Pentecost 17

Jeremiah 11:18-20
Psalm 54
James 3:13 – 4:3, 7-8a
Mark 9:30-37

Greetings and welcome to all! This last couple of weeks we have seen the start up of another school year. My own inner annual calendar has never been able to shake the orientation developed early in childhood toward Fall as the beginning of the year rather than the end. School played a large part in all of that. The beginning of the school year meant knew cloths; tablets that had not yet been written upon and brand new pencils with clean erasers. The first day of class was truly a new start. My teachers did not know me well enough to form an impression of me, good or bad. I did not have any poor grades, missed assignments or bad conduct to make up for. The coming year was a blank slate waiting for my imprint.

Yet that sensation of newness was also a little deceptive. Some things do not change from year to year. The learning difficulties I experienced throughout elementary and middle school did not go away over the summer. I still had my place in the pecking order of school social life-and it was nowhere near the top. The bullies from last year would be on the playground and lurking about the neighborhood this year as well. I remember that school was often a ruthless, dangerous and carnivorous environment. It is a wonder anyone ever managed to learn anything there.

In fact, however, I did learn a lot at school-and not only from the stated curriculum. School was the place in my early life where I began to wrestle with the big questions: Who am I? What is important to me? What am I willing to take risks for? How much risk am I willing to take? Where does God fit into all of this? I am still not through with those questions, by the way. I don’t believe we ever stop pondering them. The texts for this coming Sunday plunge us into the heart of these big issues. Jeremiah discovers that his prophetic ministry is placing his life in danger. The psalmist faces ruthless enemies. James discusses the true meaning of wisdom and Jesus describes what true greatness is. For those of us returning to the battles fought in school and for those of us who have never managed to escape those battles, these texts offer us some valuable insights into our struggles.

Jeremiah 11:18-20  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1358&cmpgn=5244

The time is somewhere between 609 and 587 B.C.E. Jeremiah had spoken forcefully against the leadership of Judah accusing the royal establishment of idolatry, injustice and oppression. Moreover, as war loomed on the horizon for Judah against Babylon, Jeremiah prophesied the victory of Babylon. Such preaching, especially during a time when the nation faced imminent attack, was thought to be subversive and perhaps even treasonous. Jeremiah was seen as undermining the morale of the people, failing to support the troops and giving aid and comfort to the enemy. Jeremiah was a national security risk. That explains the assassination plot against him. We are not told whether the assassins are agents of the royal establishment or some ultra patriotic group of rival prophets. In either case, it is clear that Jeremiah is in danger and that this danger will only increase if he continues his preaching.

We seldom experience persecution in this country as a result of preaching and witnessing to Jesus Christ. In some parts of the world persecution goes right along with being a disciple of Jesus and living out your baptism. Such was the case for the New Testament church. Of course, I would like to think that the freedom from persecution we enjoy flows from our constitutional right of free speech and free exercise of religion. Yet sometimes I wonder whether our lack of persecution is due rather to a lack of faithful witness.  Perhaps our society and culture is content to leave the church alone because the church has become so compliant with cultural values and societal norms. Though it is quite uncommon, people still are getting arrested in this country simply for doing what Jesus calls them to do. I refer you to a remarkable message delivered by Shane Claiborne at the recent ELCA Youth Gathering in New Orleans that I had the opportunity to attend with our youth ministry leaders and five of our young people. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaOzKDRF0D4&feature=related Perhaps our preaching and our discipleship are too tame and domesticated.

The price of faithfulness required of Jeremiah harkens back to last week’s gospel in which Jesus calls all who would follow him to take up the cross. The cross, persecution and opposition, is the shape the Kingdom of God takes in our sinful world. Yet the joy of knowing that by faith we are already living in God’s future outweighs the burden of suffering which that entails.

Psalm 54  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1357&cmpgn=5244

This psalm is a lament; a cry for help to God. The psalmist is threatened by enemies. We don’t know who these enemies are or why they are attacking the psalmist, but they are described as “ruthless” and they are seeking the psalmist’s life. These enemies are not merely political rivals in a hotly contested election or contenders for professional advancement in the ruthless world of office politics. These enemies are threatening actual violence. They mean business. No wonder the psalmist wants to see them punished with evil and put to an end.

At first blush, this psalm might seem not to reflect the attitude toward enemies we learn from Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus taught us to love our enemies and pray for our persecutors. Yet while this is surely the ultimate objective, it often takes us human beings time to get there. When we have been hurt, we need to cry. We need to express that hurt and anger in language that sometimes isn’t very nice. Nothing is gained by putting on a false front, suppressing our anger and pretending it isn’t there. The issue is not whether to express our anger and hurt, but how and to whom we express it. That is important for two reasons. First, we learn that God is always open to hearing our prayers-not only when we are filled with praise and thanksgiving, but also when we are filled with anger, hurt and hatred. I don’t know about you, but my religious education did not make that very clear to me. Consequently, there were times when I felt too angry to pray, too hurt to worship and too filled with unworthy emotions to approach God. Through reading the psalms I learned that we are never too unclean, too mean, to petty or too sinful to come before God in prayer.

Second, this psalm teaches us where to direct our anger. The psalmist is not screaming at his enemies “I wish you were dead!” Rather, he is expressing these dark thoughts to God. The psalmist knows that s/he is not in a position to judge the situation. As strongly as s/he may feel that s/he is in the right and the enemies are entirely in the wrong, the psalmist also knows that “human anger does not work the righteousness of God.” James 1:20. In fact, anger has a way of distorting our vision. It is then that we are most prone to see everything in terms of black and white. It is when we are angry that we forget how there is always two sides to every dispute and resort to retribution before even trying to figure out what the other side might be. It is for this reason that the psalmist leaves the business of punishing the wicked and executing justice to God. God and God alone can be trusted to punish the wicked-or show mercy. Knowing that makes it possible to let go of anger and the desire for revenge. That is the first step toward seeing our enemy in a different light and learning eventually to love him or her.

James 3:13 – 4:3, 7-8a  http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=214910244

Once again, I find inscrutable the minds of the lectionary police who feel the need to censor the biblical writers. I find it impossible to believe that these few verses 4:4-6 and the second half of verse 8 were omitted merely to save space. Yet for the life of me, I cannot figure out what it is that they are trying to hide from us. In any event, I have chosen to give you the entire unedited and uncensored passage. Perhaps you will have more success than me in discovering that deep, dark secret.

James begins by asking the question, “Who is wise and understanding among you?” Perhaps we need to pause here and ask ourselves what wisdom and understanding is. If wisdom is nothing more than the accumulation of knowledge, then our generation is surely the wisest yet. Never in the history of the world has so much knowledge been available to so many people. But it should be clear to us that knowledge does not equate with wisdom. As knowledgeable as we are, nations still cannot seem to settle their disputes without resort to warfare. Our agricultural ability has grown exponentially over the last several decades-yet so has starvation and the growing gap between the few very rich and the many poor. I think James is onto something here when he warns us that all the knowledge, understanding and wisdom in the world is useless where hearts are driven by jealousy and selfish ambition. Such wisdom, James points out, is actually demonic.

James goes on to point out that wisdom is shaped not so much by what you know as by what you desire. “What causes wars, and what causes fightings among you? Is it not your passions that are at war in your members?” James 4:1. If your desires are selfish, knowledge will only make your selfish ambitions more deadly and destructive. If your desires are for God and for God’s kingdom, your knowledge will be placed in the service of peacemaking, mercy and reasonableness. James 3:17. So James urges us to “draw near to God” because you are shaped by what you love.

Mark 9:30-37  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1360&cmpgn=5244

You cannot possibly miss the irony here. Jesus has been teaching the disciples that he must soon be handed over to the powers of Rome that will kill him. And this is not just a passing remark. It is clear from the context that Jesus has been making this point with his disciples throughout his journey through Galilee. In fact, that was the point of the journey: to avoid public attention and the distraction it brings so that Jesus could focus with his disciples on the meaning of his mission. At the end of this day of heavy instruction, Jesus asks his disciples what they had been discussing among themselves along the way. If I had been in Jesus’ place, I might have expected the disciples to respond that they had been discussing all that they had heard him say that day. I would have expected the disciples to ask Jesus why he was going to Jerusalem, what he expected to accomplish by getting himself arrested, what purpose his death would serve and what did he mean by “rising again.” But the disciples have been reflecting on something else altogether. They have been arguing over who is to be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. This is rather like the teacher who spends the morning painstakingly explaining long division to her class, asks them for their questions and receives only one response: “Is it time for recess yet?”

Jesus responds with far more patience than I think I would have had under the circumstances. He takes a child in his arms and says, “You want to be great? I will show you great.” Now it is critical not to confuse this passage with others where Jesus uses the child as an example of faithfulness and urges his disciples to become as children. That is not the point here. Greatness is demonstrated by receiving the child. Understand that child care was considered women’s work then much as it is today in most quarters, despite the trend toward greater shared responsibility between spouses. Even today, greatness is seldom demonstrated through babysitting. Yet Jesus seems to place a high priority on children. In one of the very few instances where Jesus threatens hell fire, he directs his admonition against persons who cause one of his “little ones” to stumble. Despite his handlers’ efforts to keep Jesus on message with the crowds, Jesus insists on taking time to bless infants. Children are a priority for Jesus. There is no greater task than to care for a child.

It strikes me that our culture’s attitude toward children is ambivalent to say the least. Their parents frequently shower children with money or spend money for them. Not surprisingly, then, billions of dollars are spent on marketing to children. In what I can only characterize as a wildly neurotic and delusional belief in parental ability to ensure a child’s success (however that might be defined), parents in Manhattan compete for limited spots in prestigious pre-school programs that promise to put toddlers on a track to the Ivy League. At the other end of the extreme, there are 1.6 million homeless children in the United States according to the National Center on Family Homelessness. These are kids that get shuffled with their families from homeless shelters, to hotel rooms, to group homes or foster care-or simply live on the street. They suffer from poor nutrition, lack of proper medical care and education that is inadequate to non-existent. Some of these children are undocumented and, in the view of many people, that makes these little urchins worthy of even the sad little scraps that fall from our tables. I have a feeling Jesus would take a different view. Not surprisingly, deep cuts in the federal budget depriving these kids of the paltry benefits they now receive has not created anywhere near the stir made by mere rumors of cuts to Medicare. Unlike senior citizens, children do not vote. Neither do they have super pacs to lobby for them.

The welfare of children has always been a high priority of the church. The first orphanages were established by the church in the first century. Before that time, orphaned children without responsible relatives were doomed to a life of begging, thievery or prostitution. In the year 1886, eleven Lutheran congregations in the metropolitan New York area created the Bethlehem Orphan and Half-Orphan Asylum, to take care of children who were orphaned due to a severe outbreak of influenza within the German communities of New York City. Dedicated on May 30, 1888, the asylum’s mission was to care for and educate orphans and half-orphans to be Christians and useful members of society. http://www.lssny.org/site/history/. Lutheran Social Ministries of New Jersey (LSM/NJ) began with the establishment of an orphanage in Jersey City in 1904. The LSM/NJ Adoption Program has been a licensed adoption agency since 1948 and offers a multi-faceted statewide adoption program focused on building healthy families and supporting all those touched by adoption. http://www.lsmnj.org/programs-services/community-outreach-services/adoption-program/. These activities are significant insofar as the lives they touch and the values of God’s kingdom to which they bear witness. But they cannot address the magnitude of our children’s needs throughout the country. Only when all hearts are drawn to love the kingdom Jesus proclaims and recognize the greatness of embracing a child can we hope to see a transformation in the treatment of all children.

Finally, as school begins, I am reminded once again that between fifty and seventy children walk past our church twice each day going to and from school. Those of you who have served with me on the council know that I view this as an opportunity for ministry and mission. Thus far, I have failed to generate much interest or discussion on this point. So I would urge all of you to think more deeply about our responsibility to the children in our community, the opportunities we have to minister to them and what resources we might bring to such a ministry.

Pentecost 16

Isaiah 50:4-9a
Psalm 116:1-9
James 3:1-12
Mark 8:27-38

Prayer of the Day
O God, through suffering and rejection you bring forth our salvation, and by the glory of the cross you transform our lives. Grant that for the sake of the gospel we may turn from the lure of evil, take up our cross, and follow your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.

Greetings and welcome back! This week’s lessons have a focus on suffering for the sake of God’s good news. This is crystallized in Jesus call to his disciples to “take up the cross” and follow him. I have to confess that “cross bearing” is a term I use with great trepidation. In common parlance, that expression has come to mean nothing more than a personal inconvenient circumstance, as in “we all have our cross to bear.”  But the cross is not just any misfortune that happens to occur nor is suffering patiently a virtue in itself. No woman should accept her husband’s violent and abusive behavior as a trial to be endured with patience and acceptance. No child should accept sexual abuse. No one should be expected to remain passive in the face of discrimination or persecution on the basis of race, gender or sexual orientation. Similarly misguided is the notion that God inflicts suffering upon us to punish or instruct us. We now know that parenting methods that employ the infliction of pain and guilt do not produce healthy children. I don’t believe we can attribute to God child rearing practices that even we know to be defective.

So what does it mean to “bear the cross”?

Isaiah 50:4-9a  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1353&cmpgn=5244

As was the case last week, this reading comes to us from a section of the Book of Isaiah scholars attribute to “Second Isaiah.” For more information on this fascinating prophet, I refer you to last week’s post for the September 9^th readings. This Sunday’s lesson is the third of four poems which scholars often refer to as “servant songs.”  There is no little debate over whether the “servant” refers to Israel as a whole, the prophet/poet or some other figure. It is probably misleading to insist dogmatically on any single answer to this question as the prophetic message of Isaiah (indeed, of all the Hebrew prophets) is layered and complex. In this reading, it seems clear that the servant is the prophet whose message is meeting resistance from among his own people. Nevertheless, the prophet models the call of Israel to live faithfully among the nations in obedience to a just and faithful God. Israel can expect that her faithfulness will bring about ridicule, rejection and perhaps persecution in a world governed by the brutal geopolitics of empire. Yet both Israel and the prophet have the assurance that the God of Israel, who yearns for a new and better day, struggles and suffers with them. The suffering in this case is not good in and of itself. But because it is the consequence of faithful obedience to the God whose purpose is to redeem and restore all of creation, this suffering will not have been in vain.

