Happy Father's Day!!!

 

 

1As a deer longs for flowing streams,

so my soul longs for you, O God.

2My soul thirsts for God,

for the living God.

When shall I come and behold

the face of God?

3My tears have been my food

day and night,

while people say to me continually,

"Where is your God?"

4These things I remember,

as I pour out my soul:

how I went with the throng,

and led them in procession to the house of God,

with glad shouts and songs of thanksgiving,

a multitude keeping festival.

5Why are you cast down, O my soul,

and why are you disquieted within me?

Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,

my help 6and my God.

My soul is cast down within me;

therefore I remember you

from the land of Jordan and of Hermon,

from Mount Mizar.

7Deep calls to deep

at the thunder of your cataracts;

all your waves and your billows

have gone over me.

8By day the LORD commands his steadfast love,

and at night his song is with me,

a prayer to the God of my life.

9I say to God, my rock,

"Why have you forgotten me?

Why must I walk about mournfully

because the enemy oppresses me?"

10As with a deadly wound in my body,

my adversaries taunt me,

while they say to me continually,

"Where is your God?"

11Why are you cast down, O my soul,

and why are you disquieted within me?

Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,

my help and my God.

1Vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause

against an ungodly people;

from those who are deceitful and unjust

deliver me!

2For you are the God in whom I take refuge;

why have you cast me off?

Why must I walk about mournfully

because of the oppression of the enemy?

3O send out your light and your truth;

let them lead me;

let them bring me to your holy hill

and to your dwelling.

4Then I will go to the altar of God,

to God my exceeding joy;

and I will praise you with the harp,

O God, my God.

5Why are you cast down, O my soul,

and why are you disquieted within me?

Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,

my help and my God.

Psalms 42 and 43

 

Under the Wave off Kanagawa

Katsushika, Hokusai

1830-1831

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Print

New York City, NY

United States

 

https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/diglib-fulldisplay.pl?SID=2022061880761586&code=act&RC=58624&Row=18

 

 

A short essay on the artistic and spiritual meaning of this artwork is available from The Visual Commentary on Scripturehttps://thevcs.org/thirsting-god/terror-transience-transcendence.

… Notably, Hokusai’s visions of Fuji were mass-produced prints—in this series alone, thirty-six images, a number signifying completeness. A single sheet sold for little more than the price of a bowl of noodles. Thus they circulated widely among tourists, townspeople of all classes, and pilgrims who came by the thousands each year to climb the sacred mountain, hoping to glimpse a reality that transcends the floating world of pleasure-seeking and pain.

Likewise, Psalms 42–43 (originally a single psalm) express a pilgrim’s longing for God’s ‘holy mountain’ (43:3), presumably Jerusalem. Wandering in distant places, literally or metaphorically, the psalmist prays that divine light and truth will lead her to the place where God’s saving presence is a palpable reality.

 

https://thevcs.org/thirsting-god/terror-transience-transcendence

 

 

 

 


Through pride we are ever deceiving ourselves.

But deep down below the surface of the average conscience

a still, small voice says to us,

something is out of tune.

~ Carl Jung

 

 

 

We gain strength, and courage, and confidence

by each experience in which we really stop

to look fear in the face …

we must do that which we think

we cannot.

~ Eleanor Roosevelt

 

 

 

 

 

Chew and Chat

Sondra Kellogg, Karla Byrd, Marilee Ross

 

 

Nikki Chodur with their fourth child.

 

Moses Chodur is 8 days old.

Evergreen Rotary’s youngest Honorary member.

 

Our first TREX bench near the Rotary Musical Park.

 

In Memory of Rotarian Anne Field

1953 — 2021

 

 

The Rotary WildFire Ready truck in today’s

Rodeo Parade.

 

 

CONGRATULATIONS!

Master of Business Administration

in Design and Leadership

for Societal Innovation

Junna Sakamoto Yoshioka

AND … Junna is expecting a baby girl on August 11th!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are no easy answers but there are simple answers.

We must have the courage to do what

we know is morally right.

~ Ronald Reagan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

June 19, 2022  Second Sunday after Pentecost - Year C

 

Previous OPQs may be found at:

     http://www.dotjack.com/opq.htm

 

 

26Then they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. 27As he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs. 28When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, "What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me"-29for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) 30Jesus then asked him, "What is your name?" He said, "Legion"; for many demons had entered him. 31They begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss.

32Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So he gave them permission. 33Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

34When the swineherds saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the country. 35Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. 36Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by demons had been healed. 37Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear. So he got into the boat and returned. 38The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but Jesus sent him away, saying, 39"Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you." So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him.

