Day 1 (Monday)
Exodus 25:10-22, 27:20-21, 29:38-46, 30:22-33, & 31:12-18
Last time we read how God called 70 of the leaders of the people to come up on the mountain to see Him, and then sent them back down again, while Moses stayed on the mountain for 40 days. While he was there, God gave him instructions how the Tabernacle was to be built and used. This goes on for several chapters, but we will read only selections from these chapters, with brief explanations of what has gone before and come after each selection.
These chapters begin with God telling Moses that the Tabernacle will be made from materials offered by the people of Israel from their own possessions, and then continue with some directions on how to make the items that will go in the Tabernacle and how to make the Tabernacle itself.
Exodus 25:10-22 – The Ark of the Covenant
10 They shall make an ark of acacia wood; it shall be two and a half cubits long, a cubit and a half wide, and a cubit and a half high. 11 You shall overlay it with pure gold, inside and outside you shall overlay it, and you shall make a molding of gold upon it all around. 12 You shall cast four rings of gold for it and put them on its four feet, two rings on the one side of it, and two rings on the other side. 13 You shall make poles of acacia wood, and overlay them with gold. 14 And you shall put the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark, by which to carry the ark. 15 The poles shall remain in the rings of the ark; they shall not be taken from it. 16 You shall put into the ark the covenant that I shall give you.
17 Then you shall make a mercy seat of pure gold; two cubits and a half shall be its length, and a cubit and a half its width. 18 You shall make two cherubim of gold; you shall make them of hammered work, at the two ends of the mercy seat. 19 Make one cherub at the one end, and one cherub at the other; of one piece with the mercy seat you shall make the cherubim at its two ends. 20 The cherubim shall spread out their wings above, overshadowing the mercy seat with their wings. They shall face one to another; the faces of the cherubim shall be turned toward the mercy seat. 21 You shall put the mercy seat on the top of the ark; and in the ark you shall put the covenant that I shall give you. 22 There I will meet with you, and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim that are on the ark of the covenant, I will deliver to you all my commands for the Israelites.
Then God gave instructions on how to build the Tabernacle itself, and continued with how to make the altar, and continued with guidance for what oil should be used in the lamp.
Exodus 27:20-21 — The Lamp Oil
20 You shall further command the Israelites to bring you pure oil of beaten olives for the light, so that a lamp may be set up to burn regularly. 21 In the tent of meeting, outside the curtain that is before the covenant, Aaron and his sons shall tend it from evening to morning before the Lord. It shall be a perpetual ordinance to be observed throughout their generations by the Israelites.
Then He gave instructions of how to make the vestments for the priests, and how Aaron and his sons should be ordained as priests, and continued with the instructions for the daily offerings.
Exodus 29:38-46 – The Daily Offerings
38 Now this is what you shall offer on the altar: two lambs a year old regularly each day. 39 One lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer in the evening; 40 and with the first lamb one-tenth of a measure of choice flour mixed with one-fourth of a hin of beaten oil, and one-fourth of a hin of wine for a drink offering. 41 And the other lamb you shall offer in the evening, and shall offer with it a grain offering and its drink offering, as in the morning, for a pleasing odor, an offering by fire to the Lord. 42 It shall be a regular burnt offering throughout your generations at the entrance of the tent of meeting before the Lord, where I will meet with you, to speak to you there. 43 I will meet with the Israelites there, and it shall be sanctified by my glory; 44 I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar; Aaron also and his sons I will consecrate, to serve me as priests. 45 I will dwell among the Israelites, and I will be their God. 46 And they shall know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them; I am the Lord their God.
Then He gave further instructions for the incense altar and other items inside the Tabernacle, and then gave instructions for the anointing oil, which was used to consecrate the Tabernacle itself, and to ordain the priests as well.
Exodus 30:22-33 – The Anointing Oil and Incense
22 The Lord spoke to Moses: 23 Take the finest spices: of liquid myrrh five hundred shekels, and of sweet-smelling cinnamon half as much, that is, two hundred fifty, and two hundred fifty of aromatic cane, 24 and five hundred of cassia—measured by the sanctuary shekel—and a hin of olive oil; 25 and you shall make of these a sacred anointing oil blended as by the perfumer; it shall be a holy anointing oil. 26 With it you shall anoint the tent of meeting and the ark of the covenant,[e] 27 and the table and all its utensils, and the lampstand and its utensils, and the altar of incense, 28 and the altar of burnt offering with all its utensils, and the basin with its stand; 29 you shall consecrate them, so that they may be most holy; whatever touches them will become holy. 30 You shall anoint Aaron and his sons, and consecrate them, in order that they may serve me as priests. 31 You shall say to the Israelites, “This shall be my holy anointing oil throughout your generations. 32 It shall not be used in any ordinary anointing of the body, and you shall make no other like it in composition; it is holy, and it shall be holy to you. 33 Whoever compounds any like it or whoever puts any of it on an unqualified person shall be cut off from the people.”
