Tag Archives: prayer

Sunday, August 2nd

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

TENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

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

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O God, eternal goodness, immeasurable love, you place your gifts before us; we eat and are satisfied. Fill us and this world in all its need with the life that comes only from you, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

John’s gospel doesn’t spoon feed us the good news. Instead, we are given signs, metaphors, images and symbols that don’t always fit neatly together into a coherent whole. Reading this gospel is hard work. This week’s lesson tells us that Jesus is the “bread come down from heaven.” Unlike ordinary bread, it is not obtained by human labor. It is a free gift. The “work” God requires of us is to believe in Jesus. But is that really “work”? The language Jesus is using here does not set well with my Lutheran upbringing. From Sunday School through seminary I have been taught never to mention “faith” and “works” in the same breath. Yet Jesus seems to be doing just that. He is telling us that the bread which comes down from heaven is more than a simple handout. Receiving it gratefully is the work God requires of us.

Perhaps it is best to think of the bread from heaven as a precious gift that nevertheless demands much. It is not simply a cash gift that can be spent in any way the recipient pleases. Receiving the bread from heaven is more like being given a very fine violin. As a gift, it is obviously free. Yet such a gift clearly demands much of the recipient. If a violin is going to be of any use to me, I must learn to play it. Unless I happen to be one of those rare musical prodigies capable of picking up an instrument cold and making music, I will probably need years of instruction and hours upon hours of practice before I am merely proficient. If I want to become more than proficient, if I want to become a performance level violinist, I am looking at a lifetime commitment that will require much sacrifice and dedication to the instrument.

It is not surprising to me that relatively few people become accomplished musicians. Though I am not a musician myself, I have them in my family and among my friends. They know how much time goes into learning scales, practicing arpeggios and learning to read music-all of which comes before you can begin making music. They know the frustration of being stuck at a plateau in development beyond which it seems impossible to advance. They also know that every advance must be maintained by relentless practice. There is no such thing as a vacation from the instrument. Nevertheless, they tell me that making music is their greatest joy.

I believe the gift that is Jesus is a little like that. God offers us through him a restored relationship, friendship with God’s self. Friendship is not built over night. It takes time. Friendship requires a lot of energy, forgiveness, growth and patience. Friendship changes you in ways you cannot predict. Friendship is risky. You can never know the price you might have to pay for loyalty, faithfulness and love for your friend. Jesus called his disciples friends. John 15:14-15. That is a marvelous gift that demands much of us. Perhaps that is what Paul means when he urges us to “lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called.” Ephesians 4:1. Maybe that is just another way of telling us to live fully and completely out of our friendship with Jesus. There is no other way to receive such a free, precious and wildly extravagant gift.

Exodus 16:2-4, 9-15

Less than two months into their new found freedom brought about by God’s marvelous, liberating miracle at the Red Sea, Israel is in a deep funk. The people are learning that freedom is in many respects more difficult than slavery. The slave knows that the master will feed him/her for no other reason than that a slave must eat to live and live to work. A slave has few weighty decisions to make. The master makes all the decisions. A slave does not have to wonder about what tomorrow will bring. The following day brings more of the same. Cruel, burdensome and oppressive, to be sure, but at least it is predictable. By contrast, the wilderness (and freedom) is highly unpredictable. You can’t assume that you are going to find enough water to sustain your community ten miles down the road. No master will be there to give you your rations. In the wilderness, you have no choice but to place your trust in the God who brought you there.

The people of Israel were hungry. As we all know, hunger can bring out the worst in us. Such was the case for Israel. It seems the people caught a bad case of “good old days” disease. They began reminiscing about the days back in Egypt where at least they had food. “Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate bread to the full,” they complain. Vs. 3. I doubt that, as slaves, they really were that well fed. But that is how it is when you look back at the past through rose colored glasses. Everything was better back then. The church was so full we had to set up chairs in the aisles to accommodate everyone. The Sunday School was filled with kids-and they behaved themselves better and had more respect than kids these days. Neighborhoods were friendlier. City streets were safer. Food tasted better. On and on it goes. Was the past really all that wonderful? Of course not! The Israelites were slaves. Had they forgotten so soon what it was like to be treated like cattle? Evidently, they had forgotten and that should not surprise us overly much. Good old days disease is as much a part of our age as it was in Biblical times. As Barbra Streisand sang in the movie, The Way We Were,

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

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

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

That said, the journey from slavery into freedom is long and difficult. The people of Israel spent forty years in the wilderness on the way to Canaan. The way was slow and fraught with dangers. Sometimes it seemed as though they were not making any progress. Sometimes they appeared to be going nowhere. Often it seemed that they were losing ground. The life of discipleship to which Jesus calls us is no different. Perhaps that is why Paul and other New Testament writers employed the stories of Israel’s wilderness wandering as metaphors for that life. It is hard to believe that Jesus is leading us into a new creation when our bodies increasingly show their age, our energy level isn’t what it used to be and it seems as though the best years of our lives are behind us. It is hard to believe that Jesus is leading his church for the sake of the world when that church looks increasingly fractured, divided and marginalized. It is precisely when the going gets rough, when we see no evidence of progress and there seems to be no end in sight that the temptation to look back is strongest. But the scriptures warn repeatedly that there is nothing for us in the past and that the only way given to us is forward.

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

Psalm 78:23-29

Our psalm for this Sunday is but a snippet from a much longer saga reciting Israel’s history from the Exodus to the rise of King David. As always, I encourage you to read Psalm 78 in its entirety.

This is one of the historical psalms in the psalter. It is similar in form and structure to Psalm 105 and Psalm 106 of the same genre. Historical psalms were employed by Israel chiefly in her commemorative celebrations, i.e., Passover, Day of Atonement, Feast of Booths, etc. They celebrate the acts pivotal to Israel’s self-understanding. Accordingly, the historical psalms also serve a didactic (teaching) purpose. In learning these psalms, each new generation internalized the great acts through which God displayed salvation to Israel and made her the unique nation she was.

The faith of Israel was unique in the ancient near east. The Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Phoenicians and Israel’s Canaanite neighbors saw the power of the divine chiefly in the realm of nature. Thus, their religion was built around the natural cycles of birth and death, seedtime and harvest, summer and winter. Their worship revolved around mythical themes of creation, the interaction of the gods behind the cosmic forces of death and life at work in the change of seasons. By contrast, Israel experienced the salvation of her God through God’s mighty acts in her history. Though Israel also recognized the cyclical processes of nature critical to agricultural existence, her worship gave meaning to these cycles through recitation of historical events taking place not in some distant mythical past, but in the realm of human events. Israel celebrated her deliverance from Egypt, the conquest of the land of Canaan, the establishment of the royal house of David and the dedication of the Temple in Jerusalem. Her worship and world view were anchored in these historical watersheds rather than in cosmic battles between the gods at the dawn of time.

The section of this lengthy psalm constituting our reading echoes in poetic form the lesson from Exodus. The story is not all sweetness and light as one might suppose from reading only the verses given us by the lectionary. Verses 17-22 point out that the gracious outpouring of mana and quail comes in spite of some serious provocation:

Yet they sinned still more against him,
rebelling against the Most High in the desert.
They tested God in their heart
by demanding the food they craved.
They spoke against God, saying,
‘Can God spread a table in the wilderness?
Even though he struck the rock so that water gushed out
and torrents overflowed, can he also give bread,
or provide meat for his people?’

Furthermore, God’s carrot is accompanied by a stick:

But before they had satisfied their craving,
while the food was still in their mouths,
the anger of God rose against them
and he killed the strongest of them,
and laid low the flower of Israel.

Vss. 30-31. Once again, the lectionary folks are doing their best to spare our left leaning, mainline protestant, upper middle class, ever white and ever polite sensibilities by excising all references suggesting that God might be something other than the gray-bearded slightly senile, over-indulgent grandfather that can be inoffensively slipped into our cultural landscape without disrupting the architectural skyline. Obviously, there is a serious disconnect between the God of the scriptures and the inoffensive god we would like to believe in who, like elevator music, fills in the uncomfortable silences but otherwise remains in the background. No wonder church attendance in mainline denominations is in decline. In fact, it is a wonder that anyone still comes! Just as nobody would waste time and money for a concert performance of background music pipped in over a third rate sound system, it is hard to imagine how anyone could become the least bit interested in such a boring god.

The psalm makes the point that God’s love for Israel (and the church, too, for that matter) is not a philosophical disposition shorn of all passion and feeling. The God of Israel’s love is passionate, jealous and intense. Anyone who has ever been in love knows how close anger lies at hand. Nobody can hurt us as deeply as those we love. God’s anger against us is the measure of God’s love for us. The sad reality is that God’s acts of mercy and kindness are too quickly forgotten. Too often we approach God with a sense of entitlement rather than gratitude and trust. Our demands take precedence over God’s commands. Our prayers resemble letters to Santa Clause, filled with our own self-centered demands. Yet God’s passionate love for us never grows cold. Even God’s judgment is designed to melt our cold hearts and re-ignite our trust. This psalm “makes evident how closely God’s grace and his judgment are related to each other.” Weiser, Artur, The Psalms, The Old Testament Commentary (c. 1962 S.C.M. Press, Ltd.) p. 541.

The historical recitation in Psalm 78 culminates with God’s selection of David as Israel’s king.

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

The rise of the monarchy in Israel was surrounded by controversy. The prophet and judge, Samuel, was appalled when the people demanded appointment of a king to rule over them so that they might “be like the other nations.” I Samuel 8:4-5. After all, God called Israel to be unlike the other nations. In a culture that regarded kings as equal to gods, only the Lord was worthy of the title “king.” Much of the prophetic tradition in Israel remained critical of the monarchy and saw it as a betrayal of all that Israel was called to be. Nevertheless, there is also in the Hebrew Scriptures an express belief that God’s covenant with David and the rise of his Kingdom was a saving event to be celebrated with thanksgiving. Psalm 78 is an example of this pro-monarchy sentiment.

We saw an echo of this pro-monarchy enthusiasm in last Sunday’s gospel when the crowd of five thousand, having eaten their fill of the loaves and fishes Jesus blessed, sought to take him and make him king by force. Clearly, Jesus must be the one sent by God to shepherd his people Israel. Had he not, as the psalm says, “rained down on them manna to eat, and gave them the grain of heaven”? Vs. 24. Yet Jesus seems intent on not becoming a king like David-or at least the kind of king the people were seeking. That becomes clear as Jesus speaks in this Sunday’s gospel about the true bread from heaven he has come to offer.

Ephesians 4:1-16

For my general comments on the Letter to the Ephesians, see my post of Sunday, July 12, 2015. At this point in the letter, Paul turns to a description of what life in Christ looks like. The remarkable thing about this text describing life in the church is the total lack of hierarchy. In virtually every other organization, be it social, political or religious, the key question always comes down to “Who is in charge?” In the Body of Christ, however, the key issue is “What is your gift?” “There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism and one God and Father of us all.” Vs. 5. Though the church is made up of individual members, each has his or her own “gift.” The gifts, however they may differ from one another, have one purpose: “to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Vs. 3.

Much scholarly debate has swirled around the enumeration of these gifts in verse 11. Some interpreters maintain that the apostles, evangelists, teachers and pastors represent offices in the church. Others maintain that these reflect natural gifts recognized by the community and exercised by individuals in non-structured communities. Lincoln, Andrew T., Ephesians, Word Biblical Commentary (c. 1990 by Word Incorporated) p. 233; Fischer, K.M., Tendenz und Absicht des Ephersbriefs, (c. 1973 by Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht) pp. 21-39. Whichever the case may be, it is clear that the gifts are not intended to enhance the recipient, but to strengthen the unity of the church. Vss. 15-16. So what matters is not who has which gift, but how the gift is used. A pastor that pushes through an educational program that interests him or her, but does not meet the needs of the church is not rightly exercising the gift of ministry. A council officer that manages to get a new addition to the church building erected, but in doing so causes dissent and division throughout the congregation might be improving upon the structure of a building, but he or she is not “building up the Body of Christ.” Vs. 12. That does not mean, of course, that we all walk on egg shells and do nothing for fear of offending anyone. Sometimes uncomfortable truths need to be spoken. Often the mission of the church must take precedent over deeply valued traditions in the congregation. Correction and reproof is part and parcel of living together in love. The church will necessarily deal with divisive and controversial topics. But unlike the rest of the world where the most powerful personality prevails and issues are often settled by a simple up or down vote, we are a community determined to take whatever time is needed to arrive at a resolution and course of action that everyone can live with-even if it means sacrificing “progress.” Getting together is more important than getting ahead. For that sort of living, we need a lot of lowliness, forbearance, patience and meekness. Vs. 2.

More than any other epistle in the Pauline corpus, Ephesians highlights the cosmic purpose of the church as a sign of God’s intent to unite not merely Jews and Gentiles, but “to fill all things” with Christ. Vs. 10. “God gives Christ as head over all to the Church and it becomes his instrument in carrying out his purpose for the cosmos. The readers are to see themselves as part of this Church which has a universal role and which is to be a pledge of the universe’s ultimate unity in Christ.” Lincoln, supra at 248. In a religious landscape increasingly dominated by “personal salvation,” individual pseudo-psychological “self-help” and individual “spirituality,” Ephesians sounds a countercultural call to lose the self in a corporate life of discipleship that isn’t all about “me.” The church’s calling is to continue corporately the life Jesus lives in the world, embracing all of the hostility such life invariably provokes.

John 6:24-35

As you may recall from last week’s gospel, Jesus had to withdraw from the crowd of five thousand he had just fed as they were seeking to take him by force and make him king. The disciples set out for the other side of the Sea of Galilee that same evening. Jesus later rejoined them in their boat on the Sea and they arrived in Capernaum. Some of the five thousand pursued Jesus and found him there on the other side of the Sea. Now they are curious as to how Jesus was able to get himself across the sea without a boat, but Jesus cuts right to the chase. “You are here because you ate your fill. Not because you saw signs.” Vs. 26. Of course, the people had, in fact, seen a remarkable sign. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that they witnessed a miracle only. They do not understand that the feeding was a sign; that the drama unfolding in the wilderness of Galilee was intended to reflect the wilderness of Sinai where the children of Israel wandered for forty years depending on the Lord for each day’s sustenance. The fact that they demand from Jesus a sign as proof of his claims demonstrates how thoroughly they have missed the meaning of what they experienced in the wilderness. They were looking for a way out of the wilderness to restored national power and prosperity. Jesus offers them a restored relationship with the Lord who promises to give them abundant life in the midst of the wilderness. That is the true bread that comes down from heaven.

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

So what is this “bread” that comes down from heaven? It is Jesus, plain and simple. There is no “work” demanded by God as a price for this bread. It has already been freely given and now stands in the questioners’ very presence. The “work,” such that it is, amounts simply to “believing in the one God sent.” Vs. 29. Belief, of course, is not mere ascent to a theological proposition. To believe in Jesus is to trust Jesus; to live out of a relationship of faith in his promises. But this is God’s work, not our own. God wins our trust and strengthens our faith by consistently demonstrating his own faithfulness to us.

This is one of many instances throughout John’s gospel in which Jesus uses the “I am” construction (in Greek, “Ego eimie”). This “I am” of Jesus echoes the “I am” spoken to Moses in response to his inquiry about God’s name. God replies “I am that I am” or, as some translators put it, “I will be who I will be.” Exodus 3:13-15. This statement is less an ontological assertion about God than it is a declaration that God demonstrates who God is by God’s acts of faithfulness to the covenant with Israel as shown by what follows immediately thereafter. God instructs Moses: “Go and assemble the elders of Israel, and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me, saying: I have given heed to you and to what has been done to you in Egypt. I declare that I will bring you up out of the misery of Egypt, to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with milk and honey.’” Exodus 3:16-17. So too, the full significance of the “I am” Jesus pronounces will become clear only when he completes the work his Father has sent him to do. Not until he is “lifted up” will Jesus’ glory as the only Son of the Father be made known. John 12:27-36.

Sunday, July 19th

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

EIGHTH SUNDY AFTER PENTECOST

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

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O God, powerful and compassionate, you shepherd your people, faithfully feeding and protecting us. Heal each of us, and make us a whole people, that we may embody the justice and peace of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

“…they were like sheep without a shepherd…” Mark 6:34.

The greatest difficulty with this metaphor is our inability and/or unwillingness to see ourselves as sheep. I would prefer to think of myself less as a heard animal and more like a common house cat. I go where I choose, hang around as long as I get fed and leave for better digs when the opportunity presents itself. My own life story, as I frequently narrate it, contains more than a few first person singular pronouns. This is “my” story of the choices “I” made that make “me” who “I” am.

The truth is, I am a product of a mother who was reading Bible stories and praying with me from as far back as I can remember. I was shaped by the elder siblings I sought to emulate. I was indoctrinated by the hymns I sang in my home church year after year and, though probably in a subliminal way, by hundreds of sermons preached in my hearing. Though the church of my childhood was less than prophetic in naming the sin of racism, it was nevertheless a community in which racial slurs and demeaning stereotypes were not tolerated. It was a place where a kid my age who in those days was labeled “retarded” could find full acceptance and a refuge from the merciless teasing and bulling he faced every day at school. Though far from perfect, my church was enough like the Body of Christ to form in my heart a belief in Christ and a vision the reign of God he proclaims. It was a flock of the Good Shepherd.

Of course, there were other forces shaping me as well. I had peers whose influence drew me in ways contrary to the reign of Christ. I listened to music that glorified drug abuse, promiscuous sex and violence. I attended schools where athletic achievement was celebrated more than learning, popularity more than character and physical beauty more than virtue. Nationalism/Patriotism elevated the flag over the cross, often confusing and conflating faithful discipleship with good citizenship. Furthermore, for all the talk about how political discourse has become so angry, polarized and uncivil in our day, I can’t say that it’s any worse than in my own youth back in the sixties when politicians called each other communists and the generations mutually excoriated each other with dehumanizing caricatures. There were plenty of shepherds out there besides the Good Shepherd seeking to direct me, promising to lead me to the good pastures and quiet waters along easier paths eschewing the cross. That I have remained within the flock of the Good Shepherd is more a testimony to the might of the Spirit of that Good Shepherd working through the means of grace and the care of a faithful community than any decision I have ever made in my life.

I try to keep that in mind when I preach to a people whose televisions and radios broadcast hate speech almost 24/7 into their homes. I try to remember that when I confront a confirmation class that finds Katy Perry infinitely more interesting and inspiring than a 60 year old bald guy with a seminary education. I try remember how the Spirit continues to work through the church with all its faults as I critically examine my own life and realize that, if Christianity ever became an outlawed religion, the prosecutor might have a difficult time amassing evidence sufficient to convict me. I will also work too keep before me the testimonies of faith I heard last week by children, teenagers and young adults at the Ekklesia Project Gathering discussed further below. They are proof enough that the Good Shepherd knows his own and calls, gathers and enlightens them. The Church is in Jesus’ care and it’s going to be just fine.

Jeremiah 23:1-6

The prophet Jeremiah’s ministry took place during the last dark days of the Kingdom of Judah-as did that of Ezekiel (see my post for Sunday, July 5, 2015). The little kingdom emerged from Assyrian domination around 640 B.C.E. under the able leadership of King Josiah, who gained a large measure of power and independence for his country. Under his reign Judah’s territorial control spread beyond even the borders of the united Kingdom of David and Solomon. See Bright, John, A History of Israel, Second Edition (c. 1972 by Westminster Press) pp. 321-322. But that good fortune was not to last. Egypt and Babylonia soon rose up to fill the power vacuum left after Assyria’s fall. Josiah was slain in a fruitless battle with Egyptian forces on their way to join the remnant of the Assyrian army in a last desperate stand against Babylon. The victorious Pharaoh Neco placed one of Josiah’s sons, Jehoiakim, on the throne as his vassal. Ibid 324-325. Shortly thereafter, in 605 B.C.E., the Babylonian empire under Nebuchadnezzer soundly defeated Egypt in the battle of Carchemish and began advancing into Palestine. Ibid. Seeing the impressive string of victories won by the Babylonian army against Judah’s neighbbors, Jehoiakim reluctantly switched his allegiance to Nebuchadnezzer.

Jehoiakim’s allegiance to Babylon was not to last. A victory of sorts by the retreating Egypt army against the Babylonian forces late in 601 B.C.E. led Jehoiakim to believe that the Babylonian invasion had reached its high water mark and would soon run out of steam. The future, he felt, lay with Egypt. So Jehoiakim switched sides once again, rebelling against Babylon. Ibid 326. This rash decision sealed Judah’s fate. Babylon was far from out of steam.  Nebuchadnezzer advanced against Judah in 597. Jehoiakim had the good sense to die before Babylon laid siege to Jerusalem. His eighteen year old son, Jehoiachin ascended to the throne and ruled all of three months before the Babylonians forced Judah’s surrender and placed an uncle of the king, Zedekiah, on the throne. Ibid.

