Proper 28C / Pentecost +23 November 13, 2022

Prayer

Let each new day be for us a time to testify to the gospel. Let the day on which the sun of righteousness dawns find us bearing witness to your all-embracing love. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God forever and ever. Amen.

From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year C, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Luke 21:5-19

"Jesus never promised it would be easy to follow him."

Commentary, Luke 21:5-19, David Tiede, Pentecost +25, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2010.

"How does one preach apocalyptic literature to people who are not suffering? Do we have to convince them that they are suffering for this literature to make sense?"

Exegetical Notes by Brian Stoffregen at CrossMarks Christian Resources.

"It is tempting to think that nothing really is done for anybody by seemingly small, everyday things when the problems are so systemic. As my teachers remind me, however, the truth is just the opposite: without the little things, there are no big changes."

"One Plot at a Time," Roberta C. Bondi, The Christian Century, 2004.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

I imagine a couple of things will happen in the preacher or bible class leader’s mind this week; either
avoid this passage because it seems of no real relevance, or focus in the teaching on the images of the destruction of the Temple provided by Jesus, spending most of the time musing about the time of Luke’s writing.

I want us to see here though a very important Lukan theme: Jesus as prophet. Prophecy was a prized gift in the world of Jesus’ time. Here Jesus is making a prophetic judgment about the future, not unlike the great prophet Jeremiah. The power of the prophecy of course, is in the fact that indeed the Temple is destroyed.

Our modern and post-modern world will want to deconstruct the passage into its historical, critical and literal meaning. This is a fascinating trail to leisurely stroll, not unlike watching a History Channel program on the Middle East of Jesus’ time--something I love to ponder and think about.

However, if we spend all of our time pondering we miss what I believe to be the Gospel’s chief focus in the telling of the story and that is that Jesus is who Jesus says he is and he is who the first disciples bear witness to.

Notice in the midst of our selected passage these words: “It will turn out to be a chance for you to bear witness ... do not prepare ahead of time your defense ... I will give you speech and wisdom” (21:13, 14, and 15).

Let us now remember the first words of the text: “I have decided to write for you, excellent Theophilus, an orderly account, so that you might have full confidence concerning the words in which you have been instructed” (1:3-4).

The point of the passage we are reading is not that Jesus is a prophet. But that we have evidence from his life and speech that he is a true prophet and therefore we may build our proclamation of the Good News of Salvation upon the truth of God’s revelation in Jesus Christ.

Luke is himself offering us the words of Jesus and communicating to those who would follow him to see the times in which we live as opportunities to proclaim and bear witness to the risen Lord. To work and offer a vision of our future, which is held within the bosom of God and calls us forward into a transformed community beyond the pain, suffering, war, and calamity of this world.

We perpetually live a life of Christian discipleship claiming God cares and has given us to the world to help make it different tomorrow than it is today. Like Jesus, we are the voices of prophecy for the poor and the hungry, the out-of-work and the abused. We are the ones who, today, give voice to Jesus’ promise of companionship and support in the most difficult of times.

We trust in God and in the wisdom provided for the right times that we might bear witness to the world God loved in which Christ became incarnate. Our trust in God calls us into political and social work as we seek to partner with God in bringing to bear a reign of sustainability and peace. The message of today’s Gospel lesson is not one for the individual but rather one to help the community understand its work in the face of oppression and abuse by radical and fringe groups who will try and take over the Gospel for their own purposes.

We are reminded that as we make our proclamation of Jesus Christ, as we bear witness, as we speak and have confidence in the words we offer as Good News, it is in the deep connectedness and willingness to rest in the wisdom of God that brings us peace in times such as these.

I was struck by what Dr. William Loder wrote in his commentary on the text for this Sunday:

“Trust in God has profoundly personal implications. It also has important political, social and religious ramifications. Luke has not withdrawn into individualism. He (or his text) still weeps for Jerusalem and longs for its liberation. He is prepared to be inventive to tackle the madness of fear and hate and the fanatical theologies it also generates. He keeps our feet on the ground about abuse and oppression. He stands in a tradition which tackles enmity in a way that is not off-centered by hate or fear, but informed by the stillness and wisdom of the Spirit. The shift is then from quantity of time to quality of being in all times and places."

Some Thoughts on 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text

I find Paul to be the kind of person who doesn't mince too many words.  He is a pretty straightforward kinda guy.  What I know about the text from reading 1 Thessalonians and from scholars (like Abraham J. Malherbe, p 448 of Thessalonians, Anchor Bible Series among others), is that Paul has been clear about expectations of behavior as Christians. He did this when he helped in the planting of the Thessalonica community.  He was clear in his first letter.  He is clear in his second letter; I don't think I ever want to be on the second or third "reminding" from Paul or anyone for that matter.

So, here he addresses once again the idlers.  Paul says to stay away from them...Christians are not idle. People who follow Jesus are busy people who pay for their food, who toil and labor (a lot) so as not be a burden on anyone else.  People have to be working, taking their part, and doing their share. To spread the Gospel and work to contribute to the community - these are key Christian values.

  

Paul is mostly about grace, but the response to that grace is work.

I don't think Paul is making some case for socio-economic policy in the new millennium.  I do think Paul is serious about people in the community working to spread the Gospel and to support the commons.  

Two interesting perspectives are offered by scholars.  The first is that it is possible that the Thessalonica church has individuals who are used to a patron-client relationship. So...they give to the work as patrons but do not actually do any of the work.  The church community becomes something like a city's Theater.  (Bruce Winter, 1994, Thessalonians)

A second possible explanation of what is going on is that the Thessalonica community is a kind of communal church - a tenement church. (Malherbe Robert Jewett, 1993, Thessalonians)  This is a kind of church where people live together and contribute their money and food to the whole community.  It is like a commune.

The classic explanation is that the church simply gave up working because Jesus' return was to happen at any moment.

So...here is the deal.  Christians have since the very beginning believed that working to build up the community of God was an essential part of life with God.  Christians believed they were to work hard and they were to share what they have.  Christians believed they were to do good work.  

In a world where we have set up a patron-client relationship with our members, and we don't tell the truth about our requirements for being part of the community (for fear people won't like us), and for excusing poor responses to the Gospel because we are concerned about our own response to the Gospel (and certainly wouldn't want anyone to examine it...) - we have created a community that would be very foreign to Paul and Jesus.

My advice for preachers and teachers this Sunday:  Don't preach on this passage if you are mad at your congregation.  If you aren't mad and can honestly wade into the text and our Christian response to the Gospel...well you might have a pretty good teaching - one worth a listen.  After all, people want to hear the truth with gentleness and kindness...because they know the truth and can sniff out inauthentic preaching.

Some Thoughts on Isaiah 65:17-25

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text

Resources for Sunday's Old Testament

Isaiah gives voice to a people desperate for a message of hope. And then God reminds them that it is very difficult to find God unless you seek God out and that most often it is only when you discover you really are the lost, the least, or the broken that you find that God is present. God, through Isaiah, reminds the people that when things were going so well they choose to turn their backs on God and those who were in need. 

Then God promises that God is always working out a new heaven and a new earth from the seeds of the present one. God says that when you are lost I can find you when you are least, I can raise you up, when you are broken, I will heal you and this is how you shall come to be part of what God is doing. This is how you become part of the new...the Jerusalem that waits in our future with its roots in the present. God will forget waywardness, and sorrow will cease. New lives and lifetimes will flourish. The harvests will be bountiful and the tree will provide much fruit on the holy mountain. Here the wolf and the lamb will feed together and the lion shall become a vegetarian and the evil of the world, the evil one, the serpent will find no food here in this new Jerusalem.

Part of what is so essential here (as it is in the above lessons) is that people must understand that the powers, principalities, and authorities of this world will all fade away for they participate with the serpent, they turn their back on God, they are never the lost, the least, or the broken. Until people give up on believing they need not God and that the organizations of their choosing will save them it is very hard for them to be found by God. God really just can't do a lot for those who think they have everything figured out. And, until they realize all gain in this world is passing away constantly and only the roots of the new Jerusalem are steadfast - people will suffer disappointment and hunger.

