Imago Scriptura 35 - Reflections

 As I read the stories of Jesus' teachings and actions in Luke 13, I glanced up and saw my sunglasses hanging off the back of the seat in front of me. I am flying down to New Orleans for Hupo 2016 with my wife sittingacross the aisle from me - an entire weekend without kids! What ever will we do?

But seriously back to the sunglasses. I saw faces of a bunch of people sitting around and beside me. I saw some people reading, some starting to take naps, some starting to take naps.m there was a family that had settled their son down and the father was gently holding the sleeping little guy. There was also one guy pouring a little “extra something” into his Coke not 5 minutes after it was shared that alcohol brought on board was to be kept stored for the duration of the flight. In fact he just passed a beer across the aisle to one of his buddies.

In the Gospel reading for today were people looking into their own lives about salvation but also looking at others around them with words of judgment and condemnation. There is a fine line to trad when it comes to judgment. There are times that I believe we are called to call others and ourselves of course) to new ways of living and new directions in life. But that can also become our default action when there are times when grace needs to be shared and felt first. It's a fine line to tread.

It is easier to simply look around us, especially like we're looking in the reflections of a pair of sunglasses where others can see us watching and silently judge rather than looking into ourselves. In Luke 13:24, Jesus tells his hearers that they (we) are to “strive to enter through the narrow door, for many will try to enter and not be able.” Sounds like a message that the life of discipleship is hard enough to work on our own without also living as judgmental people.