Hurricane Matthew caused extraordinary devastation in our area.  All of us know someone who has been displaced because of the damage to their homes … literally made homeless … some for a few weeks, many for a few months, and a few have lost their entire home … possessions and buildings.  The piles of broken tree limbs, destroyed household possessions, and moldy drywall attest to the destructive force of rising sea water and high winds. 

This morning’s reading from Luke’s Gospel begins with the introduction, “Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.”  The parable of the Unjust Judge and the Widow then follows. 

When I was a youngster … in the third or fourth grade … there was a girl who lived down the street named Nancy.  Nancy was what we called then a Tomboy who wore jeans and a t-shirt and rode bikes with us to the railroad tracks, and to the fort we built in the woods, and even climbed down into the unused storm drains in the unfinished housing development we lived in.  Nancy’s family attended the same church as my family … I think it was a Congregational Church … and on Sunday Nancy would show up in a dress … and she even wore a necklace.  The necklace was a gold chain with a little glass globe with something in the glass.  One Sunday I asked her what was in the glass and she told me it was a mustard seed.  I said, “Why?”  And she said, “I don’t know, but my grandmother gave it to my mother before she died, and my mother gave it to me … it has something to do with the Bible.”