Monday, July 1, 2024  

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Today's Scripture
Matthew 21:12–22

Then Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who were selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer’; but you are making it a den of robbers.” The blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he cured them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the amazing things that he did, and heard the children crying out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they became angry and said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?” Jesus said to them, “Yes; have you never read, ‘Out of the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself’?” He left them, went out of the city to Bethany, and spent the night there.

In the morning, when he returned to the city, he was hungry. And seeing a fig tree by the side of the road, he went to it and found nothing at all on it but leaves. Then he said to it, “May no fruit ever come from you again!” And the fig tree withered at once. When the disciples saw it, they were amazed, saying, “How did the fig tree wither at once?” Jesus answered them, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only will you do what has been done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ it will be done. Whatever you ask for in prayer with faith, you will receive.” (NRSV)

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Reflection

“Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only will you do what has been done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ it will be done. Whatever you ask for in prayer with faith, you will receive.”

These verses are often described as faith having power to move mountains. But never doubting that it will be done seems harder.

Never?

It will be done. Lovely — but when?

When I’m waiting and praying for something to change in life, the new thing feels like waiting for a gift that someone says is coming. Waiting is miserable! How big is this gift, this box (this job offer, this project) going to be? How does it look?

How will I know it’s mine?

If only the gifts of God arrived with packaging and labels with exactly spelled names. Maybe that’s why we need to tell others what we see as gifts. “Oh, you have a gift for design” or organizing or writing.

When we recognize a gift, how do we use it?

When I was small, I waited with varying amounts of patience for gifts. Thanking the givers was important. So was writing my thanks. But I remember hearing that the best way to assure someone that I enjoyed a gift was to let them see me using it.

So when you receive a gift, let God see you using it. Pray your thanks, too.

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Prayer
Heavenly Father, I may not recognize a gift. Help me to wait for your gifts, to use them, and to know that you will send the gifts I need. Thank you. Amen.

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Written by Margaret Laing, Member of Fourth Presbyterian Church

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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