Biblical Prophecy - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Wednesday, 1/13/2020 

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 119:1–24; Isaiah 41:1–16; Ephesians 2:1–10; Mark 1:29–45 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 11 (“The Third Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 60:1–3,11a,14c,18–19, BCP, p. 87); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 16 (“The Song of Zechariah,” Luke 1:68–79, BCP, p. 92) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we ask how God might direct our lives from that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you this Wednesday of the first week of Epiphany. We are in Year 1 of the Daily Office Lectionary, and we find ourselves exploring Isaiah’s promises on behalf of Yahweh, Mark’s lionesque portrait of Christ, and Paul’s wondrous unpacking of life in Christ.  

Isaiah’s promise of redemption and empowerment. Subject to humiliating domination and exile both from Assyria and Babylon, the people to whom Isaiah ministers have been made to feel like “worms” and “insects” (Isaiah 41:14 NRSV). Sometimes you just have to be brought that low, it seems.  

Isaiah wants the children of Israel to know that their story doesn’t end in ignobility—in being squashed like a bug! Right now, they feel like they are the laughingstock of the world. However, through Isaiah, Yahweh wants the world to know—and his people to find comfort in the fact—that just as millennia before, he had called Abram from the east to become his “friend” (through whom Yahweh intends to bless the whole world), he now calls “a victor from the east” to rescue God’s elect who are in such dire straits and low estate. Later, Yahweh will name him: “Cyrus, ‘He is my shepherd, and he shall carry out all my purpose’” (Isaiah 44:28). Indeed, in 539 B.C. Cyrus of Persia would conquer Babylon and decree Judah’s release from captivity. This act, Isaiah claims, is under the sovereign control of Yahweh.  

Yahweh will thereby show himself still to be—as he was in the exodus, just so now—“your Redeemer … the Holy One of Israel” (Isaiah 41:14). Back then, the Israelites had witnessed Yahweh dispatch their enemies in the Red Sea and then make them a strong army for the conquest of the Promised Land. So now, he will once again rescue them and make them warriors.  

The fulfillment of biblical prophecy often takes surprising form. The return under the Persian ruler Cyrus was by simple decree. Israelites did not have to take up arms to retake the land. While they would have to protect themselves against the threat of military intervention when they rebuilt Jerusalem and the temple, there was nothing that approximated Isaiah’s language of becoming “a threshing sledge, sharp, new … you shall thresh the mountains and crush them” (Isaiah 41:14). Centuries later, the Maccabees would rise up briefly in successful military revolt against their Seleucid oppressors; but eventually, the Israelites would succumb to Roman conquest.  

On this side of the New Testament’s story, I suggest that Isaiah’s promise of a Redeemer and of the empowerment of his people finds a deeper and greater fulfillment in the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. That’s where today’s gospel and epistle readings come in. 

Jesus as Redeemer in Mark. Because Mark’s Gospel is not loaded with extensive teaching material like the other synoptic gospels (Matthew and Luke), he focuses on demonstrations of Jesus’s power. Fever breaks at his presence. Demons depart (and their knowledge of his true divine identity obliquely points to the “behind the scenes” contest underway—though we know that the contest is not in doubt). Leprous skin becomes clean at his touch. As C. S. Lewis will finally put it in his Chronicle of Narnia, Aslan the Lion Redeemer, is in the land, and the endless winter of sin and death is “working backwards.” Amen! 

Jesus empowers the replacing of one “walk” with another, in Ephesians.  The apostle Paul writes from the perspective of Jesus’s finished work on the cross, where he accomplished “redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses” (Ephesians 1:7). Now, God gives, as Isaiah promised, strength to his people, power to his saints, noble status to those who once were “worms” and “insects.”  

Paul’s way of putting it is that we were spiritual zombies, the walking dead—subject to a domination by desires beyond our control. We were “were dead through the trespasses and sins in which [we] once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. Among these we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of body and mind, and so we were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.” (Ephesians 2:1–3 RSV).  

Then Paul follows with one of the Bible’s great “But God…” clauses. “But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ…” (Ephesians 2:4–5). God counters our nothingness, and our being worthy of wrath and rejection, with the riches of his mercy and the depths of his great love. He raises us up right along with his own Beloved Son. On the cross, God kills our sin. By the empty tomb, he annuls our walking death. He “seats us in the heavenly places,” and empowers us to live again. He gives us the grace to believe in Christ, the grace to accept the amazing gift of forgiveness in Christ, and the strength and vision to work out what it is now to be “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:8–10 RSV). The walking dead, no longer. The perspective is breathtaking. The words are worth poring over again and again, unhurriedly.  

As Paul prayed in chapter 1, just before writing this stunning paragraph, so I pray for you, “that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints [including … insert your name!], and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe” (Ephesians 1:18–19 NASB).  

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+ 

The Lion - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Tuesday • 1/10/2023 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 5; Psalm 6; Isaiah 40:25–31; Ephesians 1:15–23; Mark 1:14–28 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 13 (“A Song of Praise,” BCP, p. 90); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we draw insights from that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you. This is Tuesday of the first week of Epiphany, and we are in Year 1 of the Daily Office Lectionary.  

