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<DIV><FONT size=4>Gregory Peck, not long before he died, said that if you’re
going to play the part of the devil you have to look for the angel in him, and
if you’re going to play an angel you have to look for the devil in him -- a kind
of actor’s "hermeneutic of charity." </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>There is a self-righteousness in me that does not want to die.
There is something inside me that is not bothered when others are excluded, that
<I>wants </I>others to be excluded, that feels more special when I’m on the
inside and somebody else is not. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>We will look for substitute ways of distinguishing ourselves
from those on the outside. The boundary markers change from century to century,
but they all reinforce a false sense of superiority, fed by the intent to
exclude others.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><A
href="http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2898">http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2898</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>John Ortberg, 2003</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>The phrase "hardness of heart" is used not only for God’s
people’s enemies, like Pharaoh in Egypt, but also for God’s people, Israel. In
the New Testament it describes not only the scribes and Pharisees but also the
disciples (Mark 6:52). A hardhearted person is self-centered, impervious to
spiritual things, resistant or closed off to God and what God wants to do in
that person’s life. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Mary Ann Tolbert says in <I>Sowing the Gospel, </I>"if the
heart is God’s ground, nothing else is required; and if the heart is not God’s
ground, nothing else will suffice." </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><A
href="http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=1983">http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=1983</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Heidi Husted, 2000 </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Ironically, even as the Christian church was suffering brutal
persecution at the hands of the Roman Empire and evolving to become the religion
of that empire, Christianity was creating forms of ritualistic legalism that
were as out of phase with the teachings of Jesus as the legalisms of the
Pharisees and scribes.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>It would be hard to deny that historically, the majority of
Christians have advocated ethics closer to those of the ancient catholic church
and the Pharisees than to those of Jesus. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Given that we are rich when the world is poor, that we cling
to our nuclear arms as if world extermination were a noble risk, destroy ancient
forests, gouge the landscape, pollute the soil, water and air, that we copulate
and abort with unrestrained abandon -- how then are we to interpret Jesus’
words, "It is what comes out of a person that defiles," so as to come up
smelling like roses?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><A href="http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=659"><FONT
size=4>http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=659</FONT></A></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Ronald Goetz, 1997</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4> "No outcasts," writes Garry Wills in <EM>What Jesus
Meant</EM>, "were cast out far enough in Jesus' world to make him shun them—not
Roman collaborators, not lepers, not prostitutes, not the crazed, not the
possessed. Are there people <EM>now</EM> who could possibly be outside his
encompassing love?" In a tragic irony, of course, some Christians have
considered Jews accursed, not to mention gays. I've found it a humbling exercise
to ask what categories of "outcasts" do I sanctimoniously spurn as impure,
unclean, dirty, contaminated, and, in my mind, far from God. The mentally ill,
people who have married three or four times, wealthy executives, welfare
recipients, people who hold conservative political opinions, or maybe people
with AIDS? How have I distorted the self-sacrificing, egalitarian love of God
into self-serving, exclusionary elitism? What boundaries do I wrongly build or
might I bravely shatter?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><A
href="http://www.journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20060828JJ.shtml">http://www.journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20060828JJ.shtml</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Dan Clendenin, 2006</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4> </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>The precise difference between Jesus and the Pharisees was
that they looked at the external activity whereas Jesus looked at the heart, the
source of activity. They looked to the fulfillment of law and tradition while he
looked to love and commitment. They looked at the letter of the law while he
looked at it's spirit.<BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=5> <FONT
size=4> We can also find the same tendency in our selves. If we are honest
enough to look into our hearts we will discover elements of the childishness of
Ahab and the rootlessness of his wife Jezebel as we subtly make events work out
for our own benefit. We can find people who are very careful about their
devotions and have no problem in treating their maids worse than their pets.
Where are those who will travel hundreds of kilometers to see a dancing sun but
who make very little effort to live the words of the gospels in their
lives.</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><BR><FONT size=4><A
href="http://www.bible.claret.org/liturgy/daily/sundays_pierse/cycleB/B_22ndSunOT.htm">http://www.bible.claret.org/liturgy/daily/sundays_pierse/cycleB/B_22ndSunOT.htm</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV>
<P><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></P></DIV>
<DIV style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify; MARGIN: 2pt 0cm" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana"><FONT size=4 face="Times New Roman">Their question
about why Jesus and his disciples do not observe the practice of washing
their hands is, therefore, fairly straightforward. It is, in fact, Jesus who
puts the cat among the pigeons by calling them hypocrites and quoting Isaiah’s
condemnation of those who honour God only with lip-service - seeming to denounce
them and their religious practices.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><A
href="http://www.wellsprings.org.uk/weekly_wellsprings/year_b/sunday_22.htm"><FONT
size=4>http://www.wellsprings.org.uk/weekly_wellsprings/year_b/sunday_22.htm</FONT></A></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Catherine McElhinney and Kathryn Turner, 2006</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>I don't know where the expression 'cleanliness is next to
godliness' comes from, but some significant godliness I've experienced out in
life's margins has been in the person of people none too clean in soap &
water terms. 'The Great Unwashed'! Not the kind of person we want sitting near
us in the pews! But maybe just the one to rescue us in some hour of need out
there somewhere. I doubt any of us would want Jesus on his way to Golgotha
reeking of his own sweat & blood, or hanging up there on the cross without
deodorant, aftershave, or even fly-spray, too close to us either. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><A
href="http://www.angelfire.com/journal2/marginallymark/MMK7123P12.html">http://www.angelfire.com/journal2/marginallymark/MMK7123P12.html</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Brian McGowan, Anglican priest in Western Australia.<!--mstheme--><!--msthemelist--></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>We can eat with family and friends. But, what would we do to
prepare to eat a meal with God? This simple question cut to the heart of one's
relationship with God. Do we prepare by removing ourselves from the dirt of the
world? Or do we prepare ourselves by removing the dirt of the heart?
</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><A href="http://www.word-sunday.com/Files/b/22-b/A-22-b.html"><FONT
size=4>http://www.word-sunday.com/Files/b/22-b/A-22-b.html</FONT></A></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Larry Broding </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Why is it, when the heart is not renewed, that a religious
person often becomes consumed by their religiosity? </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4><A
href="http://www.lectionarystudies.com/studyg/sunday22bg.html">http://www.lectionarystudies.com/studyg/sunday22bg.html</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>Bryan Findlayson</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=4>- - - - -</FONT></DIV>
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