All Hallows Evening Prayer for Saturday Evening (March 26, 2022)
PROCLAMATION OF THE LIGHT
One or more candles may be lit.
Bless be God who forgives all our sins
God’s mercy endures forever
EVENING HYMN
Open this link in a new tab to hear Joyous Light of Glorious God from Kent Gustavson’s Mountain Vespers.
Joyous light of glorious God,
heavenly, holy, Jesus Christ,
We have come to the setting of the Sun
and we look to the ev’ning light.
We sing to Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Our voices pure voices together.
O precious God, giver of life,
we sing your praises forever.
Joyous light of glorious God,
heavenly, holy, Jesus Christ,
We have come to the setting of the Sun
and we look to the ev’ning light.
We sing to Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Our voices pure voices together.
O precious God, giver of life,
we sing your praises forever.
PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.
Blessed are you, O Lord our God,
the shepherd of Israel,
their pillar of cloud by day,
their pillar of fire by night.
In these forty days you lead us
into the desert of repentance
that in this pilgrimage of prayer
we might learn to be your people once more.
In fasting and service
you bring us back to your heart.
You open our eyes to your presence in the world
and you free our hands to lead others
to the radiant splendour of your mercy.
Be with us in these journey days
for without you we are lost and will perish.
To you alone be dominion and glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.
Open this link in a new tab to hear Psalm 141 from Kent Gustavson's Mountain Vespers.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
O God, I call you; come to me quickly;
Hear my voice when I cry to you.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
Set a watch before my mouth,
and guard the doors of my lips.
Let not my heart incline to any evil thing;
Never occupied in wickedness.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
My eyes are turned to you, O God,
in you I take refuge.
My eyes are turned to you, O God,
Strip me not of my life.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
Silence is kept.
May our prayers come before you, O God, as incense, and may your presence surround and fill us, so that in union with all creation, we might sing your praise and your love in our lives. Amen.
SCRIPTURE
Romans 12: 1-21 Life in God’s Service
And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.
Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us. Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other.
In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out with as much faith as God has given you. If your gift is serving others, serve them well. If you are a teacher, teach well. If your gift is to encourage others, be encouraging. If it is giving, give generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously. And if you have a gift for showing kindness to others, do it gladly.
Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other. Never be lazy, but work hard and serve the Lord enthusiastically. Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying. When God’s people are in need, be ready to help them. Always be eager to practice hospitality.
Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them. Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with each other. Don’t be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people. And don’t think you know it all!
Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone.
Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say,
“I will take revenge;
I will pay them back,”
says the Lord.
Instead,
“If your enemies are hungry, feed them.
If they are thirsty, give them something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap
burning coals of shame on their heads.”
Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.
May your word live in us
and bear much fruit to your glory
HOMILY
Psychologists tell us is that when someone or something triggers an angry reaction in us, our first impulse is to respond with aggressive behavior toward whoever or whatever triggered that reaction. The trigger does not have to be real. It may be something that our brain imagined. We may have misunderstood what someone said or did.
How we respond will be determined by how we learned to express anger during our childhood. We may snap at the person who triggered our anger. If we have been bottling up anger, we may explode, expressing anger that is disproportionate to the situation.
On the other hand, if we have learned to express our anger indirectly, we may turn our backs on them and walk away from them, showing that we are angry with them in our body language. We may act in other ways to show our displeasure with them. We may refuse to talk to them; snub them—insult them by not giving them any attention or treating them as if they are unimportant; and talk about them behind their back, saying things about them, which are unkind or untrue. We may cancel them, block them on social media, and we may try to persuade other people to cancel them too. We may do other things to make trouble for them and to turn other people against them.
In verse 19 of today’s reading from his letter to the Romans Paul tells the members of the church at Rome and us that we should never take such actions. We should never do harm to someone else as a punishment for harm that they have done to us or which we believe that they have done us. Punishing someone for harming us, our friends, or our family is something that we should leave solely to God. He goes on to cite two passages from the Old Testament.
The first passage is Deuteronomy 32: 35.
“I will take revenge; I will pay them back.
In due time their feet will slip.
Their day of disaster will arrive,
and their destiny will overtake them.”
The second passage is Proverbs 25: 21-22.