Proper 27C / Pentecost +22 November 6, 2019

Prayer

Work in our times the wonders of your grace, so that the whole world may see that those cast down are being raised up, and what has grown old is being fashioned anew, and all creation is moving forward toward fulfillment through the One who is the beginning and end of all, the Christ who was, who is and who is to come. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever. Amen.

From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year C, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Luke 20:27-28

"However I feel about Jesus? reply to the Sadducees concerning the poor woman with seven consecutive husbands, I am glad that Jesus cited Exodus to demonstrate to his opponents why he believed that God 'is God not of the dead, but of the living, for they are all alive to him.' This is certainly my experience."

"Monastic Mentors," Roberta C. Bondi, The Christian Century, 2004.

"'He makes us no promises about death,' Joseph said. 'He makes us promises about life. I do not know what he promises to the dead if he promises them anything'."

"God of the Living," sermon discussion from Frederick Buechner, Frederick Buechner Blog.

"God is the certain detail which hope has. The rest one might add is speculation or the brushstroke of imagination."

"First Thoughts on Year C Gospel Passages in the Lectionary," Pentecost 25, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

For those of you who preached and celebrated the Feast of All Saints and are moving on with Luke, I have a few thoughts.

We cannot look at this story and not see the contrast between Jesus’ proclamation of the Kingdom of God and the religious institutions' understanding of it. The religious institution of the day sees the reign of God in political terms. Jesus is speaking in a wholly different manner.

You must read Luke Timothy Johnson’s perspective on this. It is too long to quote but he clearly puts forth the religious argument that the kingdom and politics are connected. I will give you only this quote from the end of his insightful paragraph: “Finally, we see the symbolic expression of such a closed-horizon religion: the professional religionists who find their reward in earthly recognition in public acclaim and prestige, but who cannot be content with that, and oppress others even as they parade a public piety.” (LTJ, Luke, 318) Ouch! These are strong words and powerful ones for those of us who sit in the seats of power in our congregations and in diocesan offices.

Jesus, instead argues is “expressing the deepest convictions of the Christian community concerning its understanding of the kingdom of God. God owns ‘all things’ and ‘all things must be given back to God, but this allegiance is not spelled out in terms of specific political commitment, rather it transcends every political expression. No king, not even a Jewish king, not even David’s son, can receive the devotion of ‘all the heart and soul and strength and mind’ but only God.” (LTJ, Luke, 318)

The point Jesus is making when he makes the reply is precisely this: our God is a God of the living. We cannot attempt to pin God down through the mechanisms of this world. The world that is being reshaped as the reign of God is a living world entirely new, completely redeemed, transformed, and restored from the life we experience today. Yes, we do experience the first fruits of God’s reign but at the same time, we cannot believe for a second that God does not have the power to restore all things to life. We see only dimly then what God sees and offers us in his son Jesus Christ clearly.

You and I get so caught up in the world and our cultural contexts that we at times foolishly believe we perceive as God perceives. Behold though, all things are being made new. It is the living, the Holy Spirit, and the Christ of God that we are to share. 

Can we in the days, months, and years to come share the living God more than we protect the church politic? Can we set aside the Constantinian notions of Christendom, which are as carefully guarded as those of Jesus' day sought to protect their own religion? Can we become missionaries once again? Can we dare to share the living Christ with all those who we meet? 

We are given the opportunity to lift our heads from the political infighting of our daily religious life to see that the living Jesus has left the church building and is calling us back out into the world in order to participate in the reign of God unleashed as a living spirit in the world. Can we reclaim the Pentecost moment not as the birth of the Church but rather as the beginning of a new missionary spirit, which is at work in the world around us?

I leave you with these words from Luke Timothy Johnson:

“Finally, this kingdom is symbolized by the widow, who though left all alone in human terms, is not only herself alive but capable of giving life by sharing ‘all her living’ with others.”

Some Thoughts on 2 Thessalonians 2:1-17

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text

Recently a friend told me that they are not worried about the end of the world because the bible says it won't happen until Damascus falls. (Isaiah 17)  A week later a woman told me her son-in-law believed we were in the midst of the end of the world...so I told her that the bible says that Damascus must fall before that happens.  She was comforted and it enabled us to talk more about what was really troubling her.  I tell you this story only because concern over the end times is not something new by any stretch, and perhaps is only more prominent because of the many start-up churches and internet sights willing to talk about it, the successful series of books entitled "Left Behind", and our culture's fascination with post-apocalyptic movies!

One of the key theological issues Paul is dealing with is in the idea that the end is here.  He instead begins:  As to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we beg you, brothers and sisters, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as though from us to the effect that the day of the Lord is already here."

Paul is aware that there are people spreading such news and with it panic.  He offers to them examples of signs that must occur but have not yet occurred.  Paul is clear that the "lawless" one is not yet among us and therefore that we should not be concerned with such things but rather redouble our efforts in other areas.

Paul reminds the people of the Ephesian church that God has already chosen them, that God is even now blessing them and revealing himself to them.  That God calls and invites participation in the good news so that they might in the end participate in the heavenly kingdom.  Their work is to stand firm in their faith and their traditions. They are to remember, concerning these things especially, what Paul and others have taught.  They are to be about the work of spreading the gospel.  

They are to be comforted and strengthened in their work by the very words of God which offer hope for them - even in an age of anxiety.

This passage works well with the Gospel of Luke passage in that both are about living in response to God's good news.  People who follow Christ are to be concerned with life and the living of it as examples of Christ's love. Their actions are to glorify God.  They are not to idle away the days and years concerned about events that they cannot possibly know the hour or day upon which the Lord will return.  This is in simple fact not the business of the church; the mission of the church is reconciliation in our time through a ministry that always and everywhere reveals God's mercy, love, and forgiveness.

Some Thoughts on Haggai 1:15 - 2:9

Oremus Online NRSV Text

Wil Gafney, writing for Working Preacher, helps me think about the message of Haggai to the people regarding their temple:

'How many of you remember the good old days? Does this new temple hold a candle to the previous one? Buck up Z! Hold your head up Josh! Everyone, keep working! You have nothing to fear, I am here and I am with you all. And it won’t always be like this. I will bring resources – treasure – from far away lands and in its final form, this holy house will be even better than the one Solomon built!'

She writes, 'In some ways, each successive generation of Israelites tried to live into this promise by continually expanding and renovating the temple, as did Herod in the New Testament. (This is one thread underlying the synoptic story in which the disciples swell with pride when they show Jesus the fancy work on the perpetual temple project and their horror when he says the whole thing will come tumbling down, see Matthew 24:1-2; Mark 13:1-2; Luke 21:5-6.)... It is easy to focus on the material promise: one day the returnees will be more prosperous.'

I was also struck by these words from John Holbert writing for Patheos, 'Yes, Haggai wanted a rebuilt temple, but clearly not for its own sake. The bricks and mortar of any building have no meaning apart from the conviction that God has brought us out of the bondage of Egypt and remains with us still. No matter what this building looks like, God is here, and God is working.'

Haggai was one of the last prophets before the age of sages in the Jewish tradition. We often break this up between major and minor prophets in Christianity. Yet was seems very important is that the age or break concludes as God comes and dwells in the temple. We get so focused on the nature of the temple in Haggai's writing that we miss some of what is to come next. The people of Israel after the destruction of the first and second temples will have to make sense of the events. Their understanding will begin to shift to the attitude that there is shared responsibility for the living word in the midst of the people. 

Here is how Rabbi Jonathan Sacks spoke of the change, 'Note the difference between the two approaches. The Prophet takes a heroic stand but does not take responsibility for whether the people listen or not. The Rabbis do not take a heroic stand. In fact, they democratise the responsibility for rebuke so that it applies to everyone. But they are ultra-sensitive to whether it is effective or not. If there is a chance of changing someone for the better, then you must try a hundred times, but if there is no chance at all, better be silent. This is not only a wise approach; it is a highly effective one.'

