Luke 13:34-35
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that
kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I
desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her
wings, and you were not willing! See,
your house is left to you. And I tell you, you will not see me until the time
comes when you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of
the Lord.’”
An offering from Rob Leacock
About five years ago, I participated in the consecration of
a bishop. It was a pretty big deal, and
I had been put in charge of some of the logistics including shepherding a
rather large group of clergy including a few bishops who were participating in
the service. On the day itself, the time
for the service to start, and the procession was so absurdly long that it
snaked through the church building down several long halls. Slowly, the line of the procession started to
move. I was very near the back of the
line, and we couldn’t even hear a hint of the processional hymn, but we
gathered that the procession had started.
As we turned the corner down a long hallway an affable retired bishop
turned to me and said, “Rob, where the devil are we going?!”
In Lent we sometimes ask, where are we going? And sometimes we know the answer. Sometimes we think we know the answer. And sometimes we hardly know, though we may
do a good job of pretending. In this
passage, Jesus has his eyes and his feet set on Jerusalem. Like the disciples and others who were
following Jesus, we sometimes think we know how the story will unfold. Even Jesus himself seems conflicted about
going to Jerusalem in how he expresses his feelings about the city and her
people and the Temple. Does he know what
will happen once we get there? Does he
want to go, and do we want to follow him?
Prayer
My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see
the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I
really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to
please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I
am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I
know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know
nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be
lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and
you will never leave me to face my perils alone.
-Thomas Merton
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