Daily Worship

Textile selling

Jo Penn November 18, 2024 6 2
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Acts 16:14 (NRSVA)

14 A certain woman named Lydia, a worshipper of God, was listening to us; she was from the city of Thyatira and a dealer in purple cloth. The Lord opened her heart to listen eagerly to what was said by Paul.

I imagine Lydia’s words:

“This week, I managed to close a significant deal for our finest woven cloth, soft and smooth, and useful for all sorts of local and Roman fashions. Our product makes it possible for families to show off to relatives or dignitaries visiting them in this city, through the quality of their clothing and furnishings.

My family have been actively part of the industrial district of Macedonia ever since my great-grandmother’s love of searching out the best textile dyes inspired a business venture. She researched the processes to make the dyes fast, so they stayed in the cloth without being washed out. Her fingers were always stained with a different colour, depending on the time of year and plants available, like an artist’s hand spattered with paint from their latest masterpiece. She perfected the colour purple, highly sought after, obtained from the local Madder root (more available than the most expensive purple made from sacrificing the lives of many sea molluscs — all to make a cloak fit for the Roman Emperor). 

Along with the Romans, we have other incomers from Jerusalem and they drive a hard bargain, I can tell you, as they run their own businesses. Yet we get along together, and I often help answer their questions about trade in this city.

I have befriended some of these ladies and their families and, curious about their ways, I have asked them about their faith, their culture and their way of life. 

I have been welcomed in to their Sabbath meetings, down by the riverside, as their people are instructed by their God:

'Don't mistreat any foreigners who live in your land. Instead, treat them as well as you treat citizens and love them as much as you love yourself. Remember, you were once foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God' (Leviticus 19:33-34)

Week by week, I am learning from them more about the God they serve.”

 

Prayer:

 

Hospitable God,

You said: ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples’ (Isaiah 56:7)

Help us to be prayerful and hospitable congregations of believers, serving our local communities.

Amen