We are a small Episcopal Church on the banks of the Rappahannock in Port Royal, Virginia. We acknowledge that we gather on the traditional land of the first people of Port Royal, the Nandtaughtacund, and we respect and honor with gratitude the land itself, the legacy of the ancestors, and the life of the Rappahannock Tribe. Our mission statement is to do God’s Will in all that we do.

Pentecost 13, Year C, September 4, 2022

I. Theme – Exploring the meaning of discipleship and commitment.

  

“Climb That Hill”

The lectionary readings are here or individually:  

First Reading – Deuteronomy 30:15-20
Psalm – Psalm 1
Epistle – Philemon 1-21
Gospel – Luke 14:25-33 

Today’s readings explore the meaning of discipleship and commitment. In Deuteronomy , Moses challenges God’s people to “choose life” by remaining faithful to God. In his personal letter to Philemon, Paul disarms the slaveholder’s authority by bidding him to receive the slave as a dear brother. In today’s gospel, Jesus describes a disciple as one who knows the cost and is willing to make a radical surrender to Christ.

The Gospel says, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”

Hate our parents? Reject our spouses? Deny our children? The traditional hyperbole of today’s gospel may have been designed to separate the serious followers from the crowd. Whenever huge throngs gather, we can assume a variety of motives. Did they follow Jesus from curiosity, hope for healing, need for security, peer pressure or self-interest? He dispels all motives but one: radical commitment to a way of life that carries an exorbitant cost.

The final verse of today’s gospel reading (Luke 14:33) reiterates Luke’s concern that possessions might be an obstacle to Christian commitment. His concern can be interpreted in many ways. Jesus was addressing people who didn’t have any possessions, so why would it pose a problem to them? Luke Johnson argues in The Gospel of Luke that the language of possessions is symbolic, referring not so much to wealth (which can be used for good or ill) as to attitudes. Jesus wants vulnerable people, ready to surrender their assumptions and find a new identity in him. On the other hand, he rejects those who cling to comfortable ideas and who resist transformation.

Yet to over-emphasize symbolism would blunt the evangelist’s sharp social criticism. He wrote for a wealthy community, or for well-to-do Gentiles concerned that conversion might mean grave economic loss. He challenged them to continue Jesus’ welcome to the economically poor and to work for a reversal of the social order that would bring justice to all.

While Luke does not offer a definite answer to the problem of possessions, he suggests a direction that is fleshed out in Paul’s letter to Philemon. There we find a concrete example of the radical commitment Jesus demanded. Paul has the audacity to ask a slave owner to give up a costly possession; in this case, a human being. Furthermore, he invites a shift in attitude: that Philemon see Onesimus not as slave but as brother. His plea combines both elements of Luke’s message: relinquishment of possessions, change of heart. If we have the courage to apply the message to our own lives, we probably respond with an honest “Ouch.”

There are other thoughts about living a life according to God.  There are two ways to live: to live into God’s ways, or to live into the way of the wicked. It is clear in the Scriptures that the way of the wicked is to abandon God. Do we abandon God in exchange for a set of rigorous rules? Do we abandon God in exchange for worldly success, comfort and wealth? Do we abandon God to be around people who think, look and act like us, where we are comfortable? Or do we seek God’s ways, which are not always easy but are often hard—to be among people who are different, to be open to learning new ways of thinking, to stand against war, injustice, and poverty? One way is more straightforward and easy, but serves ourselves. The other way is harder, but serves others, and is concerned about the whole community—the whole kingdom—the whole reign of God.

II. Summary

First Reading –  Deuteronomy 30:15-20

The book of Deuteronomy was written as Moses’ farewell address to the people of Israel gathered at the border of the promised land. The book re-presents Mosaic teaching in order to deal with the changed situations of later history. The applicability of Moses’ teaching to each generation is emphasized (5:3; 6:1-2).

 This reading comes from Moses’ third address (chaps. 29–30). It challenges the people to decide between two ways of living, life or death, blessing or curse, as they prepare to enter the land that was prepared for them. The format reflects treaties between nations of that period. These concluded with a call to the gods to act as witnesses to the treaty. Here the whole created universe is called to witness the covenant (31:28).

The people are urged to “choose life,” not merely a prolongation of days but the fullness received in love, obedience and faithfulness to God.  In a classic prophetic “rib” pattern, heaven and earth are called to witness what God sets before Israel: “life and death, blessings and curses”.  It is classic covenantal speech that beseeches Israel to do one thing.  “Choose life!”

For those who follow God, obey the commandments, observe the ways they have been taught, God’s blessings are with them now and always. But for those who go astray, who do not follow the commandments and what they have been taught, it will lead only to death. This is part of the final discourse of Moses, warning the people that the way they live their lives matters. The way we live our lives shows our faithfulness to God, our upholding the covenant. God cannot break the covenant, only we can.

Psalm –  Psalm 1

Psalm 1 reflects the blessings and curse of life choice reflected in Deuteronomy. For those who turn towards God, the blessings of life are found in the life well-lived; for those who turn away from God, they will not experience the blessings. This isn’t about worldly success and riches, but rather the blessings are wisdom and fulfillment—even joy—for those who choose to follow God.

This psalm, with its call to a righteous life based on knowledge of the “law of the lord” (v. 2), the Torah, serves as a fitting introduction to all the psalms. It springs from the wisdom tradition, which emphasized how to live in both material and spiritual prosperity.

The righteous are those who have not taken the advice of the wicked, nor imitated their way of life, nor joined in their rejection of the law. They “meditate” (v. 2) upon it, literally, read it aloud in a low voice. The lord is in intimate and personal relationship with the righteous.

Here all of these portions of Wisdom are assigned to the ones who love YHWH.  They are compared to the “wicked” that are like chaff.  Another agricultural image describes the righteous – “like a tree planted by streams of water”.  Note, however that it is not an ideal tree always in bloom and with fruit – no, times and seasons govern these as well.  Real life is lived by both the righteous and the wicked.  The righteous will be given the way of life, a path not granted to the sinner.

Epistle-  Philemon 1-21

This is the only personal letter of Paul’s to have been preserved. Paul writes from prison (perhaps in Ephesus around AD 56 or in Rome around AD 60), to Philemon, an earlier convert of Paul’s (v. 19b), in whose home the local congregation now meets (v. 2).

Onesimus was converted to Christianity by Paul, and the relationship between the two men was most like quite close.  The book becomes an exercise in practical Christianity in the face of social norms and expectations.  The letter consists of four sections: a) Introduction (1-3), b) Thanksgiving (4-7), c) the main Body (8-22) and finally a d) Conclusion (23-25). Onesimus has now runaway. The legal penalties for runaway slaves were severe.

Paul complies with the legal requirements by returning the slave and by making himself responsible for all damages due the owner. Paul asks Philemon to receive back his runaway slave, Onesimus, and then, like Abraham at Sodom, asks him to go farther and to send Onesimus back to Paul for “he is indeed useful to you and to me.” 

In the privacy of their relationship, Paul pushes the boundaries of their relationship in Christ.  There is no preaching against slavery, nor is there any accusation about Philemon’s desiring Onesimus’ return.  Instead there is the request to understand this as a situation unique to these two, no three, Christian men. 

Paul is able here to use the slave language to advantage, he who described himself as a slave to Christ.  Thus he describes the possibility for Onesimus as “no longer a slave but more than a slave.”  Paul does not push his apostolic authority, but yet implies a greater authority that ought to direct Philemon’s response, “Confident of your obedience.”   

Playing with Onesimus’s name (which means useful, beneficial), Paul points out that the formerly useless slave is now useful to both of them and asks for Philemon’s generosity (vv. 20-21). Paul’s letter is a masterful work of rhetoric in hopes of convincing Philemon to not be harsh to Onesimus, but to welcome him back and to see him differently—no longer as a slave, but as a brother in Christ. Paul is calling for Philemon to change his mind, to change his view. Paul calls Philemon to become a person of stature, to embrace a larger vision of his social context in which all people are God’s beloved children, worthy of affirmation.

This is not merely suggested as a personal favor to Paul but is grounded upon the recognition that the slave is now a “beloved brother” of his master, “in the flesh and in the lord” (v. 16). Philemon is left to decide his own course of action: whether merely to refrain from punishing Onesimus, or to free him or to accept him as a fellow evangelist (and perhaps send him back to Paul).