Zedekiah, was a weak and indecisive ruler easily swayed by his advisors who were intent on restoring Judah to its former glory under King David. Under their influence, the king engaged in a diplomatic strategy of playing his Babylonian master off against Egypt. This was a dangerous game that Zedekiah ultimately lost. In reliance upon a promise of support from Egypt, Zedekiah led his nation in revolt against Babylonian domination. Egyptian support never came and Jerusalem was surrounded and subjected to a brutal siege that ended with its destruction in 587 B.C.E. Ibid 328-321.

This is the context in which we read Jeremiah’s criticism of the “shepherds” of Israel, that is, her rulers. Jeremiah’s critique rests upon a tradition that saw the Davidic monarchy as the champion of justice, the protector of the poor and oppressed. E.g. Psalm 72. Yet in a hopeless effort to achieve national glory, the king and his minions disregarded the covenant at the heart of Judah’s existence. Judah’s kings took to worshiping the gods of other nations and relying upon international military alliances rather than on the Lord their God. The people of Judah suffered the horrific consequences of Judah’s misguided and self-serving political agendas. They were killed in the crossfire of war, driven into exile and impoverished as a result of the Babylonian reprisals. Rather than protecting and caring for the sheep, the leaders disregarded their welfare, exploited and scattered them among the nations. Yet the prophecy ends with a word of promise. God finally will raise up from the line of David a “righteous branch.” Vs. 5. Jeremiah continues to hope for a faithful descendent of David who, like David himself, will rule Judah with an eye toward caring for the sheep.

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

Ultimately, Judah’s shepherds were responsible for misleading the people with a false hope. They promised glory without obedience; greatness without faithfulness; prosperity without sacrifice. I might be on dangerous ground here, but I am convinced that all the presidential hopefuls thus far are guilty of the same sin. I also feel compelled to add that we, the people, share responsibility for their propagation of false hope. What we need are leaders that tell us the truth: that we face a crisis of malnutrition, poor schools and declining public infrastructure; that the gap between rich and poor is growing at an alarming rate; that more and more of our citizens are falling below the poverty line; that our disproportionate consumption of the earth’s resources is not sustainable. Further we need leaders who tell us that all of these problems are difficult and complex. Addressing them effectively will require sacrifice, hard work and profound changes in our lifestyles.

But that is a message nobody wants to hear and we are not likely to elect a leader who brings us such unwelcome tidings. Instead, we elect leaders who tell us what we want to hear: that the solutions are simple and require nothing from us. We vote for people who tell us that we can have prosperity, security and peace without paying a penny more in taxes, without enduring any risk and without sacrificing an ounce of comfort. Of course, soon after putting these people in office it becomes clear to us that we have not elected the messiah, but another human being who cannot possibly keep the promises that had to be made to win the election. So when the next election rolls around, we angrily kick the false god we have made off the pedestal on which we placed it and set up another one in its place. I don’t see this deadly cycle ending until we finally face up to the truth. Our problems cannot be regulated out of existence nor will they miraculously disappear if only we let the free hand of the market economy do its magic. As long as we continue to believe in lies, we will continue to elect liars.

I don’t have any suggestions for fixing the political system in Washington (or Bergen County either, for that matter). All I can do is point to the righteous branch Jeremiah spoke of. He does not come to us with promises of easy fixes and miraculous cures. Rather, he calls us to the slow work of witnessing to God’s Kingdom and following him in a common life of service to one another. I have always been convinced that the one and only thing the church has to offer the world is a vision of God’s alternative for living together. Jesus did not preach easy solutions. To the contrary, “it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” Mark 10:25. “Strive to enter by the narrow door.” Luke 13:24. “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” Mark 8:34. I doubt Jesus could ever get himself elected to public office, but that is not a thing to which Jesus aspired.  The reign of God is made known not in the seats of empire or the halls of congress, but in communities that spring from the righteous branch where “the least” of all people are valued the most, where the truth is spoken in love, where daily bread is enough and where the offer of hospitality is made to all people all the time. That is where the truth that sets us free is enacted. That is where the light from God’s future breaks into the darkness of the present age.

Psalm 23

Professor Walter Brueggeman has said that commenting on the 23rd Psalm is almost pretentious. That has not stopped me from trying, however. Nonetheless, given the frequency with which this psalm appears in the lectionary, I am fairly sure that I have said about everything I have to say at my posts for Sunday, April 26, 2015, Sunday, October 12, 2014, Sunday, May 11, 2014, Sunday, March 30, 2014, Sunday, April 21, 2013 and Sunday, July 22, 2012. That, of course, does not mean that there is no more to be said. I encourage you to read the commentary by James K. Mead, Associate Professor of Religion at Northwestern College, Orange City, IA and the commentary by Joel LeMon, Associate Professor of Old Testament at Candler School of Theology, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, both on workingpreacher.org. I would also recommend The Shepherd Who Feeds Us by Debra Dean Murphy at ekklesiaproject.org. This article discusses the “shepherd” metaphor employed in the 23rd Psalm and elsewhere. Finally, Augustine’s profound reflections on this psalm in his commentary are well worth rereading.

I will say that my thinking about this psalm has been influenced by my participation last week in the Ekklesia Project Gathering in Chicago at which believers of all Christian traditions came together to reflect on faith formation for young people in our respective communities. We heard some very moving testimony from young people whose lives have been meaningfully shaped by learning the art of discipleship in their churches. We were also made painfully aware of how our church is, to a very large degree, failing in that crucial task. What I took away from this gathering is the conviction that we seem to have a problem reaching younger people because Jesus has so much difficulty reaching us. We are called to a life of radical discipleship reflecting the countercultural claims of God’s reign of justice and peace in a violent and oppressive world. But young people (all people for that matter) have a difficult time seeing among us anything different from the rest of the world. To a large degree, we are still operating as though the nation depended upon us to provide religious grounding and ideological support for the American way of life. We have yet to digest the fact that the Empire no longer needs or wants our services. Once we get that new reality into our heads, we will be free to do what Jesus has always urged us to do: become and make disciples shaped by a desire for God’s reign.

Ephesians 2:11-22

This text is a poignant reminder that we in the church are, as St. Paul puts it in his Letter to the Romans, “wild olive shoots” that were grafted into the cultivated olive garden of Israel. Romans 11:17-24. This reminder is important because historically there has been a lot of bad theology out there suggesting that somehow the church has replaced Israel as God’s chosen people. This understanding is further exacerbated by our reference to the Hebrew Scriptures as the “Old Testament.” This might suggest that the covenant with Israel is obsolete, that Old Testament history is a story of failure that had to be corrected and replaced by the New Testament. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. The God and Father of Jesus Christ is the God of the Hebrew Scriptures. The God who raised Jesus from death is the same God that brought Israel up out of the land of Egypt and into the promised land. The covenant, it must be emphasized, was with Abraham and Sarah and their descendants. We gentiles come into the picture for one reason and one reason only: Jesus, the messiah of Israel, invites us in. As Paul makes very clear in his letter to the Romans, God has not revoked the covenant promises made to Israel. Israel still is God’s people and no less so merely because in God’s mercy the benefits of those promises have been extended to us gentiles through Jesus.

Of course, this passage also emphasizes once again that the flesh and blood church, the communion of saints, is the place where God’s saving work in Jesus Christ is made manifest. It is in the church that the mystery of God’s intent for all creation is revealed. Paul places great significance upon the church in this letter. As one very profound observation has it, “Paul’s revolutionary idea in Ephesians is the central idea not just of Ephesians but of the whole New Testament-in fact, of the whole of the Bible. The idea is that God is gathering together groups of people to love God, to love one another, to die to self, to become one. When you think about it, the Bible is about little more than God’s gathering a loving, united people to himself.” Alexander, John F., Being Church, (c. 2012 by John Alexander, pub. by Cascade Books) pp. 19-20. But it is also important to add that “These groups don’t exist for themselves, so they can feel warm and fuzzy. They have a purpose. And that purpose is to gather the whole world into groups that are in unity with God and therefore one another.” Ibid 20. And the purpose of that is to “make all men see what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things; that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 3:9-10.

Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

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

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

More than anything else, these verses illustrate for us what it means to be a follower of Jesus. At the very center of discipleship is hospitality-the willingness to make space, share necessities and take time for the neighbor. That is not so difficult when it comes to welcoming neighbors I know and love. I always enjoy having people from my congregation drop in and see me when I am in the office. I look forward to visiting the people to whom I am pastor. I am less sanguine about the fellow in the ragged, stinking clothes who shows up ten minutes before Easter Sunday Eucharist is about to begin with a problem that needs my immediate attention and, of course, it is a problem that only cold, hard cash can solve. So, too, there are times when I am just not up to hospitality. Spending weeks on the road meeting, greeting, healing, exorcising demons from, caring for and lodging with people all over Galilee has got to take its toll. After all that, having to confront a hungry, needy crowd of thousands pushes the envelope to the limit. This is a poor introvert’s nightmare. Left to themselves, the disciples would have been overwhelmed. But they were not left to themselves. Just as a few loaves and fish in the hands of Jesus feeds over five thousand, so Jesus enables his disciples to stand with him as shepherd to this crowd of lost and directionless people.

In small churches like my own, radical hospitality is a challenge. We seem ill equipped to meet the very big challenges in our community. We fear that, if we were to take the steps we need to take in order to make all people feel welcome, we would be crushed under the weight of their need. Yet I think that behind this fear lies a dangerous misperception. We tend to think of ourselves as the helpers, saviors, givers. On the other side of the counter are the needy, the receivers, the “helped.” In fact, we are in as much need as those we invite and those we would “help” have gifts of their own to offer. Moreover, we are not hosts to a sea of demanding guests. Jesus is the host. Like the disciples, we are household servants as dependent upon Jesus as the guests. Our confidence arises from the conviction that Jesus always has matters well in hand, however chaotic they might seem.

Sunday, July 5th

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

SIXTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Ezekiel 2:1-5
Psalm 123
2 Corinthians 12:2-10
Mark 6:1-13

PRAYER OF THE DAY: God of the covenant, in our baptism you call us to proclaim the coming of your kingdom. Give us the courage you gave the apostles, that we may faithfully witness to your love and peace in every circumstance of life, in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

I am not a progressive. It’s not that I don’t believe in progress. My problem is that I am not capable of recognizing it. For that reason, I don’t share the confident 19th Century faith in the inevitable improvement of humanity through the workings of democratic government that still animates so much of American Protestantism-at least the mainline variety. Democracy gave us the Nazis as well as Lincoln. Those who follow me will not be surprised to learn that I am thrilled with last week’s Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality. But is that progress? From my perspective, yes. It makes the United States of America a more just and humane society. But I am not convinced that God’s agenda is tied into the evolution of American society. For all I know, in the grand scheme of things, America might be an obstacle to God’s ultimate redemptive purpose for the earth. God might very well be fixing to remove the United States from the arena of history through conquest or imperial implosion. That would likely render moot all of the great social achievements of which we are so proud.

If that sounds a bit harsh, it is surely no more drastic than God’s employing the Babylonian Empire to bring an end to the house of David and the kingdom of Judah. The destruction of Jerusalem and the Babylonian Exile that followed did not look much like progress to most of the people of Israel. From their perspective, it was hard to see these events as anything other than the end. Existence as God’s people was unimaginable for Israel apart from the land God had given her, the temple guaranteeing God’s presence in her midst and the Davidic line that was supposed to last forever. Only the prophetic imagination of folks like Ezekiel could see in this disaster the seeds of a new beginning.

I am not a prophet. Thus, I have no idea whether the development of American society in any particular direction (or at all) represents progress or not. I don’t know what time it is in the grand scheme of things or what God is up to in the geopolitical realm. That does not mean that I am resigned to ethical paralysis, however. Jeremiah counseled the Babylonian exiles to seek the welfare of the city to which they had been taken, for in its welfare they would find their own. Jeremiah 29:7. I believe that counsel is sound for the church in the United States as well. There is much in this country that is good, life giving and worthy of preservation. There is, I believe, a “common good” toward which all Americans, including disciples of Jesus, should strive, however much we might argue over the shape of that good and the means of achieving it. But the reign of God is not the same as the common good and might very well be adverse to it. The parables of Jesus, Mary’s Magnificat and the visions of the prophets foretell not reform, but revolution. While our good works might well bring about a measure of social improvement, they cannot deliver a new heaven and a new earth. That will require a radical dissolution of the status quo and the restructuring of human/divine/ecological relationships.

Furthermore, I am wary of trusting progress, even when I think I recognize it, because I know that it is neither inevitable nor permanent. Today we see dramatic growth in the acceptance of gay, lesbian and transgendered persons that would have been unimaginable two decades ago. We have seen the election and re-election of an African American president-something I did not expect to see in my lifetime. Yet the numerous shootings of young black men in recent years and the horrific murder of black worshipers at Mother Emanuel in Charleston remind us how often the demon we think we’ve exercised comes back with seven others more evil than itself. History is filled with stories of great civilizations that have descended into barbarism. The gains we think we have made are fragile. We dare not assume that decisions of the Supreme Court, enactment of legislative reforms or changes in public opinion are permanent hedges against hatred and bigotry. Ours would not be the first society to allow its gains and achievements to be swept away in pursuit of nationalistic goals or by the false promises of some tyrannical demagogue. At the turn of the last century, Germany was among the most accepting of Jewish people among European nations-until the day it wasn’t.

So while I do believe in human progress, I don’t trust it. The only reliable anchor for faith is the “yes” to all of God’s promises, our Lord Jesus Christ. “Fear not little flock, it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” Luke 12:32. Confidence in those words makes it possible to continue the good work of mercy, compassion and justice, even when we aren’t making any progress.

Ezekiel 2:1-5

Though a prophet and critic of Judah’s cultic and religious practices, Ezekiel appears to have been of priestly lineage being intimately connected to the temple in Jerusalem and its worship. Ezekiel’s eccentric behavior, lurid visions and obscene imagery have discomforted both his Jewish and Christian interpreters. According to some Jewish traditions, the study of Ezekiel’s prophecies was restricted to men over the age of thirty.

Ezekiel was a contemporary of Jeremiah. But whereas Jeremiah’s ministry took place in Jerusalem during and immediately after its final conquest and destruction by the Babylonians in 587 B.C.E., Ezekiel preached among the exiles deported to Babylon ten years earlier in 597 B.C.E. Like Jeremiah, Ezekiel viewed Jerusalem’s destruction as God’s judgment for her unfaithfulness. Judgment, however, is not Ezekiel’s final word. The book of his oracles ends with a glorious vision of a restored Jerusalem and a new temple from which rivers of healing water transform the land of Israel into an Eden-like paradise. The parallels between this vision (Ezekiel 40-48) and that of John of Patmos in Revelation 21-22 suggest inspiration of the latter by the former. For further general information on the Book of Ezekiel, see Summary Article by Dr. Alan Padgett, Professor of Systematic Theology at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, MN on enterthebible.org.

The Book of Ezekiel opens with a tough assignment for the prophet. He is sent to speak a word to people that don’t want to hear it, won’t listen to it and might even resist it violently. Vss. 3-4. He has got to tell the people that there will be no divine deliverance for Jerusalem this time as there was in the days of the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah 36-37; II Kings 18:13-19:37; II Chronicles 32:1-23. The Babylonian invasion is God’s judgment on a rebellious and recalcitrant people. Resistance is futile. In repentance alone lies Judah’s last hope. Neither king nor people are having any of that. They are determined to hold out for a miracle.

If you have ever had the experience of having to say “no” to your teenager or, as a teenager, you have tried to move mom or dad from “don’t even start with me” to “yes,” then you know how hard Ezekiel’s job was. Once people get dug into a position, they are not inclined to move. The harder you try to push them off of it, the more tenaciously they cling. It seems as though God the irresistible force is pressing against Judah the immovable object and poor Ezekiel is caught in the middle. God does not seem to have much confidence that the word spoken to Judah will be received. Nevertheless, as a result of Ezekiel’s ministry, Judah will know that God’s prophet has been among them.

Perhaps the good news here comes from the mere fact that we have these words from Ezekiel at all. Obviously, the people of Judah finally did recognize that there had been a true prophet among them during those last dark days of Jerusalem. Clearly, the words of Ezekiel declaring God’s judgment helped the Jewish exiles begin to make sense of the terrible thing that had happened to them. In all probability, this recognition did not come until long after the destruction of Jerusalem and very likely after Ezekiel’s death. The prophet may never have seen the fruit of his ministry.

This should bring some comfort to those of us who have preached, taught Sunday School, led youth ministry or spearheaded stewardship for congregations with dwindling membership and resources. Like everyone else, I like to be assured that what I do is making a difference. I tend to look for that confirmation in measurable results-something I can express with positive numbers on my annual parish parochial report. But the results I am looking for might not have anything to do with what God is working to achieve. If God needs to destroy the existing infrastructure of the church I serve-just as God needed to destroy the monarchy, priesthood and land occupation of Israel-in order to make something altogether new, then my lust for “measurable results” shoring up the old order constitutes rebellion. It is not about results. It is about faithfulness. God will see to the results.

I understand that this argument can be invoked to rationalize failure and provide cover for laziness and incompetence on the part of clergy and lay leaders alike. I am not suggesting that the church should be resigned to failure, only that it should not be driven by fear of failure. I do not mean to say that the faithfulness, competence and diligence of ministers cannot or should not be evaluated, but only that the evaluation should not be made on the basis of “measurable results.” The principal standard governing ministry is faithfulness to the Word. Such faithfulness calls for devotion, sacrifice and ceaseless striving. Results of such ministry may or may not be measurable, but will surely further the redemptive purposes of God.

Psalm 123

This psalm is labeled a “Song of Ascents.” It shares this title with a group of psalms of which it is a part (Psalms 120-134). The meaning of this title has not been established beyond doubt. The title is thought by a number of scholars to mean that the group of songs was composed for use in the procession of pilgrims coming to Jerusalem for high festivals. E.g., Rogerson, J.W. and McKay, J.W., Psalms 101-150, The Cambridge Bible Commentary (c. 1977 by Cambridge University Press) p. 114. Other scholars cast doubt on this hypothesis, pointing out that most of these psalms appear to have been composed for cultic purposes unrelated to the post-exilic pilgrimage tradition. E.g., Weiser, Artur, The Psalms, The Old Testament Library (c. 1962 by S.C.M. Press, Ltd.) p. 100.

The psalm begins as a personal individual lament. The psalmist makes a humble affirmation of faith in God. In verses 3-4 the psalm continues as a communal plea for deliverance from oppression. This could be a plea on behalf of Israel as a whole or an oppressed group within Israel. Either way, it is clear that the psalmist/s are subject to oppression and contempt by “those who are at ease” and the “proud.”

It is difficult for me to pray this psalm. I have never been held in contempt (though I came close a few times while practicing law). On the whole, I have been relatively at ease in the land, despite the so called “war on Christianity.” See my post of Sunday, May 31, 2015. Nobody has ever detained me, asked for my citizenship papers or inhibited my ability to speak my mind or worship freely. So this psalm seems not to apply to me personally. But then again, being a disciple of Jesus is never just a personal thing, is it? There are other parts of the Body of Christ that live under grinding poverty. There are places in the world where simply being a follower of Jesus places one in jeopardy. There are disciples living in war zones, refugee camps and prisons whose lives are in constant danger. They are no doubt praying this prayer or one like it. So too, I think, the Mother Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston in South Carolina might well pray this prayer with conviction. What is more peaceful than prayer, or more violent and warlike than shooting those who engage in it?

So should I not be joined in this prayer with them? In fact, is not more than prayer required here? Recall how, in last week’s lesson from II Corinthians, Paul reminded the Corinthian Church that where one church has a surplus, it should be applied to any other having a deficit. So the psalm poses the question: How can disciples like us, who are “at ease in the land,” use our wealth, position and influence to meet the needs of those “who have seen more than enough of contempt” and “scorn?”

