Oct. 26 | Pentecost 20, 12 months C
Joel 2:23-32 or Ecclus. 35:12-17 or Jer. 14:7-10, 19-22
Ps. 65 or Ps. 84:1-6
2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18
Luke 18:9-14
Once we take a look at our lives, what’s vital shouldn’t be how we started and even what we now have accomplished. What’s vital is what stays when our lives finish. The problem we face is to complete properly. As a way to end properly, we should start someplace and make selections whereas dwelling. These selections, nonetheless, solely have lasting worth if we keep on with them till the top.
As finite human beings, at one time or one other, our ideas naturally drift to the unsettling indisputable fact that the world might need to exist with out us. That’s not a shock. The issue is that it’s arduous to think about the world with out me, or that when we’re gone, the world will proceed with out taking discover. Naturally, an vital query arises: What’s it for which we will probably be identified or remembered? The longer we dwell, the longer the listing of prospects grows.
At numerous occasions we might have aspired to put in writing a e book, win a prize, be wealthy and well-known, train nice energy and affect, be morally excellent and a mannequin citizen, and even supply some nice act of mercy or compassion. However historical past has taught us that every one of these are however fleeting reminiscences that won’t even attain the flames of the Final Day. The trophies within the attic are a hidden and forgotten testimony to athletic glory. A dissertation containing unpronounceable phrases collects mud on the again shelf of educational achievement. A yellowing ordination certificates a minimum of offers us entry to the Church Pension Fund. The actual fact is that in the long run, pretty much as good as all these are, they won’t final—they aren’t of final worth. What issues is to face earlier than the grave and say, irrespective of the circumstances, “I’ve fought the great combat, I’ve completed the race, I’ve saved the religion.”
In his closing letter to his religious son, Timothy, St. Paul used the picture of a race to explain the profitable completion of his ministry. Within the context of St. Paul’s letter and within the church, the race is extra like a relay, with every era working a leg, the success of which incorporates the handing off of the baton to the subsequent runner. The baton is religion in Jesus Christ. The subsequent runner is our baby, genealogically or spiritually, as within the case with St. Paul and Timothy. The need of our coronary heart ought to be that our kids will seize the baton of religion and run arduous with it.
If we will come to the top of our leg of the relay and efficiently hand off the baton, then we can have accomplished the race and given others one thing of everlasting price. With God’s assist, we can have completed properly certainly.
Look It Up: Luke 18:9-14
Assume About It: Once we justify ourselves earlier than God and folks, we do it on the expense of our neighbor.
The Rev. Dr. Chuck Alley, former rector of St. Matthew’s Church in Richmond, Virginia, teaches anatomy at Virginia Commonwealth College Medical Faculty.