The Revised Common Lectionary excludes the last few verses of personal note, but verse 22 is very important because Paul is going to follow up and make sure that Philemon is treating Onesimus well, for Philemon is a follower of Jesus

Gospel –  Luke 14:25-33 

This scripture also needs to be set in context Luke’s parables in Chapter 13 – 14 (of which this is part) which calls us to whom we should direct our ministries – the crippled woman, the man with dropsy, and the guests from the highways and byways.

In this reading, Jesus cautions those who accept the invitation into the kingdom too easily. In Semitic idiom, hate means to lack commitment or attachment, a point made clear in Matthew 10:37. Coming to Jesus for teaching and healing must be complemented by following him as disciple and servant (9:23).

Therefore the “hatred” of father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters” is not disaffection from persons we love, but rather understanding the even greater things that Christ calls us to.  The family of reference is really the larger family of discipleship.  What is it, we ought to wonder, that Jesus really calls us to, and do we know the cost of it.

The two brief parables illustrate the point that one must count the cost before undertaking a demanding enterprise.

  1. ” For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, saying, `This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.’ The tower is not a fortification but a farm building, a watchtower or a silo.
  2. ” Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.” 

Verse 33 does not summarize the parable but counts the cost of true discipleship: renunciation.

This passage does cause to examine the larger context of our lives. Are we “possessed” by our possessions, stressed out in our quest for the comforts promised by the American dream? To love the world rightly we need to place God at the center of our lives; conversely, we love God best by bringing beauty and joy to the world. The vision of an impossible ideal can motivate us to seek the most realistic transformation in our current situation.

Sermon, Aug 28, 2022

Sermon, Proper 17, Year C, 2022 Proverbs 25: 6-7, Psalm 112, Luke 14:1, 7-14

“Supper at Emmaus”- Caravaggio

In today’s gospel, Jesus tells us about how we are to come to our true place in the reign of God and find ourselves seated at God’s “welcome table.”   

In this story, Jesus is eating a meal on the Sabbath with a leader of the Pharisees.  The first verse of this passage says that they were watching Jesus closely.   I’m assuming that “they” were the group of Pharisees who would have been invited to this meal.

Jesus watches the Pharisees take their places at the meal.  Where they sat was quite important, for the seating indicated where people stood within the group, who were the most honored, and who were the least important.    

The Pharisees were strict followers of Jewish tradition.  The more they followed the tradition, the better they considered themselves to be.    They judged one another on their accomplishments in the department of law keeping.  And those who were the best were the ones chosen to sit in the place of honor at banquets. 

Inevitably the Pharisees had come to believe that their relationships with God were determined by how well they kept the laws, and that they earned God’s favor by keeping God’s commandments.      

We fall into the same trap ourselves.  We try to live by God’s laws.  We try to love God and to care for others.  We are proud of our accomplishments.  We are proud of being good people.  But that proudness we develop can adversely affect our relationship with God, and with other people.    

Here’s an example.   Years ago, Easter Sunday had at last arrived at St George’s in Fredericksburg.  The scent of lilies filled the church, exquisitely arranged flowers delighted our eyes, the choir, accompanied by trumpets, sounded like a heavenly chorus—what a grand way to celebrate our Lord’s resurrection.   How proud I was to be there, proud of being a good Christian on this day, along with all the other good Christians who filled every pew. 

And then my rejoicing was interrupted.

For who should be the lector that day but a woman in our congregation who was well known for her struggles in life and who wasn’t the best reader either.   

I’m ashamed to admit that I thought to myself, “I can’t believe that she is reading on Easter Sunday of all days!  She isn’t worthy of that honor.  Someone who is better than she should be the one up there in front of all these people.  I am worthier than she is!  Why didn’t I get chosen to read today?”  And then I instantly felt guilty and ashamed for this proud thought. 

I have mulled over that incident many times in the years that have passed since then.  I had gotten caught up in trying to prove myself to God and to everyone else, trying to prove that I was worthy of a place of honor. I was trying to earn my way to God’s table.  I had not taken to heart the wisdom of what Jesus had to say in today’s gospel.     

Maybe the Pharisees who listened to Jesus that day took the parable he told literally.  Maybe at that very meal they had observed the host asking someone to move  so that someone more important could sit near the host.  And so Jesus underscored what they had all just seen by reminding them of the verse in Proverbs that says “It is better to be told, “Come up here,” than to be put lower at the table.  Who would want to be embarrassed in such a public way? 

But there’s more to the story Jesus tells than just what happens on the surface of the story.

Jesus is reminding those with ears to hear that our true place in God’s reign is not up to us.  No matter how hard we try, we cannot earn the seat of honor at the heavenly banquet, or even a place at all.   

Instead, our place at the table in God’s house is entirely up to God’s gracious love and mercy.  And we want to put forth our best effort out of gratitude for God’s gracious love and mercy at work in our lives.      

Instead of working on earning a place of honor, instead of trying to prove our worthiness, our assignment is simply to trust in the Lord instead of ourselves, to fear the Lord, to take delight in the Lord’s commandments, to be merciful and full of compassion, and to be generous and just, as today’s psalmist explains. 

Our assignment is to be humble, just like Jesus was in his life on earth. 

In his letter to the Philippians, Paul reminded his listeners that Jesus himself, God incarnate, did not cling to equality with God, but humbled himself, becoming a servant, and became obedient to death, even death on a cross. 

To be a follower of Jesus is to cultivate humility, and to be a servant to God and to those around us. 

Remember the parable Jesus told that we heard a few weeks ago, in which the watchful slaves are to be dressed for action and to have their lamps lit, to be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. 

And then when the master arrives, he blesses the alert slaves.  Just as Jesus did when he washed the feet of his disciples at the last supper, this master will come in, put on his apron, and have the servants sit down to eat, and the master will serve them! 

That is shocking, that God would choose to wait on us! 

And even more shocking, God invites everyone to the table, not just the worthy few who may, in the eyes of this world, be the deserving ones. 

Jesus reminds the Pharisees, and us, of that aspect of God’s unconditional love for all of us in the second half of today’s gospel, when he tells the host, “Next time, don’t invite the ones who can and will repay you.  Instead, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind.”  They can’t repay you.  But God, the only one who can bless us, will bless you because what you have done for those who cannot repay you have done for God. 

To offer this grace and mercy to all that is around us is not about earning God’s favor.  Offering grace and mercy to the other is an act of gratitude and thanksgiving to God—God, who loves us enough to welcome us to the table even when we are poor in spirit, even when we are crippled physically or spiritually or emotionally, even when we are too weak to get up and walk through another day, even when we can’t even see that God is right there before us, inviting us to God’s table, even when we struggle to be unselfish and hesitate to invite those who cannot repay us to come on in.      

So how are we to come to our true place in God’s reign? 

To humbly trust in the Lord instead of in ourselves and our accomplishments.   

And to live in gratitude by sharing God’s undeserved hospitality, knowing that God embraces all of us and all things in God’s great circle of love, and invites us all to God’s  welcome table. 

Augustine of Hippo, Aug. 28

Augustine was born in Thageste, North Africa, in 354. His mother, Monnica, was a committed Christian and tried to raise Augustine in the faith.

In Augustine’s time, Christians were not baptized until later in life for fear that they would stain their souls with their post-baptismal sins. Augustine took this as a license to sin, and sin boldly. Although brilliant, he had a passionate and tempestuous personality and was infamous for his profligate lifestyle, complete with a scandalous mistress, creative cursing, and drunken debauchery.

Augustine had a quick and insatiable mind. He studied philosophy, rhetoric, and law and was an accomplished professor. Drawn to Neoplatonism and Manichaeism, Augustine remained restless, unable to find a system of thought that both engaged his mind and soothed his soul.

While Augustine was serving as professor of rhetoric at the Court of Milan, his mother Monnica’s pleas and prayers for her son to return to Jesus finally reached their climax.

In the summer of 386, Augustine heard the story of Placianus’s and his friends’ conversion after reading of the life of Saint Anthony of the Desert. He was jealous of the revelation given to them and was pacing his garden, wishing for some clarity in his faith, when he heard a child’s voice telling him to “take up and read.”  Augustine believed this was the sign he sought and took it as a divine command to open the Bible and read the first thing he saw.