And then finally God told Moses which craftsmen from among the people should be in charge of the work of making all these things, and repeated the law about the Sabbath. Then He gave Moses the tablets of the covenant.
Exodus 31:12-18 – The Sabbath Law
12 The Lord said to Moses: 13 You yourself are to speak to the Israelites: “You shall keep my sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, given in order that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you. 14 You shall keep the sabbath, because it is holy for you; everyone who profanes it shall be put to death; whoever does any work on it shall be cut off from among the people. 15 Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord; whoever does any work on the sabbath day shall be put to death. 16 Therefore the Israelites shall keep the sabbath, observing the sabbath throughout their generations, as a perpetual covenant. 17 It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.”
The Two Tablets of the Covenant
18 When God finished speaking with Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the covenant, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God.
Discussion Questions
1) What did you notice in today’s reading? What surprised you or what was memorable to you? (Leader can point out how there are counterparts in the Church to each of the things talked about here. First of all, in the Church we have the Platytera Icon in the Apse, which shows Christ enthroned on the lap of the Virgin Mary with two angels to either side, corresponding to the Ark and the Cherubim and Mercy Seat. As for the oil lamp, we still have that on the Altar Table in the Church. The sacrificial lambs are notable in the Church simply by their absence; in their place we participate each Liturgy in the one sacrifice of the Lamb of God, Who takes away the sin of the world. The anointing oil used to consecrate the Tabernacle and the priests continues to be present in the Church in the Chrism which we use in baptism. Finally, the sabbaths see their fulfillment in the Great and Holy Sabbath on which Jesus lay in the tomb, and even now in the weekly celebration of the Lord’s Day on the day after, on Sunday, the day of the Resurrection.)
2) What do we learn about God in this story? (This question and the others can be used if there isn’t sufficient discussion from the first question).
3) What do we learn about human beings in this story?
4) What do you find difficult about this story? Is there anything confusing about it, or anything that you dislike? (This is an open question, as always. The amount of animal sacrifice involved here may be troubling to some, and it’s not uncommon to find the amount of detail given in these chapters rather boring. It’s worth remembering that any written or spoken description of a physical reality will tend to be boring, but it’s worth trying to move past that initial reaction to actually imagine what is being described, and to see the points where what is being described connects to the Church as we see and experience it.)
5) Does this story make you think that you need to change anything in your life? (Hopefully we can take God’s call to worship Him with awe and repentance more seriously.)
Day 2 (Wednesday)
Metropolitan Anthony Bloom on the Publican & Pharisee
In what we have already read from his book “Beginning to Pray,” Metropolitan Anthony has talked about prayer as beginning with us feeling that God is absent, and how that is natural, and even something for which we should be grateful. But the point is not to remain in that state, but to move forward, so he continues by talking about how we should begin to approach God in prayer.
What we must start with, if we wish to pray, is the certainty that we are sinners in need of salvation, that we are cut off from God and that we cannot live without Him and that all we can offer God is our desperate longing to be made such that God will receive us, receive us in repentance, receive us with mercy and with love. And so from the outset prayer is really our humble ascent towards God, a moment when we turn Godwards, shy of coming near, knowing that if we meet Him too soon, before His grace has had time to help us to be capable of meeting Him, it will be judgment. And all we can do is to turn to Him with all the reverence, all the veneration, the worshipful adoration, the fear of God of which we are capable, with all the attention and earnestness which we may possess, and ask Him to do something with us that will make us capable of meeting Him face to face, not for judgment, nor for condemnation, but for eternal life.
I would like to remind you of the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican. The publican comes and stands at the rear of the church. He knows that he stands condemned; he knows that in terms of justice there is no hope for him because he is an outside to the kingdom of God, the kingdom of righteousness or the kingdom of love, because he belongs neither to the realm of righteousness nor to the realm or love. But in the cruel, the violent, the ugly life he leads, he has learnt something of which the righteous Pharisee has no idea.