II Corinthians 12:2-10

This is without doubt one of the most fascinating and difficult Pauline passages in the New Testament. Again, we are a little embarrassed by Paul here. That, I think, is why the folks who prepare the readings have clipped off verse 1 of chapter 12 which reads: “I must boast; there is nothing to be gained by it, but I will go on to visions and revelations of the Lord.” Paul has already delivered a laundry list of his many accomplishments, his many sacrifices for the work of the Gospel and the suffering he has endured. II Corinthians 11:21-29. If you have been reading the last couple of chapters, you are by now probably a little sick of Paul. I think there is no getting around the fact that Paul had some serious personality deficits. He was arrogant and prone to boasting. He also comes off as a little hypersensitive, tending to take a lot of things far too personally. I have noticed that these two personality defects often come together. Yet it is precisely this-and the fact that Paul is very self-aware-that makes the man so endearing. At the end of his unabashed boasting that climaxes in an account of a profound mystical experience, he goes on to say that God afflicted him with “a thorn in the flesh.” Vs. 7. There has been no end of speculation as to what that thorn was. Some of that makes for fascinating reading. See Furnish, Victor Paul, II Corinthians, The Anchor Bible Commentary (c. 1984 by Doubleday & Company, Inc.) pp. 548-550. Yet for all of the erudite speculation put forward by eminent scholars, speculation is still just speculation. We don’t know whether Paul suffered from a physical ailment, a moral weakness or some spiritual/emotional struggle. Whatever the case may be, it was of sufficient severity that it kept Paul’s inflated ego in check. Paul recognizes that it is this very weakness that has made him realize how he must rely solely on God’s grace and mercy. The power of God, Paul knows, is made perfect in weakness, in vulnerability and in the recognition that we have nothing but what is given to us. Without that thorn, whatever it was, could Paul have reached such a profound understanding and acceptance of God’s grace?

Like Paul, I struggle with my own thorns and limitations. I often wish the quality of my voice were richer, more powerful-more like James Earl Jones and less like Woody Allen. I wish I had a more impressive physical presence-which is another way of saying I wish I were less of a geek. I wish I could stop blinking. Life and ministry would be easier if I were not such an introvert. I could name perhaps a dozen other changes I long to make to myself that, in my opinion, would make me a more effective minister. But highly effective ministers typically face highly charged temptations. How many powerful and charismatic preachers can you name that have been brought down by scandal of one kind or another? Maybe pride is a vocational liability for preachers. As Mac Davis says (or sings): “Oh Lord it’s hard to be humble when you’re perfect in every way.” Neither Paul nor I come close to perfection and it is still hard to be humble. Since humility is essential to faithful ministry, perhaps it is a good thing that we are so far from perfect. Maybe it is better to have a few thorns keeping the helium from inflating your head than to experience a spectacular explosion and fall from high altitude. I cannot imagine how insufferable we would be if, God forbid, either Paul or I ever achieved perfection. Perhaps flawed, imperfect and broken people make better ministers than would the perfect people we would like to make of ourselves.

Mark 6:1-13

The Gospel lesson appears to be paired with the lesson from Ezekiel. Here, too, the prophet (Jesus) is met with hostility and skepticism. I must confess that I don’t understand the opposition Jesus faces in his home town of Nazareth. Jesus has attained rock star popularity throughout Galilee. He cannot go into a town without collecting mobs of people. You would think that Nazareth would welcome its famous son with a parade down Main Street. After all, Jesus put Nazareth on the map. Even today, would anyone know about Nazareth if it were not for Jesus of Nazareth? Yet so far from welcoming him, the people of Nazareth treat him with contempt. “Who do you think you are? What is so special about you? We know your people and they aren’t anything special. So where do you get off teaching in our synagogue as though you were some sort of celebrity?”

Perhaps this coolness toward Jesus in Nazareth goes back to chapter 3 where his family, assuming him to be insane, came out to take charge of him. Mark 3:20-35. When they send word that they have arrived and would like to see Jesus, Jesus responds by asking: “Who are my mother and brothers?” He then goes on to explain that his true family consists of all who obey the Word of God. Mark 3:31-35. So in effect, Jesus has repudiated family ties for the new loyalties created by the reign of God. Family ties run deep in small agricultural towns. Each family has long tentacles that penetrate other families and embrace the entire community. These ties are the stuff that binds a town together. When you cut them, you sever the blood vessels of the whole community. It may well be that Jesus is now experiencing the fallout from the encounter with his family back in chapter 3. If loyalty to the Kingdom of God requires one to renounce or at least subjugate family and clan loyalties, then a prophet who preaches the Kingdom in his own back yard is likely to earn a good deal of hostility.

In the next part of the lesson, Jesus sends the Twelve Disciples he selected back in chapter 3 (Mark 3:13-19) out in twos. He does not give them specific instructions, but he does give them authority over unclean spirits. They are charged to bring with them no provisions whatsoever, but to depend upon the hospitality of the towns to which they are sent. We are told in crisp, succinct Markan fashion that they “preached that men should repent and they cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many that were sick and healed them.” Vss. 12-13.

What I find striking here is that the disciples are dependent upon the hospitality of strangers. The sharing of hospitality and meal fellowship is an intimate act-usually restricted to family and clan. One does not go into the home of sinners to eat with them. But Jesus’ disciples are sent out to question that proposition, as indeed Jesus himself already has. Repentance means breaking away from learned patterns of behavior and acculturation to embrace the openness and generosity of God’s table which is open to all. In return, the disciples are commanded to make available to all people the blessings of God’s reign in the form of casting out unclean spirits and healing. The gospel lesson thus provides a necessary counterpoint to the warnings about rejection and persecution. Disciples are also to anticipate hospitality and welcome.

Note well that it appears there was no formal education to prepare these disciples for their ministry. They were not authorized by any ecclesiastical authority other than Jesus. There was no “mission feasibility” study done in advance; no demographic research done to ascertain the racial, ethnic and cultural makeup of the target populations. Needless to say, if we in the church had been in charge of this mission, it would never have happened. Thanks be to God we were not in charge. And very great thanks be to God that we still are not in charge!

Sunday, June 28th

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Lamentations 3:22-33
Psalm 30
2 Corinthians 8:7-15
Mark 5:21-43

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Almighty and merciful God, we implore you to hear the prayers of your people. Be our strong defense against all harm and danger, that we may live and grow in faith and hope, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

Mourning and lament are part and parcel of our lessons for Sunday. Our first lesson comes to us from a book bearing the very name of lament. Our psalm speaks of joyous deliverance from mourning and sorrow. In the gospel lesson Jesus enters into the sorrow of a bereaved family. Not until you are immersed in anguish of this kind is it possible to appreciate the comfort and salvation Jesus brings. But mourning and lamentation are not a part of our national DNA. In reflecting on the mindset of the church in North America and its tendency to neglect in its worship the biblical Psalms of lament, Professor of Old Testament, Walter Brueggemann observes, “It is a curious fact that the church has, by and large, continued to sing songs of orientation in a world increasingly experienced as disoriented.” Brueggemann, Walter, The Message of the Psalms, Augsburg Old Testament Studies (c. 1984 by Augsburg Publishing House) p. 51. In his view, “the reason for such relentless affirmation of orientation seems to come, not from faith, but from wishful optimism of our culture.” Ibid. Our relentless cheerfulness is, in fact, an exercise in denial.

Nowhere is such denial more evident than in our society’s failure to acknowledge and come to grips with the reality of racism. One would think that after Walter Scott had been shot eight times in the back while fleeing a police officer in Charleston; after seventeen year old Justus Howell had similarly been shot in the back by police in Chicago just three hours later; after Freddy Gray of Baltimore had been beaten to death in police custody; after Eric Garner had been killed in a police chokehold; after Trayvon Martin had been shot to death by a vigilante; and after unarmed Michael Brown was shot multiple times by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri; after all of that we should all be connecting the dots. But there continues to be a significant sector of society in stark denial. Radio commentator Rush Limbaugh addressing the Brown shooting blamed not racism, but the media for “perpetuat[ing] myths in Ferguson because what happened is not common, it does not happen all the time, and yet this story is being covered and treated by everybody involved as though it goes on so much that we’ve had our fill of it… the only problem is it isn’t happening; it is irregular when this happens. It does not happen.”  In much the same vein, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani insists that black men are killed by white police officers not because they are black, but because they are inherently more violent. Really folks, this is not about race. We’re over all that.

Frankly, I thought that argument was put to rest once and for all last week when white supremacist Dylann Roof  walked into an historic black church with links to African Americans’ struggle for freedom predating the Civil War and shot dead nine African American worshipers making clear his intent to ignite a race war. Racism does not get any more explicit than that. Yet incredibly, Fox News expressed doubts about the racial motives of the shooter as well as the characterization of the shooting as a hate crime, suggesting instead that the killing was more properly understood as another battle in the so called “war on Christianity.” See my post of Sunday, May 31, 2015. The Wall Street Journal ran an article confidently stating that “the U.S., notably the South, has moved forward to replace the system that enabled racist killings like those in the Birmingham church [of 1963].” Finally, in what can only be described as a bizarre article and subsequent interview, Fox contributor Erick Erickson blamed Caitlyn Jenner for the violence in Charleston. “A society that looks at a 65 year old male Olympian and, with a straight face, declares him a her and ‘a new normal’ cannot have a conversation about mental health or evil because that society no longer distinguishes normal from crazy and evil from good,” he wrote. Don’t bother trying to re-read it. It won’t make any more sense the second time through. It will just make your head hurt.

If there is any value to repeating the above denials, it lies only in exposing their emptiness. Clearly, for anyone willing to acknowledge the facts, it is evident that our nation is mired in systemic racism of epic proportions. While the Charleston shooter was admittedly a fringe character, he was enabled, encouraged and incited by cultural enclaves in which racist epitaphs, stereotypes and jokes permeate routine conversation. Revelations from the recent investigation of the Ferguson, Missouri police force in the wake of the Brown shooting demonstrate that these enclaves are not limited to isolated bars, gangs or extremist political groups. They are ensconced in state, local and federal government as well as business and civic organizations. Racism is very much alive and well in the United States this Twenty-First Century.

To be fair, Fox News was not entirely wrong in calling the shooting at Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston an attack on Christianity. It was just that. As disciples of Jesus, we confess that through baptism into Jesus Christ, we are reconciled to God and enlisted in Christ’s mission of reconciliation. The good news of Jesus Christ destroys all divisive barriers between “Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female” and of course black and white. Racism is nothing less than a sinful attempt to maintain and fortify those divisive walls that Jesus died to abolish. As such, it is a direct assault on the Gospel.

Lamentations 3:22-33

A word or two about the book of Lamentations is in order. It is not a book we hear from very often in the ordinary course of our Sunday readings. Because it does not contain any stories, it does not often find its way into our Sunday School curriculum. It is a short book that you can easily overlook when casually paging though the Bible. So it is entirely possible that you have never heard of the Book of Lamentations. For a brief but thorough overview of this book, see the Summary Article by Richard W. Nysse, Professor of Old Testament, Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN on enterthebible.org.

As the name suggests, this book is a collection of laments, that is, prayers in which the Jewish people pour out their sorrow and pain to God. There are many such prayers found in the Psalms as well. Generally speaking, they follow a common format:

  1. Initial Appeal to Yahweh, vs. 1.
  2. Portrayal of inward distress, vs. 2
  3. Expression of confidence, vss. 3.
  4. Witness of praise to the community, vss. 4-8.

See Anderson, Bernard W., Out of the Depths, The Psalms Speak for us Today, (c. 1983 by Bernard W. Anderson, pub. by The Westminster Press) p. 97. Sometimes, however, laments do not progress beyond the second point, namely, the prayer expressing inward distress. See, e.g., Psalm39, which concludes with a mournful plea for God to “turn your gaze away from me, that I may smile again, before I depart and am no more.” The journey from despair to hope is a long one, often involving a lengthy trek through the darkness before one encounters any signs of light.

The laments in Lamentations express the grief of the Jewish people over the Babylonian invasion of Judah in 587 B.C.E. which resulted in the sack of Jerusalem, the destruction of the Temple and the deportation of a substantial number of Jews to Babylon. It is hard for us to get our heads around the scope of that catastrophe and what it meant to Israel. I suspect that the Somali refugees struggling to survive in refugee camps throughout the Horn of Africa could probably relate better to the following:

My eyes will flow without ceasing, without respite,
until the Lord from heaven looks down and sees.
My eyes cause me grief at the fate of all the young women in my city.
Those who were my enemies without cause have hunted me like a bird;
they flung me alive into a pit and hurled stones on me;
water closed over my head; I said, ‘I am lost.’

Lamentations 3:40-54

Lamenting or giving expression to grief is not part of my northern European constitution. I came from a community in which grief was met with stoic aplomb. My childhood memories of funerals I attended with my folks include hearing remarks such as “She is so brave!” or “He is holding up so well” spoken in hushed tones of admiration and respect. Of course, we were understanding when a widower got a little choked up at the wake and we were forgiving when a widow got a little teary at the last closing of the casket. But bursting into tears, whaling and lamenting would definitely have been considered in poor taste. Worse, it would have been interpreted as a lack of faith in the promise of the resurrection. I don’t suggest for a minute that this is a healthy way to approach grief. But healthy or not, it is the way in which I was acculturated.

By contrast, biblical psalms and prayers of lament acknowledge the reality of what Professor Walter Brueggemann calls “disorientation.” These laments insist “that the world must be experienced as it really is and not in some pretended way.” They also insist that all “experiences of disorder are a proper subject for discourse with God.” Brueggemann, Walter, The Message of the Psalms, Augsburg Old Testament Studies (c. 1984 by Augsburg Publishing House) p. 52.

Again, it is hard for typical white, middle American protestants like me to imagine living through a catastrophe such as the Babylonian conquest of Judah. Yet there are plenty of personal tragedies so deep, so painful and so life altering that it seems there is no way back. Dissolution of a marriage comes to mind as a good example of disorientating trauma. When all the hopes and expectations you had for a life together go up in smoke, you know there is no going back. You know things will never be the same again, nor will the future you anticipated materialize. You don’t know when the raw pain will end or when life will get back to normal or even what normal will look like should you ever get there. Indeed, life never returns to normal if “normal” means the way things used to be. But you might discover in your grief ever deeper levels of family, friendship and support that allow you to heal, grow and find new opportunities for love.

People who have been through periods of disorientation can never again sing the old songs from the season of well-being in quite the same way. They have learned how much life can hurt. But that is not all they have learned. They have come to recognize that God was indeed present even when God seemed most absent. Re-oriented people no longer expect to be spared from all suffering and disorientation, but they are firmly convinced that, come what may, God will always be with them. See, Brueggemann, Walter, The Message of the Psalms, (c. 1984 Augsburg Publishing House) p. 19.

It is out of such confidence in God’s abiding presence and faithfulness that Israel found the courage to hope when there seemed to be no rational basis for hope. I get the feeling that the author of this text is asserting just such confidence, reciting a tried and true confession of God’s faithfulness even though s/he is not entirely convinced by it. But the question is not whether one believes or not. The question is whether one wants to believe. And if you want to believe God’s promises, then the best thing you can do is “go through the motions,” act as though you actually do believe. Pull yourself out of bed and drag yourself to church even though you don’t feel like singing, praying, making conversation with anyone or, worst of all, listening to another sermon. When church is the last place you want to be, that is probably when you need it most.

Psalm 30

This is a psalm of thanksgiving for deliverance. It is impossible to determine precisely the danger or threat from which the psalmist has been delivered. It is possible that the psalmist is a warrior giving thanks for deliverance from death in battle. Vs. 1. It is also possible that the psalmist is thanking God for recovery from illness. Vs. 2. In either case, the psalmist is deeply thankful for God’s mercy which lasts forever and triumphs over God’s anger that is only momentary. Vs. 5.

The psalmist acknowledges that, prior to his/her troubles, s/he had become cocky and complacent. “As for me, I said in my prosperity, ‘I shall never be moved.’” Vs. 6. It is perhaps this very pride and presumptiveness that led to trouble for the psalmist. Prosperity and ease can create a false sense of security and invulnerability. When all is well and everything seems stable and secure, it is easy to forget how fragile a thing life is. Just one second of inattention to the road by me or someone else can tragically alter the course of my life forever. If that tiny spot on the X-ray is what I fear, then it does not matter how successful I have been, how much I have stashed away in my savings or how carefully I have planned my retirement. Suddenly, it becomes very clear just how dependent I am for life upon the God who gave it to me and who will sooner or later require it from me again.

The psalmist describes how s/he cried out to God for deliverance. Vs. 8. Then s/he aims what appears to be a rather presumptuous rhetorical at God: “What profit is there in my death, if I go down to the Pit? Will the dust praise you? Will it tell of your faithfulness?” Vs. 9. Seriously? Does this individual really believe that God needs his or her praise and testimony so much that God simply cannot afford to let him or her die? I suppose that is one way of looking at these words. Of course, there is another take on this as well. We are, after all, created to give praise to our Creator. Perhaps the psalmist is merely pointing out to God that s/he has learned his or her lesson. Meaning and security are not found in prosperity, however impressive it might be. Human fulfillment and joy cannot be found apart from faithful reliance upon God and a life of praise directed to God.

Verses 11-12 conclude the psalm with thanksgiving to God for reversing the psalmist’s fortunes. Having turned the psalmist’s “mourning into dancing” and having “loosed” the psalmist’s “sackcloth and girded [him/her] with gladness,” God has liberated the psalmist to do that for which s/he was created: giving thanks to God forever. Vs. 12.

This psalm is a striking contrast to the lament in Lamentations. Here we have a person who has come up from the depths, out of the quagmire of despair and back into the light. Whether the psalmist’s problem was sickness, enemies or a combination of both, it is now behind him/her. Still, verses 4-5 of the psalm are remarkably similar to Lamentations 3:31-33. Both psalms emphasize that, in the long run, God can be trusted; that however dark the situation may be, God’s salvation ultimately will see one through. The circumstances, however, are wildly different. The author of the Lamentations psalm prays these words of affirmation in hope while surrounded by impenetrable darkness. The psalmist here prays in the confidence of having seen the faithfulness of God proven in his/her own life experience. The people of God are at all times in both places and everywhere in between. That is why the psalms form such a large part of my devotional life. They speak from so many different levels of human experience that there is bound to be one that fits.

2 Corinthians 8:7-15

Again, I find myself wondering “what were they thinking?” as I try to figure out how the folks who put together our readings decided to begin and end where they do. What is this “gracious work” Paul is referring too in vs. 7? Read the previous verses and it will become clear that Paul is taking up a collection from the Corinthian church. Most likely, this refers to an offering for the churches in Judea that were experiencing economic difficulties. (Galatians 2:1-10; I Corinthians 16:1-4; Romans 15:25-27).  This passage reflects the catholicity of the early church-a community that transcends cultural, regional and national borders. It is this catholicity that made the church such a fearful enemy of the Roman Empire. Nation states typically feel threatened by groups within their borders holding a loyalty higher than national allegiance. Such groups are deemed inconvenient at best and dangerous at worst. That the protestant churches in America typically do not feel such cultural distrust and national persecution is not, as many suggest, a tribute to American tolerance. Rather, it is an indication of how deeply complicit we have become in protecting the interests of the nation state. A disciple of Jesus cannot be on board with an “America First” policy. A disciple must always “seek first the Kingdom of God” and the well-being of its citizens in whatever nation state they may be living.

In the same manner, congregations, such as the church in Corinth, cannot adopt a parochial view of ministry. The whole church is one body and all parts either flourish or fail together. Thus, the Corinthian church, which is evidently a wealthier congregation, must, for its own well-being and that of the whole church, use its surplus to meet the needs of the churches experiencing privation. For Paul, though, the issue is more than a matter of simple fairness. This tangible expression of service to and support of the Jerusalem church by Paul’s gentile congregations illustrates concretely Paul’s understanding of the church as a community of the baptized in which there is neither Jew nor Greek.” Galatians 3:28. The offering signals a new era in which God in Christ has come to “reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby bringing the hostility to an end.” Ephesians 2:16.

To get the full gist of what St. Paul is saying, you really need to read the full section at II Corinthians 8-9 in its entirety.

Mark 5:21-43

This is an aggravating story. Jairus’ daughter is at the point of death. This is a 911 call and Jesus is treating it as though it were an invitation to an open house. There is no need for him to terry on the way. The woman with a discharge of blood had already been healed and was on her merry way. Why waste precious time stopping to call her out, publically embarrass her and so further endanger the life of Jarius’ daughter? I suppose that raising a dead child is more impressive than healing a sick one. But since Jesus ultimately kept the whole affair a secret, that motivation does not seem likely. Even in Mark’s fast paced gospel narrative, Jesus will not be rushed. He does not permit events to dictate what he says, what he does or where he goes. What happened to this woman was important. The crowd, the disciples and Jarius need to know about her healing and to hear Jesus’ word to her.

Jarius, it should be noted, was a ruler of the synagogue. As such, he may have supervised worship services. Clearly, however, he held a position of honor and leadership in the Jewish community. Nineham, D.E., Saint Mark, The Pelican New Testament Commentaries (c. 1963 D.E. Nineham, pub. by Penguin Books, Ltd.) p. 157; Taylor, Vincent, The Gospel According to St. Mark, Thornapple Commentaries (c. 1966 by Vincent Taylor, pub. by Baker Book House) p. 287; Cranfield, C.E.B., The Gospel According to St. Mark, Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary (c. 1959 Cambridge University Press) p. 183. He would have been responsible for upholding religious standards in the community, including those governing ritual purity.