His Bible turned to Paul’s Epistle to the Romans: “Let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarrelling and jealousy. Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires” (13:13-14). Augustine felt the words were speaking directly to him. He was deeply convicted about his life of sin and felt called to dedicate his life to God. Shortly thereafter Augustine made the acquaintance of Bishop Ambrose, and, under his influence, came to view Christianity as both intellectually respectable and morally desirable. Augustine was baptized on Easter Eve 387.

His baptism and conversion to Christianity transformed Augustine completely from a prominent debaucher to a powerful defender of the faith. Upon returning to Africa, he gave away all of his possessions to the poor, with the exception of the family home—which he converted into a monastery. He was ordained a priest in 391 and consecrated as bishop of Hippo in 395, a position he held until his death thirty-five years later. He was described by his friend and fellow bishop, Possidius, as a man who “ate sparingly, worked tirelessly, despised gossip, shunned the temptations of the flesh, and exercised prudence in the financial stewardship of his See.”

Augustine’s writing provides his greatest legacy to the Church and the world. After his conversion, the quick, insatiable intellect he had applied to rhetoric and philosophy turned to theology and ethics. Augustine answered God’s call to “love the Lord your God with all your mind,” and fulfilled it well. Yet Augustine’s writing and thought were not dry and detached but passionate and evocative, engaging the heart as well as the mind.

Augustine’s Confessions is one of the earliest and most well-known examples of spiritual autobiography. In Confessions, Augustine tells the story of his life and faith: the good, the bad, and the ugly. 350 sermons and 100 works also survive Augustine did not hide his past sins and early debauchery but confessed them freely. In Confessions, he admitted that, as a young man he prayed, “Grant me chastity and continence, but not yet.” And in a letter to some bishops, he once wrote, “I too have sworn heedlessly and all the time, I have had this most repulsive and death-dealing habit. I’m telling your graces; from the moment I began to serve God, and saw what evil there is in forswearing oneself, I grew very afraid indeed, and out of fear I applied the brakes to this old, old, habit.”

Augustine of Hippo is commemorated in The Episcopal Church’s calendar on August 28.

Augustine’s Ideas

One question preoccupied Augustine from the time he was a student in Carthage: why does evil exist in the world? He returned to this question again and again in his philosophy, a line of inquiry motivated by personal experience. Augustine lived in an era when the pillar of strength and stability, the Roman Empire, was being shattered, and his own life, too, was filled with turmoil and loss. First he lost his mistress, then his mother, and finally his son. To believe in God, he had to find an answer to why, if God is all-powerful and also purely good, he still allows suffering to exist.

Augustine’s answers to this question would forever change Western thought. First, he states that evil exists because we have free will. God enables humans to freely choose their actions and deeds, and evil inevitably results from these choices. Even natural evils, such as disease, are indirectly related to human action, since they become evil only when in contact with people. According to this theory, a disease spreads only because men and women put themselves in harm’s way. Augustine gave a more theological explanation later in his life: we cannot understand the mind of God, and what appears evil to us may not be evil at all. In other words, we cannot judge God’s judgment. The roots of both of these answers stemmed from two philosophies, Manicheanism and Neoplatonism, which shaped Augustine’s ideas.

He helped formulate the idea of original sin – “the deliberate sin of the first man is the cause of original sin.” Adam by his fault transmitted to us not only death but also sin. The grace of Christ was therefore indispensable to human freedom .

Free Will and Responsibility

Before Augustine, Manicheanism was extremely influential among early Christians. Manicheanism was a cult that first arose in Roman North Africa, begun by a Persian named Mani, who died around A.D. 276. This cult combined elements of Christianity with elements of Zoroastrianism, the ancient religion of Persia, or Iran. Mani taught that the universe was a battlefield of two conflicting forces. On one side is God, who represents light and goodness and who seeks to eliminate suffering. Opposing him is Satan, who represents darkness and evil and is the cause of misery and affliction. Human beings find themselves caught in the middle of these two great forces. According to Manicheanism, the human body, like all matter, is the product of Satan and is inherently evil, whereas the soul is made of light. The only escape from evil is to free the soul from the body through the practices of asceticism and meditation. Manicheanism taught that Satan is solely responsible for all the evil in the world, and humankind is free of all responsibility in bringing about evil and misery. Augustine became a follower of Manicheanism during his student days in Carthage, but he ultimately broke with the Manicheans over the question of responsibility for evil, since he believed that human beings are capable of free will and are among the causes of suffering in the world. This disagreement led him to Neoplatonism, a system of philosophy developed by Plato’s follower, Plotinus, that would prove to be the most influential in his life and work.

The Importance of the Body and the Soul

Plato’s influence on philosophy was widespread during the later Roman Empire, the time in which Augustine lived. The philosopher Plotinus (a.d. 204–270), in particular, was responsible for redefining and reshaping Platonic philosophy into a cohesive system of thought called Neoplatonism. To explain the presence of evil, Plotinus drew on Plato’s distinction between the world of physical, tangible things and a world of intangible ideas or Forms. Plato taught that the physical world is changeable, perishable, and imperfect, in contrast with world of ideas or Forms, which is constant, perfect, and everlasting. Because the physical world is marked by change and corruption, it is impossible to fully know it. True knowledge can be achieved only by thinking about the eternal and perfect forms, of which the tangible world is only a copy, just as a painting is only an imitation of something real.

The Neoplatonists used this distinction between the physical and the ideal to explain the relationship between the body and the soul. They taught that the soul is perfect but trapped in an imperfect body. Because the body belongs in the physical realm, it is the root of evil. Thus, the soul seeks to break free of the body so it can live true to its perfection, in the realm of ideal forms. In Plotinus, Augustine found the important idea that human beings are not a neutral battleground on which either goodness or evil lays claim, as the Manicheans believed. Rather, human beings are the authors of their own suffering. Plotinus carried this line of thought further than Augustine was willing to accept, asserting that the body is unimportant in defining a human being and that true human nature involves only the soul and has nothing to do with the body. Augustine disagreed, maintaining that human beings are both body and soul together. We bring evil on ourselves because we actively choose corruptible elements of the physical world rather than the eternal, perfect forms, which are spiritual. Augustine argues that God does not allow evil to exist so much as we choose it by our actions, deeds, and words. Later, he came to the conclusion that it is impossible for us to understand the mind of God, and therefore we cannot come to a proper comprehension of why suffering exists.

The Possibility of Certitude

A number of philosophers before Augustine had argued that certainty is impossible and that the best the human mind can hope to achieve is the conviction that its conclusions are highly probable. Augustine disagreed with this premise and sought to demonstrate philosophically that certitude is in fact possible. His first argument is that if we accept the possibility of our conclusions being probable, we’ve already implicitly assumed that certainty exists, because things can only be “probably” true if truth (in other words, certainty) does in fact exist. If there is no truth, there is no probability. Second, happiness is the result of acquired wisdom, which all human beings desire. Thus, to say wisdom cannot be attained is to say that happiness is impossible—an unacceptable conclusion. Third, Augustine takes issue with the idea that the senses cannot be trusted, and he does not agree with his opponents that the mind is entirely dependent on the senses. On the contrary, our senses do seem reliable to a certain extent, and the mind can understand things independently of the senses, so therefore it must be even more reliable than the senses. Finally, Augustine points out that our mental states are beyond doubt. Whatever we may say or not say, we cannot doubt that at this moment we are thinking. We may say that we are being deceived, but this very fact of being deceived proves that we exist. These four reasons support the thesis that certitude is possible.

The Gospel – Luke 14:1, 7-14 – Pentecost 12 The Way Up With God Is Down

"Feast of Simon the Phrarisee" – Peter Paul Rubens (1618-1620)

I love David Lose’s comment on this passage -“If there was ever a gospel reading that invited a polite yawn, this might be it. I mean, goodness, but Jesus comes off in this scene as a sort of a progressive Miss Manners.” He later backs off of it.

Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem. And so this, and all reported encounters with religious authorities, are going to clarify and sharpen the division between Jesus’ vision of right now, right here, being the time and the place for the realization of God’s Kingdom, and the authorities’ anxiety to keep social peace as defined and enforced by the Roman occupiers.

