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.

March 03, 2007

I. Readings
Psalms 31, 43, 143
Deuteronomy 11:18-28
Hebrews 5:1-10
John 4:1-26

II. Selections
Psalm 43:2
For 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?

Deuteronomy 11:26-27
See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse: the blessing, if you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I am commanding you today ...

Hebrews 5:8
Although [ Jesus] was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him ...

John 4:10
Jesus answered [ the Samaritan woman], "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water."

III. Meditation: A daily choice

Today you set a choice before us: a blessing or a curse.
If we choose the curse, we walk about mournfully,
feel cast off from you, as if an enemy oppresses.

Or we can choose to ask you for your living water,
that we each day from suffering may learn obedience,
as he who became our source of salvation was obedient.

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