For the hurt of my poor people I am hurt, I mourn, and dismay has taken hold of me. Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then has the health of my poor people not been restored?
.
Luke 19:9-10
Then Jesus said to Zacchaeus, “Today salvation has come to this house, because you too are a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”
…
Words of Grace for Today –
…
Always we humans have had cause to cry:
is there no balm in Gilead,
pleading really, is there no balm here for us and all these people in our time.
…
So much illness.
So much injustice.
So much loss.
So much sorrow.
So much death.
So much grief.
…
To these cries, God answers with Jesus, living among us, a human, who will heal many, teach with great wisdom, and sacrifice his own life that all people may live.
We do not need so seek Jesus out.
For Jesus came to seek out and to save the lost,
which is all of us,
whether we know it or not.
There is a balm in Gilead,
and here and now,
for our every ill.
What a life Jesus offers us, to fully live, healed
A Canada goose and a bald eagle battled in Burlington, Ont., on Feb. 23. Photographer Mervyn Sequiera captured the fight and posted it on his Instragram account @msequeiraphotography. (Mervyn Sequeira)
God Does Not Save Us From Our Trials,
But In Our Trials.
Isaiah 2:2-4
In days to come …
nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
.
Hebrews 12:14
Pursue peace with everyone, and the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.
…
Words of Grace for Today –
…
The World is in chaos, again, or rather still.
John reports that Jesus says he will Leave Us Peace. What a promise!
On the 8th of May Germany’s 2nd TV service (ZDF) broadcast the Worship Service for the 80th Anniversary of the End of WWII in Europe, a memorial of being liberated. In the service the Germans remembered, with thanks for the end of war in 1945, yet still with endless guilt, for war did not just break out. It was begun by Germany’s Nazi Party. Even more, they remembered the efforts made to rebuild for decades after hostilities ceased. And they gave thanks for the prosperity and peace that Europe has enjoyed since.
Meanwhile violence, destruction, and death in Ukraine, just 100s of km east, remind us all that the lack of war is not ever guaranteed.
But peace in this world, which they celebrated, is more than just the lack of war. This peace is also to have institutions that honour all people, freedom to worship as one chooses, and a social contract wherein all are free to speak their mind, but no one is free to harm others, not even with words. Where justice is striven for earnestly by all, for all. Yet, nothing can guarantee peace.
Here in Canada, as the US has thrown chaos and fear at the world order, as global powers grow in strength and threat, and as extremist militias and failed states create chaos in our world, we must remain vigilant, and continually strive for those things that make for peace in our world, our nation, our province, our communities, and in our homes. Ignorance and apathy, fake news and heated rhetoric, extreme ‘solutions’ and the status quo can have no place in our lives, if we wish peace to continue, if we hope to avoid the complete loss of prosperity that we have enjoyed for many decades. Peace requires work and sacrifice to give it to the next generations. That work begins with each of us.
Yet, John reminds us that peace in this world, peace that we must work for every day, is not the kind of Peace God offers us. God offers us a more powerful, more life-changing, more effective kind of Peace. It is the Peace that the Holy Spirit gives us and teaches us to share with all people.
This Peace is already here today. Trust it. Live it. Share it.
I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me.
.
Mark 7:37
They were astounded beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.’
…
Words of Grace for Today –
…
Jesus walks from village to village with his disciples following along. Dusty roads. Wise sayings and guidance, and challenges to the powers that were. And miracles healing the incurable. And giving renewed life to the worst sinners (or were they the best sinners? That always catches me.)
As we realize that, though Jesus is not healing us of our incurable diseases as record numbers of people die from disease (mostly because there are more people than ever trying to live on earth,) – though Jesus may not be healing us of diseases, Jesus is freeing us from our sins and sending us out with purpose: to provide all people with the food of life, and the living water.
For that we can sing God’s praises, each day and each night.
Pick a melody, the hills and the planets provide the harmony.
On the day I called, you answered me, you increased my strength of soul.
.
Luke 11:10
For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.
…
Words of Grace for Today –
…
In the newsletter from 19 March 2025 of the transcript of their podcast titled “Moving from Me vs You to Us vs Them” the Missing Middle Initiative initiated a new word, ‘Precarcity’.
