Almighty and everlasting God, you are always more ready to hear than we to pray, and to give more than we either desire or deserve: Pour down upon us the abundance of your mercy, forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things for which we are not worthy to ask, except through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ our Savior; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

As a driver I’ve been involved, in one way or another, in four collisions I can recall. The first was near my parents’ house, driving at night through thick white snow, coming back home from Walmart. I was driving their Jeep Grand Cherokee, which, luckily, rode high and meant there was little damage to their car when I somehow missed that the car in front of me was slowing to turn left and we careened into its rear end. My brother’s girlfriend, who was pregnant at the time, had ridden along. Thankfully none of us were injured. As it happened I knew the person I hit, though not well. Their rear end was smashed, but I don’t think they filed for it. They said it was an old car and they were just glad everyone was okay, their son included. In the second I bumped into a car at a stoplight in broad daylight with no extenuating circumstances whatsoever. I was just plain distracted. The third was a little more interesting. It was about five years ago, maybe six. Elizabeth and I had some sort of tiff as I was heading out the door to the grocery store, and distracted by frustration I didn’t check my rear view mirror before zooming our CR-V out of its spot. If I had checked, I’d have seen the flank of our Ranger behind me, which asserted itself regardless. I found it instantly difficult to be frustrated about our argument as I walked back inside to tell Elizabeth I had hit our car with our other car. I was pretty embarrassed until, about a month later, my father-in-law hit the same car in the same spot. Misery loves company. In the last accident, almost a year ago, I was rear-ended in traffic by a driver taking his daughter to school who missed the ‘stop’ in ‘stop-and-go,’ smashing into my Camry’s trunk at about twenty or thirty. It was the first time I’d ever filed an insurance claim. But none of these were as instructive as what happened two weeks ago when Elizabeth was hit in the Target parking lot by a young and suddenly very nervous driver. There is some bumper damage, and the safety cameras need to be checked, but everyone was fine. Handling the matter was just another thing on my to-do list until I sat down with this week’s Scripture passages. I’ve felt a little awkward ever since.

See you Sunday.

Thomas Pfenson

I own a pair of expensive prescription sunglasses (above) that aren’t quite right. I can’t tell you exactly how they’re wrong, but the lenses seem to ever so slightly distort my periphery, and, if I wear them long enough, give me headaches.

Conscience is a lens; the lens through which we perceive reality. We can see in Scripture three ways an otherwise healthy conscience can be distorted, or bent: inward, outward, and if far enough in either direction, shattered.

This week’s Gospel reading—a story of Mary, Martha, Messiah, and manipulation—is a case study in how a conscience slightly distorted reveals itself in the warp and woof of life.

See you Sunday.

Steve+