The Greatest Commandment

Reformation Sunday

and

All Saints’ Day

 

34When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, 35and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36“Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” 37He said to him, “&squo;You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38This is the greatest and first commandment. 39and a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

41Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them this question: 42“What do you think of the Messiah? Whose son is he?” They said to him, “The son of David.” 43He said to them, “How is it then that David by the Spirit calls him Lord, saying, 
44  ‘The Lord said to my Lord, 
     “Sit at my right hand, 
          until I put your enemies under your feet”’? 
45If David thus calls him Lord, how can he be his son?” 46No one was able to give him an answer, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.

Matthew 22:34-46

 

The Pharisees and the Saduccees Come to Tempt Jesus

TISSOT, James

Between 1886 and 1902

gouache over graphite on gray wove paper

Brooklyn Museum

Brooklyn, New York

United States

 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10195994

 

 

 

 

 

The beginning of love is the will to let those we love

be perfectly themselves,

the resolution not to twist them to fit our own image.

If in loving them we do not love what they are,

but only their potential likeness to ourselves,

then we do not love them:

we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them.

~ Thomas Merton

 

 

 

It is the time you have wasted for your rose

that makes your rose so important.

~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

 

 

 

 

 

Brunch with Jim and Lynn Gilbert

before going to the Arvada Center.

 

What an amazing job the cast did!

We were very happy we had attended the performance.

 

At the Arvada Center.

 

Vicki Kyle and Heidi Smithson figuring out the winners at Bunco.

 

Our Seniors’ Grief Group had lunch at Lariat Lodge.

We had a few more join us after I had taken the photo.

 

Harley likes it under my desktop.

 

Witches on Little Cub Creek.

 

 

 

Robin Sakamoto’s latest in Tokyo.

 

 

 

 

 

Kindness is a mark of faith;

and whoever hath not kindness,

hath not faith.

~ Muhammad

 

 

 

 

October 29, 2023  Twentysecond Sunday after Pentecost: Proper 25 Year A

 

Previous OPQs may be found at:

     http://www.dotjack.com/opq.htm

 

1You yourselves know, brothers and sisters, that our coming to you was not in vain, 2but though we had already suffered and been shamefully mistreated at Philippi, as you know, we had courage in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition. 3For our appeal does not spring from deceit or impure motives or trickery, 4but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the message of the gospel, even so we speak, not to please mortals, but to please God who tests our hearts. 5As you know and as God is our witness, we never came with words of flattery or with a pretext for greed; 6nor did we seek praise from mortals, whether from you or from others, 7though we might have made demands as apostles of Christ. But we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children. 8So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of

God but also our own selves, because you have become very dear to us.

1 Thessalonians 2:1-8

Agnus Day, by James Wetzstein

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

 

 

 

 

The Luther Seal or Rose

https://www.growingwithgrace.org/believe

 

 

 

 

 

LECTIONARY

Deuteronomy 34:1–12 

Psalm 90:1–6, 13–17 

1 Thessalonians 2:1–8 

Matthew 22:34–46

 

 

THE WORD:

In this Sunday’s Gospel, as in last Sunday’s, the Jewish leaders seek to trip Jesus up.  The question the lawyer poses was much discussed in rabbinical circles:  Which is the greatest commandment?  The Pharisees’ intention in posing the question was to force Jesus into a single rabbinical school, thereby opening him up to criticism from all other sides.  Jesus’ answer, however, proves his fidelity to both the Jewish tradition and to a spirituality that transcends the legal interpretations of the commandments: the “second” commandment is the manifestation of the first.  If we love the Lord God with our whole being, that love will manifest itself in our feeding of the hungry, our sheltering of the homeless and our liberating the oppressed.

HOMILY POINTS:

Jesus’ “command” to love our neighbor means seeing one another as we see ourselves: realizing that our hopes and dreams for ourselves and our families are the same dreams others have for themselves and their families.  

Every one of us, at one time or other, is an alien, outsider, foreigner and stranger.  The commandment to “love your neighbor as yourself” is not confined to our “own” people or to a list of specific situations but should affect every relationship we have and every decision we make.

As our society becomes more and more diverse, as science continues to make once unimaginable advances in all forms of technology, the ethical and moral questions we face become more complicated, difficult and challenging.  The “great commandment” gives us the starting point for dealing with such issues: to love as God loves us – without limit, without condition, without counting the cost, completely and selflessly.  

In our “e-connected” existence, the words of Jesus in today’s Gospel are especially challenging: to love with our whole heart and soul and mind requires us to “unplug” and be present to one another, to engage one another as our loving God is engaged with us, to seek not just images and perceptions of compassion but behold compassion and experience love in one another.  

https://connectionsmediaworks.com/sundaygospel.html#oct29

 

 

 

First Reading Deuteronomy 34:1-12

1Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho, and the LORD showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan, 2all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, 3the Negeb, and the Plain — that is, the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees — as far as Zoar. 4The LORD said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants’; I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.” 5Then Moses, the servant of the LORD, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord’s command. 6He was buried in a valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth-peor, but no one knows his burial place to this day. 7Moses was one hundred twenty years old when he died; his sight was unimpaired and his vigor had not abated. 8The Israelites wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days; then the period of mourning for Moses was ended.

9Joshua son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, because Moses had laid his hands on him; and the Israelites obeyed him, doing as the LORD had commanded Moses.

10Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face. 11He was unequaled for all the signs and wonders that the LORD sent him to perform in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants and his entire land, 12and for all the mighty deeds and all the terrifying displays of power that Moses performed in the sight of all Israel.

Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17

1   Lord, you have been our dwelling place 
          in all generations. 
2   Before the mountains were brought forth, 
          or ever you had formed the earth and the world, 
          from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

3   You turn us back to dust, 
          and say, “Turn back, you mortals.” 
4   For a thousand years in your sight 
          are like yesterday when it is past, 
          or like a watch in the night.

5   You sweep them away; they are like a dream, 
          like grass that is renewed in the morning; 
6   in the morning it flourishes and is renewed; 
          in the evening it fades and withers.

13  Turn, O LORD! How long? 
          Have compassion on your servants! 
14  Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, 
          so that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. 
15  Make us glad as many days as you have afflicted us, 
          and as many years as we have seen evil. 
16  Let your work be manifest to your servants, 
          and your glorious power to their children. 
17  Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us, 
          and prosper for us the work of our hands — 
          O prosper the work of our hands!

Second Reading 1 Thessalonians 2:1-8

1You yourselves know, brothers and sisters, that our coming to you was not in vain, 2but though we had already suffered and been shamefully mistreated at Philippi, as you know, we had courage in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition. 3For our appeal does not spring from deceit or impure motives or trickery, 4but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the message of the gospel, even so we speak, not to please mortals, but to please God who tests our hearts. 5As you know and as God is our witness, we never came with words of flattery or with a pretext for greed; 6nor did we seek praise from mortals, whether from you or from others, 7though we might have made demands as apostles of Christ. But we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children. 8So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you have become very dear to us.

Gospel Matthew 22:34-46

34When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, 35and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36“Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” 37He said to him, “&squo;You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38This is the greatest and first commandment. 39and a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

41Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them this question: 42“What do you think of the Messiah? Whose son is he?” They said to him, “The son of David.” 43He said to them, “How is it then that David by the Spirit calls him Lord, saying, 
44  ‘The Lord said to my Lord, 
     “Sit at my right hand, 
          until I put your enemies under your feet”’? 
45If David thus calls him Lord, how can he be his son?” 46No one was able to give him an answer, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.