As we learned last week, the prophet of Second Isaiah had the task of convincing his or her exiled people that the time had come for them to leave their captivity in Babylon and make the perilous journey back home to Palestine. Many of these folks were skeptical of the prophet’s message and motives. No doubt some of them dismissed his daring vision as a mystical pipe dream. It appears that some folks were actually hostile to the prophet. They felt threatened by this impractical call to return to the homeland that was dividing families, disrupting communities and apparently convincing many families to uproot themselves and leave behind their land, livelihoods and loved ones. The intensity of opposition to this prophet is reflected in his reference to “those who pulled out the beard.” Shaving off the beard is a method of shaming a man still very much alive and well throughout the middle east. Taking off facial hair without the benefit of a razor adds a good measure of pain to the shame! We don’t know whether these measures were literally taken against the prophet or whether they are merely figures of speech. Either way, the prophet is experiencing intense opposition and isolation. This prophet is not a masochist. S/he does not revel in pain for pain’s sake. Nevertheless, s/he understands that the call to proclaim God’s new beginning for Israel will necessarily stir up opposition among those who are determined to maintain the status quo. The prophet does not shrink from such opposition, however, because the prophet is convinced that God’s new beginning is inevitable and s/he experiences joy in his or her part in proclaiming it.

Psalm 116:1-9  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1352&cmpgn=5244

This is a prayer of thanksgiving offered by a person who has just come through a very difficult time in his or her life and has reached a level of recovery. The prominent Hebrew Scripture scholar, Walter Brueggemann would probably call this a psalm of “reorientation.” It might well be sung by someone who has endured a long and difficult cancer therapy and received news that he or she is finally “cancer free.” Or it might be heard on the lips of someone who has gone through a difficult divorce that brought to an end a relationship that was supposed to last until death-and found the way back from heartbreak and despair to a healed life of love and trust. This psalm could be the song of a recovered alcoholic or the survivor of an abusive relationship.

This psalm does not explain what caused the psalmist’s suffering. Nor does it not suggest that the psalmist is somehow at fault or that his or her suffering is part of some greater plan. Sometimes suffering just is. There is no explanation for it, but one thing is clear. The psalmist knows that God has not deserted him or her throughout the dark times. God has been present all along the difficult journey from darkness into light. It is important to understand that this journey does not take the psalmist back to “the way things were.” Often, there is no going back. The scars of surgery remain even after a full recovery. Life after divorce can be filled with love, life and hope-but it does not restore the relationship that was lost.

There is no way back to the way things were. There is only the way forward into a better future that God promises.

Professor Walter Brueggemann divides the psalms into three categories: Psalms of orientation, psalms of disorientation and psalms of re-orientation. I believe that is a helpful distinction because at any given time in our lives we find ourselves orientated, disorientated or re-orientated. There are times when all seems well with the world. The job is exciting and filled with opportunities for advancement. Marriage is filled with intimacy, spontaneity and delight. The kids are getting good grades and behaving themselves. There is not a cloud in the sky. A psalm of orientation, of shear praise and thanksgiving for God’s faithfulness and goodness is appropriate.  Then tragedy strikes. The company you work for goes out of business. A spouse proves unfaithful. One of the kids gets sick-really sick. Or that routine X-ray exposes something very wrong going on under the skin. That picture perfect life is thrown into disarray. The darkness seems impenetrable. At times like these, psalms of disorientation give expression to our feelings of panic and abandonment. A good example is Psalm 39 which concludes with a prayer that God would “look away from me, that I may know gladness, before depart and be no more.” Yet even though the psalmist seems to have given up on God, the psalmist is nonetheless still speaking to God! Psalms of re-orientation, such as Psalm 116, are songs of those who have fallen from a secure and well oriented life into disorientation, but have experienced the salvation of a God who has led them out of the darkness and re-orientated their lives. The journey has not been easy, nor does it bring them back to where they were before. Re-orientated people have been changed forever by their trek through the darkness. They now know just how dark and terrifying life can be. But they also know just how faithful and steadfast is the God who continues to lead them even as they pass through the valley of the shadow.

Once again, I strongly encourage everyone to read two psalms per day, one in the morning and one at night before going to bed. There is no better path to deep, meaningful and transformative prayer!

James 3:1-12  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1354&cmpgn=5244

Last Sunday Morning I stopped at the little convenience store on Main Street in Bogota to pick up some milk and cream cheese for the family education hour I hoped would follow the Eucharist. I met a very young woman with a little girl that could not have been more than four years old. The woman greeted me with the words, “Good morning, Father.” Then she said to her little girl, “You see that man? He is a priest. Do you know who a priest is?” The little girl said nothing. “A priest is someone who works for God,” the woman continued. The little girl looked up at me, wide eyed. I have no idea how much or little she understood about God or whether the word “God” had any meaning for her at all. But if she remembers anything from this interchange it will be that people who wear black shirts and collars like mine represent God. That is a scary notion! Now I think I understand why James tells us that “not many of you should become teachers.” Like it or not, we who teach are held to a stricter standard. We can protest that we are only human. We can insist that a clerical collar does not make us better people and that is certainly true. Nevertheless, the collar sets me apart and identifies me with God. Like it or not, I have to live with the consequences.

“We who teach shall be judged with greater strictness.”  That might not seem fair, but it’s true. It does not matter that the instances of pedophilia are actually much lower among priests than in the male population generally. When a clergy person molests a child it is always more devastating. In addition to the permanent emotional scars always left by such abuse, the abused child’s perception of God is horribly corrupted. The public’s perception of the church-which is called to be Christ’s resurrected presence in the world-is irreparably damaged. It does not matter either that clergy are statistically among the least susceptible to crimes of embezzlement and fraud. When a pastor abuses the trust of his or her church in matters of money, the damage to the congregation far exceeds whatever the financial loss may be. Again, the church’s credibility with the public is undermined and so is its witness to Jesus and the kingdom he proclaims. So I read James’ warning with a degree of fear and trembling.

Of course, like it or not, we are all teachers in some measure. Our children learn from us more than they will ever learn in Sunday School about faith, worship and discipleship. We parents are teaching our children by example every waking moment about love, forgiveness, faithfulness and the importance of worship. We cannot avoid being teachers. The question is, how well and faithfully are we teaching? What lessons do our children come away with? What are they learning from our examples about what really matters?

James draws our attention to our use of speech as the chief source of potential destructiveness. It takes only one disparaging word to undo the sense of confidence, self worth and courage that parents, teachers and mentors work so hard to instill in a child. Once a false rumor gets started, it continues to live on, projecting itself over the internet, through mouths of talk show hosts and in idle conversation-even after it has conclusively been refuted. But the most insidious abuse of speech, as far as disciples of Jesus are concerned, is its effect on our witness. Like every other gift, speech is intended to give glory to God and to serve our neighbor. Yet when speech is used to injure, insult and destroy, it becomes “a restless evil, full of deadly poison.”

The Eight Commandment is clearly implicated here: “You shall not bear false witness.” In his Small Catechism, Luther writes concerning this commandment that “We should fear and love God that we may not deceitfully belie, betray, slander, or defame our neighbor, but defend him, [think and] speak well of him, and put the best construction on everything.” It is the second part of this commandment that needs our attention. It is easy enough for me to stand by and remain silent when I am part of a conversation in which someone is being attacked. Much harder it is to come to their defense, to speak well of them and try to convince everyone else to give them the benefit of the doubt. This is particularly so in cases where I tend to think that the victim might deserve some criticism or when I have my own reasons for feeling angry at him or her. But whether the absent person is guilty or not, the point is that he or she is absent. That person is the one who needs to hear whatever criticism any individual may have. Speaking it in his or her absence only conveys a one sided account to other people who may not even have any part in the dispute. Such speech, rather than bringing about healing, reconciliation and understanding, instead broadens the conflict and contributes to distortion and misunderstanding.

Mark 8:27-38  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1355&cmpgn=5244

This episode marks the turning point for the Gospel of Mark. Several things are at play here: First, Jesus asks the disciples point blank who they think he is. Of course, we as readers know that Jesus is God’s Son and Israel’s Messiah because we were told that in Mark 1:1. Jesus knows who he is because the Spirit descended upon him at his baptism by John in the Jordan, telling him that he is God’s Son, the beloved. The demons know who Jesus is and are ready to proclaim it-except that Jesus will not let them. Jesus’ disciples, however, remain in the dark about who he is. After Jesus calmed the storm on the Sea of Galilee, the disciples ask in wonder, “Who is this, that even the wind and the waves obey him?” Now Jesus pops the question directly, “So, who do you say that I am.” Peter, ever the impetuous spokesperson for the disciples, blurts out his answer. “You are the Messiah.” That is half the answer. Jesus is indeed the Messiah promised to Israel. But he is more than that. Peter’s answer is therefore incomplete. Just how far Peter is from understanding Jesus becomes clear in the next scene.

This is the first place in the Gospel of Mark that Jesus speaks specifically about his coming suffering, death and resurrection. Once again, Peter is the disciple who responds to Jesus’ words-and with a rebuke. Mark does not tell us exactly what Peter said, but Peter seems to have taken Jesus aside to have his conversation in private. On the face of it, it sounds reasonable. It is what good friends do when they hear a friend talking about his imminent death. “Oh, don’t talk rubbish! Things will get better. You’ll see. Nothing of the kind will happen to you. I’ll see to that!” Jesus, however, turns and sees his disciples. Why does Mark add this little observation? What does the sight of Jesus’ disciples do to evoke Jesus’ harsh response to Peter? I suspect that the sight of his disciples reminds Jesus why his suffering, death and resurrection are so important. Yes, the cross might be avoided. Jesus could remain in Galilee with his disciples, teaching in the wilderness, on the lake shore and outside of the towns and villages. That way, he might evade capture indefinitely. Indeed, if Jesus were content to remain on the outskirts, it is possible that neither Rome nor the Jerusalem religious establishment would consider him a threat worth pursuing. But Jesus came not merely to level criticism against the powers that be from a safe distance. He came to challenge the right of those powers to rule God’s creation. He came to establish the reign of God. The world needs to be told that Caesar is not Lord. The world needs to hear that God is not the property of any religious elite. There must be a confrontation between the power of empire that claims to rule God’s world and the Son of Man who actually does. Only so will the world know how different the gentle reign of God over creation is and that this reign of God finally will displace the imperial rulers who seek in every age to grasp the reins of power.

Of course, the reign of God will not be born without the pain, rending and blood that accompanies every birth. Just as Jesus will confront the violent reign of the powers that be with the gentleness of God’s reign on the cross, so the disciples will be called upon to live under God’s kingdom in a world that is hostile to it. The shape of faithfulness to God’s kingdom in a sinful world is the cross. Again, this is not to glorify suffering in and of itself. Suffering is unequivocally bad. Nevertheless, suffering that is incurred as a result of faithful discipleship can be redeemed. Just as God raised Jesus, the one who was faithful to God unto death, so God raises up his disciples whose witness to God’s peaceful kingdom in a violent world leads them into the heart of conflict, persecution and suffering.

Staying alive is not everything. “Survivalists” fail to understand that in making survival the number one priority, they are surrendering what is most precious. The kingdom Jesus proclaims is worth living for. And if living for the kingdom results in our dying, then the kingdom is also worth dying for. As the late Dr. Martin Luther King put it, “If there is nothing you are willing to die for, you have nothing to live for.” Or in the words of Jesus, “What does it profit one to gain the whole world, but lose one’s self?”

Pentecost 15

Isaiah 35:4-7a
Psalm 146
James 2:1-10 [11-13] 14-17
Mark 7:24-37

Welcome once again to our discussion of the Sunday lessons, this time for Sunday, September 9^th. Beginning this Wednesday at 11:00 a.m., we will be meeting again face to face in the Trinity Memorial Chapel for discussion of these texts. Accordingly, if you can make time to join us and swell our ranks, I encourage you to do so. Of course, you are also welcome to share your thoughts with us here online. Moreover, I would like to remind you that you can have each week’s lessons sent to your e-mail by subscribing to this site, a simple procedure that begins when you click the “follow” tab at the bottom right of the screen.

Isaiah 35:4-7a  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1348

Today’s lesson comes to us from what biblical scholars call “Second Isaiah.” As those of you who studied Isaiah with me four years ago no doubt recall (has it really been that long?), The collection of prophetic pronouncements and narrative put together in the Old Testament book we call “Isaiah” can be divided into roughly three sections. Chapters 1-39 are associated with the prophet Isaiah who lived and preached in the Southern Kingdom of Judah at the end of the 8^th century B.C.E. During this period Judah was living a precarious existence in the shadow of the great Assyrian Empire. Chapters 40-55 were written by an anonymous prophet between 150 and 200 years later. A lot of water had gone under the bridge during that time. The influence of Judah’s nemesis, Assyria, began to wane around 622 B.C.E. During this time, Judah was able to re-establish herself as a regional power, but this renaissance was short lived. The Babylonian Empire rose to fill the power vacuum left by Assyria’s decline and dominated Judah for decades. An ill fated rebellion against Babylon led by Judah’s last king, Zedekiah, ended with the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E. and the deportation of Judah’s leading citizens to Babylon. The conquest of Babylon by Cyrus the Persian and his edict of 638 B.C.E.  permitting the return of peoples exiled by the Babylonians to their respective countries opened up the possibility for the exiles to return to their homeland in Palestine. The prophet of Second Isaiah (chapters 40-55) recognized in this development a new saving act of Israel’s God. Just as God had led Israel out of Egypt through the midst of the Red Sea and the wilderness into the promise land, so now God would lead the Judean exiles out of Babylon, through the desert wilderness back to that same promised land. This is the context of our lesson for Sunday.

