Luke and Harry

It’s been over a week since I last posted. Harry Potter is finally out, I’m on page 46 and reading very slowly because it’s the last book and the last time I’ll be able to spend such quality time with his story. Sigh............today KP preached on Martha and Mary and she was very good but before I go there I have to say a word or two about last week’s sermon on the Good Samaritan.....how many sermons have I heard on Luke 10 over the years? Countless.....and almost always the same....don’t be like the Priest or the Levite but be like the Good Samaritan who it turns out was never even referred to as “good” by Jesus.....that was added!

So E+ turned this parable upside down for me..........I learned that “in most of Jesus’s parables, the way they’re constructed, the really central character is the one everyone else comes in contact with.” And she focused on the wounded and powerless victim who was lying in the ditch. Looking at this story from the victim’s point of view made everything new. We can all identify with that point of view as we’ve all been wounded at some point in our lives....His/Her dilemma centered on being able to accept help from someone that would have been considered to be an outcast, or someone who might be unclean or a social reject. E+ stated that “the mercy and healing of God came not only from an unexpected source, it came from a despised source.”..........what if God comes toward me as someone or something I fear? Will I be able to accept such help? Such grace? Such love? Lots to ponder there.

And then today KP preached from Luke 10 & Genesis 18 on hospitality - which is showing love to strangers. My experience of this passage has been the age old question of “are you a Martha or a Mary?”..........as if all women can be categorized into only one of these categories (not to mention where men fit in here.)...Just as Abraham had invited the 3 men in for calf and cakes, Martha followed suit by inviting Jesus and his followers in for a meal. Jesus of course told her that her sister Mary had chosen the better part by sitting at his feet which must have been confusing to say the least. But KP said that “Jesus is telling her to stop and be hospitable to herself, to love the stranger in herself.”.....thus exhibiting a new form of hospitality......one in which we start with our own hearts, making way for a new creation - in order to love our neighbors as our selves.........I like that. But I also like to stick with what I know and God never seems to allow that.....which is why we are hopefully, with God’s help, always becoming a new creation..........