He is invited to dinner by the big cheese – “house of a leader of the Pharisees”. Jesus does not seem to be invited for the hospitality of it, but for the hostility of it. The setting seems hostile. Sabbath controversy stories in chapters 6 and 13 had both ended with pharisees on the defensive (6:7; 13:17). Chapter 11 had ended with the pharisees "lying in wait for him, to catch him in something he might say." (11:54).

Thus Jesus is not being watched closely to see what they might learn from him. He is being watched closely to assess just how much of a threat he really might be. He is being tested outside of the admiring crowds. Jesus is watching them very closely in order to make observations about human conduct. He wanted to contrast their kingdom of ritual with the kingdom of God emphasizing mercy and radical inclusion.

The word pharisee can mean "to separate". The Pharisees were a group of people who separated themselves from the riffraff of society. They sought to live holy and pure lives, keeping all of the written and oral Jewish laws. Often in the gospels, Pharisees are pictured as being holier-than-thou types, the religious elite. They felt that they had earned the right to sit at the table with God. They criticize Jesus because he doesn’t separate himself from the "sinners and tax collectors."

The Gospel is sandwiched between two other situations. Just before the Gospel Jesus heals a man with dropsy and defended that Sabbath healing. He may have been the bait

There are two main scenes here with advice: 

1. Going to banquet sit at the lowest place so you can move up rather than forced down

In Israel, the meal table played a very important role, not only in the family, but in society as well. When an Israelite provided a meal for a guest, even a stranger, it assured him not only of the host’s hospitality, but of his protection Also in Israel (as elsewhere), the meal table was closely tied to one’s social standing. “Pecking order” was reflected in the position one held at the table

Jesus knows that most people would want to take the place of honor. What is interesting is that those who put themselves forward to take the highest or most dignified place might be removed not to the second place but to the lowest place.

And, Jesus takes pains to show that this "demotion" is really an experience of humiliation. Rather than seeking to put ourselves forward, we are to wait until we are invited up to the honored position.

When the guests jockeyed for position at the table, Jesus spoke to this evil as well (vv. 7-11). While they believed that “getting ahead” socially required self-assertion and status-seeking, Jesus told them that the way to get ahead was to take the place of less honor and status. Status was gained by giving it up. One is exalted by humbling himself, Jesus said.

Note that Jesus is not criticizing the system but how people operate within it.

His exhortation is to pursue humility, a concept with significant status connotations. Humility was very rarely considered a virtue in Greco-Roman moral discourse.

Humility doesn’t mean being passive. Letting others walk all over us Jesus shows by his life that being humble didn’t mean being passive, but, when necessary, it meant taking out the whip and driving the self-centered bullies out of the temple. 

There is a balance between being humble without self-degradation or shame of letting others "walk all over" us vs. deliberately putting ourselves above others through self-exaltation or arrogance.

Exaltation depends too if you are doing the exalting or God raising up and exaltation belong to God; recognition of one’s lowliness is the proper stance for human beings. The act of humbling oneself is not something for its own sake, but for the sake either of God or of Christ .Jesus advises a strategy of deliberately and consciously living beneath one’s presumed status in order to receive even greater honoring later.

Some scholars speculate that this teaching would particularly apply to Luke and his first readers as they were higher status Gentiles, and the mixed-status Christian communities would require them to live beneath their comfort zone. God would later recognize and honor their accepting of lower social standing.

Here is a paradox indeed. The way up is down. To try to “work up” is to risk being “put down.” Those who wish to be honored must be humble and seek the lowly place. Those who strive to attain the place of honor will be humiliated

2. If you are the host, don’t invite who can in turn invite you and be repaid but invite “ the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind” and be repaid by God

Shift in emphasis here. Now Jesus is not working within the system but challenging it.

The host had apparently invited all the prominent people to his table on this occasion.

Jesus assumes that you are putting on the feast, rather than attending a marriage banquet, and that you have to put together your guest list. Guest lists are put together based on a philosophy or on some kind of principle. Two popular ways to do it are because you "owe" someone who has invited you to their event or you want to "get in good" with some people and so you extend an invitation to them 

First century middle-eastern dinner parties were political, social, and class affairs. One would invite those considered one’s social equals or superiors. Accepting an invitation to a such a dinner carried with it the expectation that the one invited would return the favor.

Obviously, in the unlikely event they would get an invite, poor people would not accept since they would not be able to repay.

The central principle of this advice is that we are to give things to people without expecting any kind of return.

Jesus told him that while men might seem to get more in return from inviting their friends, family, and prominent people to a meal, in heaven’s currency men were rewarded by God when they invited those who could not give anything in return—the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.

Jesus calls for “kingdom behavior”: inviting those with neither property nor place in society. God is our ultimate host, and we, as hosts are really behaving as guests, making no claims, setting no conditions, expecting no return.

We are to do good to people regardless of their ability to repay. In fact, we might delight even more in extending ourselves to people if they can’t repay because, in this case, we will have a reward at the "resurrection of the righteous."

Notice here that the listing: the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind – reflect those listed in Jesus’ initial declaration for his ministry way back in Luke 4:18. Your "blessing" is the total removal of social rank in the reign of God. In God’s eyes, this is justice, and you will be rewarded at the "resurrection of the just."

Helping the needy is more than just sending money, but getting involved with the people — perhaps sitting down together with them as equals at a supper table.

What the "helpers" frequently discover is that Christ serves them through the needy. Jesus says we need to start inviting new people to dinner and it may challenge our comfort zones.

We are disciples on the road – disciple on the road with Jesus is to share with those who have nothing and who can give nothing in return.

Back to David Lose on inviting the “the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind”:

“And while that sounds at first blush like it ought to be good news, it throws us into radical dependence on God’s grace and God’s grace alone. We can’t stand, that is, on our accomplishments, or our wealth, or positive attributes, or good looks, or strengths, or IQ, or our movement up or down the reigning pecking order. There is, suddenly, nothing we can do to establish ourselves before God and the world except rely upon God’s desire to be in relationship with us and with all people. Which means that we have no claim on God; rather, we have been claimed by God and invited to love others as we’ve been loved.

“As we see in today’s reading, precisely because we have been invited into relationship by God — because, that is, God has conferred upon us freely a dignity and worth we could never secure for ourselves — we are free to do the same for others. We are free to put them before ourselves, to lead them to seats of honor, to invite them to be our dinner guests, not because of what they can do for us, but because of what has already been done for all of us.

“It’s a new humanity Jesus is establishing, a new humanity that has no place for our insecurities and craving for order. Which is why it’s frightening and why those invested in the pecking order — which, of course, includes all of us — will put him to death.&qu

Lectionary August 28, Pentecost 12

I. Theme –  Our lives should exhibit humility and love

Feast of Simon the Pharisee” – Peter Paul Rubens (1618-1620)

The lectionary readings are here or individually:  

First Reading – Sirach 10:12-18 or Proverbs 25:6-7
Psalm – Psalm 112
Epistle – Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16
Gospel – Luke 14:1, 7-14 

Today’s readings remind us that our Christian way of life is characterized by humility and love. The wisdom teacher Sirach warns his readers to avoid arrogance, violence and pride. The author of Proverbs counsels about having a humble attitude and being content with one’s own social status. The author of Hebrews urges readers to make Christian love a practical reality in their lives.

At a banquet, Jesus teaches the meaning of true humility.Jesus’ teachings on humility challenge us, and cause us to go deeper—it is not enough to humble ourselves in the presence of others, but to actively reach out and invite those who would not be invited to join in. We are called to live out our witness, especially when it is hard and goes against the grain of the world. How does the invitation of Jesus challenge us at the table as we celebrate?

Some of us may know the honor of sitting at the head table at some social or business function. Because recognition of our importance is a coveted honor, the scene in Jesus’ parable of the wedding feast is familiar to us. Who has not looked for his or her place card near the host and been disappointed to find other names at the seats of honor?

The twinge we feel when we do not make the head table at important meetings reveals the fact that we still have a trace of the old nature in us. We want to look rich before people; we forget how rich Christ has made us before God.