Although located within the collection of prophetic material usually attributed to the Isaiah of the 8^th century, these verses are taken from a poetic composition that comes to us from the 6^th century and is therefore attributed to Second Isaiah or a prophet of his or her circle. In order to get a clear picture of what is happening here, you need to read the entire poem which you can find by clicking on this link. http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=213629199 The prophet’s principle concern was to encourage the exiles to return to their homeland in Palestine. Naturally, the exiles were hesitant. After all, most of these people were second generation exiles born in Babylon. For them, exile did not feel like exile. It felt like home. They had built their livelihoods in Babylon and set down roots there. How likely is it that they would want to leave all of that behind to make a dangerous trip through what is now the Iraqi desert to start all over again in a land that they knew only through stories, songs and tradition? The prophet announces that God will be with the exiles no less than with the Israelites in Egypt. God will cause a garden to bloom in the heart of the desert rich with pools of water, vegetation and shade. No dangerous animal will inhabit this Eden like paradise that will stretch from Babylon to Jerusalem. Moreover, the garden highway will remain forever as a memorial to God’s new saving act of deliverance for the exiles. As the exiles set out on their journey home, their illnesses will be healed. The blind will see. The lame will dance and the deaf will hear.

One might fault the prophet for over promising. After all, we know that no such miraculous garden ever sprang up from the desert floor. We know also that the exiles’ journey back to Palestine was difficult and dangerous. Moreover, when the exiles arrived back home they found their beloved city in ruins, the land occupied by hostile peoples and much political resistance to rebuilding the community. Yet in spite of all that, the exiles did in fact return. The prophet’s message inspired them to respond in faith to this new window of opportunity and so a new chapter in Israel’s history began.

I believe this reading is instructive for us on many levels. First, it teaches us to look for the doors of opportunity God is opening for us in the unremarkable occurrences of everyday life. The exiles might have looked at the conquest of Babylon by Persia as no more than a geopolitical event that meant nothing to them. One tyrannical empire conquers another. That is how it has always been. So now we have a new master. So what? It took a prophetic imagination to see in this event an opportunity for something truly new. It took the eye of a prophet to spot God’s hand at work in what most would cynically characterize as “geopolitics as usual.” So where are the opportunities God is making in our life here at Trinity? What doors are being opened? Is God dangling a glorious future right under our nose, but we fail to see it because we are so fixated on the past we lost and to which we long to return? What will it take to reignite a prophetic imagination in our hearts and minds?

Another aspect of all this is that, in some respects, the prophecy failed. The miraculous signs did not occur. The eternal memorial highway from Babylon to Jerusalem never materialized. The rebuilt community did not become the glorious magnet of wisdom and teaching that would draw all nations to peaceful co-existence. Then again, maybe the prophecy has not failed. Perhaps it still awaits fulfillment. Maybe this word of the Lord is bigger and more profound than even the prophet realized. Does God still have plans for Jerusalem? I hesitate even to ask the question because there is so much bad theology out there about the restoration of Jerusalem. Some of that theology calls for uncritical and unquestioned support for the State of Israel based on the mistaken belief that the rebuilding of Solomon’s temple (highly unlikely to occur for many reasons) will trigger a bloody end to the present age and the dawn of a new one-for the survivors anyway. Naturally, we don’t want to encourage these misguided notions.

Still, we ought not to over spiritualize this text. Clearly, Jerusalem is central to God’s saving work in the Hebrew Scriptures. Jesus wept over Jerusalem and broght his ministry to conclusion there. The New Testament speaks of Jerusalem as a potent symbol of the fulfillment of God’s ultimate intent of living among human creatures. Revelation 21:3-4. Jerusalem has been throughout the scriptures a unifying symbol of peace. Yet throughout history, the city of Jerusalem has been anything but that. Like the prophecy in Isaiah, the symbol that is Jerusalem has yet to become an historical reality.

I have never been a fan of “interfaith” dialogue. I find that enterprise generally trite, superficial and unproductive. Nevertheless, I cannot overlook the fact that the city of Jerusalem is a potent symbol of salvation, justice and peace for the three Abrahamic faiths, Judaism, Islam and Christianity. Perhaps a good place to begin a truly fruitful discussion is around the city of Jerusalem that means so much to all of us. How do we understand the role of Jerusalem in each of our faith traditions? Are we content to let Jerusalem continue being a source and center of bloody conflict? How might Zion become the crossroads where nations come for instruction in the ways of peace and justice? See Isaiah 2:2-5.

Psalm 146  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1347

This is a psalm of praise celebrating the sovereignty of Israel’s God. More than likely, this psalm comes rather late in Israel’s history. There is no mention of the line of David or any hint of the monarchy in Israel. After a half millennia of disappointing kings whose leadership ultimately led to the destruction of Solomon’s temple, the siege of Jerusalem and the loss of the promised land, Israel was in no mood to put her trust in yet another royal figure.

During this binge of craziness that comes over us every four years as presidential elections draw near, we who follow Jesus would do well to take to heart the psalmist’s admonition: “put not your faith in princes or in any mortal that has no power to save.” That includes presidential candidates who tend to make messianic claims. Let’s put some perspective on this folks. What we are doing these days is a job interview-nothing more. We have narrowed the resumes down to two final contenders. One will get the job and the other won’t. There is no more to it than that. Contrary to what the candidates and the pundits are telling you, this is not an historic choice because presidents do not make history. The Lord makes history. The Lord sets the prisoners free. The Lord opens the eyes of the blind. The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down. The Lord watches over the sojourners. The Lord upholds the widow and the fatherless. Does God use presidents to do that? I don’t know, but I do know that the Lord does not depend on them and neither should you.

Are presidential elections important? Of course they are. So are job interviews, but seldom does the fate of a company hang in the balance over a hiring decision. Even more preposterous is the notion that the flow of history hinges on such a decision. When we start to think otherwise we stray into the sin of idolatry. Either God is sovereign or not.

James 2:1-10 [11-13] 14-17  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1349

As those of you who were in church last Sunday already know, I will be preaching on the Book of James throughout this month of September. Therefore, I encouraged everyone to read through the entire book of James sometime this week. Oh, stop groaning! It is only four pages long! If you do that, I think you will get a lot more out of the lessons we will be reading and reflecting upon each Sunday.

This Sunday’s lesson begins with an admonition against making judgmental distinctions among people within the church. Of course, there are legitimate distinctions among members of the Body of Christ as Paul points out. There are various gifts given to different members for use in building up the church. Some are called to preach, others to teach, still others to evangelize and so on. But there is no hierarchical distinction here. Rather, each person is to use his or her gift in building up the Body of Christ. It is not important which gift you have but rather how you are using it.

James is not talking about such distinctions here. Rather, he is coming down hard on the practice of importing into the church distinctions of rank, class and social status that deserve no recognition among disciples of Jesus. Distinction based on wealth noted by James is but one example of such improper discrimination. There are many others. Sunday morning is still the most racially segregated time of the week in our country.  Some churches distinguish between charter members or “long time” members and more recent members by affording more respect and giving greater deference to the opinions of the old timers. I believe also that our ELCA is in danger of making its rostered leaders into a special class. Indeed, one of the deep reservations I had and still hold toward the Call to Common Mission agreement between the ELCA and the Episcopal Church in the USA is the provision for setting bishops apart as a special class of clergy uniquely capable of ordaining persons to the ministry of word and sacrament. This model of channeling the outpouring of the Holy Spirit through hierarchical channels has troubling theological implications to say the least. The liturgical pomp and circumstance that has grown up around the office of the ELCA bishop and has trickled down to parish pastors as well over the last couple of decades hardly reflects the kind of leadership Jesus models for us in the gospel and certainly does not make the greatest among us like the least.

Often I believe churches practice an unintentional but deeply improper discrimination against children. I have never favored the practice of running “child care rooms” during the worship service or conducting Sunday School classes while the grownups are in church. Yes, I know how hard it is to be in church with small children. I raised three of my own. I know what it is like trying to keep them pacified, taking them in and out to the bathroom, enduring the annoyed and agitated stares of people in the surrounding pews. I’ve been there and done that. But I will add that I don’t regret a minute of it and I believe that there is no better place for a small child to be during the worship service than in the worship service. And let me go on record here to say that, as a pastor, I don’t care how loud, disruptive or hyperactive kids get during worship. From my perspective, there is only one thing worse than babies crying in church: no babies crying in church.

Mark 7:24-37  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1350

I don’t much care for the way Jesus treats this Syrophonician woman, but I can understand it. Jesus went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon. This is gentile territory, territory where Jesus probably would not be generally known. Evidently, he wanted it that way. Jesus entered a home intending not to be seen or recognized. Jesus had had enough. He had fed two crowds of people after teaching them for several days. He has had to endure constant sniping and criticism from his enemies. He has had to put up with the faithless and dimwitted antics of his disappointing disciples. Now Jesus is entitled to some down time. But even in this district where he should be anonymous, he cannot be hid. A woman comes crying after him, begging him for help. Jesus snaps at her. “Let not the children’s bread be thrown to the dogs!” That sounds harsh and it is. But it is just a fact of life. Not even Jesus can heal everyone in the world. You have to draw the line somewhere, don’t you? Furthermore, dogs are dependent animals. They live from the hands of their masters, “the children.” If the children are not fed, the dogs will perish as well. Jesus needs his bread. If he doesn’t get it, nobody gets fed.

Yet the woman will not leave it there. Yes, she says, the children must be fed. But even so, there is enough left over to feed the dogs. This remarkable woman is turning back on Jesus his own teachings that have been demonstrated not once, but twice in his feeding of the five thousand and four thousand respectively. God always provides enough for everyone’s need (if not for everyone’s greed). We cannot tell from the text, but it would not surprise me if Jesus smiled at this point as if to say, “Alright, you got me.”

If it is a little discomforting to see Jesus getting tired, irritated and losing his cool, perhaps that is because we forget that he was, after all, fully human. Jesus got tired and cranky like everyone else. Jesus was afraid of suffering and prayed to be delivered from the cross. When he was crucified, the pain, the suffering and despair was real. It was not just Superman playing dead. Living faithfully as God’s son did not make Jesus any less human. In fact, you could say that Jesus is the only one ever to have lived a genuinely human life.  We say that he was without sin not because he lacked human limitations, but because he lived faithfully within those limitations trusting his Heavenly Father with all matters beyond those limits.

The second story in this Sunday’s reading is Jesus’ healing the deaf and speechless man. This healing is intensely personal. In contrast to the exorcism of the Syrophonician woman’s daughter whose demon was cast out from a distance, Jesus gets physical here. He touches the man’s ears. He spits and touches his tongue. He looks up to heaven and sighs. He shouts, “Be open!” The casting out of the demon in the prior story seemed almost effortless. This healing seems to require a great deal of exertion on Jesus’ part. I am not sure what is going on here. Is Jesus slowing down? Is the frantic pace of his ministry as related in Mark’s gospel finally starting to take its toll? In any event, Jesus once again enjoins this man who has received the benefit of healing to secrecy. As in prior instances, Jesus’ admonitions prove ineffective. The news of his good work spreads despite his efforts to keep it confidential. It appears that not even Jesus can keep a lid on the good news of God’s coming reign.

Pentecost 14

Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9
Psalm 15
James 1:17-27
Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

Greetings once again to our weekly reflections on the Sunday lessons. As many of you already know, daughter Emily has arrived safely in Rhodes, Michigan where she is beginning a year of pastoral internship at Hope Lutheran Church under the instruction of Rev. Reed Schroer. She has been given a warm and enthusiastic welcome. You can view Hope’s welcome message to Emily and find out more about her church and its ministry by visiting the website at http://www.hopeinrhodes.com/. I ask that you keep Emily in your prayers as she begins this new chapter in her pastoral instruction.

Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1343&cmpgn=5244

The lesson from Deuteronomy marks a new chapter in the life of Israel as well. Moses addresses his people, Israel, as they stand poised to enter into Canaan. The years of living as wandering nomads have come to an end. Israel’s settled future as a nation in its own right is about to begin. The critical question is: what sort of nation will Israel be? At the dawn of history, Cain asked God rhetorically, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” I think Cain’s attitude reflects the mentality behind most nations of the world. We look after ourselves and our own. We guard jealously our sovereignty and our national interests. Even within nations there exists a hierarchy of loyalties. My state, my community, my tribe, my family-the further away you travel from the people nearest and dearest to me, the less I care. I don’t want my tax dollars squandered on people down in Haiti. As a matter of fact, I don’t even like to see them spent on my own fellow Americans that I deem unworthy of assistance. Why should I be responsible for them? Israel, however, must be a nation guided by a different spirit reflected in different national priorities.

Moses makes clear to Israel that God did not liberate her from Egypt and bring her safely through the wilderness only to create another Egypt, another oppressive empire living off the forced labor of its oppressed subjects. Israel is not to be distinguished by its commercial wealth or its military might. When the nations of the world look to Israel they are not to be terrified of its power or dazzled by its wealth. Instead, they will say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” vs. 6. “For what great nation is there,” asks Moses, “that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us; whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there that has statutes and ordinances so righteous as all this law which I set before you this day?”  vss. 7-8. Israel’s greatness lies in her recognition that the earth is the Lord’s. Her possession of the land is a gift given not in perpetuity, but as a sacred trust to be used for the greater glory of her God. Unlike Egypt which oppressed and enslaved the aliens living within its borders, Israel is instructed “When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. The stranger who sojourns with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” Israel is not to replicate Egypt (or Arizona either for that matter!). Furthermore, Israel is to be a nation without poverty. Disparity in wealth there may be, but Israel’s statutes and ordinances governing commerce and agriculture ensure that no one must ever go without the necessities of life: “And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field to its very border, nor shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger; I am the Lord your God.” Leviticus 23:22. Furthermore, “If there is among you a poor man, one of your brethren, in any of your towns within your land which the Lord your God gives you, you shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother, but you shall open your hand to him and lend him sufficient for his need, whatever it may be.” Deuteronomy 15:7-8.

Jesus also made it clear to his disciples that they were to be an alternative community modeling a different way of living together. “You know that those who are supposed to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Mark 10:42-45. The community of disciples we call the church is a kingdom without borders. It is a household where rich and poor, strong and weak, saint and convict sit at the same table, eat from the same loaf and drink from the same cup. In Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male nor female, straight or gay, legal or illegal, criminal or law abiding citizen. All of these are called to be one body of which Jesus Christ is the head.