“If your enemies are hungry, give them food to eat.
If they are thirsty, give them water to drink.
You will heap burning coals of shame on their heads,
and the Lord will reward you.”
Inferred in what Paul is saying is that we should not even wish for such punishment to happen, much less inflict it ourselves.
Jesus himself equates the desire to hurt someone or do harm to them in retaliation for what they may have said or done or what we imagined them to have said or done with hurting them or doing harm to them. In the Sermon on the Mount, he taught that harboring anger toward someone else in our hearts is the same as or equal to murdering them.
What Paul and Jesus are not saying is that we should not be angry but rather we should express it in appropriate way, verbalize it, and then let go of it. When we verbalize our anger, taking responsibility for our feelings and not blaming them on someone else, our anger diminishes. On the other hand, if we blame someone else for our angry feelings, we feed our anger. We make it worse.
Someone who refuses to speak to someone else after they became angry with them, is harboring anger toward that person. They may be hiding their anger from other people and themselves, but they are angry with the person with whom they are refusing to speak. If they were indifferent to that person, if they were not thinking about them, or if they had no interest in them, it would not matter to them if they spoke to that person or otherwise had contact with them. They would not go out of their way to ignore them or avoid them. Their avoidance behavior is an expression of displeasure with the person with whom they are angry and is a form of punishment.
Among the common reasons that we avoid people, psychologists tell us, are that we experience social anxiety around them.
When we are angry with someone, avoiding them may be our way of expressing our displeasure with them. It may be our way of punishing them for having displeased us and even of manipulating and controlling them.
Other common reasons that we avoid people is that a particular individual is manipulative and tries to control us to their advantage.
We feel confused when we are around a particular individual. They may do nothing to trigger our confusion. Rather we have conflicted feelings toward them. We experience unexpected feelings for them, which we are not used to experiencing. It is easier to avoid them than deal with the uncertainty of where the relationship might lead.
We do not feel comfortable around a particular individual. We may feel that they do not fully approve of us or accept us. We may suspect them of having ulterior motives.
We feel bad about ourselves in a particular individual’s presence. They may say unkind and unpleasant things to us. We may have been unkind and unpleasant to them and feel guilty and ashamed for what we did. We may feel that we were dishonest with them and led them on.
The person who we are avoiding is judgmental all of the time and they do not consider the circumstances or our feelings.
They are too negative. They have nothing good to say about anything.
They are passive-aggressive. They make snide remarks, intentionally do things to interfere with what we are doing and to keep us from succeeding, and deliberately do something or not do something to make things difficult for us or to upset us.
They are self-centered and only interested in themselves and their own activities. They care mostly about themselves. They give no thought to how their actions affect us and they give a lot of attention to getting what they want or having things their way.
They have difficulty in managing their anger and will blow up at the slightest provocation. When they are angry, they say unkind, unpleasant things and even intentionally try to cause pain to the person at whom they are angry. They rarely apologize and if they do, their apology is insincere. They may use their outbursts of anger to intimidate and control other people. They may also resort to physical violence.
They are controlling to the point they do not want us to have any contact with our friends or family and they want to make every decision for us—how we spend our money, what clothes we were, and so on.
We have lost interest in them as a friend, having found a more interesting or exciting friend, and we cannot be bothered to tell them that we are no longer interested in continuing the friendship. We are hoping that if we avoid them, they will get the hint.
The person that we are avoiding may not have done anything bad or harmful. We may not be comfortable with feelings, and they may more open with their feelings than we are. We may have irrational fears of what might happen if we do not keep a distance between us and them. We may fear that they will engulf us and we will lose our identity.
If we are a disciple of Jesus, how we respond to these situations will differ from how other people respond. What Jesus taught and practiced will guide and determine how we respond.
For a disciple of Jesus avoiding someone because we are angry with them, refusing to speak to them and ignoring them, is not an option. Cancelling them is certainly not an option. Verbalizing our anger at someone is one thing; acting it out is entirely different.
Doing harm to or punishing the person responsible for something bad done to us, our family, or our friends is up to God, not us, is what Paul is telling the members of the church at Rome and us. God makes the final decision.
When we take avenging ourselves or someone else into our own hands, we are taking control of something that we do not have the right to do. It may be our first impulse. It may be something which the world does. But it is not something that a disciple of Jesus does.