Isaiah’s promise of comfort. Isaiah 40 includes a call to look for help coming from “the wilderness”:  

A voice cries out: 
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the  Lord, 
    make straight in the desert a highway for our God. 
Every valley shall be lifted up, 
    and every mountain and hill be made low; 
the uneven ground shall become level, 
    and the rough places a plain. 
Then the glory of the  Lord  shall be revealed, 
    and all people shall see it together, 
    for the mouth of the  Lord  has spoken” (Isaiah 40:3–5).  

The way in the wilderness evokes memory of the exodus, when Yahweh revealed his glory by providing his people a highway through the desert out of Egyptian slavery. Just so, Yahweh will once again provide a freedom trail out of exile in Babylon. Yahweh is, says today’s passage, “great in strength, mighty in power … the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth” (Isaiah 40:26,28). Therefore, people who have been enervated and deflated, depressed, and demoralized—hardly up for an arduous journey—will find new strength for themselves in him:  

He gives power to the faint, 
    and strengthens the powerless. 
Even youths will faint and be weary, 
    and the young will fall exhausted; 
but those who wait for the  Lord  shall renew their strength, 
    they shall mount up with wings like eagles, 
they shall run and not be weary, 
    they shall walk and not faint (Isaiah 40:29–31).  

Which brings us to Mark. Yesterday, we began reading Mark’s Gospel. It begins with Isaiah’s voice in the wilderness, calling, once again: “Prepare the way of the Lord!” The assumption is that once again God’s people are enslaved, in need of rescue and of strength for a journey. That journey begins with “a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Mark 1:4).  

Because Mark’s gospel begins in the wilderness, early Christians associated his gospel with the “lion,” the powerful king, so it was thought, of the wild places. Accordingly, it only takes a little imagination to appreciate why C. S. Lewis would cast his Christ-figure as a lion — “Aslan,” who is “not safe, but good.”  

That is Mark’s Christ. Skipping right over Matthew’s and Luke’s birth narratives and John’s soaring prologue, Mark takes us directly to Jesus’s baptism and temptation, and then to the launch of Christ’s mission. Jesus begins his ministry by gathering disciples—Simon and Andrew, James and John—to witness his power to deliver (Mark 1:16–19). Then, he begins his powerful acts of deliverance, as he frees from physical and psychic oppression a man in the thrall of demonic forces (Mark 1:21–26). Ultimately, Jesus will also deliver from dullness of spirit and mind (like the disciples he has chosen) those who are slow to recognize him as Son of God. Jesus will lead them to understand that he has come for a singular act of rescue: “to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).  

The redeeming Lion is on the loose. As the people at his first miracle in Mark recognize, “They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, ‘What is this? A new teaching—with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.’ At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee” (Mark 1:27–28).  

Be blessed this day,  

Reggie Kidd+ 

Hand in Hand - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Monday • 1/9/2023 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 1; Psalm 2; Psalm 3; Isaiah 40:12–23; Ephesians 1:1–14; Mark 1:1–13 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 9 (“The First Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 12:2–6, BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we explore that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd. Thanks for joining me. This is Monday of the first week of Epiphany, and we are in Year 1 of the Daily Office Lectionary.  

During the next few weeks—weeks “after Epiphany”—we will read through the second half of the Book of Isaiah. In blighted and calamitous times, it is good to survey a portion of Scripture that has as its keynote:  

“Comfort, O comfort My people,” says your God. 
“Speak kindly to Jerusalem; 
And call out to her, that her warfare has ended, 
That her iniquity has been removed, 
That she has received of the Lord’s  hand 
Double for all her sins” (Isaiah 40:1–2).  

In hard times, it’s hard to find real comfort. Not all avenues to comfort are especially beneficial, whether binge-watching or bourbon-drinking. Not all avenues to consolation are benign, whether addiction or indulgent hyper-indebtedness.  

After thirty-nine chapters of preparing God’s people for a long night of exile, Isaiah looks to the daylight of return and restoration. It’s still going to be a long way off, but daylight is coming nonetheless. Happily, for us, much of what is revealed to us for Israel’s future in these chapters has come to pass in Jesus Christ, most notably the epiphany (the manifestation) of the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53, who has been “crushed for our iniquities” so he can “make many righteous” (Isaiah 53:11).  

Today’s verses from Isaiah 40 are cautionary. Having sounded the note of hope in the opening verses of this chapter, Isaiah warns against resorting to false sources of comfort and solace.  

There is only one source of life, the very author of life. “Who has measured the waters in the hollow if his hand and marked off the heavens with a span, enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance?” (Isaiah 40:12).   

There is only one who can unravel the puzzle of our lives. “Who has directed the spirit of the Lord, or as his counselor has instructed him?” (Isaiah 40:13). 

There is only one hope for the righting of all wrongs in the world and in our lives. “Whom did he consult for his enlightenment, and who taught him the path of justice?” (Isaiah 40:14). 

There is only one who has the power to unseat wicked rulers: “Even the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as dust on the scales; see he takes up the isles like fine dust … [He] brings princes to naught, and makes the rulers of the earth as nothing” (Isaiah 40:15,23).   

