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Sunday, March 6th

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Fourth Sunday in Lent

Joshua 5:9-12
Psalm 32 
2 Corinthians 5:16-21
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32

Prayer of the Day: God of compassion, you welcome the wayward, and you embrace us all with your mercy. By our baptism clothe us with garments of your grace, and feed us at the table of your love, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Probably from the time I first gave Jesus’ parable of the “Prodigal Son” more than a superficial glance, my sympathies lay with the elder son. I know this kid who grew up under the storm clouds of conflict between his parents and his rebellious sibling. I know the compulsion he felt to ease his parents’ heartbreak by being good enough to make up for the pain his brother’s selfish conduct was causing. I understand his deep desire to smooth things over and make peace in the family. I know the burden of guilt he carried for having failed at this hopeless task. I know well the nights he cried himself to sleep and, if he could have articulated his pain, might have said, “Daddy, I know my problems are not as great as my brother’s, I know my sins are not as weighty as his. But I hurt too. I am also afraid and insecure. I need your understanding and forgiveness. Forgive me, but I sometimes wish your heart would break for me too. You yearn for the son you have lost-but this son is still with you and needs you too.”  The prodigal son learned some hard lessons in the far country. But the elder son’s journey on the home front wasn’t a cake walk either.

If we resist the temptation to place this familiar parable of Jesus into the straight jacket of a simplistic morality play or reduce it to mere illustrative scaffolding for some abstract theology of grace, the story can lead us into a deeper understanding of family, faith and salvation. Now that I have become a father myself, it’s easier for me to understand the anguish of the father in Jesus’ parable. We love our children, to be sure. Yet their needs exceed everything we have to give them. We yearn to save them from the mistakes we have made in life and arm them with the hard won knowledge we have gained through life experience. But the wisdom we have to share comes across as irrelevant, pedantic and judgmental. We want desperately to support our children with our love, but a growing child is a moving target. Just when it seems we have this parenting thing down pat, the kids enter into another stage of their development and all bets are off. We can never love our children enough in the right way at the right time.

Consequently, the results of our parenting are always mixed. Under the best of circumstances, our relationship with our parents is nuanced, conflicted and ambiguous. Love and admiration mix with resentment and disappointment. Thankfulness is laced with blame. Perhaps we can never do more than love our children the best we can, keep our doors ever open to them and continue urging them “to come home,” whether that means actually returning to the homestead or being reconciled with each other through repentance and forgiveness. That, in any event, is where Jesus’ parable leaves us.

There is a reason why the scriptures employ parenthood (not fatherhood exclusively!) as the strongest metaphor for God’s covenant relationship with Israel and with the church. That relationship, too, is laden with ambiguity and unreconciled conflict. Nowhere is the ambivalence in our relationship to God more evident than in the Psalms, that treasury of prayer found at the heart of the Bible. There, as in the parable, we find the whole spectrum of parent/child sentiment from profound love, pride and thankfulness to rage, blame and resentment. Yet the very fact that the covenantal dialogue continues throughout the darkest of times testifies to God’s dogged determination to keep that covenant alive and bring its promises to fruition. The father’s pleading prefigures Jesus’ weeping over Jerusalem. The cross is finally the price God willingly pays to keep the covenantal line from going dead and hold together the fraying bonds of God’s covenant family.

At the end of the parable, we find the father pleading with his elder son to join the festive celebration for prodigal’s return. He offers the boy his very self and all he has. Still, it is not enough. Nor is it clear that his lavish welcome for the returning prodigal succeeded in turning that boy’s heart to obedience and humility. For all we know, the prodigal son might have been off the very next day to another far country for more riotous living. Like last Sunday’s parable of the fig tree, this story leaves a lot of loose ends for us to ponder. But that, after all, is the purpose of parables.

Here is a poem about parenthood by Langston Hughes. Perhaps you too can hear in this an echo of the God who urges us never to despair of his covenant love.

Mother to Son

Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time
I’se been a-climbin’ on,
And reachin’ landin’s,
And turnin’ corners,
And sometimes goin’ in the dark
Where there ain’t been no light.
So, boy, don’t you turn back.
Don’t you set down on the steps.
‘Cause you finds it’s kinder hard.
Don’t you fall now—
For I’se still goin’, honey,
I’se still climbin’,
And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.

Source: The Weary Blues, by Langston Hughes (c. 1926 by Alfred A. Knopf, pub. by Random House, LLC). Langston Hughes was an important African American voice in the “Harlem Renaissance” of the 1920s. Though well-educated and widely traveled, Hughes’ poetry never strayed far from his roots in the African American community. Early in his career, Hughes’ work was criticized by some African American intellectuals for portraying what they viewed as an unflattering representation of back life. In a response to these critics, Hughes replied, “I didn’t know the upper class Negroes well enough to write much about them. I knew only the people I had grown up with, and they weren’t people whose shoes were always shined, who had been to Harvard, or who had heard of Bach. But they seemed to me good people, too.”  Today Langston Hughes is recognized globally as a towering literary figure of the 20th Century. You can read more about Hughes and discover more of his poetry at the Poetry Foundation website (from which the above quote is taken).

Joshua 5:9-12

Sunday’s reading from the book of Joshua marks a significant transition in the story of Israel. Moses, the man who led Israel through the wilderness for forty years is dead. Israel’s nomadic existence is ended. No longer will she eat bread from the hand of God and water from miraculous springs. She will now get her bread from the good earth God has given to her-and therein lurks the next temptation. Israel has no experience with agriculture. Though the God of Israel is clearly competent when it comes to leading nomads through the wilderness, what does he know about farming? Can Israel manage to transform herself from a nomadic society into an agricultural society without losing her soul to the Canaanite gods of fertility?

Israel’s new Canaanite neighbors’ entire culture is founded on farming and fertility. Where religion permeates all of life, it is nearly impossible to separate the mechanics of planting, growing and harvesting from the mythical underpinnings and cultic practices that accompany these tasks. It was hard for Israel to download this new agricultural app from the surrounding culture without importing the designer’s malware into her spiritual hard drive. The tales recounted in the much older book of Judges suggest that Israel’s transition was a rocky one. The conquest narrative in the book of Joshua reflects the gravity of the issues involved and the stark choices Israel must face every time she finds herself in a new cultural context-whether that be Canaanite, Babylonian, Persian, Roman or American.

I sometimes wonder whether the internet and the cornucopia of communication options it makes available does not pose some of the same threats for the church that Israel faced in the land of Canaan. I have heard terms like “virtual church” and “liquid church” tossed around in some circles. Online discussion groups consisting of faceless monikers and online IDs can sometimes approach a sort of closeness that resembles intimacy. Yet how, I wonder, can intimacy exist in such a medium where you cannot even be sure that the people you are communicating with really exist? More to the point, how can a church professing to be the Body of Christ, claiming that the Word of God became flesh and asserting that the body and blood of Christ are truly present in bread and wine exist in a virtual universe? How do you share the peace of God in a chat room?

Of course, I recognize the irony involved in posing these questions on an internet blog. Obviously, I am not a Luddite rejecting all things digital. The internet brings together people and perspectives that might not otherwise meet. Online discussions may lack the warmth and humanity of a face to face discussion. Still, they enable persons who might otherwise lack time or mobility to engage in conversation with others about things that matter. Moreover, I tend to think online discussions give introverted persons who usually get shouted down and talked over in face to face meetings a better shot at being heard. This blog, Trinity’s Facebook presence and our webpage provide valuable links to folks we might not otherwise reach. Still, I am fully aware that whatever else I might be doing here, it is not church. The folks who regularly interact with me on these posts might arguably be classified in some sense as a community, but they are not the Body of Christ. For that you need to be physically present at 167 Palisade Avenue on Sunday at 9:00 a.m.

For some good background information on the book of Joshua, see the Summary Article by Kathryn Schifferdecker, Associate Professor of Old Testament at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, M.N. on enterthebible.org.

Psalm 32

This is one of the seven “penitential psalms” so classified in the commentary of Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator written in the 6th century C.E. (The others being Psalms 6, 38, 51, 102, 130 and 143). Not surprisingly, it was a favorite of Augustine and Luther. The psalmist speaks eloquently about the joy and relief found in forgiveness of sin and the futility of denial and self justification. The psalmist does not disclose the nature of his or her sins, but indicates that it was some illness that brought him or her to an acknowledgement of sin and the need for confession. There is no question but that guilt induced stress can bring about illness, but it is far more likely in this case that the psalmist’s illness was the catalyst for guilt. Sickness was almost universally understood in ancient cultures as an affliction from God intended to punish sin. As such, its onset naturally drove the psalmist to introspection and self examination.

In this case, the psalmist’s self examination led to the discovery of sin that the psalmist had been trying to hide from God and perhaps even from the psalmist’s own self. In the confession and acknowledgement of sin, the psalmist found healing and relief. The psalmist therefore instructs fellow worshipers not take the path of sin and self deception that leads to illness and misfortune, but to “come clean” with God and cry out for deliverance. Mulish stubbornness will only lead to grief. As Augustine puts it, “much is he scourged, who, confessing not his sins to God, would be his own ruler.” Moreover, “it is right to be subject unto [God], that so you may be placed above all things beside.”  Augustine’s Commentary of Psalm 32 published in The Nicine and Post Nicine Fathers, Vol 8, (Erdmans, 1979) p. 71.

This advice is good as far as it goes, but the psalmist’s experience, valid and instructive though it may be, must not be elevated to a universal principle. As the case of Job illustrates, illness is not always the result of sin. The preacher from Ecclesiastes points out that in many cases justice and right do not prevail and all seems like “vanity.”  As last week’s gospel makes clear, sometimes tragedy happens for no apparent reason. There are psalms to address these circumstances as well. See, e.g. Psalm 39.

2 Corinthians 5:16-21

A few introductory words about the Second Letter of Paul to the Corinthians are in order. The church in Corinth, you may recall from previous weeks, was a congregation only Paul could love. See post for Sunday, January 17th Paul’s first letter makes clear just how divided, conflicted and scandal ridden this church was. Paul evidently made a visit to the church in Corinth after writing his first letter. This visit was “painful” and did not result in any reconciliation of differences between the apostle and his congregation. Rather than attempting another visit that he feared would also be unsuccessful, Paul wrote a “letter of tears” to Corinth sent by the hand of Titus. II Corinthians 2:1-13; II Corinthians 7: 5-16. Fearing the effects of this severe letter, Paul left Troas in Asia Minor where he had begun a successful mission and returned to Macedonia in search of Titus. Paul rejoined Titus in Macedonia and was greatly relieved to learn that the Corinthians had indeed responded favorably to his “severe” letter with a change of heart toward him. Paul wrote his second letter to express his gratitude to the Corinthians and to encourage them in their faith.

For centuries biblical scholars have puzzled over the abrupt change in tone between II Corinthians 1-9 and II Corinthians 10-13. Most scholars now agree that these two sections represent different letters, though both authored by Paul. To further complicate matters, there is a fragment at II Corinthians 6:14-7:1 that seems to have no bearing on what precedes or follows suggesting that we might have part of a third letter in the mix. Some scholars believe that chapters 10-13 constitute all or part of Paul’s “letter of tears” while chapters 1-9 constitute a letter of thanksgiving written in response to Titus’ favorable report. Enslin, Morton Scott, Christian Beginnings, (c. 1938 by Westminster Press) pp. 254-261; Filson, Floyd V., “Introduction and Exegesis,” The Interpreter’s Bible, 10th Ed. (c. 1953 by Abingdon Press). If that is in fact the case, the reading for this Sunday comes from Paul’s letter of thanksgiving. As appealing as this hypothesis might seem at first blush, there are substantial grounds for dating the material found in chapters 10-13 after rather than before the composition of chapters 1-9. Furnish, Victor Paul, II Corinthians, The Anchor Bible, Vol. 32A, (c. 1984 by Doubleday & Company, Inc.) p. 38-41. Accordingly, chapters 10-13 most likely are not Paul’s tearful letter.

“From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view.” To fully understand the import of this sentence, you need to back up and read verses II Corinthians 5:14-15: “For the love of Christ urges us on, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died. And he died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised for them.” To regard no one from a human point of view is to regard everyone from God’s viewpoint-as people for whom Christ died. Consequently, I believe when we read that “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation,” or, as some translators put it, “when anyone is in Christ-new creation,” Paul is not talking only about some inward individual spiritual renewal. We are talking about a radical reorientation in terms of how we see the world and the people in it. Because Christ has died, all have died. Because all have died, all are reconciled. It is the task of the church to live as an embassy of God modeling and proclaiming the reconciliation accomplished in Jesus.

From a human point of view, our enemies are defined for us by the U.S. Department of State. Our interests are defined by national borders and international treaties. Our neighbors are defined by accidents of geography, demography and history. But from the perspective of God in Christ, these are distinctions without a substantive difference. The starting point for viewing every individual is the conviction that such individual is reconciled to God in Christ. Whether he or she knows it is entirely beside the point. We know it and that knowledge shapes our thoughts and actions. The implications of this text are subversive to say the least. Reconciliation is a fine objective-as long as it applies only to neighbors with nothing between them but white picket fences. Take it into the arena of geopolitics and you could get yourself crucified.

Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32

I have expressed my reflections on the gospel lesson above. Here are some interesting points that may or may not influence your understanding of the story.

A father could dispose of his property in one of two ways: 1) by a will that is probated after his death; or 2) by a gift made during his lifetime. Though there is no specific provision for disposition of an estate prior to the testator’s death in the Old Testament, there is some evidence that the practice existed even if discouraged. The book of Sirach written in the early 2nd Century B.C.E. contains the following admonition:

“To son or wife, to brother or friend, do not give power over yourself, as long as you live; and do not give your property to another, in case you change your mind and must ask for it. While you are still alive and have breath in you, do not let anyone take your place. For it is better that your children should ask from you than that you should look to the hand of your children. Excel in all that you do; bring no stain upon your honor. At the time when you end the days of your life, in the hour of death, distribute your inheritance.” Sirach 33:19-23.

In any event, it would be highly irregular, to say nothing of presumptuous, for a younger son to initiate the settlement of his father’s estate with his living father. The parable tells us nothing of the son’s motives in making such an unusual request or those of the father in acquiescing. At first blush, it might appear as though in “dividing his living between them” the father had made a complete disposition of his estate between his two sons. But it is obvious from the balance of the story that, at the very least, he maintained control over his property. His gifts to the returning prodigal, slaughter of the “fatted calf” and preparation of the lavish celebration all indicate that the balance of the estate remained under the father’s control.

The degree of the younger son’s reinstatement is a matter of dispute. Some commentators see in the provision of the robe and the ring an echo of Pharaoh’s elevation of Joseph, the implication being that the younger son was being included once again in the father’s inheritance. Jeremias, Joachim, The Parables of Jesus, (c. 1971 by SCM Press) p. 130; Marshall, I. Howard., The Gospel according to Luke, New International Greek Testament Commentary (c. 1978 by Paternoster Press, Ltd.) pp. 610-611. I think that is something of a stretch. The father assures his older son at the end of the parable that “all that is mine is yours.” Vs. 31. In view of this assurance, the only conceivable complaint the older son might have is that the lavish party for his brother was diminishing his future inheritance. I am not convinced that the legal framework of the transactions in the parable can be reconstructed or that doing so would give us any clearer picture of what is going on. Like the ungrateful guests who refused the lavish wedding invitation (Luke 14:16-24), the circumstances of this parable appear to be exaggerated for literary effect. No one could imagine a son so blatantly disrespectful and imprudent. Nor could anyone imagine a father forgiving and receiving back such a son, much less with so lavish a reception. Against this seeming madness, the elder son’s protests come across as the single voice of sanity.

The one constant in this parable is the father whose love pursues in unrestrained measure both of his wayward sons. The lavish party is given not because the younger son deserves it, but because he needs it. The elder son must learn that his father’s love for him cannot be earned but only received as the free gift genuine love always is. We cannot know how these two sons will respond to their father’s love, but it is clear that their father is determination to continue loving both his sons, come what may.

Sunday, February 28th

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THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT

Isaiah 55:1-9
Psalm 63:1-8
1 Corinthians 10:1-13
Luke 13:1-9

Prayer of the Day: Eternal God, your kingdom has broken into our troubled world through the life, death, and resurrection of your Son. Help us to hear your word and obey it, and bring your saving love to fruition in our lives through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Young lives tragically and undeservedly cut short. A life mercifully and undeservedly spared. This Sunday’s gospel places these very different outcomes in stark contrast. The story about the eighteen killed by the collapse of a tower has a contemporary ring to it. Only last week a crane in New York City fell from the top of a building killing instantly a man sitting in his car below. Also last week a dislodged manhole cover somehow became airborne and crashed through the windshield of an SUV killing the driver, an art teacher. It is not clear why Pilate killed the Galileans in our reading. It is possible they were involved in an insurrection of some sort, but they were most likely innocent victims selected for slaughter at random “to send a message” to any would be insurrectionists. Maybe, like so many killed in Syria and Iraq these days, they were simply caught in the crossfire of someone else’s fight. Acts of terror against innocent civilians are hardly novel these days.

Events like these send chills down the spine. They bring home to us how frail and vulnerable we all are. It takes only one defective screw, a second’s inattention, an unanticipated change in weather patterns to cut off a bright and promising future for an unsuspecting victim. It takes years of dedication, patience, sacrifice and anguish to raise a child. It takes only the pull of a trigger erase all of that. When we read about these horrific events, we can’t help thinking, “That could have been me or someone I love!”

Blaming the victims comes naturally. We take a perverse comfort in believing that the victims were somehow at fault for what befell them. After all, if I can identify some error, moral infraction or misjudgment on their part, it is easier for me to convince myself that I can avoid their fate. I just have to exercise more care than they did, stay off the route they were driving, or refrain from the sinful conduct I believe brought down upon them the wrath of God. I can fool myself into thinking that I am in control of my life and safe from the randomness with which death and destruction so often strike.

Jesus dispels that notion altogether. Are the victims of accident and violence any more deserving of death than those who lived to tell about it? “I tell you, No,” says Jesus, but he goes on to say that “unless you repent you will all likewise perish.” What does Jesus mean by that? I doubt he meant that repentance shields one from a violent death. Jesus has already made it clear that repentance and faith take us on the path of the cross. Discipleship makes a violent end more rather than less likely. I believe the explanation lies hidden in Jesus’ parable of the fig tree that follows.

