A Year of Prayer: Season One Weekday DevotionalsSample

If you’ve ever been in a hurry to load an already overpacked dishwasher or wash a bunch of dishes at once in the sink, you may have been guilty of skipping a thorough cleaning in order to expedite the process.

Expedite is a beautiful word in itself - and not only because of the term ‘expedited postage,’ where our desired parcel comes extra quickly! Expedite literally means ‘free the feet from fetters.’ Expedite means to make something ‘footloose and fancy-free’!

It frees prisoners, speeds up the process, and allows us to run now!

But expediting can also mean we cut corners. If you’ve ever seen the American sitcom The Office, you’ll remember the marathon scene where half the employees catch a taxi once out of sight, spend the day relaxing, and then are ferried to the finish line. They just ‘expedited’ the process for their own advantage.

The Pharisees are perhaps a really clear example of this expedited process backfiring. They had the Torah - the first five books of the Old Testament - and understood what God was asking of them. They were to be a separate people, beloved and an example of God’s favour and standard for the world of holiness.

But somewhere along the way, they’d lost sight. Jesus himself quoted Isaiah 61 back to the Jewish people. He had come to ‘set the captives free,’ to unfetter their feet, and to bring healing and hope.

But we must ensure our feet are free to run the right race. Jesus accuses those listening of only appearing to be righteous, appearing to be upright, and inside being full of corruption. The race for freedom was not being followed. They were expediting the law for their own gain (as Jesus elaborates further in the book of Matthew, chapter 23).

Jesus has no time for that. We must come down low, be thorough in our self-examination, and be honest in our communion with one another. This might seem the harder, slower, less impressive way, but this is the way the rabbi requires.

Prayer: Jesus, we submit to your gentle leading and your faithfulness in life and love. Help me in our relationship to see and know you better and be seen and known by others.

Action: Let’s use this version of the five-step Daily Examen that St. Ignatius practiced to help review each end of the day:

1. Become aware of God’s presence.
2. Review the day with gratitude.
3. Pay attention to your emotions.
4. Choose one feature of the day and pray from it.
5. Look toward tomorrow.