Epiphany 3B, 21 January 2024. The Very Rev. Pamela L. Werntz

• Jonah 3:1-5, 10. God changed [God’s] mind.
• 1 Corinthians 7:29-31. The present form of this world is passing away.
• Mark 1:16-20. And immediately.

O God of many callings, grant us the wisdom, the strength and the courage to seek always and everywhere after truth, come when it may, and cost what it will.

This morning we heard a short passage from Paul’s first letter to the Church in Corinth. It sounds as if he were saying, “The end is near, so shelter in place.” If he did think the very, literal end was near, he was wrong; so why read his teachings 2000 years later as scripture? Here’s one reason: I think that Paul was using rhetorical language to communicate a sense of urgency about behaving as if we were free from the slavery of mistreatment and of mistreating others, so that the present form of this world does pass away, can pass away, and will pass away. In the very next verse after our short passage he writes, “I want you to be free from anxieties or worries.” (It seems as if that would have been a nice verse for the lectionary to include.) Continue reading →