Unlike the seemingly hapless victims in the daily news-both in Jesus’ day and our own-the fig tree has earned the judgment of destruction passed by the owner of the vineyard. In a semi-arid climate where cultivatable land is limited, it is difficult to justify allowing an unproductive tree to go on using up valuable soil. Yet as unexpected and cruel as was the fate of the victims we read about earlier, equally unexpected and undeserved is the owner’s act of mercy sparing the fig tree. At the request of the vinedresser, the tree is given a year’s reprieve. That is where the parable ends and we are left with a huge question. Will the tree use wisely and well the year of grace it has been given? Will it respond to the care and attention of the vinedresser? We might find it strange that Jesus imposes such heavy moral and spiritual responsibility on a plant. But bear in mind that Israel is frequently compared to a vine, a branch or a tree throughout the scriptures. Anyone listening to this parable would have known that Jesus is addressing his people Israel and, by extension, us.

Almost two weeks ago many of us received ashes on our foreheads in the sign of the cross. These ashes are a graphic reminder that we are indeed dust and will, sooner or later, return to dust. Death is God’s judgment upon us and there is no getting around it. The question is not how soon or late that judgment overtakes us, but whether we meet it confident that the life we must now surrender has borne fruit for the kingdom of heaven. Or as Paul would put it, have we built on the foundation which is Christ with gold, silver and precious stones, or have we contributed only hay, stubble and chaff that will not withstand the fire of judgment? I Corinthians 3:10-15.

How, then, shall we live? It is tempting to begin filling up our remaining days with good intentions. I will buy only Free Trade coffee; I will increase my giving to the church and to the poor; I will be more “intentional” (whatever that means) in working for justice and equality. All of those objectives are noble. But true discipleship begins with being rather than doing. Only a good tree is capable of bearing good fruit. Thus, before we can begin to do anything fruitful, we must be the kind of tree Jesus is looking for. We must become creatures capable of living joyfully, thankfully and obediently within the limits of our human mortality.

Our death denying culture hides its dying members away in institutions, sells all manner of cosmetics to hide the effects of aging, celebrates youth and encourages retirees to revert in their “golden years” to a self-absorbed, adolescent lifestyle. But disciples of Jesus are called to embrace with thanksgiving life in all its manifold stages. Disciples are challenged to receive each day as one that the Lord has made and offers as a gift. They are mindful that the number of such days is finite, that tomorrow is not a foregone conclusion and that health, strength and length of days is guaranteed to no one. But that only makes today all the more precious. It is out of such faithful gratitude that generosity flows. Generosity gives birth to compassion and compassion fuels zeal for justice, righteousness and reconciliation.

Here is a poem by New Hampshire poet laurite, Jane Kenyon, a woman whose struggle with depression and chronic illness taught her the art of living thankfully, generously and compassionately.

Otherwise

I got out of bed
on two strong legs.
It might have been
otherwise.  I ate
cereal, sweet
milk, ripe, flawless
peach.  It might
have been otherwise.
I took the dog uphill
to the birch wood.
All morning I did
the work I love.

At noon I lay down
with my mate.  It might
have been otherwise.
We ate dinner together
at a table with silver
candlesticks.  It might
have been otherwise.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the walls, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.

Source: Constance, Graywolf Press, 1993 (c. Jane Kenyon). Jane Kenyon was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She attended the University of Michigan in her hometown and completed her master’s degree there in 1972. It was there also that she met her husband, the poet Donald Hall, who taught there. Kenyon moved with Hall to Eagle Pond Farm, in New Hampshire where she lived until her untimely death in 1995 at age 47. You can read more of Jane Kenyon’s poetry and find out more about her at the Poetry Foundation Website.

Isaiah 55:1-9

For a brief but thorough overview of the book of Isaiah, see the Summary Article by  Fred Gaiser, Professor of Old Testament at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN published at enterthebible.org. Here it is enough to say that these words were spoken by the prophet to the Judean exiles living in Babylon. The conquest of Babylon by Cyrus the Persian opened up the possibility for the exiles to return to their homeland in Palestine. The prophet sees in this development the hand of God at work creating a new future for Judah. The exiles are naturally skeptical. Most have built new lives for themselves in the foreign land. Those born in Babylon know of Israel only through the legends and stories told by their elders. The prophet’s task is to make his fellow exiles see the glorious new future God is offering them. To that end, the prophet employs some of the most beautiful poetic language in the scriptures. He compares the opportunity for return from Babylon to the Exodus from Egypt. He promises that, just as God provided miraculous protection and provision for the Israelites as they traveled through the wilderness from Egypt to the land of Canaan, so God will shelter and protect the exiles as they travel once again to that promised land from captivity in Babylon.

In our lesson for today, God speaks as though he were a street vendor or a carnival barker inviting all those passing by to “come.” The remarkable thing here is that the voice of the Lord goes on to announce that the goods are free. “He who has no money, come, buy and eat.” Verse 1. The banquet is a frequent metaphor for the new life God offers Israel. The point is clear. God is giving a banquet for which there is no admission charge. Only a fool would turn away from such an opportunity! Yet that is precisely the choice Israel will have made should she ignore the opportunity for return to the land promised to her ancestors. This is reminiscent of Jesus’ parable of the ungrateful guests invited to the wedding feast. (Matthew 22:1-14; Luke 14:15-24). The reference to milk and wine, foods associated with richness, seems to echo the image of Palestine as the land of “milk and honey.” Deuteronomy 26:9.

This is the only passage in the writings of “Second Isaiah” (Isaiah 40-55) in which King David is mentioned. The prophet is far more interested in the messianic role of Israel as a whole than in any of her leaders. Yet he or she can hardly ignore so prominent a theme in Israel’s faith and history as God’s covenant with David: “Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me; your throne shall be established forever.” II Samuel 7:16. Yet what hope can this promise offer now that the line of David has been extinguished? As the prophet sees it, the covenant with David is now extended to all the people. God’s “steadfast love” for David is now embodied in an “everlasting covenant” with all Israel. Vs. 3. It should be noted also that Israel has been given as “a covenant to the people, a light to the nations…” Isaiah 42:6. Thus, God opens up the Davidic covenant to the whole of Israel so that Israel might become a channel of God’s salvation to all the nations of the world.

“‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are my ways your ways,’ says the Lord.” This verse summarizes well a recurring theme throughout Second Isaiah: That God is God and we are not. One of the more subtle forms of idolatry is the assumption that God’s ways are our ways. Though the so called “Christian Right” has been justly criticized for linking godliness and morality to a narrowly defined set of white, middle class cultural biases, I think that we mainline protestant types are often far too certain about what “social justice” ought to look like and far too eager to identify the will of God with our own partisan projects and agendas. Conservatives should be weary of assuming they know what God desires to conserve. Progressives should be equally weary of assuming they know which way God is progressing. What a hoot it would be to find out at the close of the age that nothing we thought was historic, significant and earth shaking, nothing we have given our lives to achieve ever really mattered. How rich it would be to learn that the real history was taking place in some corner of the earth we never even thought to look-like a stable in Bethlehem.

Psalm 63:1-8

The reference in verse 11 to “the king” rejoicing in God (not included in our reading) and the psalmist’s having “looked upon [God] in the sanctuary” suggest that this psalm was probably composed before the Babylonian Exile and during the reign of the Davidic kings over the Judean monarchy. The longing for God’s presence expressed in verse 1 through the metaphors of hunger and thirst of a person lost in the wilderness are artfully contrasted with the images of feasting on “marrow” and “fat” in verse 5. The psalmist’s need for God is as critical as reliance on food and water. This need is satisfied through praise and thanksgiving in God’s sanctuary. The psalmist has experienced God’s help and protection throughout his/her life and so “clings” to God. Vs. 8. God’s steadfast love (“chesed” in Hebrew) is better than life itself. Vs. 3.

From a strictly liturgical perspective, it is hard to sanction this wanton show of gluttony during Lent, even though we know it is expressed only in a metaphorical sense.  Yet on further reflection, is it not appropriate to ask during this season of repentance whether in fact we actually experience this sort of hunger for God’s presence? If we do not, then perhaps, like the audience of the prophet in our first lesson, we are spending “[]our money for that which is not bread and []our labor for that which does not satisfy.” Isaiah 55:2. Our appetites need instruction. We need to learn to yearn for and crave the things that will sustain us. We need to learn to pray well. For that purpose, I can find no better teachers than the psalmists. I have said it before. I will say it again. Two psalms per day, one in the morning and one at night. There is no surer way to a rich and satisfying life of prayer.

1 Corinthians 10:1-13

Few sections of the Hebrew Scriptures have been as instructive for the church as the forty years of Israel’s wilderness wandering recounted from the middle of Exodus to the end of Deuteronomy. This period between Israel’s deliverance from Egypt and her entry into the Promised Land was a fertile source of instruction, admonition and encouragement for the early church living between the inauguration of God’s kingdom through the ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus and the promise of his coming again in glory. Disciples of Jesus, who remember with thanksgiving the “exodus” accomplished by Jesus in Jerusalem and look forward in anticipation to his return in glory, naturally identify with the Israelites at this period in their history. During these “in between” years Israel was totally dependent upon her God for food, water and protection from enemies. She was tested, tried and prepped for her entry into and occupation of Canaan.

In our reading Paul calls upon the church at Corinth to understand her own day to day existence as a time of testing and sanctification. She needs to understand that her sins of divisiveness, rebellion and lack of love (See post for Sunday, January 31, 2016 ) will produce dire consequences for her. Nevertheless, the Corinthians must also keep in mind that God’s judgment is to be understood as another side of God’s mercy. God wounds in order to heal; God judges in order to induce repentance; God’s wrath is born of God’s zealous passion for the salvation of God’s people. For this reason, Paul asserts that “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man…” vs. 13. Temptation here is not to be understood as a personal affliction. Paul is speaking here to the church. The temptations afflicting the Corinthian church are those that threaten her oneness in Christ and lure her into the quagmire of destructive conflict, class distinctions and partisan divisions. Just as God forged a group of escaped slaves into a mighty nation in the furnace of wilderness wandering, so the Spirit of God is shaping the Corinthian church, a fractured and divided community, into the Body of Christ where all work as one. The take away: sanctification is a slow, painful and difficult process. Left to ourselves, we are tempted to abandon it. Thankfully, God can be trusted to complete the job of transforming the church into the image of Jesus.

Luke 13:1-9

The two incidents referenced here, Pilate’s killing of an unspecified number of Galileans and the death of eighteen people in the collapse of a tower, are not referenced in any other historical source. That is not surprising. Violent and repressive measures were the modus operendi of the occupying Roman forces. The death of a few Galileans would hardly have been front page news. These Galileans were most likely put to death in Jerusalem during Passover. This is the only occasion on which lay people would be sacrificing their own animals. Longing for independence and resentment at Rome ran high during Passover. For this reason, Pilate made a point of being present in Jerusalem during the feast with additional troops to maintain order. That, of course, only added to the resentment of the people. It is easy to see how violent conflicts between Pilate’s troops and the Passover pilgrims might erupt.

The incident Jesus brought up involving the fall of the tower also appears to have been a relatively minor occurrence. “Silome” was a name given to the reservoir associated with the water supply in Jerusalem fed by the spring of Gihon. The spring was the main source of water for the city. It is referenced in Psalm 46. An aqueduct built during the Bronze Age brought the waters of the spring into the city. According to the Biblical account, it was through this aqueduct or one like it that David and his army were able to invade and conquer Jerusalem without breaching its walls. II Samuel 5:6-10. Interestingly, Pilate oversaw the construction of an aqueduct designed to improve the water supply system for the city. While it is possible that the fall of the tower to which Jesus referred had something to do with this project, there is no positive evidence on that score.

The implication here is that the people bringing to Jesus news of the unfortunate victims of Pilate’s wrath believed those victims were responsible for their plight by reason of their sins. Jesus does not specifically refute them on this point, but states that the Galileans were no more sinful than anyone else. Consequently, these people should not be focusing on what the Galileans may or may not have done, but rather upon turning from their own sin lest they meet the same fate. The same point is made with respect to the victims of the tower collapse. People should not be asking why these eighteen people died, but recognize instead God’s mercy in the very fact that they are still alive and still able to repent.

The parable of the unfruitful fig tree follows. Like this tree that has taken up good soil for three years without producing fruit, Jesus points out that the folks he is addressing are living similarly unfruitful lives. Like the butchered Galileans and the victims of the tower collapse, they deserve God’s punishment. But the ax has not fallen-yet. God has graciously given them time. The question is, how will they use it?

This parable of the fig tree is intriguing. It is tempting to interpret it allegorically with God being the owner of the vineyard and the vinedresser Jesus interceding on our behalf for mercy. But that does not work for a number of reasons. God clearly does not wish for the destruction of anyone. Even when God threatens judgment, it is with the hope that those who are so threatened will turn and repent. The owner of the vineyard is making no such threat and seems to have no hope for the tree. This is simply a business decision. The tree is an investment that has failed for three years to yield a return. It is time to pull the plug and invest elsewhere. The vinedresser’s motives are unclear. Perhaps he sees more potential in the tree than does the owner. In any event, the vinedresser is convinced he can get fruit out of the tree and tries to convince the owner to give him one more year.

As I see it, the parable has but one purpose: to illustrate the point Jesus has made with respect to the two tragedies discussed in the previous section. Fruitless as we are, we have lived to see another day. That is sheer grace. We have done nothing to earn this new day and have no guarantee that we will see another. Note well that we never hear the owner’s response to the vinedresser’s plea for more time. We would like to think that the owner said, “Fine. You think you can make this tree produce some figs? You have one year and one year only. Knock yourself out.” But it is just as likely that he said, “You have to be kidding! Three years this tree has produced nothing. What do you think will be different about year four? Cut it down!” Given that, undeservedly and inexplicably, we have been freely given this day, this hour, this minute-what are we going to do about it?

Sunday, February 21st

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SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT

Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18
Psalm 27
Philippians 3:17–4:1
Luke 13:31-35

Prayer of the Day: God of the covenant, in the mystery of the cross you promise everlasting life to the world. Gather all peoples into your arms, and shelter us with your mercy, that we may rejoice in the life we share in your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often I would have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you would not! Behold, your house is forsaken.” Luke 13:35.

Jesus takes no delight in pronouncing Jerusalem’s doom. He does not speak here as an angry firebrand, a zealot for justice burning with contempt for oppression and tyranny. Jesus does not speak as one throwing his life defiantly against the Roman military machine. His mood is sad more than it is angry; heartbroken more than outraged; tired more than inspired. He is a man resigned to a violent death at the hands of his own people for the sake of a new age he will not live to see. Nevertheless, he takes the next step in his journey to Jerusalem toward which he “set his face” back in Chapter 9. Luke 9:51. Jesus displays a grim determination to complete this race in which he is hopelessly behind and cannot hope to win. Compassion is the driving force for Jesus. Jesus loves the city of Jerusalem and all that it symbolizes throughout the Hebrew Scriptures. His compassion survives where his vision has grown dim and the kingdom he longs for seems further away than ever.

I have often wondered how it is that some people are able to work in conditions of human suffering that defy description-such as refugee camps throughout northern Africa and the Middle East-for years on end without burning out. I wonder too why some pastors burn out of parish ministry within their first five years while others continue to grow in their faith and thrive in their work, even when the work itself is less than successful. I suspect that the common denominator for those with staying power is compassion. When someone you love deeply becomes ill, you keep on caring for them no matter how hard it gets, no matter sick they get and regardless whether there is any likelihood they will ever recover. In just that way Jesus loved the city of Jerusalem and its people ground under the heels of poverty, sickness and injustice.

I am afraid that much of what we do in the church grows out of a commitment to abstract principles of justice, equality and social progress that find expression in programmatic activity. Though well-intentioned, much of this work can result in distancing ourselves from the people we seek to assist. In his book, Toxic Charity, Robert D. Lupton shows how good-intentioned Christians are actually harming the people they are trying to help. Too many efforts to help the poor actually make the poor feel judged, looked down upon, only worthy of charity and handouts. The tendency is to see these people as “social problems” that need to be fixed rather than valued persons deserving honor, respect and friendship. Lupton, Robert D., Toxic Charity, (c. 2011 by Robert D. Lupton, pub. by HarperCollins Publishers).  Whereas Jesus ate with sinners and outcasts, calling them to be his disciples, our programs tend rather to remain a safe distance from these folks, handing them care packages and sending them on their way. While there are some very notable exceptions to these antiseptic procedures, they are unfortunately the exception rather than the rule.

Instead of trying to raise people up to a standard of success and social acceptability where it becomes possible to include them in our community, we need to enter into their world with an openness to being transformed. That is the only way to become transformative. Transformation is a slow and tedious process. It is not for impatient people who crave results. It is not for problem solvers who are bent on finding a “fix.” The only people that can survive discipleship burnout are those whose love for the people they serve simply won’t let them quit.

Here’s a heart break a poem that I think expresses something of the compassion Jesus felt for the people of Jerusalem and the compassion to which he calls his disciples.

Harlem Shadows

I hear the halting footsteps of a lass
In Negro Harlem when the night lets fall
its veil. I see the shapes of girls who pass
To bend and barter at desire’s call.
Ah, little dark girls who in slippered feet
Go prowling through the night from street to street!

Through the long night until the silver break
Of day the little gray feet know no rest;
Through the lone night until the last snow-flake
Has dropped from heaven upon the earth’s white breast,
The dusky, half-clad girls of tired feet
Are trudging, thinly shod, from street to street.

Ah, stern harsh world, that in the wretched way
Of poverty, dishonor and disgrace,
Has pushed the timid little feet of clay,
The sacred brown feet of my fallen race!
Ah, heart of me, the weary, weary feet
In Harlem wandering from street to street.

By Claude McKay

Source: Harlem Shadows, Poems by Claude McKay (c. 1992 by Harcourt, Brace and Company). Claude McKay was born in Sunny Ville, Jamaica, in 1889. He was a key figure in the Harlem Renaissance movememt of the 1920s. His work ranges from verse celebrating peasant life in Jamaica to poems challenging white dominance in the United States. You can find out more about the life and literature of Claude McKay on the Poetry Foundation Website.

Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18

Why would a man take a bunch of animals, cut them in half and make a path through the two halves of each of the bloody carcasses? In order to answer this question, we need to take a trip back in time to the Bronze Age. Society is made up of city states that owe their allegiance to larger kingdoms that in time will become the empires of the Iron Age. Obviously, such alliances are not agreements between equals. The ruler of a smaller state received a promise of non-aggression from the larger kingdom in return for payment of tribute and a pledge of military support if required. If this sounds rather like a protection racket, it is because that is essentially what the agreements were. These lopsided alliances were sealed by covenant ceremonies in which numerous animals were slain and cut in two. The subject king would then swear absolute allegiance, promise tribute and pledge military support to the dominant king. The dominant king would then force the subject king to walk on the bloody path between the severed animal parts. It was supposed to produce the same effect as the horse head next to which Jack Woltz woke up in the movie, The Godfather. “See these hacked up animals little king? This is what happens to little kings that try to cross the Big King? Any questions?”

In Sunday’s lesson from Genesis, God stands the whole notion of covenant making on its head. Abraham asked God “how am I to know that I shall possess [the land of Canaan]?” God’s response is to make a covenant with Abraham. Usually, it is the weaker, vassal king who seeks covenant protection from the dominant king. But here God is the one seeking a covenant with Abraham. In near eastern politics, the weaker king is the one who makes all the promises. In this case, God is the one who makes an oath to Abraham. Instead of forcing Abraham to walk between the mangled carcasses, God passes along the bloody path saying, in effect, “Abraham, if I fail to keep my promise to give you a child, a land and a blessing, may I be hacked in pieces like these animals.”

This remarkable story illustrates what one of my seminary professors, Fred Gaiser, once said: “The Old Testament tends toward incarnation.” The New Testament witness is that the Word of God became flesh, that is, became vulnerable to the rending and slaughter experienced by the sacrificial animals used in the covenant ceremony. In fact, we can go further and say that God’s flesh was torn apart, God’s heart was broken and that this rending of God’s flesh was the cost of God’s faithfulness to the covenant. So understood, it is possible to recognize the cross in this strange and wonderful tale from dawn of history.

Psalm 27

The scholarly consensus seems to be that this psalm actually consists of two psalms, the first being a prayer of trust not unlike Psalm 23 including verses 1-6. The second is a lament consisting of verses 7-14. Rogerson, J.W. & McKay, J.W., Psalms 1-50, The Cambridge Bible Commentary (c. 1977 by Cambridge University Press) p. 121. However that might be, I still believe the psalm fits together nicely as a unit. It is precisely because the psalmist has such great confidence in God’s willingness and power to give protection that the psalmist feels free to cry out for that very protection in times of danger. Though as previously noted the commentators characterize verses 7-14 as a lament, it concludes with an affirmation of confidence in God’s anticipated salvation and an admonition to “be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the Lord.” Vs. 14.

Two things are noteworthy. First, this psalm is focused on dangers posed by enemies. By enemies the psalmist does not mean people who are merely disagreeable or less than friendly. These are people who “breathe out violence.” Vs. 12. The psalmist’s response to these enemies is prayer. He or she does not strap on a six shooter with the intent of “taking care of business.” Instead, s/he calls upon the Lord to deal with the enemy. This is the characteristic approach of the psalms. Even when the psalmist expresses a distinct desire to see the enemy punished in very violent and graphic terms, the psalmist leaves the business of retribution to God. That, of course, is precisely in line with what Jesus teaches his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount.

Second, the last verse of the psalm is very telling. The psalmist encourages his hearers to “wait for the Lord.” Vs. 14. The odd thing about the psalms is that, although they are prayers addressed to God, they often contain admonitions from God in the psalmists’ mouths. Sometimes the psalmists seem to be conscious of an audience listening in on their prayers. God hardly needs to be reminded to “wait on the Lord.”  Biblical prayer is a dialogical process. The psalmists’ outpouring of prayer to God is only one side. God responds to the psalmists. Sometimes these responses are oracles delivered by a prophet or priest that have become imbedded in the psalm. See, e.g., Psalm 60:6-12. Often these prayers are sung as praises by the psalmist in corporate worship where they give encouragement to the assembly. See Psalm 27:6. For Israel, prayer was never an entirely personal matter. The confidence of this psalmist is drawn as much from God’s faithfulness to Israel throughout history as from his or her own experience. So also, the psalmists’ personal struggles become a public arena for God to demonstrate his compassion and salvation to Israel.

Philippians 3:17–4:1

To repeat briefly what I have said about Paul’s Letter to the Philippians in the past, this is not one letter but three.

Phil A = Phil 4:10-20   (a short “Note of Thanksgiving” for monetary gifts Paul received from the Philippians)

Phil B = Phil 1:1 – 3:1; 4:4-7; (a “Letter of Friendship” written from prison, probably in Ephesus)

Phil C = Phil 3:2 – 4:3; 4:8-9; 4:21-23   (a stern warning against the rival missionaries who require the circumcision of Gentiles)

This Sunday’s reading comes from the third letter warning the Philippians to beware of the teachings of rival missionaries who were evidently teaching gentile Christians in Paul’s congregations that they needed circumcision in order to be full members of the church. In years past, scholars referred to these folks as “Judaizers,” but that name is somewhat misleading. The false missionaries with which Paul was contending were probably not Jews at all. Most likely, they were local people, probably gentiles who had received circumcision and took pride in the depth of commitment it demonstrated. Paul responds by pointing out that if such things as circumcision were really a source of pride, he could make a much stronger case on his own behalf than his adversaries. In verses 4-6 of chapter 3, Paul points out that he has a real Jewish ancestry that he can trace; circumcision done strictly in accordance with the law and a first rate Hebrew education. But of all this St. Paul says, “I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.”

Knowing all of this makes it a little easier to stomach Paul’s call to imitate him. Paul is not just being a pompoms ass here (though I suspect that he could be just that at times). It isn’t his moral example or his sterling character that Paul calls us to imitate. Rather, he calls us to imitate his indifference to racial identity, cultural status and religious achievement. You don’t come into the church through your success in living as an observant Jew anymore than you win God’s love by living as an observant Lutheran. You come into the church by Jesus’ invitation. Everything else you bring with you is just excess baggage.

Luke 13:31-35

This encounter of Jesus with the Pharisees needs to be placed in the larger context of Luke’s story about Jesus. Recall how two Sundays ago Jesus stood with Moses and Elijah discussing the “Exodus” he was to accomplish at Jerusalem. From that point on, it was clear that something big was about to occur in the Holy City. So when we read in Luke 9:51 that Jesus “set his face to go to Jerusalem,” it is clear that the time is at hand. From here on out, everything that occurs is leading up to the final confrontation that we know is approaching with every step Jesus takes toward his goal.

The Pharisees warn Jesus that Herod Antipas is seeking his life and urge him to flee. We do not know their motivation. Though the Pharisees were often hostile toward Jesus, this was not always the case in Luke’s gospel. In fact, in the very next chapter Jesus is invited to dinner at the home of a very prominent Pharisee. Moreover, the Pharisees had no great love for Herod. However much they might have disagreed with Jesus over any number of issues, Jesus was still a Jew that cared deeply about the Torah. Herod was a thug and a bully appointed by Rome who cared little about anything beyond his own comfort. As between the two, it is likely that the Pharisees would have sympathized with Jesus.

Of course, it is also possible that the Pharisees were trying to intimidate Jesus. Perhaps they felt that raising the specter of Herod might frighten him away from Judea and back into the more remote parts of Galilee where he would be someone else’s problem. In either case, Jesus will not be deterred from the course he set out in chapter 9. So far from fleeing, Jesus sends the Pharisees back to Herod with his travel itinerary.

Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem is one of the most moving passages in the gospels. We seldom get a glance into the head of Jesus. It seems to me that all four gospel writers are intent on preventing us from doing that. We are almost never told how Jesus felt or what his thoughts were about the things taking place around him. This passage marks one of the rare exceptions to that rule. Unlike the account in Matthew, Luke does not tell us that Jesus wept over the city. Nevertheless, his lament is filled with compassion. Jesus is resigned, it seems, to failure. The city that kills the prophets and stones the messengers sent to it will deal likewise with Jesus. Its people will not be gathered together by Jesus. Jesus is going to die without seeing the consummation of the reign of God to which he has given his life.

New Testament scholars are in virtual agreement that the Gospel of Luke was composed anywhere from fifteen to thirty years after the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple by Rome in 70 C.E. Many of them are also inclined to view this saying less as a reflection of Jesus’ sentiments upon his arrival in the city toward the close of his ministry and more as the early church’s effort to provide a theological explanation for the Temple’s destruction. No doubt Luke’s telling of the story is colored by the church’s experience of historical events that followed the ministry of Jesus. That said, I don’t think it is possible to divorce Jesus from his dire judgment upon the Holy City. All four gospels contain Jesus’ words of judgment against the Temple and its corrupt leadership. One of the more serious charges leveled against Jesus at his trial was his alleged claim that he would “destroy this temple that is made with hands, and in three days…build another temple not made with hands.” Mark 14:58. Furthermore, Jesus was not the first prophet to pronounce a judgment of destruction against Jerusalem. Jeremiah and Micah similarly warned that, however much God might treasure the Temple and the city of David, neither could be used as a shield against God’s punishment for injustice and unrighteousness.  Jeremiah 12:7; Jeremiah 22:5; Micah 3:9-12. The judgment against the Holy city brought about in Jeremiah’s time by the Babylonian invasion served as a solemn warning for all subsequent generations. It is hardly surprising that Jesus should draw upon this prophetic tradition in speaking to the Jerusalem of his day.

Jesus’ statement, “How often I would have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood,” calls to mind a host of images from the Hebrew Scriptures. See e.g., Deuteronomy 32:11; Psalm 17:8; Psalm 36:7;Psalm 57:1; Psalm 91:4; Ruth 2:12. The shelter Jesus promises affords the kind of protection proclaimed in Psalm 27, our Psalm for this Sunday. Jesus makes it clear to us that he knows he is walking into a conflict that will claim his life. He does so with the confidence that God will see to the completion of what his “Exodus” in Jerusalem will begin and that the people will one day cry out, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”

 

Sunday, February 7th

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TRANSFIGURATION OF OUR LORD

Exodus 34:29–35
Psalm 99
2 Corinthians 3:12—4:2
Luke 9:28–36

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Holy God, mighty and immortal, you are beyond our knowing, yet we see your glory in the face of Jesus Christ. Transform us into the likeness of your Son, who renewed our humanity so that we may share in his divinity, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Just about the time I think I have Jesus figured out, I discover I don’t. That, more than anything else, gives me hope that I am still Jesus’ disciple. Anyone who thinks s/he has Jesus figured out surely has stopped listening to him. Everyone who pays attention to Jesus understands that the more you get to know Jesus, the more you realize you have to learn. Our gospel lesson for Transfiguration reminds us emphatically that God would have us listen to Jesus, because that is the only way we are ever going to know anything about God, about ourselves, where we are in the grand scheme of things and wither we are going.

Listening to Jesus is a lifelong assignment quite different from learning the rudimentary doctrines of the Christian Faith. Catechetical instruction does not end with our mastering a finite collection of doctrines, teachings and traditions. Though important, doctrine, theology and faith practices merely give us the language we need to grow into our living relationship with the Crucified and Resurrected Lord. They equip us with the language, images and conceptual tools we need to hear the voice of Jesus.

Jesus came to deconstruct all our humanly pre-conceived notions about God. As Mark Twain once remarked, “It ain’t what people don’t know that’s so dangerous; it’s what they do know that ain’t so.” There is plenty said by preachers, politicians and pundits these days about who God is, what God wants and how God acts that isn’t so. I don’t have to name any names to make the point that what people are led to believe about God can lead to monstrous images of God. For the sake of gods masquerading as the God of the Bible we have conducted holy wars, executed people for witchcraft, practiced racial segregation, murdered and socially ostracized sexual minorities, subjugated women and abused children.

It is all too easy, I think, for those of us in the mainline protestant traditions, who claim to have moved beyond some of the more blatant manifestations of these sins, to point the finger at the likes of Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell, Jr. who are still breathing words of hate and intolerance in the name of God. We had best be careful with our stone throwing, because our distance from them is more rhetorical than real. As much as we rail against racism, our churches are still the most segregated institutions in America today. Though we have been ordaining women as ministers for decades and can even boast a few women bishops, the glass ceiling is still alive and well throughout the church at large. We may have come a long way in recent years toward welcoming gay, lesbian and transgendered people in theory, but in practice our churches still harbor more than a little fear, hostility and bigotry against them. At some level, it seems that we have yet to free ourselves from the angry, intolerant, moralistic monster we have created in our own image and made god.

Or perhaps our struggle is not so much to free ourselves from a false notion of God as it is to believe in the true vision Jesus opens up for us. At the end of our gospel reading, the disciples are left with no bright light, booming voice or all-encompassing cloud. Moses and Elijah have vanished. Jesus alone remains with them-and that is all the God there is. No wonder the disciples kept silent about this event. How can you comfort a frightened child with a God who is only human, who will not invoke protective angelic armies, who will not shield his disciples from the cross he must bear, who warns them that the only glory worth having is in siding with the hungry, the sinful, the outcast, the sick, the condemned criminal and the outsider-the last folks you’re likely to find sitting next to you in the pew on Sunday. How much comfort and security are you going to find with this God who calls you into a way of living that is likely to get you killed? How can you trust a God who is not in control? The god who sits in front of the instrument panel making everything happen on earth is a mirage. He does not exist. The only real God is the one whose heart breaks on the cross, but still keeps loving and forgiving; the God who came to win hearts by the power of his Word rather than to win wars by the might of his armies. This alone is God. Listen to him.

When we listen to Jesus, he helps us re-imagine God-not as the mere projection of our own prejudices and our need for security-but as the one who slowly, patiently and gently draws the universe into reconciliation and invites us to participate in that good work. When we listen to Jesus, we discover, not the god made in our own image, but the God who transforms us into God’s image.

Here’s a poem by Brook Emery about re-imagining God.

Monster [It’s possible I misconstrued you]

It’s possible I misconstrued you,

laid too much emphasis on the uniqueness of a birth,
failed to acknowledge circumstance could corrupt, sustain;
I indulged myself in accusations against an absolute.

I don’t believe what I then believed. You are not responsible

for Leibniz or the Lisbon quake, for the twenty-six-eyed
and sixty-arsed box jellyfish, that the cosmos
is shaped like a soccer ball; or for the dosido
of right and wrong around the garden bed.

You are not the monster I thought you were,

not by definition or necessity the one immutable.
You are a creator caught in a creator’s net, in fact
a creature. Every horror has its own pathology,

the disease infects the flock. Prey present as predators,
the malefactors replicate even as the angels
experiment with cures. Each encounter pulls against reductive story,
says I will not, I am just (an instant, an instance),

and reference skews on maps not drawn to scale.

I know saintliness exists. It’s all around me.
My next door neighbours in their simple modesty,
the lady down the street who is always
helping someone older than herself. Even the slow
judicial process conceives it natural to be better
than we are. I’m trying to shoo the gloomy birds away

but crows repeat about me on the lawn; and the vulture
and the kite, the cuckoo and the owl: should I have given up the ghost
when I was drawn from the womb?

By Brook Emery

Source: Uncommon Light, Five Islands Press, 2007 (c. 2007 by Brook Emery). Brook Emery is an Australian poet and high school teacher born in 1949. His poems integrate philosophy, science, and psychology. You can find out more about Emery and his many poetic works at the Poetry Foundation website.

Exodus 34:29–35

Chapter 34 of Exodus forms the climax of a narrative section beginning with Exodus 32 relating the story of idolatry with the golden calf and  Moses’ smashing of the original two tablets of the law. In Exodus 33, Moses intercedes with God and achieves a healing of the breach of covenant occasioned by Israel’s idolatrous conduct. Exodus 34 recounts the restoration of the covenant terms. Notably, Moses himself cuts these tablets and inscribes the law upon them whereas the first tablets were inscribed “by the finger of God.” Exodus 31:18. Professor Childs seems to think that this is simply a distinction without a difference. Childs, Brevard S., The Book of Exodus, The Old Testament Library (c. 1974 by Brevard S. Childs, pub. by The Westminster Press) p 611. I am not so sure about that. I suspect that the narrator means to tell us that this episode of unfaithfulness on Israel’s part, which later became a paradigm of prophetic preaching in the 8th and 9th Centuries B.C.E., has done some long term, if not permanent damage to the covenant relationship.

Moses has just come down from the top of Mt. Sinai. He has been up there for forty days fasting and writing the terms of the renewed covenant onto the two stone tablets. He is quite unaware that he has been noticeably changed, so much so that the children of Israel are afraid of him. This is a mystery, of course. I doubt we will ever understand exactly what happened to Moses at Sinai, but perhaps there are some analogies in our own experiences that give us a glimpse. I remember the return home of each one of my three children from their first semester at college. They were changed. They had been exposed to new ideas and values different from the ones with which they grew up. They had experienced a measure of independence that had given them a new sense of confidence. They thought about and responded to me in new and often critical ways that often made me just a little uncomfortable. They were still the same kids they were when I left them at the dormitory-but they were also different. I knew that if I was going to continue having a meaningful relationship with them, I had to start relating to them differently. Things between us would be different from now on. Good, but different.

How much more changed a man must be after a face to face encounter with the God of Israel! Moses was returning after having received the Torah, the commandments and ordinances that would assist Israel in living into nationhood as the chosen people of God. He had seen the shape of holiness. That is not the sort of experience you can share in a brief press release. Neither can you undergo such an experience and expect to come back the same person. It will take some time for Moses to unpack everything he brought with him from the top of Mt. Sinai and it will take some time for the people to digest it.

We all have life changing experiences that shape who we are. Some of them shape us for the better. Others can leave us wounded and scarred. Life is such that you cannot control the experiences you are going have. But you can put yourself in a place where you are assured that God’s Word will be a powerful and transformative experience in your life. You can make time with the scriptures a part of every day. You can make prayer a daily practice. You can worship with your sisters and brothers gathered around the preaching of God’s Word and the Eucharistic meal. I cannot promise that you will come away from church with your face glowing; but you can be sure that your heart is being transformed by the working of God’s Spirit.

It should also be noted that St. Paul cites this story in his Second Letter to the church at Corinth. II Corinthians 3:7-18. For Paul, the veil over Moses’ face symbolizes the obstruction to a correct understanding of Moses that can only be removed by faith in Jesus Christ.

