Dear Friends
As we enter another period when we are unable to meet together on Sundays for worship, I attach readings, collect and psalm for tomorrow & also a reflection.
Hopefully this will be a short stage on level 3 and we will soon be able to return to the Churches.
Until then – keep well & stay safe
Best wishes
Alan
Collect, Reading and Psalm for the Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity
11th October 2020
Collect
Almighty and everlasting God:
Increase in us your gift of faith
that, forsaking what lies behind,
we may run the way of your commandments
and win the crown of everlasting joy;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Exodus 32: 1-14
32When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered around Aaron and said to him, ‘Come, make gods for us, who shall go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’ 2Aaron said to them, ‘Take off the gold rings that are on the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.’ 3So all the people took off the gold rings from their ears, and brought them to Aaron. 4He took the gold from them, formed it in a mould,* and cast an image of a calf; and they said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’ 5When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation and said, ‘Tomorrow shall be a festival to the Lord.’ 6They rose early the next day, and offered burnt-offerings and brought sacrifices of well-being; and the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to revel.
7 The Lord said to Moses, ‘Go down at once! Your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have acted perversely; 8they have been quick to turn aside from the way that I commanded them; they have cast for themselves an image of a calf, and have worshipped it and sacrificed to it, and said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” ’ 9The Lord said to Moses, ‘I have seen this people, how stiff-necked they are. 10Now let me alone, so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them; and of you I will make a great nation.’
11 But Moses implored the Lord his God, and said, ‘O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? 12Why should the Egyptians say, “It was with evil intent that he brought them out to kill them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth”? Turn from your fierce wrath; change your mind and do not bring disaster on your people. 13Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, how you swore to them by your own self, saying to them, “I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it for ever.” ’ 14And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people.
Psalm 106
1 Alleluia.
Give thanks to the Lord, for he is gracious, ♦︎
for his faithfulness endures for ever.
2 Who can express the mighty acts of the Lord ♦︎
or show forth all his praise?
3 Blessed are those who observe what is right ♦︎
and always do what is just.
4 Remember me, O Lord, in the favour you bear for your people; ♦︎
visit me in the day of your salvation;
5 That I may see the prosperity of your chosen
and rejoice in the gladness of your people, ♦︎
and exult with your inheritance.
6 We have sinned like our forebears; ♦︎
we have done wrong and dealt wickedly.
19 They made a calf at Horeb ♦︎
and worshipped the molten image;
20 Thus they exchanged their glory ♦︎
for the image of an ox that feeds on hay.
21 They forgot God their saviour, ♦︎
who had done such great things in Egypt,
22 Wonderful deeds in the land of Ham ♦︎
and fearful things at the Red Sea.
23 So he would have destroyed them,
had not Moses his chosen stood before him in the breach, ♦︎
to turn away his wrath from consuming them.
Philippians 4: 1-9
41Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.
2 I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. 3Yes, and I ask you also, my loyal companion, help these women, for they have struggled beside me in the work of the gospel, together with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life.
4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. 5Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. 6Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
8 Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about* these things. 9Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.
Matthew 22: 1-14
22Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: 2‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. 3He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. 4Again he sent other slaves, saying, “Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.” 5But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, 6while the rest seized his slaves, maltreated them, and killed them. 7The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. 8Then he said to his slaves, “The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.” 10Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so the wedding hall was filled with guests.
11 ‘But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, 12and he said to him, “Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?” And he was speechless. 13Then the king said to the attendants, “Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 14For many are called, but few are chosen.’
Reflections – Sunday 11th Oct 18th after Trinity
Have you recently been in conversation with anyone who might have remarked on your apparel – “… oh there’s something different about you, did you get some new clothes? “…nice dress”, or “…lovely shirt” – “… is it new, ….. where did you get it?”
The readings this week are both straightforward …. But also strange!
In the Old Testament we see the people of Israel out in the desert having escaped from the Egyptians and wandering about (in more ways than one)
Moses has been summoned, by God, to go up the mountain and the rest of the people are wondering “…is he coming back? Moses has been up the mountain for some time, and they are getting restless. In the end they ask Aaron, who has been left in charge, to sort out a god who will lead them into the future – the result is a golden calf – an idol to which they can bow down to.
The challenges of the story are many, but a major part is the desire, and may be the need, that we have to worship something. It led St Augustine, many thousands of years later, to write the famous phrase about God “… our hearts are restless, until they find their rest in thee”. He was talking about a ‘God shaped gap’ that can only be filled by God, but that people often attempt to fill with something else. We can see around us, in many different ways, – people trying to find peace and wholeness but ending up with the same sense of dissatisfaction and incompleteness that began their search for fulfilment.
In the Gospel we have a parable relating to the Kingdom of God, it is based around a feast, and a familiar theme of guests not coming when invited. Excuses have been made, distractions noted and violence against the slaves (possibly an allusion to the prophets) who are maltreated and even killed. The king then invites everyone to the feast.
It all seems straightforward until the last couple of verses where a guest’s clothing comes to be spotlighted. It seems a little odd that someone might be precluded from a celebration on the grounds of dress sense. These verses seem to be unnecessary. Had Jesus ended the parable without them, and the finished story was a hall full of guests, it would still have made sense and been a complete parable.
In order to see what these last two verses are about it is good to know something of the customs at that time.
In those days, everyone attending a wedding feast was given a robe by the host. So when the king invited everyone on the highways and byways to the wedding feast, he had to pay for enough robes for every invited guest to have one. It meant that they were all made equal through the king’s generosity – the great and the good and the beggar and outcast – would both be clothed with robes of royalty and enjoy the same status which had been bestowed upon them by the king.
There are echoes of this in both the Old Testament … Isaiah 61:10 says, “For He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness.” And in the New Testament in Revelation 7:9 John sees a vision of heaven and says, “After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes.”
So, this guest had come to the wedding, but not accepted the robe given to the all the guests, by the king in order to honour his son. He didn’t feel the need for it – his own were good enough. The robes were given to the guests but they had to be willing to change clothes. They had to take off their old clothes and put on the new clothes. So even a beggar could wear a new robe to the wedding feast. They honoured the son by wearing the robe. The only thing the king asked of his invited guests was to accept the free gift and put on the robe; but to put on the new clothes, you have to be willing to get rid of our old clothes—which represent your own sense of righteousness and worthiness – and accept the robe given by God
In both the Old Testament and the Gospel readings there is a sense in which people are trying to do things for themselves, and by themselves, rather than trusting in God and accepting the free gift of grace which is given to them. In the Old Testament reading the people pool all that they value – represented by gold, and make their own god to worship, instead of giving thanks to the God who brought them out of Egypt. In the Gospel reading it is reliance upon one’s own worth (represented by clothing), expecting that to be enough to be present at the feast, and not needing anything from the king.
The Christian journey is often the realisation of our dependence upon God, of our being entirely contingent upon his love, – not a little bit, not a ‘top up’ of our own goodness – but being clothed in God’s righteousness rather than our own. In accepting this gift of grace and salvation, given freely by God, we not only honour Jesus – God’s son, – we also acknowledge our dependence upon God’s grace lavished upon us by God’s generosity.
In living this life of worship, in gratitude for the love lavished upon us by God, – worth so much more than silver or gold, or our own ego, – we wear the robe that God bestows upon us – and in wearing that ‘robe of grace’ perhaps people will remark in conversation “… oh there’s something different about you, ….. where did you get it?”