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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.

Tuesday, October 30, 2012

30 October 2012




True wisdom comes from the one place possible, God.  Let's use a bit of logic.  If there is a God who existed prior to the universe and who also created all that is, He would then know things that couldn't be known by anyone else.  If He chose to make Himself known and chose to set up a way to communicate with human beings then it would seem logical that we would set ourselves to listen to Him.  The writer says that the God who created it all has chosen one particular people group, the descendants of Abraham, the Israelites, as the people to whom He reveals wisdom.  The Law is the wisdom of God, see Psalm 119, and life according to the precepts of the Law would therefore be a life lived with wisdom.  Why then do we spend so much time leaning on worldly wisdom, the wisdom of, "Did God really say?" 

Jesus was incredibly consistent in saying, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”  The final phrase of that sentence is wisdom.  Hearing the word of God is one thing, keeping it reveals wisdom in that if God truly said, it must be right so I will do according to His Word I have received.  This time it was in response to a blessing pronounced on His mother, and she was indeed blessed for her obedience to the will of God, "be it done to me according to your will."  Mary's wisdom is seen in her lack of understanding of what God's will would mean but acquiescing to it. 

There are a couple of interesting statements in this passage.  The first is, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.”  Since there are ten more chapters to the book of the Revelation we know there is much more to be done before we see the kingdom of God established.  Remember in the book of Daniel that the angel is delayed, but that the outcome has been determined.  Here, from the perspective of heaven, the battle is won even though it rages.  The Lord is establishing His kingdom even now, since Jesus came and announced it.  We proclaim that victory even now.  The second odd statement is "God's temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple."  The Revelation tells us later that there is no temple in the new Jerusalem.  Here the praise of the heavenly host opens the temple and John sees the ark of the covenant, the place where His glory abides in the earthly temple.  It is a glimpse of God that John sees here. 

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