He has learnt that in a world of competition, in a world of predatory animals, in a world of cruelty and heartlessness, the only hope one can have is an act of mercy, an act of compassion, a completely unexpected act which is rooted neither in duty nor in natural relationships, which will suspend the action of the cruel, violent, heartless work in which we live. All he knows, for instance, from being himself an extortioner, a moneylender, a thief, and so forth, is that there are moments when for no reason, because it is not part of the world’s outlook, he will forgive a debt, because suddenly his heart has become mild and vulnerable; that on another occasion he may not get someone put into prison because a face will have reminded him of something or a voice has gone straight to his heart.
There is no logic in this. It is not part of the world’s outlook nor is it a way in which he normally behaves. It is something that breaks through, which is completely nonsensical, which he cannot resist; and he knows also, probably, how often he himself was saved from final catastrophe by this intrusion of the unexpected and the impossible, mercy, compassion, forgiveness. So he stands at the rear of the church, knowing that all the realm inside the church is a realm of righteousness and divine love to which he does not belong and into which he cannot enter. But he knows from experience also that the impossible does occur and that is why he says “Have mercy, break the laws of righteousness, break the laws of religion, come down in mercy to us who have no right to be either forgiven or allowed in.’ And I think this is where we should start continuously all over again.
Beginning to Pray – pg. 31-33
Discussion Questions
1) What did you notice in today’s reading? What surprised you or what was memorable to you? (Leader can point out how important the idea of mercy is to real prayer. We won’t pray well when we think we deserve mercy; our prayer only becomes real prayer when we realize that we don’t deserve it, but decide to ask for mercy anyway.)
2) What do we learn about God in this story? (This question and the others can be used if there isn’t sufficient discussion from the first question).
3) What do we learn about human beings in this story? (We learn that human beings are not able to meet God without the grace of God to make us capable of meeting Him for salvation, and not for judgment)
4) What do you find difficult about this story? Is there anything confusing about it, or anything that you dislike? (This is an open question, as always. The idea that we can’t earn the love of God SHOULD bother all of us, since all of us tend to believe that we CAN earn His love, or at least do better than people around us. The Church’s demand that we not look at other people either to judge them or to encourage ourselves, and simply must stand in honest repentance before God, is one of the hardest things we are asked to do as Christians. But it is necessary for us to actually encounter God.)
5) Does this story make you think that you need to change anything in your life? (Everything about this passage is about what we need to change about how we approach God…as the outsider, the sinner, the unworthy one, and not as the heir, the one who possesses and deserves good things already.)
Day 3 (Friday)
Luke 9:46-62
Last time we saw Jesus transfigured on the mountain, and then He came down and drove a demon out of a young boy, and told His disciples again that He was going to be betrayed and killed. Apparently they don’t get the point He is trying to convey to them, because their next conversations were all about which of them was better than the others, and how all of them together were better than other people outside.
True Greatness
46 An argument arose among them as to which one of them was the greatest. 47 But Jesus, aware of their inner thoughts, took a little child and put it by his side, 48 and said to them, “Whoever welcomes this child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me; for the least among all of you is the greatest.”
Another Exorcist
49 John answered, “Master, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he does not follow with us.” 50 But Jesus said to him, “Do not stop him; for whoever is not against you is for you.”
A Samaritan Village Refuses to Receive Jesus
51 When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; 53 but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. 54 When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” 55 But he turned and rebuked them. 56 Then they went on to another village.
Would-Be Followers of Jesus
57 As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” 58 And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” 59 To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” 60 But Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” 61 Another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” 62 Jesus said to him, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Discussion Questions
1) What did you notice in today’s reading? What surprised you or what was memorable to you? (Leader should point out how often Jesus does what His disciples don’t expect here. He tells them that caring for children is important, and that the least among them is the greatest. He doesn’t let them destroy the Samaritans, even though they rejected Him. And His words to the three people who say they want to follow Him are very hard for us to hear, but they certainly remind us that we can’t choose to both follow Christ and still hold on to the things of this world that are important to us.)
2) What do we learn about God in this story? (We learn that He is different from what we expect Him to be.).
3) What do we learn about human beings in this story? (We see that we want to be the greatest, that we like thinking of other people as our enemies, and that we struggle to actually follow Christ when it means leaving other things we love behind).
4) What do you find difficult about this story? Is there anything confusing about it, or anything that you dislike? (This is an open question, as always. I think the most difficult piece is the part where he tells the man who wants to bury his father to “let the dead bury their own dead.” The point here, I think, is that we can’t put Christ second to anything, even to good things. We have to seek first the Kingdom of God; and then, very often, the way that we follow Christ will be by loving and serving those who are dear to us. But Christ has to be first.).
5) Does this story make you think that you need to change anything in your life? (It is hard to put Christ first…but it is necessary, for all of us).