1 Corinthians 7: 17-35 (links validated 1/10/24)

1 Corinthians 7 explores the implications of Paul’s insistence that “the time is short” and “this world in its present form is passing away.” He implies that Jesus’ followers should invest themselves in people and things that are “built to last.” So preachers might consider quoting the Grateful Dead’s “Built to Last’s” lyrics. In verse 1 they sing, “There are times that you can beckon/ There are times when you must call/ You can shake a ton of reckoning/ But you can’t shake it all/ There are times when I can help you out/ And times that you must fall/ There are times when you must live in doubt/ And I can’t help at all.” In its chorus Grateful Dead then sings, “Three blue stars rise on the hill/ Say no more, now, just be still/ All these trials, soon be past/ Look for something built to last [italics added].”

There’s a beautiful prayer that a priest by the name of Fr Pedro Arrupe wrote in the 20th Century that is a favorite of mine to help me constantly check myself in my life of discipleship that I’ll share to close this with hopes that it can maybe be a source of reflection for you as well in answering those questions, it goes: Nothing is more practical than finding God, that is, than falling in love in a quite absolute final way. What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect everything. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you do with your evenings, how you spend your weekend, what you read, who you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love, stay in love, and it will decide everything.

always good insights!

In a January 31, 2020 USA Today article entitled, “In Sickness and in Health, But Not in Debt,” Jessica Menton writes about how student debt is “putting a damper on young Americans’ relationship decisions.” About a third of the respondents between the ages of 18 and 34 to a LendKey Technologies survey reported that they might postpone – or have already postponed – marriage until student debt is paid off. That number, Menton adds, shrunk among older respondents. About 17% of those between 35 and 54 would postpone marriage and 10% of those 55 and older would delay it.

It reminds me of Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind. Scarlett is a self-absorbed schemer whose every emotion—or lack thereof—seems to be some kind of game. No one understands Scarlett better than Rhett Butler, and at the end of the film as Rhett prepares to quit Scarlett once and for all, he utters a line that sums her character up perfectly (and it is more devastating than the more famous “Frankly, my dear . . .” line that comes moments later). As he offers her a handkerchief, Rhett says, “Here, take my handkerchief. Never in any crisis of your life have I known you to have a handkerchief.” What Rhett means is that she’s never really shed a true tear. It’s all stagecraft, niggling, maneuvering, manipulating. She’s never had a hankie because she never really needed one...

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So perhaps a Surrealist painting is the perfect vehicle to convey the appointed time. Kay Sage's painting here is titled just that: At the Appointed Time. I have no information that it is a religious or Biblically-based painting. Still, the title invites us to take a moment and look at the painting with scripture in mind. What do you see in the painting (literally what can you describe...there is a darkening gray sky, there is a horizon line in the middle of the picture, etc.)? What do you think about what you see? What do you wonder about this painting?...

The whole idea of living in shortened time is explored with devastating honesty in a couple of recent books. The young adult book, The Fault in Our Stars, focuses on two teenaged cancer patients, Augustus and Hazel Grace. Though Augustus has apparently conquered his cancer (at the cost of an amputated leg), Hazel Grace is terminal. Is there any point in falling in love when the time is short? Spoiler alert! Yes, gloriously and painfully, yes!...

("You have probably heard of the nineteenth century Russian novelist, Feodor Dostoevsky. He wrote The Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment and other wonderful novels. As a young man, Dostoevsky got involved with a group of subversives who were arrested and imprisoned...")