Psalm 15  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1342&cmpgn=5244

According to the Cambridge Bible Commentary on the Psalms, archeologists have recovered a number of religious inscriptions instructing worshippers in the ancient world concerning the preparations to be made and conditions to be fulfilled before entering a shrine or temple. These texts usually set forth a list of cultic requirements for cleansing, proper ritual attire and acceptable offerings. Psalm 15 focuses instead on the characteristics of character and ethical conduct as critical for determining worthiness to approach the Lord in worship. See Cambridge Bible Commentary on the Psalms, J.W.  Rogerson & W. McKay, (Cambridge University Press, 1977) p. 65. The requirements for approaching the Temple have less to do with placating the desires of a ritualistically finicky deity than they do with conduct of the worshiper toward his or her neighbor. There is much that could be said about the importance of truthful speech, faithful friendship, speaking well of one’s neighbor and honoring one’s promises. But I want to focus on just one characteristic of the righteous worshiper that caught my eye this week.

The one worthy to approach the Lord in worship does not put out his money at interest. Vs. 5. This injunction sounds a little archaic to generations raised in an economy that runs on credit. Unless we are one of the fabled 1%, most of us buy houses, cars and education for our children with money we have not yet earned. If there were no credit, I would not own a home and my children would likely not have had a college education. Hopefully, I would be able to find a rental unit within walking distance of the church. Otherwise, I would have to rely on public transportation or the kindness of my wealthier neighbors. There is no question that credit has allowed me to enjoy a lifestyle to which I could hardly expect to come close without it.

On the face of it, there is nothing unfair about reasonable interest. If I receive money from the bank that I have not yet earned, it is only fair that the bank be compensated for losing the use of its money for a period of time and for taking the risk that I might not be able to pay it back. But there is more than fairness at stake here. There is something fundamentally troubling about the fact that the middle class lifestyle many of us enjoy; the business opportunities that many entrepreneurs are able to seize; and the chances for making quick and easy fortunes on equities and commodities markets all are based on money which has yet to be made or on the future value of goods or business ventures that is speculative. If everything from my car to Facebook is being paid for with phony money-that is cause not only for financial concern but for deep moral reflection. There is an element of profound self deception here that hides the true cost of what we are purchasing and conceals the risks of the transactions we enter into. The projected cost as well as the anticipated profits from fracking for natural gas, exploiting offshore oil and building nuclear energy plants cannot possibly reflect the potential economic, environmental and geopolitical forces that might very well erase all profit and inflict losses now unimaginable. The value of the fruits and vegetables we purchase does not reflect damage inflicted on the soil and ground water by pesticides, agro fertilizers or the destabilizing effect of holding prices down through use of low cost foreign labor both here and abroad. What we should have learned in the 2008 debacle applies not only to mortgages, but to everything we purchase in a credit driven society: an economy that grows by encouraging people to spend money they don’t have to buy things they cannot afford is bound to crash sooner or later.

I am not suggesting a return to barter economy. Nor am I suggesting that you all go out and cut up your credit cards (though in some extreme cases, that is actually good advice). I do believe, though, that in this time and place when everyone is fixated on “the economy,” people of faith need to go beyond the sterile debate over how best to revive it and begin questioning the fundamental assumptions that underlie our economic relationships and whether those assumptions ring true.

James 1:17-27  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1344&cmpgn=5244

First, a word or two about the Book of James: Though styled as a letter, the book reads more like a string of sermonetts on different topics. There is no lack of debate among scholars as to whether James, the putative author of the letter, was actually the brother of Jesus we meet in Acts addressing the earliest disciples of Jesus, or a disciple of James writing in his name to a second or third generation Christian community or some other Christian leader named James. Though many of the teachings in the book are close and even identical to the sayings of Jesus, Jesus is mentioned only twice. For a more thorough review of the book, its origins and content, I urge you to read the summary written by Prof. James Boyce of Luther Seminary at Enter the Bible, http://www.enterthebible.org/newtestament.aspx?rid=59

The one theme that strikes me particularly this week begins at verse 19. “Let every man be quick to hear and slow to speak.” This is at variance with the encouragement I have always been given to “speak up.” As a shy introvert, I suppose that encouragement was a salutary influence. Yet as introverted as I might be by nature, I am just as prone as anyone to let anger take the wheel of my heart. Frequently, I take issue with people before trying to understand what the issue is. Often, I am more interested in refuting people I believe to be in error than in listening carefully for whatever truth may lay at the heart of what they are saying. Even when I remain characteristically silent, that does not mean that I am listening with care. Often my silence is spent in crafting my response to an argument I have not thoroughly considered. So shy people no less than extroverts must take James’ warning to heart.

Perhaps this admonition is also a good one for the church as a whole. We set great store by preaching-as well we should. Our ELCA has produced a number of provocative and thoughtful statements addressing important moral, social and ethical questions facing our world today. But as important as it is to speak boldly and truthfully, James reminds us that it is equally important to listen carefully and empathetically. I wonder what a ministry of listening would look like? I must confess that I have often been tempted to publicize a special event at our church inviting everyone in the community who has left the church, who is not interested in the church or who is angry at the church to come and tell us why. For our part, we would promise not to argue or even answer their charges. Our role would be simply to listen.

I would love to do that some day and perhaps I will. The only thing that gives me pause is doubt about my ability to keep my mouth shut. I am sure that I would hear many criticisms of the church that seem unfair, inaccurate or misplaced. I would be tempted to jump to the church’s defense with some well reasoned response. But that would defeat the whole purpose. The ministry of listening is just that: remaining silent; making space for people to express their hurt without having to fear retaliation; showing hospitality to strangers; and creating an environment in which reconciliation is possible. So what do you think? Are we up for this?

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1345&cmpgn=5244

Once again, the lectionary people have so thoroughly butchered this text that I hardly know what to do with it. Generally speaking, chapter 7 of Mark begins with a dispute as to what constitutes uncleanness. The disciples’ eating pods of grain in the fields with “hands defiled” sparks a dispute between Jesus and the Pharisees. Mark tells us by way of a parenthetical remark that the Pharisees do not eat without washing. It should be noted that this has nothing to do with hygiene and everything to do with ritual cleanliness. Jesus does not reject this practice per see. Rituals serve as reminders that every aspect of life is holy for God’s holy people. This is particularly true for meals. (That should come as no surprise for disciples of Jesus whose most significant worship activity is the Eucharist.) But ritual is distorted and burdensome when it becomes a master rather than a servant. When sickness or hunger prevent a child of God from enjoying the Sabbath rest God intends for all his creatures, it is sinful to prevent healing or preparation of food that would open the door to Sabbath rest for such excluded persons. So also the disciples, being out in the field and having no access to water or vessels for cleansing, should not be prohibited from receiving with thanksgiving what God provides to satisfy their hunger. The disciples were actually exercising their right to “gleaning” discussed in our review of the Deuteronomy text above. Where God makes provision for the poor, no one must seek to revoke that provision by resort to humanly devised rituals however useful or legitimate those rituals might be.

Excluded from the Sunday reading is Jesus condemnation of the use of “corban” to deny an aging parent the support owed by their children under the Ten Commandments. Vss. 9-13 The point here, too, is that the law was intended to serve God’s people in honoring God and loving the neighbor. When the law is used to circumvent that purpose, it is abused. A literal application of the law that violates its spirit is just as evil as outright disobedience.

Jesus goes on to discuss what makes a person unclean. Clearly, it is not what goes into a person, but what comes out. This theme will be repeated in the story of the Syrophoenician woman whose daughter Jesus heals.

Pentecost 13

Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18
Psalm 34:15-22
Ephesians 6:10-20
John 6:56-69

Greetings everyone!  This week marks the thirtieth year of my sojourn in New Jersey. That term “sojourn” is not really accurate anymore. For a very long time now I have considered New Jersey my home. As much as I enjoy visiting the State of Washington out on the west coast where I was born and raised, it is no longer home for me. The house in which I grew up has long since been sold. My parents are no longer living. Much of the area in which I spent my boyhood years has changed almost beyond my recognition.

Yet there was a time when Washington was home and New Jersey was a big question mark. I was twenty six-years old when I packed my few belongings into my Mercury Zephyr and left Bremerton for Teaneck, New Jersey to serve a congregation there. Referring to Teaneck as the Promised Land might sound a little hyperbolic, but in many respects, it was just that for me. Teaneck represented an opportunity for me to begin doing what I had spent years training, preparing and practicing for. It also presented me with the challenges of adulthood that are deferred for people like me who spend nearly the first decade of adulthood in school. I am talking about things that are pretty routine-like opening a bank account; finding a doctor/dentist; obtaining a New Jersey drivers license and getting my taxes done. Of course, these were all challenges I anticipated. I could never have anticipated meeting the girl of my dreams, having three beautiful children and the unexpected detour of my professional life into the practice of law. The Promised Land held more promises (and challenges) than I could possibly have anticipated.

Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1338&cmpgn=5244

The Book of Joshua is the story of the Israelites’ entry into the Promised Land after forty years of wandering in the wilderness. Joshua, the successor to Moses, led the Israelites into Canaan where they conquered the Canaanites and redistributed the land among the twelve tribes of Israel. The book ends with a covenant ceremony in which the people of Israel vow in the presence of Joshua and their God to “serve only the Lord.” That is where our reading for this Sunday fits in. If you read one verse further, you will discover that Joshua is skeptical of his peoples’ ability to meet the challenge of living as God’s covenant people in the land which God has given them. He can see all too well how easily the lessons learned in the wilderness, where God fed Israel each day her daily bread, could be lost now that Israel had inherited a good land capable of sustaining her.  Memory seems to be a key factor here. Fresh in Israel’s memory are the saving acts of God that liberated her from slavery in Egypt and God’s provision for all of her needs as she traveled through the wilderness. Perhaps that explains why “Israel served the Lord all the days of Joshua; and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua and had known all the work which the Lord did for Israel.” Josh. 24:31.  The memory of God’s saving acts and the awareness of God’s continuing presence was fresh in Israel’s mind. When memory fades, so does faithfulness.

Statistics demonstrate that, of those persons who leave the church, a significant number are made of people who have moved from one community to another. Moving is a stressful and demanding process. So is the process of finding a new church home. Reasons given by people who have moved and neglected worship are many. Lack of time and energy is one factor. Getting settled into a new home is a chore in itself. Finding a good pediatrician for the kids and getting them registered for school takes time. Changing your driver’s license, auto registration, voting registration and opening bank accounts all take their toll on your time. Looking for a job in a new community also taxes your time, finances and psyche. For those who have made an effort to find a church, many are disappointed because the churches they visit seem less than friendly, or don’t have the programs they are looking for or “it just aren’t the same as our old church.” Whatever the reasons, often the first thing people shed when they settle into a new community is their faith. So Joshua was justified in his concern that, with all the demands of settling the land of Canaan, worship of the faithful God Israel had come to know in the wilderness would fall to the bottom of the priority list.

In some respects, each new day is another entry into the Promised Land. One never knows what any given day will bring, but we believe that “it is the day the Lord has made.” Psalm 118:24. There are always the routine and anticipated aspects of the day. Sometimes it seems as though that is all there is. Yet even in the most ordinary humdrum day there is some element of the unexpected: the card from that friend you have not heard from in years; the call from your child’s teacher suggesting a conference; the guy in the smelly sweatshirt that approaches you asking for money as you are coming out of the grocery store. These circumstances often present us with the same choice Joshua presented to the children of Israel as they prepared to settle into Canaan: will you serve the Lord your God or some other “god”? If we are attentive, we can hear Joshua’s voice throughout our day asking us, “Choose this day whom you will serve.”

Psalm 34:15-22  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1337&cmpgn=5244

The psalm reading for Sunday is the third and last section of Psalm 34, the psalm we have been reading for the last two weeks. My comments on the content, style and form of this psalm are found in the posts for Pentecost 11 and Pentecost 12. I would only add as a point of interest that verse 20 is prominently cited in the Gospel of John.

“Since it was the day of Preparation, the Jews did not want the bodies left on the cross during the sabbath, especially because that sabbath was a day of great solemnity. So they asked Pilate to have the legs of the crucified men broken and the bodies removed. ³²Then the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and of the other who had been crucified with him. ³³But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. ³⁴Instead, one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once blood and water came out.³⁵(He who saw this has testified so that you also may believe. His testimony is true, and he knows^* that he tells the truth.)³⁶These things occurred so that the scripture might be fulfilled, ‘None of his bones shall be broken.’ ³⁷And again another passage of scripture says, ‘They will look on the one whom they have pierced.’”

John 19:31-37.  For further perspective on this psalm, you might want to read the commentary of Henry Langknecht, Professor of Homiletics at Trinity Seminary in Columbus, Ohio. This can be found at Workingpreacher.org.   http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?lect_date=8/26/2012&tab=5&cmpgn=5244

Ephesians 6:10-20  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1339&cmpgn=5244

In this remarkable passage we are encouraged to “be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.” Then the author of Ephesians proceeds to turn everything we think we know about strength on its head. “For we are not contending against flesh and blood” says the writer. But there are many forces in our culture telling us that our struggle is against flesh and blood. It is against liberals and socialists; against conservatives and right wingers; it is against illegal immigrants; it is against terrorists and criminals. The devil is constantly trying to convince us through a huge array of ideologies that the world can neatly be divided into good people and evil people. As long as you are on the side of good, it is acceptable to employ violence to achieve justice and defend “our” way of life whoever “we” may be. The devil would have us believe that “God is on our side” and that he, the devil, is on the side of our enemies. Of course, the devil does not take sides in human conflict. He has no stake in who controls the world or which nation triumphs over all others. As long as people are hating and killing each other, it matters not who “wins.” As far as the devil is concerned, wherever there is war he is the winner.

The writer of Ephesians recognizes, however, that our real fight is “against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” In truth, the line between good and evil does not run along national, racial, religious or ethnic lines. The line between good and evil runs through the middle of every human heart and that is where we need to begin engaging evil. We are urged to put on “the whole armor of God.” The writer then uses a host of extremely militaristic images of armor and weaponry to describe the spiritual resources given to the church for its struggle against evil. This remarkable contrast is designed to emphasize the gentle means by which God overcomes the powers of wickedness that know only violence and coercion. The only body armor the disciple of Jesus has is truth, righteousness and peace. The only shield a disciple has to withstand the violent forces of evil is faith in God’s promises. The only protection from a mortal head wound is the salvation wrought in Jesus Christ. This is the armor with which disciples of Jesus were called upon to meet the brutality of a hostile empire with armies, weapons and torture implements at its disposal. The only offensive weapons disciples of Jesus have are prayer and the Holy Spirit.

