called be Jesus. And we have been thus called.

There are many sheep that are still lost, still troubled and abandoned, still desperately in need of salvation. God wants to use us to help summon those who will be specially ordained or consecrated to the task. But he wants to use us directly as well. There is no limits to the compassion of his heart. And he desires that we place no limits on how that compassion can work in us and flow through us to the world.

Chris Tomlin - Jesus Messiah

 

13 June 2026 - no guarantees

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

Do not take a false oath,
but make good to the Lord all that you vow.
But I say to you, do not swear at all;
not by heaven, for it is God's throne;
nor by the earth, for it is his footstool;
nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.

The practice of swearing oaths had become so common that a person might have seemed insincere unless he resorted to one. People were expected to provide a level of certainty and assurance that they could not guarantee themselves. But many of the things that people wished to promise were too trivial to directly invoke God and ask for his assistance. So people tried a work around. They wanted to present their speech as more definitely connected to future results than mere creatures could. They thus attempted to insinuate divine assistance indirectly. Thus they could, as they thought, reap the benefits of an oath, and speak with certainty proper to God, without risking the consequences. They may have begun to think of themselves as people who could provide such certainty, even without reference to God or his providential care. No doubt the more they thought that way the more these empty oaths went unfilled. The expectations of others must gradually have eroded to the point where people no longer thought of such oaths as genuine, but more as a baseline of any kind of sincerity. Thus to make a promise without an oath must have seemed like one was not even trying. 

Do not swear by your head,
for you cannot make a single hair white or black.
Let your 'Yes' mean 'Yes,' and your 'No' mean 'No.'
Anything more is from the Evil One."

Jesus insisted that the way oaths were commonly used at the time was an abuse of the purpose for which they were intended, which was to safeguard the public good when it transcended individual interests. Taking an oath upon joining an army, or giving testimony, or taking office, were all such valid cases. But to merely strengthen an individual promise was generally not. He called his disciples to speak with the full knowledge that they were not in control of the future and could not alter its course by using more elaborate formulations of their promises. 

We may not be given to the abuse of oaths ourselves since they are no longer in vogue. But we do sometimes feel pressured to provide more assurance than we can realistically offer. And so make certain assumptions about the ways that the present will connect to the future, for better or for worse, and absolutize these assumptions. We speak as though we are prophets but without any genuine divine inspiration. We allude to vague but unassailable reasons for why the things we say must be true. We try to use our speech to add some certainty in an uncertain world, even if it is only certainty of doom and gloom.

Let's change our strategy of speech so that it reflects the fact the we do not know and can't guarantee the future. This may at first be disconcerting to the world around us which is used to a false sense of calm from people who pretend they can so guarantee it. Yet we may hope that people gradually come to realize that it isn't necessary for us to construct the future with empty words, since the future is in the hands of one much more trustworthy than us: God himself.

Matt Maher - Finished Work

 

12 June 2026 - take my yoke

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

although you have hidden these things
from the wise and the learned
you have revealed them to little ones.

God did not choose Israel to be peculiarly his own because they were the largest or most impressive of all nations. It was because "the LORD set his heart on" them. And so it is with us. We don't impress Jesus with our qualifications. It's not that he expects great results from us because of our resume and skill set. It is rather his love for us that enables us to bear good fruit. In fact, he often chooses the under-resourced, those who same ill-equipped or outnumbered, to be his champions, precisely so that his saving power, and thus also his love, is evident. If his choice of us was motivated by something other than love what else could it be? Utility, as though we could provide some benefit? But then he would simply be using rather than loving us. Even when it seems we are putting our natural talents to use we have to remember that we only have those talents as gifts from God. And if we are using them well it is only because of his providential guidance in our lives. But we shouldn't imagine that our skills somehow make it easier for God to do his job. When he works through natural talents it is because he loves us. When he works in spite of their absence it is because he wants to make it clear that he loves us. We are not merely chosen by him once and then left to run our course. We are chosen by him constantly.

Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened,
and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,
for I am meek and humble of heart;

Jesus invites us to come to him for rest. But it will be a short lived rest if we stop by briefly and then head elsewhere. We are meant to come and abide with him, to share the yoke of obedience to the Father that he himself carries, in which he himself abides in perfect peace. He has chosen us to participate in his own relationship to the Father, not because it adds anything to him, but because in so doing lies our path to fulfillment. Though it is hard to accept, even the fact that he invites us to share in his sufferings for the sake of his Body, the Church (see Colossians 1:24), is precisely because he loves us, not because there was anything lacking in what he did. He has no need of us. And yet, because his heart has chosen us, he calls us to participate in the saving love that is properly his own. He can think of no greater favor to bestow than to share that which matters most to his heart with his friends.

and you will find rest for yourselves. 
For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.

Normally we imagine that we earn rest as a break when we accomplish a days work or a retirement at the end of a long career. But Jesus promises a kind of rest that we can experience and enjoy even amidst our trials and the necessary efforts of life. Our burdens become qualitatively different when they are shared with him, and therefore bearing fruit for the world's salvation. There is so much unnecessary struggle that we can surrender if we will but embrace his gentle yoke. We when do share his yoke and abide in love we eventually arrive at the same conviction as John: "We have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us".

Songs In His Presence - The House Of God

 

11 June 2026 - more than a performance

Today's Readings
(Audio)

I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that
of the scribes and Pharisees,
you will not enter into the Kingdom of heaven.

It had to exceed theirs because they were focused on appearances, rather than pursuing a genuine desire for righteousness. They didn't hunger or thirst for it. Rather, they performed it since they were hungry for appreciation and popularity. But that isn't so unusual. A lot of our earlier training in morality comes down to what the adults in our lives notice. We try to be good because we want them to like us. We try to at least not appear to be bad because we don't want to get in trouble. This does yield some legitimate progress in building virtuous habits. But if things remain at this external level we run the risk of growing up to be like the scribes and Pharisees. And that is not enough. It takes more than a performance to enter the Kingdom of heaven. It takes conversion of the heart.

"You have heard that it was said to your ancestors,
You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment.
But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother
will be liable to judgment

It is not enough to avoid killing because it is illegal and unpopular. We should be people who do not want to kill, and wouldn't even if we could get away with it. But the trouble is that many of the feelings about others with whom we are angry are not entirely benign. They are actually the beginnings of murder within us. We protest that we don't actually want to kill anyone. But neither are we will to easily abandon such feelings when we feel that others have wronged us. And the logical result of these feelings left unchecked and run amok is murder. We don't want the plant or allow it to grow. But we are unwilling to remove the roots. And yet these roots are worse in a way, since they contaminate the soil of our hearts. Jesus tells us it is not enough to avoid the plant's growth while still fertilizing the roots. We want our hearts to be the good soil for his grace that they are meant to be.

Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar,
and there recall that your brother
has anything against you,

By the time our feelings have led us to the level of an actual breach of relationship with others things are more serious than we probably realize. We may imagine ourselves as in the right, sufficiently justified to stand by the altar and offer our sacrifice. But something significant in our spiritual lives is already so impaired that corrective action becomes an urgent priority, at least insofar as it lies in our power. It might seem genuinely surprising that God would have us weight our priorities in this way. Wouldn't we finish up at his altar and then go attend to the issue with our neighbors? But the issue is not only external. It is the unforgiveness to which we cling in our hearts that makes our sacrifices unacceptable. It isn't something out there that is a problem that we need to solve. It is ourselves.

Chris Tomlin - Give Us Clean Hands

 

10 June 2026 - to fulfill

Today's Readings
(Audio)

Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.

Everyone could tell that Jesus represented something new and different. He spoke with an authority that was independent of the merely human traditions of the religious leadership. He did not ground his teachings in statements by this or that famous rabbi. If he wasn't careful people would assume he represented something entirely different from the faith handed down in the books of the law and prophets. Christian heretics would later assert exactly this. They suggested that the God of the Old Testament was a cruel, evil God, and that Jesus Christ, who was instead kind and wise, supplanted him. But nothing could be further from the truth. There were not multiple God's, but one. There were three Persons, but always perfectly united in love.

Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away,
not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter
will pass from the law,
until all things have taken place.

