Friday, 5/14/2021
Week of 6 Easter

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 85; Psalm 86; Ezekiel 1:28–3:3; Hebrews 4:14–5:6; Luke 9:28–36

This morning’s Canticles are: before the Psalm reading, Pascha Nostrum(“Christ Our Passover,” BCP, p. 83); following the OT reading, Canticle 10 (“The Second Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 55:6–11; BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93)

 Today’s Scriptures bring us three gifts.

Luke and Hebrews: The Father’s initiative. Somehow, people can slide into the notion that God is a grump whose Son has to cajole him into accepting us. Maybe it’s because people have their own father-issues. (Well, I mean, who doesn’t? I’m sure my own kids do; to this day they tease me by calling me “Bad Dad.”) But the architect of our redemption was not the Son. The architect was the Father. “Today I have begotten you” (Hebrews 5:5b). “This is My Son, My Chosen One; listen to Him!” (Luke 9:35 NASB NET). Hebrews and Luke agree with John: “God so loved the world that he gave…” (John 3:16). 

God has appointed us a High Priest, and has sent him as Apostle of his love (Hebrews 3:1). Deep down each and every one of us knows we need someone to represent us, and to bring us both mercy (the withholding of our just deserts) and grace (the gift of goodness we have not earned—Hebrews 4:14, and see below). Hebrews and Luke, along with John, go out of their way to say that God the Father has supplied what we need.  

Hebrews: A friend in a high place. The one who has “gone through the heavens” (a reference to Christ’s ascension to the right hand of the Father) is one who can “sympathize with our weakness” because he was here among us as one of us, “like us in every way—except for sin” (Hebrews 4:14,15). As one of us, he was set upon by every temptation. On our behalf, he responded the way we were designed to. He said “No!” And his “No!” counts for us!!

We need to have every confidence that our prayers do not fall on deaf ears. The Son brought the mercy we needed: we have not received the judgment we deserve. The Son brought the grace we needed: we have received a life we did not merit. What’s more, we are encouraged, with the Son’s mediation, to come continually to ask for the additional mercy and grace that we need for each day, and for each moment of each day. “Therefore let us [keep] draw[ing] near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16 NRSV slightly edited). 

As we keep coming to the throne of grace, we do so knowing that our High Priest is already there, praying even harder than we, for “he ever lives to intercede” (Hebrews 7:25). Until we have arrived safely at home, we will still need mercy (to be delivered from what we deserve) and grace (to be provided with that which we cannot earn).

Ezekiel: A word that comes alive in us. There’s an ironic twist in Ezekiel’s call. He’s thirty years old. He should be taking up his priestly duties in the temple, as that is the calling into which he was born. Thirty is the age at which aspiring priests normally begin their priesthood duties (Numbers 4:3). But Ezekiel is in an alien land, far from the temple. God touches him with the gift of prophecy instead. Not just any gift of prophecy, though. Yahweh gives him some of the most surreal visions in all the Bible (as we’ve just seen in the first part of Ezekiel 1), and calls him to some of the strangest prophetic actions in all the Bible (like lying on his side for over a year, and eating food he first cooks on human feces—Ezekiel 4:4–17).

It was a difficult call to take up, comprising a mixture of the severest warnings at the beginning of his ministry, then containing the sweetest promises toward the end. So Yahweh’s Spirit prompts Ezekiel to listen and speak: “As He spoke to me the Spirit entered me and set me on my feet; and I heard Him speaking to me” (Ezekiel 2:2 NASB). Further, Yahweh calls upon him to eat a scroll the words of which are condemnatory, and yet the taste of which is sweet (Ezekiel 2:8–3:3)! 

May you and I trust that the same is true for us. May our confidence in God’s “Thus says the Lord…” (see Ezekiel 2:4) overrule our hesitancy to stand upon God’s Holy Word when we know it won’t be popular. May the Spirit of the Lord prompt us to “hear…, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest,” as the Book of Common Prayer puts it, “all holy Scriptures.” May we find them, as Ezekiel did, to be “sweet as honey” in our mouth (Ezekiel 3:3).  

Collect for Proper 28. Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning: Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+

Image: Icon of Ezekiel, 17th cent., North Russia, AnonymousUnknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons