Disabusing Ourselves of Expectations
- davidwperk
- Jun 24
- 5 min read
Devotional Reflection, Tuesday, June 24. 2025
Proper 7, the week of the second Sunday after Pentecost
The Rev. David W. Perkins, Th.D.
Key phrase for reflection from today’s Gospel reading:
3Then Satan entered into Judas called Iscariot, who was one of the twelve; 4he went away and conferred with the chief priests and officers of the temple police about how he might betray him to them.
(You will find the full text of today’s Gospel reading at the end of this reflection.)
Today we celebrate the Feast of the Birth of John the Baptist. (See below.)
Lectionary readings (BCP, 972)
AM Psalm 97, 99, [100]; PM Psalm 94, [95]
1 Samuel 6:1-16; Acts 5:27-42 ; Luke 21:37-22:13
David's Reflections
Julia Cameron once observed that anger is a roadmap to our values.* Developing that metaphor, I would maintain that disillusionment and disappointment are roadmaps to our expectations. Identify those places where we are disillusioned or disappointed and we will have ferreted out expectations that failed to materialize. What we expected of a person, a crisis moment, a new job, a new circumstance, an institution, or God, failed to materialize.
Judas Iscariot evidently was a disillusioned and disappointed person. He had been with Jesus for somewhere between two or three years and probably had seen and heard most that Jesus had done and said. We can only speculate about why he betrayed Jesus. One guess assumes a frustrated political agenda. If Jesus truly were Messiah, the savior sent from God to liberate Israel, he certainly was not following the dominant models. He was not liberating the people from Roman bondage the way Moses led the Israelites from Egypt or the way David drove out the Philistines and unified the twelve tribes of Israel.
Judas accepted a modest reward for providing the religious authorities with the location of Jesus' nightly lodging place during Passover. That information would enable them to arrest him away from the crowds and avoid a political uprising during that feast, a time when nationalistic fervor could easily boil over in Jerusalem.
Would you and I dare to admit it when persistent disappointment and disillusionment plague us? Would we dare to trace those disillusionments and disappointments to frustrated expectations of God and/or of the church or of certain persons or of life? The specter of Judas can encourage us to rethink those expectations, to share our pain with others of vibrant faith and accepting spirit. Otherwise, expectations to which we cling could well embitter and paralyze us. How horrible to discover only too late that we've acted destructively with irreversible consequences spurred by those frustrated expectations. Judas made just such a discovery and took his own life as a result.
Thank you Julia for the metaphor we extended. Disillusionment and disappointment could well be a roadmap to our expectations. God, grant us grace to disabuse ourselves of misdirected expectations. Free us to hope, enlightened by the Spirit.
* Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity (New York: Tarcher/Putnam, 1992), p. 61
Collect of the Day, Proper 7, the second Sunday after Pentecost.
O Lord, make us have perpetual love and reverence for your holy Name, for you never fail to help and govern those whom you have set upon the sure foundation of your loving-kindness; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you
and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. (BCP, 230)
Today we celebrate the Feast of the Birth of John the Baptist.
Collect of the Feast of the Birth of John the Baptist
Almighty God, by whose providence your servant John the Baptist was wonderfully born, and sent to prepare the way of your Son our Savior by preaching repentance: Make us so to follow his teaching and holy life, that we may truly repent according to his preaching; and, following his example, constantly speak the truth, boldly rebuke vice, and patiently suffer for the truth's sake; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
A Collect for Peace
Most holy God, the source of all good desires, all right judgments, and all just works: Give to us, your servants, that peace which the world cannot give, so that our minds may be fixed on the doing of your will, and that we, being delivered from the fear of all enemies, may live in peace and quietness; through the mercies of Christ Jesus our Savior. Amen. (BCP, 123)
For the Departed
Almighty God, we remember before you today your faithful servant N.; and we pray that, having opened to him the gates of larger life, you will receive him more and more into your joyful service, that, with all who have faithfully served you in the past, he may share in the eternal victory of Jesus Christ our Lord; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. (BCP, 253)
A Prayer for Light
O Lord God Almighty, as you have taught us to call the evening, the morning, and the noonday one day; and have made the sun to know its going down: Dispel the darkness of our hearts, that by your brightness we may know you to be the true God and eternal light, living and reigning for ever and ever. Amen. (BCP, 110)
A Collect for Mission
Almighty and everlasting God, by whose Spirit the whole body of your faithful people is governed and sanctified: Receive our supplications and prayers which we offer before you for all members of your holy Church, that in their vocation and ministry they may truly and devoutly serve you; through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. (BCP, 100)
Daily Office Gospel, Luke 21:37-22:13
37Every day he was teaching in the temple, and at night he would go out and spend the night on the Mount of Olives, as it was called. 38And all the people would get up early in the morning to listen to him in the temple.
22:1Now the festival of Unleavened Bread, which is called the Passover, was near. 2The chief priests and the scribes were looking for a way to put Jesus to death, for they were afraid of the people. 3Then Satan entered into Judas called Iscariot, who was one of the twelve; 4he went away and conferred with the chief priests and officers of the temple police about how he might betray him to them. 5They were greatly pleased and agreed to give him money. 6So he consented and began to look for an opportunity to betray him to them when no crowd was present.
7 Then came the day of Unleavened Bread, on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. 8So Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, ‘Go and prepare the Passover meal for us that we may eat it.’ 9They asked him, ‘Where do you want us to make preparations for it?’ 10‘Listen,’ he said to them, ‘when you have entered the city, a man carrying a jar of water will meet you; follow him into the house he enters 11and say to the owner of the house, “The teacher asks you, ‘Where is the guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’” 12He will show you a large room upstairs, already furnished. Make preparations for us there.’ 13So they went and found everything as he had told them; and they prepared the Passover meal.
Daily Prayer Offices in The Book of Common Prayer
Morning Prayer, Rite 2, page 75, Book of Common Prayer
Noonday Prayer, p. 103, Book of Common Prayer
Order of Worship for Evening (Vespers), p. 109, Book of Common Prayer
Evening Prayer, Rite 2, page 115, Book of Common Prayer
Compline (Night Prayer), Page 127, Book of Common Prayer
Daily Devotionals, page 136, Book of Common Prayer
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