Luke 8:26-39

Agnus Day, by James Wetzstein

Agnus Day appears with the permission of www.agnusday.org

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lectionary

1 Kings 19:1–4 [5–7] 8–15a 

Psalm 42 and 43 

Galatians 3:23–29 

Luke 8:26–39

 

The story of the demoniac liberated from the “legion” of demons is a story of Jesus’ power to defeat the darkest evils and restore those very far from God to adopted sonship. As in the other Synoptics, many of the story’s details hold up the demoniac as the prime example of the oppression of the spiritual powers of the world. The story has a Gentile context, far from the sanctity of the Jewish people. He has no clothes—a frequent biblical symbol of enslavement—and no house, no possibility of living in sanity among people; the demons often drove him out into the wilderness. Moreover, he is among the tombs, and therefore ritually unclean. The portrait is almost inhuman. After Jesus is done with him though, he is clothed and in his right mind.

The point of documenting the deliverance is straightforwardly to show Jesus’ power over evil and his ability to restore anyone in creation. The significance of the pigs could be either their ritual uncleanness—sending unclean spirits into unclean animals was appropriate—or that they were a symbol of Roman military power (the region the story takes place in happens to be nearby where a Roman legion was stationed). It is likely that the story works on both levels, showing the reader how Jesus has power over all temporal powers that oppress: spiritual, political, and otherwise. The point is that Jesus has the power to deliver all humankind from the powers that oppress them, and that no case is so far gone as to be beyond his ability to restore.



https://www.preachingtoday.com/lectionary/

 

The steadfast love of God is evident throughout the passages for this day. Elijah becomes the expression of resolute and determined faith, an example rewarded by God carrying him to safety. The psalmist reminds us that throughout times of distress and dark nights of the soul, God is ever present. The Epistle passage proclaims that we are justified by faith in Christ, who claims us all as children of God. The promise of belonging to Christ is echoed in the healing of the Gerasene demoniac who Jesus instructs to share how much God has done for him. 

 

https://www.ministrymatters.com/all/entry/3954/worship-elements-june-23-2019

 

 

First Reading 1 Kings 19:1-4 (5-7) 8-15a

1Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. 2Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, "So may the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life like the life of one of them by this time tomorrow." 3Then he was afraid; he got up and fled for his life, and came to Beer-sheba, which belongs to Judah; he left his servant there.

4But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die: "It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors." 5Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, "Get up and eat." 6He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. 7The angel of the LORD came a second time, touched him, and said, "Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you." 8He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God. 9At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there.

Then the word of the LORD came to him, saying, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" 10He answered, "I have been very zealous for the LORD, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away."

11He said, "Go out and stand on the mountain before the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by." Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; 12and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. 13When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" 14He answered, "I have been very zealous for the LORD, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away." 15Then the LORD said to him, "Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus; when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael as king over Aram.

Psalm Psalms 42 and 43

1As a deer longs for flowing streams,

so my soul longs for you, O God.

2My soul thirsts for God,

for the living God.

When shall I come and behold

the face of God?

3My tears have been my food

day and night,

while people say to me continually,

"Where is your God?"

4These things I remember,

as I pour out my soul:

how I went with the throng,

and led them in procession to the house of God,

with glad shouts and songs of thanksgiving,

a multitude keeping festival.

5Why are you cast down, O my soul,

and why are you disquieted within me?

Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,

my help 6and my God.

My soul is cast down within me;

therefore I remember you

from the land of Jordan and of Hermon,

from Mount Mizar.

7Deep calls to deep

at the thunder of your cataracts;

all your waves and your billows

have gone over me.

8By day the LORD commands his steadfast love,

and at night his song is with me,

a prayer to the God of my life.

9I say to God, my rock,

"Why have you forgotten me?

Why must I walk about mournfully

because the enemy oppresses me?"

10As with a deadly wound in my body,

my adversaries taunt me,

while they say to me continually,

"Where is your God?"

11Why are you cast down, O my soul,

and why are you disquieted within me?

Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,

my help and my God.

1Vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause

against an ungodly people;

from those who are deceitful and unjust

deliver me!

2For you are the God in whom I take refuge;

why have you cast me off?

Why must I walk about mournfully

because of the oppression of the enemy?

3O send out your light and your truth;

let them lead me;

let them bring me to your holy hill

and to your dwelling.

4Then I will go to the altar of God,

to God my exceeding joy;

and I will praise you with the harp,

O God, my God.

5Why are you cast down, O my soul,

and why are you disquieted within me?

Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,

my help and my God.

Second Reading Galatians 3:23-29

23Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. 24Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. 25But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, 26for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. 27As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. 29And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise.

Gospel Luke 8:26-39

26Then they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. 27As he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs. 28When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, "What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me"-29for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) 30Jesus then asked him, "What is your name?" He said, "Legion"; for many demons had entered him. 31They begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss.

32Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So he gave them permission. 33Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

34When the swineherds saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the country. 35Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. 36Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by demons had been healed. 37Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear. So he got into the boat and returned. 38The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but Jesus sent him away, saying, 39"Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you." So he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him.