The props we build for ourselves—whether literal idols, or little godling crutches—they eventually prove to be useless, or worse. “To whom will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him? An idol?—A workman casts it … then seeks out a skilled artisan to set up an image that will not topple” (Isaiah 40:18,20).  They all topple in the end.  

“Comfort, O comfort my people….” May God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ speak comfort to our hearts today. May he encourage us that our lives and destinies are in his benevolent hands (a la Ephesians 1); assure us that he will work justice in the world and fortify us for our part in its pursuit; and displace all false and lesser sources of satisfaction and inner peace with the Spirit of his own life-giving presence.  

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+ 

We Are Drawn to Christ - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Friday • 1/6/2023 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 46; Psalm 97; Isaiah 52:7–10; Revelation 21:22–27; Matthew 12:14–21 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 11 (“The Third Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 60:1–3,11a,14c,18–19, BCP, p. 87); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 16 (“The Song of Zechariah,” Luke 1:68–79, BCP, p. 92) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we bring to our lives that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you this Feast of the Epiphany of Christ.   

Feast of Epiphany. January 6 is, by tradition, the day we remember the three magi from the East who bring to the Christ Child gifts of frankincense (in recognition of his deity), gold (in acknowledgement of his royalty), and myrrh (in anticipation of his sacrificial death): 

Born a king on Bethlehem’s plain; 
Gold I bring to crown Him again 
King forever, ceasing never 
Over us all to reign. 

Frankincense to offer have I;  
Incense owns a Deity nigh;  
Prayer and praising, voices raising,  
Worshiping God on high. 

Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume 
Breaths a life of gathering gloom; 
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding dying 
Sealed in the stone-cold tomb. 

The remarkable thing about the trek of the magi (probably Persian astrologer-priests) is that, according to Matthew 2, they are led to Jesus not by Holy Scripture but by some celestial sign, whether a visible alignment of objects in the heavens, the reading of an astrological chart, or something altogether unique and unknown to us. The point is that the magi represent “the nations” being drawn by their own devices to Israel’s—and therefore the world’s— King of kings and Lord of lords. Praise be! 

Today’s readings in the Daily Office contemplate the wonder of Israel’s God drawing all peoples and all nations to himself as he manifests—the Greek word epiphania means “manifestation”—his glory.  

In Isaiah 52, God redeems Jerusalem in the sight of all the nations. All the nations “see the salvation of our God.” In Revelation 21, the kings of the earth “bring their glory into” the City of God.  

Most remarkably and wonderfully, Matthew 12 portrays Jesus as altogether reticent during his earthly ministry to publish his fame. He is here to heal the sick and bind up the broken—to draw his people and the nations through his quiet love, not bombastic displays of ego. He has come for all the “bruised reeds” and “smoldering wicks.” There will be no small irony in the way he brings “justice to victory.” 

His leadership is one of service, not ego-inflation. His words are encouraging, not rancorous. When one of his followers uses a sword in his defense he says: “Enough!!” (meaning, “Stand down!”). Even as he hangs on the cross he cries out, “Father, forgive them!” There in the sacrifice of the cross he manifests his true deity and royalty. He trusts his Heavenly Father to transform his crown of thorns into a crown of gold. As Matthew says, may you and I hope in his name … and in no other.  

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+  

The True Vine - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Thursday • 1/5/2023 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 2; Psalm 110; Joshua 1:1–9; Hebrews 11:32–12:2; John 15:1–16 

(See my comments about “abiding” in Christ in John 15:1–11, from April 22, 2020.) 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 13 (“A Song of Praise,” BCP, p. 90); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we consider some aspect of that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you this Thursday of the week in which Epiphany takes place, 13 days after Christmas, on January 6.  

Strength and Courage from the True Vine. When Jesus says, “I am the True Vine” (John 15:1), he evokes so many vivid biblical images. Today we read this passage alongside Joshua 1’s exhortation to be “strong and courageous,” and alongside Hebrews 11’s tribute to those whose faith had made them just that: strong and courageous.  

Joshua 1 (and Numbers 14) and the Call to Courage. Forty years prior to Yahweh’s challenge to Joshua to be “strong and courageous,” Joshua had shown exactly this sort of mettle when he and his fellow spies returned from their reconnoitering of the Promised Land. As a kind of first fruit of what that land had to offer, the scouts brought back with them a cluster of grapes so large that it took two men to carry it: “…they…cut down from there a branch with a single cluster of grapes, and they carried it on a pole between two of them” (Numbers 14:22). Ten of the returning twelve scouts were cowed by the challenge of taking the land. Two—Joshua and Caleb—saw the promise. It was as though they could taste already the goodness of the land and the sweetness of the wine that these grapes promised. Because Yahweh had promised to give them the land, Joshua and Caleb had shown fortitude and resolve. Unlike the other ten men, they are ready to move forward. Distrusting that promise, the others displayed cowardice and sloth.  