This disclaimer was necessary since Jesus was about to launch into a set of teachings where he contrasted what he had to say with what was written in the law. These are the famous antithesis of "You have heard it said" and "But I say to you". Yet what he taught was not going to invalidate the earlier principles of the law. Rather, he was going to bring the inner logic of the law to a more complete fulfillment. He did not leave aside the morality with which the prohibitions of the law were concerned. But rather he asked that his disciples respond not only by avoiding specific actions, but by an cultivating an intense concern for the genuine goods those negative commandments were meant to protect. He called for a fulfillment in the form of a more complete observance of the law that began at the heart. 

When it was noon, Elijah taunted them:
"Call louder, for he is a god and may be meditating,
or may have retired, or may be on a journey.
Perhaps he is asleep and must be awakened."

Elijah taunted the prophets of Baal by insinuating how his lack of presence and power and consistency made him appear more human-like, created in the images of those who worshiped him, than divine. We must not make the mistake of thinking of our God as subject to change and imperfection in this way. We ought not think of him as having changed his mind about bad laws to arrive at better ones. We should not imagine that our prayers convey anything he doesn't know or convince him of anything about which he was previously unsure. That he is unchanging is in some ways intimidating. But the things that are most fundamental to his identity, and therefore displayed with the utmost consistency through revelation, are his mercy and his love. His condemnation of evil isn't going to change. But the reason for that condemnation is because he won't ever let us settle for less than love. Human idols might be content to let us off the hook because doing better is sometimes humanly impossible. But God calls us higher because he has the power to bring us higher, to himself.

Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments
and teaches others to do so
will be called least in the Kingdom of heaven.

Our love for the law is not because we are legalistic like the scribes and Pharisees. It is because we love the lawgiver. We know his rules are given to allow his family to flourish and to grow in the image of the God who is himself love.

Chris Tomlin - Everlasting God

 

9 June 2026 - meant to be

Today's Readings
(Audio) 

You are the salt of the earth.

You are the light of the world.

The images of salt and light in today's Gospel are meant to express the necessity of being true to our Christian identity. We are new creations in Christ. But the old self still fights for control. It doesn't always reveal itself in big obvious sins. Often it first manifests in small acts of infidelity to our call as disciples. We simply choose to prefer the lesser goods over the demands of discipleship. We have firmly ingrained habits of a life before we were disciples or before we took discipleship seriously. And we tend to fall back into routines like this unless we make a conscience choice not to do so. This was part of what Paul meant about "forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead" (see Philippians 3:13). Salt and light imply that we have a purpose that is now bigger than ourselves. Our value to the world is something more than a rearranging of the pieces of our old life. It is a gift that is given to us in baptism through the new identity we have as sons and daughters of the Father.

But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned?
It is no longer good for anything
but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.

We might justify our lack of commitment as disciples by saying that we are at least accomplishing this or that other thing in the world. But if it is not ordered to our God given purpose and aligned with the mission of Jesus and his Kingdom it cannot have a meaningful impact. The metaphorical food will quickly become bland and insipid. Before long it will spoil entirely. 

Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket;
it is set on a lampstand,
where it gives light to all in the house.

We tend to conceal the light of the Gospel as if we were living through an air raid drill. It does have the potential to make us a target of the animosity of others. We're willing to let other less offensively bright lights be seen, but not the one that truly has the potential to light up the whole house. As long as there is still room to slide from shadow to shadow no one complains. But the light of Christ leaves no room for darkness. We conceal the light because revealing it often requires more of our attention than we are willing to commit. We're content to let others see our good deeds so that they may glorify us, in the sense of knowing what good people we are. But the light of God at work within us, light that leads to his glory, is something we are wont to avoid. Too much trouble for too little direct reward is how it often seems. Yet, as with salt, the world without the light of the Gospel is inherently impoverished. It is a place of struggle, mishap, and spiritual injury. The Gospel light might seem like a bit much. But nothing else is even adequate, not if we want ourselves and others to flourish.

What we are being asked is not really so different than what Elijah asked the widow. We are being asked to have faith and make such meager contributions as we are able. But when these are done according to the purpose and plan of God they open up a whole world of grace.

‘The jar of flour shall not go empty,
nor the jug of oil run dry,
until the day when the LORD sends rain upon the earth.’” 

Newsboys - Shine