Third Saturday of Advent
Scripture Reading for Today:
Psalm 89:1-4, 19-26
A maskil of Ethan the Ezrahite.I will sing of the Lord’s great love forever; with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations. 2 I will declare that your love stands firm forever, that you have established your faithfulness in heaven itself. 3 You said, “I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to David my servant, 4 ‘I will establish your line forever and make your throne firm through all generations.’”
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19 Once you spoke in a vision, to your faithful people you said: “I have bestowed strength on a warrior; I have raised up a young man from among the people. 20 I have found David my servant; with my sacred oil I have anointed him. 21 My hand will sustain him; surely my arm will strengthen him. 22 The enemy will not get the better of him; the wicked will not oppress him. 23 I will crush his foes before him and strike down his adversaries. 24 My faithful love will be with him, and through my name his horn will be exalted. 25 I will set his hand over the sea, his right hand over the rivers. 26 He will call out to me, ‘You are my Father, my God, the Rock my Savior.’
Judges 13:2-24
2 A certain man of Zorah, named Manoah, from the clan of the Danites, had a wife who was childless, unable to give birth. 3 The angel of the Lord appeared to her and said, “You are barren and childless, but you are going to become pregnant and give birth to a son. 4 Now see to it that you drink no wine or other fermented drink and that you do not eat anything unclean. 5 You will become pregnant and have a son whose head is never to be touched by a razor because the boy is to be a Nazirite, dedicated to God from the womb. He will take the lead in delivering Israel from the hands of the Philistines.” 6 Then the woman went to her husband and told him, “A man of God came to me. He looked like an angel of God, very awesome. I didn’t ask him where he came from, and he didn’t tell me his name. 7 But he said to me, ‘You will become pregnant and have a son. Now then, drink no wine or other fermented drink and do not eat anything unclean, because the boy will be a Nazirite of God from the womb until the day of his death.’” 8 Then Manoah prayed to the Lord: “Pardon your servant, Lord. I beg you to let the man of God you sent to us come again to teach us how to bring up the boy who is to be born.” 9 God heard Manoah, and the angel of God came again to the woman while she was out in the field; but her husband Manoah was not with her. 10 The woman hurried to tell her husband, “He’s here! The man who appeared to me the other day!” 11 Manoah got up and followed his wife. When he came to the man, he said, “Are you the man who talked to my wife?” “I am,” he said. 12 So Manoah asked him, “When your words are fulfilled, what is to be the rule that governs the boy’s life and work?” 13 The angel of the Lord answered, “Your wife must do all that I have told her. 14 She must not eat anything that comes from the grapevine, nor drink any wine or other fermented drink nor eat anything unclean. She must do everything I have commanded her.” 15 Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, “We would like you to stay until we prepare a young goat for you.” 16 The angel of the Lord replied, “Even though you detain me, I will not eat any of your food. But if you prepare a burnt offering, offer it to the Lord.” (Manoah did not realize that it was the angel of the Lord.) 17 Then Manoah inquired of the angel of the Lord, “What is your name, so that we may honor you when your word comes true?” 18 He replied, “Why do you ask my name? It is beyond understanding.” 19 Then Manoah took a young goat, together with the grain offering, and sacrificed it on a rock to the Lord. And the Lord did an amazing thing while Manoah and his wife watched: 20 As the flame blazed up from the altar toward heaven, the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame. Seeing this, Manoah and his wife fell with their faces to the ground. 21 When the angel of the Lord did not show himself again to Manoah and his wife, Manoah realized that it was the angel of the Lord. 22 “We are doomed to die!” he said to his wife. “We have seen God!” 23 But his wife answered, “If the Lord had meant to kill us, he would not have accepted a burnt offering and grain offering from our hands, nor shown us all these things or now told us this.” 24 The woman gave birth to a boy and named him Samson. He grew and the Lord blessed him,
John 7:40-52
40 On hearing his words, some of the people said, “Surely this man is the Prophet.” 41 Others said, “He is the Messiah.” Still others asked, “How can the Messiah come from Galilee? 42 Does not Scripture say that the Messiah will come from David’s descendants and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?” 43 Thus the people were divided because of Jesus. 44 Some wanted to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him.
