Daily Devotion for Day 27 of Lent 2016

Scripture Reading: Exodus 25:23-40 (NRSV)

It is better to light a candle than
to curse the darkness.

To be honest, the priestly readings that give the details of how to make things like the table for the Bread of the Presence or the Lampstand can be a little like reading an instruction manual.

You may be left wondering at the end, what's helpful about this for me?

It does reflect for us the importance of ritual for the Hebrew people.  The Bread of the Presence was set out each week on this table on the Sabbath day.  It was consumed by the priests according to Leviticus.

As we consider our own ritual today, we still have acolytes who light the altar candles. We still use bread in the sacrament of Holy Communion.  There is something about the basics of bread and light that speak to us.  Is it any wonder that Jesus declared, "I am the Bread of Life" and "I am the Light of the World?"

How do these basics of bread and light come to us during this time of Lent?  How do we counter their opposites of hunger and darkness which can destroy life?
 



Photo by Vicky Ponce via Flickr.com, used by permission under the Creative Commons license.  

Earliest known usage of the picture caption is in W. L. Watkinson's sermon 'The Invincible Strategy' collected in 1907 in The Supreme Conquest.