Lent 3
Devotional
Water From the Well
Lectionary Devotional For Cycle A
Object:
Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah....
-- Psalm 95:8
In the midst of a strong call to praise God, there was this prophetic reminder of the human failure to trust God. For Israel the wilderness experience was the paradigm for their entire relationship with God. Both in the wilderness and in the act of creation itself (Psalm 95:4-5), God had provided ample evidence of God's faithful and generous support of Israel. The natural response was one of praise, "O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker." Life itself summons us to praise God. For Christians and Jews, there is the recognition of the privilege of our relationship, "For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand." Yet worship can become "like a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal" (1 Corinthians 13:1) if it does not result in our response of trust in the difficult challenges of our life. Again, the wilderness was a paradigm for how people learned to trust God. "... your ancestors tested me, and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work." The need to respond to God in trust is what is required for the completion of creation and the enjoyment of sabbath rest. Our failure to trust God denies us the ability to fully experience the sabbath. "Therefore, in my anger, I swore, 'They shall not enter my rest.' " If our worship is but a hasty interruption of our drive to work, our lives will fail to experience the sabbath joy that God invites us to on the seventh day of creation. The sabbath is an invitation to trust God. Our failure to trust God results in unending stress for our weary souls.
-- Psalm 95:8
In the midst of a strong call to praise God, there was this prophetic reminder of the human failure to trust God. For Israel the wilderness experience was the paradigm for their entire relationship with God. Both in the wilderness and in the act of creation itself (Psalm 95:4-5), God had provided ample evidence of God's faithful and generous support of Israel. The natural response was one of praise, "O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker." Life itself summons us to praise God. For Christians and Jews, there is the recognition of the privilege of our relationship, "For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand." Yet worship can become "like a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal" (1 Corinthians 13:1) if it does not result in our response of trust in the difficult challenges of our life. Again, the wilderness was a paradigm for how people learned to trust God. "... your ancestors tested me, and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work." The need to respond to God in trust is what is required for the completion of creation and the enjoyment of sabbath rest. Our failure to trust God denies us the ability to fully experience the sabbath. "Therefore, in my anger, I swore, 'They shall not enter my rest.' " If our worship is but a hasty interruption of our drive to work, our lives will fail to experience the sabbath joy that God invites us to on the seventh day of creation. The sabbath is an invitation to trust God. Our failure to trust God results in unending stress for our weary souls.