So where are the principalities and powers, the hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places today? I suggest that many of them are found in the same places they were dwelling in the days of the New Testament church. They are found in the machinery of empire, the jealous sovereignty of nation states insisting that their own national interests trump global concerns for the wellbeing of all. When the “world rulers of this present age” insist that we must kill our neighbors in direct contradiction to Jesus’ call to love even our enemies and to resist not one who is evil, then we should be hearing the voice of Joshua from our Old Testament lesson crying out, “Choose this day who you will serve.” For too long, I believe, the church has sided with the principalities and powers in exchange for public support and respectability. For too long churches have confused the interests of the Kingdom of God with the interests of whichever nation they happen to reside in. The cry of “God and country” has too often muffled Joshua’s cry of either or.

I also believe that the principalities and powers often worm their way into the life of the church. A church that values doing worship “right” over worshiping Jesus well has succumbed to the powers. A church that values maintaining its traditions over welcoming its community and allowing the Spirit to transform it has come under the influence of the principalities. A church that values survival over mission is a church that is run by the rulers of this present age. A church that values its reputation over faithful witness to the scandalous and controversial good news about Jesus Christ is a church that has lost its armor and has become fearful of taking a stand for its Lord.

Thanks be to God that in Jesus Christ we are well armed. The power of truthful speech unmasks the powers of evil urging us toward violence and hate. The good news of God’s reconciliation in Christ gives us all the ammunition we need to wage peace. Righteousness and integrity guard us from temptation, threats and intimidation. Faith, the conviction that God has already accomplished all things needful for the salvation of the world in Jesus Christ, gives us courage to endure the seeming failure of our own faithful efforts. We know that Christ promises to complete what we can only begin. Finally, through prayer and the work of God’s Spirit within us we exercise the very power that raised Jesus from death. No more potent weapon exists or is needed for the advance of God’s Kingdom.

John 6:56-69  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1340&cmpgn=5244

Last week it was the crowd and Jesus’ critics who mumbled and complained because Jesus said in very graphic terms that he was the bread of life and that having life meant eating his flesh and drinking his blood. This week it is Jesus’ own disciples who are doing the complaining. Many of them, after hearing these words from Jesus, no longer followed him. But I have to ask, were they ever really following him to begin with? These disciples may have cheered as Jesus cleansed the Temple and rid it of corruption and commercialism. They were thrilled to receive their fill of bread in the wilderness. If this is what Jesus is doing, what’s not to like? Now, however, Jesus offers them more. He offers them his very self. But these disciples do not want anything more. They do not want Jesus. They want all the good things they think Jesus can give them. They want to be disciples of Jesus, but on their own terms. To internalize Jesus, to be sustained by him alone and to be transformed by Jesus is more than what they bargained for. They wanted Jesus to transform their unhappy circumstances, but they had no intention of letting him change them. These disciples were prepared to be admirers of Jesus, supporters of Jesus and even followers of Jesus-up to a point. But when Jesus makes it clear to them that salvation lies precisely in going beyond that point, they want nothing further to do with him.

Let’s be clear. It is not that Jesus is demanding a higher morality, a higher level of devotion or a higher level of spiritual awareness from his disciples. Jesus has already said that the only work God requires is that we trust in him. Trusting Jesus means believing Jesus when he tells us that what he has to give us is what we truly need. Jesus offers to abide in us. Abiding in Jesus means being absorbed into Jesus, transformed into the likeness of Jesus and drawn into the mission of Jesus. We don’t accomplish that on our own. Jesus offers it to us as a gift. But therein is the rub: too often we just don’t want this gift. We don’t want to internalize Jesus. We want Jesus at a distance. We want him to be there as a shoulder to cry on, a gentle presence to give us peace, a savior who is there in times of trouble, but decent enough to stay out of our way when times are good. We want a Jesus who will defend our homes and protect our soldiers, but not the Jesus who prepares a table for us in the presence of our enemies and then calls upon us to invite those enemies to the feast. We want a Jesus who will change our unpleasant circumstances, but not a Jesus who wants to change our hearts and minds. As the Gospel of John has already indicated: “this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.”  John 3:19.

Jesus lost some disciples that day and he seems not to have been too worried about that. There are some kinds of followers Jesus does not need. Among them are those who are tagging along only for what they can get out of discipleship. There is a great deal of concern expressed these days about the decline in church membership among protestant denominations such the ELCA. Some folks are blaming the national church for its stances on controversial subjects. Others blame the synods for their lack of leadership. Many blame pastors for failing to speak effectively to the younger generations. We pastors, for our part, point the finger at our congregations for their lack of commitment and support. That is all counterproductive. Fixing blame for the sinking of the Titanic would not have kept it from going down and certainly will not bring it back up from the bottom of the sea. Moreover, I am beginning to wonder whether anyone is to blame or whether anything blameworthy is being done. Maybe the membership of the church is shrinking because its capacity for true discipleship is growing. Maybe we are driving people out of the church precisely because more of us are internalizing Jesus. When a church takes seriously its duty to show hospitality to the stranger regardless of the stranger’s legal status; when the church opens its doors to people who dirty its carpets, disrupt the flow of its worship and tarnish its reputation, very often long time members respond as did many of Jesus disciples in our Gospel lesson: “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”

These days I am hearing an ever more urgent call for some strategy, some new change of direction, some marketing ploy that will “turn the church around.” If by that we mean turning away from sin and turning toward Jesus and the new life he offers, then I am all for it. But if “turning the church around,” means only that we grow our membership by whatever means available and increase our income so that we can preserve our denominational institutions, I am not sure I want in on that. Maybe Jesus does not need a church that owns real estate in every town. Maybe Jesus does not need a guild of professional clergy represented in every congregation. Maybe Jesus does not need bishops who travel the world to address heads of state and numerous programs addressing every conceivable human need. Maybe all Jesus needs is a little band of sheep that hear his call and follow him. Perhaps a poor, small, broken church living faithfully at the margins with no social influence or political power is a more faithful witness to the resurrected Christ than a large, thriving corporate church. It may be that we are not dying, but only getting pruned. (See John 15:1-2). I don’t pretend to know God’s grand plan for the church in the twenty-first century. I do not even know what God’s plans are for the ELCA. I am convinced, however, that we need to be open to the possibility that our view of what our church needs might be vastly different from what God is doing with us. We may fear that we are getting too small, but from God’s perspective we may still be too big.

In sum, following Jesus is no sure way to success, institutional or otherwise. But then again, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” That alone is why we follow Jesus. Jesus knows what matters eternally and tells us in no uncertain terms that we matter eternally to him. Jesus loves us too much to let us waste our lives pursuing bread that cannot feed us, chasing success in projects that don’t matter and satisfaction in pleasures that do not last.

Pentecost 12

Proverbs 9:1–6
Psalm 34:9–14
Ephesians 5:15–20
John 6:51–58

August is a slow month on our calendar here at Trinity. We don’t have a lot of scheduled activities this month. But the calendar does not tell the full story. The needs of the poor and hungry in our midst are as acute as ever and our response to those needs is evident in the regular stream of groceries that come into our sanctuary each week. We welcomed yet another family into the Green House apartment this month. We concluded yet another successful session of our Summer Camp. Our sacramental ministers have been faithfully visiting our homebound and ill members. We continue meeting on Wednesday evening for prayer throughout the year. So don’t let the calendar fool you! The dog days of summer are filled with mission and ministry!

Our lessons this week all seem to touch on “wisdom” in some way, shape or form. The ninth chapter of Proverbs contains a beautiful poem in which wisdom, personified as a beautiful woman, calls people to abandon foolishness and simplicity in order to pursue understanding. The psalmist issues the invitation, “Come, O sons, listen to me, I will teach you the fear of the Lord.” The author of Ephesians admonishes his hearers to “Look carefully how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil.” In the gospel lesson from the sixth chapter of John, the dialogue between Jesus and the hungry crowd he fed with the loaves and fishes continues with a pointed discussion about what truly sustains life.

Proverbs 9:1–6  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1333&cmpgn=5244

The Book of Proverbs, along with Job, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs and several of the Psalms constitutes a collection of works scholars often refer to as “wisdom literature.” “Wisdom,” loosely defined, is insight gained through life experience often expressed in short proverbial sayings. One such example is Proverbs 10:2, “Treasures gained by wickedness do not profit, but righteousness delivers from death.” This is true as far as it goes. How many wealthy and powerful people have been brought down by an insatiable desire for wealth that knows no moral or ethical boundaries! But is it always the case that ill gotten gain leads to ruin? Is righteousness always rewarded? It didn’t turn out that way for Job. Furthermore, the “preacher” in Ecclesiastes has this to say: “There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it lies heavy upon men: a man to whom God gives wealth, possessions, and honor so that he lacks nothing of all that he desires, yet God does not give him power to enjoy them, but a stranger enjoys them; this is vanity; it is a sore affliction.” So which is true? Is it the proverb or the observation of the preacher?

The answer is that both utterances are true as far as they go, and they only go as far as the experiences of the people who make them. Human wisdom, though valuable and worth pursuing, is nevertheless incomplete, partial and subject to modification. It is true that righteousness and integrity can bring you respect and a good name in the community. But sometimes the cost of doing the right thing can be the loss of friendship, respect and social standing. Wickedness often is its own punishment, but we also know of people who inflict all manner of pain on others and are never brought to justice. That is why it is best to take these utterances of human wisdom not as moral laws governing the universe, but as the experiences of individuals who have lived their lives in pursuit of understanding. Wisdom literature invites us to step into the shoes of people who have lived life under numerous circumstances and view it from their perspective. Think of wisdom sayings as portholes into reality. Because they are unique and different from our own perspectives, they enrich our understanding. Yet we dare not forget that, like all human perspectives, these sayings are limited to the experience of one individual. They do not take in all of reality. So it should not surprise us to find different and even conflicting expressions of learned wisdom. Biblical wisdom does not fit neatly into a unified system because, as the product of human experience, it is necessarily incomplete.

Psalm 34:9–14    http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1332&cmpgn=5244

These verses constitute the second half of the psalm from last Sunday. For my observations on the psalmist’s style and its literary characteristics, see the post for Pentecost 11.

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” says the psalmist in Psalm 110:10. Not surprisingly, then, the psalmist in our psalm for this Sunday calls us to learn the fear of the Lord. “What man is there who desires life, and covets many days, that he may enjoy good?…Depart from evil, and do good; seek peace, and pursue it.” Does good conduct lead to a long and satisfying life? Often, but not always. Again, this is the experience of the psalmist. It is also my own experience. Let me be clear about this. I have not always been so very successful in departing from evil and doing good or seeking peace. But when I am, I discover that life is better. I am much happier when I am not pursuing a zero sum game, win at all costs strategy, but looking instead beyond the immediate conflicts I have with people to the people themselves and working toward building relationships of trust. That makes it possible to find win/wins solutions.

Still, in all honesty, that has not always been my experience. Sometimes people take advantage of my trust and return my offer of friendship with hostility. The psalmist appears to have had similar experiences. He or she goes on to say, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous…”  Clearly, righteousness does not immunize one against the slings and arrows of living in a world filled with cruelty and injustice. Indeed, righteous conduct sometimes invites hostility. The righteous are sometimes “brokenhearted” and “crushed in spirit.” Nevertheless, the psalmist reminds us that even at these times “the Lord is near.”

Ephesians 5:15–20  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1334&cmpgn=5244

The author of Ephesians admonishes us to “understand what the will of the Lord is.” That is a tall order. It isn’t that I don’t know generally what God requires. The problem arises when I try to understand what God requires of me in the minutia of my day to day life. If God is not active there, then God’s will is largely irrelevant.

Oddly enough, we are not given much guidance here. We are warned against drunkenness-that clearly will not get us to an understanding of God’s will for us. But when it comes specifically to figuring out God’s will, we are told simply to be filled with the Holy Spirit-and to sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Yet maybe the apostle is on to something here. There is nothing like singing to create a sense of community and shared vision. Other than the national anthem sung at sports events, I cannot think of any situation in our culture except worship where people still sing together. There is something about singing that opens a person’s imagination to a broader vision of things. A hymn is sort of like a snowball. The more you sing it at different times and places in your life, the more meaning it accumulates. I suspect that for all of us there is a hymn that makes us tear up, a song that helps us visualize the mysteries of faith that escape conceptualization. I think that the practice of singing our faith together helps us to internalize that faith and so also create space for the Spirit of God to begin working out God’s intent for us. We don’t begin by trying to figure out God’s will and then trying to do it. Rather, we begin with worship. Gradually, we begin to recognize God’s will unfolding in our lives after it has seeped into our bones through the practices of worship, singing, prayer, generosity and hospitality.

John 6:51–58  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1335&cmpgn=5244

I have to confess that my initial reaction to this section of John is, “Yuck!”  The image of someone eating flesh and drinking blood, even when understood metaphorically, is distasteful to put it mildly. And clearly, Jesus is not speaking metaphorically. This conversation started out with Jesus providing bread to five thousand people who proceeded to eat, chew and swallow it. Jesus then identifies himself as the bread of life, that which sustains human existence. But lest we get to comfortable with this assertion as a benign figure of speech, Jesus drives it home with some very graphic language: “unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you…” The bread of life Jesus offers comes at the cost of his own death at the very hands of those he came to feed. Moreover, the way to eternal life is through sharing in Jesus’ suffering and death. The crowd which initially sought Jesus with enthusiasm thinking that they had found an ATM with a limitless supply of bread, now begins to turn on Jesus. How can Jesus’ flesh satisfy their hunger? How can his blood satisfy their thirst? They want desperately to turn the conversation back to plain old bread. But Jesus will not let them off the hook. “The bread you are seeking,” says Jesus, “won’t satisfy your hunger.” Even the manna God provided for Israel in the wilderness could not satisfy the peoples’ deepest need. What the people needed and what we need is a restored relationship with our Heavenly Father. Reconciliation requires risk, sacrifice and even loss of life. Not surprisingly, Jesus paid with his life for the reconciliation he offers our troubled and warring world. The early Christian martyrs knew that witnessing to the reconciliation achieved in Jesus leads to persecution. The price of pursuing peace and reconciliation was death for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. This living bread, so freely and generously shared with us, comes at a terrible cost.