We’ve all searched for strength to deal with the threats to our communities and even our own lives as so many struggle to afford the basics of life, clean water, food, clothing, shelter. Add to that the ever greater damage and further threats to human existence the world around from climate change’s alarming ever more vicious storms, … all that and many of us have been overwhelmed.
Where can we found strength?
Some have turned to their own finances as their security. Their own homes, and investments, and income seem to provide enough security for themselves and the people they care about. That, of course, requires a harsh and uncaring blindness to others’ suffering and the effects that swiftly spreading plight has on all our lives, and even more on our futures. For example, though one has a comfortable home in Edmonton or Calgary, far from the melting Arctic, or the burning forests, the wildfire smoke still invades our summers making breathing a challenge on more and more days. And the supply of fresh water in our rivers, the glaciers in the mountains, is dwindling. No amount of wealth can provide fresh water when there simply isn’t enough to supply a city, yet alone all of us.
Others have turned to a pseudo faith that says God will let those others suffer, but will always provide for us, if we are ‘good’ enough. So they work harder at being better. Which is of course futile. We are all always really good at one thing, sinning.
The podcast makes that point that we’ve know scarcity fears: affordability for food, housing, and other basics of life. They say now that has shifted in Canada to a fear of the fragility of our future. They call that precarcity. (A new word formed from the root precarious, combined with the ending and idea of scarcity.) Precarcity brought on by the threats from Trump making chaos in the world and setting many givens on edge or on the brink, like the existence of Canada, along with Greenland and Panama, as countries not part of the USA.
So how can we deal with this ever growing, spreading threat to our lives. The ground seems to be shifting under our feet, no matter where we stand.
Denials (like ‘climate change is not real or new or anything we can do anything about’), escapes (like alcohol, drugs, hedonism, travel, privilege, luxury comforts, poverty comforts), misplaced anger and rage (such as blaming others, with slogans like ‘ax the tax’, and f- Trudeau, damn orange amoebae in the White House, or with boycotts and curses of the USA), all provide no solution while degradign the life of those who try such responses – which is all of us to some degree at times.
The only solutions are not solutions but remembrances of who we are and whose we are:
God has created us and, knowing we would sin as we have, collectively and individually, God brought Jesus to live among us, teach, heal, and sacrifice himself. Therewith God demonstrates so clearly that God offers us all 2nd chances over and over again to repent, not just during Lent. And then we can surrender to accept what only God can give us: redemption, new life, and mission worthy of life itself. The mission is to be God’s generous Grace, forgiveness, and love for all people, thus bringing hope out of this precarcity, for ourselves and for all people. Yes our strength to deal with it all comes from God, and God alone.
So we say with the Psalmist: On the day I called, you answered me, you increased my strength of soul.
And we trust Jesus’ promise that Luke reports: everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.
So we pray: help us in these times of growing fears to call for strength. Help us ask, search, and knock on the door that opens life abundant for us all.
Then Joshua said to the people, ‘You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the Lord, to serve him.’ And they said, ‘We are witnesses.’
.
2 Peter 1:10-11
Therefore, brothers and sisters, be all the more eager to confirm your call and election, for if you do this, you will never stumble. For in this way, entry into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ will be richly provided for you.
…
Words of Grace for Today –
…
Standing in the crowd, most people bow to the emotions and direction of charismatic rulers, as those leaders promise to provide better days for the crowds, even as those charismatic punks steal everything and everything possible from the crowds for themselves and those who pave the way to power for the weak people desperate to be rules.
So the crowd conforms.
So the crowd confirms.
So the crowd gives weak people power over them, to let themselves be robbed of life, hope, and peace.
Then I will encamp at my house as a guard, so that no one shall march to and fro; no oppressor shall again overrun them, for now I have seen with my own eyes.
Luke 8:24-25
They went to him and woke him up, shouting, ‘Master, Master, we are perishing!’ And he woke up and rebuked the wind and the raging waves; they ceased, and there was a calm. He said to them, ‘Where is your faith?’ They were afraid and amazed, and said to one another, ‘Who then is this, that he commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him?’
…
Words of Grace For Today
…
Life has all sorts of challenges.
Many would do us in.
More would just make our lives a whole lot more difficult, leading to an earlier death.
How do we hang on to our faith in the midst of these challenges?
…
If faith were our own making, the news would be devastating. We could not hang on to our faith. We’d lose it. We’d be toast.
