TUESDAY, June 30

Acts 8:1-13. Saul approved of their killing [Stephen].

Saul. That's the Paul we honored yesterday, here witnessing the death of Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr. This was one thing Paul had in common with Simon Peter, who had denied Jesus not once, not twice, but three times during his final hours. And their perfidy was no closet sin. Neither may have made the front page of a newspaper, but while each changed his name, their betrayals have been remembered now for two millennia.

And how blessed we have been by their memory, because you cannot get through life without at some point hurting someone you love. How reassuring it is at such times to remember Peter, the rock on which the church was built, doing just what he had sworn  he would never do--deny his dearest friend Jesus when he needed him most. And if we ever feel that our habits of sin are too ingrained to change, we have but to remember Saul and his complete about-face in the persecution of Christians.

In Saul and in Simon we see once again that, with God, no one is beyond forgiveness and that, with God, nothing is impossible.

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