Signpost for Sunday 16 October 2022: Jer 31:27-34; Ps 119:97-104; 2 Tim 3:14–4:5; Luke 18:1-8.

The thing that struck me about this week’s well-known reading from Luke is that it is a widow who constantly petitions the judge and her persistence does the trick. What if it hadn’t been a widow who was so persistent? Would persistence alone be enough to change the judge’s mind?

I ask that question because the author of Luke’s gospel has Yeshua tell the disciples that this is a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.

The fact is, though, that any first century Jewish judge knew he had been commanded by YHWH to take care of widows. And I’ve written before about the fact that the widow didn’t just persist, she might well have been threatening to give the judge a black eye if he didn’t rule in her favour.

Anyway, then I Googled ‘does prayer work?’ and this was the first thing that came up. It’s from the Aetherius Society which was “founded in 1955 by the late western Master of yoga, Dr George King, in order to help the Cosmic Masters bring a state of balance back to humanity.” Well, I wasn’t expecting that. And I certainly wasn’t expecting what this society has to say about Jesus: Jesus was not the one and only son of God. He was – and is – an extremely advanced intelligence from the planet Venus, who chose to allow a small part of his vast consciousness to be born into an Earth body.

The saddest thing I discovered about the Aetherius Society is that one of the messages it promotes is that Jesus “came to Earth to teach you how to love – through God. Came I not to teach you to love me – but your brother.”

That’s a bit more like it. Shame about them thinking Yeshua might have had pointy ears though.

Paul