Saturday, January 17, 2015

but the greatest of these

today's readings: Genesis 35:1 - 36:43, Matthew 12:1-21, Psalm 15:1-5, Proverbs 3:21-26

so the OT reading today was, to me, just funny. I mean, we did read about Rachel naming her child "son of my sorrow" with her dying breath, and then Jacob going "ehhh.... let's call him 'son of my right hand' instead" (which is also funny, in a tragic kinda way... but I mean I guess it was kinda selfish for Rachel to name him "son of my sorrow" to begin with)

but man... those names!  one funny name after another... how would you like to go through life with the name Basemath? as a woman?? seems like her sisters should be named Toughalgebra and Killercalculus...

but I laughed out loud every time I saw the name Oholibamah... it's like someone taking our president's name in vain.

anyway, on to the NT. Jesus says some very deep and liberating things in today's reading. He basically says ... look, it's important to be holy. it's important for you to live a clean and pure life. but it's far MORE important that you love other people.

if you have a choice between keeping yourself "sin free" and helping someone, err on the side of helping them. and it's usually true, I think, that the more we get busy helping others, the less time we have to 'besmirch' ourselves with sin, anyway.

I didn't even mention Horite... heh heh.  Horite!

1 comment:

Julie said...

I agree with you, I found myself so amused with the unbelievable names. It wasn't like Joe, Bob, Sue, Ann or in east Texas Jim Bob. I find in my own life when I become pious about absence of sin, I find myself staying away from others that I deem bad sinners. However, when I ageed to go to feed those who are homeless and need help, I went because it was the right thing to do and we could afford to help. It is one of the most humbling thing that I current help with. Only by the grace of God am I not in this situation. ( as are all of us) the appreciation given to me is humbling, they all are very thankful and start the dinner with prayer by them and no one appears " entitled", families and individuals that live on the edge of our society. Makes me very humble and thankful for this opportunity to share some smiles with people who have not had nor will they probably ever have even a pillow or blanket of there own or know where they will sleep tonight. Reality of our blindness to the needs of others due to staying in our comfort zone.