“For It Is Love I Desire” by Melanie Rigney

“For It Is Love I Desire” by Melanie Rigney 

Saturday of the Third Week of Lent

Your piety is like a morning cloud,
    Like the dew that early passes away.
For this reason, I smote them through the prophets,
    I slew them by the words of my mouth;
For it is love that I desire, not sacrifice,
    and knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings. (Hosea 6:4-6) 

It is mercy I desire and not sacrifice. (Hosea 6:6)

“… for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18:14) 

Piety

Lord, help me to love You without reserve and to embrace Your mercy.

Study

A junior high friend who’s an associate Methodist pastor and college ethics teacher recently inspired quite an online discussion about what made Jesus so angry that he cleared the temple. (The posters recognized, of course, the metaphor of Jesus’ body and the temple, but that wasn’t the end of the discussion.) I still don’t have the answer, and likely none of us do. But I think you might find some clues in today’s first reading from the eighth-century prophet Hosea: 

        For it is love that I desire, not sacrifice,

                And knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

Burnt offerings—in the day, bulls, sheep, goats, turtledoves, or pigeons, depending on your wealth—weren’t hard for the faithful to obtain. They were signs of a visible, transactional faith: you sinned, you made your offering, and all was well. We still are tempted to default to that sort of relationship with God: I’ll pray for health/You’ll grant it; I’ll work among the poor and those in need/You’ll find me a place in heaven; I’ll give up wine this Lent/You’ll be grateful. 

And maybe, just maybe, that was what angered Jesus so much.

God is not satisfied when we offer transactional homage. No, God’s looking for worship and love that leads to continual conversion, to intensified closeness to and reliance on the Holy One. 

Love and devotion can be a lot harder to offer than burnt offerings. But when we humble ourselves and provide what God truly desires, our faith becomes more than transactional. It becomes downright transformational.

Action

Examine what temples need to be cleared in your life.

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[i] Image credit is Frédéric Lix, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/Lix_J%C3%A9sus_chassant_les_marchands_du_temple.jpg).