Signposts On The Way

The Way from Abraham’s Time to Ours

Today’s readings for the day after Christmas, the feast of Stephen, intrigued me. What’s in all those gaps in the readings from Acts and the Psalm? I think I’ve been influenced by a chaplain who frequently reminds us to look at the entire context of the day’s readings. So, curiosity drove me to investigate.

The selection from Acts begins with the last three verses of chapter 6 and then omits the first 53 verses of chapter 7, skipping to its conclusion. Those 53 verses contain Stephen’s discourses on the community’s ancestors in faith: Abraham, Joseph, and Moses.

Psalm 31 is a thanksgiving song by someone delivered from affliction. Thanksgiving—Eucharist in Greek—and deliverance from affliction, whether sickness or bigotry: do we not pray “deliver us from evil” at the Eucharist? Psalm 31 proclaims that God is our refuge, just as God was Abraham’s, Joseph’s, Moses’, Christ’s, and Stephen’s. It’s a long psalm. Today’s verses reflect the Passion of Christ and culminate in words of hope: save me in your kindness, safe from scheming enemies. The omitted verses repeatedly emphasize not only the psalmist’s suffering but trust in God.

The Gospel contains the Lord’s instructions to his disciples then and now, our obedience to them a sign of our gratitude for God’s fatherly care. So Christmas just arrived—Emmanuel, God-with-us. This next day we look at what this means for our lives. Will everything be rosy from now on? Far from it. But, like our ancestors in faith, we place our trust in God-with-us, most especially in the Eucharist.