Week of Nov. 6 devotions

Nov. 6-The readings today emphasize staying alert. I think most of us are in dire need of spiritual caffeine to be able to stay spiritually awake. Most of us see worship and prayer as boring duties, the exact opposite of spiritual stimulant. We may well demand that worship stimulate the senses or emotions so that we feel that we have been nudged into greater awareness and alertness.

Monday-After failing in trivia contests and fumbling around for a name, I realize my memory is not what it once was. At the same time, I am still making connections. I may not remember the name of someone who recently tried to sneak into a marathon race, but it did trigger Rosie Ruiz who tried the same thing in the New York marathon in 1980. In teaching a class on comparative religion, I am struck by how many faiths emphasize training and discipline in the faith. The temptation is to seek a shortcut, to try to get the benefits without going through the effort of the whole course.

Tuesday In Romans 13 Paul famously spoke of the government as an agent for God. Luther called officials the left hand of God. Calvin called government work a high calling, if not the highest calling. Where did our callous disregard for the public sphere come from? Should Christians go about judging governmental work and officials harshly? Can we assign only malfeasance to government? Where have we gotten when people who call themselves patriots seem to hate their own government?

Wednesday-I picked up on old book by Eugene Peterson on Jeremiah, Run with the Horses. Therese, the Little Flower said “talking to God is always better than talking about God....pious conversations always have a touch of self-approval about them.” Where does your prayer life fall short and where does it lift you toward the divine?

Thursday-With eye surgeries, I misread a bit. Paul wrote that we see as in a mirror dimly. Enlightenment or illumination means that our distorted vision becomes more clear. indeed, Calvin said that reading Scripture acts as as an aid to spiritual sight, just as glasses help physical sight. Our egotism is an impediment to our spiritual sight. It curves in on our self-interest, so it skews our perspective toward others.

Friday-Veteran’s Day emerges from the end of WWI, the eleventh hour, of the eleventh day, of the eleventh month. with advances in medicine, we have veterans returning home who would have been remembered on Memorial day. So many blasted bodies and minds have returned home.Lincoln’s call to find up a nation’s wounds takes on a physical aspect to help these returning ones whose long march to restoration is often kept shamefully hidden.

Saturday-We’ve been reading Romans, and it bring sup the question: when can trying to be good become distorted? Paul gives examples such as boasting, excessive zeal, and illusion about our intentions or results of our actions. Once again, Paul shows remarkable depth in his analysis of human beings. Even when we try to be good, it gets distorted and we devalue people by trying to make them objects of our viewpoints as normative.