We sometimes talk about Jesus’ “comfortable words”. Well, the gospel today, and the Isaiah reading that accompanies it, could be described as “uncomfortable words”! It’s the sort of text where we’d much rather go to the preacher’s 10 greatest hits of Scripture passages that are familiar, reassuring and not quite so pointed. The lectionary doesn’t allow us to pick and choose, and it’s just as well really, because sometimes, like today, we need to be reminded that it’s a slippery slope to self-righteousness. These texts exclaim, with both barrels, that we are hypocrites. And then we must, at all costs, resist the temptation to respond, “no we’re not!” which only serves to make the point.