What we hold in our hand here is a shift from a centralized view of the Temple to a means of understanding the living word of God in the midst of the people. That the major prophets had a vision for the whole, distant, and present regardless of the action of people. Yet as we see in these verses a change is occurring wherein the people are invited to be representative of the 'temple' in the world. They are to be neighbors to one another and to seek to build a particular tribal society.

What we then begin to understand about Jesus, from this revelation, is that he comes to fulfill this work. He further takes the shape of the great high priest, the temple of the body (not only an ecclesia or church) itself becomes the place in which the living Word is present through our actions. We are not building a throne/nation in league with Christianity - as in the lie of Christendom. Instead, we have in the Haggaic invitation an opportunity to be a different people within the world that we find ourselves, whatever context.

 

Some Thoughts on Job 19:23-27a

Oremus Online NRSV Text

"The first two chapters of Job are the curtain raiser of the drama, the opening act of the play, designed to present to us the old God, the God whom Israel so often claimed to know and worship. A new God is set to emerge later in the play."

"Just Who Is God, Anyway?" John Holbert, Patheos, 2015.

"Perhaps the biggest question for people of faith is this: How can a God whom we believe to be good and just allow or even instigate what we see and experience as evil?"

Commentary, Job 1:1, 2:1-10, Karla Suomala, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

"We enter this week into one of the most difficult and theologically sophisticated books of the Old Testament: the book of Job."

Commentary, Job 1:1, 2:1-10, Kathryn Schifferdecker, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

"The idea that God blesses the faithful, rewarding the righteous with what they deserve, and that the opposite, trials and tribulation, are signs of being out of sync with God?apparently the prosperity gospel is nothing new under the sun?is rejected outright by Job."

Commentary, Job 1:1; 2:1-10, Karl Jacobson, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

Oremus Online NRSV Text

So let us talk about Job the devil and me. 

We have a precious few weeks to talk about Job as it is rare that the book comes up in our reading. This is a very important biblical text, almost always misunderstood, and avoided because of its odd nature. Job is God's suffering servant. Quotes about Job fill our cultural vocabulary like "suffering like Job" or the "patience of Job". 

The text is a really a tale, a story, a narrative with characters of virtue. It is one meant to be told and listened to. I find it loses a bit when it is read. There is some biblical criticism that seems to prefer the unity of the soliloquies of Job to his friend's speeches. Moreover, there is some critical argument about the integrity of the text. There is a popular theological view that winds its way from the discourse that invites us to think that Job is God's suffering, patient, and faithful servant. 

We in church have a kind of popular sentimentality towards Job's cause. We recognize his complaining in our own complaints. We make Job into a modern man with modern sensibilities and philosophies. His internal angst is appealing and his speaking out against God gives voice to our own hostility towards transcendence. In Job we project all of our post modern anxiety. Out of his mouth we hear our own frustration with our adopted therapeutic moral deism. In Job we see our frustration with God's distance and our fractured narratives.

We enjoy the friends' taunts and their holding him accountable. We allow him to be our psychological scapegoat for our feelings of theological discomfort with a God who allows evil in the world. Job is a book that allows us to in a sense put God, the Bible, theology, and religion on trial for the horrors we find in the world around us.

When we do this, and this is how we so often read and talk about job, we engage, as René Girard the religious philosopher explains, 

"a naive theodicy that would serve as a paradoxical pretext to its contrary, the questioning of this theodicy, and from there the shaking up of religion, which modern interpreters consider the necessary goal of all sincere reflection on the misfortune of human beings... So concerning what is essential in the book of Job, there are two responses. The first is the patience of Job, his obedience to the will of God. The second, the modern response, is Job the rebel, Job the protester en route toward the virulent atheism of the contemporary Western world."

There is a second reading here as well. Perhaps it is a subtext to the first. This reading proposes that Job is actually poorly treated by God. This may appear like the same argument. It is but from a slightly different angle. But the angle is important. The first reading allows us to focus on God and God's seeming injustice. This second subtext is about how evil and bad things are completely exterior to human control. In other words, evil in the world is divorced from humanity. It is independent. Such a reading verges on the ancient heresy of dualism where God and the Devil have equal power and humanity is caught in the middle. You can read about dualism here or here.

[Before we go much further, I want to be transparent and say that the most influential writing that has both enlivened a rereading of Job and challenged me is the work of René Girard. If you are not new to the blog you know that I like his writing a great deal. As we parse out this passage I am going to lean heavily on Girard here - shall we say exclusively? I am going to paraphrase Girard's argument in part to continue to deepen my own understanding and in part to connect it to our present day work. I am writing with with the following in mind: Chapter 12 - Job as a Failed Scapegoat, by René Girard found in Excerpt from The Voice from the Whirlwind: Interpreting the Book of Job, edited by Leo G. Perdue and W. Clark Gilpin, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1992, pages 185-207. You can read this chapter here.]

The problem as Girard points out is that both readings don't actually go with the book/story. Satan is not equal to God and must get God's approval to act. This leads us down the road that God takes our parents and our children from us. "God needs them in heaven" we suggest poorly. Or, "God is punishing us", we tell ourselves. This of course is hogwash theology and really bad pastoral and self care!

There is another problem as well. We are tempted to put Job in the part of a character in a Greek tragedy. He was happy, now he suffers. Job was a good and faithful man. Job had friends, family, and wealth. He was looked to as a leader and a man of honor. All of this is lost. In his lostness he must be being punished. The friends who taunt, cajole, and practically celebrate his demise are those who appear to speak for God. What is interesting though...is that in the Greek tragedy the hero who falls quickly understands his place in the drama. He agrees with the voices of the God's. Girard exegetes Oedipus as an example of a Greek character who "quickly agrees with his persecutors."

Job on the other hand does not do this. Job takes the role of living out the psalmist's cries to God. In this way the place of Job and his suffering in the world rejects the notion that God is the one who is making the suffering happen. The psalmist, like Job, defends himself against the "collective" voices and ideas of those who surround him like dogs surround carrion.

What do we have left? Who is this Job? How are we to interpret the texts over the next few weeks? How do we do so with integrity to the tale as a whole steering clear of poor dualistic theology and even worse pastoral approaches to evil?

What the friends mimic an perpetuate is the misinformed notion that religious violence is acceptable. In this way the friends see Job as the scapegoat. He protests his innocence, which is not a lie. Yet his friends offer a theology of violence where God punishes the deserving. But this is not at all what is happening in the story! Not at all.

What the friends do is what people do when they perpetuate mimetic violence in religion, they side with and justify the idea of a violent God. They have a false piety that places them with the lesser mythological gods of violence that demand sacrifice. Girard writes, "

"...The theology of the four friends is nothing but an expression, a little more refined and evolved, of the theology of violence and the sacred. Any sufferer could not suffer except for a good reason in a universe governed by divine justice. He is therefore punished by God, and pious conduct for those surrounding him consists in their conformity with the divine judgment, treating him as guilty and so multiplying further his sufferings. This is indeed the theology of the hidden scapegoat. Every sufferer must finally be guilty because every guilty person ends up by falling into misfortune, and if God delays a little too long in executing his justice, human beings will take it upon themselves to speed up the process. Everything is thus for the best in the best of worlds."

The poor, the migrant, the homeless, the hungry, and the abused (sexually, violently, and psychologically) must in the end deserve what they get. This is how pervasive violence is in the subtext of our religion and how it misinforms the subtext of politics and societal norms. Again, Girard,

"The evil one is cursed by God, and the worst disasters will certainly befall him. And when the friends of Job speak to him, they evoke plague, the sword, fire, flood, famine, and poison (see 20:22-29)."

Why is Job so difficult? Because we in our own time perpetuate mimetic desire, that leads to violence, and scapegoating. In this way our society and culture informs the narrative of Job instead of the other way around. 

