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By Phillip Medhurst
[CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)],
via Wikimedia Commons
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By Melanie Rigney
The
Lord said to Samuel: “How long will you grieve for Saul, whom I have rejected
as king of Israel? Fill your horn with oil, and be on your way. I am sending
you to Jesse of Bethlehem, for I have chosen my king from among his sons.” But
Samuel replied: “How can I go? Saul will hear of it and kill me.” (1 Samuel 16:1-2)
Once
you spoke in a vision, and to your faithful ones you said: “On a champion I
have placed a crown; over the people I have set a youth.” (Psalm 89:20)
“Have you never read what David did when he was in need and
he and his companions were hungry? How he went into the house of God when
Abiathar was high priest and ate the bread of offering that only the priests
could lawfully eat, and shared it with his companions?” Then (Jesus said to the
Pharisees), “The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath. That is why
the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath.” (Mark 2:25-28)
Piety
Lord, open my soul to trusting that You have a plan for
me, even when I can’t see it.
Study
When I was
young, I loved reading girls’ series books featuring heroines like Betsy Ray,
Polly Pepper, Trixie Belden, Penny Parrish, Marcy Rhodes, and Donna Parker.
They solved mysteries, took care of their siblings, fretted over makeup and
clothes and boyfriends, fought with their best friends, the usual stuff.
And then
there was Beany Malone.
The heroine
of fourteen books by Lenora Mattingly Weber, Catherine “Beany” Malone was the
youngest of four children in a Denver family whose mother was dead and whose
father was an often absent newspaperman. I liked Beany because she was capable,
pretty much running the household even when we met her at sixteen. Some girls
liked her because you always figured she would follow in her dad’s footsteps
and become a writer. Beany figured that too; her after-school job was helping the
newspaper’s advice columnist, and she worked on the school newspaper.
But in the
oh-so-aptly titled Pick a New Dream, Beany’s
graduated from high school and the advice columnist is leaving the
country—permanently. Perfect, right? Wrong. There’s no summer job for Beany
with the columnist, who in parting basically tells Beany she’s not meant to be
a writer. Beany mourns this turn of events. And yet—she finds happiness and
love in a totally unexpected way: by working at the community center.
Pick a new dream.
That’s in
essence what the Lord tells Samuel today, or rather, He tells Samuel he’s
picked a new dream for him in the form of one of Jesse’s sons, who turns out to
be David. Samuel doesn’t immediately marvel or rejoice at this news; rather, he
fears for his earthly life if he carries out the Lord’s plan.
In the Gospel
reading, the Pharisees know the rules about the sabbath. Jesus offers more than
a new dream; he offers a new way of life, as the Lord has set forth in the
Messiah’s coming.
That’s the thing
about earthly hurts or disappointments, whether you’re Samuel or the Pharisees
or Beany Malone. The Lord desires nothing but good for us, but we can get in
our own way and set ourselves up for disappointment when we listen to our own
egos rather than praying for guidance and the strength to be obedient. When we
discern and accept the Lord’s dream for us and put down our struggles, it all
gets a lot easier, no matter how difficult it may appear on the outside.
Action
Ask
the Lord for clarity in where He desires you to go… and for the faith to follow.
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