Introduction
Each week we hear a Peace Moment in addition to the prayer for peace. Hopefully all will be blessed with these devotional thoughts.
This week’s Peace Moment is by Claudia Schooler.
PEACE MOMENT
Palm Sunday. Jesus entering Jerusalem on a young donkey. In Luke’s account we read
“As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power they had seen, saying, ‘Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heaven!’ Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, ‘Teacher, order your disciples to stop.’ He answered, ‘I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.’” Luke 19:37-40 NRSV
One lesson in the story of the triumphal entry is the frailty of the human attention span. Multitudes turn out to welcome Jesus loudly shouting Hosanna and enthusiastically waving palm branches and even parting with scarce and valuable items of clothing. Everyone loves a parade! But where were these crowds the next day? And the next? And a week later as Jesus hung on a cross?
What about our time? There are so many causes, cries and marches for justice, petitions and protests. The issues grab headlines and our attention for awhile, then seem to fade. There are so many concerns worthy of attention: equal education opportunities, immigration policy, human trafficking, Black Lives Matter, plastic pollution, green house gasses, drinking water safety, the Me Too movement, indigenous people’s rights, natural disaster recovery, depletion of rain forests, mass extinction of species, the plight of the homeless, LGBTQA? discrimination, religious persecution, mental health awareness, attacks on Asian Americans, bullying, animal neglect, domestic abuse.
That’s a lot, and you can probably think of more. No one person can address all causes at the same time. But can we “open our hearts and feel the yearnings of – the ones – who are lonely, despised, fearful, neglected, unloved?” (Doctrine and Covenants 161:3a, adapted) And can we discern where our “greatest joy meets the world’s greatest need’?(Frederick Buechner)
Then when the world goes silent, we will be as the very stones who cry out.
Please join me in our prayer for peace by W.B. “Pat” Spillman
Creator God,
We struggle to bring to reality and permanence your peaceable kingdom. As we reflect on the events of Holy Week, we realize that struggle, effort, and even pain are inevitable parts of your design of creation. Love, justice, and peace have costs in human mental and physical efforts, time, resources and determination.
We yearn for your peaceable kingdom, Lord. May we be more sensitive to the work of the Holy Spirit which you granted to us as an encourager and comforter, but which also inspires and challenges us to be faithful in our quest to create Zion. Encourage us to continue our efforts toward peace and justice. Grant us patience and remind us that your time is not limited to our time. Amen.