Scripture:June 1,2010

Scripture: I Peter 3:12-15a, 17-18. Psalm 90. Mark 12:13-17: We all need reality checks from time to time. Good news for us today is that the Scriptures are a daily reality check when it comes to looking at our journey with Christ and moving on it with others. Peter's first letter has been helping us to see the journey in the light of our Baptism. The Psalm Response often confirms the readings and adds the spirit of prayer to them. We do not even have to compose our vocalize our own prayers; it is all there in the psalms and their responses offered each day. The reality check from Psalm 90 is that it gives us a look at the later stages of life by telling us that if we are reaching the age of seventy that is normal; if we make eighty we are strong! Many people surpass the Psalms way of looking at the aging process, but we have not added more than another generation of life to this advice which is almost 1500 years old. Something to think about. With God we see that a thousand days are like an evening that has just past. One day in God's realm is like a thousand in our realm! You get the picture. We are limited in our years on this earth. Quality living is what we look for in them and this has to be extended to our spiritual lives as well. What I Peter is doing in this section of the letter is giving us an endtime perspective or an eschatological way of looking at our journey. Reading it again and notice how it tells us to have patience by referring to the patience that Jesus showed us in the work of salvation. We are encouraged to grow in this patience through the grace and knowledge that we have about our Lord Jesus Christ. In the Gospel Jesus teaches us that God's way for us is bound up with truth What is bound up with secular concerns belongs to the secular and what belongs to God in our life is given only to God. The secular has its limits whereas the sacred intimacy we have with God is eternal in its benefits of joy, peace, and love. Mark is always concerned that we think the thoughts of God and not those of secularism. "Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God." Amen