The woman with the perpetual menstrual bleeding would have been unclean by definition-and perpetually so. Leviticus 15:25-28. She would have been forbidden to touch anyone or anything that might come into contact with someone else, as this would render them unclean. Leviticus 15: 26-27. Clearly, she should not have been about in a tightly packed crowd like the one following Jesus. Furthermore, a woman’s intentionally touching the clothing of a strange man was at best a breach of propriety and etiquette. To do so while ritually unclean was an egregious breach of Mosaic Law. As a ruler of the synagogue, Jairus could hardly have been expected to approve of the woman’s conduct. For her part, the woman appears to harbor a superstitious belief common in the ancient near east (and evident in the scriptures as well) that holy men generate impersonal healing power. She hoped to be healed by Jesus without ever being noticed by him.

Jesus will not have this woman believe that she has escaped his notice. She is important and she needs to know that. Moreover, Jairus needs to know that she is important as well. It is no accident that Jesus calls this woman “daughter.” Vs. 34. It is as though Jesus were saying, “Look, Jairus. I am about to exercise compassion for your little daughter. I expect you to do the same for mine.” Just as Jesus will touch the unclean body of Jairus’ daughter, so Jairus must be open to the touch of others regarded as “unclean.”

“Talitha cumi” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise.” Vs. 41. This is one of the very few words of Jesus we have in the New Testament. It is a transliteration of the Aramaic tongue in which Jesus spoke. Recall that the gospels are all written in Greek and thus represent a translation of Jesus into a language he did not speak. Thus, even when we read directly the original gospel texts, we are dealing with a translation and thus an interpretation.

There is a symmetrical contrast in these two healings. The woman who sought healing in secrecy is brought out into the open. The synagogue ruler, who has Jesus coming to his home accompanied by the crowd to a house filled with mourners, receives his miracle in secret-and is enjoined to keep it that way. The interplay between secrecy and revelation running through the gospel of Mark is very much in evidence here. So, too, this contrast between what is clean and what is deemed unclean will be developed further throughout the following chapters of Mark. Whereas Jesus’ opponents shun the “unclean” fearing contamination, Jesus touches the unclean and renders it clean.

 

Sunday, June 21st

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Job 38:1-11
Psalm 107:1-3, 23-32
2 Corinthians 6:1-13
Mark 4:35-41

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O God of creation, eternal majesty, you preside over land and sea, sunshine and storm. By your strength pilot us, by your power preserve us, by your wisdom instruct us, and by your hand protect us, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

Perhaps it is because my reflections this week happen to have been influenced by the works of two very profound poetic works. Or maybe I am impressed with how deeply the scriptural narratives this week are rooted in the poetry of the psalms and prophets. Whatever the reason, I have been thinking a great deal about poetry, its influence on us and the value (or lack thereof) that our contemporary culture places on it.

I was introduced to poetry in the same way that I suspect most of you were: through music. The choruses I learned in Sunday School, the hymns shaping worship in my church and the songs I sang in school and at civic ceremonies gave me an appreciation for the power of words wrapped in music. It is difficult for the most hardened cynic to remain unmoved while standing among a crowd of people singing The Battle Hymn of the Republic.

My introduction to the naked word of poetry came largely through my sophomore high school honors English class with Mrs. Boyer. She began our unit on poetry by pointing out that poetic works are looked upon with suspicion and suppressed in many countries throughout the world. “But of course,” she added, “that is not true of our own country. Poets here are free to write and publish as they wish.” Then she added with a wry smile, “The state department knows very well that nobody in this country reads poetry anyway.” Turns out she was right. Even poets are not necessarily readers of poetry. It is my understanding that the Poetry Foundation’s publication, Poetry, has more contributors than subscribers! Mrs. Boyer was determined to do everything in her power to change our cultural disinterest in poetry. To her credit, I can still recite The Road not Taken and Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost as well as Mark Anthony’s funeral oration from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar.

To be honest, my relationship with poetry over the years has been an on and off sort of thing. I was glad to be done with the poetry unit in Mrs. Boyer’s class. I figured that I had probably had about as much exposure to poetry as a normal person needs. But in my senior year I discovered the Psalms-quite by accident as it happened. Being in study hall with no desire to study, I happened to notice a paperback book containing the Psalms someone had left in the rack under my desk. I picked it up and began reading. There began a practice that I maintain to this day: two psalms per day, one in the morning and one at night. Just like vitamins. I discovered T.S. Elliot in college and got re-acquainted with Robert Frost in seminary. As a classics major, I could hardly avoid Homer, Sophocles, Euripides, Aeschylus, Virgil, Ovid, Juvenile and all the other usual suspects.

After graduation from seminary, I lost contact with these and other poets just as I did with most of my classmates. There was no animosity involved. It is just that our lives wound up going in different directions. My life did not intersect again in any significant way with poetry until the end of the 1990s. At that point, I began writing my own poems. I cannot say what drove me to it. There was a great deal of uncertainty during that period of my life. I was struggling professionally in my law practice, dealing with the chronic illness of my wife and wondering how (if at all) I would ever get my children through college. Poetry gave me back my imagination, enabling me to see beyond the dead end I had made for myself. I found that writing poetry allowed me to enter into and view my life from a different perspective. It also made me sensitive to the rich texture of existence that can so easily be overlooked when you are working twelve hours per day at a job that requires intense focus on detail. Nothing I wrote was worth publishing nor was it so intended. Its value lay chiefly in the spiritual support it gave me at a low time in my life and the appreciation I developed for the difficulty of the poetic task.

I don’t write poetry anymore and (apart from the Psalms) I read it only infrequently. Reading poetry is hard work. The disciplined concentration it demands does not develop naturally in our tweety, texty, brief memo, “get to the point already” culture. I think, however, that such disciplined and imaginative concentration is precisely what we need. The lessons for this week invite us to engage in poetic imagination. The poetry of Job challenges us to look past our simplistic assumptions about God, morality and the universe. The Psalm gives poetic expression to God’s acts of salvation experienced by seafaring merchants caught in a violent storm. Paul cites the bold poetry of Isaiah to encourage the church at Corinth in its common mission with him. Finally, Mark suggests that a hint to Jesus’ true identity might be wrapped up in the poetic testimony of our Psalm. Each of these poetic threads is leading us down the path of discovery. Let us follow them with awe, reverence and openness to the power of imagination.

Job 38:1-11

“Stay away from the Book of Job,” my preaching professor told me in seminary, “unless you are prepared to go the distance.” What he meant, I think, is that preaching Job honestly requires us to deal with the whole messy, troublesome story. And this story is plenty messy and troublesome.

Job, you may recall, was a righteous man. So righteous was he that he not only took care to avoid sin himself, but offered sacrifices on behalf of his children to atone for any sins they might have committed. Job 1:1-5. God rewarded Job’s righteousness with a beautiful wife, wonderful children and fabulous wealth. “Now there was a day,” we read,” when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord and Satan also was among them.” Job 1:6. The NRSV translates “sons of God” as “heavenly beings” which, though making the text properly inclusive, says more than we actually know. It is presumed that we know who Satan is, though we might wonder at how he manages to slip in and out of God’s court with such freedom. Though clearly adversarial, Satan’s relationship with God seems almost collegial. Their rivalry resembles more the philosophical jousting typical among professors within the same university faculty than cosmic conflict between mortal enemies.

God, it seems, is a humanist convinced that human nature is capable of righteousness and moral progress. Satan, by contrast, is a hardened cynic. To him, human beings are a bundle of nerve endings. They do whatever they do to avoid pain and obtain pleasure. The specimen Job seems to prove God’s position and God cannot help but rub this in a little. “How ‘bout that Job, Heh? Blameless, upright, not an evil bone in his body! Now tell me Satan, doesn’t the existence of a man like that put the lie to your pessimistic outlook on the human race?”

“Righteous, yes. I’ll give you that.” Says Satan. “Of course, he’s got good reason to be righteous, doesn’t he? You reward him well enough for it. Pay me like you pay him and I’ll be righteous too!”

“What are you suggesting?” God inquires, a little uncertainly.

“Oh, just this,” says Satan. Job is righteous because he knows it pays to be righteous. But take away all the goodies, rob him of his wealth, introduce a little tragedy into his life and he will turn on you in a New York minute.” This, by the way is strikingly similar to the tactic the serpent used on Eve in the Garden of Eden. “Can God really be trusted to do right by you? Are the commands he gives you really for your own good? Or is God holding something back? Is there something God wants to keep all to God’s self?” Just as the serpent undermined humanity’s trust in its Creator, so now Satan seeks to undermine God’s confidence in God’s creature. Like Eve, God takes the bait-hook, line and sinker. God gives Satan leave to take everything from Job but his life and health.

If Satan thought he would score an easy philosophical victory here, he was wrong. Job lost his wealth and his children in one fell swoop. Though urged by his wife to curse God and die, Job replies: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I return; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job 1:21. Now God can hardly contain himself: “Have you considered my servant Job…he still holds fast his integrity, although you moved me against him, to destroy him without cause.” Job 2:3. In what God thinks is a victory speech, God has unwittingly conceded defeat. God admits that Satan has “moved” God against his faithful creature. That has been Satan’s game plan all along.

Satan has more dirty work to do, however. “Well,” says Satan, “I must admit that your Job held up much better than I expected. But every man has his price. Job still has his health. Break his body, render him incontinent, deform his appearance and afflict him with chronic pain and he will crack. A human being is but a bundle of nerve endings. Let’s see how well he pronounces blessings when those nerve endings start to hurt.” Once again, God takes the bait and Job is afflicted with bodily sores that disfigure him. At this point, Satan drops out of the story and is heard from no more. God is also off stage until the very end of the drama. In the meantime, Job receives a visit from three friends who come to comfort and advise him.

Job can see no reason for his suffering or the failure of God to respond to his cries for vindication. His friends, however, know full well what the problem is. Job is being punished for his sin. That is the only explanation there can be if we accept as true the theology of Psalm 1, which teaches us that the righteous one “is like a tree planted by streams of water, that yields its fruit in its season,” who prospers in all that he does; whereas the wicked “are like chaff which the wind drives away.” If Job is perishing, it can only be because of some evil he has done. Any other conclusion ascribes injustice to God-which is blasphemy. Naturally, the friends’ theology of God constricts their ability to speak a life giving and comforting word to Job. Job’s insistence upon his innocence only threatens the friends’ deeply held beliefs about how God’s justice works to reward the righteous and punish the wicked. Their lengthy poetic argument with Job on this point proceeds for thirty-four dreary chapters, becoming more vitriolic with every verse. The friends seem to be more concerned with defending God’s honor than comforting poor Job. Job increasingly ignores his friends’ arguments and directs his speech to the God who does not answer. Finally, just as the argument seems mercifully to have ground to a halt, one more friend steps out of the shadows to put in his two cents worth. In fact, he puts in more than two cents worth of pedantic blather, lecturing poor Job for six more chapters on his pride and impiety.

Then God speaks, and that is where our lesson for Sunday comes in. God bypasses the friends and speaks directly to Job, peppering him with rhetorical questions that Job cannot possibly be expected to answer. The point seems to be that creation is such a terrible, fearful, beautiful and awesome mystery that no mortal can comprehend it. Human life in all of its complexities cannot be boiled down to simplistic rules of moral cause and effect. The reasons for beauty, terror, joy and despair defy rational explanation. It should be enough to know that the creation is a wondrous place filled with potential for human joy and fulfilment as well as human tragedy. It is not for Job to complain that God did not make the world differently or that God could have made it better.

All of that might fly well enough if only Job’s suffering really were inexplicable. But it’s not. We already know that Job’s suffering has nothing to do with mysteries too deep for human understanding. The reader understands only too well why Job has been so cruelly afflicted. God was induced by Satan to brutalize Job in order to make a point. Worse than that, it is obvious that God is not coming clean with Job. God has Job believing that his suffering lies hidden in mysteries too great for his understanding. In the end, God restores Job’s wealth and gives him more children. The inadequacy of such a remedy is clear enough to every parent who has lost a child and been told by some well-meaning friend, “Well, thank God you’re young enough to have more children.” Children are not fungible goods. So the Book of Job ends as it began-with a lot of very troubling issues.

I have a feeling some folks might be taking offense at my treatment of this great book. In my own defense I can only say that I have chased commentators, preachers and linguists from hell to breakfast looking for a way to derive a positive message from Job. But the only way I have found to make peace with the book is to interpret it as satire from beginning to end. It is, I believe, a cautionary tale about religion run amok. “This,” says the anonymous author(s) of Job, “is what you get from a religion of moral causation, a religion that interprets all events as rewards or punishments for human behavior. (Are you listening Pat Robertson, Frank Graham and Assemblywoman Shannon Grove?) You wind up with people like Job who can find no comfort in their faith. You wind up with people like Job’s friends whose religion can provide no healing or life giving word to those who suffer. You wind up with a god who is unworthy of Job’s worship and trust.

The latter observation is aptly expressed in Robert Frost’s play Mask of Reason, which is based on the Book of Job. The drama takes place years after the events related in the Bible have transpired. God pays a visit to Job and his wife and Job poses the question: “Now after all these years You might indulge me. Why did You hurt me so? I am reduced to asking flatly for the reason-outright.”

God responds: “I was showing off to the Devil, Job, as set forth in Chapters One and Two. Do you mind?”

“No, No. I musn’t,” Job Replies. “Twas human of You. I expected more than I could understand and what I get is almost less than I can understand.”

Mask of Reason, lines 207-269; lines 327-233 printed in Frost, Robert, The Poetry of Robert Frost (c. 1969 by Holt, Rinehart and Winston) pp. 473-390.

If there is a positive word in this book, it finds expression in the character of Job. Though Satan succeeded well in turning God against God’s creature, he failed to turn Job from his faith in his Creator. So the question posed by the Book of Job is this: “Is there a God out there worthy of Job’s steadfast trust and confidence?” The book does a fine job of telling us what such a god is not. We must look beyond that book for a portrait of who that God is.

Psalm 107:1-3, 23-32

This is a psalm of praise. Verse 22 suggests that it was sung by the faith community before a sacrifice of thanksgiving. That the worshipers are “gathered from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south” (Vs. 3) suggests that this psalm was composed after the Babylonian Exile and the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem. Though some of the exiled Jews returned home to Palestine, most of the Jewish population remained scattered throughout the Mediterranean world, making pilgrimages to Jerusalem on high holy days. Such pilgrim journeys were fraught with dangers, escape from which was one of many occasions for thanksgiving.

Our lesson begins at verse 23 and relates the adventures of sea going merchants (who might also have been pilgrims). In addition to being a powerful metaphor for the primordial chaos that reigned prior to creation (Genesis 1:2), the sea was also a very tangible source of terror for the Israelite people. How many Jewish sea captains do you read about in the Hebrew Scriptures? Jonah is the only Hebrew scriptural character known to have gone to sea-and it did not turn out well for him. Yet even the terrifying power of the sea is subject to the voice of Israel’s God.

“Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress; he made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed.” Vss. 27-28. These words parallel the cries of the terrified disciples in our gospel lesson and the Psalm as a whole implies the answer to their question: “Who, then, is this, that even the wind and sea obey him?” Mark 4:41. Of course, for the pilgrims in the Psalm standing safely within the confines of the temple courts, escape from the dangers of the sea seemed no less miraculous and God driven.

These are the testimonies of persons who have experienced in a graphic way God’s saving intervention. That God does not always so act and that there are also ships full of people that go down does not dull the effect of their faithful witness. Rather, it underscores the gracious nature of God’s salvation which is neither earned, deserved, nor can it be expected as a matter of course. People who have experienced God’s salvation from death understand that each morning is a gift of one more day in a finite lifetime. Such humble thankfulness is well expressed in a poem by the late Jane Kenyon:

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.

Jane Kenyon from Constance (1993)

Moreover, such salvation experiences are not to be understood as special favors reflecting God’s preference for one person over another. Instead, they are occasions for God’s mercy and steadfast love to be manifested to the world. Hence, the command: “Let them extol him in the congregation of the people, and praise him in the assembly of the elders.” Vs. 22.

2 Corinthians 6:1-13

Paul has just finished a very fine articulation of his apostolic mission set forth in II Corinthians 5:16-21. He describes himself as an “ambassador” for Christ; God making God’s appeal for reconciliation through Paul’s ministry. In the name of Christ, then, Paul appeals to the Corinthian church “not to accept the grace of God in vain.” That is, let not the grace of God be without effect. Furnish, Victor Paul, II Corinthians, The Anchor Bible Commentary (c. 1984 by Doubleday & Company, Inc.) p. 341. Quoting Isaiah 49:8, Paul urges his readers to respond faithfully now, for time is of the essence. Vs. 2.

Verse 3 seems to be an abrupt transition. Paul has been speaking of his apostolic mission to the world, but now seems fixated once again upon his detractors’ rejection of his apostleship. Some commentators suggest that the material in II Corinthians 6:14-7:1 belongs immediately after vs. 2 rather than after verse 13. Ibid. 353. There is no question that this material seems wildly out of place where it now is and that II Corinthians 7:2 follows naturally after verse 13 in our lesson. But the transposed section does not seem to fit any more naturally between verses 2 and 3 than it does after verse 13. Accord, Furnish, supra. For my part, I am doubtful that II Corinthians 6:14-7:1 is even genuinely Pauline. It seems to contradict entirely the advice given in I Corinthians 7:12-16. If, however, one enlarges the focus to include the whole of Chapter 5, it becomes evident that Paul is simply circling back to the defense of his apostleship begun at II Corinthians 5:11-15. He points out that his credentials are the hardships he has embraced and the sacrifices he has gladly made for the sake of Christ’s reconciling mission. Vss. 4-10. Paul argues that he has done everything possible to earn the trust of the Corinthian church and asks that, as he has opened his heart to them, they similarly open their heart to him.

This passage illustrates how the greatest asset any church leader has is his/her integrity. A pastor that tithes need not apologize for asking the same from his/her congregation. A trustee that takes up the rake need not be bashful in calling upon the rest of the congregation to pitch in with the spring cleaning to avoid the expense of landscaping bills. Nothing takes the wind out of criticism quite as effectively as honesty, transparency and reliability.

Mark 4:35-41

In this gospel lesson Mark continues pressing the $64,000 question: “Who is Jesus?” Of course, those of us reading the gospel already know who Jesus is because the gospel begins in Mark 1:1 by telling us that this is the story of Jesus, the Son of God, the Messiah. Jesus knows who he is because the voice from heaven spoke to him at his baptism saying, “You are my beloved Son.” Mark 1:11. The demons know that Jesus is the Son of God and Jesus has to tell them to keep quiet about his identity. Mark 1:23-25. The only people who don’t seem to be getting it are the disciples.

Mark’s telling of this story is rich in allusions to the Hebrew Scriptures suggesting that Jesus is something more than a mere teacher. Indeed, as will later be demonstrated on the Mountain of Transfiguration, he is more even than Israel’s Messiah. The ability to control the sea and subdue storms was regarded as divine. Psalm 89:8-9; Psalm 93:1-4; Psalm 106:8-9; Psalm 107:28-29; and Isaiah 51:9-10. Additionally, the image of “the waters” was a common metaphor for the powers of evil and the trials of the righteous. Psalm 69:1-2; Psalm 18:16. Finally, in the mist of such tribulation, the faithful are called upon to express confidence in God’s power to save and deliver. Isaiah 43:2; Psalm 46:1-3; and Psalm 65:5. It should also be noted that the ability to sleep peacefully, as Jesus is evidently doing, is a sign of trust in the protective power of God. Proverbs 3:23-24; Psalm 4:8; Psalm 3:5; and Job 11:8-19. Jesus’ posture of trust evidenced by his sleeping is therefore a potent contrast to the agitation of the disciples. For a fuller discussion of these Hebrew scriptural echoes, see Nineham, D.E., Saint Mark, The Pelican New Testament Commentaries (c. 1963 by D.E. Nineham, pub. by Penguin Books, Ltd.) pp. 146-148.

It is tempting to criticize the disciples for being such dolts. Particularly after they make the remark, “Who is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” vs. 41. Unwittingly perhaps, they are practically quoting from this week’s Psalm. Had they realized what they were saying, they would not have had to ask their question. Yet the problem here is deeper than mere failure to connect the scriptural dots. Surely the people to whom Mark’s gospel is addressed, like us, know that Jesus is the Son of God. The question is, does that knowledge make any difference to them or us? Though we confess that Jesus is the Son of God, is he the first one to whom we turn in the midst of a raging storm? Or do we call out to him only when our strength, our wits and our resources have all failed us and the boat is half swamped? In these troubled and fearful times, we can still hear Jesus speaking to us, “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” vs. 40.

