Tuesday of Holy Week

Thoughts from Sara:

So what did Jesus do during Holy Week? I went looking in the Gospels.

Each one, of course, is slightly different. Matthew, Mark and Luke have him clear the Temple of the "money-changers." (Ooops ... so much for having chocolate eggs available for a donation this past Sunday and Malaria Nets for Mother's Day this coming Sunday!)

Matthew and Mark agree that Jesus is anointed at Bethany (it happens some other time in both Luke and John). Jesus spends time in the temple grounds (remember the widow and her two "mites"?).

But mostly Jesus talks and he teaches. And he continues to tell his parables and some of these are the hardest and most thought-provoking of all the parables ... especially when it comes to all these parables about "keeping watch," the Last Judgment (about the sheep and the goats) and preparing for the return of the Son of Man. This is where all those passages are embedded we often hear during Advent about Christ's return.

But what surprised me, because it never shows up in the Lectionary during Holy Week, is that according to Matthew and Mark's sequence of events, one of the things Jesus taught during Holy Week is the Great Commandment: "Which commandment in the law is the greatest?" a lawyer asked him. Jesus said to him: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

Out of all the other things that crowd our preaching and teaching agendas during Holy Week, maybe we should simply remember that it was in his last week that Jesus taught us what is the most important of all.

Not a bad thing to remember on Tuesday of Holy Week.

P.S. An aside: During the month of March for the past several years, our congregation has hosted the Samaritan Emergency Winter Shelter for people experiencing homelessness in Kent County. This year the shelter included a 9-year old and her mom and sister. Volunteers told me that at supper each night, she would ask to give the blessing and would read the words that are painted as a mural on the wall of our Fellowship Hall: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind ... and your neighbor as yourself." ... Amen and amen.

Photo by: Sara Holben ... Abbey of Iona, Scotland - June 2009