Our earthly status is always insecure; it waxes and wanes, and the retirement party inevitably comes. Newcomers take our place, and we are expected to go fishing–or at least stay out of the way of our successors. Not so in God’s service. Once a saint, always a saint here. We are never retired from work in the kingdom. Our future is to be more glorious than is our present in God’s service.

God continues to give freely to us who are poor in what matters most. Our attempts to emulate God’s generosity and hospitality are received and honored when done in the spirit of humility that befits God’s image in us. Then, like God, we too can enjoy the company of those who can never repay us.

II. Summary

First Reading –  Sirach 10:12-18

The book of Sirach, also called Ecclesiasticus in older Bibles, reflects the teachings of Judaism in the second century BC. The author, Ben Sirach (50:27), describes himself as “one who devotes himself to the study of the law of the Most High” (38:34). Apparently, Sirach ran a religious school, a “house of instruction” (51:23), for those whose wealth afforded them such leisure. He set down in writing the content of his oral instruction about 180 BC. His grandson translated the work into Greek sometime after 132 BC. (See the Prologue to the book of Sirach.)  It is a book of moral instruction and wise sayings.

It was included in the Greek translation of scripture (the Septuagint, usually abbreviated LXX). Although not a part of the Hebrew canon of scripture, the work was highly valued both in Jewish and Christian circles. Thus it acquired its Latin title, Ecclesiasticus, “of the Church,” that is, to be read in church. It is the last major product of the tradition of wisdom literature (such as Job, Proverbs and many of the Psalms), and is an early example of the teaching that developed into the rabbinic schools of Judaism.

The reading for this week is a little homily on human pride.  Notice the consistent structure of coupled clauses.  From the ostensibly theological premise that begins this discourse, Ben Sira quickly moves into the world of wisdom and commonplace practicality.  He sees pride in the rulers of the world, a pride that God quickly undermines and brings to naught.  Ben Sira had ample fodder for his mill.  Living in the period of the Seleucid kings, the author saw ample examples of pride in the face of God.  Perhaps some reading in the Maccabees might help flesh out these insights for you.  History had left the old concerns about the Davidic kingship behind.  In spite of the success of the Maccabean Period (164-63 BCE) the Levant was already engulfed by far mightier powers whose secular and religious life was at odds with what Israel had long known.  Faithfulness to God, rather than national or personal pride, during such a period is what Ben Sira hopes to receive.

Proverbs 25:6-7

For those bothered by reading the apocryphal text, the lectionary provides this snippet from Proverbs.  As such it deftly serves as an inspiration point for Jesus’ saying in the Gospel.  The reading from Proverbs has more of a personal scope while the reading from Sirach has a more global feel.

The Book of Proverbs consists of short, memorable sayings drawn from human experience that are shaped poetically for memory and meaning. Since they are practical, proverbs serve a multitude of functions for people in their communities including observation, command, admonition, prohibition. In general they help to preserve tradition, ponder the mystery of life, and promote proper behavior. Today’s reading, for example, offers advice on how to conduct oneself when invited to dine with the king.

Not only are the images and message memorable, but the shape is poetic. In particular, Hebrew wisdom utilizes the parallelism of couplets to juxtapose truths and tease out new meanings. Good proverbs are characterized by being memorable, true to experience, practical or useful, and universally applicable.

Each proverb is like a snapshot of a vast panorama that needs to be complemented by other viewpoints. Since no proverb can totally capture the complexity of life’s mystery, the truth of each must be taken in context with that of others to create the whole picture.

Proverbs 25:6-7 is a brief passage about humility. It is better to be raised up than to be taken down. Humility is one of the character values lifted up by Wisdom literature. In our second thread of the Hebrew Scriptures this season after Pentecost, we have been following passages about the covenant that God made with the people and the promises of the covenant.

This passage, while at first glance doesn’t seem to fit, reminds us that when we are humble, we are more likely to witness and experience God’s grace firsthand than if we are proud. As often among people, we think we only need God when things are bad. If we remember with humility that all things, including ourselves, come from God, if we remember our dependence upon God, then we remember God’s presence, through good times as well as difficult times. When we are low, we hold on to the hope of God to raise us up, and when we are high, we remember with gratitude that it is God who has raised us up, and we also remember others who need help to be raised up. We focus not on our own gain, but the will of God and the care of others.

Psalm –  Psalm 112

This is an acrostic psalm, each line beginning with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet

This psalm is in happy company with both Sirach and with Proverbs, for all three of them are examples of Wisdom literature.  Here the idea person is held up for us to emulate and to exploit.  The proper noun indicates a warrior or a hero, but it is really anyone who has to deal with the issues of this world.  Prophetic issues are raised up here: righteousness, mercy, generosity, truthfulness, and such. 

Psalm 112 sings of the blessings of God for those who follow God, and that even those who are blessed with riches are blessed so they can give freely to the poor. The blessings are not only spiritual, but include children (v. 2) and wealth that can be used to help others (v. 3, 5, 9). These blessed faithful contrast with the wicked whose “desires come to nothing” (v. 10).

The psalm closes with a neat comparison – The ideal person stands in sharp contrast to the one who is wicked.  The wicked are the ones who are angry and jealous, who allow greed to overcome them, but the righteous give freely, sharing with all, and delighting in God who has given them everything. They are in sorrow at the comparison, and unlike the reputation of the righteous one (which, according to the psalmist, is eternal) the desires and story of the wicked will soon be gone.

Epistle-  Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16

The first people to hear this letter were Jews who had become Christians. Their conversion cost them their membership in familiar Jewish circles, so the author persuades them that they have an even better, if yet unfamiliar, membership in Christ.

Here, in this reading, the author gives the reader some final recommendations on how to live a worthy life.  We are given advice on loving service and then in a later section on true worship

The writer reminds the readers that in following Jesus, we must love one another, and that love comes with respect.  Hospitality, especially to fellow Christians, was a practical way of showing love, since one’s fellow guests at ancient inns were likely to be thieves. Hospitality was especially a duty for leaders of households. The responsibilities and rewards of such hospitality could be unexpected.

Prisoners and the ill-treated were to be helped. Christians should be able to be compassionate concerning the sufferings of others.

We must honor our spouses and remain faithful. We must love one another with mutual respect, and not live in greed.. Adultery and immorality will be judged. Love of money also disrupts relationships in the community and with God. Everyone is to be content, trusting in God’s care and adopting Psalm 118:6 as a watchword.

Jesus’ teachings, the commandment to love one another, still stands. We honor God by living for others, caring for others, doing good to others. The writer makes the bold claim, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” While we all grow and change, God’s promise fulfilled through Jesus—indeed, God’s love through Jesus, remains the same.

The recipients of the letter are urged to remember the example of their own leaders, as previously they have considered that of the Old Testament saints (chap. 11). These leaders appear to be those who originally proclaimed the gospel to them (2:3c), and who have now died. Whereas mortal leaders die, Jesus Christ is always available as model and mediator.

Gospel –  Luke 14:1, 7-14 

The particular sequence in Luke 14:1-24 of a healing, a teaching and a parable has been shaped by Luke around the theme of supper in the home of a Pharisee. The teaching on humility in verses 7-11 is, at one level, an illustration of simple worldly wisdom (Proverbs 25:6-7). But it takes on meaning for the whole Christian community when related to the community meal or eucharist.

Jesus is eating at the house of a leader of the Pharisees, and Jesus has noticed where everyone has sat down for the meal. The guests are choosing to sit closest to the host and to Jesus, to show how honored they are, rather than showing their humility.

There are two teachings.  The first is about humility. What Jesus advises them goes against all tradition—to sit at the lowest place and then be invited to move up. Jesus’ reasons for this is that all who humble themselves with be exalted (vs. 11), but this exaltation may not come in this lifetime. In verse 11 the passive verbs indicate that God is the one doing the action. The future tenses point to the humbling of the proud and the exaltation of the lowly on the last day, already implicit in the coming of the Messiah proclaimed in Mary’s Magnificat prayer (Luke 1:52).

The second observation is about the virtue of hospitality and how it is lived out in the actual lives of people.  Who should be invited to our banquets?   The guests should be, according to Jesus those on the  margin of society – the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.  Those whose reputations and labels would not make them on the guest list. This teaching goes beyond humility, but that we are called to bless others

In other words, all those who are mentioned by both Isaiah and Jesus as the recipients of the messianic kingdom should be invited to this earthly feast.  There is no reciprocity here, only the promise of the kingdom.  Thus, this simple human dinner party becomes a sign of what is to come in the heavenly realm.

