View as Webpage

Morning Devotion for the Season After Pentecost

November 3, 2023

Richard Hooker

The Invitatory

The mercy of the Lord is everlasting: O come, let us adore him.

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.

Reading: 1 Corinthians 2:6-16

Yet among the mature we do speak wisdom, though it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to perish. But we speak God’s wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written,

‘What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,

  nor the human heart conceived,

what God has prepared for those who love him’—

these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For what human being knows what is truly human except the human spirit that is within? So also no one comprehends what is truly God’s except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit that is from God, so that we may understand the gifts bestowed on us by God. And we speak of these things in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual things to those who are spiritual.

Those who are unspiritual do not receive the gifts of God’s Spirit, for they are foolishness to them, and they are unable to understand them because they are discerned spiritually. Those who are spiritual discern all things, and they are themselves subject to no one else’s scrutiny.

‘For who has known the mind of the Lord

  so as to instruct him?’

But we have the mind of Christ.

Meditation: Jo Ann B. Jones

I imagine any number of us have had the following experience. During an eye exam, the optometrist says something like, “Things are going to get very blurry for a minute.” Lenses click by and in an instant, where there had been legible letters, now there are just grey/black blobs that are visible. No force of will or act of squinting can bring the blobs into focus. One cannot see what was there a moment before. Or maybe the experience happens in reverse: images first appear blurry and then, with the correct lens, the whole world comes into focus.

In Paul’s experience and preaching, “Jesus Christ and him crucified” is shorthand for the event that acts as an interpretive lens for every other encounter. It reveals the wisdom of this age as so much that is indistinct, simultaneously bringing into focus what God has revealed. In this context, “Christ crucified” is not what Paul sees but how he sees. Perhaps, we, too, should see in this fashion. For Paul and for us this revelation begs two questions: 1) what does the shorthand, “Jesus Christ and him crucified” mean? (2) what does it bring into focus?

“Christ crucified” is shorthand for God’s intervention into this age, to bring about a new one. The intervention involved the self-emptying and self-giving love of Christ, love that culminated in Christ’s giving his life — and not solely for righteous people, but rather, for all. This foolishness is the beginning of the new creation, one in which old ways of defining oneself and others (Jew/Greek, strong/weak, wise/foolish) no longer describe the real world. “Everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new.”

The crucified Christ is a constant reminder that our attempts, however subtle, to achieve notoriety or success, to the end that we might save ourselves, are misdirected. It strikes me that the greatest challenge for us, no matter our station in life, occupation, or vocation, is to frame and reframe life constantly in terms of the reverse logic of the Gospel. We could call upon all the identifiers and perspectives that further fracture us to the point that we lose sight of what it means to be human. Moreover we lose sight of what it means to be human in the presence of God and in the reality of Jesus Christ and him crucified. Paul’s challenge is excruciatingly clear. What we have taken for granted about our social world was dissolved and reconstructed. Any attempt to rely upon a human facility to justify ourselves or seek a measure of success, or gain human advantage is precisely an “old” practice. As soon as we think we have achieved a measure of wisdom or maturity, that we believe is authoritative over another’s, we find ourselves caught in Paul’s trap. Paul came to this realization that energized his faith: What happened in Jesus’ death and resurrection is that these structures and divisions were destroyed. Those who were far off are now brought near. This welcome at God’s initiative is real and active in the world. The only certitude that counts is absolute confidence in the cross of Christ, God’s grace revealed in the cross of Christ

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.