DAY 241

DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOU ARE?

Psalm 123, 124 & 125 and 1 Corinthians 10:1-18

I was speaking with someone the other day who is on this journey of reading the Bible. Sometimes “the task” can be so much before us, and we so focused on the task, that we lose our way.

The Psalms can help. While they are repetitive, they keep reminding us of eternal truths such as the nature of God, the nature of humans, and the challenge before us. Consider the Psalm for today:

Psalm 123: To you I lift up my eyes…why? Because just as servants look to their master we look to the Lord our God…at least that is what we are suppose to be doing the psalmist reminds us.

Psalm 124: If it had not been the Lord who was on our side then…Do you view the Lord as on your side? We all know we are suppose to, but if we really thought God was “in our corner” I imagine that we would stop worrying so much.

Psalm 125: The Lord surrounds his people…is this a good thing or a bad thing? It depends on your image of God. This psalm certainly reminds us that this is a good thing.

In many of the same ways 1 Corinthians 10:1-18 is reminding us. In verses 1-5 there is the reminder from where we came. In verses 6-13 it is a reminder that we don’t make the same mistakes, and finally in verses 14 into tomorrow we are reminded of the privilege of being at the Table of the Lord.

Do you and I know where we are? Not just in our reading, but in life. We can be like the Corinthians, who seem to be like people who, as actors, have stepped out on the middle of stage and do not have a clue what the play is about, or what act they are in. So Paul begins be retelling parts of the Exodus story with a twist, and the twist is Jesus: our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink...for they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ.

Life can cause us to be disoriented. The Corinthians have forgotten who they are, where they came from, where they are going, and where they fit into God’s plan for redemption. We can make the same mistake:

1.      Who are we? God’s chosen people, chosen and won by the Blood of the Lamb.

2.      Where did we come from? From God! Before God laid the foundations of the world the Bible says “God thought of you” (Ephesians 1:4)—we are created in the image of God. Further we have come from a freedom march, a march that Jesus made to Calvary, the tomb…defeating it all and rising to new life.

3.      Where are we going? To God! We are sojourners in this world.

4.      Where do we fit in the plan? We are in the world where Jesus has defeated death, but the full end has not yet come. We are to be the people who point others to God.

It is easy to get disoriented. The church in Corinth has gotten that way, and we certainly can lose our way. Guess what—others have as well. So Paul in verses 6-13 reminds people not to make the same mistakes. When it comes to making mistakes there really aren’t any new ones under the sun…we just keeping making the same ones.

Finally, in verse 14 we begin to read about Holy Communion. Why? Because this is the centering meal: just as the Passover reminded them of their freedom march out of Egypt, Holy Communion reminds us. In chapter 5 verse 7 Jesus has already been referred to as “Christ our Passover Lamb.” In fact Holy Communion not only reminds us, but we participate in our freedom march:  The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? 17 Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. 

Don’t get lost…and if you do I suggest you go to Church and go to Holy Communion…it may sound rather mechanical, but if you pay attention to the words, you will find yourself right back where God wants you.