Sunday, June 14th

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

THIRD SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Ezekiel 17:22-24
Psalm 92:1-4, 12-15
2 Corinthians 5:6-17
Mark 4:26-34

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O God, you are the tree of life, offering shelter to all the world. Graft us into yourself and nurture our growth, that we may bear your truth and love to those in need, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

I know that parents are not supposed to live vicariously through their children, but I have to confess that I do just that. I enjoy the achievements of my daughters in their mastery of biblical and classical languages that far outstrips my own just as if they were, in fact, my own. In a different way, I live vicariously through my son, an evolutionary biologist who took the road I abandoned to enter the ministry. Like him, I spent a good part of my youth schlepping through swamps and tide pools, turning over rocks and logs to find sea cucumbers, salamanders and snakes. Living things fascinated me then and they still do. I can’t look at a body of water without wondering how deep it is, what fish and other aquatic animals inhabit its depths. A part of me has always regretted not having taken the alternative road at the fork. Now I feel that, in some measure, I am privileged to travel both roads.

It was my son who first made me aware of the profound ecological consequences flowing from the introduction of an invasive species into an established ecosystem. For example, at least 25 non-native species of fish have entered the Great Lakes since the 1800s. These newcomers alter the environment, preying on native fish that have no defenses against them, driving them close to extinction. This, in turn, creates a vacuum in the food chain allowing other native fishes and plants to multiply to unsustainable levels. This all sounds like pretty bad news and it is-from the standpoint of the existing ecosystem. But nature has a way of balancing things out. In time, a new ecosystem will evolve. To be sure, it will be different from what now is, but as my son points out, this has been going on for millions of years. Animal species, our own race in particular, tend to migrate given the opportunity. They invade new territory changing it for better or for worse wherever they go.

Jesus uses the example of an invasive species in one of his parables from Sunday’s gospel lesson. Mustard, though it has some practical uses, is not a plant you would want growing in your cultivated field. Once it takes root, it comes to occupy and stay. Like any weed, it is tougher than anything else growing around it, especially the plants you are trying hard to cultivate. Yet Jesus speaks of the coming of God’s kingdom as resembling the sowing of a mustard seed. The kingdom, says Jesus, is like a tenacious weed. Its seeds are so small you cannot even see them. Yet it gives rise to an invasive plant that digs in, takes over and grows big enough give shelter to the birds.

What does it mean to compare God’s kingdom to an invasive plant? How does the coming of God’s reign disrupt the ecology of our predatory economic system? Our power structures infected with racism? The maintenance of privilege for a relative few at the expense of the world’s poor? If this parable doesn’t scare the socks off us, then I think we must not yet have ears to hear it. Make no mistake about it, the parable of the mustard seed is good news. God has broken into the world through the ministry of Jesus to alter radically the human ecosystem. As the prophet Ezekiel tells us, a lot of big trees must fall in order for the languishing trees to thrive. Or, to put it into Jesus’ words, the last will be first and the first will be last. The end result will be a new heaven and a new earth. But the transition for some of us on the higher end of the food chain will not be easy. In fact, Jesus tells us that those of us who are rich will find entering the kingdom downright hard. Yet we are also told that hard is not impossible. Being last in the kingdom is still being in the kingdom. That is what I hold onto as this parable disrupts my orderly little ecosystem.

Ezekiel 17:22-24

For some background on Ezekiel, see my post of September 7, 2014. You might also check out the Summary Article by Alan Padgett, Professor of Systematic Theology at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, M.N.

You can’t grow a new cedar simply by planting a twig from another cedar. Vs. 22. That is just not biologically possible. Moreover, cedars do not bear edible fruit. Vs. 23. But that only makes more emphatic the work God is doing here. The allegory of the cedar is filled with messianic and eschatological (consummation of the age) imagery. The messiah is frequently spoken of in prophetic literature as a “branch” or “shoot.” See Jeremiah 23:5-6; Zechariah 3:8. The exaltation of Mount Zion is a common prophetic term for the fulfilment of God’s purpose for Israel and the world generally. See Micah 4:1-4; Isaiah 2:1-4; Psalm 87. From a mere twig cut from the tree out of which it draws sustenance, a twig that by all rights is as good as dead, God grows a tree on the highest mountain that will tower over all other trees. Vs. 23. It will give shelter to animals and a home to birds of every kind. Vs. 24. By this great act, “all the trees of the field,” that is, the nations “shall know that I the Lord bring low the high tree, make high the low tree, dry up the green tree, and make the dry tree flourish.” Vs. 24.

The phrase “you shall know that I am the Lord” appears frequently throughout the Book of the Prophet Isaiah. Ezekiel 6:7, 10, 14; Ezekiel 7:4, 9, 27; Ezekiel 12:15; Ezekiel 13:23; Ezekiel 14:8; Ezekiel 17:21. It is important that God and God’s works be made known to Israel. In this passage, however, God is to be made known to all the nations, not merely by name but by action. God is to be known as the one who brings mighty empires to nothing and raises up a people that, to all appearances, appears to be nothing. Echoes here can be heard of the Exodus-God’s liberation of Israel from slavery in Egypt to make of her a nation of promise. In a culture where the greatness of a god is measured by the political and military might of its patron nation, the God of a defeated and exiled people would seem hardly worthy of worship. But God does not belong to Israel only. God is God of all nations, raising them up and disposing of them as best serves God’s redemptive purposes. Moreover, God’s glory is not tied to Israel’s military might or geopolitical influence but to Israel’s faithfulness. This portrait of Israel’s exultation is therefore not comparable to the rise of great empires such as Assyria and Babylonia that dominate and exploit the lesser nations. Israel’s exaltation will be a life giving event for the nations of the world. This will be a different kind of kingdom ruling a different kind of world!

It is always worth asking how disciples of Jesus articulate and live out the prophetic confession of this God who raises and brings down empires for God’s own purposes in a nation that believes itself to have been uniquely selected by God to further God’s purpose through advancing its own national interests. The identification of God’s purpose with that of America, known as “American particularism,” is deeply imbedded in the American protestant psyche. Nowhere is this heretical notion better expressed than in our standard practice of placing the American flag in our sanctuaries, frequently on the same level as the altar and the cross. Sometimes I long for an encyclical from our ELCA presiding bishop condemning this idolatrous practice. I know full well, though, that no such directive will be forthcoming. First, American Lutheran bishops don’t issue encyclicals. Second, such a decree would generate more opposition than an order to shorten the worship service by omitting some of the appointed lessons. The latter is a sad commentary on the spiritual state of the church!

Psalm 92:1-4, 12-15

The superscription, “A Song for the Sabbath,” indicates that this psalm was used in connection with Sabbath observance in later Judaism. According to one commentator, the psalm most likely originated in public worship at a festival at some sanctuary lasting for several days. Weiser, Artur, The Psalms, The Old Testament Library (c. 1962 by S.C.M. Press, Ltd.) p. 614. It is possible that the festival in question was the New Year celebration instituted in Leviticus 23:24-25. Ibid. The strict injunction against work of any kind during this holiday would help to explain its later use for Sabbath worship. The sanctuary in which this liturgy was first used could have been the one at Shiloh referenced in I Samuel or the temple in Jerusalem.

“It is good to give thanks to the Lord.” Vs. 1. That is a simple yet important reminder. To live well is to live thankfully. Thankfulness does not come naturally for most of us. Many of us are stuck in the entitlement mentality, believing that God, the world, our families or our churches “owe us something” and never quite pay up in full. Or we are caught up in the deadly sin of envy that can never recognize God’s gifts to us as anything other than second best to what is given to others who seem to be better off. Of course, in a culture that values accomplishment and achievement, thankfulness is practically an admission that you received something you have not earned or deserved. Why thank God or anybody else for what I earned by the sweat of my own brow?

A thankful worshiper understands quite simply that s/he lives by grace. S/he lives life at a leisurely pace, refusing to be rushed. S/he savors the smell of fresh coffee each morning, the warmth of the sun, the refreshment a spring rain brings to thriving vegetation, the songs of birds and the shouts of children. A thankful worshiper understands that each day of health, strength and vigor is an undeserved gift and that there is no entitlement to the same tomorrow. S/he knows that on the worst day there is still always plenty for which to give thanks and praise.

It is not altogether clear what is meant by a “ten stringed lute” in verse 3. The lute was a medieval predecessor to the guitar, but whether it was anything like the instrument described in the psalm is unknown. Rogerson, J.W. and McKay, J.W., Psalms 51-100, The Cambridge Bible Commentary (c. 1977 by Cambridge University Press) p. 161. That it had “strings” suggests that it was something like a lute, guitar or lyre.

Verses 12-14 are reminiscent of Psalm 1 which speaks of the prosperity that flows from choosing the way of righteousness over wickedness. The fate of those who lack the sense to recognize God’s works and ways is discussed in verses 5-9 which are not included in our reading. For my cautionary remarks on the interpretation of psalms such as these, see my commentary on Psalm 1 in my post for Sunday, May 17, 2015. As always, I encourage you to read Psalm 92 in its entirety.

2 Corinthians 5:6-17

For my general comments on Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians, see my post of June 7, 2015.

The most puzzling piece of this passage is Paul’s remark that “while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord.” Vs. 6. Shorn of its context, this sentence is rife with potential for misinterpretation. Paul is not suggesting that the body is the prison of the soul or that salvation is liberation of the spirit from bodily incarceration. Paul is merely stating a fact. As pointed out earlier in II Corinthians 5:1, “the earthly tent we live in is [being] destroyed.” We are dying as is the creation. Nonetheless, “though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed every day.” II Corinthians 4:16. So far from separating soul from body, salvation consists in resurrecting the body. Thus, “while we are still in this tent [body], we groan, and long to put on our heavenly dwelling, so that by putting it on we may not be found naked.” II Corinthians 5:3. There is no advantage to being a naked spirit even if such a thing could exist. To be human is to be a body. It is only through the body that we can know each other. We are dependent on speech, hearing and sight. Critical to communication are the subtle tones of voice telling the hearer that, whatever our bear words might convey, we are speaking in jest. Facial expressions, hand gestures, hugs, kisses and so much more can only be conveyed by creatures with bodies. That is precisely why God has always spoken to Israel and the church through the words of Moses, Elijah, the prophets and apostles. That is why in the fullness of time the word became embodied. Jesus’ resurrection was the resurrection of his Body. His ascension to the right hand of the Father did not dispense with that Body but extended its reach to every scrap of matter in the universe. God remains embodied in God’s holy people. It is for this reason only that we can say God is in some measure knowable.

That said, we are in a limited sense imprisoned by our bodies. However much we might think we know another person, there are depths we cannot reach even with our best communication skills. How much more so with our God! Our bodies are imperfect communicators, lacking the ability to “know as we are known.” We cannot know each other or our God perfectly. As Paul says in his first letter to the church in Corinth, “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood.” I Corinthians 13:12. Thus, our hope is not that we shall be liberated from our bodies to become naked spirits, but that “we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.” II Corinthians 5:4. God is even now working the miracle of this transformation in our bodies giving us manifestations of God’s Spirit within the church as a guarantee of all that is to come. II Corinthians 5:5.

Knowing this, Paul is confident in his ministry. He is well aware that some in the Corinthian Church are critical of his personal appearance and what they judge to be his deficiencies as a public speaker. II Corinthians 10:10. There is also a suggestion that some in the congregation believe Paul to be mentally unstable. Vs. 13. Paul does not waste his breath disputing any of this. “I may stutter, I may be uglier than a baboon’s butt and mad as a hatter,” says Paul (highly paraphrased). “But it’s all for your sake that we do what we do.” Vs. 13. Paul is motivated by the love of Christ who died for all. Knowing that, it is impossible for Paul to view or judge anyone from a purely human perspective. Vs. 16. Paul once judged Jesus from just that perspective, but having encountered him as the one God raised from the dead, Paul cannot view him anymore as just another misguided teacher with some radical notions who came to a bad end. Vs. 16. Neither can Paul view women as subordinates, slaves as mere property or gentiles as unclean. Galatians 3:28. The resurrection is a game changer. Seen through the lens of Jesus’ resurrection, creation is altogether new. Vs. 17.

Sadly, the lectionary moves on next week to chapter 6 of II Corinthians passing over what I believe to be one of the most powerful articulations of the church’s mission to be found in the New Testament, namely, II Corinthians 5:16-21. I invite you to read it and reflect on it as it follows directly from what Paul has just told us in today’s lesson and explains what follows in next week’s reading.

Mark 4:26-34

The first of these two parables of God’s kingdom follows upon the Parable of the Sower told in Mark 4:3-9. This parable is not an allegory, though Jesus later resorts to allegory in order to explain it to his clueless disciples. Mark 4:10-20. The kingdom of God is to be seen in the totality of the circumstances: the sower who spreads his precious seed indiscriminately over soil both receptive and resistant; the varying degrees of response to that sowing and the resulting fruitfulness. Building on the same imagery, the parable of the planting, growth and harvest in verses 26-29 illuminate the kingdom from a different angle. The sower, though powerless to make the seed sprout, grow and mature nevertheless takes an active role in the process. The sower both plants and takes in the harvest. But that is the extent of the sower’s power to act. Growth comes of itself without the sower’s activity. For all that takes place between planting and harvest, the sower can only patiently wait.

So is Jesus intimating that the kingdom may be a long time in coming and that his disciples must sow the seeds of their ministry and wait patiently for growth? (Weiss, J., Das Markusevenelium (in Die Schriften des Neuen Testaments, Vol. I, 3rd ed. Revised by W. Bousset, c. 1917) cited by Taylor, Vincent, The Gospel According to Mark, Second ed., Thornapple Commentaries (c. 1966 by Vincent Taylor) p. 266)). Or is he saying in effect that the time of growth is over and the day of harvest has arrived? (Schweitzer, A., The Quest for the Historical Jesus (c. 1906 by W. Montgomery, English Translation) cited by Taylor, supra.); Cranfield, The Gospel According to St. Mark, The Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary (c. 1959 by Cambridge University Press) p. 167; Nineham, D.E., Saint Mark, The Pelican New Testament Commentaries (c. 1963 by D.E. Nineham, pub. Penguin Books, Ltd.) p. 142. That the reference to the harvest has strong eschatological overtones (e.g. Joel 3:1-13) suggests that the interpretation favored by the weight of scholarly authority is in fact the better view. The conviction that the time for harvest has already come comports with Jesus’ inaugural declaration that “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand.” Mark 1:15. Nevertheless, it is appropriate to recognize the parable’s emphasis on the growth and maturing of the crop as beyond the control of the planter. As Mark will make clear to us, the disciples’ understanding of Jesus and the kingdom he proclaims is laden with misconceptions and clouded by self-interest. Nevertheless, that kingdom is erupting into the world under their very noses and the opportunities for harvest are plentiful but as yet unseen.

The Parable of the Mustard Seed in verses 30-32 should likewise be understood against the backdrop of Jesus’ declaration that the kingdom of God has drawn near. Just as the parable of the planter concludes with an allusion to the final judgment pronounced by the Prophet Joel, so too this parable concludes by echoing the messianic proclamation in our lesson from Ezekiel. Yet there is a striking difference between the Parable of the Mustard Seed and Ezekiel’s prophetic oracle about the miraculous growth of the great cedar. Unlike the stately cedar, mustard is an invasive plant that can readily take over a field cultivated for more profitable crops. It is, not to put too fine a point on it, a weed. Whereas Matthew and Luke dignify the parable by characterizing the mustard plant as a tree (Matthew 13:31-32; Luke 13:18-19), Mark is content to call it what it is-a bush.

However one wishes to characterize the mustard plant, there is an obvious contrast between its seed which is proverbially small and the grown plant. Moreover, mustard is a fast growing plant that is highly disruptive. Hooker, Morna D., The Gospel According to Mark, Black’s New Testament Commentaries (c. 1991 by Morna D. Hooker, pub. by Hendrickson Publishers, Inc.) p. 136. Thus, it is unlikely that the parable is stressing the need for patience as the disciples wait for the gradual, progressive evolution of God’s kingdom through the institutions of democratic societies. The seed carries in it the immanent incursion of God’s reign into the well-ordered imperial garden. Be afraid, Caesar. Be very afraid!

Sunday, June 7th

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

SECOND SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Genesis 3:8-15
Psalm 130
2 Corinthians 4:13—5:1
Mark 3:20-35

PRAYER OF THE DAY: All-powerful God, in Jesus Christ you turned death into life and defeat into victory. Increase our faith and trust in him, that we may triumph over all evil in the strength of the same Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

These are tough times for the Duggar family. For those of you who might not be in the know, Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, along with their nineteen children, are stars of the TLC network reality show, “Nineteen Kids and Counting.” The show focuses on the life of the Duggar family. Devout Independent Baptists, the Duggars have home schooled all of their children and limit their access to movies, television and gaming. They frequently discusses values of purity, modesty, and family. The Duggars reject all forms of birth control claiming that God alone should determine the number of children they have. They practice “chaperoned courtship,” monitoring the dating relationships of their children. The expectation is that physical expressions of affection, even hand holding, are to be avoided until engagement. Kissing and sexual conduct are to be foregone until marriage. The Duggars promote and practice family structure based on male hierarchy and female submission to male authority.

TLC portrayed the Duggars as the model of everything a wholesome Christian family ought to be. At its peak, Nineteen Kids and Counting averaged 2.3 million viewers. But this image began to crumble two weeks ago after a police report from 2006 surfaced showing that sexual molestation allegations had been made against the Duggars’ eldest son, Josh Duggar. According to the report, Josh, who was then fourteen or fifteen years old, molested five young girls, four of which were his own sisters. TLC promptly suspended the series.

I feel sorry for the Duggars. No parent should have to go through what they did with their son Josh. Certainly no little girl should have to endure molestation. Obviously, Josh has serious problems that need to be addressed, not only for his sake, but chiefly for the sake of all children with whom he might someday come into contact. This is a family deeply in need of prayer, care and support. That they happen to be celebrities does not make them any less human. I wish them only God’s comfort and healing presence.

That said, it sticks in my craw that for nearly a decade the Duggars, with the help of their TLC handlers, represented themselves as the paradigm of Christian family wholesomeness and virtue when they knew full well that incest and sexual abuse had been occurring under their own roof. I find it repulsive that Josh had the moxie to accept a leading position at the Family Research Council, a right wing parachurch organization that seems to conduct little research but lobbies and promotes extensively “family values” which, however defined, I am sure does not include incestuous predatory behavior by teenagers against their younger siblings. Be aware that Josh’s criminal conduct was brought to light in 2006, a good two years before the Duggar family took to the airwaves in order to help “others to see that the Bible is the owner’s manual for life.” Thus, for the better part of a decade the Duggars have been perpetrating a lie on the public. For that they ought to be ashamed.

Though I would not describe the Bible as a “manual for life,” it is (unlike the Duggars) brutally honest about the realities of family life. Our lesson from Genesis tells us that the first recorded marriage in the Bible is seeded with mutual blame, dishonesty and struggle for dominance. The next generation brought with it the first recorded murder-a fratricide. Biblical families are rife with incest, sexual abuse, violence and betrayal. According to our gospel lesson for this Sunday, even the “holy family” seems to have been a bit dysfunctional. Nevertheless, these same dysfunctional families are the arena for love, faithfulness, reconciliation and promise. Despite their brokenness, God finds ways to work redemptively through families to bring healing and peace.

Parents Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar write in their official response to the recent revelations about Josh, “We pray that as people watch our lives they see that we are not a perfect family. We have challenges and struggles everyday.” Well Jim Bob and Michelle, though I wish you had said this eight years ago, I am glad to hear you say it now. I hope you mean it. I hope that the brokenness in your own family moves you to look with greater empathy, understanding and acceptance for all of the other broken families in our country, especially the ones that look different than your own. I hope you can now see single parent families, families of same sex couples, even white bread families like my own that don’t adhere to your standards of behavior as arenas for God’s redemptive work. I hope that you will come to see that all families, whatever their makeup, share common needs, yearnings and dreams. Perhaps one day we can both sit at the same table and discuss how together we can strengthen our families by ensuring a living minimum wage for all workers, stable communities based on an economy driven by human need rather than corporate greed, and access to affordable health care-especially for our children. Perhaps, too, we can share insights into how we read the scriptures for wisdom and guidance in our parenting. Your experience has demonstrated that you do not have all the answers for what ails our family life. There is no shame in that. None of the rest of us have answers either. But working together in humility, mutual acceptance and trust in our God, we can build a healthier environment in which some of those answers might emerge.

Genesis 3:8-15

To get the full impact of this encounter between God and God’s human creatures, we need to go back a chapter to where God, determining that it is “not good” for the “Adam” (“earth creature”) to be alone, draws from Adam a partner. Here for the first time Adam is referred to as “man” or “ish” in contrast to the “isha” or woman. Significantly, they are at this time both naked and unashamed of their nakedness. Genesis 2:25. We are told that the serpent was more cunning than all the other creatures God had made. Genesis 3:1. There is a clever play on words here that gets lost in translation. The Hebrew words for “naked” and “cunning” are “arumim” and “arum” respectively. Thus, the knowledge offered through the cunning (arum) of the serpent manifests itself first by revealing to Adam and Eve that they are naked (arumim). Genesis 3:7.