This teaching speaks both specifically to the exclusivity of the Pharisees and generally to the ethic of reciprocity widely accepted. The maimed, the lame, the blind were excluded from worship at the Jewish temple, and thus w ould have also been unacceptable dinner guests for the Pharisees. None of those mentioned would have been able to repay this hospitality.

Jesus’ challenge to inclusiveness at the Christian eucharistic banquet continued to haunt the early Church (James 2:2-4; Romans 12:16) and remains just as much a challenge today.

As Christians we often say Christ has no hands or feet but ours. We are called to bless people with our lives. It’s not just about giving money to those in need, but is about extending our lives to those on the margins. We must not just be humble ourselves, but we must empty our own selfish ambition and reach out with the love of Christ beyond society’s boundaries.

Virgin Mary, Aug. 15

We celebrate her saint day on August 15. 

Mary lived circa 18 BCE- 41 CE. She was a Jewish woman of Nazareth in Galilee, the daughter of Joachim and Anne and the wife of Joseph, the carpenter. Little is known of her life except when it relates to Jesus life. She remained faithful to him through his death (when his disciples denied, betrayed, and fled), and even after his death, continued life in ministry with the apostles.

The New Testament records many incidents from the life of the Virgin which shows her to be present at most of the chief events of her Son’s life:

  • her betrothal to Joseph [Luke 1:27]
  • the Annunciation by the angel Gabriel that she was to bear the Messiah [Luke 1:26-38]
  • her Visitation to Elizabeth the mother of John the Baptist [Luke 1:39-56]
  • the Nativity of our Lord [Luke 2:20]
  • the visits of the shepherds [Luke 2:8-20] and the magi [Matthew 2:1-12]
  • the Presentation of the infant Jesus in the Temple at the age of forty days [Luke 2:22, 2:41]
  • the flight into Egypt, the Passover visit to the Temple when Jesus was twelve, [Matthew 1:16,18-25; 2; Luke 1:26-56; 2];
  • the wedding at Cana in Galilee [John 2:1-11]
  • and the performance of her Son’s first miracle at her intercession [John 2:1-11],
  • the occasions when observers said, "How can this man be special? We know his family!" [Matthew 13:54-56, Mark 6:1-3, Luke 4:22; also John 6:42],
  • an occasion when she came with others to see him while he was preaching [Matthew 12:46-50,Mark 3:31-35, Luke 8:19-21],
  • her presence at the foot of the Cross, where Jesus commends her to the care of the Beloved Disciple [John 19:25-27],
  • her presence with the apostles in the upper room after the Ascension, waiting for the promised Spirit [Acts 1:14].   

Besides Jesus himself, only two humans are mentioned by name in the Creeds. One is Pontius Pilate, Roman procurator of Judea from 26 to 36 AD and the other is Mary. There are more feast days in The Episcopal Church honoring Mary than anyone else.

There have been many appearances of Mary over the centuries. Tradition says that in 39 CE, the Virgin Mary appeared in a vision to Saint James the Great in Zaragoza, Spain. Over the centuries, there have been dozens of additional reports of appearances of the Virgin Mary in different times and places. Two of the most influential visions of the Virgin Mary are the Virgin of Walsingham and the Virgin of Guadalupe.

Her story was carried by National Geographic in December, 2015 –"How the Virgin Mary Became the World’s Most Powerful Woman"

Her message to us was simple – "Listen to Him. Listen to my Son. Do what He tells you." 

Sunday Links for August 14, 2022 – Pentecost 10

Aug.14, 11:00am – Eucharist

The peace Jesus has come to bring by establishing right relationships demands a complete revaluation and transformation of oneself and one’s relationships

  • Zoom link for Aug.14 Meeting ID: 869 9926 3545 Passcode: 889278
  • Bulletin Aug. 14, 2022
  • Lectionary for Aug. 14, 2022, Pentecost 10
  • All articles for Aug. 14, 2022

    • This Week

  • Ecumenical Bible Study, Wed, Aug 17, 10am-12pm. Reading lectionary of Aug. 21
  • Village Harvest, Wed, Aug 17, 3:00-5pm. Come grab some fresh produce, canned goods, and meats and anything we have available

    • Gospel, “I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! “

    This a shift of mood in the gospel from last week’s Luke 12:32-48. That passage begins with a beautiful theme of blessing for the crowd. “Do not be afraid, little flock” to this week’s “Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!” Now there’s a shift ! 

    When he is with the crowd, strangers and foreigners, he proclaims the Good News of God’s unconditional acceptance and universal compassion. When Jesus is with the disciples, his teaching is far more demanding and often blunt.

    Contradicting the angels’ promise of peace on earth at his birth in Luke 2, Jesus emphatically denies that he’s come to bring peace. Instead, he claims to be the bearer of discord and fragmentation. As he journeys toward Jerusalem, Jesus becomes a source of conflict and opposition when he lays claim to startling forms of authority and power. His words are marked with a sense of urgency and intensity. The road to Jerusalem, after all, leads to a violent confrontation with death.

    "Fire Window" – National Cathedral, Washington

    This week’s gospel can be divided into three parts :

    1 In verses 49-53, there are three images – casting fire, baptism/immersion , division of family members

    At least with the first two images, fire and baptism, Jesus’ is distressed that he hasn’t completed these tasks. By placing this saying in the midst of the journey narrative — Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem but not there, yet — Luke may be indicating that the completion of these tasks takes place on the cross in Jerusalem when he is "immersed" into death, or, in a broader sense, his immersion into the passion/suffering events that take place in Jerusalem

    Jesus explains the way in which His coming will “cast fire on the earth.” He also expresses an eagerness to get on with the process of bringing fire to the earth. This “fire” has implications for the family, but not those which we would prefer. The coming of Christ will cause great division within families, driving wedges between those family members between whom we normally find a strong bond.

    What is this fire ?

    One possibility of the “fire” of which Jesus spoke is the same fire about which the prophets, including John the Baptist, spoke—the fire of divine wrath. When Jesus said that He had come to “kindle a fire” – the outpouring of God’s wrath on sinful Israel/ His death on the cross would set in motion a series of events, which will eventuate in the pouring forth of God’s divine wrath on sinners.

    Another possibility is to consider the phrase “begin on fire” to refer to someone who is passionate about something. We need to get rid of things that exploit and do not sustain us (such as poverty, racism, disease). Redemption can come only when those systems are shattered and consumed by fire and we rebuild based on a different set of values. Business as usual means injustice and death. Thus, life can not flourish with a crisis which is God’s presence.

    Thirdly, it can also speak to Jesus transformation – from man to resurrected individual and the change. His purpose was to become a sacrifice for our sins and his baptism was the crucifixion. His death on the cross would set in motion a series of events, which will eventuate in the pouring forth of God’s divine wrath on sinners and the creation of the church

    One needs to separate the idea of “means” and “end” in this passage . The difference is, on the one hand, that between “then” (heaven, the kingdom of God) and “now.” “Peace” is the end, but a sword and division is the means. “Life” is the end, but death—our Lord’s death, and the disciple’s “taking up his cross” is the means

    Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote from his German prison cell in 1944 about the violence which destroyed the sense of fulfillment of life for him and the long isght of history. Out of this painful experience came a profound insight, part of his Daily Meditations from His Letters: “This very fragmentariness may, in fact, point toward a fulfillment beyond the limits of human achievement."

    What is this baptism ? This part of the scripture refers to Jesus himself and not his followers. Not immersion in water but tis baptism is clearly the death which He would die on the cross of Calvary. He is being cleansed for a purpose . His purpose was to become a sacrifice for our sins and his baptism was the crucifixion. It can refer also to his mission against the structures of the world about which he is “stressed” since it will lead to his own death. Yet, there is relief when it is over.

    The division which Jesus speaks of here has several interesting features. Following Jesus is more than just affirming his message – it is teaching of action which has its consequences. First, there is a division which occurs within the family.