For a disciple of Jesus there is no tit for tat, no actions done intentionally to punish someone else because they have done something unpleasant to us. It is God’s decision as to what consequences that person suffers and if, when, and where they occur. It is not ours.
God can be trusted to make the right decision. We cannot. We do not know the entire situation, the extenuating circumstances, and the things like that. God does. We will let our feelings do the thinking for us. God’s decision will be dispassionate, uninfluenced by emotions.
Paul is not saying anything different from Jesus. Our Lord taught his disciples to love their enemies and to do good to them. He taught them to turn the other cheek, to go the extra mile, to give their shirt as well as their cloak, to give money with no expectation of seeing it again. He taught his disciples to do others what they would wish to have done to them, to forgive others as they would wish to be forgiven, and not to limit how many times they forgave someone.
In none of these teachings do we find any suggestion that we should take avenging a wrongdoing, real or imagined, into our own hands.
Paul concludes this passage by telling the members of the church Rome and us not to let evil take control of us but to take control of evil ourselves by doing good. When we do not do the right thing as a disciple of Jesus, when we do things the way that world does them and not the way that Jesus taught his disciples to think and act, we are giving what is not good for us as his disciples and what may harm us a foothold in our lives.
The way our friends and family do things, the way things are done on social media, the way that we have done things influences us much more than we realize. These ways of thinking and acting are often in conflict with Jesus’ teachings and example. They can influence us to the point that they become a serious obstacle to following Jesus.
Practices like ghosting and cancelling, while increasingly common on social media, are the opposite of what Jesus taught and practiced. We cannot love a fellow Christian and a member of our church if we blocked them on Facebook because we did not like what they wrote in a post. The post may have displeased us but Jesus’ teaching to love one another does not allow us to put our displeasure with them before loving them. We are letting our feelings get in the way of following Jesus.
We may not like being told that we are not following Jesus when we do something that is not in line with what he taught and practiced but if we are really honest with ourselves we are not. The person who is telling us is not being judgmental, being too quick to criticize people or acting morally superior, they are simply telling us like it is. They may be fully aware of their own flaws and imperfections and may be speaking not out of a desire to cause us hurt but to help us grow spiritually.
As disciples of Jesus, we do have a responsibility to nurture each other in the Christian faith and life and to care for each other spiritually. It is a responsibility which we all should take seriously. If we genuinely love our fellow disciples, we are going to take an active interest in their spiritual well-being. We will expect our fellow disciples to do the same thing for us. Otherwise, we are not disciples of Jesus. We are just consumers of Sunday School lessons, religious music, and sermons.
There is nothing wrong with “attending upon the ordinances,” as John Wesley called them. But attending upon the ordinances alone is not discipleship.
Mark Croston in an article, “What Does Discipleship Look Like in Real Life,” on the Lifeway Voices website offers this explanation of what a disciple is.:
“The Greek term for “disciple” in the New Testament is mathetes, which means more than just “student or learner.” A disciple is a “follower,” someone who adheres completely to the teachings of another, making them his rule of life and conduct. So, in real life, everything we see in Jesus we are to live out in our lives.”
He goes on to write:
“Many people think they are good disciples, because they know a lot of answers and follow their own set of rules. I say ‘their own set’ because they are usually a favorite sub-set of the biblical teachings—go to worship, read our Bible, give a tithe, pray, and care about people like us—all great Christian things, but they are not what Jesus declared as the ultimate sign of a real disciple.”
He reminds us:
“Love is how we live out everything we know about God.”
We love God and we love everyone whom God loves. We live a life of love, following Jesus’ example.
Being a disciple of Jesus is not always easy. It is not always the least difficult way to do things. It requires that we make sacrifices. Among those sacrifices is giving up getting even or wanting to get even in order to love the person whom we want to punish for doing something bad to us or to someone we love.
SONG OF PRAISE
Open this link in a new tab to hear the Magnificat from Kent Gustavson’s Mountain Vespers.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
1 You O God have done great things
and holy is your name.
You have mercy on those who fear you
n ev’ry generation.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
2 You have shown the strength of your arm,
you have scattered the proud in their conceit.
