Sixth Sunday in Epiphany

Today's Link
Charle's Pedley's Earth Shattering News

Saying for the Day
If Jesus Christ were to come today people would not even crucify him. They would ask him to dinner, and hear what he has to say, and make fun of it. ~Thomas Carlyle

Picture of the Day

It is the sixth Sunday after the Epiphany in the liturgical churches and the Gospel for the day is Mark 1:40-45.
If you read the text you will find in it two impossible requests. One is made of Jesus and the other by Him.
The first request comes from a leper who wants to be healed.
Now that certainly is an impossible request. It would be like somebody coming up to you and saying I have terminal cancer please heal me. You might feel sorry for the person. You might wish you could help him. You might even send him to a cancer center. But you wouldn’t and couldn’t heal him.
This leper comes to Jesus and asks the impossible. He asks and doesn’t demand. He says if it is your will you can heal me. Where we often go to God demanding that he heal somebody we love, treating God as if He owed us, this leper knows the healing will come only if it is in the will of Jesus. He asks the impossible. He hopes for the impossible. But he doesn’t demand the impossible.
Jesus looks at him with compassion and says it is my will. He touches him. Then the impossible happens. The man is healed.

Then comes Jesus impossible request.
He asks the leper now cured not to tell anybody that He cured him.
Jesus has other things he wans to do. He has good news of the Kingdom to proclaim. He has rabbis to teach about the meaning of Old Testament Scripture. He does not want to be deluged with people wanting healing.
So he requests that the man tell nobody about Him. Another impossible request.
The man is so full of joy at his healing, so full of thanksgiving, that he just has to shout it out. He can’t keep it to himself. For years he had been isolated from everybody. He couldn’t touch or be touched. He had to beg for food.
But Jesus changed all that and he had to tell about the wonderful person who did it. He failed to keep the impossible request of Jesus.
It still works that way. We make impossible requests of God and God , when it is within his will , fills them. God asks of us to “ pick up our cross and follow Him” and we fail.
Betty knows that He still fills impossible requests because I am here writing this blog.
When my children were young an ear infection I had had for years somehow went through to the brain. I went into convulsions and my heart stopped. My oldest son gave me CPR and they rushed me to the emergency room. The doctor’s didn’t offer much hope. My good friend Father Gondeck came and gave me last rites. They rushed me to Green Bay. Betty asked God to save me. God granted her impossible request.
Then, just a few years ago I ended up collapsing in the doctor’s office from a pneumonia we didn’t even know was there. They rushed me to the emergency room. My lung collapsed. They rushed me to Marquette. There I was in a coma that lasted several months and that the doctors didn’t think I would come out of. My children were called home. Betty asked God to save me. God granted her impossible request.
I , on the other hand, have often failed as God asked me to love the unlovable which for me is an impossible request. I am by nature judgmental and somewhat cynical. I fail God over and over.
The good news is that God does one more impossible thing, He forgives me.
I want to shout that with joy from the roof tops.
He forgives me.
The God of impossible requests forgives me.
I know from your blogs that some of you reading this blog this morning think I am deluded, that all religion is a delusion.
That’s okay I’m still forgiven and I love you. You don’t have to think like me you are still God’s child and I love you.
To the Christians reading this blog join me in rejoicing in the impossible forgivness God has given us.
Then let us try to fulfill God’s impossible request to love all of His creation.

News from Pigeon Falls

The little town in my basement where the trains still run, dragons fly, and life is back to normal
There was a real fracas over at the Fly Inn last night. As usual both of the men that started it had too much to drink. It doesn’t take much of a perspicacious mind to realize that. Theodore Mattson was sitting at the bar studying intently one of the last of the state quarters when Busz Maki asked him if he was now into Numismatics . Ted thought that was some kind of an insult and socked Busz and the fray was on. Friends of both men joined in and the bartender had to call the State Police, there being too many involved for the local constable. When the police arrived the fight was pretty much over and Ted was crawling around on the floor looking for his quarter. Busz and Ted promised to pay for the broken chairs and the clean up so no charges were made. Just an average night at the Fly Inn.
The congregation thought that Pastor Joan seemed really happy this morning. She has chosen to wait to make her announcement to the congregation. She wants the pregnancy to be her’s and her husband’s secret for now. But in a small town like Pigeon Falls it won’t be secret very long. The lab leaks and the clinic.
Tommy UK acolyted this morning. He still hasn’t told his father what Mrs. Trumble said. But he might do it after church today.

Wrap UP

Cold day today. But warm fellowship at the Church.Both the sermon and the children's sermon were very good. The choir sang like angels. We had Holy Communion. It was a great morning.In the afternoon I wasted a lot of time trying to get some old movie editing software to work with Vista. I failed. It looks like I will have to buy some new software. I did get the website up to date except I have a movie of the Baptism from this morning which I really need to edit. Now I need a breathing treatment.
GBYA

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