In John’s Gospel, the last of Jesus’s great “I AM” sayings—Jesus’s claim to be “the True Vine”—is a challenge to us to embrace the same kind of resolve that Joshua and Caleb had displayed. In the Eucharistic wine, not only do we “drink the blood” of his sacrifice for our sins, but we celebrate in advance the marriage supper of the Lamb. The Eucharistic wine looks back and it looks forward. We remember our exodus, and we anticipate our entrance into “the glory about to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18). In Jesus, therefore, we find strength and courage to walk by the same sort of faith exemplified in Joshua and by the saints of Hebrews 11—Gideon, Barak, Samson, et al.  

Most of all, we find here at the Table of the True Vine the persevering courage to follow Jesus himself, “the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).  

John 15 and the Command to Love. Nowhere, perhaps, is such courage and strength more necessary than in finding the capacity to love each other with the love that Jesus commands at the end of today’s passage in John: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you” (John 15:12–14). We are his friends, he says, so our motives are no longer slavish fear of punishment. Now our motives are the genuine confidence of knowing the affection of the one who has called us friend—and who has laid down his life for us. This friend calls us to do for one another what he has done for us.  

I am grateful—relational coward that I can be—for examples in my life of people who have loved me this way. I pray that you have friends like that, friends who have shown that “the way of the cross” is “the way of life.” Regardless, our Heavenly Friend—the great “I AM” who has come in sandaled feet—has loved us enough to lay down his life for us. He chose us. We didn’t choose him. And he chose us to be his friends (John 15:15–16). Now he has appointed us, he adds, to bear this fruit: to love others as he has loved us. And so I pray that this next year, God grants all of us the strength and courage to love as we have been loved.  

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+ 

The Burning Bush - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Wednesday • 1/4/2023 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 85; Psalm 87; Exodus 3:1–12; Hebrews 11:23–31; John 14:6–14 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 9 (“The First Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 12:2–6, BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we ask how God might direct our lives from that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you this Wednesday of the week in which Epiphany takes place, 13 days after Christmas, on January 6.  

The Feast of St. John , which took place on December 27, provided the opportunity to consider the soaring perspective of John’s written portrait of Christ. John details how the Bible’s great “I AM” takes onto himself a human body, and comes among us with sandaled feet. For the days that immediately follow January 1’s Feast of the Holy Name, the Daily Office lingers over some of Jesus’s “I AM” statements in John’s Gospel. 

John. Today’s reading reminds us that Jesus says, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). As the Way, Jesus doesn’t simply point us in a certain direction. He guides us along the way. As the Truth, Jesus doesn’t just hand us a book of truths. He becomes our teacher. As the Life, Jesus doesn’t merely accessorize our life. He becomes our life. I am so grateful for that grand reality.  

Exodus and Moses. Our understanding of Christ is always enhanced when we see him against the backdrop of the Old Testament.  

Exodus. Moses first encounters the great “I AM”—Yahweh himself—in the burning bush on Mount Sinai. His feet are on holy ground, and so he must remove his sandals. Yahweh promises deliverance for the people whose sufferings at the hands of their oppressors have moved him. What is striking to me is that the “sign” he gives by which his people will know that they are finally free is that they will be able to return to this wilderness-mountain to worship him: “I will be with you; and this shall be the sign for you that it is I who sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall worship God on this mountain” (Exodus 3:12). 

The whole point, then, of gaining freedom is not to win accountability-free, consequence-free self-expression, but to enter into a relationship consisting of worship, service, and obedience to the great “I AM” himself. “Freedom” is not making up our own rules. Freedom is being won over by the amazing love of God, and loving him in return … and our neighbors as ourselves.  

Oh, Dear Jesus, give us grace in this coming year to taste the freedom of finding our way to the Father through you—the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  

Hebrews. And the means—the way—to this freedom is faith. The way to the Father goes through Christ. And the way to Christ goes through faith. In the heart of today’s gorgeous paragraph from Hebrews 11, the writer claims that millennia before Jesus Christ came to this earth, faith in him already motivated Moses: “[Moses] considered abuse suffered for the Christ to be greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking ahead to the reward” (Hebrews 11:26).  

All the Old Testament heroes and heroines of the faith—(in today’s reading, Moses’s parents, Moses, the people who “passed through the Red Sea as if it were dry land,” and Rahab the prostitute of Jericho)—all these could only look ahead “by faith” to a Christ whose features they could barely glimpse from afar. It is as though they were looking through the wrong end of a time-telescope.  

Our great privilege is that for us the telescope has been turned around. We “see” the one who has come in the flesh. The challenge to live by faith is still ours. But now we have not only the examples of those who came before, but also the living support of the Christ who has come and who right now “ever lives to intercede” for you and for me (Hebrews 7:25).  

Throughout the coronavirus pandemic that began in early 2020, members of our sister church, All Saints Episcopal Church in Winter Park, Florida, encouraged their neighbors with this sign in their front yards: “You Are Not Alone.” That is so true.  

I pray that “by faith” you know the presence of the great “I AM.” I pray that Jesus is, or will become, the Way, the Truth, and the Life for you, all the way through the challenges and opportunities of the coming year.    