You have cast the might down from thrones
and have lifted up the lowly.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
3 You have filled the hungry with good things,
the rich you have sent away empty.
You have come to the help of your servant Israel
you’ve remembered your promise of mercy.
The promise you made
to Sarah and Abraham.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
Glory to you, O Lord our God
With your love and power.
Glory to you, O Lord our God
With your love and power.
Amen
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
With confidence and trust let us pray to the Lord, saying, “Lord, have mercy.”
For the one holy catholic and apostolic Church throughout the world, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For the mission of the Church, that in faithful witness it may preach the gospel to the ends of the earth, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For those preparing for baptism and for their teachers and sponsors, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For peace in the world, that a spirit of respect and reconciliation may grow among nations and peoples, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For the poor, the persecuted, the sick, and all who suffer; for refugees, prisoners, and all in danger; that they may be relieved and protected, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy
For all whom we have injured or offended, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For grace to amend our lives and to further the reign of God, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
Free Prayer
In silent or spontaneous prayer all bring before God the concerns of the day.
The Collect
Gracious Father, whose blessed Son Jesus Christ came from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the world, evermore give us this bread, that he may live in us, and we in him, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
RESPONSE
Open this think to hear Lori True’s “I Send You with the Grace of My Spirit.”
I send you with the grace of my Spirit
I send you as companions of peace
I place you on the path that leads to endless joy
Go seek me in the least of these
Show by your life what my Gospel requires
Show by your life you are mine
I send you with the grace of my Spirit
I send you as companions of peace
I place you on the path that leads to endless joy
Go seek me in the least of these
Show by your life what my Gospel requires
Show by your life you are mine
I send you with the grace of my Spirit
I send you as companions of peace
I place you on the path that leads to endless joy
Go seek me in the least of these
Show by your life what my Gospel requires
Show by your life you are mine
THE LORD’S PRAYER
And now, as our Saviour has taught us,
we are bold to say,
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done;
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power, and the glory
for ever and ever.
Amen.
SOLEMN PRAYER OVER THE PEOPLE
Look with compassion, O Lord,
upon this your people;
that rightly observing this holy season
they may learn to know you more fully,
and to serve you with a more perfect will;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Joyous light of glorious God,
heavenly, holy, Jesus Christ,
We have come to the setting of the Sun
and we look to the ev’ning light.
We sing to Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Our voices pure voices together.
O precious God, giver of life,
we sing your praises forever.
Joyous light of glorious God,
heavenly, holy, Jesus Christ,
We have come to the setting of the Sun
and we look to the ev’ning light.
We sing to Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Our voices pure voices together.
O precious God, giver of life,
we sing your praises forever.
PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.
Blessed are you, O Lord our God,
the shepherd of Israel,
their pillar of cloud by day,
their pillar of fire by night.
In these forty days you lead us
into the desert of repentance
that in this pilgrimage of prayer
we might learn to be your people once more.
In fasting and service
you bring us back to your heart.
You open our eyes to your presence in the world
and you free our hands to lead others
to the radiant splendour of your mercy.
Be with us in these journey days
for without you we are lost and will perish.
To you alone be dominion and glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.
Open this link in a new tab to hear Psalm 141 from Kent Gustavson's Mountain Vespers.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
O God, I call you; come to me quickly;
Hear my voice when I cry to you.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
Set a watch before my mouth,
and guard the doors of my lips.
Let not my heart incline to any evil thing;
Never occupied in wickedness.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
My eyes are turned to you, O God,
in you I take refuge.
My eyes are turned to you, O God,
Strip me not of my life.
Let my prayer rise before you as incense,
the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
Silence is kept.
May our prayers come before you, O God, as incense, and may your presence surround and fill us, so that in union with all creation, we might sing your praise and your love in our lives. Amen.
SCRIPTURE
Romans 12: 1-21 Life in God’s Service
And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.
Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us. Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other.
In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out with as much faith as God has given you. If your gift is serving others, serve them well. If you are a teacher, teach well. If your gift is to encourage others, be encouraging. If it is giving, give generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously. And if you have a gift for showing kindness to others, do it gladly.
Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other. Never be lazy, but work hard and serve the Lord enthusiastically. Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying. When God’s people are in need, be ready to help them. Always be eager to practice hospitality.
Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them. Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with each other. Don’t be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people. And don’t think you know it all!
Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone.
Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say,
“I will take revenge;
I will pay them back,”
says the Lord.
Instead,
“If your enemies are hungry, feed them.
If they are thirsty, give them something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap
burning coals of shame on their heads.”
Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.
May your word live in us
and bear much fruit to your glory
HOMILY
Turn the Other Cheek
Psychologists tell us is that when someone or something triggers an angry reaction in us, our first impulse is to respond with aggressive behavior toward whoever or whatever triggered that reaction. The trigger does not have to be real. It may be something that our brain imagined. We may have misunderstood what someone said or did.
How we respond will be determined by how we learned to express anger during our childhood. We may snap at the person who triggered our anger. If we have been bottling up anger, we may explode, expressing anger that is disproportionate to the situation.
On the other hand, if we have learned to express our anger indirectly, we may turn our backs on them and walk away from them, showing that we are angry with them in our body language. We may act in other ways to show our displeasure with them. We may refuse to talk to them; snub them—insult them by not giving them any attention or treating them as if they are unimportant; and talk about them behind their back, saying things about them, which are unkind or untrue. We may cancel them, block them on social media, and we may try to persuade other people to cancel them too. We may do other things to make trouble for them and to turn other people against them.
In verse 19 of today’s reading from his letter to the Romans Paul tells the members of the church at Rome and us that we should never take such actions. We should never do harm to someone else as a punishment for harm that they have done to us or which we believe that they have done us. Punishing someone for harming us, our friends, or our family is something that we should leave solely to God. He goes on to cite two passages from the Old Testament.
The first passage is Deuteronomy 32: 35.
“I will take revenge; I will pay them back.
In due time their feet will slip.
Their day of disaster will arrive,
and their destiny will overtake them.”
The second passage is Proverbs 25: 21-22.
“If your enemies are hungry, give them food to eat.
If they are thirsty, give them water to drink.
You will heap burning coals of shame on their heads,
and the Lord will reward you.”
Inferred in what Paul is saying is that we should not even wish for such punishment to happen, much less inflict it ourselves.
Jesus himself equates the desire to hurt someone or do harm to them in retaliation for what they may have said or done or what we imagined them to have said or done with hurting them or doing harm to them. In the Sermon on the Mount, he taught that harboring anger toward someone else in our hearts is the same as or equal to murdering them.
What Paul and Jesus are not saying is that we should not be angry but rather we should express it in appropriate way, verbalize it, and then let go of it. When we verbalize our anger, taking responsibility for our feelings and not blaming them on someone else, our anger diminishes. On the other hand, if we blame someone else for our angry feelings, we feed our anger. We make it worse.
Someone who refuses to speak to someone else after they became angry with them, is harboring anger toward that person. They may be hiding their anger from other people and themselves, but they are angry with the person with whom they are refusing to speak. If they were indifferent to that person, if they were not thinking about them, or if they had no interest in them, it would not matter to them if they spoke to that person or otherwise had contact with them. They would not go out of their way to ignore them or avoid them. Their avoidance behavior is an expression of displeasure with the person with whom they are angry and is a form of punishment.
Among the common reasons that we avoid people, psychologists tell us, are that we experience social anxiety around them.
When we are angry with someone, avoiding them may be our way of expressing our displeasure with them. It may be our way of punishing them for having displeased us and even of manipulating and controlling them.
Other common reasons that we avoid people is that a particular individual is manipulative and tries to control us to their advantage.
We feel confused when we are around a particular individual. They may do nothing to trigger our confusion. Rather we have conflicted feelings toward them. We experience unexpected feelings for them, which we are not used to experiencing. It is easier to avoid them than deal with the uncertainty of where the relationship might lead.
We do not feel comfortable around a particular individual. We may feel that they do not fully approve of us or accept us. We may suspect them of having ulterior motives.
We feel bad about ourselves in a particular individual’s presence. They may say unkind and unpleasant things to us. We may have been unkind and unpleasant to them and feel guilty and ashamed for what we did. We may feel that we were dishonest with them and led them on.
The person who we are avoiding is judgmental all of the time and they do not consider the circumstances or our feelings.
