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Lectionary Bible Study - Ordinary Time

Trinity Sunday  June 3, 2007 10th Sunday  June 10, 2007 11th Sunday  June 17, 2007 12th Sunday  June 24, 2007 13th Sunday  July 1, 2007 14th Sunday  July 8, 2007 15th Sunday  July 15, 2007
16th Sunday  July 22, 2007 17th Sunday  July 29, 2007 18th Sunday Aug 5, 2007 19th Sunday Aug 12, 2007 20th Sunday Aug 19, 2007 21st Sunday Aug 26, 2007 22nd Sunday Sept 2, 2007
23rd Sunday Sept 9, 2007 24th Sunday Sept 16, 2007 25th Sunday Sept 23, 2007 26th Sunday Sept 30, 2007 27th Sunday  Oct 7, 2007 28th Sunday Oct 14, 2007 29th Sunday Oct 21, 2007
30th Sunday Oct 28, 2007 31st Sunday Nov 4, 2007 32nd Sunday Nov 11, 2007 33rd Sunday Nov 18, 2007 Christ the King Nov 25, 2007    

INTRODUCTION TO ORDINARY TIME

Ordinary Time is the season for the last half of the Christian Year.  It runs from Trinity Sunday (the Sunday after Pentecost) through Christ the King Sunday (the Sunday before the First Sunday in Advent), and is the longest of all the seasons of the Christian Year.  Its liturgical color is green, except for Trinity Sunday, All Saints’ Day (or the first Sunday in November) and Christ the King Sunday, when the color is white.  It has also been called Trinity Season or Kingdomtide. 

 Why is this season called “ordinary”?  This longest season in the Christian Year is centered on a change in direction from the focus of the first part of that year.  Beginning with the first Sunday in Advent, the first half of the Christian Year is focused upon Jesus – upon an Old Testament looking forward to him, to his anticipated advent in a politically-dominated Israel, to his birth, his life, his ministry, his teachings, his miracles, his triumphal procession into Jerusalem as the announced “king of the Jews”, his last week with his disciples, his betrayal, trial, scourging and crucifixion, and then his glorious resurrection that brings new purpose, hope and direction to his followers – the earliest Church.  The “Jesus” half of the Christian Year then ends with Pentecost, as the Holy Spirit descends upon and fills the church as they seek to be Christ’s disciples to the world.  That six months of the Christian Year is a most extraordinary season of celebrating the One who is liberator, redeemer, savior and Lord to the world.

The second season of the year is much more “ordinary” in theme and in nature.  It deals with the church “militant” – the church, sent forth by Jesus through these extraordinary events to become Jesus alive today in a very ordinary world.  It is about the church getting down to the business to which it has been called by Christ.  So, from June through November, God’s people encourage and seek to motivate one another to be deeply engaged in the world as Christ called us to be engaged.  That engagement includes bringing good news in our words, in our work for social justice, in our effort to empower people, and in the very quality of our life together.  What “ordinary time” is about is our effort to motivate and encourage each other as the church of Christ to work for the transformation of the world into the world as God intended it to be.  That is the focus of the season of “Ordinary Time”.