Thursday • 8/31/2023 •
Thursday of the Thirteenth Week After Pentecost (Proper 16)

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 18; 1 Kings 3:16–28; Acts 27:27–44; Mark 14:12–26

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 8 (“The Song of Moses,” Exodus 15, BCP, p. 85); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94)

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we consider some aspect of that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you. On this Thursday in the Season After Pentecost our readings come from Proper 16 of Year 1 in the Daily Office Lectionary.

Something in Sara died the day her parents divorced. It was more like something began to be killed in her. With their divorce, her mom and dad began a contest to see who could win Sara’s affection. The gifts, the demands for time-with, the bad-mouthing of the other parent. To Sara, it all translated into: “If I can’t have my daughter, nobody can.” By the time she was 30, Sara was emotionally dead. 

1 Kings: “Give her the living boy.” Solomon’s wisdom is exemplified in his handling of the matter of two prostitutes who come to him for judgment. They live together. Each has a baby boy. One claims that the other accidentally has smothered her own baby boy in her sleep and switched them. Solomon says, “Give me a sword. I’ll split the baby in half. Each can have a half.” The true mother says, “Give her the child. Don’t kill him!” The false mother says, “Neither of us will have it. Go ahead and divide it!” Solomon realizes the true mother is the one who’d rather have her child live even apart from her: “Give her the living boy,” he says. “All Israel heard of the judgment that the king had rendered; and they stood in awe of the king, because they perceived that the wisdom of God was in him, to execute justice” (1 Kings 3:28).

The way of wisdom is the way of understanding that living things (except things like flatworms) can’t be cut in half and still live. Sara’s parents could have used a Solomon. What eventually came to Sara’s rescue was a relationship with one who was greater than Solomon (Matthew 12:42). In Jesus Christ, Sara came to know someone whose love doesn’t demand, but gives; doesn’t possess, but yields; and doesn’t devour, but indwells. Praise be.  

Mark: “…after blessing it he broke it….” The One whom Sara came to know was the Jesus who took bread and broke it as a symbol and sign of the giving of his own life for her. “While they were eating, he took a loaf of bread, and after blessing it he broke it, gave it to them, and said, ‘Take; this is my body’” (Mark 14:22). All the breaks the world has ever seen, all the break-ups humans have undergone—including those in Sara’s life—were borne on Calvary’s tree. That’s true for you and me as well. 

Acts: the breaking up of Paul’s ship. Paul’s adventures in the Mediterranean Sea present another angle on the breaking of things. When we know that we’ve been promised that we will be OK even if everything around us falls apart, we can not only survive but thrive. The Lord has declared to Paul that he is going to appear before the emperor. Further, the Lord has assured him that all who accompany him on this sea voyage will survive as well, although their ship and their cargo will be lost. Paul’s ship is demolished, but Paul and company are just fine. 

None of us may have short term assurances like Paul did (in fact, I deeply distrust anybody since his day who claims to do so), but we do have the assurance that nothing will keep God from loving us. Though we lose everything in life’s tempest—though everything come against us, and every possession and relationship be stripped from us—we will never ever lose the love of God in Christ Jesus. Can’t happen. 

Not too terribly long before this fateful sea voyage, Paul had written the following words. And on this ship, he has the (I do not choose this term lightly) privilege of living them: 

Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:34,35,37–39). 

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+