30th March 2025
Reflection with readings below
The Israelites are at a transition point in the life of their community and their relationship with God. Until now they have been migrants travelling through the wilderness to their new home. Until now God had been meeting their daily needs, providing them with bread – manna – and meat – quails. God has kept them clothed and shod: in Nehemiah we read “For forty years you sustained them in the wilderness, and they lacked nothing. Their clothes did not wear out, and their feet did not swell!”
They eat their Passover meal – the event that marked their departure from Egypt – and that is the last time that they eat manna. From then on they live off food that they harvest from the new land where they are establishing their new homes.
Now they are both free and independent! The disgrace of their years of slavery when they were not in charge of their own destiny, is behind them. Now they can make a new beginning in their lives.
How often do we wish we could begin again, make a fresh start? How often do we wish we could put our mistakes behind us, no longer have to live with the consequences of things we did wrong? The Exodus story is very much a story where the people could leave behind all that had oppressed and constrained them. Where they could learn anew how to live in accordance with God’s wisdom. Where they could begin a completely new chapter in the life of their community. However it does require them to be active participants in making their new life a success. They will, for example, have to ensure that they do all that is necessary to grow food to feed their community. To live according to God’s wisdom is to sit back and let God do everything; it is to be get and be active in doing that which God desires for our fellow neighbours and for the environment we share with all of creation.
Jesus’s parable is about beginning over. Here the younger brother realises the failure of his behaviour and seeks as new beginning. But having reached this conclusion he doesn’t just wait for things to improve; he gets up, takes responsibility for his actions and begins the process of actively living a new life. The younger brother feels that this new life will not be lived on the same father-son footing as before. He does not expect that to ask for forgiveness will effect a complete restoration of his former relationship – but his father is there before him. Before the younger son can even finish his speech, his father has already forgiven him and is putting in place all that is needed for this new chapter of his life. The older son struggles to share in this reconciliation, this re-creation. The older son has never strayed from his father’s loving care, but cannot share that loving kindness with his younger brother. He is not willing to live according to the same wisdom that is demonstrated by his father.
Paul, in his letter to the Corinthians, is expounding for us how in Christ – through his death and resurrection – we have too have come to a transition point in our lives. Through his death and resurrection we have entered not just a new era, but, as it were, a whole new creation. We have become, through Jesus, a new people who are reconciled to God – and because of that reconciliation, are entrusted with the mission of sharing that reconciliation to encompass others with, it would seem, the aim of being part of the process by which Christ reconciles the whole world to God. Picking up on the other two readings, this requires our active participation in living our lives anew adhering to the wisdom of God.
Joshua 5:9-12
The Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away from you the disgrace of Egypt.” And so that place is called Gilgal to this day.
While the Israelites were camped in Gilgal they kept the passover in the evening on the fourteenth day of the month in the plains of Jericho. On the day after the passover, on that very day, they ate the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. The manna ceased on the day they ate the produce of the land, and the Israelites no longer had manna; they ate the crops of the land of Canaan that year.
Psalm 32
1 Happy are they whose transgressions are forgiven, *
and whose sin is put away!
2 Happy are they to whom the Lord imputes no guilt, *
and in whose spirit there is no guile!
3 While I held my tongue, my bones withered away, *
because of my groaning all day long.
4 For your hand was heavy upon me day and night; *
my moisture was dried up as in the heat of summer.
5 Then I acknowledged my sin to you, *
and did not conceal my guilt.
6 I said,” I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” *
Then you forgave me the guilt of my sin.
7 Therefore all the faithful will make their prayers to you in time of trouble; *
when the great waters overflow, they shall not reach them.
8 You are my hiding-place;
you preserve me from trouble; *
you surround me with shouts of deliverance.
9 “I will instruct you and teach you in the way that you should go; *
I will guide you with my eye.
10 Do not be like horse or mule, which have no understanding; *
who must be fitted with bit and bridle,
or else they will not stay near you.”
11 Great are the tribulations of the wicked; *
but mercy embraces those who trust in the Lord.
12 Be glad, you righteous, and rejoice in the Lord; *
shout for joy, all who are true of heart.
2 Corinthians 5:16-21
From now on, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
All the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to Jesus. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
So Jesus told them this parable:
“There was a man who had two sons. The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.’ So he divided his property between them. A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living. When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. He would gladly have filled himself with the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.”‘ So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. Then the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ But the father said to his slaves, ‘Quickly, bring out a robe–the best one–and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate.
“Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. He replied, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.’ Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. But he answered his father, ‘Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!’ Then the father said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.'”
The Green Tau 