But the theology is clear once the enmeshed culture of violence and its hermeneutical lens is removed. In this way we cannot preach this first passage without first removing the lens of religious and cultural violence; and secondly, without reading the whole passage. 

As you do so you will no doubt see at the climax Job is surrounded by his frenemies and begins to echo their own words. Here is the high point of the false God proclaimed, here is the climax of religious violence sanctioned, and here is the worst of prehistoric violent religion. See 19 when Job himself echoes the words of his friends: "Pity me, pity me, you, my friends,for the hand of God has struck me.Why do you hound me down like God, will you never have enough of my flesh?" (19:21-22)

Yet this is when things change radically. As if waking from a dream Job realizes that this theology, his religious understanding of suffering and who God is, is quite different. Here then is the God of the Bible. Here is the God of peace. Here is the God of love. Here what was hidden by our human blindness, our own self orientation, is now seen clearly. Job, as if having his eyes open, rejects the hermeneutic lens of religious violence that his friends have suggested. Job instead sees the situation that he is in as that which is perpetrated by humanity. He sees that his suffering is not condemnation by God but instead a deep theology of shalom. Job sees clearly he has been a pawn all along in the game of religious violence. Here then he takes up this theology over and against those that surround him. Job reveals, what Jesus reveals, and that is that God and God's ways are stumbling block for humanity.

Job says that the people have made him a dung heap, a burning pitch, a burnt offering. (17:6) Job has become, he suggests, their scapegoat. he has become their example. Societal violence, political violence, justifies itself by suggesting the guilt of the innocent. Here is an important precursor to Jesus...is it not? 

Job has been the sacrificial offering to help purify his community, he has been the exemplar of what happens when you do not behave, for surely this man is guilty say his friends. This is of course the opposite of the servant girl's words at the thought of Jesus unjust death, where at the same moment Peter (Jesus' friend) denies him, and should these not be the words of the reader of Job, surely this man was innocent!

Girard picks up Aristotle here and points out that we need, like his friends, for Job to be guilty. There is a lesser god mythology played out in our religious violence when we read the text. That is one of greek katharsis. This of course is not at all what is going on. Yet, so pervasive is our own civil myth and cultural religious and societal violence that we must read see Job as God's victim so that we might live just lives. Job himself points out the truth of his friends' theology, and the truth of our own when he says,

As for you, you are only charlatans,

physicians in your own estimation. (13:4)

And in a passage of closely related meaning he says:

You would even cast lots over the fatherless,

and bargain over your friend. (6:27)

The friends themselves are the ones who perpetuate the myth. Read now again, as for the first time, their words:

Think now, who that was innocent ever perished?

Or where were the upright cut off?

As I have seen, those who plow iniquity

and sow trouble reap the same.

By the breath of God they perish,

and by the blast of his anger they are consumed. (4:7-9)

In this theology, as we have said above, only the wicked suffer. God punishes the wicked and Job must be wicked for he is suffering. This is the lie that unravels the Gospel paradox: in death one gains life, in suffering one is Christ like, in being lost one is found. What becomes ever more clear then as we read our passage for this week and over the next few Sundays, is that Job sees clearly that humanity relishes violent religion. Moreover, the lesser violent gods of society, politics, and religions are not the God he worships. In this way Job suggests (13:7-8) that humans are taking the role of the satan - of the accuser.

Girard is brilliant in framing what happens next. He writes,

"Unable to find a defender among human beings, Job has no choice but to address himself to God. It is there that the Judaic religious genius shows through so brilliantly: Job addresses God against every probability, so it seems, for everyone agrees in saying that God himself punishes him, that God himself puts him on trial. Very often he bends before it, and the appeal that he launches is so contrary to good sense (even he himself thinks) that it sounds almost ridiculous:

Even now, in fact, my witness is in heaven,

and he that vouches for me is on high.

My friends scorn me;

my eye pours out tears to God,

that he would maintain the right of a mortal with God,

as one does for a neighbor. (16:19-21)

Here is what is so beautiful. The God that Job begins to speak about is the God of the victims. This is a God who takes up for the victims. This is the God who heard people crying out in slavery. This is a God who looks for the lost. This is a God who cares about the widow and the orphan. This is a God who is interested, very interested, in the victims of political, social, and religious violence. This is a God who weeps at the religious sacrifice of Abel by Cain who is jealous. It is the same God who rejects the religious sacrifice of Isaac.

Ahhhh...and here enters the Incarnation. Here enters the Christ! Job suggests that if God could be go'el (19:25), the redeemer, the defender of the oppressed, the advocate, then this god would be truly the messianic God.

I, like Girard, recognize conflicting material here. It is the same in the story of Isaac and elsewhere. Girard generously says, "the text hesitates." It is, Girard, suggests the Holy Spirit, that supports Job in this moment over and against his friends who so clearly want to see this as religious violence. It is the living word I believe that bolsters Job in this moment.

Girard points out that the traditional read deals with theodicy where in bad things happen to good people and the problem of evil in the world. But this is nothing more than repeated the ancient theology of the victimizing religion of Job's friends. Evil that is done by humanity is very present and to project that into the divine is to repeat the victimization and scapegoating of that old time religion. Girard puts it this way, "The evils due to human agency are the most terrible and must engage our attention more than the evils produced by nature." This becomes ever clearer when we put the hermeneutic of the gospel over this story. Think of Jesus speaking about the accidental collapse of the tower and how this is not divine action at all. (Luke's Gospel chapter 13) Jesus clarifies and puts an end to the theology that perpetuates that the good things and bad things that happen out of circumstance and context, by weather, by storm, by accident are some how divinely ordained. Here then is the affirmation of the Gospel lens attached to Job.

No, the true evils suffered by Job are those that come from his fellow brothers and sisters.

Girard has a great metaphor for the theology of the friends: tourist theology. They inhabit a metaphysics of those who think life is a deluxe voyage. Girard writes:

"To pose the question of evil as though evil were in every case a matter of one problem, that is, anything that affects my own precious self, making it suffer, or simply irritating me, is not to pose the question of Job. This self-concern is rather what I would call the metaphysics of the tourist, who conceives that his or her presence in this world is essentially like a deluxe voyage. He or she happily admires the lovely terrains and sunsets, is moved by the monuments left by past civilizations. He or she deplores modern ugliness and complains of the general insipidness, because now everything resembles everything else and there are no more differences. He or she becomes noisily indignant about the poverty encountered, is perpetually engaged in head-shaking, like Job's friends. But above all this tourist complains about the organization of the voyage and is going to transmit a complaint to the management. He or she is always ready to return his or her ticket, and the expression "return one's ticket" is typical of those who travel for their own pleasure or who go to a spectacle. This mentality of the frustrated tourist produces vehement curses concerning what is called the problem of evil. If God exists, how can he tolerate the evil present in the world? If God exists, he can be only the supercop, and in his mode of being as supercop he could at least protect us against the many disagreeable incidents of our passage through the world."

There is one response to this which says, "Yes, but what about death. No one escapes the grave." But the Gospel again comes to the Job's of this world with help. Christ is the conqueror of this death. Christ put the end to human sacrifice. Christ put an end to needing to adhere to religious scapegoating. Christ put an end to the violence of humankind (in word and deed) that works on behalf of powers and authorities. When we go down to the grave, making our claim, "hallelujah, hallelujah, death meets there not our fallen selves but the Christ of the cross, death, and resurrection.

Not even our sibling rivalry of mimetic desire can possibly keep us from an eternity spent in the grave.

What I am saying here, and I find myself in deep agreement with Girard, is that we must read the book of Job not as a text that in itself is self referential. To do so is just another humanism that pulls from the text the Gospel and incarnation that is present within the story. No, we are to read with the eyes of the Gospel of Resurrection and Jesus.  Girard concludes his essay/chapter on Job with these words, "In the world where the vicious cycle that imprisoned Job is opened up, everything becomes allusion to the Resurrection!"

Turning to Job's Text this week

In today's passage we have the story's context set up for us. Job is from the land of Uz. He was blameless and upright. He was faithful and turned away evil.