Unbelief of the Jewish Leaders45 Finally the temple guards went back to the chief priests and the Pharisees, who asked them, “Why didn’t you bring him in?” 46 “No one ever spoke the way this man does,” the guards replied. 47 “You mean he has deceived you also?” the Pharisees retorted. 48 “Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed in him? 49 No! But this mob that knows nothing of the law—there is a curse on them.” 50 Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier and who was one of their own number, asked, 51 “Does our law condemn a man without first hearing him to find out what he has been doing?” 52 They replied, “Are you from Galilee, too? Look into it, and you will find that a prophet does not come out of Galilee.”
Singing Songs of Gratefulness
by Chuck Wesley
Chuck Wesley is a band member of the Missanabie Cree First Nation, Treaty 9 territory. His father was a residential school survivor having attended St. John’s Residential School in Chapleau, Ontario from the age of five to eighteen. His mother was Finnish and from a family of commercial fishermen in the northern Lake Superior area. He is of mixed Cree and Finnish ancestry. He is married to his high school sweetheart, they have three adult sons, nine grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
He is retired after 38 years of law enforcement. He has been in most Indigenous communities in Ontario negotiating conflict resolutions with Chiefs and Councils; supporting First Nations officers, and investigating and resolving conflict between community members and the police.
Post-retirement he is a member of Redwood Park Alliance Church Walking Together Circle with the purpose of educating non-Indigenous people in Canadian/Indigenous history and a vision of his church being a conduit for reducing racism in Thunder Bay. He also volunteers at Northwind Family Ministries, a drop-in center for homeless and marginalized people in Thunder Bay. He co-chairs the Northwest Region Indigenous Advisory Council for the Ontario Provincial Police in Northwestern Ontario. He has a passion for Indigenous people and advocates for reconciliation and social justice.
As I reflect on today’s scripture readings and read in John how the religious people of the day denied Christ, it makes me think of those who are skeptical of reconciliation, those who are so comfortable with this present life that they do not want to think of our past history and the life’s journey of Indigenous people who have survived residential school or descendants who are suffering from inter-generational trauma. I have to ask the question, “What would Jesus do?” “Who does He call us to be?” “How do we obey the Great Commandment?”
In the Gospel of Matthew chapter 22 the Pharisees or church leaders of that time sent one of their own, an expert of the law to test Jesus. Verses 36-40 reads:
“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Psalm 89: 1-4 reads;
I will sing of the Lord’s great love forever;
with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known
through all generations.
I will declare that your love stands firm forever,
that you have established your faithfulness in heaven itself.
You said, “I have made a covenant with my chosen one,
I have sworn to David my servant,
‘I will establish your line forever
and make your throne firm through all generations.
The Psalmist speaks of the importance of giving thanks for all of God’s blessings and singing of the Lord’s great love for us. And with our mouth we tell others of His faithfulness. How will others hear of God’s free gifts if we don’t tell them? This Christmas gratefulness is declared as we sing:
“O Come Let Us Adore Him, O Come Let Us Adore Him,
O Come Let Us Adore Him, Christ the Lord”!
Today’s reading in the book of Judges 13:1-3 speaks of how the birth of Samson was announced by an angel. As we approach this Christmas in the year 2023, this season of advent, this celebration of the birth of Jesus, born to the virgin Mary, also told by an angel that she was pregnant and would bear a son, I think of the love and grace and compassion He gives to all who seek Him.
Scripture calls us to be stewards of His Creation. The greed of today’s world wants to take from God’s Creation without concern for the stewardship of His blessings we are called to. I give thanks every day for the Earth that God has given us to walk on, the Earth that feeds us, that sustains us. For the sun that gives us warmth, for the air that we breathe, for the water, animals, birds and fish. If these gifts cease to exist, humankind will no longer survive. Thank you, Lord, for loving us.
Thank you, Lord, for this time on earth that you have given us. Thank you for your Son, the Christ child, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the word. Jesus, who has come to reconcile us with himself.
Lord, I pray that we may be reconciled to You, that we may be reconciled with Creation, that we may be reconciled with each other, and that we may be reconciled with ourselves.
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