Our understanding of this text is clouded by our cultural association of nudity with sexual immorality. The eye opening shock experienced by Adam and Eve had less to do with sex and more to do with the sheer terror of exposure, a terror that could not exist if all indeed were clearly exposed. But I suspect that Adam is even now concocting his plan to throw Eve under the bus when confronted by God over the matter of the forbidden tree. Eve, too, is formulating her defense and would prefer to keep that strategy to herself. This new “knowledge” Adam and Eve have obtained discloses in a poignant way how little they can know of each other, which is truly terrifying given their growing lack of trust.

What we see in this story is a reflection of relationships in general as well as of marriages in particular. “There are no secrets between us,” I often here couples say. But of course that is never the case. I doubt most couples share between them all of their fantasies and daydreams. Most of us have experiences in our past we prefer to keep secret. We tell small, inconsequential lies to one another in order to bring comfort or avoid hurt. So too with less intimate relationships. We weigh how much to share with any given friend, keeping back those things we think might cause him/her to think less of us. In social settings we steer conversation away from topics that we think might give rise to argument, awkwardness or embarrassment. We develop “filters” to prevent us from speaking all that is on our mind because we know how destructive that can be to our relationships.

The portrayal of God in this story is quite remarkable. God comes not as the unbearable presence atop the fiery mountain in Sinai, nor as the overwhelming presence enthroned in the heavens we met in last week’s lesson from Isaiah. God comes strolling onto the scene enjoying the evening breeze just as any one of us might do in the cool of the evening. Adam and Eve are nowhere to be seen. Vs. 8. God must call them out of hiding. Vs. 9. God interrogates his creatures on their odd behavior. “Why ever would you hide from me?” Vs. 10. Of course, God knows what is wrong. God’s creatures now have secrets from God (or so they think). They don’t want to be naked in front of God anymore than they want to be naked before each other. There can be but one explanation for their unusual conduct: “Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” vs. 11.

Now it is clear that the humans cannot hide their nakedness any longer-at least not from God. Rather than giving God a straightforward “yes” to the inquiry about the tree, Adam moves immediately to his defense. “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.” Vs. 12. The woman explains, “The serpent [whom you made and put in the garden] tricked me, and I ate.” Vs. 13. If the serpent had an excuse, we don’t get a chance to hear it. God evidently feels he has taken enough evidence to enter judgment on this case.

Judgment is first pronounced upon the serpent. Henceforth, the serpent will be cursed even within the animal world, doomed to crawl on its belly eating dust for the rest of its days. Vs. 14. Furthermore, there will be enmity between the serpent and humanity that will continue throughout the generations to come. Vs. 15. In my opinion, we read too much into this text when we construe the “crushing” of the serpent’s head in this verse as the victory of Christ over Satan. The serpent is not a demonic figure in this narrative. It is one of God’s good creations. Though “cunning,” it is not inherently evil. Yet its presence in the garden and the role it plays in this story tells us that there is an element of randomness in God’s good creation. God made a world loaded with potential for good, but the potential for tragic and unintended consequences exists as well.

Perhaps the greatest difficulty I have found in preaching this text is the baggage it has accumulated over the last century in the still active campaign of “creationists” to defend their interpretation of this text as an historical, geological, astronomical and biological account of origins in the face of all we have learned from the sciences. Even our own theological language characterizing this story as “the Fall” mischaracterizes the narrative truth. This is not the story of a pristine beginning spoiled by a stolen apple. When the text is read in that way, we are left with a host of imponderables. Who is the serpent? Where did he come from? Why did God put him in the garden to begin with? It does not help to identify the serpent with the devil. That only kicks the metaphysical can further out into the cosmos. For now we must ask where the devil came from.

This creation story is best understood as descriptive of what now is rather than an explanation for why it is. To the extent that there is a “why” lurking in the narrative, it consists only in acknowledging that God creates a world filled with creatures loaded with potential. Human inquisitiveness, cunning essential to survival, knowledge that is both promising and dangerous are all woven into the fabric of creation. The creation of the “earth creature” or what we might call the emergence of self-consciousness and differentiation from the animal world is a good development, enabling the human to serve as God’s steward and gardener for the earth. Yet this same development brings with it the temptation to exploit, dominate and control. In a sense, each generation is Adam and Eve. We are born into a world with certain givens. There is inherent randomness. We inherit a history of violence, injustice and cruelty that continues to make itself felt. It is in this sense that we can speak of what is often (and inaptly) called “original sin.” Yet there are endless opportunities also for enacting compassion, justice and peace.

If you were to read further in the chapter, you would discover that judgment is not the last word in this story. Though the consequences of their transgression are not reversible, God nevertheless sends Adam and Eve from the garden with clothing made by God’s own hand, covering the nakedness that so terrifies them. Genesis 3:21. God has not given up on the human creatures. There is more to this story which is only beginning to unfold.

Psalm 130

This psalm is one of seven “penitential psalms” (the others being Psalm 6; Psalm 32; Psalm 38; Psalm 51; Psalm 102; and Psalm 143) so named by Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator, a statesman, writer and scholar of the sixth century. It is characterized by Hebrew Scripture scholars as a “lament” containing all of the essential elements of its type:

  1. Initial Appeal to Yahweh, vss. 1-2.
  2. Portrayal of inward distress, vss. 3-4
  3. Expression of confidence, vss. 5-6
  4. Witness of praise to the community, vss. 7-8.

See Anderson, Bernard W., Out of the Depths, The Psalms Speak for us Today, (c. 1983 by Bernard W. Anderson, pub. by The Westminster Press) p. 97. The Hebrew word “mimmaamkym” “From out of the depths” is a term that is equated with “sheol” or the abode of the dead. For the Israelite there was no “after life.” The concept of resurrection from death came only much later in Israel’s thinking. Consequently, death was the end of any meaningful life. To be in sheol was to be separated from the realm of life and therefore from the Lord of Life. There is no praise of Israel’s God in sheol. Consequently, the psalmist must have been in very deep distress, though we cannot tell what his or her specific complaints were.

According to Anderson, supra, the “word ‘depths’ [mimmaamkym] reverberates with mythical overtones of the abyss of watery chaos, the realm of the powers of confusion, darkness and death that are arrayed against the sovereign power of God.” Ibid. Perhaps, but the point seems to be that the psalmist feels as utterly distant from God who is “enthroned upon the cherubim” (Psalm 99:1) as any creature can be. This distance is due, in part at least, to the psalmist’s sin. Though clearly in some sort of deep trouble, the psalmist knows that s/he is in no position to claim God’s help and salvation. Nevertheless, the psalmist is able to “hope in the Lord” and encourages all Israel to do the same because, “there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared.” Vs. 4. It is worth repeating here that the New Testament did not invent forgiveness. God has always been and always will be forgiving toward his people Israel and toward his people engrafted into the covenant with Israel through baptism into Jesus Christ. If that were not the case, if God did in fact “mark iniquities” (vs. 3), there would be no point in prayers such as this.

The psalmist is resolved to “wait for the Lord.” Vs. 5. S/he knows that answers to prayer are not instantaneous. Prayer requires a willingness to wait and watch for the answer. Jesus also told his disciples “Ask, and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.” Matthew 7:7-8. Thus, asking is only the beginning. One must then seek the answer and be willing to knock on what appears to be a closed door.

“My soul waits for the Lord more than the watchmen for the morning.” Vs. 6. This is a striking image. In Jerusalem, watchmen took their post after sunset to keep a look out for approaching enemies. They were the ancient world’s equivalent of early warning systems. It was a tedious job on a long winter’s night and one can well imagine the watchman, who had no clock or wrist watch, scrutinizing the horizon for signs of the sunrise signaling that his lonely vigil was finally coming to an end.

In verses 7-8 the focus changes from the psalmist’s personal prayer to an admonition directed to all Israel to hope in the Lord. As we saw in Psalm 51, Israel frequently took ancient prayers of individuals and adapted them for use in public worship as prayers for the whole people. In this case, an Israelite who lived after the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem may well have found in this individual’s plea for personal help a reflection of Israel’s post exilic distress. Having lost the line of David, the Temple, and her land, Israel was likewise “crying out from the depths.” Like the individual, Israel turned to the Word of the Lord and God’s promises for comfort and hope, knowing that with her God was forgiveness. Vs. 4.

2 Corinthians 4:13—5:1

For a brief but thorough introduction to Paul’s Second Letter to the Church in Corinth, see the Summary Article by Mary Hinkle Shore, Associate Professor of New Testament at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN. In short, Paul’s relationship with the church at Corinth deteriorated significantly between the writing of I Corinthians and II Corinthians. It appears that there were some individuals or groups within the church at Corinth that were challenging Paul’s apostolic authority, undermining his leadership and questioning his fitness as a preacher. Following his first letter, Paul made what he describes as a “painful visit” to the church. II Corinthians 2:1. This visit did not accomplish whatever it was he had intended. Not wanting to make another such visit, Paul wrote a “severe letter” to the church in Corinth out of “much affliction and anguish of heart.” II Corinthians 2:4. Though we cannot be certain, many commentators believe that at least part of this “severe” letter is contained in II Corinthians 10-13. E.g., Godspeed, Edgar J., An Introduction to the New Testament, (c. 1937 by University of Chicago Press) pp. 61-62. Whatever the case may be, it is evident that Paul was concerned about the effect his letter would have upon the church and so sent his associate, Titus, to Corinth in order to deal with the fallout. (It is also possible that Paul sent the letter along with Titus). Paul became so preoccupied with the problems at Corinth and the potential impact of his letter that he cut short a preaching tour in Troas and traveled to Macedonia in search of Titus. There Paul finally caught up with his associate who brought him a very favorable report from Corinth. II Corinthians 7:5-13.

Paul’s severe letter had evidently done its work. The congregation gave its full support to Paul. Paul’s opponents were disciplined by the congregation so severely that Paul had to write and urge the church to reach out to them with forgiveness and “reaffirm” their love for these errant members. II Corinthians 2:5-11. It is this third letter from Paul to Corinth from which our lesson comes.

Our reading begins with Paul’s lose citation to Psalm 116:10: “I kept faith, even when I said, ‘I am greatly afflicted.’” To make sense of this, you need to go back and read II Corinthians 4:7-12 where Paul speaks about the afflictions he has endured as a missionary of the gospel of Jesus Christ. These include being “persecuted” and “struck down.” Notwithstanding these afflictions, the Spirit continues to give Paul the courage to “speak out.” Vs. 13. Paul is convinced that, though he is always “carrying in the body the death of Jesus” (II Corinthians 4:10), the God who “raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence.” Vs. 14.

For this reason, says Paul, “we do not lose heart.” Vs. 16. Even though our “outer nature” is wasting away, “our inner nature is being renewed every day.” Vs. 16. The former is evident. We experience the aging process that diminishes our bodily health and strength. We see our achievements fade into insignificance. Our friends move away, die or become estranged through time and circumstance. The universe, we are told, is expanding and doomed to run out of steam. The latter is not evident. Based solely on the empirical evidence, no one can assert that we are being renewed even as we are in the process of dying or that this expanding universe is being transformed into a new heaven and earth. This reality is only illuminated by the resurrection of Jesus from death. It is for that reason we dare to believe God is at work bending each subatomic particle of the universe and turning all of its energies toward redemption. In the words of Rick Barger, president of Trinity Lutheran Seminary, “If the tomb had not been empty on Easter Sunday, we’d have nothing to talk about.”

This passage is incredibly good news for social workers who spend their energies helping people crawl out of horrible situations only to fall back in again. It is good news for teachers struggling to provide a quality education to underprivileged children in underfunded, poorly run and neglected schools. It is good news for pastors of churches that continue to struggle notwithstanding their enormous efforts to build them up. We do not look only to what is seen in the light of the status quo. We view everything in the light of Jesus’ resurrection which demonstrates that the universe is bent toward the kingdom of God and that life in conformity with that kingdom is eternal.

Mark 3:20-35

What would you do if you learned that your adult son was acting erratically, not eating properly and getting himself into trouble with the authorities? Upon hearing these very reports about Jesus, his mother and brothers did what I believe any loving family would do. They organized an intervention. It was their intent to “seize” Jesus and take him home by force if necessary. They might have succeeded but for the crowd around Jesus they could not penetrate. Failing to reach Jesus, they send word that they desire to speak with him. His response must have been a blow to their hearts, particularly to his mother. “Who are my mother and brothers?” Vs. 33. “Whoever does the will of God is my brother, and sister, and mother.” Vs. 35.

As I have noted in previous posts, there is no shortage of organizations under the Christian franchise devoted to preserving the “traditional family.” One such organization is Focus on the Family whose self described mission is “to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ with as many people as possible by nurturing and defending the God-ordained institution of the family and promoting biblical truths worldwide.” Of course I think sharing the Gospel is critical and know well that success on that score requires cooperation with the Holy Spirit. I am not necessarily opposed to promoting biblical truths either, though I suspect I might not agree with Focus on what those truths are. The real sticking point, though, is the “God-ordained institution of the family.” According to Focus, the ideal family is “one man and one woman committed to each other for life, raising their children in a loving, supportive home.” That, however, is not what Jesus just told us. Marriage is not the foundation of family and blood lineage does not define its boundaries. Baptism is the foundation of family and trumps all other relationships, including marriage. See Luke 18:29-30. For disciples of Jesus, water is thicker than blood. Church is the only “God ordained” family there is. Focus on the Family is therefore focusing on the wrong family.

That is not to say that families and households are not important. To the contrary, they are. I agree with Focus that “our culture increasingly disparages family life,” though I believe poverty, inadequate wages, increasing demands for employee productivity, requirements for worker mobility, lack of job security, lack of access to adequate health care and erosion of quality educational opportunities have a lot more to do with that than marriage equality-the culprit blamed by Focus. Does anyone really believe that marriage of the gay couple across the street poses a greater threat to his/her family’s well-being than losing a job or health care coverage? If Focus is truly committed to the welfare of families, I would recommend to its board of directors a campaign against late stage capitalism. Somehow, I don’t think that would fly.

Sandwiched in between the two ends of this episode with Jesus’ family is the allegation of the scribes that Jesus is possessed by Beelzebul who enables him to cast out demons. Jesus responds by pointing out the faulty reasoning of the scribes. Vs. 22. Why would Satan give Jesus power over his own legions? If in fact “Satan is cast[ing] out Satan,” his kingdom is imploding. That can only mean the Kingdom of God is at hand-just as Jesus has been saying. Vss. 23-25. Jesus goes on to say that no one can plunder a strong man’s house unless he first binds the strong man. Thus, Jesus can only do what he is doing because he has, in fact, bound Satan. Vs. 28.

Finally, we have that ever troublesome verse about blasphemy against the Holy Spirit for which one “never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” Vs. 28-29. That verse has been a torment to many people over the centuries, not the least of whom was the father of Soren Kierkegaard who confided to his son that he once cursed God for the dreariness of his life while living as an impoverished serf. What does it mean to blaspheme the Holy Spirit? In the first place, it is important to note that this admonition is not addressed to the public but to the specific scribes who equated Jesus’ exorcism of demons with the work of demons. Unable to deny that Jesus has truly freed people from the power of Satan and unwilling to ascribe any good to Jesus whatever the evidence may show, they resort to nonsensical arguments in order to discredit Jesus. These particular scribes are hardened in their opposition to Jesus. They are not doubters, skeptics or even indifferent to Jesus. They have made up their minds and formed their opinions about Jesus. They refuse to allow the facts to confuse the issue.

To the few folks I have met over the years (and there have been a few) concerned about whether they might have committed the unforgivable sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit, I have simply told them that their concern in that regard is a pretty clear indication that they have not. I am fairly convinced that the persons (if any) who are actually guilty of this sin don’t much care and never lose a night’s sleep over it. In sum, if you are worried about having committed this unforgivable sin, you haven’t. If you have committed blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, you are not the least bit worried about it and you are probably not reading this blog anyway.

Sunday, May 24th

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

DAY OF PENTECOST

Ezekiel 37:1-14
Psalm 104:24-34, 35b
Romans 8:22-27
John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

PRAYER OF THE DAY: Mighty God, you breathe life into our bones, and your Spirit brings truth to the world. Send us this Spirit, transform us by your truth, and give us language to proclaim your gospel, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

“When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth.” John 16:13.

Not long ago I ran into a friend from a congregation to which I once belonged and served. After the usual exchange of pleasantries, she unloaded upon me her frustrations with the “new” direction taken by our church (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America). Of particular concern was our 2009 churchwide decision to permit the blessing of same sex relationships and to accept for ordination persons living faithfully in such relationships. “The Bible has taught us that marriage is a life-long commitment between one man and one woman from the beginning of time,” she remarked. “Why change it now?”

How to answer? There was so much wrong with the question itself that I hardly knew where to begin answering. My friend’s assertion about the Bible’s teaching on marriage is dead wrong. In addition to monogamy, the Bible recognizes polygamy, concubinage and sexual slavery as legitimate arrangements. When it comes to the sheer number of Bible passages available on the subject of marriage, there are far more verses one could use to undermine the monogamous relationships we have now come to call “traditional” than there are to be used against same sex marriages. The church adopted the rule of monogamy largely because it was the dominant trend both in 1st Century Judaism and throughout Mediterranean culture generally. Of course, there were theological reasons as well. Paul’s assertion that there is in Christ neither male nor female undermined the cultural assumption of patriarchy and the treatment of women as property. The comparison of marriage to Christ’s relationship with the church in the letter to the Ephesians leaves no more room for polygamy than does the First Commandment for polytheism. But at the very least, we need to acknowledge that societal trends played a large part in driving the church’s recognition of monogamy as normative for marriage. It was not that way from the beginning of time or throughout the scriptures.

If the church had all the truth, it would not need the Holy Spirit to guide it. I don’t believe the church has ever claimed that it possessed all the truth even in its worst moments of triumphalistic arrogance. I do believe, however, that we frequently claim possession of more truth than we actually have. The church has also been flat out wrong about some things-and we usually don’t take kindly to folks who point that out to us. It took us centuries to get over Nicolaus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei informing us that the earth revolves around the sun rather than the other way around. The rich irony here is that, even as the Vatican was bringing Galileo up on charges of heresy, its ships were using navigational maps based on his heretical theory because maps based on the orthodox, Bible based Ptolemaic understanding of the universe reliably ran them into the rocks. At some point, denying the obvious in order to preserve “what we have always believed and taught” is just silly.

Even as the church is not always right; so too, societal trends are not always wrong. Clearly, Copernicus and Galileo were on the right track. The church would have done well to take their work seriously and think more deeply about what the Bible actually has to say about creation and our abilities to understand it. Had we done that, it is entirely possible that we would have spared ourselves the embarrassment of Galileo’s heresy trial, the Scopes Monkey trial centuries later and the present day humiliating spectacle of multi-million dollar museums featuring T-rex’s cavorting with Adam and Eve.

So, too, it has long been the scientific consensus (since at least the early 1970s) that homosexual orientation is a naturally occurring phenomenon rather than a psychiatric disorder. It has also become painfully and tragically evident that pseudo-scientific methods employed to “cure” people of their sexual orientations are not only ineffectual, but harmful. I am not suggesting that one cannot assert good faith arguments against the blessing/marriage of same sex couples or that theological concerns about so doing should be dismissed out of hand. But let me say emphatically that no argument should be entertained based on junk science, literalistic readings of cherry picked scripture passages or irrational fear and hatred toward gay and lesbian people.

Thankfully, the church’s long history demonstrates that it is capable of adaptation. Marriage has evolved within the church from an arrangement between men by which women were transferred as property to a relationship of mutuality mirroring that of Christ to the church. That, in my view, is a much bigger leap than merely opening up our current understanding of mutual covenant love and faithfulness to same sex couples. We cannot pretend that the church is guided strictly by doctrines, morals and practices that remain unaltered in their pristine form dating from biblical times. That is not what the Bible tells us.

The church has changed throughout the ages and will no doubt change in ways we cannot predict throughout the coming century. But that should not trouble us. Jesus promises to be present in our midst through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. That Spirit can be trusted to correct our missteps and guide us into all truth. I only pray that my friend and all others who share her concerns find comfort and peace in that promise.

Ezekiel 37:1-14

For my general comments on the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel, see my post of September 7, 2014. For my reflections on this text in particular, see my post of April 6, 2014.