It is also worth noting that, for John, eternal life is more than just living forever and it does not begin sometime in the distant future. Living eternally means doing the things that matter eternally. That is what Jesus’ “signs” are all about. Jesus shares his bread with a hungry crowd; Jesus provides wine in abundance for a peasant wedding; Jesus speaks with a Samaritan woman-a bitter enemy of his people; Jesus heals a cripple who is living on the fringe of the fringe; Jesus opens the eyes of a man born blind and deemed under the curse of God. These are signs not because they are miracles, but because they show the miraculous power of God turning toward the poor, the outcast and the rejected. What matters eternally is how we treat those deemed the least of all people.

These verses resonate, I believe, with our Lutheran insistence that the Eucharistic bread and wine are not figuratively, metaphorically or symbolically Christ’s Body, but truly and actually the Body and Blood of Christ. This is so because unless the resurrected Christ is present, there is no Church. But because the bread and wine on our altar is the Body and Blood of Christ and because we are what we eat, the congregation eating this food is likewise the Body of the Resurrected Christ in the world today. I have always found it interesting that John’s gospel does not end with Jesus sending his disciples out to proclaim the gospel or with Jesus ascending to the right hand of God. John’s gospel ends the way the other gospels begin: with the disciples leaving their nets and their boat to follow after Jesus. It is as though John simply cannot conceive of the church without the presence of its resurrected Lord.

Pentecost 11

1 Kings 19:4–8
Psalm 34:1–8
Ephesians 4:25—5:2
John 6:35, 41–51

Greetings and welcome to the eleventh Sunday after Pentecost. One of the big stories this week is the draught plaguing much of the Midwestern United States. Crops are withering. Animals are being sent to slaughter en mass because there is no feed to keep them alive anymore. We are told that the consequences of this catastrophic draught, the worst since the dust bowl of the 1930s, will be felt in our pocket books this fall. Some economists estimate that food prices may rise as much as 7%. The pain will be felt by all, but none more than the families already struggling to make ends meet. The food pantries and soup kitchens throughout our country are already under stocked. Consequently, our summer food drive could not come at a better time. Please remember to contribute what you can to our drive for groceries that will end August 26^th.

1 Kings 19:4–8  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1328&cmpgn=5244

While we are on the subject of famines, it was just that lying behind the Prophet Elijah’s problems. Once again, the lectionary in its wisdom has given us an indecipherable fragment of a much larger story. The time was the ninth century B.C.E. The place was the Northern Kingdom of Israel. Unlike the Southern Kingdom of Judah where the Davidic dynasty reigned over a more or less stable monarchy, Israel was governed by a series of dynasties succeeding each other through coups and violent revolutions. The King in Elijah’s day was Ahab, but the power behind the throne was his Phoenician wife, Jezebel. Jezebel was determined to uproot the worship of Israel’s God and replace it with the worship of her own god, Baal. Under the queen’s orders, the altars of the Lord were being destroyed and the priests of the Lord were being executed. Elijah was sent with a word for the King: “As the God of Israel lives before whom I stand, there will be neither rain nor dew for three years except by my word.” When the drought came as Elijah warned, the King was determined to kill Elijah. Elijah spent the next three years of his life as a fugitive, hiding in the wilderness and living in exile. When the three years had ended, Elijah appeared to Ahab once again with a proposition. “Tell you what, your highness: you and your prophets of Baal build an altar to your god with an offering on it. I will build and altar to the Lord. The God who answers by consuming his offering with fire is God indeed.” Ahab accepted the offer. The story of the dueling gods is a gripping tale that you need to read in its entirety. (I Kings 18:1-40). For our purposes, it is enough to note that the Lord answered by fire. Baal was a no show. After this demonstration, Ahab appears to have been convinced that the Lord was indeed Israel’s God. Jezebel, not so much. When the queen learned of the outcome of the contest, her determination to kill Elijah hardened into a campaign against him. Poor Elijah was on the run once again. That is where we find him in our lesson for Sunday.

Elijah “went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a broom tree; and he asked that he might die.” Can you blame him? Three years living as a fugitive until finally he can get a hearing before the king. After such a spectacular demonstration of God’s Lordship over Baal, you would think the issue had been settled once and for all. Instead, this remarkable sign only hardens the opposition to Elijah and the God he proclaims. Everything he has done seems to have been for naught. His whole life seems to have been wasted. This is midlife crisis on steroids! We are then told that Elijah was “touched by an angel.” But the angel has no message of hope, no promise of better things to come and no clear direction for him. The angel, however, does provide what Elijah needs most at the moment: food to continue his journey-wherever that might lead. The bread does not change Elijah’s desperate situation, but it gives him strength to go another forty miles. And that is the end of the story.

OK. That is not the end of the story, but it does constitute the end of our reading. I encourage you to read on to find out what else happened. Initially, I was somewhat miffed that the lectionary does not give us that story here or in the weeks to come. Yet I am beginning to think that maybe the lectionary folks actually got it right this time. I have to say that the angels that have appeared in my life seldom came with solutions to all of my problems. Most of the time, they have given me just enough of what I needed to take the next step. I think of my brother-in-law Bill, who spent three days with me at University of Washington Medical Center when Sesle was gravely ill. Or I recall the court officer who once clapped me on the shoulder as I stood in the Union County Courthouse rotunda during a break in a difficult trial and said to me, “You look like you got the weight of the world on your shoulders. You ought to know your shoulders ain’t big enough for that. You got to let the Lord Jesus take that load off you.”  These angels did not take away the challenges I faced or remove the obstacles in front of me. But they gave me just enough encouragement to take a few steps more. I think that is very often how God’s assistance comes to us. We don’t get what we pray for. We don’t get what we want. We get what we need and sometimes just barely enough.

There are some memories, too, that constitute angelic bread for me. I know one such memory always will be last Sunday’s worship service at which my daughter Emily preached and at which five of our young people shared with us their faith experiences at the ELCA youth gathering in New Orleans. There were also three young children at our worship service whose presence was hard to miss. I was especially moved by young Jeremy’s sense of being at home in this sanctuary. I share Dr. Brighton’s sentiments fully: “would that we were all that uninhibited in our worship and witness!” The church of tomorrow is alive and well! That is bread that will sustain me for a long time! (If you missed that service, you can catch at least the preaching and testimony portions on the TLC website at tlcbogotanj.org.)

Psalm 34:1–8  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1327&cmpgn=5244

This is a psalm of thanksgiving for deliverance from unspecified distress. The psalmist recognizes in his or her deliverance from harm and danger the saving work of God. Like Psalm 145, this is one of the “acrostic” psalms, meaning that each new verse begins with the next letter in order of the Hebrew Alphabet. (See Pentecost 9). This suggests to me that the psalm is more likely a mature reflection upon events in the past than a spontaneous expression of praise for something that just occurred. Perhaps I take this view because most of the saving acts of God I have experienced I see only in the rear view mirror. That is to say, looking back on my life I can recognize the work of the Holy Spirit in bringing me to the place where I stand today. But I am not one of those persons who experience the guidance of the Spirit in the present tense. I have never made a choice in my life that I felt certain was inspired, willed or directed by God. Instead, I have stumbled blindly along through the darkness only to discover much later that Jesus has been with me in the darkness and has somehow gotten me to where I needed to be. And this despite my having taken the wrong course, made the wrong decisions and pursued the wrong dreams.

The psalmist invites us to “taste and see that the Lord is good.” This invitation ties in well with the gospel lessons for both this week and last in which Jesus tells the crowds who came seeking him after they had eaten of the loaves and fishes that he, himself, is the bread of life. This offer to “taste” makes clear that faith is neither an intellectual exercise nor an emotional attachment. Faith takes the shape of “eating” and sustaining oneself on the promises of the Lord. It is life lived out of a relationship of trust and confidence in the Lord to provide all things necessary.

Ephesians 4:25—5:2  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1329&cmpgn=5244

“Therefore put away falsehood, let everyone speak the truth with his neighbor.” I believe it was Dr. Stanley Hauerwas who commented that this verse just about sums up the whole of Christian ethics. Clearly, truthfulness is at the center of life in Christ. There is no better testimony to the importance of truthfulness than the New Testament. The gospels do not tell the story of a strong church led by heroic personalities. They are unsparing in their portrayal of Jesus’ disciples as flawed and broken people who each in their own way failed their master in his greatest hour of need. The epistles reveal a church divided by bickering, power struggles and disputes over theology and morals. We tell these stories on ourselves not because they make us look good (they don’t) or because we are trying to conceal the skeletons in our closets (the skeletons are on full display in the living room), but because they tell the truth about us who follow Jesus. We are broken people in need of judgment, forgiveness and healing. Like recovering alcoholics, we need each other to help us remain sober. Nothing threatens our sobriety more than lies, secrecy and self deception.

Sometimes I think the church fails to speak truth to the world in a straightforward and convincing way because we have failed to speak it effectively among ourselves. Though nearly every Christian denomination has issued numerous statements condemning racism, Sunday morning remains the most segregated hour in the United States. Though we tend to worry about the lack of young families in our churches and fret about how to draw them into the life of the church, too many congregations still maintain a policy of “children should be seen and not heard” during our worship services. (As anyone who attended last Sunday’s worship service can attest, that is not our policy at Trinity). I believe that the only path forward for our churches is to begin having deep and truthful conversations about our discipleship in light of the scriptures and under the Holy Spirit’s guidance. That is the direction that I hope our future cottage meetings will begin to take.

What can it mean to be “imitators of God”? Usually, when we accuse someone of “playing God,” we mean that this person is exercising authority he or she does not have. Or perhaps we mean that such a person is overreaching his or her limits and making decisions that affect the lives of people who have no input or say in those decisions. That figure of speech betrays a profound misunderstanding of the God who is revealed in Jesus Christ. The God and Father of Jesus Christ does not exercise overbearing power, but walks among us as the man who gave his life for the sake of others, suffering death rather than defending himself with violence. If we would truly “play God,” the proper model is not the CEO, but Jesus.

John 6:35, 41–51  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1330&cmpgn=5244

The gospel lesson continues the dialogues set in motion by Jesus’ feeding of the five thousand at the beginning of chapter 6. Last week Jesus explained to the crowd that came seeking him after the feeding that he, himself, is the bread of life; the bread which comes down from heaven. Now the crowd begins to murmur. No doubt John would have us recall the murmuring of the children of Israel in the wilderness when they were hungry. For reasons that escape my simple mind, the makers of the lectionary have chosen to exclude verses 36-40. That is a shame because simple-minded people like me need those verses to get the full impact of what follows. So, for my fellow simpletons, here are the missing verses:

“But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me; and him who comes to me I will not cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me; and this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that every one who sees the Son and believes in him should have eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.” John 6:36-50.

Now you can see why the crowd was murmuring. What is this mad man talking about? He didn’t come down from heaven! He came up from Nazareth. We know his family. We know the neighborhood where he grew up; the school he went to and the girls he dated. Where does he get off telling us that he came down from heaven?

This is actually a very important question. Jesus’ answer is about to turn everything we think we know about God, heaven and eternal life on its head. In the first place, asking how Jesus could possibly be the Son of God is altogether the wrong question. It is wrongheaded because it assumes we know who God is apart from Jesus, his Son. It assumes that we can somehow find our own way to the Father. It assumes that we come to know God by being taught about God rather than being taught by God. It is through trusting in Jesus that God is made known. It is through fellowship with Jesus that the Father draws us to himself. You don’t start with your understanding of who God is to figure out what to think about Jesus. You begin with Jesus who draws you into knowledge of the Father.

John is also unapologetic about Jesus’ obvious human origins. Yes, Jesus is a flesh and blood person that can be touched. He is the living bread that can be “eaten.” That will be the topic of next week’s gospel. That is the way in which the Father draws us to himself.

Whoever believes in Jesus both knows the Father and has eternal life. Note well the present tense, “has.” This is not the promise of some future blessed state. Life that is eternal begins now for all who believe. To live eternally is to live out of trust in Jesus doing those things that matter eternally. Unfortunately, we in the church have not always fully appreciated this present sense meaning of eternal life. We have tended to think of eternal life as synonymous with “after life,” or some notion of “heaven” as a strictly future reality. But Jesus would have us know that discipleship is not about passively waiting for eternal life as we sweat our way through this vale of tears. Discipleship is acknowledging that new life is ours today; the kingdom of God is now; and life that is eternal is life lived in fellowship with Jesus.

The humanity of Jesus was a barrier to the crowds’ acceptance of his claim to be the bread from heaven. But if the idea of God in the midst of dirty diapers, adolescent crushes, soil and the sweat of hard labor is difficult to swallow, that only demonstrates how much we have to learn from Jesus about God, about heaven and about eternal life.

Exodus 16:2–4, 9–15
Psalm 78:23–29
Ephesians 4:1–16
John 6:24–35

Greetings everyone! It has been a while since I have preached. Last Sunday we were blessed with daughter Emily’s sermon and the testimonies of our young people, Olivia, Meghan, Ryan, Nicole and Brendan. July 1^st we heard from the Rev. Dr. Carol Brighten and on July 22^nd from Rev. Dr. Kathryn Ellison. This week I am once again up to bat and welcome your thoughts on a fascinating set of readings.

Exodus 16:2–4, 9–15 http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1323&cmpgn=5244

Once again, you need to have the full context of this reading to understand what is really going on. In the previous chapters 15- 16 you can read all about how God rescued Israel from Pharaoh, King of Egypt and his army, leading them through the Red Sea. This exciting episode is the climax to four hundred years of slavery in Egypt and oppression under Pharaoh. Finally, the people of Israel are free. Finally the people of Israel are liberated from the bondage of slavery. Finally they are on the way to a land of their own. But Israel soon learns that the way of freedom is not the way of ease and comfort. With freedom comes responsibility and the call to continue trusting in the Lord who made them free.