Where is evil from? Evil is from humanity and has been dwelling in the midst of humanity. It is not an equal power God or even a creature of God. 

We then see in our passage that old time religion where God punishes humanity. That religion tells people that God allows Satan to test people through natural illness, plague, collapsing towers, and even human towers. This God becomes a sinister being and the preacher who undertakes this preaching must lean on the above and proclaim the Gospel that redacts this teaching. 

This is a difficult passage for you must redact the words of Job. Our lectionary does you no favors. And, to let Job's words echo in the ears of our people is to do perpetual religious damage. God does not give some evil and some bad; and, certainly not to test people. 

What you can do is speak to the fact that Job denies the idea that God should be cursed for the evil in this world - the corrupted human desire that uses violence for the gaining of powers. God is not to be cursed for human perpetuated evil and religious sacrifice. God is not to be cursed for our human love to devour each other, or enact the great sacrifice of Isaac. No, that is humanity's work. God is not to be cursed at all but instead praised for not allowing evil, violence, victimization, scapegoating, and even death to have the last word. 

No God in Christ Jesus becomes a fellow victim of human evil. The Christ becomes a scapegoat. Christ even joins us in the grave. Moreover, Christ suffers all at the hands of humanity's search for stable power and religion. Christ suffers all by the hand of human violence that seeks to quiet the truth of God's love. 

As we turn to Job 23:1-9, 16-17 we have skipped over a ton of material! Again, another disservice by our lectionary. It is difficult to take all of it in. But, I do think you have to say something. I don't think this passage stands alone very well. It certainly doesn't make much sense without a few brief comments about the chapter just before. So, let us start there.

Job's frenemies, Eliphaz the Temanite,  have challenged Job saying, "Do you really think that God has use of mortal creatures?" Of course, we know that God has created human beings as partners and invited us to be about the work of creating with God a garden social imaginary. God has invited us to be partners in building community. And, God is interested in having us in the midst of the creation so we can walk with God in this place. So, while oftentimes preachers use the friends as teachers of theology we need to be careful and this is true right off from the beginning.

Job's friends then twist their argument and make it about God's desire that we be "righteous". Which means to fulfill God's purpose for us. But this is not really what they are arguing. Eliphaz the Temanite is trying to make the case that it doesn't matter to God if we reject the mimetic sibling rivalry of the world and that it doesn't matter to God if we continue to perpetuate evil and brokenness in the world around us.

Then, though Job himself is blameless and has been living the life God imagines, out of desire and jealousy his friends suggest that Job is wicked after all. Then they make God out to be a God who desires human sacrifice for wickedness. "It is God that is sending this terrible time upon you", they quip. They even use scripture against Job to show that God is punishing him for untold inequities - which we know from the very beginning of our tale Job has not once committed. So it is that Job's frenemies suggest that he should curse God and be done with it.

Job then answers their twisted theology. Job is suffering and he wishes to go to God. He wants to know, "Is God with me in this suffering?" Job asks what so many people who are victims say, "Where is God?"

Then we skip several verses. The problem here is that if we skip these verses we are apt to let the people believe that Job has not been good and deserves this punishment. Therefore, talk about the missing verses! What they tell us is that Job has been faithful, he has followed God's ways to the very best of his abilities, he has spoken of God's goodness and love with his lips, and he has treasured God's story in his heart. And, like Moses Job tells us he has the fear of God within him.

And, out of his pain and suffering, he wishes that this would pass. This is how the passage ends. Job is in so much pain and suffering he just wants it to be over.

God hears such suffering. Remember, THE NARRATIVE people! God hears his people cry out. God desires healing, mercy, and forgiveness for all those who suffer. God on his cross is present with those who suffer.

This is a marvelous passage to preach the Gospel! So preach it. Do not let bad theology or Job's friends have the last word.

All Saints C - November 1, 2022 or moved to celebrate on November 6, 2022

Many Congregations Will Transfer All Saints to Sunday this Week; So here is your bonus Hitchhiking for All Saints

A Good Passage to Begin With:
Ecclesiasticus 44:1-10,13-14

44Let us now sing the praises of famous men,
our ancestors in their generations.
2 The Lord apportioned to them* great glory,
his majesty from the beginning.
3 There were those who ruled in their kingdoms,
and made a name for themselves by their valor;
those who gave counsel because they were intelligent;
those who spoke in prophetic oracles;
4 those who led the people by their counsels
and by their knowledge of the people’s lore;
they were wise in their words of instruction;
5 those who composed musical tunes,
or put verses in writing;
6 rich men endowed with resources,
living peacefully in their homes—
7 all these were honoured in their generations,
and were the pride of their times.
8 Some of them have left behind a name,
so that others declare their praise.
9 But of others there is no memory;
they have perished as though they had never existed;
they have become as though they had never been born,
they and their children after them.
10 But these also were godly men,
whose righteous deeds have not been forgotten;
13 Their offspring will continue for ever,
and their glory will never be blotted out.
14 Their bodies are buried in peace,
but their name lives on generation after generation.

Quotes That Make Me Think

"Saints are "holy ones" (Greek: hagioi), the 'blessed of God' (Greek:makarioi: Luke 6:20-22). But who are they really?"

Commentary, Luke 6:20-31, David Tiede, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2010.

"This is a great text to preach as a high calling to the character of Christian community. Preaching it as pre-conditions for being resurrected - that would be a mistake. Preaching it as a calling to live as those who have been raised from the dead - that would be a blessing."

Holy Textures, Understanding the Bible in its own time and in ours, Luke 6:20-31, David Ewart, 2010.

General Resources for Sunday's Lessons from Textweek.com

Prayer

As one poor in spirit and gentle of heart, your Son, O God, came to live among us, that we might hear the charter of your kingdom and see those words made flesh in the mercy and peace with which he faced insult and persecution.  As we celebrate the witness of all the saints whose lives were shaped by the Beatitudes form us according to Christ's teaching and their example, that, having shared in the communion of the saints on earth, we might take our place among them in the joy of your kingdom. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God forever and ever. Amen.

From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year C, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Luke 6:20-31

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

Resources for Sunday's Gospel

I don't normally do this, but this week I want to do a bit of comparison between the synoptic Beatitudes in Matthew and Luke. Let me begin with a bit about Matthew's version:

As we look at Jesus’ ministry, it is important to see that there is a framework at work in Matthew. One that is out of sync with our current reading cycle of Luke so is aware of shifting gears as you take on the All Saints' Day lessons. In these first chapters of the Gospel of Matthew we see that the individuals who come in contact with Jesus do not have to do anything, Jesus is not teaching about discipleship, he is not charging them to reform the religion of the time, and he is simply giving of himself. He is intentionally offering himself to those around him. The people in the first chapters of Matthew and in the Sermon on the Mount receive Jesus; this is the primary action taking place between those following and the Messiah himself.

Jesus is giving of himself to others.

The Sermon On the Mount begins in Chapter 4.25 and the introduction runs through 5.1. We are given the scenery, which is the mountain beyond the Jordan (previous verse). This continues to develop an Exodus typology which is the foundation of Matthew’s interpretive themes in these early chapters. It follows clearly when one thinks of the passages leading up to this moment: the flight from Egypt, baptism and now the Sermon on the Mount. In Matthew’s Gospel the first five chapters parallel the Exodus story. So, Jesus now arrives at the mountain where the law was given.

The structure of the following verses are beautiful and I offer them here so you can see how they play themselves out in a literary fashion (5.3-5.10).

5.3 Inclusive Voice: Theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.
5.10 Inclusive Voice: Theirs is the kingdom of heaven
5.4 Divine Passive Voice: They shall be comforted
5.9 Divine Passive Voice: They shall be called sons of God
5.5 Future Active Voice with Object: They shall inherit the earth
5.8 Future Middle Voice with Object: They shall see God
5.6 Divine Passive Voice: They shall be satisfied
5.7 Divine Passive Voice: They shall have mercy

Matthew uses these formulas and structures throughout the Gospel.