They are too negative. They have nothing good to say about anything.
They are passive-aggressive. They make snide remarks, intentionally do things to interfere with what we are doing and to keep us from succeeding, and deliberately do something or not do something to make things difficult for us or to upset us.
They are self-centered and only interested in themselves and their own activities. They care mostly about themselves. They give no thought to how their actions affect us and they give a lot of attention to getting what they want or having things their way.
They have difficulty in managing their anger and will blow up at the slightest provocation. When they are angry, they say unkind, unpleasant things and even intentionally try to cause pain to the person at whom they are angry. They rarely apologize and if they do, their apology is insincere. They may use their outbursts of anger to intimidate and control other people. They may also resort to physical violence.
They are controlling to the point they do not want us to have any contact with our friends or family and they want to make every decision for us—how we spend our money, what clothes we were, and so on.
We have lost interest in them as a friend, having found a more interesting or exciting friend, and we cannot be bothered to tell them that we are no longer interested in continuing the friendship. We are hoping that if we avoid them, they will get the hint.
The person that we are avoiding may not have done anything bad or harmful. We may not be comfortable with feelings, and they may more open with their feelings than we are. We may have irrational fears of what might happen if we do not keep a distance between us and them. We may fear that they will engulf us and we will lose our identity.
If we are a disciple of Jesus, how we respond to these situations will differ from how other people respond. What Jesus taught and practiced will guide and determine how we respond.
For a disciple of Jesus avoiding someone because we are angry with them, refusing to speak to them and ignoring them, is not an option. Cancelling them is certainly not an option. Verbalizing our anger at someone is one thing; acting it out is entirely different.
Doing harm to or punishing the person responsible for something bad done to us, our family, or our friends is up to God, not us, is what Paul is telling the members of the church at Rome and us. God makes the final decision.
When we take avenging ourselves or someone else into our own hands, we are taking control of something that we do not have the right to do. It may be our first impulse. It may be something which the world does. But it is not something that a disciple of Jesus does.
For a disciple of Jesus there is no tit for tat, no actions done intentionally to punish someone else because they have done something unpleasant to us. It is God’s decision as to what consequences that person suffers and if, when, and where they occur. It is not ours.
God can be trusted to make the right decision. We cannot. We do not know the entire situation, the extenuating circumstances, and the things like that. God does. We will let our feelings do the thinking for us. God’s decision will be dispassionate, uninfluenced by emotions.
Paul is not saying anything different from Jesus. Our Lord taught his disciples to love their enemies and to do good to them. He taught them to turn the other cheek, to go the extra mile, to give their shirt as well as their cloak, to give money with no expectation of seeing it again. He taught his disciples to do others what they would wish to have done to them, to forgive others as they would wish to be forgiven, and not to limit how many times they forgave someone.
In none of these teachings do we find any suggestion that we should take avenging a wrongdoing, real or imagined, into our own hands.
Paul concludes this passage by telling the members of the church Rome and us not to let evil take control of us but to take control of evil ourselves by doing good. When we do not do the right thing as a disciple of Jesus, when we do things the way that world does them and not the way that Jesus taught his disciples to think and act, we are giving what is not good for us as his disciples and what may harm us a foothold in our lives.
The way our friends and family do things, the way things are done on social media, the way that we have done things influences us much more than we realize. These ways of thinking and acting are often in conflict with Jesus’ teachings and example. They can influence us to the point that they become a serious obstacle to following Jesus.
Practices like ghosting and cancelling, while increasingly common on social media, are the opposite of what Jesus taught and practiced. We cannot love a fellow Christian and a member of our church if we blocked them on Facebook because we did not like what they wrote in a post. The post may have displeased us but Jesus’ teaching to love one another does not allow us to put our displeasure with them before loving them. We are letting our feelings get in the way of following Jesus.
We may not like being told that we are not following Jesus when we do something that is not in line with what he taught and practiced but if we are really honest with ourselves we are not. The person who is telling us is not being judgmental, being too quick to criticize people or acting morally superior, they are simply telling us like it is. They may be fully aware of their own flaws and imperfections and may be speaking not out of a desire to cause us hurt but to help us grow spiritually.