This familiar story of the prophet and the valley of dead bones takes on a new meaning when played in the major key of Pentecost rather than the minor key of Lent. The focus now is less on the hopeless circumstances of the people and more on the life giving power of the “the breath,” or “ruach” as the Hebrew has it. As I have mentioned before, ruach may be translated either as “spirit” or as “breath.” As our psalm points out, it is the breath of God that gives life to inanimate clay. Psalm 104: 29-30; Genesis 2:7. It is this same breath that is summoned by the words of the prophet to inspire hope among an exiled people on the verge of extinction. Vss. 11-14. The interplay between God’s word that goes forth from God finding expression in the words of the prophet and God’s Spirit/Breath that gives life is found throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, particularly in the writings of the prophets. Torah is not dead letter. It is the place where God seizes the heart and imagination even as the believer wrestles with Torah in prayer and reflection. Psalm 119 in particular testifies to this lively and dynamic relationship between word and spirit, hearing and prayer, meditation and daily life.

So, too, Spirit is not an ethereal inwardness. The Spirit of God is always tied in some way to God’s word. The Hebrew God is the one who speaks. God speaks creation into being, speaks through the gift of Torah and speaks through the mouths of the prophets. God’s Spirit is given through speech. The God of the Bible is not the deity of philosophers whose nature and identity is discovered through reflection upon his necessary attributes. The God of the Bible reveals God’s self through acts of salvation on behalf of a particular people. God’s Spirit is given through the narratives of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, through the story of the Exodus, Wilderness Wanderings, Settling of Canaan, the Davidic Monarchy, Exile and Return from Exile. To receive the Spirit is to locate yourself in these grand narratives.

It is easy enough to find ourselves in this narrative. We are the dead bones, a people in decline. We inhabit a landscape of museums, office buildings and theaters that once were thriving places of worship. For those sanctuaries that still function as such, there is often a huge disconnect between the small, aging and fragile band of worshipers and the triumphal architecture housing them. We are the dead bones, but can we recognize ourselves as the bones upon which the breath of God’ blows? Are we able to recognize those places where God’s Spirit is creating life in our midst? Where is the Spirit moving in the church today?

Psalm 104:24-34, 35b

For my extensive comments on this psalm, I invite you to revisit last year’s Pentecost post of June 8, 2014. I am struck this time around by the dependence of our earth upon the animating word and Spirit of God. The cosmology of Genesis places the habitable world under a great dome creating a bubble within the chaotic waters that were before time. Should the windows of heaven crack allowing the waters above the earth to cascade down and the waters beneath the earth erupt over the land, the creation would soon degenerate into chaos. Indeed, this is precisely what almost occurred during the great flood in Noah’s time. Genesis 7:11. Obviously, our 21st Century cosmology is a good deal more sophisticated than the biblical understanding of the universe. Nevertheless, whether one is reading this psalm or Carl Sagan’s Cosmos, one cannot help but be impressed with how vulnerable our little planet is. When you stop and think about how our earth runs its course around the sun through a gauntlet of asteroids that could inflict (and in the past have inflicted) catastrophic destruction on our planet, it is amazing that we all have the presence of mind to go about our daily business. The psalmist reminds us that we are, after all, a frail and vulnerable island of relative peace within a violent universe every bit as terrifying as the monster infested waters of creation. Yet the psalmist goes on to assure us that the universe is not a billiard table. It is not merely cosmos. It is creation, a creation that was made by a God who loves it, watches tenderly over it and animates it with God’s own Spirit.

The good news here is that even the sea monsters and seemingly destructive forces are God’s creatures in which God takes delight. The world is neither a haunted house animated by warring demons as the ancient near eastern religions often asserted, nor is it a dead and soulless chamber of ricocheting rocks subject only to randomness. The Spirit of God is at work, as I have said, bending each subatomic particle toward the creation of a new heaven and earth. That is an affirmation of faith that cannot finally be verified empirically. It is discovered by a people living in covenant with their gracious and merciful God. Finally, thanks again to the makers of the lectionary for sparing us poor, simple minded sheep from scriptural expressions not strictly in accord with American middleclass protestant, slightly left of center, ever white and ever polite sensitivities. I refer, of course, to verse 35a which reads: “Let sinners be consumed from the earth, and let the wicked be no more.”

A couple of things need to be kept in mind here. First, this is a payer expressed to God. It is one thing to ask God to rid the world of the wickedness we perceive. It is quite another to take that task on oneself whether it be through the more direct means of genocide or the softer methods of punitive legislation against perceived vice. Jesus did not commission his disciples to create a moral society, much less to “take back America” for him. Judgment there surely will be, but that’s God’s business.

Second, we do ourselves no favors by “softening” the scriptures. Of course it would be nice if the kingdom could come on earth as in heaven without changing anything (at least the things I don’t want changed). But in reality, the greatest impediment to the kingdom is sin, not merely or even primarily personal vices, but the systemic violence, oppression and abuse inherent in the powers that be. As much as it goes against the grain, we need to pray for sinners to be consumed from the earth and for the wicked to be no more. Of course, we must also recognize that we are praying against ourselves. We are, after all, complicit in systemic evil in ways that we do not even recognize. So we need to be mindful of what we are asking God to do. The line between good and evil runs through the middle of every human heart. Thus, if God were to execute judgment in military fashion, most of us would end up casualties of war. The earth and its creatures would be collateral damage. Obviously, that is not the outcome God seeks. Eradicating evil from creation is a slow, painful and exacting operation. As we will learn in the next reading from Romans, it is a process under which not only humanity, but all of creation groans. Liberation from evil comes about only through repentance-a radical reorientation of the heart. Hearts seldom turn on a dime. Generally speaking, they turn more like aircraft carriers. They move in increments so small that they are hardly visible. Only after traveling a great distance is it possible to see just how profound that fraction of a degree change actually was.

Romans 8:22-27

“The expression… ‘the whole creation’ includes the entire range of animate and inanimate objects on earth and in the heavens.” Jewett, Robert, Romans: a Commentary, Hermeneia-A Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible (c. 2007 by Fortress Press) p. 516. The groaning of creation as it awaits liberation stands in stark relief to the Roman hymns and poems declaring the rejoicing of creation at the rise of Augustus Caesar and his successors. Ibid. The Pax Romana imposed by Rome was no true peace according to St. Paul. He sees right though Rome’s nationalist propaganda. Rome’s “peace” was nothing other than institutionalized war against the masses of humanity at the bottom of the societal pyramid. The consequences of nation state institutionalized violence and enslavement on the non-human world are even clearer in our own time as we witness the mass extinction of animal species, destruction of forests and pollution of our rivers, lakes and oceans. Yet Paul points out that the creation is subjected to futility “in hope.” Vs. 20-21. Its endurance is not for the sake of pointless misery. The creation longs for the liberation it already recognizes in the children of God. Vs. 21. For Paul, the church is not merely the future of humanity, but the destiny of all creation. The agony experienced by creation and shared by the children of God is not raw, pointless suffering. It is the birth pangs of the new creation. It can therefore be borne in “hope.” Again, like the psalmist, Paul asserts that the universe is “creation” and not merely cosmos. It has a beginning in the creative act of God and an end toward which God is bringing it-an end not simply in terms of completion but as goal or purpose.

“The Spirit helps us in our weakness” (Vs. 26) or, as one commentator puts it, “Nor are we alone in our struggles. The Holy Spirit supports us in our helplessness.” The Epistle to the Romans, Sanday, W., Headlam, A.C., (c. 1977 by T. & T. Clark Ltd.) p. 212. God shares the agony of a creation in bondage to human exploitation and cruelty. It is for this reason that the Spirit of God can offer prayer for what we most need but cannot yet fully comprehend. The Spirit alone knows what it truly means for us to pray “Thy Kingdom come, they will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” The Spirit alone is able to transform us into persons capable of living in God’s kingdom, a people who will recognize the coming of that kingdom with joy rather than with dread. Our own prayers are often bent toward our selfish interests and distorted by our myopic perspectives. But the “Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.” Vs. 27. This lesson gives us the Holy Spirit as the inspiration of transformative hope.

It seems that we are transformed by that for which we hope and long for. Hope for success, recognition and wealth are powerful motivators. They drive our capitalist economy, but are they worthy of hope? Success is an elusive goal, always one step ahead of us. Recognition is often not worth the envy and ill will that frequently comes with it. As for wealth, it is an addictive substance. The more one has, the more one wants and the less it satisfies. Much energy and talk (mostly talk) has gone into increasing economic opportunities for more people in our society. While there is nothing wrong with that, opportunities do nothing for people incapable of using them wisely and well. For those whose hopes are misdirected, more opportunity means only more rope with which to hang oneself. The hope for a new heaven and a new earth is cosmic in scope. It is a hope for the wellbeing of all creation transcending personal interests. Because sin turns us in upon ourselves, we are incapable of hoping for and naturally will not pray “that God’s will” rather than our own “be done.” The Spirit is needed to draw us out of ourselves, raise our gaze beyond our own selfish interests and focus us on the higher vision of God’s glorious intent for all creation.

John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

This reading is hard to follow without having read the entire Farewell Discourse at John 13-17. You might want to do that before proceeding further. Comprehension is made all the more difficult by the lectionary peoples’ decision to excise the first four verses of chapter 16. You should read John 16:1-4 at the very least. There you will learn that the whole point of this discussion about the coming of the “Counselor,” “the Spirit of Truth” is to prepare the disciples for the hostility and violence they will encounter following Jesus’ crucifixion. As pointed out in my post for Sunday, May 17, 2015, this warning might well reflect the rejection of the Jesus movement by the reconstituted Sanhedrin at the close of the 1st Century. Yet I think that it reflects as much the general hostility toward Jesus throughout the world at large of which the Jewish community was merely a microcosm.

Of particular importance are verses 8-11 which describe the role of the Spirit. The Spirit convinces the world concerning sin, righteousness and judgment. Vs. 8. It is important to recall that for John, sin is not the transgression of any particular law, rule or statute. Sin is revealed through the way in which the Son who was sent by the Father is received. Sin is revealed in the desertion of Jesus by disciples who can not endure his “hard” teachings. John 6:60-65. Sin is revealed in the cowardice of those who believe Jesus, but will not confess him for fear of persecution. John 12:42-43. Sin is revealed in the blindness of the religious rulers who refuse to acknowledge Jesus even in the face of irrefutable testimony to his marvelous works. John 9:13-34. Sin is revealed in Judas’ betrayal of Jesus (John 13:21-30); Peter’s denial of Jesus (John 18:15-27); and Pilate’s placing his loyalty to Caesar over his recognition of Jesus’ innocence. John 19:12-16. We may have all kinds of notions about right and wrong. But it is impossible to identify, recognize and acknowledge sin apart from knowing Jesus.

Similarly, righteousness cannot rightly be understood apart from God’s verdict on Jesus’ faithful life, obedient death and glorious resurrection. Throughout John’s gospel, various people render their own judgments on Jesus. But the final judgment, the court of last appeal belongs to God. God raises Jesus from death thereby rendering all other judgments null and void. Jesus is the Son sent by God for the life of the world. All who believe this and put their trust in the Son are righteous. So, too, the final judgment upon Jesus illuminates God’s verdict against the world. In crucifying Jesus, the world shows its true colors. It is the rebel creation that murders the most precious gift its Creator has to give-the gift of the Creator’s self. The world’s religious institutions, the world’s governmental structures and the world’s people all conspire in the murder of the Son. That is the truth about who and what we are. God sent the Son and, when he was murdered and rejected, raised the Son up and continues to offer the Son to the very world that murdered him. That is who and what God is.

Again, I will be accused of reading Augustinian Trinitarian thought into verses 12-15. Perhaps, but I truly believe Augustine got this right. So if I am guilty of anything it is plagiarism or at least I would be guilty if I claimed this reading as my own. Just as the Father has given “all” that he has to Jesus, so the Spirit takes what is Jesus’ and declares it to the disciples. Vss. 14-15. The Spirit glorifies Jesus as does the Father. Vs. 14; John 12:28. This describes the internal workings of the Trinity whose differentiation in three persons exists only in their relations to each other. The Trinity’s external works are necessarily the work of the whole Trinity in perfect unity. The Spirit, then, is the presence of the resurrected Christ among his disciples communicating to them “all” that is God the Father.

Sunday, May 10th

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER

Acts 10:44-48
Psalm 98
1 John 5:1-6
John 15:9-17

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O God, you have prepared for those who love you joys beyond understanding. Pour into our hearts such love for you that, loving you above all things, we may obtain your promises, which exceed all we can desire; through Jesus Christ, your Son and our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Professor Stanley Hauerwas somewhere says that the object of a society’s worship is revealed by that for which its citizens are willing to kill and die. States of all stripes demand ultimate loyalty from their citizens, calling upon them both to kill and to die for the greater good of the nation. The United States is no different in that respect. It is expected that we will be willing to give our lives or the lives of our children if necessary to defend our country. On national holidays, particularly Memorial Day, we honor those who have made the “ultimate sacrifice” for the preservation of our nation, our freedoms, our way of life. Even when the public begins to doubt the necessity of some particular war, we nevertheless honor those who died fighting it. Something noble there is about dying in combat for the well-being of the nation that commands unusual respect.

Unusual, I say, because there are plenty of sacrifices for the common good (as we understand it) made by those who never see combat. Workers are not infrequently killed or injured in the course of constructing the roads, bridges and tunnels we drive on. It is hard to imagine our nation functioning without passable thoroughfares, yet we do not decorate people whose lives are spent in building and maintaining them. There is no holiday memorializing them nor is there a separate association, like the VA, that cares for their medical needs and those of their families. Neither do we recognize the roughly 30,000 people killed in traffic accidents to accommodate our preference for personal vehicular travel or the 10,000 who die each year for our insistence on the right to bear arms. Without thinking much about it, we deem these lives worth sacrificing to maintain the way of life to which we have grown accustomed. So, too, we in the so called “developed world,” whether we acknowledge it or not, enjoy a life of relative abundance through maintenance of a global economic system that is crushing the bottom third of the world’s population and strangling the planet we share with them. The life we enjoy is paid for with suffering and sacrifice that is hard for us to imagine and about which we would prefer not to think.

Jesus sacrificed his life as well, but not for any nation. He did not give his life to preserve the status quo. His sacrifice was made in loyalty to the gentle reign of his heavenly Father. Jesus died for an alternative way of being human and living together that he modeled throughout his life with his disciples. Like the leaders of other kingdoms, Jesus unapologetically invites his disciples to make the ultimate sacrifice for him. He calls his disciples to share in his suffering and death. A world united and held together by the same Trinitarian love that binds the Father to the Son is well worth living for and, when required, dying for. Disciples are called now more than ever before to renounce the false gods of nationalism, wealth and consumerism that cry out for the blood sacrifice of the innocent. They are called instead to lay down their lives with the victims of these idols. They are challenged to expose the false promises of wealth and prosperity gained through exploitation and point to the new, life giving existence offered through abiding in Jesus.

I should also add that the chief difference between the kingdom Jesus proclaims and all other kingdoms is this: Jesus will not have his disciples kill. While the kingdom is worth dying for, nothing justifies killing. At the end of the day, Jesus chose death over killing. The kingdom cannot be established through violence and it needs no violence to defend it. It sometimes requires the witness of martyrdom, but never the sword in its defense.

Acts 10:44-48

This passage is part and parcel of a larger narrative beginning with Peter’s vision in which the Lord speaks to him and commands him to slaughter and eat a host of animals deemed ritually unclean in the Hebrew Scriptures. See Acts 10:1-16. The meaning of this strange vision is not revealed to Peter until he finds himself in the midst of a gentile family, that of the Roman Centurion, Cornelius. There he witnesses the Spirit of God filling them all with faith and inspiring them to confess Jesus as Lord.

The story as a whole reflects the inner struggle of a deeply Jewish church with the positive response of gentiles to the good news about Jesus. Most Jewish disciples, like Peter, harbored serious reservations about receiving gentiles into the church. How could these outsiders possibly have an informed and sincere faith in the Jewish messiah when they knew next to nothing about the Jewish scriptures and practices? What would be the consequences of an influx of these new comers? What conditions, if any, should be placed upon admission of a gentile believer? Must he be circumcised? Should he be required to learn the Hebrew Scriptures? Peter was on solid scriptural grounds with his scruples about eating ritually unclean food and sharing meal fellowship with non-Jews. Jewish believers under the Greek tyrant, Antiochus Epiphanes chose to endure torture and to die horrible deaths rather than eat food deemed unclean as demanded of them. I Maccabees 1:62-64. How could Peter go into the home of a Roman oppressor of Israel and eat unclean food at his unclean table? Would this not dishonor the memory of the brave martyrs under Antiochus?

Peter’s scruples are resolved by an act of God filling his gentile hosts with the Holy Spirit enabling them speak in tongues. Vss. 44-46. His seemingly rhetorical question echoes that of the Ethiopian eunuch in or lesson from last Sunday: “Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” Vs. 47; cf. Acts 8:36. A couple of things are noteworthy here. In the first place, the filling of the Holy Spirit precedes rather than follows baptism. Our theology of baptism has it quite the other way around-and rightly so. Baptism is given as God’s pledge that God’s Spirit dwells within us-even when there are no outward manifestations or inward feelings to substantiate it. As such, it is a great source of comfort. Nevertheless, God does not need baptism to impart God’s Spirit. We need baptism to remind us that God’s Holy Spirit dwells within us. Thus, baptism was quite properly administered to these newly Spirit filled believers to serve as God’s witness and vow that the Spirit they had just received would never leave them.

Second, this outpouring of God’s Spirit upon outsiders follows the trajectory established in the first chapter of Acts where the ascending Jesus commissioned the disciples to be his witnesses “in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Acts 1:8. The church, however, seems reluctant to take the good news of Jesus so far so fast. I am sure that the leaders back at synod headquarters would have preferred to conduct a lengthy study into the theological basis for mission to the gentiles followed by a mission viability survey and vote at some subsequent synod assembly. But the Spirit will have none of that. The Spirit continues to push, prod and needle the church into action. Throughout the Book of Acts it seems the church is forever racing frantically to catch up with the Holy Spirit. Then as now, disciples of Jesus are frequently dragged kicking and screaming into God’s future. We are not in charge of the church’s mission-and a good thing that is!

Psalm 98

This is a psalm of praise celebrating a great victory won for Israel by God’s might. This victory might refer to the Exodus, the Return from Babylon or some other great act of salvation experienced in Israel’s history. Rogerson and McKay are probably right in saying that we cannot determine with certainty which of these events is intended, if any of them. Rogerson, J.W. and McKay, J.W., Psalms 51-100, The Cambridge Bible Commentary (c. 1977 Cambridge University Press) p. 226. Saint Augustine says of this opening verse to the psalm: “When the whole earth is enjoined to sing a new song, it is meant, that peace singeth a new song.” Augustine, Expositions on the Book of Psalms, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, Vol.3 (reprinted 1979, edited by Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D., pub. by WM. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.) p. 480.

“Newness” (as in “Sing a new song” vs. 1) is a recurring theme in the prophets, particularly in Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40-55): “Remember not the former things; behold, I do a new thing…” Isaiah 43:18. So also in the New Testament: “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.” II Corinthians 5:17; “Behold, I make all things new.” Revelation 21:5. Notice also the refrain of “victory” or “yeshuath” throughout the psalm. Vss. 1-3. The word is actually from the root “yeshua” or “salvation,” root also of Joshua and, of course, Jesus. God’s victory or salvation is for the ends of the earth, not only for Israel. Vss. 4 and 9. Yet Israel is instrumental in proclaiming and making known that victory.

“His right hand and his holy arm have gotten him victory.” Vs. 2. This is a figurative reference to divine power which alone is responsible for Israel’s victories. Ibid. It is worth remembering that when we confess that Jesus ascended to the right hand of God, we are asserting that Jesus is that power through which God exercises God’s reign. The power of God is God’s patient suffering, refusal to resort to retaliation and determination to love us in the face or our stark rejection.

“[God] will judge the world with righteousness and the peoples with equity.” Vs. 9. As Professor Anderson points out, “[t]he verb ‘judge’ means much more than the English word suggests. It refers to the power to obtain and maintain justice and proper order-power which human rulers should have (“Give us a king to judge us,” I Sam. 8:6) but which, in the biblical view, is vested supremely and ultimately in God.” Anderson, Bernhard, W., Out of the Depths-The Psalms Speak for Us Today, (c.1983 by Bernhard W. Anderson, pub. by The Westminster Press) p. 179.

1 John 5:1-6

Saint John’s argument is maddeningly circular. First he tells us, “No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.” I John 4:12. This week he tells us, “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.” Vs. 2. It seems we cannot know and obey God without loving one another and we cannot love one another without loving and obeying God. It is similar to the impossible conundrum faced by so many college graduates: You need experience to get the job; but you also need the job to get experience. This is a lot like trying to shimmy up a greased pole!