    -father against son 

    -mother against daughter 

    -mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law  

    Peter Wood speculates that Jesus may have meant, 1. Conflict within the order of Rome, the cult of the emperor. 2. Conflict within Jewish families with the importance of the mother determining who is Jewish. 3 Conflict within entities themselves such as within believers, or today within churches,

    Second, there is a polarization which is described, so that it is not “one against one,” or to follow the imagery established by our Lord, “one against four,” but “two against three” and “three against two.” All these numbers don’t divide evenly. Is this the origin of “being at odds with someone”?

    Those who have come to faith in Christ will join together into a new kinship, while those who have rejected Christ will also find a new bondage, a new basis of unity, in opposition to Christ

    As Phyllis Tickle writes, “All change – even Good News change – will cause conflict and grief for the simple reason that all change – even Good News change – means giving up / losing something, and it means valuing one thing over another.” Out of the old traditional family comes a new family of believers. This was a challenge to the biological family in that time, extremely important. You risk being cast out – an extraordinary demand.” You risk your own baptism on the cross.

    Jesus warned that those who make a commitment to him will be persecuted, that a commitment of faith also means that our attitude toward material possessions must change, and that moral responsibilities must be taken with even greater seriousness. Because our commitment to Christ shapes our values, priorities, goals, and behavior, it also forces us to change old patterns of life, and these changes may precipitate crises in significant relationships

    2 In verses 54-57, Jesus speaks specifically to the multitudes, pointing out a very serious hypocrisy. He reminds them that while they can forecast tomorrow’s weather by looking at present indicators, they cannot see the coming kingdom of God as being foreshadowed by Christ’s first coming.

    The illustration seems to point to the weather patterns in the Near East. The Mediterranean Sea was to the west and winds from that direction brought rain. The desert was to the south and winds from that direction brought heat.

    He calls the religious leaders hypocrites. He criticized them and also his hearers about their lack of ability to perceive spiritual realities around them. Why, then, could these people, skilled at reaching conclusions about the weather, not come to the conclusion that Jesus was the Messiah, based on the voluminous evidence, all of which conformed perfectly to the predictions of the prophets?

    You can look at this in another way and see the implications of our own lives. It is time to check the direction of the wind and let that determine the course of action. We tend to let the insignificant dominate our attention while miss or ignore the significant. Our actions help to determine the future as natural consequence follow from the weather

    3 Verses 58 and 59 conclude the chapter by making a very personal and practical application. Reconciliation with their opponent needs to take place prior to standing before the judge.

    Lectionary commentary Pentecost 10, August 14

    I. Theme –   The connection between speaking out for God and making enemies

    National Cathedral – “Fire Window”

    The lectionary readings are here or individually:  

    First Reading – Jeremiah 23:23-29
    Psalm – Psalm 82
    Epistle – Hebrews 11:29-12:2
    Gospel – Luke 12:49-56 

    Today’s readings recognize the connection between speaking out for God and making enemies. In Jeremiah , God denounces those false prophets who tell lies in God’s name. The author of Hebrews urges believers to accept hardship as a divine aid to discipline. There are no guarantees that the faithful will thrive. They may be the objects of persecution and violence, but even in adverse situations, their hearts and minds are focused on God’s realm. This may minimize the emotional impact of persecution. Jesus warns that his ministry will bring a time of spiritual crisis.

    When we ignore the poor, when we turn away from the cries of injustice in this world, we turn away from Jesus himself. In Jesus’ day, the religious hypocrites would claim to follow God’s ways but had no concern for the very ones God declared concern for through the prophets. To this day, we end up being concerned more about right belief and right doctrine than how we live out our faith. When we look to the prophets and to Jesus, we see God hearing the cries of the poor, the widows and the orphans. We see Jesus eating among the sinners and tax collectors and the prostitutes. We hear the rejection of Jesus by others being a rejection of God’s love for all people, but especially the marginalized and outcasts. This same rejection happens today—we fashion Jesus into being concerned about right belief, when Jesus seems clearly to be concerned with how we love one another. We continue to miss the mark, transforming a love for all, especially those on the margins, into a love for a few who are obedient to a set of rules.

    In the maelstrom of conflicting positions and cultural divisions, Jesus challenges us to interpret the signs of the times. Awareness opens us to see the connection between injustice and violence and consumerism and ecological destruction. The causal network has a degree of inexorability: although we are agents who shape the world, we do reap what we sow.

    II. Summary

    First Reading –  Jeremiah 23:23-29

    Jeremiah began his prophetic ministry in 627 BC, and ended it about 580 BC. His career spanned the period culminating in the Kingdom of Judah’s final defeat by the Babylonians, the destruction of Jerusalem and the burning of the temple, and the exile of the major part of the population. In the time before the final defeat, some prophets advocated resistance while Jeremiah counseled submission to Babylonian rule as being God’s will.

    Jeremiah was blunt about what was right and what was not, and he suffered at the hands of the powerful because of his outspokenness. Judah’s defeats at the hands of foreign enemies were the result, Jeremiah insisted, of the bad faith of the king and other leaders among the people. This and similar statements seemed seditious to some. They were still reluctant to kill him outright, so they got the king to order Jeremiah thrown into a pit and kept there. Then someone else got the ear of the wishy-washy king, and successfully argued for Jeremiah’s release

    In these passages, Jeremiah ponders what it is that constitutes true prophetic work, and determines that it is proclaiming the word (of God) faithfully. . Jeremiah’s 23rd chapter is a compendium of commentary on the work of the prophets. They are compared to evil shepherds, and liars.

    Jeremiah 23:23-39 shows God’s faithfulness through the covenant with Israel. Through Jeremiah, we are reminded that our God is a God who is close to us, not far away. Our God is the creator, the God who is faithful to all of creation. Many of the prophets in Jeremiah’s day have gone astray and just prophesy what the people want to hear, but the true prophet will speak in faithfulness. Though this passage may seem dark words from Jeremiah, we are reminded that God continues to be faithful, God continues to be very near, and God’s word is like fire that purifies, a hammer that breaks through the rock of stubbornness, the rock of oppression.

    God is fully aware of the activities of these false prophets and brings them to judgment. God is no local deity easily hoodwinked, but transcendent and omnipresent. God is not revealed in dreams, but in visionary experiences (the classical prophetic tradition distinguished strongly between dreams and visions). God’s word does not result in the forgetting of God’s name. Its impact is challenging, not soothing. The final result is never complacency but radical obedience.

    Psalm –  Psalm 82

    Psalm 82 shows that God is the God of justice. This psalm celebrates Israel’s God as the ruler over all the nations and their protective deities

    This psalm assumes a heavenly court of other gods, in which God cries out for justice against the unjust gods. God removes their power, making them powerless, and instead gives power to the powerless ones, the weak, the widow, the orphan, and the needy. God is the God of the oppressed, the God of the marginalized, and God will not rest until they receive justice.

    The psalmist sees justice as being foundational. It is justice that allows the earth “to be” – “all the foundations of the earth are shaken”, when justice is not allowed to have its way. Even God’s own realization is shaken. “I thought that you were gods”. Now there is a different understanding on God’s part. “You shall die like mortals, and fall like any prince.” The powers that were thought to rule life are found to be wanting. It is God who will rise and judge the earth.

    Epistle-  Hebrews 11:29-12:2

    This letter was written for the sake of Jews who had become Christians, and who were promptly rejected by other Jews. Kicked out of synagogue and cut off from family and old friends, from the comforting rituals and institutions they had known, these folks needed their faith bolstered

    The letter to the Hebrews bolsters the faith of Jewish converts who missed the rituals and institutions of Judaism. The author wants his audience to think of themselves as athletes in a race in a stadium. The fans cheering for them are ancestors who struggled for the faith in the past. Jesus, on the other hand, is not a cheering witness, but the supreme example. The sentences describing his fidelity are not just images; they’re strong and direct statements

    The author recalls examples of faith from throughout Israel’s history. He recalls the experience of the early Israelites during their exodus from Egypt and their trek through the wilderness to the promised land. He alludes to the Judges, the kings and the prophets whose faith provided and protected the nation. Many were rejected and killed for what they believed in. These heroes of the faith, these witnesses give us strength and hope. Through many trials and persecutions, these ancestors persevered because of their trust in God. However, they “did not receive what was promised,” because God had an unexpected surprise in store through Jesus, who will be the perfect model of faith. Ultimately it is Jesus who gave himself for us, who let go of himself to die and live for us.