Scholars tell us that the classical Greek translation illustrates the pains that Matthew took as he rewrote Luke’s and Q’s Beatitudes to create the parallels we see. He also writes so carefully that when he is finished, there are exactly 36 words in each section of the Beatitudes (5.3-5.6 and 5.7-510). This combined with the parallels highlights the two sections that must have been meaningful to the church at Antioch (comprised of those who have fled persecution).

5.3ff describes the persecuted state of the followers of Jesus
5.7ff describes the ethical qualities of the followers of Jesus that will lead to persecution

The Beatitudes are blessings, not requirements. The teachings, therefore, are words of grace. In the initial teachings of Jesus’ ministry, healing comes before imperative statements, here Jesus preaches that grace comes before requirements and commandments. This is perennial Christian teaching: one must receive first before service.

The difficulties required of followers of Jesus presuppose God’s mercy and prior saving activity.

The Beatitudes are clear that the kingdom of God brings comfort, a permanent inheritance, true satisfaction and mercy, a vision of God and divine sonship. This may be Matthew’s most important foundation stone within the salvation story. We are given, through grace, our freedom to follow. We are like the Israelites and sons and daughters of Abraham, delivered so we may follow and work on behalf of God.

The Beatitudes also are prophetic as in the passage from Isaiah 61.1. Jesus is clearly the anointed one. Jesus is the fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecy from Isaiah, bringing Good News to those in need. Furthermore, the words of Jesus are the result of the prophecy and so they set him apart from all other teachers.

The beatitudes then are also words which not only promise Grace to the follower, they fulfill the prophetic words of the old message from Isaiah: Jesus was meek (11.29; 21.5), Jesus mourned (26.36-46), Jesus was righteous and fulfilled all righteousness (3.15; 27.4, 19), Jesus showed mercy (9.27; 15.22; 17.15; 20.30-1), Jesus was persecuted and reproached (26-7). The beatitudes are illustrated and brought to life in Jesus’ ministry, they are signs that he stands in a long line of prophets offering comfort to God’s people, and he is also clearly the suffering servant who epitomizes the beatitudes themselves. Origen wrote that Jesus is offering this grace he fulfills and embodies his own words and thereby becomes the model to be imitated.

The Beatitudes are words of proclamation. Are we in a place where we can articulate Jesus’ story and life as a fulfillment of God’s promises to his people?

The Beatitudes are words of mercy. Are we in a place where we can hear Jesus’ words for us? Have we allowed ourselves to be saved before we begin to work on Jesus’ behalf?

The Beatitudes are words of care for the poor. Are we in a place where we can hear Jesus’ special concern for those who are oppressed in the system of life? Are we ready to follow him into the world to deliver his people imitating the work of Moses and Jesus?

So let us turn to Luke now and see what the Gospel offers:  Luke’s version of the Beatitudes is quite different. While clearly laying out the boundaries of those who belong within the reign of God Jesus then turns to charge those who follow in the working of God’s will in their lives and in their discipleship.

Love your enemies
Do good to those who hate you
Bless those who curse you
Pray for those who abuse you

If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt

Give to everyone who begs from you if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again

Do to others as you would have them do to you.

These are the standards of our lives in Jesus Christ. Many of us pray for God’s will in our lives, here it is.

Luke Timothy Johnson says, “Ultimately, of course, Luke grounds this morality in the covenantal attitudes and actions of God. As God is kind toward all creatures, even those who are not themselves kind, even wicked, so are these disciples to be. The reward is itself the reality of being of God toward the world.” (LTJ, Luke, 112)

We blessed in so many ways. One of those ways is the unequivocal invitation to be members of God’s creation and inheritors of his reign. This is our baptismal promise. We cannot read this without Matthew’s own story of it residing deep within the ancient history of the Israelites planted firmly within our current mission context. We are also blessed because God does not simply invite us but beckons us to join him in the garden as partners in the stewardship of his reign. You and I receive the blessing of God for the purpose of blessing the world through our mission and ministry.

Some Thoughts on Ephesians 1:11-23

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text

Resources for Sunday's Epistle

Our passage is a kind of blessing or beginning for the whole text; within it is a brief summary of Ephesians.  Many scholarly articles and texts spend a great deal of time using this blessing section as a tool for touching on the themes of the letter.  Our context though is in the midst of the celebration of All Saints and it is to that particular message that I think we should try and listen as we prepare for preaching.

The first piece of the passage is not news to those who read a great deal of Paul.  Paul is clear our inheritance (Jew or Greek) is always obtained by and through the work of God.  Moreover, the purpose of our receiving such an inheritance is the praise and glory of God.

20God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, 21far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. 22And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things

God's grace is abundant and always comes first and it is our response then that marks us outwardly as Christ's own, even though that claim is assured only by the work of Jesus and the Holy Spirit.  We were "marked" and "sealed"; words that echo even today in our baptismal liturgies.

Even now, Paul reminds us, we are being redeemed.  Such a faith is what Paul speaks to in verse 15:  "I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints..."  - the mark of the outward claim God has on our hearts.  Love for others is key to our ministry and our mission; it is the mark by which we are known as Christ's own forever.

Paul then urges that the church in Ephesus is filled with this Holy Spirit and that the "eyes of your heart" be enlightened so that they may see clearly what is God's hope.  This hope is nothing less than a) that all creation praises God; b) that all people are drawn to God for this purpose.  This is the richness of the witness born by the saints who believe and have lived and are living accordingly.

Paul believed that a Christian, a follower of Jesus, would live such a life that others in witnessing the living out of faith would then turn to God and receive salvation.  He is very clear that people don't save other people, nor do they save themselves.  This is once and always God's work.  Nevertheless, the Christian who lives out the saintly life is one who lives life for God's glory so that they might join the rag tag group and be saved by God themselves. (I Cor 7.16; I Cor 10:31-33)

God is even now saving us.  Paul's invitation is to live a saintly life by acting as a people who are saved and that such action is marked by a love of neighbor just as the love of God is the saving power.

Proper 26C / Pentecost +21 October 30, 2022

Prayer

In our delight we welcome Jesus Christ as guest at our house and in the home of our hearts. Count us among the children of the covenant, among those sinners who were found when Jesus came to seek out and save those sheep that were lost. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever. Amen.

From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year C, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Quotes That Make Me Think

"Zaccheus, they're all of them peculiar as Hell, to put it quite literally, and yet you can't help feeling that, like Zaccheus, they're all of them somehow treasured too."

"Zaccheus," sermon discussion from Frederick Buechner, Frederick Buechner Blog.

"What a strange mixture of passions must Zaccheus have now felt, hearing one speak, as knowing both his name and his heart!"

From Wesley's Notes. John Wesley (1703-1791).

"Maybe justice is our way of tracking each other, our way of defining each other, of keeping count, of keeping score, of following who's in and who's out, who's up and who's down. If this is so, if God's love regularly trumps God's justice ? and I believe Jesus dies precisely to show us that it is ? then we're operating with flawed categories."

"Zacchaeus and the Reformation," David Lose, Dear Working Preacher, 2010.

General Resources for Sunday's Lessons from Textweek.com

Some Thoughts on Luke 19:1-10

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

Resources for Sunday's Gospel

As you probably know the story of Zacchaeus is only found in Luke’s Gospel. Zacchaeus was a chief tax-agent. He was wealthy, not unlike the wealthy man in the Lazarus parable and the wealthy young man from 18.18. So we are see that Luke has crafted a story which is linked through geography and theme.

Zacchaeus climbs up into the tree trying to see Jesus. He wants to see and know who Jesus is. Previously the blind man (18.38), who could not see, indeed recognizes and knows who Jesus is – the Son of David. The blind see the Messiah; they are healed and follow Jesus. So you and I are meant to pause here, only sentences away, and wonder if Zacchaeus, who can see but is blind to who Jesus is, will gain his sight as well. Will his faith make him well?