As disciples of Jesus, we do have a responsibility to nurture each other in the Christian faith and life and to care for each other spiritually. It is a responsibility which we all should take seriously. If we genuinely love our fellow disciples, we are going to take an active interest in their spiritual well-being. We will expect our fellow disciples to do the same thing for us. Otherwise, we are not disciples of Jesus. We are just consumers of Sunday School lessons, religious music, and sermons.
There is nothing wrong with “attending upon the ordinances,” as John Wesley called them. But attending upon the ordinances alone is not discipleship.
Mark Croston in an article, “What Does Discipleship Look Like in Real Life,” on the Lifeway Voices website offers this explanation of what a disciple is.:
“The Greek term for “disciple” in the New Testament is mathetes, which means more than just “student or learner.” A disciple is a “follower,” someone who adheres completely to the teachings of another, making them his rule of life and conduct. So, in real life, everything we see in Jesus we are to live out in our lives.”
He goes on to write:
“Many people think they are good disciples, because they know a lot of answers and follow their own set of rules. I say ‘their own set’ because they are usually a favorite sub-set of the biblical teachings—go to worship, read our Bible, give a tithe, pray, and care about people like us—all great Christian things, but they are not what Jesus declared as the ultimate sign of a real disciple.”
He reminds us:
“Love is how we live out everything we know about God.”
We love God and we love everyone whom God loves. We live a life of love, following Jesus’ example.
Being a disciple of Jesus is not always easy. It is not always the least difficult way to do things. It requires that we make sacrifices. Among those sacrifices is giving up getting even or wanting to get even in order to love the person whom we want to punish for doing something bad to us or to someone we love.
SONG OF PRAISE
Open this link in a new tab to hear the Magnificat from Kent Gustavson’s Mountain Vespers.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
1 You O God have done great things
and holy is your name.
You have mercy on those who fear you
n ev’ry generation.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
2 You have shown the strength of your arm,
you have scattered the proud in their conceit.
You have cast the might down from thrones
and have lifted up the lowly.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
3 You have filled the hungry with good things,
the rich you have sent away empty.
You have come to the help of your servant Israel
you’ve remembered your promise of mercy.
The promise you made
to Sarah and Abraham.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For you have looked with favor on your lowly servant;
from this day all generations will call me blessed.
Glory to you, O Lord our God
With your love and power.
Glory to you, O Lord our God
With your love and power.
Amen
PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE
With confidence and trust let us pray to the Lord, saying, “Lord, have mercy.”
For the one holy catholic and apostolic Church throughout the world, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For the mission of the Church, that in faithful witness it may preach the gospel to the ends of the earth, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For those preparing for baptism and for their teachers and sponsors, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For peace in the world, that a spirit of respect and reconciliation may grow among nations and peoples, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For the poor, the persecuted, the sick, and all who suffer; for refugees, prisoners, and all in danger; that they may be relieved and protected, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy
For all whom we have injured or offended, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
For grace to amend our lives and to further the reign of God, we pray to you, Lord.
Lord, have mercy.
Free Prayer
In silent or spontaneous prayer all bring before God the concerns of the day.
The Collect
Gracious Father, whose blessed Son Jesus Christ came from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the world, evermore give us this bread, that he may live in us, and we in him, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
RESPONSE
Open this think to hear Lori True’s “I Send You with the Grace of My Spirit.”
I send you with the grace of my Spirit
I send you as companions of peace
I place you on the path that leads to endless joy
Go seek me in the least of these
Show by your life what my Gospel requires
Show by your life you are mine
I send you with the grace of my Spirit
I send you as companions of peace
I place you on the path that leads to endless joy
Go seek me in the least of these
Show by your life what my Gospel requires
Show by your life you are mine
I send you with the grace of my Spirit
I send you as companions of peace
I place you on the path that leads to endless joy
Go seek me in the least of these
Show by your life what my Gospel requires
Show by your life you are mine
THE LORD’S PRAYER
And now, as our Saviour has taught us,
we are bold to say,
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done;
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power, and the glory
for ever and ever.
Amen.
SOLEMN PRAYER OVER THE PEOPLE
Look with compassion, O Lord,
upon this your people;
that rightly observing this holy season
they may learn to know you more fully,
and to serve you with a more perfect will;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.
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