Thank God, the Holy Spirit creates faith in us, and through our experiences collected from our forebearers and our own experiences, we can learn that there simply are no challenges to us, not even imminent death, that need create fear in us that we are on our own, that God has abandoned us to the deep and deadly.
For God stands as sentry to our hearts, minds, and spirits, protecting us from all that would do us in. For, since God has made us sinners into saints (though we also remain sinners), we are therefore spiritual beings on a human journey, not mere humans on a failing spiritual journey.
Death is not our end, just an end to this journey, and then comes …
well that we will find out, but God promises it will be more wondrous than this journey as humans.
For from the least to the greatest of them, everyone is greedy for unjust gain; and from prophet to priest, everyone deals falsely. They have treated the wound of my people carelessly, saying, ‘Peace, peace’, when there is no peace.
Romans 12:9
Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good;
…
Words of Grace For Today
…
We’ve all heard again that famous, or infamous, Rant, I am Canadian. With quiet music building to swells of patriotic music Joe states his case:
Hey, I’m not a lumberjack or a fur trader
I don’t live in an igloo or eat blubber or own a dogsled.
and I don’t know Jimmy, Sally or Suzy from Canada, although I’m certain that their really, really nice.
Uh
I have a prime minister, not a president.
I speak English and French not American
and I pronounce it about, not aboot.
I can proudly sew my country’s flag on my backpack.
I believe in peacekeeping not in policing.
I believe in diversity, not assimilation.
And I believe the beaver is a truly proud and noble animal.
A toque is a hat.
And a chesterfield is a couch.
And it’s pronounced Zed, not Zee, Zed.
Canada is the second largest landmass
The first nation of hockey
and the best part of North America.
My name is Joe
and I am Canadian.
Reality
Given Trump and his threats and actual tariffs that will do great damage to our economy, one can understand the call to be patriotic.
At the core of our problems, though, we do not find economics or politics, but good old fashion love, faith, and hope, expressed as empathy and care for all people, especially the poor.
So ours is not a rant but a chant backed by any number of great pieces of music, for example “Canticle of the Turning” (ELW 723) by Rory Cooney, to the lively Irish folk tune used as a rugby match song:
Hey, I am not a crusading knight, nor a desert ascetic.
I don’t hold exorcisms, live in Corinth or Bethlehem or Nazareth.
I have a pastor and a bishop, not a coach or a guru.
I speak many native languages, but not Latin or Sanskritic.
I proudly were a cross on a fine chain around my neck.
I believe in peace not in war or violence.
I believe in respecting and welcoming diversity, not excluding strangers or foreigners.
I believe the fish is a wonderful symbol of faith, as is the boat.
I’m not concerned with how people pronounce words, but that we share the radical Word of God.
God’s favour is not won by what we do or say or believe, but is God’s free gift given to us.
We can refuse it and we do, sinners that we are. But God keeps saving us over and over again, making us saints able to do miraculous things for others, especially the poor, the hungry, the homeless, the outcasts, refugees, strangers, and especially children.
Christianity may be worldwide and messed up in many places, sometimes even here at home, but it is the gift of life,
the gift of life abundant for all people.
We may be getting fewer in number, but being a follower of Jesus is the best part of life.
My name is not important because God knows it and everything about me and still loves me. I’m not ashamed of my name, yet it’s not what I’m proud of.
I’m proud that I bear Jesus’ cross and Jesus’ name,
Then he said to me, ‘Mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.” Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord God: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel.
1 Corinthians 15:42-44
So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body.
…
Words of Grace For Today
…
Everyone wants to know what happens after we die.
Just think if one could guarantee that one’s information about what happens to us after death were absolutely true! One could control the hearts and minds of many people with that information.
But dying is what we know.
After that it is wild guessing.
Some call that hope, but it really is still a feeble hope built on wild guessing.
Real hope is
to know that God loves us, promises to forgive and renew us in this life (which we need desperately each day, hour, minute, second), and gives us so many gifts we do not deserve, all so that we are equipped to share life abundant with others,
and knowing that
we can
trust that whatever comes our way in this world,
whatever would zap life-energy from our bones
to lay us low and take life from us
God will respond by reviving us
and renewing our spirits:
God will walk with us,
and help us continue
to help others,
and if we die
to bring us
home.
Hope in that, instead of some wild-guess based description of what happens after death,
so that when we lie on our deathbed, we know from so much experience
