Monday: Week 5 in Lent Year B

Lent for Everyone
Mark Year B
WEEK 5 MONDAY...

Imagine you are standing on a high hill, overlooking a long valley. In the valley are villages, a river, fields and woods, with a network of small roads winding their way between them all. Now imagine that you can see a car, driving much too fast, along one of those winding roads. The driver is obviously hell-bent on getting somewhere quicker than he should. At the same time, you see another car, coming the other way, going about its ordinary business. With horror, you see what’s going to happen. Round one of the corners, any minute now . . .

Welcome to Mark 11. Jesus has been warning his fellow Jews, up and down the country, that God’s kingdom is coming. But they, for the most part, have preferred their own aspirations, their own agendas. They have been speeding on their way, eager for national liberation of the usual revolutionary sort. Within the society, the rich have been getting richer, and the poor poorer. The self-appointed religious watchdogs have been concentrating on the outward rules and purity regulations rather than on the human heart. The Temple itself, the place where heaven and earth were supposed to meet, where God’s forgiveness was supposed to happen, has been used as a symbol of national pride. They have ignored the warning signs and are heading straight for a sharp bend . . . where, coming the other way, is Jesus...

Taken from Lent for Everyone Mark Year B by Tom Wright