Be blessed this day,  

Reggie Kidd+ 

God Intervenes - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Tuesday • 1/3/2023 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 117; Psalm 118; Isaiah 59:15–21; Revelation 2:8–17; John 4:46–54 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 10 (“The Second Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 55:6–11; BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we draw insights from that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you this Tuesday of the week in which Epiphany takes place, 13 days after Christmas, on January 6. Today, I happen to be contemplating passages that are normally read on January 8, two days after Epiphany: Isaiah 59:15–21; Revelation 2:8–17; and John 4:46–54.  

John: an Epiphany of healing words. The “second sign” that Jesus performs in John’s Gospel manifests (we are talking about the season of Epiphany, after all!) the power of his spoken word. The Word became flesh, and the very words of that Word restore life. Jesus does not even have to go to the place where this dying son of a royal official lies. “Go; your son will live,” and it’s done. The boy begins to recover at that very hour. As a result, the father and his whole household believe in Jesus. The words that come from the Word create their own world of hope and life.  

Isaiah: an Epiphany of covenant words. Into his own world in which “truth is lacking,” Isaiah speaks on behalf of the Word who will centuries after him be manifest in the flesh. Where there is no truth, Isaiah says, there is no justice. The doing of right doesn’t exist in a world without truth: “Truth is lacking, and whoever turns from evil is despoiled. The Lord saw it, and it displeased him that there was no justice” (Isaiah 59:15). Where there is no truth there is no standard of right and wrong; only personal whim and tribal interests. Isaiah would be quite familiar with a world like ours, a world in which you choose your news network depending on what you want the news to say!  

Isaiah counters with the power of God’s own words. Into the prophet’s mouth God places words from the Spirit—words that enforce the irrevocable covenant that God has made with his people and anticipate God’s own intervention. Words insisting that God is not aloof and uncaring: “He … was appalled that there was no one to intervene” (Isaiah 59:16a). Words promising that God himself will personally enter the fray against evil and for the good (which he literally did in the incarnation of his Son): “[H]is own arm brought him victory … He put on righteousness like a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head” (Isaiah 59:16b–17). Words demand a hearing: “[M]y words that I have put in your mouth, shall not depart out of your mouth … from now on and forever” (Isaiah 59:21). You and I need not—indeed, dare not—let ourselves be led around by self- and tribe-serving truth-spinners, but by God’s own Word and the Spirit of discernment.  

Revelation: an Epiphany of sustaining words. The Word’s words were spoken ahead of time through Isaiah. They came from his flesh and blood lips when he walked the earth. And in the Book of Revelation, the Word speaks from on high, as the “first and the last, who was dead and came to life” (Revelation 2:8). The words that Jesus speaks as ascended Lord give believers in Smyrna the power to endure intense trials—even unto death at the hands of those who should know better (members of the parent faith whose resistance to Jesus as Messiah has turned devilishly deadly—Revelation 2:9–11). Lord, have mercy!  

And if we listen closely enough despite whatever confusion surrounds us (in Pergamum, pagan-influenced heresy and debauchery were being promoted in the church! Like that would never happen now, right!?), we can hear Jesus whisper the “new name”—the new identity—he gives to each of us personally and intimately: “To everyone who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give a white stone, and on the white stone is written a new name that no one knows except the one who receives it” (Revelation 2:17).  

Be blessed this day,  

Reggie Kidd+ 

The Wedding in Cana - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Monday • 1/2/2022 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 103; Psalm 114; Isaiah 52:3–6; Revelation 2:1–7; John 2:1–11 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 8 (“The Song of Moses,” Exodus 15, BCP, p. 85); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we explore that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd. Thanks for joining me. This is Monday of the week in which Epiphany takes place, 13 days after Christmas, on January 6. Today, I happen to be contemplating two passages that are normally read on January 7, the day after Epiphany: John 2:1–11 and Revelation 2:1–7.  

The Wedding in Cana. As we were reading through John’s Gospel last August, we came upon this account of the wedding in Cana. Now we read it through the lens of the season of Epiphany. This is the first of seven “signs” that Jesus performs in John’s Gospel—illustrations of his “epiphany” or “manifestation.”  

For your further investigation, here is a list of the seven signs (as traditionally numbered—some scholars offer slightly different reconstructions): 

• Turning water into wine at the wedding in Cana (John 2:1–11—“the first of his signs”)   

• Healing of the official’s son in Capernaum (John 4:46–54—“the second sign”) 

• Healing of the paralytic at Bethesda (John 5:1–15) 

• Feeding of the five thousand (John 6:1–14) 

• Walking on water (John 16–24) 

• Healing of the man born blind (John 9) 

• Raising of Lazarus (John 11) 

Though some of these events are explicitly named “sign,” others are not. Each points up distinct aspects of Christ’s person and work. They are pointers to his glory, manifestations of the “grace and truth” he has brought into the world.  