Psalm 99

This psalm appears to be constructed in three sections, each ending with the refrain “Holy is he [God].” See vss. 5, 7 & 9. Like psalms 93 and 97, this psalm acclaims God as king over all the earth. The fact that these psalms make no mention of the kings of Israel or Judah suggests that they were composed after the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem ending the line of Davidic kings. To a vanquished people in a world filled with unjust and tyrannical kings, this psalm boldly proclaims that the only true King is the Lord. This King is a “lover of justice,” has “established equity” and has “executed justice and righteousness in Jacob.” Vs. 4. Naturally, then, the peoples and their unjust rulers tremble when confronted with the reality of God’s kingship. Vs. 1.

The “cherubim” (Vs. 1) were winged bull like creatures with lion heads. Dahlberg, B.T., “Angel,” The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, Vol. 1, (c. 1962 by Abingdon Press) pp. 131-132. Two of these fabulous beasts were carved at the top of the Ark of the Covenant over which the God of Israel was thought to be enthroned. Exodus 25: 18-20; Exodus 37:6-9; Numbers 7:89; I Samuel 4:4; I Kings 6:23-28; I Kings 8:6-7. If this reference is to the Ark, it is possible that the psalm is of much earlier origin than generally thought, dating back to the early period of the monarchy when the Ark was still in Israel’s possession. But the term “cherubim” is also used to personify storm clouds and thunder storms. Therefore, its use here is not inconsistent with a composition date for this psalm after the Babylonian conquest.

The mention of Moses, Aaron and Samuel, prominent men of faith who lived and ministered before the rise of the monarchy in Israel, further suggests that this psalm is post-exilic. Vs. 6. Having seen generations of kings fall short of what righteousness and justice demand, Israel was now convinced that God alone deserved the title “king.” Though their actions had an undeniable political dimension, the chief role of the three figures named in this psalm was priestly and intercessory. Aaron was the founding figure of cultic practice in Israel. Moses’ intercessions frequently came between Israel and God’s wrath at her disobedience. So also Samuel interceded on Israel’s behalf on numerous occasions. Yet while the psalmist affirms the role and legitimacy of Israel’s priestly establishment and the sacrificial worship over which it presides, this worship is only effective because “thou wast a forgiving God to them.” Vs. 8. The sovereignty and power of God, though manifested in storms and earthquakes, is chiefly expressed in God’s zeal for justice and readiness to show mercy.

2 Corinthians 3:12—4:2

A few words about Paul’s Second letter to the Corinthian church are in order. Paul evidently made a visit to the church in Corinth after writing I Corinthians. This visit was “painful” and did not result in any reconciliation of differences between the apostle and his congregation. Rather than attempting another visit that he feared would also be unsuccessful, Paul wrote a “letter of tears” to Corinth sent by the hand of Titus. Fearing the effects of this severe letter, Paul left Troas in Asia Minor where he had begun a successful mission and returned to Macedonia in search of Titus. Paul rejoined Titus in Macedonia and was greatly relieved to learn that the Corinthians had indeed responded favorably to his “severe” letter with a change of heart toward him. Paul wrote II Corinthians expressing his gratitude to the congregation and to encourage it in its faith.

For centuries biblical scholars have puzzled over the abrupt change in tone between II Corinthians 1-9 and II Corinthians 10-13. Most scholars now agree that these two sections represent different letters, though both authored by Paul, chapters 1-9 constituting the earlier letter and chapters 10-13 forming a later message. Furnish, Victor Paul, II Corinthians, The Anchor Bible Commentaries, (c. 1984 by Doubleday & Company, Inc.) p. 41. Some scholars maintain, however, that chapters 10-13 constitute all or part of Paul’s “letter of tears” while chapters 1-9 constitute a subsequent letter of thanksgiving written in response to Titus’ favorable report. Ibid p. 37.

Paul is here interpreting the lesson from Exodus discussed above. You will recall that Moses’ face glowed following his descent from Mt. Sinai with the tablets of the law. This change in Moses frightened the people and so Moses wore a veil when addressing the people. When Moses spoke with God, he removed the veil. Paul compares this veil on Moses’ face to the veil he contends prevents some of his fellow Jews from recognizing Jesus as God’s messiah. The metaphor is difficult because Moses’ veil was not designed to hinder the people from seeing or hearing him, but rather to protect them from the radiance of God’s glory by which they felt threatened.  Moses, not the people, takes cover under the veil. Consequently, we need to focus not so much on the people as on Moses. When Moses turns to speak with the Lord, the veil is removed. The glory of God is allowed to permeate Moses and he is transfigured with light. But when Moses turns away from the Lord, he must put on the veil.

According to Paul, Moses is rightly understood and seen only when he is face to face with God. He is no longer a mediator between God and Israel. Now God has shown directly into the hearts of his people “to give the light of knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” II Corinthians 4:6. Thus, only in Jesus Christ are the Hebrew Scriptures fully understood. “And we all,” says Paul, “with unveiled face [like Moses], beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed [like Moses] into his likeness from one degree of glory to another.” II Corinthians 3:18. What could previously be seen only through the veiled face of Moses can now be seen directly in Jesus. The same transformative power that filled Moses with light now shines through Jesus in the church.

Luke 9:28–36

Luke tells the transfiguration story a little differently than do Mark and Matthew who also report this amazing event. In Luke, the disciples are “weighted down” with sleep, but may not have actually fallen asleep. Vs. 32. Luke tells us not only that Jesus was conversing with Moses and Elijah, but also what they were talking about. They were speaking of the “departure” that Jesus was to accomplish at Jerusalem. Vs. 31. It is highly significant that the Greek word Luke uses for “departure” is the same one the Greek Old Testament uses for the title of the second book of the Bible, “Exodus.” The Exodus, of course, is the foundational and most significant saving act of God in the Hebrew Scriptures. Thus, Luke wishes to make absolutely clear that God is about to accomplish through Jesus’ suffering and death a new Exodus, a new saving event. The presence of Moses, the giver of the law, along with Elijah, the greatest of all prophets, indicates that this new Exodus to occur in Jerusalem, the City of David, will fulfill the whole of the Hebrew Scriptures. So when we arrive at verse 51 in which Jesus “set his face to go to Jerusalem,” we know that a critical turning point in the narrative has arrived. Jesus is now zeroing in on his primary objective.

The cloud enveloping the mountain top cannot help but bring to mind God’s appearance in the cloud over Mt. Sinai-the place from which Moses returned glowing with divine glory. Quite understandably, the disciples are afraid of the overshadowing cloud. So, too, the voice from the cloud is reminiscent of the voice thundering from Sinai so terrifying the people of Israel that they begged Moses to implore God no longer to speak directly to them. Exodus 20:18-20. Of course, it is also possible to see in this event a reflection of Elijah’s encounter with God on the holy mountain in the 19th Chapter of 1 Kings. There, too, the prophet encountered a powerful wind storm, an earthquake and a terrifying fire. In this case, however, God’s word was not found in any of these impressive natural events. Instead, God was heard in a “still small voice” or, as some translators have rendered it, “a sound of sheer silence.” I Kings 19:12.

I am intrigued by the possible link to the Elijah story because it alters my Sunday School impression of that voice from the cloud as deep, commanding and terrifying. Although the disciples are frightened as they enter the cloud, there is no indication that the voice from the cloud had a similar effect. Luke does not have the disciples falling on their faces in fear as do Mark and Matthew. Thus, I wonder whether my image of this event has not been colored more by Cecil B. DeMille than careful reading of the text. How does the voice of God really sound? How did the disciples perceive it? Would we know the voice of God even if we heard it? How does this question shape our perception of Jesus as God’s Son?

The marvelous thing about this story is its incomprehensibility. It raises more questions than it answers and reminds us that however much we may think we know about Jesus, we are not close to knowing him fully yet.

 

Sunday, November 22nd

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SUNDAY OF CHRIST THE KING

Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14
Psalm 93
Revelation 1:4b-8
John 18:33-37

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Almighty and ever-living God, you anointed your beloved Son to be priest and sovereign forever. Grant that all the people of the earth, now divided by the power of sin, may be united by the glorious and gentle rule of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. 

“The mobilization of the French police and gendarmes against this terrorist organization will be total and merciless.” Francois Hollande, President of France.

I can fully understand this response to what was by far the most brutal and far reaching act of terror committed on French soil since the Second World War. I remember all too well how the same sentiments were expressed by our leaders here in the United States in the wake of the attacks on September 11, 2001. Crying out for vengeance after having been grievously and wrongfully wounded is a very human reaction. Perhaps that is why we find so many such cries throughout the Book of Psalms. God, it seems, is entirely open to our expression of such feelings of outrage and our desire to see retribution visited upon our enemies.

Nevertheless, as graphic as their demands for punishment for their enemies might be, the psalmists leave the business of carrying it out to the Lord. Even the psalmist who blesses anyone who might bash out the brains of his/her enemies’ babies does not undertake that task him/herself. Psalm 137:9. And that for good reason. At our most objective best we find it hard discern what is just and fair when it comes to dishing out retribution. We are, of course, far from our most objective best after having been deeply hurt. All of this suggests to me that perhaps the day after a terrorist attack is not the best time to respond.

So, given time to cool down, how should we respond to an act of terror? Much depends on who the “we” is. Beyond our identity as American or French citizens, we are disciples of Jesus. We live first and foremost under the reign of God Jesus declares. I can already sense that some of my readers are tensing up. “Don’t drag Jesus and the Sermon on the Mount into this! These are terrorists. They won’t just strike us on the cheek. They will take our heads off if we let them!” The assumption is that, at some point, violence becomes both necessary and inevitable. If not now, when?

Similarly, in numerous conversations I have had with death penalty proponents, I get the question: “How would you feel if your mother, daughter, grandma were brutally murdered? Can you honestly say you would want the killer to be spared, possibly released again at some point?” If I show the slightest hesitation in my response, that is taken as some sort of moral victory. No doubt it is just that. I cannot deny that a brutal attack on someone I dearly love could transform this white, privileged, protestant, slightly left of center male into a blood thirsty vigilante. What matters, though, is not what I would do if my loved one were murdered, but what God did when his beloved Son was in fact murdered. When the Son God sent for the life of the world was brutally attacked and tortured to death, God did not respond with retribution. Instead, God raised up his crucified Son and gave him back to the very ones that crucified him. It is this crucified and risen Son that we call our king. That means fighting terrorism the way Jesus does: by loving and forgiving your enemy-even if it proves to be the death of you.

It seems that the presidential wannabees in both parties are vying to demonstrate that, if elected, they would be the “most merciless” in dealing with terror. But I am quite sure that excluding mercy from any response to those who have wronged us is quite out of the question for disciples of Jesus. That does not mean, of course, that no response is warranted. The venerable “just war” teaching, recognized in most Christian traditions, leaves room for the potential use of military means to deal with aggression. But even when resort is made to military force, it is always the last resort and the objective is always to restore peace and reconciliation. War, in Christian tradition, is never an instrument of retribution or vengeance.

Perhaps the most urgent contribution disciples of Jesus can make to the war on terror is changing the direction of the conversation about it. It seems to me that there are some important questions our leaders should be asking. What do the followers of the ISIS want? What are their grievances? What would reconciliation with ISIS look like? What sacrifices are we prepared to make for the sake of a just peace and reconciliation? I don’t hear those questions being asked by any of our governments. It seems to me, though, that they must be asked and every effort must be made to answer them before any military response can be considered “just.” If we don’t raise these critical questions, who will?

Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14

I discussed at some length the historical context and the outline of the Book of Daniel in my last post for Sunday, November 15, 2015. In short, the book was written to encourage the Jewish people during the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes over Jerusalem from 167-164 B.C.E. Antiochus used barbaric means to force the Jews in Jerusalem to abandon their faith and to embrace Greek religion and culture. Those who resisted him were often subjected to torture and execution. In this Sunday’s lesson the prophet Daniel sees God, “the ancient of days” (vs. 9) give all rule and authority to “one like a son of man.” Vss. 13-14. It is not clear whether this one is understood to be a human ruler or an angel of God. His rule, however, will be universal. Unlike the empires of Babylon, Persia and Greece, which invariably fracture under the weight of so many ambitious rulers seeking dominion, the kingdom of the son of man will remain forever.

As is usually the case for apocalyptic literature, the message is one of hope and encouragement. Despite all appearances to the contrary, God is still at work in the midst of all the global political, social and military turmoil that is turning everyone’s life upside down. It is tempting to sum up all of this with the trite phrase “God is in control.” I don’t care much for that assertion, however. Control is something you exercise over your lawn mower or automobile. It is not something you exercise over someone you love. Nothing ruins friendship, marriage, family and community quite as effectively as someone’s desire to exercise control. Arguably, God could come with a show of force, as he does in the Left Behind books, and impose his reign by sheer might. But that would make God little more than Hitler on steroids. God does not want to reign over creation in that way.

I don’t think God engineers the events of history so that they occur in accord with some predetermined plan. I do not believe that the murder of six million Jews was part of God’s design. Nor do I believe that God wills cancer, auto accidents, hurricanes and earthquakes. Is God triumphant over all of these things? To be sure, but God’s triumphal victory is a strange kind of victory. It is God’s patience rather than any exercise of power that carries the day. God does not fight fire with fire. That only results in a bigger fire. Instead, God responds to the wastes of our wrath with forgiveness, patience and eternal love. God does not clobber evil. God simply outlasts it. Against God’s eternal determination to save us, our stubborn resistance finally just runs out of steam. That might take some time, but God is nothing if not rich in time. The redemption of all creation is too important a job to rush.

Psalm 93

In this psalm the God of Israel is acclaimed king, though the proper translation is a matter of some dispute. Some scholars claim that the phrase echoes the proclamation that a human ruler has been elevated to kingship, i.e., “Absalom is King,” (II Samuel 15:10) or “Jehu is King” (II King 9:13). The Psalm might have been part of the Feast of Tabernacles liturgy. Rogerson, J.W. & McKay, J.W., Psalms 51-100, (c. 1977 Cambridge University Press) p. 209; Bruggemann, Walter, The Message of the Psalms, Augsburg Old Testament Studies (c. 1984 by Augsburg Publishing Company) p. 146. If this be the case, then the proper reading would be “The Lord has become king.” This hymn contains traces of ancient mythology reflecting a battle between the waters or the great sea monster, Tiamat and the Babylonian deity, Marduk.. See vss 3-4. Such mythological imagery is clearly reflected in the Genesis creation and flood narratives, though the “waters” in Genesis are not portrayed as hostile enemies of God. Instead, they are the instruments of God’s creative power (Genesis 1:2) and of God’s judgment against a sinful world. Genesis 6-8. Read in this way, the psalm can be understood as a declaration of God’s ascendency over all other gods and forces of nature. The lack of any specific denial of the existence of other gods argues for an earlier date for the composition of this psalm, surely before the Babylonian exile of 587 B.C.E.

Other scholars are inclined to interpret the psalm as a simple assertion that God is king. Ibid. p. 210; Anderson, Bernhard W., Out of the Depths: The Psalms Speak to us Today (c. 1983 by Bernhard W. Anderson, pub. by The Westminster Press) p. 176. Such a confession declares by implication that all other rulers who claim the title of “king” are mere pretenders. In short, it is a political statement. Such an interpretation would comport with a distaste for human monarchy consistent with much post-exilic Judaism fueled by prophetic criticism of Judah’s kings and their unfaithful, disastrous policies. It would also be entirely at home in an environment where, as was the case in post-exilic Judaism, such kings as there were ruled over empires whose armies occupied Judah and Jerusalem exercising varying degrees of oppression. Though the kings of the earth may make proud claims of sovereignty, God alone rules the earth and God only is worthy of the title “king.”

Whenever this psalm was composed and however one might interpret the opening acclimation that God is King, the message is clear. God reigns to the exclusion of all others who claim divine sovereignty. Indeed, the celebration of Christ the King that we observe this coming Sunday was instituted in 1925 by Pope Pius XI in response to what he characterized as growing secularism. The old monarchies governing Europe had been dissolved by this time and had given way to the modern nation state. The church’s political power and social status were substantially diminished under these new regimes as the state increasingly asserted its autonomy and independence from religious influence.

There was more at stake, however, than the church’s loss of political muscle. The new secular environment had become a breeding ground for dangerous and dehumanizing ideologies elevating loyalty to the nation state and its rulers over all other claims. As Pope Pius saw it, this new nationalism amounted to idolatry, constituting a threat both to the Christian faith and to human worth and dignity. Sadly, the horrific events that unfolded in the following decades proved him right. The celebration of Christ the King serves to remind us that, while the church throughout the world lives under many different governments all asserting their claims to the loyalty of her members, yet there is for the church only one King. A nation is only a group of people joined together by culture, ethnicity and force of humanly designed covenants. The church is a living Body joined as one by Christ, its Head. When loyalty to the Body of Christ conflicts with our allegiance to flag or country, “we must obey God rather than human authority.” Acts 5:29.

That does not preclude obedience to human governmental authority. To the contrary, government is a gift of God given for the sake of ordering our lives for good. Yet in a sinful and rebellious world, government tends to overstep its bounds and claim authority that rightfully belongs to God alone. No government has authority to command what God forbids. No government may exercise power that rightly belongs to God alone. No flag of any nation must ever fly higher in our hearts than the cross of Christ.

Revelation 1:4b-8

The Book of Revelation is, as I have said before, the most frequent victim of preacher malpractice in the Bible. Many people flock to this book with an insatiable interest in discovering when and how the world will end. If centuries of clever and complex interpretation along these lines proves anything at all, it is only that Revelation is entirely unsuitable for such a purpose. The book was written to encourage the persecuted churches of Asia Minor with their immediate struggles rather than to spawn speculation by 21st Century suburbanites about the distant future.

Our brief lesson for Sunday is taken from a larger greeting from the author of the Book of Revelation, John of Patmos, addressed to the churches of Asia Minor (modern day Turkey). Though the precise time of its writing is a matter of scholarly dispute. Most New Testament commentators agree that it was composed late in the 1st Century C.E. Christians were not under direct, systematic persecution at this time. Nonetheless, their relationship with the Jewish community was deteriorating. They were looked upon with suspicion and contempt by the imperial culture. Where it was acknowledged in every patriotic ceremony and civic event that “Caesar is Lord,” the confession that “Jesus is Lord” amounted to an act of sedition. Collins, Adela Yarbro, “Reading the Book of Revelation in the Twentieth Century,” Interpretation, vol. 40, No. 3 (July 1986) p. 240. Thus, when John confesses Jesus as “ruler of kings on earth” (vs. 5), he was firing a shot across Caesar’s bow that could well explain why he was living in exile.

