Lent
March 24, 2017
Scripture Reading: Ephesians 5:8-14
For once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light—for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true. Try to find out what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what such people do secretly; but everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for everything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says,
‘Sleeper, awake!
Rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.’
The last phrase in this scripture is most likely a quote from an ancient hymn now otherwise lost. It made me wonder how numb have I become to the world about me. Does anything I do make a difference? At times, I identify with Don Quixote who did battle with windmills. What seems so right to me is deemed wrong by many. How do we ever define what the common good is, if our values are so different?
Perhaps we all need to exchange places for a time and view the world from another’s perspective. I worked in human services for 35 years and was aware of the tremendous lack of services for the mentally ill during that time. It was through my church that I experienced the reality of the life for many persons with mental illness. I was serving in a soup kitchen line one evening. A local pie company had donated some pies whose shelf life was ending soon. The ones I was handing out were packaged in wrappers displaying ninja turtles in various stances. The next man in line stepping before me picked up one of the packages of fried pie and studied it intently. He was a giant of a man. At least a head taller than me. A Native American, his skin was bronzed deeply from the sun. I could not guess his age but he wore dog tags, I supposed he was a Vietnam War veteran. He asked, “What kind of pie is green?” Realizing he could not read, I explained the pictures were of cartoon like characters; the pie crust was filled with vanilla pudding. He took one and proceeded down the line. My dad and uncle were veterans of World War II; they both received excellent follow-up care from the Veterans Administration. I stood stung by the reality that, not just this one, but many of our veterans struggle daily to survive on the street.
We all need to wake up to the world around us and see the reality of it, and only then attempt to define and provide for the Common Good.
Prayer: Lord rescue us from the barriers we build each day that keeps us from seeing the needs of our neighbors near and far. Amen.