Readings: Deut 6:2-6; Hebrews 7:23-28; Mark 12:28-34
‘And after that no one dared question him any more’… Interesting. What do you think shuts them up so thoroughly? Are they scared? Confused? Are they silenced by his cleverness? Are they moved in some more obscure and unknown way?
And what of us? What happens in your heart on hearing that great prayer echoing tonight? ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is the one God and you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength’. What stirs in you? Anything? Fear? Devotion? Joy? … What?
All my heart, all my soul, all my mind and all my strength. That’s asking a lot. Will there be anything left over? All my heart, my soul, my mind, my strength. All my time and all my money. All my health and all my illness. All my virtue and all my vice. My light and my dark. My feeling, my dreaming, my laughing, my losing, my living, my dying. My blood and bones and highest hopes. My all.
And the more, the more I give, the more I have to love my neighbour and myself.