Like the Book of Daniel, Revelation is written to a people living under some degree of persecution or, at the very least, the threat of persecution for their faith. Under such circumstances, it might seem as though God has abandoned his people or that God is powerless to save. How else can one explain the innocent suffering of Christians in Asia Minor? On a more universal plain, one might well ask how a God acclaimed both good and supreme over the earth can fail to intervene in horrific events like Auschwitz, the Cambodian killing fields or the carnage last week in Paris. The Book of Revelation takes this suffering seriously. Throughout its many chapters John makes clear how the “beast” that is the Roman Empire is not merely the enemy of Christians, but “the destroyer of the earth.” Revelation 11:18. Yet God’s victory lies not in the ability to inflect even greater destruction through retribution, but in patient and enduring love exemplified in the faithful lives of the saints.

It is important to recognize that God overcomes the forces of evil throughout Revelation by means of the “word.” When John describes his vision of Jesus, the only weapon Jesus has is the two edged sword issuing “from his mouth.” Revelation 1:16.  When Jesus Christ returns sitting upon a white horse ready to conquer his enemies, he is referred to as “Word of God.” The weapon with which he smites the nations is “the sharp sword that issues from his mouth.” Revelation 19:15. In short, it is the incarnate Word of the church’s preaching and teaching by which the political and military machinery of Roman oppression will be overcome. That is the only weapon God wields and it is the only arrow in the disciple’s quiver.  God prevails through the incarnate Word by which hearts are won over through faithful witness and preaching. As many of us might be singing this Sunday, “For not with swords loud clashing nor roll of stirring drums, but deeds of love and mercy the heavenly kingdom comes.” “Lead on, O King Eternal!” Evangelical Lutheran Worship # 805.

John 18:33-37

This brief snippet from the lengthy interchange between Jesus and Pontius Pilate is laced with irony. Pilate stands in the shoes of Caesar, the one acclaimed “king,” yet as John’s passion story unfolds, it becomes ever clearer that he has no real authority. Pilate must go out to meet his Jewish subjects in the portico because they refuse to contaminate themselves by coming into his courtroom. Though he purports to pass judgment on Jesus, it is Pilate who comes under judgment. Pilate’s tenuous hold on authority weakens with each verse. His interrogation of Jesus gets completely away from him. He cannot get Jesus either to admit that he is a king and so incriminate himself, or to deny his kingship and so pave the way for his release. So far from wielding kingly authority, Pilate finds himself bullied, intimidated and blackmailed by those who are supposed to be his subjects. He sounds almost pathetic when he protests to Jesus, “Do you not know that I have power to release you and power to crucify you?” John 19:10 “Power?” says Jesus. “You must be joking. You have no power. You know as well as I do that this is entirely out of your hands. God is at work here and there is nothing you or your little empire can do to stop it.” (my highly paraphrased rendition of Jesus’ response in John 19:11).

This gospel lesson brings into sharp focus the issue of the day: Is Jesus our King? What sort of King is he? Obviously, he is not the sort of king his accusers are making him out to be, that is, a messianic partisan seeking to overthrow Rome by violence. His kingly authority is not the sort that can get the charges against him dismissed. Yet there clearly is authority here. Jesus is the one character who is not driven by fear, anger or jealousy. Jesus alone is where he is because that is where he chose to be. Jesus is not a victim of circumstance. He is not an innocent bystander caught in the crossfire of somebody else’s fight. Jesus has stepped into Pilate’s court to bear witness to the truth. Pilate cannot handle the truth, but he cannot silence it either. The truth shines through the thin venire of Pilate’s pretended authority and imagined control.

Of course, in the final analysis the truth is not a what, but a who. Jesus is the truth and to know and trust him is to know the truth. It is our bold testimony that we cannot see rightly or understand what is true apart from submission to the kingly authority of Jesus.

Sunday, November 8th

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TWENTY-FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

1 Kings 17:8-16
Psalm 146
Hebrews 9:24-28
Mark 12:38-44

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O God, you show forth your almighty power chiefly by reaching out to us in mercy. Grant us the fullness of your grace, strengthen our trust in your promises, and bring all the world to share in the treasures that come through your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

The psalm for this coming Sunday makes unmistakably clear God’s preferential love for the widow, the orphan, the alien, the oppressed and the hungry. Our lesson from the Hebrew Scriptures focuses on the heroic faith of a single mom struggling to keep herself and her son alive during a famine. In the gospel lesson, Jesus raises up the fate of a widow whose last means of support is taken for maintenance of the Temple in Jerusalem. I have heard criticisms of the lectionary from time to time by people who insist that the Sunday readings were selectively chosen to support a “liberal social agenda.” Anyone who follows my posts can attest that I have often questioned the wisdom of the selection process employed by the lectionary makers. But in all fairness to them, I think they would have been hard pressed to give equal time for passages that encourage individual achievement, self-reliance and libertarian independence. The lectionary makers would have had a difficult time finding texts supporting the right of the wealthy to accumulate and retain for themselves more wealth. More difficult still would be the task of locating passages supporting imprisonment and deportation of aliens, legal or otherwise. Those actions and the ideologies justifying them find support neither in texts from the Hebrew Scriptures nor in those of the New Testament. So if there is a political agenda here, it is God’s. Don’t blame the lectionary.

As I have often said, the United States is not God’s chosen people. The Bible is not addressed to America. Its voice is directed to Israel and the Church. For that reason, it is a mistake to apply biblical norms to the social and political workings of the United States as though the Bible were a book produced for general consumption and its teachings were applicable to everyone. The Bible is normative for disciples of Jesus and for the people of Israel. Apart from these communities formed and shaped by it, the Bible is nothing more than an anthology of ancient literature of no more contemporary relevance than the Egyptian Book of the Dead.

Nonetheless, the Church lives in America. We drive on American roads, rely on American governments to collect our garbage, protect us from fire, regulate commerce and provide us a measure of social security. We cannot be indifferent to all that transpires in the larger society. Even as exiles who “have no lasting city” (Hebrews 13:14), we find our welfare in the welfare of our city of exile. Jeremiah 29:7. What, then, do we as Church have to contribute to the welfare of the United States?

In the past, I have used the term “counter-cultural” community as a useful synonym for the church’s faithful corporate witness. I am less than enamored with that term now, however. In addition to having become too “trendy,” the term can be construed to mean a community that derives its identity merely from being against the dominant culture. That is not an apt description of the life of the Church in society. In the first place, the dominant culture we call American is not rotten to the core. There is much that is admirable, much that is worth preserving and much with which the church can identify. Moreover, sometimes developments in the surrounding culture alert the church to its own blind spots, prejudices and sinfulness. The culture is not always wrong and the Church is not always right.

More significantly, however, I am uncomfortable with the term counter-culture because the church is not principally about protesting evil and injustice in the world. It is about embodying the mind of Christ and living out that consciousness. To be sure, faithful discipleship will at times bring the Church into conflict with ideologies and practices of the dominant culture. Indeed, the cultural environment might become so hostile to the reign of God that disciples will need to withdraw into their own enclave to live faithfully under that reign. Yet even such withdrawal should constitute a positive witness to the Lord we confess rather than mere revulsion at the condition of society.

The texts for this Sunday challenge us to recognize God’s agenda for creation in Jesus’ life given faithfully and freely to the implementation of that agenda and God’s resurrection of Jesus from death guaranteeing God’s eternal commitment to making that agenda a reality so that God’s will is “done on earth as in heaven.” We are challenged to practice hospitality to aliens, show mercy to those living on the margins of society and seek justice for those who have neither voice nor vote. That brings us into direct conflict with advocates of mass deportation and militarized borders. It puts us at odds with all who feel that nutrition, health care and housing for the poor in our midst is too expensive. Discipleship puts us on a collision course with an economy that elevates profit over people. That’s neither liberal nor conservative, Democratic or Republican. It’s Moses. It’s the prophets. It’s Jesus. Deal with it.

1 Kings 17:8-16

This story is from the beginning of the Elijah/Elisha tales. These tales come into the Bible from the Northern Kingdom of Israel that broke away from the Davidic Monarchy after the death of David’s son, Solomon. This Northern Kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrian Empire in 722 B.C.E. The stories of Elijah and Elisha were likely brought to the Southern Kingdom of Judah shortly after that time by refugees from the north. The stories were then incorporated into the traditions of Judah, which continued to exist under the Davidic monarchy until its conquest by Babylon in 587 B.C.E. During and following the Babylonian captivity the Elijah and Elisha stories were woven into the narrative fabric of Israel’s life in the land of Canaan.

As one commentator points out, “[r]ecent studies…have sought parallels between twentieth and twenty-first century communal traumas and the biblical events of 722 and 587. The past century has witnessed not only numerous cases of devastating war and population displacement but also a good deal of research into these phenomenon, using the tools of the social sciences. If we proceed with appropriate caution, we may assert that there are indeed insights to be gained into our texts. Clearly, the destruction of the Northern and Southern Kingdoms and the Babylonian Exile were central events in the life of Israel. In a pivotal article Wright (2009) argues that the Bible as a whole and its notion of a People of Israel owe themselves directly to catastrophic defeats (722 and 587) that resulted in Israel and Judah’s loss of territorial sovereignty. More recently, Carr (2010) has called the Hebrew Bible ‘a Bible for exiles.’ This is manifested in many biblical texts-not only portions of the Early Prophets, but also Lamentations, selected Psalms, passages from the prophets, and possibly Job-that express reactions akin to post-traumatic stress disorder. They reflect the need to constantly relive the trauma, as it were; they focus on blaming the Israelite community for its fate; and they at times give rise to feelings of intense nationalism, amid a glorification of the distant past. The Bible thus represents an Israel, or at least an influential group of Israelites responsible for its composition, trying to come to terms with catastrophe.” Fox, Everett, The Early Prophets, The Schocken Bible: Vol. 2 (c. 2014 by Everett Fox, pub. by Schocken Books) pp. 554-555; citations to Wright, Jacob, “The Commemoration of Defeat and the Formation of a Nation in the Hebrew Bible,” Prooftexts 29. (2009 Gen’l); Carr, David M., An Introduction to the Old Testament: Sacred Texts and Imperial Contexts for the Hebrew Bible, (c. 2010 by Wiley Blackwell).

While there is obviously danger in over psychologizing the Bible, I agree that the Hebrew Scriptures reached their final form during the nadir of Israel’s existence while she lived as a conquered and exiled people in a land not her own. Israel, or more properly Judah, was coming to grips with the loss of everything that had made her a nation: the land promised to the patriarchs and matriarchs; the temple in Jerusalem; and the line of David that was supposed to last forever. If national prominence, wealth and military power measure the strength of a deity, Israel’s God had surely been bested by the Babylonian pantheon. How could the God of a ruined and enslaved people be God in deed? How could Israel be the people of God while living in servitude? If Israel were not to abandon her faith altogether, she would need to rethink who her God truly is and what it means to be the people of such a God.

We are citizens of what is now the wealthiest and most powerful empire in the world. Most of us have been inducted into a Christianity that has dominated Western culture for over a millennium. For this reason, I believe we find it hard to hear the genuine voice of these scriptures. Moreover, that voice has undergone some horrible distortions from having been spoken under the acoustical conditions of wealth and prosperity. For centuries the Bible has been employed as justification for white privilege and western domination of the globe. It has been enlisted to support genocidal wars, heartless political ideologies and ruthless acts of terror. Today, it is being cited in support of racial hate, violence against gays and lesbians and the right to carry concealed weapons.

The scriptures speak from a context that is entirely alien to most of us. The biblical authors and editors have, for the most part, far more in common with the millions of refugees eking out their existences in containment camps with no nation to call home than with middle class American churchgoers who have been raised to believe that theirs is the nation “under God.” While this does not mean that we cannot rightly understand the scriptures, it does mean that we must learn to read them through different lenses and view them from perspectives other than those of power and privilege. The Bible is the book of the poor, the disenfranchised and the oppressed. That isn’t simply a political statement (though it surly has political import). It is a fact.

On its face, Sunday’s lesson is a touching story about kindness shared between a couple of strangers living on the margins. Some context is helpful here to give the story its full narrative punch. Elijah is a fugitive on the run. King Ahab is out to kill him for his fearless words of judgment against the king’s idolatry and the ruthless oppression of his administration. The woman in is a native of Phoenicia, a gentile outside the scope of Israel’s covenant and not a worshiper of Israel’s God. She is also a single mom living in the depths of poverty in the midst of a famine. As with hurricanes and other natural disasters, famine hits hardest the weak and the vulnerable. A widow with a small child living in a society with no “safety net” is about as weak and vulnerable as weakness and vulnerability get. When Elijah encounters this woman, she is gathering sticks to make a fire and cook a small biscuit from the last bit of wheat and oil she has. She will then split this small morsel with her little boy. After that, they will both starve.

Elijah asks her to bake him a biscuit also from her meager store. That is a mighty big ask. In the first place, this man is a stranger, a foreigner and a criminal. Why help him? What does she owe him? Helping him might get her in trouble with the authorities. We know that King Ahab has enlisted the help of all the neighboring kingdoms in tracking down Elijah. I Kings 18:7-10. Why would a woman with enough troubles of her own want to get involved with an illegal alien that has a bounty on his head? Secondly, there simply isn’t enough. What little this woman has cannot even sustain her and her son for long. Charity begins at home, after all. Could anyone blame her for denying aid to a perfect stranger in order to save the life of her own son?

The story, however, takes a turn that we would not expect. This is no chance meeting. We learn that God sent this prophet Elijah to this particular widow. That changes everything. God is behind all of this. The prophet therefore can promise the widow that her little jar of wheat meal and her flask of oil will see all three of them through the famine. The woman believes Elijah and they are, in fact, sustained. If the widow in this story had been practical and pragmatic, she would have sent Elijah away empty handed and kept for herself and her son the little she had left. Ultimately, she probably would have starved. Instead, she had compassion on Elijah and trusted the promise of his God who was surely unknown to her. In so doing, she discovered what the people of God have had to learn again and again: Our God is a God of generosity and abundance.

So here is the take away: The people of God do not believe in “chance,” We should not be caught uttering nonsense like, “Well what are the chances of our meeting here?” or “I guess we just got lucky.” At least we should not be using these terms when it comes to the people we encounter in our daily lives and the opportunities God gives us to show them compassion and hospitality. We believe that our God is behind every encounter we have with another person. We believe that every encounter is another opportunity to give or to receive God’s tender loving care. Because God stands behind every human encounter, it follows that God is able and willing to provide us with all we need to make such an encounter a saving, redemptive, life-giving event. Because God is generous, we can afford to be generous-always. To put it plainly, there is always enough. To believe less than that is to doubt the existence of the God we claim to worship.

Such bold faith stands in stark contrast to the craven fear of privation pervading our culture. Despite all the talk in Washington these days of belt tightening, deficits and fiscal cliffs and notwithstanding the irrational and racially motivated hatred of immigrants “stealing our country” whipped into a white hot frenzy by some presidential hopefuls, there is no shortage of anything anyone in the world needs to live well. However little we may think we have, when we place it at the service of our God it is always more than enough for ourselves and our neighbors. That is the divine economics of the loaves and the fishes. It is the economy of the people of God.

Psalm 146

This hymn of praise is among a group of psalms called “Hallelujah Psalms” (Psalms 146-150) because they begin and end with the phrase: “O Praise the Lord!” commonly translated “hallelujah.” The fact that this hymn speaks of royalty and the reign of justice solely in terms of God’s sovereignty with nary a mention of the Davidic monarchy suggests to me that it was composed after the Babylonian conquest of Judah when the people had no king or prince of their own. Such kings and princes as there may have been were no friends to this conquered people living in a land not their own. This would explain why the psalmist urges people not to put their “trust in princes.” Vs. 3. Skepticism about human rulers may also reflect Israel’s disappointment in her past rulers whose selfish, shortsighted and destructive actions contributed to the loss of her land and her independence as a people. In either case, the psalmist would have us know that God is the only king worthy of human trust and confidence. God alone has the interests of the widows, the fatherless and the resident aliens at heart. Vss. 7-10. God is able to exercise power without being corrupted by it. These factors and linguistic considerations support an exilic or postexilic date for this psalm. See Rogerson, J.W. and McKay, J.W., Psalms 101-150, The Cambridge Bible Commentary (c. 1977 by Cambridge University Press) p. 178.

I have always loved the phrase from the second verse translated by the old RSV as “Praise the Lord, O my soul.” Vs. 1. The Hebrew notion of “soul” or “nephesh” is nothing like the contemporary understanding of the soul as an immortal part of the human person that somehow survives death and goes on living somewhere in a disembodied state. In Hebrew thinking, the soul is the life force, the self, the innermost person. This innermost person must be urged, encouraged, prodded to praise the Lord. That is very much the way it is with me. I do not always feel like praying when I first wake up. In fact, more often than not I must discipline myself to make time for prayer. It is not until I am well into praying that I experience the joy that prayer brings. Like the psalmist, I need to encourage myself: “Come on, soul! Get with it! Wake up and look around at all there is for which you ought to be thankful!”

I must also say that I love these psalms of praise above all others. I am convinced that they are transformative. If we let them shape our hearts and minds, they make of us the joyful people God desires for us to be. Happy people are thankful people; people who recognize that all they have received is a gift; people who receive thankfully their daily bread without turning a jealous eye to see what is on everyone else’s plate. They are people who recognize, even in their failures and defeats, the presence of the one who makes each day new and finds new directions where everyone else can see only a dead end. This psalm was in all probability written by one who knew well the realities of oppression, poverty and human cruelty. But these things do not reign in his/her heart. God reigns throughout all generations. To God belongs all praise and trust.

Hebrews 9:24-28

As I have pointed out in previous posts, I believe that the author of Hebrews is struggling with the trauma to early believers resulting from the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. The loss of this structure and the liturgical institutions that gave meaning and substance to the faith of Israel struck a demoralizing blow to all of Judaism, including those Jews who were disciples of Jesus. The argument spelled out here is that the Temple and its sacrificial liturgy were merely “a shadow of the good things to come.” Heb. 10:1. They could not effect true reconciliation with God. The Temple was only a symbol of the dwelling place of God and its priests were merely human representatives whose sacrifices could do no more than point to the perfect sacrifice required to establish communion with God. By contrast, Jesus’ faithful life, obedient death and resurrection by the power of God establish communion with God, the reality to which the Temple and its priesthood could only point in anticipation.