    Verse 12:2 is a brief hymn, summing up Christ’s work as model and perfecter of faith. Christ sets up the race, an appropriate Hellenistic model, as the metaphor for life. That life might include difficulties is exactly the connection that the author wishes to make with the life of Christ Jesus voluntarily submitted himself to suffering and in turn reaped the reward of resurrection and exaltation to the place of honor at God’s right hand. His example is the model for any suffering that we might need to endure in order to arrive where he, as leader, has gone before us

    Gospel –  Luke 12:49-56 

    Today’s gospel reading again expresses the sense of imminent crisis in Jesus’ own ministry and in the life of the nation. There are two central images.

    Jesus speaks of his ministry, through which he intended to reveal and establish right relationships, as being “to set the earth on fire.” Fire is an apt image of God’s transforming presence because it leaves nothing that it touches the same as before. Fire destroys but with it also purifies. A second image is baptism in which water can be death or life.

    All of these images are pointing to the passion, and this aspect will serve as a dividing point for many. Jesus speaks to the difficulty of God’s judgment, that people will become divided because of it, even within the family, even within what is supposed to be one, units of sometime comfort and closeness.

    Jesus has come to reconcile all people to God, but that reconciliation will cause some to reject God. There are those who cannot accept a God who accepts and loves all people. They will reject Jesus, and in turn reject the very God who loves them. And those who do reject Jesus do not understand what they are doing, they do not understand the signs of the times for them.

    The peace Jesus has come to bring by establishing right relationships demands a complete revaluation and transformation of oneself and one’s relationships .
     

    Sermon, Pentecost 9, August 7

    “Watchful Servants” – Eugène Burnand (1850-1921)

    Sermon, Proper 14, Year C 2022

    Genesis 15:1-6; Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16; Luke 12:32-40

    We spend a great deal of our lives waiting.  Our lives begin with nine months of waiting to be born, and that’s only the beginning  of the waiting we will do throughout our lives. 

    Today’s scriptures remind  us that, as Christians, the most important thing we wait for is for God’s reign to become complete on earth, as it is in heaven. 

    No wonder that’s the first thing Jesus asks us to pray for in the Lord’s Prayer. When we pray for God’s kingdom to come on earth, we are praying for God to make the old destructive death dealing ways of the world into something new and life giving.  

    Even waiting at a stoplight can take on new meaning if I know that the big thing I am waiting for is for God’s reign of love to come on this earth, and that how I wait, even for a stop light, matters.   

    Abraham is a faithful waiter.  God promises Abraham that Abraham’s old life is going to become a whole new thing—specifically, Abraham will inhabit a new land and have many descendants.  God asks Abraham to pick up and go to the land that God will show him.  And as the writer of Hebrews tells us, Abraham does what God asks and goes, not knowing where he is going—but he trusts that God will lead him where God wants him to go.    

    As Oswald Chambers points out, “to wait is not to sit with folded hands, but to learn to do what we are told” by God to do.  I like that idea, that waiting is not static, but dynamic.  Waiting involves active listening for what God might be calling us to do while we wait for what God is trying to make new in our lives.    

    So like Abraham, who waited faithfully,  we must listen for God’s promise to us, and for the world, (God’s reign coming into reality) and as we wait for that promise, to do what God calls us to do, because God is counting on us to do our parts for God’s coming reign as God makes our lives and the life of the world new. 

    The next thing we must do is to trust. Because we’re human, we can’t often see how God’s promises are being realized in our lives. So we must trust that even when God seems to be asking us  to do something that in our understanding  goes against what God has promised, then we should consider doing what God is asking.    

    Jesus faced this dilemma in the Garden of Gethsemane.  How could God’s reign on earth come closer to reality through Jesus dying on the cross?    How could death lead to new life?  But Jesus trusted God and did end up on the cross.  On the other side of death, God resurrected Jesus.  And God’s reign on this earth is all about the resurrection of the old into something new. 

    In her poem, All Things New, Frances Havergal  lists some of the gifts God provides when we wait faithfully for God to make all things new, especially when we are dealing with difficulties in our lives. 

    Light after darkness

    Gain after loss

    Strength after weakness

    Crown after cross

    Sweet after bitter

    Hope after fears

    Home after wandering

    Praise after tears

    Sight after mystery,

    Sun after rain,

    Joy after sorrow

    Peace after pain

    Near after distant

    Gleam after gloom

    Love after wandering

    Life after tomb 

     

    Alpha and Omega

    Beginning and the end

    He is making all things new. 

    Springs of living water

    Will wash away each tear

    He is making all things new. 

     

    In today’s gospel, Jesus tells the disciples not to be afraid because God’s good pleasure is to give us the kingdom. 

    Jesus reminds us that in all the waiting we do in our lives, we will want to do what God has asked us to do, which is to love God with our whole heart and to love our neighbors as ourselves.  As we care for our neighbors, God will care for us. 

    Remembering this puts a whole new spin on what we do with our stuff while we wait for God’s reign here on earth to become fully realized—all the way from that duplicate rolling pin I have in my kitchen, and the extra food I’ve saved up for hard times, to any extra money that God provides. 

    One of the biggest challenges that Jesus lays out for the disciples in today’s gospel is the need to be constantly ready as they wait for Jesus’ return and God’s kingdom fully realized on this earth.    

    This challenge is even harder for us than it was for the disciples, for we are the current generation of the countless generations of Christians who have waited faithfully for Jesus to return in glory.  Along with the Hebrews, who were discouraged because Jesus had not returned after only two generations,  we have grown tired of waiting for Jesus to show up in glory and some of us have even given up and left, placing our hopes in our self-sufficiency, or in the material things of this world, even though we say with our fingers crossed each Sunday that we really do expect Jesus to return in glory.  We have simply given up and stopped looking for the signs of  God’s homecoming.   

    So today’s gospel brings us up short!    

    Jesus reminds his disciples and us that we need to get busy and clear out all that extra stuff that clutters up our minds and our spirits to get ready for God to show up!

    In our physical lives, we Christians also have the dilemma of too many material things distracting us and keeping us worrying about the things that ultimately don’t matter.

    Last week we heard the story that Jesus told about the rich man who was worried about what to do with his excess crops.  He went to great expense to build extra barns to store everything in, only to find that he was going to die that night, and that none of the stuff that seemed so important just hours earlier now really mattered at all. 

    We’ve all got stuff we need to get rid of, both inner and outer stuff, so that we can travel light and to be ready, no matter when Jesus comes.  If we have been getting ready,  we won’t get caught by surprise.  Until we get rid of the old stuff, we will find that waiting for God to make all things new might be a wait that lasts forever because we haven’t done what we need to do. 

    Which brings us back to the issue of trusting in God instead of in ourselves and what seems like our material self-sufficiency. 

    But even after we have done what God has asked us to do, and we find ourselves still waiting,  we must trust God that God really is making all things new in God’s own, perfect time. 

    The thoughts of Christopher Davis, who teaches at Memphis Theological Seminary in Memphis, Tennessee, are helpful here. 

    Davis says in his commentary on today’s Genesis passage that there comes a place in the process of waiting that our trust gets put on trial.   “If you’re going to move from frustration to fulfillment, you must develop an intentional life of waiting…the prize isn’t always finally getting what you wanted, it’s what you learned while you waited.”  He goes on to say that our job is to go from putting God to the test to simply trusting God, that it’s not just about what we do, but also about who we grow into. 

    In the waiting, if we wait faithfully, God really does make us new.

    What is God trying to make new in my life, and in yours? What is God trying to teach us in the waiting?  What is God trying to make new in our church and in our world? 

    All of us are waiting for something.  So let’s remember that as we wait for whatever it is, that all the waiting, for both the small and large things in our lives, must be informed by our expectant waiting for God’s kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven.  

    So let’s resolve to listen for God, to wait faithfully and obediently and to trust that even if not in our lifetimes, God’s reign of love will someday come to pass on this earth, as it is in heaven.

    And in our intentional, faithful, and trusting waiting, our lives can be a sign  to the rest of the waiting world that God’s reign of love really  is on the way.   

     

    Resources:  The poem, “All things new” by Frances Havergal

    Commentary on Genesis 15:1-6