As to the first of these signs: the turning of water into wine at the wedding banquet in Cana, here is what I find noteworthy and exciting:  

• “My hour has not yet come” — John 2:4. “The hour” for which Jesus has come into this world is the hour of his being lifted up on the cross. That “hour” will, ironically, be his “glory.” In that act he will take away the sin of the world, defeat Satan, and reunite in fellowship with himself a fractured human race (John 12:20–33). At the wedding of Cana, despite the fact that his “hour” has not yet come, Jesus graciously assents to provide this “first sign” of his “glory.” Jesus provides a glimpse into the amazing spectacle of what he has come to do for us.   

• … the steward tasted the water that had become wine … — John 2:9. What happens is that water set aside in jars for purification turns to wine that will fill goblets of celebration. These were huge jars—six of them, each able to hold twenty to thirty gallons. It must have been quite the wedding party! Because the Lamb of God has come to take away the sin of the world (as announced at Jesus’ baptism in the previous chapter of John), our baptism will not only purify, it will lead to the Eucharist of joy. Cinderella doesn’t just get cleaned up, she gets invited to the ball!  

• … there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee … — John 2:1. Jesus’s blessing of this wedding in 1st century Galilee echoes the profound biblical theme of God’s wedding his people to himself. For that very reason, John’s larger story line unites his Gospel to his Book of Revelation. Changing water into wine at the wedding at this point in time, Jesus foreshadows an invitation for us to join him at the Wedding Feast of the Lamb at the end of time: “And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. … The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come’” (Revelation 21:2; 22:17). Our Eucharist is not just a remembrance of what the Lamb of God has done in taking away our sin. Our Eucharist is a foretaste of a heavenly banquet. Alleluia, amen! 

• “But you have kept the good wine until now” — John 2:10. The Lord of History shows himself to be the ultimate host who has saved the best wine (his Son) for last: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16 KJV).  

To the Ephesians. One quick note, in closing, from Christ’s letter to the Ephesian church in Revelation: “But I have  this  against you, that you have  left your first love” (Revelation 2:4 NASB). Though it is valuable, theological accuracy is not a substitute for love. The Ephesians policed themselves well when it came to fighting off heresy, but not so much when it came to guarding their hearts against lovelessness. And so, Jesus urges the church to return to its “first love.”  

That’s one very good reason for us to remind ourselves that “the first sign” Jesus performs is at a wedding banquet, not a lecture hall. This truth suggests a powerful corollary to Thomas Cranmer’s adage, “What the heart wants, the mind justifies, and the will chooses.” The corollary is this: Engage the heart, and the mind (and the will) will follow. May God grant us the grace to love him first, foremost, and always — all else will follow.  

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+ 

Holy Name of Jesus - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Friday • 12/30/2022

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 103; Psalm 148; Genesis 17:1–12a,15–16; Colossians 2:6–12; John 16:23b–30 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 10 (“The Second Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 55:6–11; BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we bring to our lives that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you here in Christmas Week.   

One more piece of lectionary-juggling. Today, I treat passages prescribed for January 1, the Feast of the Holy Name.  

In the Christian Year, the first day of the calendar year is the Feast of the Holy Name. This feast falls on the eighth day of Christmas, in recognition of the fact that, as Luke records, “After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child; and he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb” (Luke 2:15).  

It is Matthew who explains why the baby is to be given that particular name: “…for he will save his people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21 — the Hebrew Yeshua means “Yah saves!”). The cutting of his foreskin in this eighth day ceremony symbolizes how it is that Jesus is going to save us from our sins.   

Three decades later, Paul explains how the one “in whom the fullness of deity dwells bodily” experienced a second circumcision. Paul calls Jesus’s being nailed to the cross “the circumcision of Christ” (Colossians 2:11). On the cross, Jesus’s whole being—not just a tiny piece of his flesh—is cut off from the land of the living. His death brings pardon for us, and his resurrection brings, right now, life from spiritual death for us, and, at his return, resurrection from physical death. And this amazing gift is precisely in line with what Isaiah had prophesied: “For he was cut off from the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people. … When you make his life an offering for sin, he shall see his offspring, and shall prolong his days …”(Isaiah 53:8,10). 

The wonderful thing is that “the circumcision of Christ”—his being “cut off from the land of the living”—becomes our circumcision when we are plunged beneath the symbolically drowning waters of baptism: “In him also you were circumcised with a spiritual circumcision … when you were buried with him in baptism, you were also raised with him through faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead” (Colossians 2:11–12).  

In celebrating the Holy Name of Jesus, we also celebrate his naming us anew. Because he has saved us from our sins, we are no longer “Sinner,” but “Saint” (1 Corinthians 1:2)! No longer “Polluted,” but “Washed” (1 Corinthians 6:11)! No longer “Destined-for-the-Scrap-Heap,” but “Treasured” (Deuteronomy 7:6)!  The Vineyard Ministries song writer D. Butler put it magnificently in these lyrics, and rendered here by the Nesbitt family: 

I will change your name. 
You shall no longer be called: 
Wounded, Outcast, Lonely, or Afraid 

I will change your name. 
Your new name shall be: 
Confidence, Joyfulness, Overcoming One,  
Faithfulness, Friend of God, One who seeks my face.  