This message is difficult for us to get our heads around because we are so far removed from the trauma it is intended to address. Yet, as I have said previously, there are perhaps some parallels in our own experience. We preach, teach and confess that the church is the body of believers in Jesus. Yet we cannot help getting attached to the building in which we worship. The sanctuary is a place where treasured memories coalesce. It is the place where we bring our children for holy baptism. It is the place where we witness their confirmation. It might also be the place where we spoke our marriage vows to our spouses and where we bid our last farewells to dear ones gone to join the church triumphant. When a sanctuary filled with so much meaning and so many memories is taken from us-whether through its destruction, the disbanding of the congregation or through renovations that altar the look and feel of the sanctuary-the result can be a deep sense of loss. The author of Hebrews reminds us that the building, however deeply we may be attached to it, is only a symbol or reflection of the reality which is Christ. As John points out in his gospel, worship of God is not tied down to any location or physical structure. John 4:21-25. The same can be said of particular liturgies, hymns or styles of worship to which we have a tendency to become attached. We can afford to lose them, provided we keep our focus on the person of Jesus to which they point us. As a book written to a church traumatized by loss and change, Hebrews speaks a timely and much needed word of hope and encouragement.

Mark 12:38-44

While the scriptures themselves are the inspired word of God, the same cannot be said of the chapter and verse designations that come with all of our Bibles. The chapter divisions commonly used today were developed by Stephen Langton, an Archbishop of Canterbury in about 1227 C.E. While these divisions make citation of Biblical texts easier, they can also blind us to connections between related portions of scripture that are arbitrarily broken by Langton’s system. I believe this Sunday’s text is a victim of this distortion. I should also say before going any further that I owe this insight to Professor Gerald O. West, a remarkable young theologian who teaches at the University of Theology at Kwazulu-Natal in South Africa. Professor West was a speaker at the Trinity Institute National Theological Conference which I attended in January of 2011. He is the one that alerted me to the context of this story of the “Widow’s Mite” which I simply failed to see for all of my life because I have always stopped reading this story at the end of Mark chapter 12. Now I invite you to read this story in its full context:

“As he taught, he said, ‘Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to be greeted with respect in the market-places, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.’

“He sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he called his disciples and said to them, ‘Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.’ As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!’ Then Jesus asked him, ‘Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.’”

Mark 12:38-13:2.

We have always used this text as a stewardship lesson. We urge people to be more like the poor widow who gave to the point of impoverishing herself than like the rich people contributing large sums of money representing only the excess of their great wealth. But that might not be the point at all. First of all, notice that Jesus does not commend the woman or her offering. He merely states the obvious. Her little coins are far dearer to her than the excess of the rich. For the rich, their offerings would at most affect the quality of the hotel they choose to stay in while vacationing at Monaco. For this woman, her offering represents her last chance for survival. Does it make sense that Jesus would commend this woman for committing suicide? When Jesus challenged the rich young man to sell everything and follow him, he instructed him to give his money not to the Temple and its commercial enterprises (which Jesus soundly condemned), but to the poor. Moreover, Jesus did not leave the young man without any options other than starvation. He invited the young man to follow him and find his security not in wealth but in the community of faith through which all disciples are blessed. This woman is given no such summons and has no such option.

Perhaps we need to read the story of the widow in connection both with what precedes and what follows. Just prior to this incident, Jesus warns his disciples to beware of the scribes who “devour widow’s houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers.” Vs. 40. The widow in our lesson appears to be “Exhibit A” for this very point. She has put into the Temple treasury all that she had to live on. Vs. 44. We have always assumed that this was a voluntary donation and thus an expression of generosity and faith in God. But that isn’t exactly what the text says. The gospel tells us only that Jesus was watching “the multitude putting money into the treasury.” Vs. 41. How do we know that they were doing so voluntarily? Could this have been a sort of tax? We know that there were such taxes imposed for the support of the temple from other biblical sources (See, e.g., Matthew 17:24-27). Taxes, as we all know, fall harder upon the poor and lower classes than on the rich. Again, our lesson is a case in point. If I am right about this, then the first two verses from chapter 13 which are not a part of our lesson, make perfect sense. Jesus leaves the Temple with his disciples who have presumably heard his teaching in Chapter 12. As usual, they are clueless. All they can do is gawk at the Temple like a band of tourists coming to the big city for the first time and yammer about how marvelous it is. But Jesus has been telling them from the time of his arrival in Jerusalem that the Temple and the corrupt and exploitive practices it represents are not marvelous in God’s eyes. Instead of glorifying the God who is the guardian of widows and orphans, the Temple and its priesthood, aided by their Roman overlords, are impoverishing and exploiting widows. For this reason, the Temple is doomed. Not one stone of it will remain upon another when God is through with it.

I have to confess that I have been unable to find another single commentator on the Gospel of Mark that agrees with this reading or even considers it. (I have consulted four) But given the context, I must say that I find this interpretation very compelling. How, then, does this text so construed speak to us? I don’t think the church in the United States can fairly be accused of impoverishing anyone. Unlike the Temple authorities in Jesus’ day, we don’t have the power to impose taxes. We ask for financial commitments, but these are voluntary and they are not legally enforceable. Still and all, there is often a tendency in the church to view people from the standpoint of consumers. Very often dialogue about mission degenerates into tiresome discussions in which the dominant question is “How can we get more members?” The trouble here is that we begin to view people not as persons to be served and cared for, but as raw meat to fill our committees and help finance our operations. Naturally, people flee from organizations seeking to exploit them and so we fail both in our purpose as a church and in our objective of bringing on board new members.

The lesson also forces us to face the troublesome fact of economic inequality within the church. If we take seriously what Jesus teaches us about the proper use of wealth and if we take to heart Paul’s understanding of the Church as the Body of Christ whose health depends on the wellbeing of all its members, we must ask ourselves how it is possible that we have disciples of Jesus here in the United States and around the world that lack the basic necessities of living. If we are called to be an outpost for the reign of God in the world, then we ought not to import into the church the same disparities and lack of concern for our neighbor that is distressingly common in our culture today.

Sunday, November 1st

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ALL SAINTS DAY

Isaiah 25:6-9
Psalm 24
Revelation 21:1-6a
John 11:32-44

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Almighty God, you have knit your people together in one communion in the mystical body of your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Grant us grace to follow your blessed saints in lives of faith and commitment, and to know the inexpressible joys you have prepared for those who love you, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

I have been reading a lot lately about young people from Europe and North America leaving everything and traveling to the Middle East to fight for ISIS, Al Qaeda and other such organizations. We can rant and rail all we want about how awful these terrorist groups are and wonder aloud why young people are drawn to them. But perhaps the more pertinent question for the church is why these young people are not drawn to leave everything and follow Jesus-as did the first disciples and generations of disciples after them. Say what you will about the terrorists, but it seems obvious to me that they are communicating a vision sufficiently compelling to inspire young people to to leave behind their comfortable middle class existences to live for it fight for it and even die for it. Mainline Protestantism typically does not offer anything of the kind. Worship in our culture is not worth sacrificing the Super Bowl, much less our lives. Our churches don’t demand sacrifice from our members. Instead, we woo them with programs, services and entertainment, then beg them for contributions and plead with them to volunteer their time to support us and our programs. Not surprisingly, the response we get is just as tepid as the bland consumer faith we are marketing. When you market to consumers, consumers are what we get. Consumers only consume. It’s what they do. They are savvy enough to know a good deal when they see it. If you can get assurance that the church will be there to baptize, marry and bury you for the price of showing up once in a blue moon and tossing a few dollars into the collection plate, that’s a fair enough exchange. Why would any informed consumer pay more?

Trouble is, the church is not called to market to consumers. The church is called to recruit saints. To borrow a motto from the United States Marines, Jesus is looking for a few good people. Make no mistake about it. Jesus loves all people. Jesus ministers to all people. Jesus never turns away anyone in need. But when it comes to choosing his disciples, Jesus is selective. Jesus does not want as disciples those who are not prepared to part with everything they own, even to the point of becoming homeless. Mark 10:17-22; Matthew 8:18-20; Luke 9:57-58. Jesus will not have disciples who put even family obligations over loyalty to him and the reign of God he proclaims. Mark 3:31-35; Matthew 8:21-22; Luke 9:59-62. Following Jesus means loving your enemy-even the ones that strike you on the cheek, take everything you have, blow up your buildings and behead you. Matthew 5:38-48. Discipleship requires that we go out to meat ISIS armed only with prayer. “But, pastor, with all due respect, those people would just kill us!” That’s typically the response I get to these observations and my standard reply is, “Yep, you got that right.” Jesus calls his disciples to take up the cross and stand with him in the line of fire. If you are squeamish about getting shot, beheaded or nailed to a cross, discipleship is not your line of work. Sainthood is not for whimps.

Now my Lutheran readers are squirming in their seats at this point. So let me assure you all that I am not preaching “works righteousness” here. Salvation is God’s work from beginning to end. Contrary to what our ELCA logo might be taken to imply, God doesn’t need our hands or anything else from us to get God’s work done. I side altogether with Martin Luther who tells us that the kingdom of God comes without our prayers-and without our programs, activities, witness, advocacy and all our preachy-screechy social statements. I repeat: the kingdom will come without you’re doing a damn thing. But is that what you want? Do you really want to spend your life on the sidelines as God’s new creation breaks into our old world? Would you be content to be a mere spectator at the World Series if you had a chance to play in the game? Do you want just to sit on the curb, eat your funnel cake and watch as the saints come marching in, or do you want to “be in that number”? No, God does not need us to bring to birth the new creation in which all things will be reconciled in Christ. But God has graciously invited us to participate in and be a part of that great work. God invites us to start living eternally now. That’s worth living for, sacrificing for and dying for. I don’t know about you, but I want in on this.

To sum up briefly: I believe many young people (people of all ages, for that matter) are hungry for a vision worthy of their life’s dedication. The reign of God Jesus proclaims in which all the walls of animosity dividing humanity and the ancient hatreds that keep us at each other’s throats are finally swallowed up in a love stronger than death is precisely that. A life that is shaped by God’s future lived in the present under the sign of the cross is a life well lived. It is what we call sainthood.

Isaiah 25:6-9

As I have pointed out before, the book of the prophet Isaiah is regarded by most Hebrew Scripture scholars to be the work of three different prophets. Isaiah 1-39 is attributed in the main to Isaiah the prophet who lived and prophesied during the 8th Century B.C.E.. during the reigns of Judean kings Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah. Isaiah 40-55 is attributed to a prophet who preached toward the end of the Babylonian exile of the Jews, declaring to them God’s forgiveness and God’s promise to lead them back from exile to their homeland in Palestine. Isaiah 55-65 contain the words of a prophet addressing the Jews who in fact returned to Palestine and were struggling to rebuild their community under difficult circumstances. But this neat three part division is still a little too simplistic. All three prophetic collections underwent editing, revisions and additions in the course of composition. Consequently, there are many sections of First Isaiah that probably belong to a prophet speaking to a much later time. It appears that the words from our lesson, which fall within the chapters attributed to the Isaiah of the 8th Century B.C.E., are more likely from the time of disillusionment that developed in the post-exilic setting of the 6th Century. Some commentators date these verses or fragments of them as late as the first third of the 2nd Century B.C.E. e.g., Kaiser, Otto, Isaiah 13-39, The Old Testament Library (c.1974 by SCM Press, Ltd.) p. 179. Others maintain that our reading, or at least parts of it, can be attributed to the Isaiah of the 8th Century B.C.E. See Mauchline, John, Torch Bible Paperbacks (c. 1962 by SCM Press, Ltd.) p. 24.

The lesson is a small portion of a larger section beginning at Chapter 24 where the prophet announces that the Lord will lay waste the earth and that all people will be caught up in its desolation. Isaiah 24:1-13, Isaiah 24:17-23. This woeful dirge is punctuated by a psalm of praise calling for the earth to acknowledge and glorify the majesty of God. Isaiah 24:14-16. This desolation is of cosmic proportions. Chapter 25 begins with a psalm of thanksgiving to the Lord for God’s just judgment upon the world rulers and his protection for the poor and the needy. Isaiah 25:1-5. It is for this remnant, the poor and the needy who have been ruthlessly oppressed by the kings of the earth, that “the Lord of Hosts will make for all peoples a feast of fat things….”  Vs. 6. This judgment for the poor and oppressed includes all nations and peoples, but it is a particularly joyful event for Israel because it demonstrates that God is indeed the very God she has been faithfully serving and in whom she has been placing her hope. No wonder, then, that the people of Israel cry out: “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us.” Vs. 9. This passage is a bold declaration that Israel’s hope in the justice and salvation of God is not misplaced. The smart money is on the God of Israel!

Notice that Israel has played no active part in this saving work of God. She has only waited patiently for it. I have to say that this grates on me a bit. Having come of age in a generation that thought it would change the world for the better and which placed a high value on social activism, the notion of sitting and waiting for salvation feels grossly irresponsible. Yet when it comes to God’s kingdom, there is nothing else that we can do. God will establish peace and justice in God’s own time. The temptation we face is impatience. We want the kingdom now and we are prone to take all the military, legislative and revolutionary short cuts necessary to get there. We don’t have time to wait for love to persuade. We don’t have enough patience for the long and difficult work of reconciliation. Prayer seems so weak and ineffectual compared to action. So we push ahead with our own notions of peace and justice, employing our tactics of “shock and awe” to get the job done quickly and efficiently. But that is not the way of our patient God who has all eternity to work with. Changing hearts and minds takes time-a lot of time. God is willing to take all the time in the world to prepare every heart for the coming of his kingdom. Jesus promised that it was his Father’s good pleasure to give us the kingdom. He never said it would be done within the first hundred days of his administration.

Psalm 24

There has been much scholarly speculation about this ancient hymn of praise. It has often been thought that this psalm is a liturgy for the annual procession with the Ark of the Covenant commemorating David’s movement of the Ark to Jerusalem. (II Samuel 6). Rogerson, J.W. & McKay, J.W., Psalms 1-50, The Cambridge Bible Commentary (c. 1977 by Cambridge University Press) p. 108. This is possible, but there is no direct evidence in the Hebrew Scriptures that such a ceremony existed in Israel. Other commentators suggest that this song might have been sung at the climax of the autumn festival. See Weiser, Artur, The Psalms, The Old Testament Library (c. 1962 by S.C.M. Press, Ltd.) p. 232. It is probably safe to say at least that this psalm is a worship liturgy of some sort and that it dates back to the Judean monarchy and perhaps even to the time of David and Solomon. If the psalm does go back to the time of David, then the “holy place” (vs.3) is obviously not the Temple (which was built after David’s death by his son, Solomon), but a tent-like shrine or tabernacle. The “hill of the Lord” is Mt. Zion. Vs. 3. The psalm reflects both dimensions of Israelite worship-the coming of God to the sanctuary and the coming of the worshiper into God’s presence there. Because “all the earth” belongs to the Lord (vs. 1), God is not confined to the sanctuary or bound to any holy place. The doors must “lift up” their heads that “the King of Glory may come in.” vs. 7. It is absurd to imagine that any humanly constructed sanctuary could contain the God who laid the foundations of the world. Yet God in his mercy and compassion for Israel voluntarily comes into the sanctuary to meet those who come to worship.

“Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place?” vs. 3. The answer to this question in many of the ancient Near Eastern religious traditions would be strict measures of cultic purity such as ritual washing, fasting from certain foods, abstinence from sexual relations, freedom from disease or physical defect, etc. Indeed, these kinds of cultic purity requirements for worship are found in the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. But here the proper preparations for worship are ethical. Honesty and integrity trump external cultic preparations.

What, then, does this psalm tell us about worship? First, worship begins with acknowledging that “the earth is the Lord’s.” This has profound geopolitical, ecological and ethical implications, challenging our accepted notions of land ownership and national sovereignty.

“Get off my land!”

“Who says it’s your land?”

“I have the deed to it”

“Where did you get the deed?”

“From my father.”

“Where did he get it?”

“From his father.”

Where did he get it?”

“He fought for it!”

“Well, then, I’ll fight you for it!”

This little interchange goes to illustrate the obvious: If we go back far enough, we invariable discover that we are living on land our ancestors took away from somebody else. So even if you assume that whatever land is not occupied is up for grabs, it has been several millennia since there has been any such land available for the taking. Claims of land ownership are therefore intrinsically morally suspect. Moreover, the psalmist makes clear that the earth, every inch of it, belongs to the Lord. Even the promised land was not given to Israel in any absolute sense. Life in the land of Canaan was to be lived in compliance with Israel’s covenant with God. When Israel began treating the land as her own, living contrary to the covenant and exploiting the land and her own people, God expelled her from the land.

Second, the earth is God’s living creation. It is not an inert ball of resources we are free to exploit at our convenience to serve the national interests of whatever nation state we happen to belong to. If you go back to the second chapter of Genesis, the earth was created first. Only then did God create the human being to tend and care for the Garden God planted in Eden. Genesis 2:15. The message is clear: It’s not all about us. The earth is God’s garden and we are here not as owners, but as gardeners. One objective of worship, then, is to re-orient our hearts and minds to accept God’s ownership of all creation and our privileged position, not as one of domination, but of careful stewardship and responsible care.

Revelation 21:1-6a

Revelation is by far the most abused, misunderstood and misquoted book in the entire Bible. It has been an inexhaustible source of speculation for people who understand it as the key to figuring out how and when the world will come to an end. This is not the place to embark on a lengthy discussion of the origin, purpose and meaning of Revelation. Nevertheless, I would urge you to read Revelation 2-3 in addition to the lesson for this Sunday. There you will find seven letters dictated by Jesus to the seven churches of Asia Minor in a vision to the author, John of Patmos. The letters reflect the struggles of a church under varying degrees of persecution. Some of them face prosecution and death. Others face more subtle social pressures to compromise with cultural ethical norms and pagan religious practices. This is a church struggling for survival in a hostile society. The Roman Empire’s oppressive cruelty is given expression in the lurid images of beasts, demons and prostitutes employed by John. The imagery used in describing the Lamb of God, the heavenly court and the angelic forces of God all stretch the imagination to the breaking point, but affirm the ultimate victory of the Lamb who was chose to be slain rather than prevail through violence over against the violent demonic forces at work in the Empire. Thus, Revelation is not so much a key to the future as it is a word of encouragement and hope for disciples of Jesus who face suffering and persecution in every age. For those of you wishing to understand more about this strange and wonderful book and its proper overall interpretation, I refer you to an excellent article produced by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. You might also want to check out the Summary Article by Craig R. Koester, Professor of New Testament at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN. on enterthebible.org.

