Forward Movement is an official, non-profit agency of the Episcopal Church whose mission is to create compelling content for Christian living. Since 1935 we have published the quarterly devotional Forward Day by Day, as well as pamphlets, booklets, and books that encourage and nourish people in their lives of prayer and faith.
1 Maccabees 1:41-63. The king wrote to his whole kingdom that all should be one people, and that all should give up their particular customs.
The books of the Maccabees (in the Apocrypha) tell of the battles of Judas Maccabee and his brothers to liberate Judea from foreign domination. They are full of history and hard-to-digest accounts of sacrilege and slaughter. Not for the faint of heart, but instructive in understanding corruptible human nature.
At first glance the verse above seems benevolent, and not unlike Jesus' commandment that we are to be one as he and the Father are one. But the king's order is issued on pain of death, while Jesus' rests on love. There is no similarity at all.
Recent political campaigns have often appealed to our baser instinct to fear anyone foreign. Facing rising poverty, homelessness, and hunger, we have chosen to build a wall between Mexico and the U.S. We have not learned how to get along with our neighbors.
It is possible to be "one people" and yet have our differences. All it requires is love. We do not have to accept every custom of another tradition, but neither do we have to trample them. If we are to follow Jesus, we must love one another--including those different from ourselves.
PRAY for the Diocese of Victoria Nyanza (Tanzania)
Ps 88 * 91, 92; Revelation 19:11-16; Matthew 16:13-20
View the daily Lectionary Readings at Satucket.com.
Or view the Bible passages at Biblegateway.com.
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