Jesus, who is seeking the blind and lost, stops under the sycamore tree and tells Zacchaeus that he is coming to his home. Jesus has come and wishes to “remain,” to dwell with Zacchaeus. This is his opportunity to see who Jesus is. This is the moment when Zacchaeus will have the opportunity to welcome the living word of God into his house, and the home of his heart.

The crowd grumbles. They are upset because Zacchaeus is clearly a sinner and a tax collector. Tax collectors are of course beloved by the minority for whom they work and generally despised by the majority from whom they take the tax. In those days the tax collector collected some seven layers of taxes from the day laborer. They also collected from the overall total some money for themselves upon which to live.

But Zacchaeus is not an ordinary tax collector. He has climbed up into this tree because he has already seen and known that amendment of life is essential in the reign of God. He tells Jesus that he has already been giving away half of his possessions to the poor. And if he has cheated someone he is already making restitution. He is fulfilling the law from Exodus 22.1. Zacchaeus has faith. He is being made well before he ever meets Jesus.

Salvation happens because Zacchaeus is living the life foretold in the Lazarus parable. He is a wealthy person but is making a difference in the lives of others.

This is not simply a moral tale though. It is a story of the reign of God coming and making inroads throughout the community. We are clear in the teachings over the past weeks that piety alone does not mean that individuals will: a) welcome the Lord b) change their lives c) live out through action the will of God. Many will be saved, many will glorify God and many will welcome the Gospel of Jesus, the Living Word into the home of their hearts.

We end our parable today knowing the answer to the question from 18.26: Who then can be saved? A blind beggar and a rich tax collector can be saved.

For you and I, we must ask ourselves the perennial Lukan question: Are we faithful but not acting? Jesus seeks us out hoping to find us living out our faith in the world with him through the changing of people’s lives as in the story of Zacchaeus; or proclaiming and glorifying God as in the story of the blind man, which precedes today’s pericope.

There is that wonderful story of the man who stood up just before the offertory at Christ Church and proclaimed: I am Jesus. The Dean turned to the clergy on his right and said, “What should we do?” The answer: “Look busy.”

Jesus challenges us in Luke’s Gospel to see the Living Word of God, the Son of Man, in the person of Jesus, and to not only look busy but be busy in the kingdom work to which we have been invited.

Some Thoughts on 2 Thessalonians 2:1-17

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text

Recently a friend told me that they are not worried about the end of the world because the bible says it won't happen until Damascus falls. (Isaiah 17)  A week later a woman told me her son-in-law believed we were in the midst of the end of the world...so I told her that the bible says that Damascus must fall before that happens.  She was comforted and it enabled us to talk more about what was really troubling her.  I tell you this story only because concern over the end times is not something new by any stretch, and perhaps is only more prominent because of the many start-up churches and internet sights willing to talk about it, the successful series of books entitled "Left Behind", and our culture's fascination with post-apocalyptic movies!

One of the key theological issues Paul is dealing with is the idea that the end is here.  He instead begins:  As to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we beg you, brothers and sisters, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as though from us to the effect that the day of the Lord is already here."

Paul is aware that there are people spreading such news and with it panic.  He offers to them examples of signs that must occur but have not yet occurred.  Paul is clear that the "lawless" one is not yet among us and therefore that we should not be concerned with such things but rather redouble our efforts in other areas.

Paul reminds the people of the Ephesian church that God has already chosen them, that God is even now blessing them and revealing himself to them.  That God calls and invites participation in the good news so that they might in the end participate in the heavenly kingdom.  Their work is to stand firm in their faith and their traditions. They are to remember, concerning these things especially, what Paul and others have taught.  They are to be about the work of spreading the gospel.  

They are to be comforted and strengthened in their work by the very words of God which offer hope for them - even in an age of anxiety.

This passage works well with the Gospel of Luke passage in that both are about living in response to God's good news.  People who follow Christ are to be concerned with life and the living of it as examples of Christ's love. Their actions are to glorify God.  They are not to idle away the days and years concerned about events that they cannot possibly know the hour or day upon which the Lord will return.  This is in simple fact not the business of the church; the mission of the church is reconciliation in our time through a ministry that always and everywhere reveals God's mercy, love, and forgiveness.

Some Thoughts on Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text

Things are not looking good. Habbakkuk does not bring good news. When things were going well and the people were threatened from outside oftentimes the prophets preached against the enemy that was out there. However, Habbakkuk turns his attention to the people themselves. Today's lesson is a conversation - a talk hearkening to Abraham and God. 

What is happening in the context is that the northern kingdom is being ravaged by Babylon and the folks in the south where Jerusalem lay are wondering if they will be next. Habakkuk says yes. 

First, Habakkuk pleads with God to do something. "The people are being wrecked by the outliers. Surely you care God," he might have said.

God replies that because of their unfaithfulness, God is not going to stay his hand. In fact God believes they have brought all this on themselves. Habbakkuk is like, "What?" "Wait, are you not our God?"

Habakkuk waits for God's reply. Hoping to send good news! God is pretty straight and says, "Habakkuk, I will take care at the appointed time, you will have to wait." Then God reminds Habakkuk that the proud do not last very long, they think they are self-sufficient, but they are not, they do not endure.

The righteous, even in this mess, will endure. Those who keep the faith remember God's love and care for each other, and they continue to live even in difficult times. In part, God suggests, they do so because they know God is their God, and that these enemies are but fleeting in their own way. What Habakkuk learns is that the faithful will be rewarded always while those who seek their own ways and selves will struggle even in the end.

Some Thoughts on Isaiah 1:10-18

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text

"With its stunning poetry, inspiring call for justice, and complex portrayal of God, Isaiah 1 is one of the most memorable chapters of biblical prophetic literature."

Commentary, Isaiah 1:1, 10-20, Blake Couey, Pentecost 12C Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2016

 

So, let us find our place. We are at the beginning of Isaiah, and it is rarely read and given as an opportunity for preaching. In fact, this is track 2 of our offerings this week, so it is more likely you will have Habakkuk before you - also a rarity. In these first chapters, Isaiah is rehearsing the historic relationship between God and God's people. He is offering a vision of the present situation which is not looking good and will be prophesying judgment and justice because the people have forgotten God and lost their way, they no longer care for the poor and the orphans. They have forgotten their covenant with God and so, God is not going to stay God's hand. 

If you hadn't figured out we are headed toward the end of the preaching year!

We will get to the hopeful Isaiah much later, but that is not the first Isaiah (as the author is often called). 

People aren't worshiping God and others is no sincerity or truth. The rulers are focused on themselves. They no longer reflect God's beauty and love, but instead are repugnant and an abomination. So, God is turning away. God is no longer going to listen. 

The people have an opportunity along with their rulers to change their ways and be willing participants in the life of God and be obedient to their agreements. They must stop refusing the prophetic words that offer guidance and must become obedient to God. No longer will it be enough to proper materially but the people must seek deep wisdom, prayer, and spiritual depth. Or, God through the prophet promises their demise. 

What is really powerful here is the notion that our actions have reactions, and our faithfulness or lack thereof has actions. I don't believe that God is going to smash us down. However, nations and people without charity, without generosity, and without consideration of others will bring down upon themselves. We actually do get the world we live in, our faithfulness to a loving God who wishes us to remember the widows and orphans creates a different world. 

I guess sometimes, it begins with us. If we chose to be a different society where everyone gets as much as they can, people win if they die with the most toys, and the world should bow before our might, then we may be creating an unrighteous community has been forgotten. The God we worship invites us to feed the hungry, visit the prisoner, heal those who need healing, welcome the stranger, house the unhoused, and treat each other with dignity, loving each other as family members. When we abandon these things I am pretty sure the modern-day powers will come knocking on our doors too.

Proper 25C / Ordinary 30C / Pentecost +20 October 23, 2022

Prayer

Silence our prayer when our words praise ourselves. Turn your ears from our cry when our hearts judge our neighbor. Place always on our lips the prayer of the publican: “O God, be merciful to us who are sinners.” We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God forever and ever. Amen.