Israel, it seems, has a bad case of “good old days” disease. Wilderness life is difficult. The people are hungry. They begin reminiscing about the days back in Egypt where at least they had food. “We had meat to eat and as much other food as we wanted” they complain. I doubt that, as slaves, they really were that well fed. But that is how it is when you look back at the past through rose colored glasses. Everything was better back then. The church was so full we had to set up chairs in the overflow room. Kids behaved themselves better and had respect. People were more patriotic. Food tasted better. On and on it goes. Was the past really all that wonderful? Of course not! The Israelites were slaves. Had they forgotten so soon what it was like to be treated like a head of cattle? Evidently, they had forgotten. Barbara Strisand sings in her song, The Way We Were,

Memries, may be beautiful and yet
What’s too painful to remember
We simply choose to forget

That is the problem with the “good old days” disease. Our selective memories make the past seem a lot rosier than it really was. We fall into the trap of measuring the present against a past that is no more real than the Emerald City of Oz.

Furthermore, “good old days” disease represents more than just delusional thinking. It constitutes rebellion against our God. “This is the day which the Lord has made,” says the Psalm. “Let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Psalm 118:24. Who are we to throw the gift of today back in God’s face and tell God it isn’t good enough? Who are we to reject the time and place where God now places us and sit pouting because our memories of some other time and place seem better? God calls us to a new day. Our stubborn insistence remaining in the old one needs to be named for what it is: rebellion.

That said, the journey from slavery into freedom is long and difficult. The people of Israel spent forty years in the wilderness on the way to Canaan. The way was slow and fraught with dangers. Sometimes it seemed as though they were not making any progress. Sometimes they appeared to be going nowhere. Often it seemed that they were losing ground. The life of discipleship to which Jesus calls us is no different. It is hard to believe that Jesus is leading us into a new creation when our bodies increasingly show their age, our energy level isn’t what it used to be and it seems as though the best years of our lives are behind us. That is often when the temptation to look back is strongest. But Israel is warned repeatedly that there is nothing for us in the past and that the only way given to us is forward.

Of course, the good news here is that God can be trusted to provide for our needs along the way. Our needs may not be the same as our wants. Perhaps quail is not what Israel would have chosen from a more varied menu. The manna may have been sweet as honey, but even the bread of angels can become tiresome after forty years. Yet it was enough to sustain Israel throughout her journey and that is what Jesus promises as well. As the gospel for this Sunday points out, Jesus is our “bread from heaven” that sustains us.

Psalm 78:23–29  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1322&cmpgn=5244

Psalm 78 is one of a relatively few historical psalms in the Psalter that recount the focal points of Israel’s history. In a pre-literate society where the common people had no knowledge or written language or access to books, the narrative of Israel’s journey with her God was passed on through song, poetry, liturgy and dance. This particular psalm begins with the wanderings of Israel in the wilderness following the Exodus from Egypt and concludes with God’s selection of David and his descendents to lead Israel and “be a shepherd to the people of Israel.”

The rise of the monarchy in Israel was surrounded by controversy. The prophet and judge, Samuel, was appalled when the people demanded that he appoint a king for them so that they might “be like the other nations.” After all, God called Israel to be unlike the other nations. In a culture that regarded kings as equal to gods, only the Lord was worthy of the title “king.” Much of the prophetic tradition in Israel remained critical of the monarchy and saw it as a betrayal of all that Israel was called to be. Nevertheless, there is also in the Hebrew Scriptures an expression of the belief that God’s covenant with David and the rise of his Kingdom was a saving event to be celebrated with thanksgiving. Psalm 78 is an example of this pro-monarchy sentiment. The psalm concludes with the words:

[God] chose his servant David,
and took him from the sheepfolds;
⁷¹ from tending the nursing ewes he brought him
to be the shepherd of his people Jacob,
of Israel, his inheritance.
⁷² With upright heart he tended them,
and guided them with skilful hand.

We saw an echo of this pro-monarchy enthusiasm in last Sunday’s gospel when the crowd of five thousand, having eaten their fill of the loaves and fishes Jesus blessed, sought to take him and make him king by force. Clearly, Jesus must be the one sent by God to shepherd his people Israel. Had he not, as the psalm says, “rained down on them manna to eat, and gave them the grain of heaven”? Yet Jesus seems intent on not becoming a king like David-or at least the kind of king the people were seeking. That becomes clear as Jesus speaks in this Sunday’s gospel about the true bread from heaven he has come to offer.

John 6:24–35  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1325&cmpgn=5244

As you may recall from last week’s gospel, Jesus had to withdraw from the crowd of five thousand he had just fed as they were seeking to take him by force and make him king. The disciples set out for the other side of the Sea of Galilee that same evening. Jesus later rejoined his disciples in their boat on the Sea and they arrived in Capernaum. Some of the five thousand pursued Jesus and found him there on the other side of the Sea. Now they are curious as to how Jesus was able to get himself across the sea without a boat, but Jesus cuts right to the chase. “You are here because you ate your fill. Not because you saw signs.” That might appear to be contradictory. The people had, in fact, seen a remarkable sign in the miraculous feeding. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that they had witnessed a miracle only. They do not understand that the feeding was a sign; that the drama unfolding in the wilderness of Galilee was intended to reflect the wilderness of Sinai where the children of Israel wandered for forty years depending on the Lord for each day’s sustenance. The fact that they demand from Jesus a sign as proof of his claims demonstrates how thoroughly they have missed the meaning of what they experienced in the wilderness. They were looking for a king to restore Israel to a position of power and prosperity. Jesus offers them a restored relationship with the Lord who promises to lead them through the wilderness to abundant life. That is the true bread that comes down from heaven.

It is obvious that the crowed has misunderstood the text from Exodus previously discussed. They credit Moses with providing the children of Israel with bread in the wilderness and they hope that Jesus will do the same. But Jesus points out that it was not Moses, but the Lord who provided for the children of Israel. Faith in Moses or any other human leader is misplaced. Furthermore, fixation on things like bread that ensure mere survival is insufficient. One does not live by bread alone. Life that is abundant and eternal flows from a vital relationship of trust in the God who alone can give us such life.

So what is this “bread” that comes down from heaven? It is Jesus, plain and simple. There is no “work” demanded by God as a price for this bread. It has already been freely given. The “work,” such that it is, amounts simply to “believing in the one God sent.” Belief, of course, is not mere ascent to a theological proposition. To believe in Jesus is to trust Jesus; to live out of a relationship of faith in his promises. But this is God’s work, not our own. God wins our trust and strengthens our faith by consistently demonstrating his own faithfulness to us.

Ephesians 4:1–16  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1324&cmpgn=5244

At this point in the letter to the Ephesians, the author turns to a description of what life in Christ looks like. The remarkable thing about this text describing life in the church is the total lack of hierarchy. In virtually every other organization, be it social, political or religious, the key question always comes down to “Who is in charge.” In the Body of Christ, however, the key issue is “What is your gift?” “There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism and one God and Father of us all.” Though the church is made up of individual members, each has his or her own “gift.” The gifts, however they may differ from one another, have one purpose: “to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Much scholarly debate has swirled around the enumeration of these gifts in vs. 11. Some interpreters maintain that the apostles, evangelists, teachers and pastors represent offices in the church. Others maintain that these reflect natural gifts recognized by the community and exercised by individuals in non-structured communities. Whichever the case may be, it is clear that the gifts are not intended to enhance the recipient, but to strengthen the unity of the church. So what matters is not who has which gift, but how the gift is used. A pastor that pushes through an educational program that interests him or her, but does not meet the needs of the church is not rightly exercising the gift of ministry. A council officer that manages to get a new addition to the church building erected, but in doing so causes dissent and division throughout the congregation might be improving upon the structure of a building, but he or she is not “building up the Body of Christ.” That does not mean, of course, that we all walk on egg shells and do nothing for fear of offending anyone. Sometimes uncomfortable truths need to be spoken. Often the mission of the church must take precedent over deeply valued traditions in the congregation. Correction and reproof is part and parcel of living together in love. The church will necessarily deal with divisive and controversial topics. But unlike the rest of the world where the most powerful personality prevails and issues are often settled by a simple up or down vote, we are a community determined to take whatever time is needed to arrive at a resolution and course of action that everyone can live with-even if it means sacrificing “progress.” Getting together is more important than getting ahead. For that sort of living, we need a lot of lowliness, forbearance, patience and meekness.

Ninth Sunday after Pentecost

2 Kings 4:42-44
Psalm 145:10-18
Ephesians 3:14-21
John 6:1-21

Greetings one and all! As you know, I spent the better part of last week down in New Orleans with Kim Pulido, my daughter Emily Olsen and five of our young people attending the ELCA Youth Gathering. This event takes place every three years and draws over thirty-thousand youth from all over the United States. Worshiping and working with these young people and listening to their thoughts and convictions has convinced me that the church they represent is not our parents’ Lutheran Church. This generation has no qualms about welcoming gay and lesbian persons as pastoral leaders. This question, that was so divisive in our church for over two decades, is not even an issue for them. These young people are passionately committed to justice for the poor; ending violence in the family, in the classroom and on the world stage. They believe discipleship means involvement with these very political issues, but they have little patience with abstract political red state/blue state kinds of arguments. They love worship that involves “heart and hands” as well as “voices” and preaching that reminds them of God’s love for them while challenging them to run with that promise of God’s grace in their daily lives.

This Sunday Emily will be preaching and our young delegates to the Gathering will be sharing their experiences with us. Following the service, there will be a coffee fellowship during which we will see photos and video highlights from the Gathering.

John 6:1-21  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1320&cmpgn=5244

That serves as a good lead in to the gospel lesson for this coming Sunday, the feeding of the five thousand from the Gospel of John. Unique to John’s telling of the story is an unnamed youth. He appears on the scene just as the disciples are facing what they view as a crisis. Five thousand people have been with Jesus for a long time out in the wilderness. They are hungry and we all know that hungry masses can easily turn violent. Buying food for all these people is not an option. Even if the disciples could have scare up two hundred denaii and there had been a deli nearby, the likelihood that it would have food on hand to serve five thousand is slim. At this point, Andrew brings the young boy’s tendered lunch to the attention of Jesus. I don’t actually know whether the boy offered his lunch or whether Andrew commandeered it. The lesson does not tell us one way or the other, but it would be just like a kid to do something like putting up his lunch in circumstances such as this. A kid doesn’t understand that what little he has in his lunch box will not even make a dent in the hunger of five thousand people. When he becomes a man, he will understand that there is only so much to go around; that if people are hungry it’s their problem, not his; that the best chance you have of survival is to hang on to what you have got and defend it with all means necessary. At this point, he is just a kid. He doesn’t understand “the real world.” The only thing he does understand is that Jesus wants to feed this hungry crowd. He believes Jesus can do it and that he has something to offer that Jesus can use. Small wonder, then, that Jesus tells us in Matthew 18:3 that “unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” The first step in becoming a disciple of Jesus is for us to unlearn all the lessons of adulthood. My prayer for the thirty thousand young people I met this last week is that they will never grow up into the kind of adulthood that can no longer believe in Jesus’ promise to provide for all our needs-and more. I pray that they never outgrow generosity or the capacity to trust Jesus.

It should be noted that this story is an opener for a lengthy discourse Jesus is about to have with his disciples, the crowds and his opponents. At the end of this discourse, many of Jesus’ disciples will desert him. This chapter is rich with sacramental imagery and challenges to faithful discipleship. I encourage you to read the chapter in its entirety before each Sunday in August.

Psalm 145:10-18  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1316&cmpgn=5244

This is one of the “acrostic” psalms, meaning that each new verse begins with the next letter in order of the Hebrew Alphabet. An English example might look like this:

Awesome is our God and Creator.

Breathtaking are God’s mighty works.

Clearly, the Lord is God and there is no other. And so on down to letter Z. This kind of composition assists in memorization which, in a pre-literate society, is the only means of passing down music and literature.

The psalm as a whole extols the character of God as compassionate as God is almighty. It is both an expression of praise to God and also a confessional statement made to the people of God declaring God’s goodness to all of Creation. Note that although the people of the covenant are in the best position to recognize and witness to this God, they are not the only beneficiaries of God’s compassion. The entire earth is God’s concern.

We can see in vs 15 an echo of the petition from the Lord’s Prayer, “Give us this day or daily bread.”  “The eyes of all look to thee, and thou givest them their food in due season. Thou openest thy hand, thou satisfiest the desire of every living thing.” It is just because sustenance comes from the hand of God that we can be content with this day’s bread without worrying about tomorrow. The assurance and confidence in God’s willingness and promise to meet our needs ties in very nicely with the feeding of the five thousand and the discourse that follows throughout John Chapter 6.

Ephesians 3:14-21 http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1319&cmpgn=5244

“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.” Eph. 3:14. There is a play on words here that gets lost in the translation. The Greek word for “father,” “pater” is the root for “patria” which means “country” or “father land.” The significance of this claim would not have been lost to folks living under the yoke of Rome which claimed to be the father of all peoples. This is a question of “Who’s your daddy?” aimed directly at Caesar.

When the author of Ephesians speaks of “power” it is always the power of the Spirit that is grounded in love. Urging his listeners to “put on the whole armor of God,” the author of Ephesians turns this militaristic image on its head by identifying the church’s weaponry as truth, righteousness, peace, faith and prayer. Eph. 6:10-20. The author prays that “Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.” It is through being “in Christ,” that one becomes grounded in love; for Christ Jesus is God’s concrete expression of love.

2 Kings 4:42-44  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1318&cmpgn=5244

This short story is one of many about Elisha and his miraculous works found in Chapter 4 of the Second Book of Kings. Elisha, you may recall, was the prophetic successor to Elijah who was taken up into heaven by a chariot of fire. He was a member and perhaps a leader of an obscure group identified in Second Kings only as “the sons of the prophets.” These folks seem to have lived together in communities. They were married, had children and apparently held property and so should not be understood as a monastic order of any kind. It is best to think of the sons of the prophets as a professional guild of persons with the unique ability to speak on God’s behalf. By the time of the prophet Amos, the guild appears to have become little more than the mouthpiece of the monarchy of the Northern Kingdom of Israel. Hence, Amos specifically denies being the son of a prophet. See Amos 7:14-15.

Based on what proceeds it in Chapter 4, we know that this story takes place during a famine. A man comes to Elisha with a first fruits offering. We do not know precisely why this offering was made. There is no statutory requirement in the Pentateuch for offerings to prophetic communities, but this appears to be a religious offering of some kind. Elisha orders his servant to share the offering (twenty loaves of bread and a sack of grain) with the rest of the sons of the prophets numbering about one hundred. The servant, quite understandably, balks at the notion. After all, the offering is not large enough to feed the whole community. It is better that the community’s leader, Elisha, be spared than that he perish from starvation along with the entire community. Elisha is confident, however, that there will be enough for the community and to spare. This confidence is based on a word he has received from the Lord to that effect. Like Jesus, Elisha focuses not on the magnitude of the hunger or the scarcity of his resources, but on the promise of the Lord to provide. Once again, this story challenges us to join the psalmist’s affirmation that God can indeed be trusted to provide for every living thing.

