Lent Devotional 2021 - Pittsburg - Flipbook - Page 20
submitting this devotional is in a few days. It’s a sweltering
summer day in the mid-Hudson Valley, an area hit particularly
hard by “the virus.” Here in New York, we are on a slow
march to whatever normal will be for us.
I can’t imagine what next week will bring, much less what
our world will look like in nine months, when it really will
be March 13. But I can tell you one thing: there’s a good
chance that we will not be singing the praises of God in the
congregation of the faithful. Singing is the one thing they’ve
told us not to do. All those diagrams and graphs and 8 x 10
colored glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a
paragraph on the back have shown us that. NO SINGING! No
new songs. No old songs. No songs with dance. No songs
with timbrel. No songs with harp. NO . . . SINGING.
Yet it’s the one thing we should be doing now—whether it’s
June or March. New songs, old songs, protest songs, praise
songs, lament songs . . . songs that fill our hearts with love;
songs that fill our eyes with vision; songs that fill our ears
with awareness. Maybe we can’t gather together as we used
to in pre-Covid-19 days, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still
sing. In fact, do this: close the computer or Ipad or phone or
whatever device you are using to read this devotional, stand
up, and hoot out your favorite hymn. If we can dance like
no one is watching, then we can certainly sing like no one is
listening. Except God. Who is listening—and beaming at all
God’s beloved children standing by themselves in their homes
and workplaces and backyards and at traffic lights and by a
loved one’s hospital bed and in classrooms or church offices,
singing. Singing for our lives. Praise God!
PRAYER
Loving God, Conductor of the Choir Invisible, we lift our
voices to you not just to praise you but also to ask your
guidance as we seek to be in harmony with each other.
Amen.
SUNDAY, MARCH 14, 2021
The Rev. Dr. Errol L. Connor ’99
SCRIPTURE
Galatians 4:21-5:1
21 Tell me, you who desire to be subject to the law, will you
not listen to the law? 22 For it is written that Abraham had
two sons, one by a slave woman and the other by a free
woman. 23 One, the child of the slave, was born according
to the flesh; the other, the child of the free woman, was
born through the promise. 24 Now this is an allegory: these
women are two covenants. One woman, in fact, is Hagar,
from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery. 25 Now Hagar
20 Lent Devotional 2021
is Mount Sinai in Arabia[a] and corresponds to the present
Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. 26 But the
other woman corresponds to the Jerusalem above; she is
free, and she is our mother. 27 For it is written, “Rejoice, you
childless one, you who bear no children, burst into song and
shout, you who endure no birth pangs; for the children of the
desolate woman are more numerous than the children of the
one who is married.”
28 Now you,[b] my friends,[c] are children of the promise,
like Isaac. 29 But just as at that time the child who was born
according to the flesh persecuted the child who was born
according to the Spirit, so it is now also. 30 But what does
the scripture say? “Drive out the slave and her child; for the
child of the slave will not share the inheritance with the child
of the free woman.” 31 So then, friends,[d] we are children,
not of the slave but of the free woman. 5:1 For freedom
Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not
submit again to a yoke of slavery.
DEVOTIONAL
How foolish! Who has bewitched you? Do you not know
you have abandoned the truth for a lie? But, like a good
neighbor, friend, or pastor, the Apostle Paul reprimands and
reminds us all that “we are children, not of the slave but of
the free woman” (Gal. 4:31).
Abraham had two sons, one by the slave and one by the
free woman. The metaphor of the slave women (Hagar)
represents all misguided human efforts to help in the
fulfillment of the promise of God. The free woman (Sarah)
represents the faith that takes God at God’s word and waits
for the promise. Through Abraham and in Jesus, we are
children, not of the slave but of the free woman.
It is foolish to think that one can be saved by works of the
law when Christ Jesus died to save sinners. Yes, it is true that
faith without works is dead; however, works apart from faith
are a dead end. We become slaves to the law because we are
prisoners of sin without Christ. We cannot be made perfect
by our own human efforts. No matter how well we keep the
law, observe tradition, or slavishly follow religious customs.
No one is made right with God by obeying the law but by
believing in Jesus. All self dependence is but vain. Christ doth
our cornerstone remain. “. . . Justified by faith, we have
peace with God” (Rom. 5:1).
So it is true, we are children, not of the slave but of the free
woman. As such, we are recipients of grace. Grace means
gift: that which we do not deserve, that for which no price
nor labor is required. By grace we are saved through faith
. . . not of works . . . it is the gift of God (Eph. 2:8-9).
That’s the Promise of the Father: freedom in Christ and
empowerment through the Spirit. Child of God, child of the
promise, may you ever stand in the grace where Christ makes
free.