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The intent of Pilgrim Processing is to provide commentary on the Daily Lectionary from the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. The format for the comment is Old Testament Lesson first, Gospel, and Epistle with a portion of one of the Psalms for the day as a prayer at the end.

Thursday, March 25, 2010

25 March 2010
Psalm 131, 132; Exod. 7:25-8:19; 2 Cor. 3:7-18; Mark 10:17-31

With the plague of frogs the magicians are able to duplicate the sign of Moses and Aaron but again, why multiply the problem? The magicians are keeping up and it is not clear at all why Moses should be allowed to take the people out of Egypt, Pharaoh has no reason to fear the Lord. Pharaoh’s heart softens towards the people because of the personal inconvenience and the cure might have been worse than the problem with dead, stinking frogs all over the land. Problem solved, however, so there is no incentive to allow them to go. The next sign is the one that stumps the magicians, creation of life out of dust. Seems like that one has been done before and the magicians rightly attribute it to the finger of God.

What is that thing the rich man lacks? Jesus says, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” He has done all the commandments since he was young (the age of responsibility is 13, when a boy has his bar mitzvah). What he lacks is the love of God and Jesus proves that lack to him in his command to go and sell and give away what he has. The commands Jesus mentions are those that have to do with duty to others, not to God directly. His attachment to his riches is too great to pass over and he walks away grieving. Jesus has called the disciples to make the same decision, leave everything behind and follow and this man just passed up the greatest opportunity he would ever have offered.

Jesus removed the veil for the man in the Gospel reading. He called him deeper in his understanding of the Words of God. The Gospel exposes us for what we truly are, selfish and vain human beings and yet at the same time it provides us with forgiveness, mercy and grace. Those things are available only to those who recognize the truth about themselves and gladly and gratefully receive the pardon and absolution on offer. If we continue to believe ourselves to be “pretty good” or “good enough” we can never know grace, our hearts continue to be hardened against Him. To continue to stand on our own merits is to deny His real righteousness. What the Gospel teaches us is that we still don’t know good and evil and we have settled for something lesser in the face of the greater.

O LORD, my heart is not lifted up;
my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child is my soul within me.

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