Jeremiah 23:1-6
Psalm 23
Ephesians 2:11-22
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

Greetings everyone and welcome! As you know, I will be in New Orleans next week from Tuesday through Sunday with five of our young members at the nationwide ELCA Youth Gathering. I ask for your prayers for all of us in our travels and for our enrichment as we join in worship, learning and mission with over thirty thousand other folks from around the country. Needless to say, I will not be present on Sunday Morning. Rev. Kathryn Ellison will be presiding in my place. As always, she will have a good word for us and I encourage you to extend to her a warm welcome.

The texts for this week seem to focus on “shepherding” or “pastoral” leadership. The prophet Jeremiah delivers a scathing critique of Judah’s rulers whose leadership has exploited and scattered the people of Israel and then promises that God will raise up a “righteous Branch” from the house of David to restore peace and security to the people. Psalm 23, of course, speaks eloquently of the Lord as our Shepherd. In the Gospel, Jesus confronts a crowd of people all in very great need. These people arouse his compassion because they are “like sheep without a shepherd.” The lesson from Ephesians does not tie in thematically with the other lessons. Indeed, the second reading typically constitutes one of a series of readings from a particular epistle rather than a text selected to match a theme. Nevertheless, the author speaks about us gentile folks, who had no part in Israel or its covenant promises, being brought into (or herded into) that covenant through Christ. I must say that, as far as my own ministry is concerned, this Ephesians text is the most helpful model for me. I have never been comfortable with the term “Pastor,” which means “shepherd.” I am not the Good Shepherd. Jesus is. I recently read an article in the Christian Century in which the author (whose name escapes me) described his pastoral role as that of a sheep dog. I prefer that analogy. I am a lot like a sheep dog. I don’t know where the green pastures are or where to find the still waters. I can’t fight off the wolves or lead the flock through the valley of the shadow. Only the shepherd can do that. But I do know where the Shepherd is and I am certain that the Shepherd knows where he is going even if the rest of us, including the sheep dog, don’t. The sheep dog can herd the sheep to the Good Shepherd and keep them within the flock. He can seek them when they stray from the flock and keep the flock together. That sounds a lot more like what I do. The heavy lifting belongs to the Shepherd.

Jeremiah 23:1-6 http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1300&cmpgn=5244

The prophet Jeremiah’s ministry took place during the last dark days of Jerusalem-as did that of Ezekiel (see notes from Pentecost 6). The little kingdom of Judah emerged from Assyrian domination around 640 B.C.E. under King Josiah and gained a large measure of power and independence. But that good fortune was not to last. Egypt and Babylonia soon rose up to fill the power vacuum left after Assyria’s fall. Josiah was slain in a fruitless battle with Egypt. The victorious Pharaoh Neco placed one of Josiah’ sons on the throne as his vassal. Shortly thereafter, in 605 B.C.E., the Babylonian empire under Nebuchadnezzer defeated Egypt and what was left of Assyria in the battle of Carchemish. Nebuchadnezzer occupied Judah in 597, placed an uncle of the king, Zedekiah, on the throne. Zedekiah, intent on restoring Judah to its former glory under King David, engaged in a diplomatic strategy of playing his Babylonian master off against Egypt. This was a dangerous game that Zedekiah ultimately lost. In reliance upon a promise of support from Egypt, Zedekiah led his nation in revolt against Babylonian domination. Egyptian support never came
and Jerusalem was surrounded, subjected to a brutal siege that ended with its destruction in 587 B.C.E.

This is the context in which we read Jeremiah’s criticism of the “shepherds” of Israel, that is, her rulers. . Jeremiah’s critique rests upon a tradition that saw the Davidic monarchy as the champion of justice, the protector of the poor and oppressed. e.g. Psalm 73:12. Yet in a hopeless effort to achieve national glory, the king and his minions disregarded the covenant at the heart of Judah’s existence. Judah’s kings took to worshiping the gods of other nations and relying upon international military alliances rather than on the Lord their God. The people of Judah suffered the horrific consequences of Judah’s misguided and self serving political agendas. They were killed in the crossfire of war, driven into exile and impoverished as a result of the Babylonian reprisals. Rather than protecting and caring for the sheep, the leaders disregarded their welfare, exploited and scattered them among the nations. Yet the prophecy ends with a word of promise. God finally will raise up from the line of David a “righteous branch.” Jeremiah continues to hope for a faithful descendent of David who, like David himself, will rule Judah with an eye toward caring for the sheep.

This lesson comes to us in the heat of a presidential contest that promises to be contentious and divisive. It is appropriate to ask what our “shepherds” are doing to unite and care for the flock. Does winning the election trump leadership? Is purely selfish political ambition driving those who would be our shepherds? Judah’s rulers were intent on restoring the former glory of Judah under David and Solomon. That vision was entirely unrealistic under the current political circumstances. Moreover, Jeremiah would have his people know that what they regarded as the “good old days,” were in God’s view a dismal failure in terms of covenant faithfulness. Therefore, Jeremiah had the task of telling his people that God would not support the nationalistic aspirations of its faithless rulers and their diplomatic duplicity. God sought faithfulness, trust and obedience-qualities for which Judah’s rulers with their real politic had little use.

Ultimately, Judah’s shepherds were responsible for misleading the people with a false hope. They promised glory without obedience; greatness without faithfulness; prosperity without sacrifice. I might be on dangerous ground here, but I believe that both presidential candidates are guilty in equal measure of this same sin. And I feel compelled to add that we, the people, share in the responsibility for this propagation of false hope. What we need are leaders that tell us the truth: that we face a crisis in the rising cost of medical care; that the gap between rich and poor is growing at an alarming rate; that more and more of our citizens are falling below the poverty line; that our disproportionate consumption of the earth’s resources is not sustainable. Further we need leaders who tell us that all of these problems are difficult and complex. Addressing them effectively will require sacrifice, hard work and profound changes in our lifestyles. But that is a message nobody wants to hear and we are not likely to elect a leader who brings us such unwelcome tidings. Instead, we elect leaders who tell us what we want to hear: that the solutions are simple and require nothing from us. We vote for people who tell us that we can have prosperity, security and peace without paying a penny more in taxes, without enduring any risk and without sacrificing an ounce of comfort. Of course, soon after putting these people in office it becomes clear to us that we have not elected the messiah, but another human being who cannot possibly keep the promises that had to be made to win the election. So when the next election rolls around, we angrily kick the false god we have made off the pedestal on which we placed it and set up another one in his place. I don’t see this deadly cycle ending until we finally face up to the truth. Our problems cannot be regulated out of existence nor will they miraculously disappear if only we let the free hand of the market economy do its magic. As long as we continue to believe in lies, we will continue to elect liars.

I don’t have any suggestions for fixing the political system in Washington (or Bergen County either, for that matter). All I can do is point to the righteous branch Jeremiah spoke of. He does not come to us with promises of easy fixes and miraculous cures. Rather, he calls us to the slow work of witnessing to God’s Kingdom and following him in a common life of service to one another. I have always been convinced that the one and only thing the church has to offer the world is a vision of God’s alternative for living together. Jesus did not preach easy solutions. To the contrary, “it is harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” “Enter by the narrow gate, for the gate that leads to destruction is wide.” “Whoever would be my disciple must deny himself, take up the cross and follow me.” I doubt Jesus could ever get himself elected to public office, but that is not a thing to which Jesus aspired.  The reign of God is made known not in the seats of empire or the halls of congress, but in communities that spring from the righteous branch where “the least” of all people are valued the most, where the truth is spoken in love, where daily bread is enough and where the offer of hospitality is made to all people all the time. That is where the truth that sets us free is enacted. That is where the light from God’s future breaks into the darkness of the present age.

Psalm 23  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1299&cmpgn=5244

What more can I say about Psalm 23 than has already been said? The biggest problem we have with this reading is that it is so familiar that I sometimes think it goes over us without our even hearing it. For example, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I have everything I need.” Really???  Let’s think about this. What if God were to appear and ask you personally, “Hey, do you need anything?” Do you think you would really say, “Nope. I’m good.” Though there is nothing I absolutely need to survive until the morning, I could think of plenty of things that it would be very helpful to have. Yet maybe that is the point. After all, Jesus teaches us to pray for today’s bread. That is the only material thing Jesus instructs us to pray for-essentially what most of us already have. The rest is not need, but merely appetite. Jesus says nothing about prayers for the satisfaction of our appetites.

One might well contrast the Lord as shepherd with the shepherds Jeremiah excoriates in the prior lesson. The Lord leads the sheep to what they need-which may not be with they want or think they need. The Lord does not promise to annihilate the enemies of the sheep, but teaches them to live abundantly and confidently in the presence of their enemies. The Lord does not promise that the way in which he leads the sheep will be easy or free from suffering and death. Rather, the Lord promises to be with the sheep in the valley of the shadow and to lead them even there.

Finally, when it comes to “dwelling in the house of the Lord forever,” I think we have a parallel in the letter to the Ephesians which emphasizes “being in Christ.”  Being “in Christ,” is for the author of Ephesians living in community with the people called together by the good news of Jesus, the church. According to Ephesians, “the blessings in the heavenly places,”  “the forgiveness of our sins” and the mystery of God’s will all are revealed within the community of persons called out to live faithfully, truthfully and obediently with Jesus. See Sermon of July 15^th at http://tlcbogotanj.org/

Ephesians 2:11-22  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1301&cmpgn=5244

This text is a poignant reminder that we in the church are, as St. Paul puts it in his letter to the Romans, “wild olive shoots” that were grafted into the cultivated olive garden of Israel. This reminder is important because historically there has been a lot of bad theology out there suggesting that somehow the church has replaced Israel as God’s chosen people. This understanding is further exacerbated by our reference to the Hebrew Scriptures as the “Old Testament.” This might suggest that the covenant with Israel is obsolete, that Old Testament history is a story of failure that had to be corrected and replaced by the New Testament. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. The God and Father of Jesus Christ is the God of the Hebrew Scriptures. The God who raised Jesus from death is the same God that brought Israel up out of the land of Egypt and into the promised land. The covenant, it must be emphasized, was with Abraham and Sarah and their descendents. We gentiles come into the picture for one reason and one reason only: Jesus, the messiah of Israel, invites us in. As Paul makes very clear in his letter to the Romans, God has not revoked the covenant promises made to Israel. Israel still is God’s people and no less so merely because in God’s mercy the benefits of those promises have been extended to us gentiles through Jesus.

Of course, this passage also emphasizes once again that the flesh and blood church, the communion of saints, is the place where God’s saving work in Jesus Christ is made manifest. It is in the church that the mystery of God’s intent for all creation is revealed.

Mark 6:30-34, 53-56  http://www.workingpreacher.org/bible_passage.aspx?reading_id=1302&cmpgn=5244

Nothing infuriates me more than when the lectionary people take their unholy pruning shears to the scriptures and begin cutting and pasting together a reading made up of selective verses. That is exactly what has been done here. Between verses 34 and 53 we have Jesus’ feeding of the five thousand and his appearing to the disciples in the midst of the Sea of Galilee walking on the water. I suppose this was done because we will be hearing John’s account of the feeding in next week’s gospel. I can understand why one would not want to place these two parallel stories back to back. Still, it seems to me that it would have been better to select another Markan reading that would not have required such brutal surgery. That said, the lesson is what it is. So I will take it as it comes, though I cannot ignore the feeding of the five thousand or the encounter on the Sea of Galilee as they both have an impact on the meaning of the text.

It is highly significant that chapter 6 begins with Jesus’ rejection at Nazareth which is followed by his sending out the Twelve to preach and heal. This mission activity appears to have alerted Herod Antipas to the Jesus movement and he is convinced that his old nemesis, John the Baptizer, has been raised. Our text for Sunday begins with the disciples returning from their mission and what appears to be a retreat for debriefing. Jesus and his disciples go out to a “lonely place” only to find that the crowds have gotten there ahead of them. Jesus finds the people much the way Jeremiah found them six centuries earlier-like sheep without a shepherd. It is significant that, just as the disciples relied upon the hospitality of the towns they visited in their mission, so now the crowd is hungry and in need of hospitality. The disciples suggest sending the people away to fend for themselves, but Jesus insists that they be shown the same hospitality the disciples were shown on their mission trip. Five loaves and two fish seem inadequate for such an undertaking but, when placed in Jesus’ hands, they turn out to be more than enough. The reading ends as it began-with crowds of people seeking Jesus.

More than anything else, these verses illustrate for us what it means to be a follower of Jesus. At the very center of discipleship is hospitality-the willingness to make space, share necessities and take time for the neighbor. Sometimes I wonder whether our life as a congregation adequately reflects this radical hospitality that Mark paints for us in the gospel lesson. Indeed, sometimes I wonder whether it exists at all. That is one reason why I attend the Ekklesia Project Gathering each year. I always discover different forms of church life and different expressions of what faithfulness to the gospel looks like. One such expression is Church of the Sojourners. The Church of the Sojourners is a live-together church community of about thirty people of various ages and backgrounds located in San Francisco. The congregation resides in four large houses and shares money and resources. Worship is held in homes rather than in a church building. Members eat five meals together every week, spend time together and take vacations together. In the church’s own words:

“Here at Church of the Sojourners, we seek to respond to Christ’s call by living together family-style, sharing our homes, resources, and friendship, our weaknesses as well as our strengths—not because living together is a requirement of committed discipleship, but because it is one real way we have found to provide us with numerous daily opportunities for forgiveness, humility, service, gratitude, worship, prayer, and other practicalities of sainthood which help build us into “the full measure of the stature of Christ.”

Obviously, this is not a model that every community can emulate. Nevertheless, it represents a challeng for us to examine our own ways of being the church in our community and think about ways to find deeper and more faithful expressions of our faith. I encourage you to visit the website for Church of the Sojourners at http://churchofthesojourners.wordpress.com/