Devotion for the Seventh Day of Lent (LCMS Daily Lectionary)

Above:  Noah’s Thank Offering, by Joseph Anton Koch

Genesis and Mark, Part VIII:  Societal Immorality

MARCH 1, 2023

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Blessed Lord, who caused all holy scriptures to be written for our learning:

Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them,

that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life,

which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ;

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

–The Book of Common Prayer (1979), page 236

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The Assigned Readings:

Genesis 8:13-9:17

Psalm 5 (Morning)

Psalms 27 and 51 (Evening)

Mark 4:1-20

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A Related Post:

Prayer:

http://gatheredprayers.wordpress.com/2011/01/25/prayer-for-wednesday-of-the-first-week-of-lent/

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The sower’s seed needed good soil in which to flourish.  And, as I return to the beginning of the composite Noah’s Ark story, I read that

The earth became corrupt before God;

the earth was filled with lawlessness.

–Genesis 6:11, TANAKH:  The Holy Scriptures

Thus the Great Flood followed in the narratives.  And, as today’s Genesis reading begins, so does renewed life on the planet.  But keep reading; the corruption returned almost immediately.

Corruption–societal immorality–is endemic among we human beings.  As a student of history, I point to examples of this.  Slavery was part of the socio-economic and political fabric of the nation from the 1600s, before this was the United States.   The blood Civil War destroyed the damnable Peculiar Institution in the 1860s.  Yet the racism which supported slavery persisted without apology, and many self-professing Christians quoted the Bible to support both slavery and Jim Crow.  The civil rights movement erased much de jure discrimination against African Americans, changing the attitudes of many people yet leaving de facto discrimination in place.  Many of my fellow human beings seek to discriminate against somebody.  These days homophobia is masquerading shamelessly as societal righteousness, but it is still a form of bigotry.

We human beings have a vocation to act toward each other according to the Golden Rule.  We ought to seek the best for each other, not look for ways to oppress each other.  This proposition undergirds my sense of morality, my ethics.  Thus I conclude  that anything else is corruption and immorality.  Here I stand; I can and will do no other.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

MAY 12, 2012 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF DUNCAN MONTGOMERY GRAY, SR., EPISCOPAL BISHOP OF MISSISSIPPI

THE FEAST OF SAINT GREGORY OF OSTIA, ROMAN CATHOLIC ABBOT, CARDINAL, AND LEGATE; AND SAINT DOMINIC OF THE CAUSEWAY, ROMAN CATHOLIC HERMIT

THE FEAST OF SAMUEL MARSDEN, ANGLICAN MISSIONARY IN AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND

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http://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/01/20/genesis-and-mark-part-viii-societal-immorality/

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