Episode Details

Prayer

O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. You have set your glory above the heavens. Worthy are you, O Lord and God, to receive the glory that is due unto your name from the sons of men. When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? What am I? Nothing and less than nothing. But you are my light and my salvation. One thing I ask of you, Lord, that I may gaze on your beauty Lord. Be merciful to me, O God, according to your unfailing love, according to your great compassion, blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity, and cleanse me from all my sin. Create in me a clean heart, O Lord, and renew an upright spirit within me. Open my eyes that I may see, wonderful things from your law. I am unworthy of the least of your mercies, and deserve only your judgment O Lord. Yet you have sustained my life. My hope is in you, and in your Son the Lord Jesus Christ. I am yours, save me. Amen.

Reading

Gen 1:24-31.

“And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds—livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so. 25. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 26. Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

28. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” 29. And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. 30. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. 31. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.”

Meditation

The stories we believe determine the shape of who we are. A man who believes that the universe is an endless cycle of reincarnation will spend his life searching for the spiritual detachment of nirvana. Another man who lives a tribal life believing in animal spirits will live a life spent in fear of those spirits, seeking both to avoid them and control them. Still another man believes that there is no spiritual aspect to existence, and he pursues whatever pleasure he can find in the here and now. What he can see is all that he believes to exist, and man is nothing more than an animal. Over time and perhaps generations, this man and his sons behave more and more like animals.

On a more personal level, one person might be born to cruel and unloving parents, and when they are grown they come to believe that they are destined to be the same kind of person. Someone else may be born into wealth and privilege, and that privilege comes to shape their expectations about who they are and what their life ought to be. The stories we believe determine the shape of who we are. With that in mind, let’s begin with a pointed question for ourselves: Who do you think you are?

It’s very important that we have the correct answer to that question. Who do yo