I am an emeritus professor from Cornell University and was a Commissioned Lay Preacher in the Presbyterian Church (USA). For many years I have followed the Daily Lectionary as printed in the Mission Yearbook of my church. For each day of a two-year cycle, the lectionary lists four psalms and three other scriptural passages--usually one from the Old Testament and two from the New Testament. My practice is to copy down a verse or two from one of the psalms and from each of the other three passages. After I have written out all four selections, I reflect upon them, rearrange their order, and incorporate them into a meditation. Sometimes I retain much of the original wording; sometimes all that remains of a selection is an idea that was stimulated when I read the original words. All selections are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible. For the Daily Lectionary, see the link below.

January 26, 2006

I. Readings
Psalms 81, 116, 143
Genesis 16:15-17:14
Hebrews 10:1-10
John 5:30-47

II. Selections
Psalm 116:16
O LORD, I am your servant;
I am your servant, the child of your serving girl.
You have loosed my bonds.

Genesis 17:8
And I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding; and I will be their God.

Hebrews 10:10
And it is by God's will that we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

John 5:36b
The works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me.

III. Meditation: By your works
We know you by your works,
and by the works you have given Jesus to complete
(the works by which we know you sent him).
By the offering of his body
we have been sanctified.

This offering has changed us
from aliens to landholders.
It has loosed our bonds
and made us your servants,
following him, the Suffering Servant.

Posted by Elmer E. Ewing

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