Upon further reflection, though, I don’t believe it is a question of the starting point. We don’t necessarily find God in love for one another. A lot of what goes under the name of love is really lust, desire for control, need for self-affirmation and codependency. Most violent crimes occur within the context of domestic abuse. Much of what goes under the rubric of loving our children has more to do with living vicariously through them. Love of one’s own family, tribe or nation often has as its flip side distrust or outright hatred of outsiders. Love, as John points out, is not an abstract principle or mere sentiment. It is concretely exercised by God toward us in the sending of God’s Son. I John 4:10. Jesus is the shape love toward our sisters and brothers in Christ must take. Moreover, this community of love is sent into the word for which Jesus died, just as Jesus himself was sent. John 20:21-22. Thus, the relationship between believing in Jesus and loving your sisters and brothers is dialogical. Love becomes concrete or “incarnate” within the community of disciples, but is refined by the abiding presence of Jesus through whom repentance and forgiveness is freely offered.

The difficulty in preaching this text and that of the gospel which follows lies in the word “love,” a vacuous word in our language. How much meaning can any word have when I can use it interchangeably to describe both my feelings for my wife as well as my fondness for rum raison ice cream? Saint John, as I have said, anchors love in God’s sending of the Son and the Son’s sending of his disciples. This countercultural love transcends and supersedes all other social, familial and nationalist loyalties grounding itself in the One who was sent for the life of the world. In so doing, it undermines all systems of domination, whether tribal, patriarchal or nationalistic. Faith in Jesus thereby “overcomes the world.” Vss. 4-5.

John 15:9-17

The gospel reading builds on the lesson from the First Letter of John. “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love.” Vs. 9. Love is grounded in the Trinity. The love binding the community of faith together is not based on common interests, family ties or cultural heritage. It is the love that is the unity of the Trinity. God’s love for the Son is bound up with the sending of the Son, the beloved. So deeply did God love the world. John 3:16. The disciples are now invited to abide in that same Trinitarian love.

It is the nature of Trinitarian love that it “goes out” from itself. As the hymn has it, “The universe of space and time did not arise by chance, but as the Three, in love and hope, made room within their dance.” “Come Join the Dance of Trinity,” Lutheran Worship,(c. 2006 by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, pub. by Augsburg Fortress) Hymn # 412. Just as love made room for the universe of space and time, so the sending of the Son makes space within the universe for that same pulsating Triune love. Love is not merely a human emotion or a humanly discerned philosophical/moral concept. It is the defining characteristic of the Holy Trinity pre-existing time itself. The same cannot be said of hatred, prejudice, jealousy, greed or any other vice. In fact, it cannot really be said of any other virtue either.

Trinitarian love is not hierarchical. Though I am hardly a student of doctrinal history, it seems to me that most, if not all, the heretical understandings of the Trinity rejected by the church have at least one thing in common: they created a hierarchy within the Trinity. It is surprising to me that a church that had become so rigidly hierarchical and so thoroughly patriarchal nevertheless rejected so many doctrinal models of the Triune God that subordinated the Son and/or Spirit to the Father in some way. Given the influence of the Empire over the Trinitarian disputes, this outcome is all the more remarkable. Perhaps we must simply attribute the church’s insistence on the unity and coequality within the Trinity to the working of the Holy Spirit in spite of rather than because of the church! Jesus makes clear that his relationship to his church is not a master/slave arrangement. It is through friendship that Jesus exercises his lordship over his disciples and will one day exercise it over all creation. To use Paul’s language, we are God’s ambassadors of reconciliation extending friendship with God to the world. II Corinthians 5:20. This is the “fruit that will last” about which John speaks. Vs. 16.

“…so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name.” vs. 16. Taken out of context, this promise is problematic. God does not give us everything for which we ask-nor should he. Half the time we don’t have any idea about what we really want. Seldom do we have the sense or courage to ask for what we need. If God were to start writing blank checks in response to prayer, I suspect we would very soon find ourselves living in a post-apocalyptic landscape. Nothing is more dangerous to us than our desires. It is therefore critical to read this promise in light of Jesus’ commission to “bear fruit that lasts.” Jesus assures his disciples that God will give them all they need to bear faithful witness to the reconciling love of God in their midst and for the world.

Finally, Jesus’ admonition in verse 17 is worth raising up. “I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.” Much of the time the church has gotten that directive backwards. Rather than putting the commandments in the service of love, we have made our love and acceptance of people contingent on compliance with the rules. While the commandments are to be observed and obeyed, obedience to any single commandment is shaped by the greatest commandment to love one another.

 

Sunday, May 3rd

Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

FIFTH SUNDAY OF EASTER

Acts 8:26-40
Psalm 22:25-31
1 John 4:7-21
John 15:1-8

PRAYER OF THE DAY: O God, you give us your Son as the vine apart from whom we cannot live. Nourish our life in his resurrection, that we may bear the fruit of love and know the fullness of your joy, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

There is a lot of dead wood in the American Church, both literally and figuratively. Let’s start with the former. We are up to our neck in real estate occupied by structures that no longer speak to who we are or further the ministry of Jesus. Most of our church buildings are anachronisms. They are lofty structures often occupying central places in the public square testifying to a time when the church was a pillar of the community. These were buildings designed not to welcome, but to impress. Many of them are large, cavernous, with high ceilings and remote altars. They were made to house the masses and are ill equipped to provide meaningful worship for a couple dozen people on a Sunday. These church buildings are old and in need of constant repair. They drain the dwindling resources of the congregations that worship in them. Rather than bringing the good news of Jesus to the world, congregations often find themselves working feverishly to maintain a shrine to the dead, honoring the memory of all whose names are engraved on every window, wall and piece of furniture.

Perhaps even more insidious than the church’s edifice complex is its stubborn attachment to ecclesiastical structures that no longer further its mission. I will be blunt here. Pastors are no more eager to let go of our career paths, pensions and benefits than Myrtle Hendricks is eager to see the sanctuary in which she was baptized, confirmed, married and hopes to be buried put up for sale. Seminary professors holding the laurel of tenure are not about to put it on the line. Prominent church leaders, whose egos are deeply invested in the programs and institutions they helped to build and develop, will fight to keep the ecclesiastical machinery going whether it serves the gospel well or not.

Finally, there is still theology and practice floating around in our church that is at best antiquated and at worst rotten to the core. Thankfully, we are beginning to dump some of it. In the case of my own denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, our decisions of 1999 to welcome and fully include gay, lesbian and transgendered folks into the life of the church was long overdue. Also overdue is a critical look at our seeming acceptance of late stage capitalism as a benign arrangement needing only a tweak here and there to achieve justice; a re-examination of our “Two Kingdom” doctrine justifying complicity with war; and our practice of church as voluntary organization serving the interests of the social order.

This is all good news, by the way. It is good news because Jesus is the vine and we are the branches. Because we are tied into Jesus, we are not going to die. But we are about to get pruned. Jesus promises that his heavenly Father will prune every branch that bears fruit so that it may bear more fruit. Getting pruned is not fun. If you have ever seen a tree or a vine pruned back to a tenth of what it once was, you get the idea. I suspect God’s pruning is going to hurt like hell. But at the end of the day, God will have a renewed church, exactly the church God wants and needs. That is why I say repeatedly that this is a wonderful age in which to be the church.

Acts 8:26-40

In our first lesson for this morning, Philip is instructed to “go toward the south…from Jerusalem to Gaza.” Vs. 26. This fits nicely with Luke’s overall story of the gospel’s spread from “Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Acts 1:8. Having begun in Jerusalem and having spread north to Samaria, the good news of Jesus Christ now travels south to meet a representative from the southern “ends of the earth,” namely, Ethiopia. As is common throughout Luke-Acts, this instruction to Philip comes from an angel of the Lord. Vs. 26. (See also, Luke 1:11-28; Luke 2:8-21; Acts 5:17-21; Acts 12:6-17).

The Ethiopian Eunuch poses a seemingly simple question to Philip: “What is to prevent my being baptized?” Vs. 36. But it’s not such a simple question at all. There are plenty of arguments to be made against baptism in this case. In the first place, this man is a eunuch. His testicles have been cut off, probably at birth, to make him fit for government office under the monarchy. That was a big problem for baptizing this Ethiopian into the renewed, Israel, the Body of Jesus. According to the scriptures, “He whose testicles are crushed or whose male member is cut off shall not enter the assembly of the LORD.” So says Deuteronomy 23:1. So there you have it. This Ethiopian fellow is a sexual deviant. He is an “abomination” and must be excluded. That the Ethiopian probably did not choose to be a eunuch is beside the point. The Bible says it; I believe it; that settles it.

Of course, the Bible has more to say about eunuchs. The Book of the Prophet Isaiah declares:

“Do not let the foreigner joined to the Lord say, ‘The Lord will surely separate me from his people’; and do not let the eunuch say, ‘I am just a dry tree.’ For thus says the Lord: To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose the things that please me and hold fast my covenant,  I will give, in my house and within my walls, a monument and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off. And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants, all who keep the Sabbath, and do not profane it, and hold fast my covenant— these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their burnt-offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples. Thus says the Lord God, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, I will gather others to them besides those already gathered.”Isaiah 56:3-8.

Clearly, the Bible demonstrates changing views on “uncleanness,” “abomination” and who is included among God’s people. I cannot overemphasize that the Bible is a collection of many words, many voices and many perspectives. One cannot simply cherry pick the voice one fancies and ignore all the others. Moreover, the authoritative voice for disciples of Jesus is that of their master. Jesus Christ is the lens through which Scripture is read in order to hear properly God’s Word to us in the here and now.

The other obstacle to baptism is that this fellow is an outsider. Though he probably is of Jewish heritage (he wouldn’t be reading the Jewish scriptures if he weren’t), he was one of those “Diaspora” Jews, an ancestor of one of the thousands who fled Palestine after the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem. His ancestors were not among those who left everything in order to return to Palestine when the opportunity arose following the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus the Great. His family was not among those who made the dangerous trek across what is now the Iraqi desert to resettle a land that was still in ruins and occupied by hostile, warring tribes. This Ethiopian’s lineage was not represented among those Jews who fought a fierce and bloody war for survival and independence against the armies of Antiochus Epiphanes in the 2nd Century B.C.E. He did not live in Jerusalem or pay the exorbitant taxes required to support the temple and its priesthood. He only came to worship on high feast days like Passover and Pentecost.

This Ethiopian is a lot like those members of your church that you only see on Christmas and Easter. They tell you all about how their parents were staunch members of this church, how they were baptized and confirmed in the church and how much their church means to them-and then they disappear for another year. And you want to say to them, “Where were you in November when the rest of us made a pledge of financial commitment to the mission and ministry of this church? Where were you when the council was meeting down in the undercroft until late into the night hammering out a budget for the coming year? Where were you when the basement flooded and we were all bailing like mad? By what right do you call yourself a member? By what right do you claim the cleansing waters of baptism?

I don’t know if questions like these were going through Philip’s mind when the Ethiopian asked him what was there to prevent his being baptized. But the Bible does tell us what Philip and the Ethiopian were talking about as that chariot made its way through the wilderness in Gaza. Philip was telling the Ethiopian the good news about Jesus. Jesus, we know, had no scruples about including among his disciples people on the margins of polite society. Jesus touched lepers. Jesus laid his hands upon unclean corpses. Jesus shared a table with tax collectors and outcasts. So whatever reservations Philip may have had about baptizing this Ethiopian Eunuch, they were overcome by the good news coming from his own lips. At the end of the day, Philip simply could not see any obstacle between Jesus’ love and this man who needed it. The Spirit of Jesus broke the logjam of objections, prejudices, traditions and deeply held beliefs that stood between this Ethiopian outsider and the good news he so much needed to hear.

Psalm 22:25-31

This is a psalm of lament that begins with the words familiar to us from Jesus’ cry of dereliction on the cross: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” vs. 1; cf. Mark 15:34; Matthew 27:46. You would never guess that from our reading, however, which begins at verse 25. Verse 22b marks a transition point in the psalm. Up to this point, the psalmist has been pouring out his or her complaint to God, describing the torment and ridicule s/he experiences at the hands of his or her enemies and crying out for deliverance. Though no such deliverance has yet occurred, the psalmist is confident that God will soon intervene to rescue him or her. So sure is the psalmist of God’s impending salvation that s/he is even now declaring thankfulness, praise and testimony to these saving acts. The psalmist takes delight in knowing that God’s intervention on his or her behalf will bring glory and praise to God from future generations who will learn from his or her experience that God is indeed faithful.

I should add that some commentators have argued that vss. 1-21 and vss. 22-31 constitute two separate psalms, the first being a lament and the second a hymn of thanksgiving. Perhaps that was on the minds of the lectionary makers when they divided the psalm as they did (assuming, of course, that they have minds-something I often question). I am not at all convinced by their arguments, however, which seem to hinge on the dissimilarities of lament versus thanksgiving between the two sections. Psalms of lament frequently contain a component of praise or promise of thanksgiving for anticipated salvation. See, e.g., Psalm 5; Psalm 7; Psalm 13. Artur Weiser, while maintaining the unity of the psalm, asserts that the psalm was, in whole or in part, composed after the psalmist’s prayer has been answered. Weiser, Artur The Psalms, a Commentary, The Old Testament Library, (c. 1962 SCM Press), p. 219. That interpretation does not fit the language of the psalm which speaks of salvation in the future tense. This salvation, though real, is nevertheless an anticipated act of God.

It has been suggested by some commentators that Jesus’ cry from the cross might not have been a cry of dereliction at all, but that the gospel writers meant to say that Jesus was praying this psalm from the cross. Clearly, the body of the psalm reflects at many points precisely what Jesus was experiencing at the hands of his enemies, so much so that New Testament scholars argue over the extent to which the psalm might have influenced the telling of the passion story. However these questions might be resolved, there is obviously a parallel between the psalmist praising God for deliverance s/he cannot yet see and Jesus’ faithful obedience to his heavenly Father even to death on the cross. In both cases, faith looks to salvation in God’s future even when there appears to be no future.

1 John 4:7-21

“God is Love.” John Wesley has noted that “[t]his little sentence brought St. John more sweetness, even in the time he was writing it, than the whole world can bring. God is often styled holy, righteous, wise; but not holiness, righteousness, or wisdom in the abstract, as he is said to be love; intimating that this is his darling, his reigning attribute, the attribute that sheds an amiable glory on all his other perfections.” Wesley’s Notes on the Bible, Christian Classics Ethereal Library. Indeed, love is the heart of God’s being, the unifying force holding the church together and the power by which the world is overcome. But this love is no abstract principle. As noted by one commentator:

“It is important not to confuse this dynamic of love with the sentimentality that passes for love in our culture. What is affirmed here makes our customary talk of love sound thin and gaseous by comparison. The kind of love initially regarded as sacrificial love (as in John3:16) has assumed awesome dimensions here. For one thing, love is regarded as constitutive for the community of believers. If we do not love, we cannot know God—which is like saying that without oxygen we would not be able to breathe. Having initially drawn breath, though, we are obliged to continue breathing and acting in love. Loving one another is mentioned several times in this text. We recognize it as something we do because we have first been loved by God.” Brusic, Robert M., “A River Ride with 1 John: Texts of the Easter Season,” Word & World, (c. 1997 by Word & World, Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN) pp. 217-218.

God’s love is expressed concretely in the sending of his Son to “abide” among us. Vss. 10, 15. That term “abide,” which is critical both for the letters and the gospel of Saint John, makes clear that the sending of the Son was not an event fixed in the past. God has been sending his Son for as long as God has been speaking through the prophets. But when that Word became “enfleshed,” and came to “tabernacle” among us, God’s desire from the foundation of the world became complete. John 1:14. It cannot be over-emphasized that the Incarnation was not a temporary state for God. When God became human, God remained human and henceforth will always be human. Only so can God abide among us such that God is our God and we are God’s people. See Revelation 21:5-8. Though perfected in the age to come, this “abiding” begins even now within the community of disciples whose love for one another reflects the love God has for the Son and the love God demonstrates toward God’s people.

The Gospel of John, and even more John’s letters, have been criticized for their concentration of love within the community of the faithful. The missionary emphasis is lacking, it is claimed. But such a conclusion can only flow from a very superficial reading of John. As we saw from last week’s gospel lesson, Jesus has sheep that do not yet belong to his fold and need to be brought in so that there will be “one flock, one shepherd.” John 10:16. The whole purpose of the oneness of the disciples in love is “so that the world may believe that you [God] have sent me [Jesus].” John 17:23. Disciples of Jesus are called to be a countercultural community that testifies to an alternative way of being human. A community that lives the Sermon on the Mount is far more transformative than one trying to preach it into legislation, social action and reform of the existing order. Saint Augustine also recognized the outward thrust of John’s letters in his homilies: “Extend thy love to them that are nearest, yet do not call this an extending: for it is almost loving thyself, to love them that are close to thee. Extend it to the unknown, who have done thee no ill. Pass even them: reach on to love thine enemies. This at least the Lord commands.” Homily 8, St. Augustine, Christian Classics Ethereal Library.

“Perfect love casts out all fear.” Vs. 18. I would be rich if I had a quarter for every time I heard a preacher say “I fear.” “I fear for our teenagers and the pressures they face…” “I fear for the future of our children…” “I fear for our church in the coming decades…” I am as cognizant as anyone of the dangers we encounter, the temptations in front of us and the challenges we face both as believers and simply as human beings. Prudence and caution are always warranted, but fear must never be part of the equation. Whenever we go into survival mode, we invariably make foolish, faithless and shortsighted decisions that bite us in the end. If the universe is the creation of a God whose determination to bring it to perfection is demonstrated by God’s “putting his own skin in the game,” sending his only begotten Son to abide with us at the cost of his crucifixion, then there is no room for fear. We cannot lose this game. We can only forfeit our opportunity to play on the winning team for fear of getting dirty, beat up and sore.

John 15:1-8

The Hebrew Scriptures frequently employ the “vine” metaphor in speaking about Israel. See Isaiah 5:1-7; Isaiah 27:2-6; Psalm 80:8-16; Jeremiah 2:21; Jeremiah 6:9; Jeremiah 12:10-13; Ezekiel 15:1-8; Ezekiel 17:5-10; Ezekiel 19:10-14; Hosea 10:1-2; Hosea 14:7. That being the case, one might expect Jesus to say that “we” or “you” are the vine inasmuch as the community of disciples represents the renewal of Israel. Instead, Jesus employs the “I am” construction seen throughout the gospel calling himself the vine. One might argue, as some commentators have, that the metaphor is problematic because its use is principally associated with judgment upon Israel’s failures. Carson, D.A., The Gospel According to John (c. 1991 by Eerdmans) p. 513. The image fits nicely into John’s incarnational thought, however. “[I]t is a feature of Johannine theology that Jesus applied to himself terms used in the OT for Israel and other parts of the NT for the Christian community.” Brown, Raymond, E., The Gospel According to John XIII –XXI, The Anchor Bible (c. 1970 by Doubleday) p. 670. The indwelling Spirit of the resurrected Christ will animate the community of faith through which the ministry of Jesus will continue. Like the vine to which all branches cling and from which they derive their sustenance, Jesus is the source of life and power to which the disciples must cling.

The disciples are branches whose life and fruit bearing capacity depend on their connection to the vine. Apart from the vine, the branches can do nothing. Vs. 4. Again, the key term “abide” is used to emphasize the indwelling of Jesus among his disciples. Vs. 4. Abiding in Christ is a life and death matter. Branches that do not “abide” in the vine wither, die and must be burned. By contrast, fruitful branches are pruned in order to make them more fruitful still. Vs. 2.

What does Jesus mean by saying that his Father is glorified as the disciples “bear much fruit” and so “prove” that they are his disciples? Clearly, the chief fruit is love among the disciples. Indeed, it is by their love for one another that the disciples will be known as followers of Jesus. John 13:35. This love, however, is not a passive emotion. Because the Spirit of Jesus is at work inspiring love among his disciples, they will do not only the works Jesus has done during his ministry, but even “greater works than these.” John 14:12. As God’s alternative humanity, the church will invariably collide with the old system of loveless domination and exploitation. This is a community that has been sent into the world just as Jesus was sent into the world. John 20:21. Because a servant is not above his master, the disciples can expect the same resistance and rejection Jesus receives. John 15:20. The cross is the shape love invariably takes in the midst of a sinful world.

Stanley Hauerwas has often said that the church is a people whose lives are incomprehensible apart from the resurrection of Jesus. Jesus says much the same thing later on in the chapter.

“If the world hates you, be aware that it hated me before it hated you. 19If you belonged to the world,* the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world—therefore the world hates you.” John 15:18-19.

Of course, the world has many good reasons for hating Christians that have nothing to do with faithfulness to Jesus. The degree to which we are not liked is a poor barometer by which to measure the effectiveness of our witness. Nonetheless, we ought to be somewhat concerned at the ease with which the church has been able to fit into the Americana landscape over the last couple of centuries. If the church’s life and ministry would look just as sensible if we were to dismiss Jesus altogether, something is clearly out of whack.