The whole thought is consistent with the renaming that takes place when God first gives the gift of circumcision in Genesis 17. There are new names and new identities for Abram who becomes Abraham, and for Sarai who becomes Sarah. His name will no longer mean simply “Exalted Father,” but “Father of a Multitude.” Hers will no longer mean (perhaps) “Mockery,” but “Princess.”  

No matter what the past looks like, I pray your future will be shaped by your “new name”—the one you received in your baptism in Christ.  

Collect of The Holy Name. Eternal Father, you gave to your incarnate Son the holy name of Jesus to be the sign of our salvation: Plant in every heart, we pray, the love of him who is the Savior of the world, our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen.  

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+ 

He Makes Things New for All - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Thursday, 12/29/2022 

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 20; Psalm 21; Isaiah 25:1–9; Revelation 1:9–20; John 7:53–8:11 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 11 (“The Third Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 60:1–3,11a,14c,18–19, BCP, p. 87); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 16 (“The Song of Zechariah,” Luke 1:68–79, BCP, p. 92) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we consider some aspect of that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you here in Christmas Week. 

Allow me to juggle the Daily Lectionary readings slightly. If you are following the Book of Common Prayer, you will notice that today I am meditating on a reading prescribed for December 30. That passage is Isaiah 25:1–9.  

First the bad news, then the good news. Isaiah 25 paints one of the most hope-filled pictures of the future anywhere in Scripture. To appreciate it, though, we have to see the horrid backdrop of the previous chapter. In Isaiah 24, the prophet foresees the earth being ravaged by human-created pollution: “the earth lies polluted under its inhabitants, for … they have violated the everlasting covenant. Therefore a curse devours the earth, and its inhabitants suffer for their guilt; therefore the inhabitants of the earth dwindled, and few people are left” (Isaiah 24:5–6). Does this sound at all like the world we live in?  

Lawlessness rules in the streets: “The city of chaos is broken down, every house is shut up so that no one can enter. There is an outcry in the streets for lack of wine; all joy has reached its eventide; the gladness of the earth is banished. Desolation is left in the city” (Isaiah 24:10–11). Does this sound at all like the year we are just closing out?  

Heavenly powers as well as earthly rulers have conspired against Yahweh (Isaiah 24:21–23). Yahweh’s response has been to “open the windows of heaven” (as he did in Noah’s day) and unleash a storm of judgment. He overthrows earthly rulers, displaces heavenly powers, and establishes his own rule: “for the Lord of hosts will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and before his elders he will manifest his glory” (Isaiah 24:21–23). 

Isaiah 25 is the manifestation of that glory. When the storm of judgment has passed, Yahweh will be shown to “have been a refuge to the poor, a refuge to the needy in their distress” (Isaiah 25:4). Because of the coming of Yahweh, “the song of the ruthless was stilled” (Isaiah 25:5).  

On the far side of that storm of judgment want gives way to plenty, and death gives way to life.  

Want gives way to plenty. Just as, during the exodus, Yahweh gathered the elders of Israel on Mt. Sinai to feast in his presence (Exodus 24), on one great day in the future, “On this mountain (Mt. Zion) the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear” (Isaiah 25:6). The Hebrew of this verse is quite difficult to render into English, but it has a beautiful assonance: 

mishteh shemanim,  
mishteh shemarim,  
shemanim memuchayim,  
shemarim mezuqqaqim  

Trying to preserve at least the feel of the text’s assonance and poetic parallelism, I render the text this way:  

a feast of filet,  
a feast of cabernet,  
filet mignon,  
cabernet sauvignon  

Whatever the precise meaning of the terms, the sentence would have been mouth-watering to Isaiah’s listeners. What lies ahead of us is a feast beyond compare! 

Death gives way to life.  

… he will destroy … the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever — Isaiah 25:7–8a. Gone is the sense of inevitability and finality that hangs like a death pall over our lives. In Canaanite religion, there was always a fear that Mot, the god of death, would prove stronger than Baal, the Canaanite’s fertility-deity, and that ultimately death (Mot) would swallow up life (Baal). Isaiah says, to the contrary, Israel’s Lord, Yahweh, will swallow up death. The pall of death that seems to condition all of life—the sense of tentativeness and fear of death we all live with—will one day surrender to life that has been secured by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  

That is why every funeral service for believers in Christ is a celebration of resurrection-life. That is why our funeral palls are resurrection-white. Our shrouds are temporary, our burial sheets are just helping us to mark time. We are merely renting our coffins and burial places or our columbarium niches. One day, we won’t need them any longer.  

… Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces… — Isaiah 25:8b. Gone are the grief and the sadness. Isaiah anticipates the apostles Paul and John. We do grieve, “but not like the rest,” says Paul (1 Thessalonians 4:13). As John brings the Bible’s story to a close in the Book of Revelation, he incorporates words from Isaiah: “he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4).  

