Where we have come from (readings for Sunday 7th July)
Isaiah 66.10-14
Psalm 66.1-9
Galatians 6.1-16
Luke 10.1-11, 16-20
Readings for today
Psalm 119.73-80
Jeremiah 6.10-19
Acts 19.21-27
thought for today
To me, the greater crime of Demetrius in not that he stirs things up against Paul because he is worried for his livelihood, but that he emphases the 'disrespect' to Artemis. I feel sure that the former problem looms larger in his mind than the latter. But his tactic has the desired effect and he gets the whole city out in sympathy for Artemis, while all the while it is his own pocket he is concerned for. Now it is not wrong to be concerned for the economy, which involves the welfare of many, and when changes are coming that might rock it, we do need to work to find solutions. But it is wrong to produce a smokescreen for our own greedy purposes. I suspect that there was a great deal of this going on in the Jerusalem of Jeremiah's day. As we so often stress the love of God - we are sometimes in danger of forgetting that God might be angry. And before we even begin to think about gloating over all the 'others' with whom we imagine God is angry, we should recall that we are all to a greater or lesser extent caught up in the broken-ness of the world. We should remember too, as the psalmist says, that this anger might actually be part of God's love for us.
Revised Common Lectionary copyright © 1992 Consultation on Common Texts. Used by permission
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