From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year C, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Luke 18:9-14

"This parable is therefore preached well only to the degree that each time we try to interpret it we find ourselves, yet again, with nothing to claim but our dependence on God's mercy."

Commentary, Luke 18:9-14, David Lose, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2010.

"Far from condemning all Pharisees, Jesus is using one as an example of virtue not yet transformed by the love of God."

"Who Are You Talking About, Jesus?" Blogging toward Sunday, Stan Wilson, Theolog: The Blog of The Christian Century, 2007.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

People love to make fun of the righteous. While the TV show The Righteous Gemstones is certainly not for everyone, it is an interesting portrayal of the modern-day parable that Jesus is teaching.  

So this week’s lesson is the second parable of the set, the first one being about the woman and the unjust judge.

After comparing the religion of the day to an unjust judge, he now speaks to those same religious leaders who think very highly of themselves. They consider themselves to be the “righteous” ones. So, now we know Jesus is talking to…us.

Yes, we like the “righteous” ones are very eager to point out how all the others just don’t have it quite right. This, in fact, is one of the church’s greatest sins. We know that whoever the other is doesn’t have it right. We scorn them, we hold them in contempt, and we do actually reject them. Sometimes we do this outright by saying, “our way or the highway.” Sometimes we do this by showing out the “other” is wrong in their theological ideas – after all, we are all so very certain. Sometimes we reject them by pretending “they” don’t want to be a part of our group. We do this all the time.

And, quite frankly we are sure glad we aren’t like them. In fact, we will even engage in some small piece of humility, then go right back to our old ways. We are all for confession and forgiveness and then we are right back at the “righteous” acting again.

So, Jesus has our number. He had our number in the story about the rich man and Lazarus. He had our number with the lepers who did not return to give thanks. Jesus has our number with these “righteous” ones. I hate that!

Jesus tells us that our spiritual discipline is to be modeled on the sinner. Hmmmmm. Whenever Jesus goes down this road I believe we all get a little nervous. He tells us that the sinner stood far away. He kept his eyes lowered. He made a sign of repentance. And, he cried out for mercy. This is our work. Over and over and over again.

I don’t know why this has come into my memory but I remembered as I studied and prayed over this passage the prayer from the movie the Hunch Back of Notre Dame by Disney. (That’s right I am about to quote Disney!) Esmeralda is in the Cathedral and here is her prayer:

God Help the Outcasts
Vocals: Esmeralda (Heidi Mollenhauer) and Chorus
Music: Alan Menken
Lyrics: Stephen Schwartz

Esmeralda
I don't know if You can hear me

Or if You're even there

I don't know if You would listen

To a gypsy's prayer
Yes, I know I'm just an outcast
I shouldn't speak to you
Still I see Your face and wonder
Were You once an outcast too?
God help the outcasts
Hungry from birth
Show them the mercy
They don't find on earth
God help my people
We look to You still
God help the outcasts
Or nobody will

Parishioners
I ask for wealth
I ask for fame
I ask for glory to shine on my name
I ask for love I can possess
I ask for God and His angels to bless me

Esmeralda

I ask for nothing
I can get by
But I know so many
Less lucky than I
Please help my people
The poor and downtrod
I thought we all were
The children of God
God help the outcasts
Children of God

This song and prayer from Esmeralda and the Parishioners shows a similar contrast.

The reality is that how we pray reveals who we are. Interesting perhaps to make the observation that the writers of the song perceive the church to be this way and what does that mean as we sit in our parishes on Sunday morning. Are our prayers and lives as Christians as private as we think? How many people see us day in and day, know us as Christians, and wonder about our relationship with God?

I also like the words from Luke Timothy Johnson on this passage:

The parable itself is one that invites internalization by every reader because it speaks to something deep within the heart of every human. The love of God can so easily turn into an idolatrous self-love; the gift can so quickly be seized as a possession; what comes from another can so blithely be turned into self-accomplishment. Prayer can be transformed into boasting. Piety is not an unambiguous posture…The parables together do more than remind us that prayer is a theme in Luke-Acts; they show us why prayers is a theme. For Luke, prayer is faith in action. Prayer is not an optional exercise in piety, carried out to demonstrate one’s relationship with God. It is that relationship with god. The way one prays therefore reveals that relationship. (LTJ, Luke, 274)

We are challenged last week and this week to take our temperature and ask how is our relationship with God? What kind of relationship with God is revealed by our prayer? What kind of faith do I exhibit to God and to the world through my prayer?

We need to remember that this series of lessons from Luke began with Jesus revealing the work that the disciples must do. Then the disciples respond with a question about how we will have the faith to do it. While there are intermittent questions by the religious leaders, it is clear that Jesus intends his followers to be considerably different than the religion of his day...and our own.

Now, the brain twister for me is this: what if Jesus is also inviting the Righteous Gemstones to be righteous too? How would be preach that?

Some Thoughts on 2 Timothy 4:6-18

"Paul is an inspiration, a mirror in which to see one's own experience, a challenge to stay on course to the end and somehow also to find the peace that comes from simply pouring oneself out without breaking oneself down by feeling one has always to be successful and hold everything together."
First Thoughts on Year C Epistle Passages in the Lectionary," Pentecost 23, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.


"Payback -- it's one of the dominant themes in art and narrative."
Commentary, 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18, Matt Skinner, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2013.


"What we have here recorded is Paul's own farewell discourse."
Commentary, 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18, Pentecost 22C, Dirk G. Lange, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2010.

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text

We come to the end of our series on 2 Timothy this week. 

The author reveals that his time is limited and that they are going to have to continue their ministry without his guidance. He encourages them to fight the good fight, run the race well, keep the faith, and rest upon the promises of Christ to deliver them. 

Not unlike the previous chapters of this letter the author encourages the community to be steadfast in the faith that they have received and not to be tempted to follow others. And, always (as the author has done) to rely on God and God's grace. 

The letter, whose author is unknown, remains a very personal letter and one that deeply taps into the continuous struggle of any community to remain resolute in their faith.

Some Thoughts on Joel 2:23-32

"The prophet Joel writes in response to an ecological disaster, a plague of locusts that exceeded their regular breeding and feeding cycles."

Commentary, Joel 2:23-32, Pentecost 22C, Wil Gafney, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2010.

"Were anyone to quiz congregants filing in to worship about the content of the little book of Joel, chances are good that few could cogently respond."
Commentary, Joel 2:23-32, Walter C. Bouzard, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2016.

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text

The prophet Joel is believed, by most scholars, to have written after Jeremiah and following the return of the people from their Babylonian captivity. The prophet throughout the text longs for the return to a Temple oriented faith, and that the people be faithful to God and respond to God's invitation into relationship. Of course, the people are not particularly faithful and the book describes a particularly devastating plague, drought, and locusts. This is all reminiscent of Egypt.

God though reminds them that he will deliver them. God will pour down rain and there will be a great deal of wheat and grain and wine and oil. God will offer them deliverance from the destruction of the famine they have suffered under these past years. The prophet Joel writes:

[God] has poured down for you abundant rain, the early and the later rain, as before. The threshing floors shall be full of grain, the vats shall overflow with wine and oil. 25I will repay you for the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent against you. You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people shall never again be put to shame. You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I, the Lord, am your God and there is no other. And my people shall never again be put to shame.

Not unlike the formula of the deliverance from Egypt: God acts, you know God's mercy, you shall respond with faithfulness, the theme is repeated here. God will deliver and they will by their deliverance know that God is in their midst and God is present with them and will watch over them.

God then promises that he will pour out his spirit upon everyone - even the gentiles: 

Then afterward I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Even on the male and female slaves, in those days, I will pour out my spirit. I will show portents in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes. Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the Lord has said, and among the survivors shall be those whom the Lord calls.

 Joel's prophecy echoes the deliverance of Israel, it repeats themes of Godly deliverance and providence. It reminds the people that they are beloved and that God hears their cry and acts on their behalf.