18 March 2019 - adjusted judgment

Today's Readings

(Audio)

It isn't enough to escape judgment and condemnation. We must stop judging and condemning others. God is interested in more than any sort of legalism. He is interested in loving us and helping us to love like him in our turn.

Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

How often do our negative assessments of the behavior of other people prove helpful? How many times are we able to bring them some sort of wisdom or clarity that actually makes a difference for them? And how many times is it rather that we simply have a sense of smug superiority? How long is it merely a division between us and them that prevents either of us from reaching out to the other in love?

Jesus eats with sinners and tax collectors. Yet we make mental barriers that keep even the most mild of sinners away from us, and that for the sake of our pride.

But yours, O Lord, our God, are compassion and forgiveness!

We can turn back to the LORD together with those from whom we formerly separated ourselves. We can realize that we really are no better than anyone. This realization lets us seek mercy sincerely and frees us from the selfish illusions that prevent us from offering mercy to others.

Let us learn the spiritual law of giving. It is the antidote to our selfishness. 

Give and gifts will be given to you;
a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing,
will be poured into your lap.
For the measure with which you measure
will in return be measured out to you.

Do we know anyone who seems to give and give and take little for themselves and yet who is still thriving and at peace? This is the stuff of which saints are made. And, without saying we need to give all the possessions or all of the free time we have to achieve it, even still it is a path to which we are called. Little gifts given in the right spirit are a wonderful place to begin to experience this. God continues to bless us to ensure that we always have more to offer. We become rich to the degree that we don't cling to the riches.

Then we, your people and the sheep of your pasture,
will give thanks to you forever;
through all generations we will declare your praise.