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.

August 16, 2007

I. Readings
Psalms 16, 62, 97
2 Samuel 15:1-18
Acts 21:27-36
Mark 10:32-45

II. Selections
Psalm 62:9
Those of low estate are but a breath,
those of high estate are a delusion;
in the balances they go up;
they are together lighter than a breath.

2 Samuel 15:1
After this Absalom got himself a chariot and horses, and fifty men to run ahead of him.

Acts 21:36
The crowd that followed kept shouting, "Away with him [ Paul]!"

Mark 10:43
" ...But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant ... " [ Jesus to his twelve disciples]

III. Meditation: Lightweights on the balances

We would like to be thought of as important-
Absalom thought a chariot and horses
and fifty men to run ahead of him
would make him more royal.

We delude ourselves-
of high estate or low estate,
we are lightweights on the balances;
how futile the attempt to prove our worth.

The people who mobbed and tried to kill Paul
felt themselves righteous and Paul a desecrater.
Paul was your servant, and he attained greatness
dwarfing the sum attained by all who reviled him.

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