Our lesson for Sunday constitutes the climax of Revelation. John witnesses the descent of the Holy City, the New Jerusalem from God to earth. This is highly significant. Note well that John does not describe Christians “going to heaven” to be with God, but God coming to dwell with God’s people. The words “Behold, the dwelling of God is with people,” reflects the heartfelt desire expressed by the Lord throughout the Law and the Prophets. It has never been God’s intent to destroy this world and replace it with a better one. Indeed, God specifically rejected that course of action in the story of Noah’s Flood. (See Genesis 8:20-22). Instead, God makes all things new.

There is both continuity and discontinuity in the new creation-just as there was continuity and discontinuity between the man Jesus the disciples had come to know throughout his ministry with them and the resurrected Christ who appeared to them on Easter Sunday. The Resurrected one was Jesus, to be sure. Yet he was not merely a resuscitated corpse. This resurrected Jesus was alive in a new and powerful sense that placed him beyond the reach of death. His ascension to the right hand of the Father as witnessed by the gospel of Luke does not make Jesus more distant, but renders him even more intimately present than ever before. In the same way, the New Jerusalem is not a spiritual shadow of the dying physical city. Rather, it is a resurrected city that is more intensely alive precisely because it is now animated by the very presence of God in its midst.

I think that the hope contained in this lesson is very well expressed by Professor Brian Peterson of Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary:

“We do not create this new heaven and earth; the New Jerusalem comes down from God, and thus comes only as a gift. We can discern its outline already in the gospel of Jesus, crucified, and risen. Because God is with us already — in the proclamation of the Gospel, at the table of our Lord, and in the Spirit filling the church — we are witnesses to that coming new city, with our words and with our lives. We carry gracious hints of its coming when we live out costly love for one another (John 13), and when we practice startling welcome to those otherwise left outside (Acts 11).”

I urge you to read Professor Peterson’s entire article at workingpreacher.org.

John 11:32-44

Unlike Matthew, Mark and Luke, John’s gospel is not divided into bite size readings that contain numerous nuggets of insight. John takes his sweet time spinning a yarn. He gives you numerous clues and hints to where he is going that only become clear a chapter or two later when he springs the punch line. I guess that is why John does not get his own year in the lectionary as do his fellow gospel writers. But perhaps the problem is more with us than with John. We are the ones with the short attention spans. We are the ones who begin to glance at our watches when we perceive that worship is not proceeding on schedule. We are a generation in a hurry. As a result, we miss a lot of living as we dart from one point to another with a third point on our mind.

If we begin at the start of Chapter 11, we hear first that Jesus was told of Lazarus’ illness while in Galilee, but chose to remain there another two days before beginning his trip to Judah were Lazarus was. Consequently, Lazarus was dead long before Jesus arrived. Why would Jesus do such a thing? Granted, raising a man from death is a lot more spectacular than simply healing a sick one. But is that any way to treat someone you love? Whatever the reason for his remaining, it is clear that Jesus moves on his own time. He will not let himself be governed by emergencies. He simply refuses to be busy. That must have been the Jesus quality that impressed John most. His gospel is anything but rushed. We proceed leisurely from Galilee to the outskirts of Bethany and more leisurely still from there to the tomb of Lazarus. Jesus is in no hurry to his work and makes clear that what he is about to do will be for the benefit of those around him who are to witness this great miracle.

Jesus wept. Vs. 35. Again, I am at a loss to understand why. I expect that Jesus knew that he was about to raise Lazarus. So why weep? I am not convinced that Jesus was weeping for Lazarus. His concern appears to be for the people around him. He is grieved that Martha, while she mouths faith in a future resurrection in the sweet by and by, does not see in him the very presence of resurrection and life. Jesus is grieved at Mary’s sorrow and her seeming lack of even Martha’s level of hope. Jesus is grieved at the mourners who have nothing to offer Mary and Martha but sympathy. He is grieved that death is roaming about the neighborhood, making its presence felt like a bully no one dares even to mention, much less challenge. Jesus needs to demonstrate in a concrete way that he is the resurrection and the life, that death has no power over him and that he is able to offer life to those enslaved by the fear of death. Hence, the raising of Lazarus.

This story is pivotal for John’s gospel. The raising of Lazarus provokes the meeting of the Sanhedrin at which the decision is made to kill Jesus. John 11:45-53. The irony here is that Jesus is to be put to death for giving the gift of life. The Sanhedrin will also plot to take the life of Lazarus as his presence constitutes ongoing testimony to Jesus. This episode expands on and amplifies the prologue to John’s gospel in which it is said of Jesus that “In him was life and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.” John 1:4-5 Neither by killing Jesus nor by murdering Lazarus will the darkness be able to overcome the light of life.

Among other things, saintliness is a life that is not driven. It is not driven by every occurrence claiming to be urgent. It is not driven by fear of what others might think or how they may judge what we do or say. It is not driven by the fear of death. The life of a saint consists of following Jesus at his own leisurely pace focusing on what is significant rather than on everything that seems urgent. This is a wonderful text on which to preach. I only wonder if I have the patience for it!

Sunday, September 6th

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FIFTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Isaiah 35:4-7a
Psalm 146
James 2:1-17
Mark 7:24-37

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Gracious God, throughout the ages you transform sickness into health and death into life. Open us to the power of your presence, and make us a people ready to proclaim your promises to the whole world, through Jesus Christ, our healer and Lord.

“Put not your trust in princes…” Psalm 146:3.

This renunciation did not come cheaply for Israel. From the dawn of the Iron Age when the people first demanded a king and the prophet Samuel reluctantly anointed one for them until the disastrous wars against Rome that ended once and for all her hopes for national restoration, Israel’s trust in human leaders invariably led to disappointment. The psalmist testifies to this hard won wisdom and warns his/her people against yielding again to the Siren song of messianic pretenders. Happy the people “whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord [their] God,” s/he declares. Psalm 146:5. God alone can be trusted to “uphold those who are bowed down…” to watch over the resident alien, to “uphold the widow and the fatherless…” Psalm 146:8-9. Yet it seems we cannot do without some type of human governance. That is why for the last three decades I have faithfully made my sojourn to the polling station on the first Tuesday in November to cast my vote.

But not this time. I have finally decided that, for the time being at least, I am through voting in national elections. I can already hear the howls of protest. How irresponsible to lay down a potent weapon in the struggle for social justice! How cold and unfeeling to abandon the marginalized by forsaking the political process! How can I so heartlessly turn my back on the needs of the world to revel in my self-centered, other worldly piety? Do I really imagine that I can keep my soul pure by refusing to dirty my hands with the hard work of advocating justice, peace and equity in the public forum? I don’t take these charges lightly. Nor did I make this decision without giving the matter some thought. So let me explain myself before you decide my case.

My rationale for refusing to vote is simple. I don’t vote because none of the candidates for whom I am eligible to vote care for the issues about which I am passionate. Some will offer them lip service, given the right audience. But no one I know is campaigning for truly affordable health care for all people, full and adequate funding for Medicaid and the WIC program. No candidate is running on proposals to end hunger and poverty globally or to pursue complete military disarmament. Nobody I know is advocating housing, healthcare and nutrition as basic human rights rather than mere “programs” that can be defunded at the whim of a congressional committee. If at least some of these things are not at the top of the agenda and incorporated into a candidate’s concrete proposals for the nation’s immediate future, I don’t believe it’s worth my time to stop by the ballot box.

Let me also say that, as far as I am concerned, it’s not about the economy. I have no interest in the sterile debate over which of the two major parties can do a better job of revitalizing the economy. Frankly, I have no interest in reviving an economy built on the foundation of exploited labor and risky financial ventures that put the pensions, savings and homes of ordinary people at risk to produce huge profits for speculators while producing no product of social value. I see no benefit to resurrecting an economy driven by credit rather than real wealth. We got into a recession just ten years ago through an orgy of consumption. By falsely inflating the value of real estate, mortgaging it to the hilt and packaging it into fraudulent financial instruments we duped the public into spending money we don’t have to buy things we don’t need at prices we cannot afford. Thinking that we can find our way to a sustainable solution through more of the same is lunacy. The economy does not need to be revived. It needs to be remade. I want an economy that produces goods and services that meet human need rather than satisfying human greed. I want an economy that compensates workers for the social value of what they produce. I want an economy that re-distributes wealth rather than concentrating it in the hands of a few. Nobody on any party’s slate is promising to work for that. To put it as simply as I can, I am not voting because there is no one for whom to vote.

Oddly enough, I have been called both cynical and hopelessly idealistic in almost the same breath: cynical because I have supposedly given up on politics and left it to the devil and his angels; hopelessly idealistic because it should be obvious to me that no candidate can possibly win an election on the platform I am looking for. Politics is the art of the possible, I am told. We must make the choices that are presented to us, not hold out indefinitely for choices we would like to have. But I must say, I cannot think of anything more cynical than the view that what we have on the slate is the best we will ever get and so we should just hold our noses and pull the lever for whoever’s stench is least offensive. I refuse to accept the proposition that we will never have any leader that is not selected for us by kingpins with the money and influence to buy their nominations. I must also say that I cannot imagine any sillier, more naïve, more head-head-in-the-sand notion than believing continued participation in a wholly corrupt, morally bankrupt system of elections dominated by two parties whose well-heeled handlers determine the outcome will someday produce a government with integrity. That is not even idealistic. It’s delusional.

I maintain that my refusal to vote is a vote. It is a vote of no confidence in a government by the wealthy and powerful for the wealthy and powerful. If enough of the electorate joins me, perhaps that will open the way for a new generation of leaders who see an opportunity in winning back the disenfranchised. Perhaps then we will get candidates willing to talk to us about the issues that matter. Maybe we will finally see an election that is not dominated by ideological food fights and name calling matches. Perhaps we will finally have debates consisting of more than trading sound bites. It may be that the door will finally be opened for concerns like mine actually to be heard, discussed and considered rather than dismissed out of hand as “off message.” Perhaps no vote is the only vote that holds out any hope for genuine change.

This might all be wishful thinking. I cannot guarantee that abstention from voting will bring about a salutary change. But I am reasonably sure that doing the same thing over and over based on the same assumptions and using the same methods practically guarantees getting the same result. Thirty years of voting consistently in every election has gotten me nothing but an increasingly self-interested, dysfunctional and unrepresentative government. So now I am trying something new.

Isaiah 35:4-7a

As I have noted previously, the Book of Isaiah constitutes a rich collection of prophetic oracles, prose and narrative that biblical commentators typically divide into three sections. The first section is largely attributed to the prophet Isaiah of the 8th Century B.C.E. (Isaiah 1-39). Isaiah preached to Judah and counseled her kings during a tense period of the nation’s history as she lived uneasily in the shadow of the great Assyrian Empire. The second section, sometimes called “Second Isaiah” (Isaiah 40-55), is the work of an anonymous prophet who prophesied toward the end of the Babylonian Exile between 587 B.C.E. and 539 B.C.E. The prophesies comprising what is commonly called “Third Isaiah” (Isaiah 56-66) come from a period beginning shortly after the return of the exiled Jews from Babylon in 539 B.C.E., but before the rebuilding of the temple in about 515 B.C.E. The identity of this prophet is likewise unknown.

This three part division of Isaiah, like life in general, is not as neat and tidy as we might hope. Our lesson for Sunday is a prime example. Although located within the collection of prophetic material usually attributed to the Isaiah of the 8th century, these verses are taken from a poetic composition that comes to us from the 6th 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 Isaiah 35 in its entirety.

The prophet’s principal 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. 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 world today? 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 brought 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

This is a psalm of praise celebrating the sovereignty of Israel’s God. Like the rest of the psalms that follow it to the end of the Psalter (Psalm 147-Psalm 150), this hymn begins and ends with the exclamation, “hallelujah” which is Hebrew for “Praise Yahweh!” It is likely that this psalm comes rather late in Israel’s history. We know, at any rate, that it was used in later Judaism as part of daily morning prayer. Weiser, Artur, The Psalms, A Commentary, The Old Testament Library (c. 1962 by S.C.M. Press, Ltd.) p. 830. There is no mention of the line of David nor 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:

Do not put your trust in princes, in mortals, in whom there is no help.

When their breath departs, they return to the earth; on that very day their plans perish.

Vss. 3-4. Instead, Israel is encouraged to put her trust in God. God is the one ruler who “sets the prisoners free.” Only “the Lord opens the eyes of the blind…lifts up those who are bowed down…” and “loves the righteous.”vss. 7-9. The only king worthy of our trust is the God of Israel.

The psalm concludes with the bold affirmation that the Lord will reign forever. The implication is that God has been reigning throughout history in spite of some severe setbacks for Israel and despite her precarious existence under foreign domination and occupation. This confidence is rooted in Israel’s past experience of God’s salvation for the poor and downtrodden in the Exodus, Wilderness Wanderings and the Conquest of the Land of Canaan. The return from Exile might also be in view here.

But it must also be said that Israel’s faith is future oriented. There is reflected here a hope, expectation and longing for the “Day of the Lord” when perfect justice and righteousness will be established through the defeat of Israel’s enemies. Everson, A. J., “Day of the Lord,” The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, Supplementary Vol. (c. 1976 by Abingdon) pp. 209-210.   This hope is sometimes expressed in military terms. When Israel prevailed over her enemies in war, she always understood these victories as engineered by God. See, e.g., Deuteronomy 8:17; Psalm 44:1-3. Yet from the time of the Judges to the time of the Maccabean princes, Israel’s experience with political and military rulers had been a disappointment. Even the best of these leaders had failed to inaugurate anything like the new creation to which her prophets testified. Clearly, another kind of messiah was needed.

James 2:1-17

For my general comments on the Letter of James, see my remarks at last week’s post for Sunday, August 30, 2015.

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.  To our shame, I must point out that my own Evangelical Lutheran Church in America leads the pack on that score. See The Most and Least Racially Diverse U.S. Religious Groups. I don’t believe that most churches consciously decide to segregate. In fact, most protestants surveyed would agree with the statement, “Our church needs to become more racially/culturally diverse.” See “Research: Racial Diversity at Church More Dream Than Reality” at Lifeway Research. Diversity is widely lauded as an important principle. Everybody wants diversity. They just don’t want to be around people that are different. Our welcome extended to folks outside of our racial/cultural preserve grows cold when it becomes clear that “they” are not going to become like “us.” As James would point out, we never really do extend a genuine welcome to anyone we think of as “them.”

Some churches distinguish between charter members or “long time” members and more recent members, affording more respect and giving greater deference to the opinions of the former. It is also not uncommon for church leaders to yield to the demands of a high volume contributor or make concessions to individuals who provide valuable services to the church that might otherwise require expenditures of money. Nepotism is fairly common in churches, especially smaller congregations where a single family can exercise a substantial influence. All such favoritism tarnishes the church’s witness to God’s kingdom that makes no such distinctions among the baptized.

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

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. Vs. 24. 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. Vs. 24. 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!” vs. 27. 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. Vs. 28. 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. Vs. 33. He looks up to heaven and sighs. He shouts, “Be open!” vs. 34. Everything Jesus does here is reflected in the healing rituals of other wonder workers in legends current during the ministry of Jesus. Nineham, D.E., Saint Mark, The Pelican New Testament Commentaries (c. 1963 by D.E. Nineham, pub. by Penguin Books, Ltd.) pp. 203-204. The casting out of the demon in the prior story seemed almost effortless. This healing appears 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 to secrecy this man who has received the benefit of healing. 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 hide himself or keep a lid on the good news of God’s coming reign.

Sunday, August 16th

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TWELFTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

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

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Ever-loving God, your Son gives himself as living bread for the life of the world. Fill us with such a knowledge of his presence that we may be strengthened and sustained by his risen life to serve you continually, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

I have never been a fan of “home schooling.” That is partly because I believe one important objective of education is training children to live in and take responsibility for the larger society. Public schools are and should be places where children are confronted with people expressing ideas, holding opinions and practicing beliefs that are different from their own precisely because ours is a nation founded on the belief that such differing folk can nevertheless work together for the common good. I must also confess that my skepticism toward home schooling has been reinforced by many of its proponents whose fear, loathing and distrust of the larger society, often supported by outlandish conspiracy theories, sometimes borders on paranoia. The belief that our public schools are the agents of some nefarious plot to undermine religion, family values and promote moral anarchy strikes me as, well, a little crazy. What sort of child emerges from an isolated family unit where s/he is taught to fear and distrust the civil institutions that make our common life as a people possible?

Yet some recent reflections shared by home schooler Paisley Hillegeist in a recent issue of Plough Quarterly have given me pause. Ms. Hillegeist is no conspiracy theorist, nor does she view the public school system as the dark side of the force. She is, however, concerned about the carnivorous environment existing in middle and high schools. Bullying, drug abuse, sexual exploitation are recurring problems within the student population that she feels the schools are finding difficult to address effectively. These concerns, however, are not the primary reasons for Ms. Hillegeist’s decision to home school her children. She points out that she is able to shape her curriculum to the needs of her children in a way that would be nearly impossible in a class of thirty students. She is able to integrate the disciplines of prayer, worship and service into the children’s daily routine. Moreover, academic learning can be integrated with daily life. “We learn life skills together. How do you balance a checkbook? Mail a package? Do the laundry? Shop for the best deals? Build a chicken coop? Butcher turkeys? All this is part of our classroom.” “Why I Homeschool,” Plough Quarterly, Winter 2015, No. 3 (c. 2014 by Plough Publishing House) p. 35.  Most impressive, however, is Ms. Hillegeist’s insistence that “character comes first.” Ibid. More important than what her children may end up doing in life is who they become. “I believe with all my heart,” she says, “that the most powerful good I can bring to my community is to raise my own kids in the way that will best help them to become the men and women that God has created them to be.” Ibid. Education is not all about knowledge. It is chiefly about wisdom.

That, I believe, is what our modern approaches to education so often lack. Our assumption seems to be that education serves the needs of the labor market which, in turn, serves the profit generating, corporate interests of Wall Street. Nothing illustrates this trend better than the so called “Common Core Initiative.” According to its website:

“State education chiefs and governors in 48 states came together to develop the Common Core, a set of clear college- and career-ready standards for kindergarten through 12th grade in English language arts/literacy and mathematics. Today, 43 states have voluntarily adopted and are working to implement the standards, which are designed to ensure that students graduating from high school are prepared to take credit bearing introductory courses in two- or four-year college programs or enter the workforce.”

