Morning Devotion for Christmas
January 3, 2022
The Invitatory
Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son: and to the Holy Ghost;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.
Praise ye the Lord.
The Lord's Name be praised.
Reading: Ephesians 4:17-32
Now this I affirm and insist on in the Lord: you must no longer live as the Gentiles live, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of their ignorance and hardness of heart. They have lost all sensitivity and have abandoned themselves to licentiousness, greedy to practise every kind of impurity. That is not the way you learned Christ! For surely you have heard about him and were taught in him, as truth is in Jesus. You were taught to put away your former way of life, your old self, corrupt and deluded by its lusts, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to clothe yourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
So then, putting away falsehood, let all of us speak the truth to our neighbours, for we are members of one another. Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not make room for the devil. Thieves must give up stealing; rather let them labour and work honestly with their own hands, so as to have something to share with the needy. Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which you were marked with a seal for the day of redemption. Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice, and be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.
Meditation: Jo Ann B. Jones
I may be getting a little ahead of ourselves in terms of the liturgical calendar, but I am reminded in this reading of the year that my Lenten discipline was to monitor my behavior in light of the Seven Deadly Sins. For some unknown reason, that Lent I decided to wrestle with anger. It proved to be a very difficult undertaking and I found myself wanting. It reminded my of my days in Lower School and being graded on self-control. I returned to those thoughts these last few months as my weariness and lack of patience with life in Covid took its toll on me. Mastering self-control with respect to anger is more than a notion. It does reveal how self-centered one can be. And, in truth, accounting for other people and their situations can prove to be unexpectedly relaxing. It relieves one of an unrealistic ability to control. Letting go creates a much-needed space to reestablish oneself within a much larger context.
In this portion of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, the larger context is the transformation of those who are in Christ. One would think that the prospect of putting away a former life would be inviting and exciting. The new life experienced in Christ is meant to have far-reaching effects. In the larger context the gift of God in Christ has brought about reconciliation of Jews and Gentiles, creating one community. For us it means reconciliation with all of creation and all people.
Paul’s writing about anger caught my attention. “Be angry but do not sin.” I hear him saying, “If you are angry, do not sin.” Anger is understood as a normal part of human emotional experience, yet also as an occasion for temptation. The solution is the limitation of anger: “Do not let the sun go down on your anger.” Living with anger for an extended period is likely to lead to sin. It festers, escalates, until it overtakes one’s better nature and becomes increasingly more difficult to control. This is a threat to the growth of the community.
The helpful corrective to this is, “let all of us speak truth to our neighbors.” It is demanding in that it calls upon us to step out of our singular reality and consider the whole reality and to transform the anger we hold to love. It does call for growth on our parts that in the end is so rewarding. And it opens the way for healing. To speak the truth in love acknowledges the reality, calls others to account, gives voice to feelings, and confesses one’s own participation in wrong-doing. When anger is the context for speaking truthfully, the division of the community often results. Yet when love is the context, healing can result. Even situations that seem intractable or unpardonable are sometimes transformed. Given the transformative effects of the love of God, we recognize that sin does not disappear. The persistence of sin is not an indictment of the transformation itself but a reflection of human frailty. It makes us all the more grateful for God’s forgiveness and removal of condemnation.
The Lord's Prayer
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy Name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the Kingdom, the power and the glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.
