Word to the Wise
Thursday, March 6, 2014 - Thursday after Ash Wed.
[Deut 30:15-20 and Luke 9:22-25]I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live.......[Deuteronomy]
There is traditional device called a "monkey trap" which consists of a box with a hole in it large enough for a monkey to stick a hand in to grab a banana serving as bait. The "trap" consists in the fact that having grabbed the banana, the monkey cannot run off because the hole is not big enough to pull both hand and banana out! To avoid being trapped, the monkey has to let go of the banana! That is why the trap works!
Jesus and Deuteronomy warn us that if we wish to "live" we will have to make some hard choices. Lent offers us an opportunity to take a look at our life to see if we have put ourselves in that "monkey trap." What have we taken hold of that traps us from living a better Christian life? Jesus warns us also that once we let go of the "banana," we have to pick up a cross to carry. Do we prefer to be "trapped?" At the moment, that "banana" is not giving life, and holding on to it will mean a worse fate when the trapper comes! Can we take a longer view that will help us to see beyond the cross to the resurrection? Lent is a good time for doing that! AMEN