Sunday, February 22, 2015

Sunday February 22, 2015     

1 Corinthians 1: 17 – 31

“So where can you find someone truly wise, truly educated, truly intelligent in this day and age?”  That question is as real today as it was for Paul’s readers.  Whether we look at world situations – Middle East, Ukraine, Nigeria, to name a few, or whether we look closer to home in our family relationships and challenges, the choices we know we must make demand wisdom and understanding.  The consequences of our choices and actions are not always clear, and they can be devastating if the choice is wrong.

I saw a play in Ottawa a week ago, called “Stuff Happens”, that explores the history that led to the bombing and invasion of Iraq.  It became obvious that actions resulted from individuals’ varying points of view and values.  When those were ego-centric, when “my” security or well-being is the top and even only priority, the choices obviously led to others’ pain and suffering being acceptable collateral damage!!

Paul is talking about that kind of thinking.  He says that people like that are “hell bent on destruction” ( The Message 18) Obviously they do not think they are!!.  His point is that God’s way is totally different, so much so that it seems like foolishness to us.  How could God possibly think that Jesus being tortured and killed would mean victory?  We have had 2000 years to ponder this and to have a “head” understanding of it.  BUT, until we are able to live that truth, to walk the way Jesus did, it still remains wisdom far beyond our own.

Humbly acknowledging that God is infinitely more wise than we are is a start.  Recognizing that “everything we have – right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start – comes from God by way of Jesus Christ” (30) helps us orient ourselves.  Practising the way of Jesus, a daily checking of our viewpoints and values with those of God, can help us in our individual daily life choices, and in the choices we make collectively in our world relationships.

Let us all this week, this Lent, pray for ourselves, each other and our leaders – that we will choose to acknowledge God’s way and that we will seek to do as He would do.  Perhaps that is the meaning of “Your will be done on earth as in heaven.”

Blessings

Ann Kelland