… and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth — Isaiah 25:8c. Gone are the shame, the guilt, the remorse, the sense of “being found out.” In the movie On the Waterfront, Marlon Brando’s character Terry Malloy sees the potential for a promising boxing career end when he lets himself be intimidated into throwing a fight. In what has become a classic cinematic moment, he looks back in despair: “You don’t understand! I could’a had class. I could’a been a contender. I could’ve been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am, let’s face it.” There’s at least a little bit of Terry Malloy in all of us. Always a question mark: did I cut too many corners? did I make the grade? did I do enough? Am I good enough, pretty enough, “cool” enough? In the movie, thanks to the intervention of a faithful priest and the power of “true love,” Terry Malloy experiences a sort of redemption. In real life, redemption comes from a greater faithful High Priest and from the source of Love itself.  

Isaiah’s promise is that our every bad decision is overruled, and is, in fact, woven into a tapestry of all things being made right. “Behold, I make all things new!” (Revelation 21:5).  

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+ 

Holy Innocents - Daily Devotions with the Dean

Wednesday • 12/28/2022 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 124; Jeremiah 31:15–17; Revelation 21:1–7; Matthew 2:13–18 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 13 (“A Song of Praise,” BCP, p. 90); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we ask how God might direct our lives from that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you this December 28th, the Fourth Day of Christmas.  

Feast of Holy Innocents. In the tradition of the Christian Year, December 28 is a day to commemorate the Holy Innocents.   

From a sermon by St. Quodvultdeus, 5th century bishop of Carthage (and student of St. Augustine) (Sermo 2 de Symbolo: Patrologia Latina 40, 655)  
 
A tiny child is born, who is a great king. Wise men are led to him from afar. They come to adore one who lies in a manger and yet reigns in heaven and on earth. When they tell of one who is born a king, Herod is disturbed. To save his kingdom he resolves to kill him, though if he would have faith in the child, he himself would reign in peace in this life and for ever in the life to come. 

Why are you afraid, Herod, when you hear of the birth of a king? He does not come to drive you out, but to conquer the devil. But because you do not understand this you are disturbed and in a rage, and to destroy one child whom you seek, you show your cruelty in the death of so many children. 

You are not restrained by the love of weeping mothers or fathers mourning the deaths of their sons, nor by the cries and sobs of the children. You destroy those who are tiny in body because fear is destroying your heart. You imagine that if you accomplish your desire you can prolong your own life, though you are seeking to kill Life himself. 

Yet your throne is threatened by the source of grace, so small, yet so great, who is lying in the manger. … While you vent your fury against the child, you are already paying him homage, and do not know it. 

If I were to make a list of “Top Ten Losers” in the Bible, near the top of my list would be Herod the (so-called) Great. Our Christmas ornaments aren’t even down, and these readings remind us of the darkness and dastardliness of Herod’s slaying of innocent children in Bethlehem. Today’s readings protect Christmas from being reduced to tinsel and decorations. The Feast of Holy Innocents is a stark reminder that Jesus has come into an evil-beset world to take on that evil face-to-face.  

Historians debate whether this incident actually took place. Unfortunately, it is totally in character for Herod. His achievements were many. Though only half-Jewish, he rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem with a magnificence that far outpaced Solomon. He had secured his alliance with Rome by conquering Jerusalem for Rome with an army of 30,000 infantry and 6,000 cavalry, and by executing forty-six members of its Sanhedrin. Nonetheless, he was maniacally paranoid. He thought his wife was trying to poison him, so he had her killed. Thinking that two of his sons were conspiring with her, he had them killed too—prompting Caesar Augustus to quip, “Better to be Herod’s pig than his son.” (As a half-Jew, Herod would not eat pork.) Not long after the slaying of the innocents in Bethlehem, Herod became so ill it was clear that he was going to die. So hated was he by the population and so determined was he that there would be mourning at this death, he ordered that the “most illustrious men of the whole Jewish nation” be corralled and executed at his death. Happily, that order was allowed to expire once he was no longer around to enforce it.  

The unimaginable cruelty of which the human heart is capable is what has necessitated the birth of Baby Jesus in the first place. The Feast of Holy Innocents reminds us how consequential that birth is. Jesus comes to undo the basest of human cruelties. The “tears of Rachel weeping for her children” (Jeremiah 31:15) will be wiped away—every one of them, when death itself dies (Revelation 21:4). Every Herod will receive his reckoning, and the Baby who escaped that day’s carnage will “make all things new” (Revelation 21:5).  

In Christian tradition, the Holy Innocents of Bethlehem are often referred to as infant martyrs: They cannot speak, yet they bear witness to Christ. They cannot use their limbs to engage in battle, yet already they bear off the palm of victory (Quodvultdeus). In silent testimony, they prompt us to remember all the martyrs of every age—boy and girl, man and woman, young and old, rich and poor. Moreover, Bethlehem’s Holy Innocents remind us acutely of all the little ones who die of cruelty and neglect for whatever reason, martyrs of life itself: pre-born babies in the United States, little ones born to refugees in Central America or the Middle East, Uighur children in Chinese concentration camps, young girls and boys in Africa who are pressed into trafficking or into children’s armies. Lord, have mercy.  

Collect for the Feast of Holy Innocents. We remember today, O God, the slaughter of the holy innocents of Bethlehem by King Herod. Receive, we pray, into the arms of your mercy all innocent victims; and by your great might frustrate the designs of evil tyrants and establish your rule of justice, love, and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. 

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+