It is important to add that, despite any flowery policy language to the contrary, the two or four year college programs are likewise designed to integrate their graduates into the workforce, albeit at a higher level. Education is all market driven. It consists in cramming the heads of young people full of knowledge that will make them profitable. That is why programs like music and art are always the first to hit the cutting room floor when public school revenue drops. Multinational corporations can hardly expect to turn a profit through county libraries, municipal orchestras or community theater. Unless you are a child prodigy, you might as well not bother pursuing an education in the fine arts. There is no market for that sort of thing. Is it any wonder, then, that kids fail to empathize with each other when they are treated like machine parts? Is it any wonder that they deaden the pain of suppressing their humanity with illicit drugs? Can you blame them for making self-destructive decisions when they are supplied with knowledge, but left unschooled in wisdom?

The scripture lessons for this week have much to say about wisdom. Our lesson from the Book of Proverbs invites us to feed ourselves with wisdom. The psalmist encourages us to pursue the wise practices of truthfulness and peacemaking. Paul urges us to walk wisely through a world in bondage to folly on the strength of prayer and song. Jesus is the very embodiment of wisdom calling us to internalize him by “eating his flesh” and “drinking his blood.”

Wisdom should never be confused with mere knowledge. Knowledge gives us power over things. Wisdom gives us power over ourselves. The same body of knowledge can enable us to make either vaccines or biological weapons. Wisdom teaches us to place knowledge in the service of life. Wisdom concerns not so much what we learn as how we are shaped by our learning. The mere acquisition of knowledge is not genuine education. Our children are not machines for programming to meet the needs of the labor market. They are unique children of God whose lives unfold like blossoms. Education seeks to nourish and strengthen them as they seek the mystery that is God’s purpose for them. I applaud Ms. Hillegeist for having the courage to say “no” to the dehumanizing and abusive values of late stage capitalism and having the courage to educate her children into character so that they might become wise as well as knowledgeable. That’s a gutsy choice that I admire-even if I cannot follow it in good conscience.

I am still not a supporter of home schooling. Though Ms. Hillegeist’s words and example have raised important questions and illuminated much that is wrong with our educational institutions in this country, I am not convinced that home schooling is the answer. My responsibility for education does not end with my own children and I cannot properly educate my children on my own. Love her or hate her, Hillary Clinton got it right on this point: it takes a village to raise a child. Together, we must all learn to educate our children to live wisely and well as they pursue the common good. To that end, can we as parents and teachers take back the education of our children? Can we make education serve our children rather than the needs of the market? Can we create space for interaction between the classroom, the family and the faith community? Can we educate children to become wise and compassionate as well as knowledgeable?

Proverbs 9:1-6

The Book of Proverbs, along with Job, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs and several of the Psalms constitutes a collection of works biblical 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.” Ecclesiastes 6:1-2. 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 is 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 have each come to view it from their own perspectives. 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.

The Book of Proverbs is made up of four distinct collections of sayings. Book I (Proverbs 1:1-9:18) consists of extended discourses of warning and admonition that encourage the hearer to live piously, ethically and prudently. In two of these poems, wisdom is personified as a wise and beautiful woman. Proverbs 1:20-33 and Proverbs 8:1-36. Wisdom is similarly personified in today’s reading taken from this first book. Our lessson is part of a larger poem contrasting wisdom with folly. Proverbs 9:1-18.

Books II (Proverbs 10:1-22:16) and IV (Proverbs 25:1-29:7) are both attributed to King Solomon. They contain collections of maxims dealing mostly with virtues, vices and their consequences. Attribution to Solomon does not necessarily imply authorship. The identification might simply reflect the author’s/editor’s tribute to Solomon’s legendary wisdom. That said, I am not ready to dismiss the potential contribution of Solomon to either of these two books. Wisdom literature reaches “back into the earliest stages of Israel’s existence.” Crenshaw, J.L., Wisdom in the Old Testament, Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, Supplementary Volume, (c.1976, Abingdon). It was during the reign of Solomon that the Israelite monarchy reached the height of its international prominence. Solomon made treaties with Egypt and the Phoenician kingdoms, transacting commerce and forming military compacts. Cultural exchanges would have followed naturally and thus exposure to wisdom literature from these sources. The authors/editors of Proverbs may well have had access to collections of sayings from this ancient and illustrious period.

Book III (Proverbs 22:17-24:34; Proverbs 24:23-34; Proverbs 30:1-31:31) is a series of exhortations of Egyptian sages probably modeled on an ancient book of Egyptian wisdom entitled “The Instruction of Amen-em-ope.” These sayings may date back to the time of David and Solomon and so could have come into the hands of royal scribes through the cultural exchanges with Egypt previously discussed. The final editor fused all four of these books into one, attributing them all to Solomon. Proverbs 1:1. For more on this marvelous book of the Bible, see Summary Article by James Limburg, Professor Emeritus of Old Testament at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, M.N.

In our lesson we read that wisdom has “slaughtered her beasts, she has mixed wine, she has sent out her maids to call from the highest places, ‘Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!’ To him who is without sense, ‘Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed.’” Vss. 4-5. Perhaps Jesus had this saying in mind when he told his parable of the unresponsive guests invited to the wedding feast. Matthew 22:1-10; Luke 14:15-24. To turn away from wisdom’s feast of learning is foolish. How much more so to snub an invitation to the messianic banquet! The reading also underscores the importance of eating that is far from simply metaphorical. Most people in the ancient near east were always just a bad harvest away from starvation. Eating well is a mark of wellbeing as Jesus’ discourse throughout chapter 6 has been demonstrating.

“Leave simpleness and live and walk in the way of insight.” Vs. 6. Simplicity is often portrayed as a virtue: “Tis a gift to be simple, tis a gift to be free…” says the old Shaker hymn. But there is a dangerous simplicity that seeks to eliminate all nuance and ambiguity. There is a simplicity that prefers clearly drawn lines between good and evil, right and wrong, friend and enemy, insider and outsider. The dangerous polarization we are witnessing in our civil discourse these days is a good example of where such simplicity leads us. Insight recognizes the shades of gray inhabiting the vast no-man’s land between the lines of combat. Insight makes us mindful of our limitations, blind spots and inherited prejudices that distort our thinking. Insight understands that every event, every conflict and every spoken word is seen, heard and processed differently by each individual person. Insight knows that listening is the most important communication skill we will ever develop.

Psalm 34:9-14

These verses constitute the second half of the psalm from last Sunday. For my observations on the psalmist’s style and the psalm’s literary characteristics, see the post for Sunday, August 9, 2015.

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” says the psalmist in Psalm 111:10. Not surprisingly, then, the psalmist in our psalm for this Sunday calls us to learn the fear of the Lord. Vs. 11. “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.” Vss. 12-13. 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 in verses not included in our reading, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous…”  Vs. 19. 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.” Vs. 18. Nevertheless, the psalmist reminds us that even at these times “the Lord is near.” Vs. 18.

How is it possible to keep one’s tongue from evil and one’s lips from speaking deceit? Vss. 13. This warning echoes Paul’s admonition from Ephesians last week to put aside all falsehood and speak the truth. Ephesians 4:25. There is much deceit taking place, not the least of it within ourselves. We have an enormous capacity for self-justification, blaming, scapegoating and excuse making that colors the way we understand everything and everyone around us. This is why we need to be in a community dedicated to speaking truthfully. We need each other to overcome our own self-deception. Unless that is happening, we cannot hope to speak convincingly to the world around us.

Ephesians 5:15-20

Once again, I refer you to my post of Sunday, July 12, 2015 for general comments about the Letter to the Ephesians. In our lesson for this Sunday, Paul admonishes us to “Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil.” Vs. 15. This usage of “walk” is found throughout Ephesians. In Ephesians 2:2 Paul reminds his readers that, prior to their baptism into Christ, they “walked” in sin following the course of this world (N.B. NRSV translates “walked” as “lived”). But now, as Christ’s workmanship, they “walk” in the “good works” for which they were created. Ephesians 2:10.  In chapter 5 we find the admonition to walk at three points. First Paul urges us to “walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us.” Ephesians 5:2. (Again, NRSV uses “live” instead of “walk”). Next, Paul tells his readers that, having been brought out of darkness into the light, they must walk as “children of the light.” Ephesians 5:8. (Again, NRSV renders “walk” as “live”). So in today’s lesson we are urged to walk as “wise” people. Vs. 15. (Ever consistently if not aptly, NRSV employs “live”).

I am not ordinarily disposed to quibble with the NRSV. It is by far one of the most accurate and readable translations of the Scriptures available in the English language. But in rendering the Greek word “walk” or “peripdateo” as simply to “live,” the translators have done us a disservice. The Greek carries with it the sense of “walking after” taken from the ancient practice of instruction under which young persons studying with a particular teacher followed after that teacher. Paul intersperses this expression with “sit” (Ephesians 1:20; Ephesians 2:6) which in Hebrew usage is also a posture of learning. E.g., Luke 10:39; Acts 8:31. For Paul in Ephesians (in the Scriptures as a whole, for that matter), wisdom is not understood as knowledge to be obtained, but as a habit of the heart to be learned, practiced and grown into. It is not merely absorbed into memory from the written page, but taught through the example of a mentor whose living relationship to his/her disciple gives shape to his/her teaching.

So too, Paul urges us to “understand what the will of the Lord is.” Vs. 17. 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. Vs. 18. 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. Vss. 18-19. 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 view 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

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 too 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…” Vs. 53. 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? Vs. 52. 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. John 6:49. 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. The last words spoken by Jesus to his disciples in the Gospel of John are “follow me.” John 21:19. It is as though John simply cannot conceive of the church without the presence of its resurrected Lord.

Sunday, August 9th

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ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

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

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Gracious God, your blessed Son came down from heaven to be the true bread that gives life to the world. Give us this bread always, that he may live in us and we in him, and that, strengthened by this food, we may live as his body in the world, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. 

I heard a sermon not too long ago in which the preacher relayed an illustrative anecdote I can still recall-a rarity in preaching. He told us about how he was seated next to a fellow on a flight out of Chicago who immediately noticed his clerical collar, pegged him accurately as a minister and began ragging on the church. The church is full of hypocrites, the church is judgmental, the church only cares about its members, etc., etc. The preacher replied, “Yes, and you don’t know the half of it. As an insider, I can tell you it is worse than what you think. But let me tell you about the wonderful God who loves these judgmental, hypocritical and selfish people!”

Though clever, I think that response was a bit disingenuous. This week our psalmist invites us to “taste and see that the Lord is good.” According to the Letter to the Ephesians, the church exists solely to make that appeal to the world through its existence as a counter-cultural community. It is within the Body of Christ that God’s good gifts and God’s good intent for all creation are revealed. It is within the church that the Bread of Heaven is made available and life grounded in what is eternal can be glimpsed. If Jesus isn’t making a difference in the lives of people who follow him, then why should anyone else bother with him? If the church merely reflects the same secular values as everyone else, the same racial segregation found in our schools and neighborhoods, the same preoccupation with meeting budgets, maintaining property and raising money as any other civic organization, why even waste time visiting?

Let’s be clear about one thing. The church is a holy people, but holiness is not to be equated with moral superiority. To be holy literally means to be “set apart” for a unique purpose. A saint is rather like a recovering alcoholic and the church is in many respects similar to an AA meeting. We are people who recognize our addiction to an unsustainable consumer lifestyle supported by a ruthlessly destructive and inequitable economy. We are a people struggling against an ingrained belief in the necessity of violence to preserve peace. We are a people striving to be honest about our mortality, our limitations, our prejudices and the destructive consequences of our sins, all within a society that is constantly lying to us about these things. By the grace of God, we have been set free to pursue life within a culture of death. We have received the gift of sobriety and we need support from one another to hang on to it. When Paul tells us “through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places (Ephesians 3:10), he means to say that the church exists to let the world know that “it doesn’t have to be this way.” There is another way to be human.

Too often, the church offers tranquilizers instead of transformation. Your “vocation” is your job, however demeaning, ethically dubious or brutally exploitive it may be. The church peddles a therapeutic gospel helping you to deal with your circumstances in an inhumane world rather than delivering a bold proclamation causing you to long for the kingdom of heaven. As one worshiper put it recently, “church helps me get through the week.” Valium does the same thing, more or less. But is a spiritual coping mechanism the best we have to offer? Is that worth sacrificing a leisurely Sunday morning with a fresh bagel, cream cheese and the New York Times? Our lessons for this week seem to be saying, “Come on, people of God. We are better than this.”

1 Kings 19:4-8

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.” I Kings 17:1. 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 Elijah’s call with 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.” Vs. 4. 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. Vss. 6-8. 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. I Kings 19:9-21. Initially, I was somewhat miffed that the lectionary did 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 my wife 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 that.

Psalm 34:1-8

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. This is one of the “acrostic” psalms, meaning that each new verse begins with the next letter in order of the Hebrew Alphabet. See my post for Sunday, July 26, 2015 for more on this poetic technique. As always, I encourage you to read Psalm 34 in its entirety.

Use of the acrostic form 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.

As I noted last week, prayer is a fluid sort of thing in Hebrew worship. This psalm is an individual confession and testimony of faith addressed to the worshiping congregation. Though not spoken directly to God, it is nevertheless a prayer in the sense that it gives glory to God and expresses the psalmist’s heartfelt thanks for God’s deliverance. At the same time, it is offered to strengthen the confidence of the worshiping community in God’s willingness and ability to save. The psalmist invites the congregation to join him/her in magnifying the Lord and exalting the Lord’s name. vs. 3.

The psalmist invites us to “taste and see that the Lord is good.” Vs. 8. 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 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 God’s promises to provide all things necessary.

Ephesians 4:25—5:2

For my general comments about the Letter to the Ephesians, see my post of Sunday, July 12, 2015. This letter has much to say about the centrality of the church in God’s redemptive intent for the world. Having discussed the church’s role in the earlier chapters, Paul now turns to life as it must be lived within the church.

“Therefore put away falsehood, let everyone speak the truth with his neighbor.” Vs. 25. 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 doctrine, practice 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. Sad to say, my own Lutheran denomination ranks disgracefully low when it comes to racial and cultural diversity. See The Most and Least Racially Diverse U.S. Religious Groups. This reality has taken on renewed urgency in light of the recent string of killings by police officers of black men and the racially motivated murder of African American worshipers at Mother Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. We cannot continue pretending that the systemic racism permeating our culture does not also penetrate our church. Racism is a grievous wound to the Body of Christ desperately in need of healing. Healing cannot happen without a frank diagnosis delivered through truthful speech.

“Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing honest work with his hands, that he may be able to give to those in need.” Vs. 28. That might seem a tad obvious. Should a disciple of Jesus even need to be told not to steal? Perhaps, though, the issue is more subtle. The thief is enjoined to labor at “honest work” and to do so “with his hands.” Thievery is hardly limited to pick-pockets and check kiters. The greatest degree of theft in our culture is entirely legal. The Wall Street barons whose wantonly reckless and willfully deceptive practices drove our nation into recession went largely unprosecuted. It is standard practice for disability insurers to employ harassment, threats and endless paperwork against claimants they know are often too sick to persevere in the process. As an attorney, I often wondered whether assisting property and liability insurance carriers in avoiding payment of claims was “honest” and productive work. I wonder, too, whether the production of inherently lethal products, such as hand guns, constitutes work that can be done by a follower of Jesus. Though Christian faith of some sort seems like a prerequisite for election to the nation’s highest office, I wonder how one can claim Jesus as Lord while carrying on his/her person the codes for activating thermonuclear weapons capable of destroying entire cities.

Maybe it is time for disciples of Jesus to consider whether there are not professions or jobs with particular commercial interests that are incompatible with faith in Jesus. Perhaps we should reflect on what constitutes “honest” work. In my own Lutheran tradition, we seek to help people see their work as “vocation.” But does Jesus call us to produce or maintain weapons of mass destruction? Does Jesus call us to labor for firms whose sole purpose is to maximize profit, even at the expense of human welfare, the environment and global peace? Too often, I think, there is a vast disconnect between what we say about the sanctity of work and the way it is experienced by far too many people. Perhaps Paul is challenging us to ensure that our work is, in fact, honest, productive and contributory to human well-being.

“Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for edifying.” Vs. 29. Edifying speech is pretty much my job as a parish pastor. Over the years I have gotten pretty good at it-when I am on duty. When I am home with my family, among friends or with fellow clergy, not so much. Of course, we all need to “vent” once in a while. But I tend to think that we do that entirely too much in our culture and more than we should in the church. Edifying speech aims at building up the Body of Christ. As noted in the previous paragraphs, edification requires truthfulness and the truth is often painful. Yet the end game for all speech is to “import grace to those who hear.” Vs. 29. To that end, “bitterness,” “wrath,” “anger,” “slander” and “malice” are to be excluded. Vs. 31. Moreover, the truth is never merely the sum of the facts. It is always to be spoken with kindness. Vs. 32. Within the Body of Christ, the posture toward a fellow believer is that of Christ himself-infinite forgiveness.

All of this should give us some insight into what Paul means when he challenges us to be “imitators of God”? Vs. 5:1. 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.

The most remarkable aspect of this letter to the Ephesians is its refusal to distinguish between the church’s inner life and its cosmic mission. According to Paul’s thought as expounded in this treatise, they are one and the same:

“Ephesians is supremely concerned about the unity of the Church. The writer exhorts the Church to maintain the unity it already possesses and stresses that the essential ingredient for achieving the harmony of unity in diversity is love (4:1-16). For him, the quality of the Church’s corporate life has everything to do with fulfilling its role in the world. As it embodies the unity it already possesses, the Church fulfills its calling to be the paradigm of the cosmic unity which is the goal of the salvation God provides in Christ (cf. 1:10). This role of the Church is outlined in 3:9, 10, where its existence is seen as God’s announcement to the principalities and authorities in the heavenly realms that he is going to make good on his multifaceted and wise plan for cosmic unity. Because the Church is the one new humanity in place of two (2:15), the one body (2:16; 4:4), it can be depicted as providing the powers with a tangible reminder that their authority has been decisively broken and that everything is going to be united in Christ.” Lincoln, Andrew T., Ephesians, World Biblical Commentary (c. 1990 by Word, Incorporated) p. xciv.

John 6:35, 41-51

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 6:36-40.

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.