Easter Sunday, Year A, April 9, 2023

Quotes That Make Me Think

Easter's First Light at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre

"We should not see the event as proving resurrection as a belief, since that would have been widespread. It was more that this Jesus had been raised, had been raised first of all, and, as follows later in the chapter, has a role to exercise and a commission to give. That commission, in turn, directs attention to the ministry and teaching of Jesus as the good news."

"First Thoughts on Year A Gospel Passages in the Lectionary: Easter Sunday,"William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

"It is only fitting that just as the tomb will not contain Jesus, neither can Mark's story. Jesus is not bound by its ending; he continues into the future God has in store for the creation."
Commentary, Rolf Jacobson, Matthew 28:1-10, Easter A, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

General Resources for Sunday's Lessons from Textweek.com

Prayer
(From wikipedia: "The Paschal homily or sermon (also known in Greek as Hieratikon or as the Catechetical Homily) of St John Chrysostom (d. 407 CE) is read aloud on the morning of Pascha (a.k.a. "Easter" in the West), called "the Great and Holy Pascha of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ" in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Eastern Catholic Churches of the Byzantine rite. According to theTradition of the Church, no one sits during the reading of the Paschal homily. Portions of it are often done with the interactive participation of the congregation.)

Are you God's friend and lover?
rejoice in this glorious feast of feasts!
Are you God's servant, knowing God's wishes?
be glad with your Master, share his rejoicing!
Are you worn down with the labor of fasting?
now is your payday!

Have you been working since early morning?
you will be paid fair and square.
Have you been here since the third hour?
you can be thankful, you will be pleased.
If you came at the sixth hour,
come up without fear, you will lose nothing.
Did you linger till the ninth hour?
come forward without hesitation.
Even if you came at the eleventh hour?
have no fear; it is not too late.

God is a generous employer,
treating the last to come as he treats the first arrival.
God gives to the one and gives to the other:
honours the deed and praises the intention.

Join, then, all of you, join in our Master's rejoicing.
You who were the first to come, you who came after,
come now and collect your wages.
Rich and poor, sing and dance together.
You that are hard on yourselves, you that are easy,
celebrate this day.
You that have fasted and you that have not,
make merry today.

 The meal is ready: come and enjoy it.

The calf is a fat one: you will not go away hungry.

There's hospitality for all, and to spare. No more

apologizing for your poverty:

the kingdom belongs to us all.

No more bewailing your failings:

forgiveness has come from the grave.

No more fears of your dying:

the death of our Savior has freed us from fear.

Death played the Master: but he has mastered death

Isaiah knew this would happen, and he cried:

"Death was angered when it met you in the pit."

It was angered, for it was defeated.

It was angered, for it was mocked.

It was angered, for it was abolished.

It was angered, for it was overthrown.

It was angered, for it was bound in chains.

Death swallowed a body, and met God face to face.

It took earth and encountered heaven.

It took what is seen and fell upon the unseen.

O Death, where is your sting?

O Grave, where is your victory?

Christ is risen and you are overthrown.

Christ is risen and evil has fallen.

Christ is risen and the angels rejoice.

Christ is risen and life reigns.

Christ is risen and not one dead remains in the tomb.

Christ is risen indeed from the dead,

the first of all who had fallen asleep.

Glory and power to him for ever and ever!

Some Thoughts on Matthew 28:1-10

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

Resources for Sunday's Gospel

Mary Magdalene and the "other Mary" are the principle actors throughout Matthew's Gospel. They arrive at early dawn.  He omits their purpose being the anointing ritual because as we might remember this was done in chapter 26. (Daniel Harrington, Matthew, Sacra Pagina, 409)  Earthquake as sign and motif runs throughout this particular gospel as a foreshadowing of apocalyptic events.  While Mark's Gospel leaves the disciples with the question, "Who will roll away the stone?" as a moniker for the work of Gospel sharing, here the angel (not unlike the infant narrative) explains the stage that is set before the women as they arrive.

We therefore are told and are led to understand the events, how the soldiers are powerless and how all this has happened as a completion of a long awaited re-creation moment. The angel tells them to go and tell the Good News and to go to Galilee.  We might well remember throughout our journey with Jesus in the Matthean narrative that Galilee is where the action is!  So go....we are charged with the women and see that the resurrected Lord goes before us to meet us there, out there, where the ministry and mission field lies.

As they are leaving, Jesus immediately appears to them as the resurrected Lord.  He too charges them to go to Galilee...there is the climax of our story.  The action is there. The work is there. The mission is there. Go and I will meet you there.

The Matthean scholar Daniel Harrington points out that so important is the message of he is not here, go and tell, go to Galilee that the words of the angel and of Jesus appear almost as a "doublet." (Harrington, Matthew, Sacra Pagina, 410) We can see it here:

The Angel:

1. He is not here; for he has been raised,

2. go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead,

3. he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’

Jesus:

1. [He is the risen Lord] they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him.

2. go and tell my brothers

3. go to Galilee

It seems to me a number of scholars will tend to write a lot about how Matthew "tidies up" Mark's account.  The problem I have is this too often takes us deep into a historical critical deconstruction of the text. It too often assumes that Mark has no reason for making his testimony in the particular manner to serve a particular mission context or based upon his own understanding of eyewitness accounts.  Both Matthew and Mark give clear testimony and each should be taken in their own right; neither is less or subservient to another.  I guess I am on my soap box now but Mark and Matthew have integrity unto themselves and we sometimes miss the very important witness when we over compare.

The second thing that seems to be dealt with in the literature is Matthew's own section of material which serves to prepare the disciple for this message:

17When they saw him, they worshipped him; but some doubted. 18And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’

You and I cannot preach (I don't think) with a sense of purpose if we do not preach the testimony of the resurrection in Matthew's Gospel for the purpose of bring people to:

1. Worship the risen Lord

2. Aid people with their doubt

3. Proclaim the risen Christ as Lord

4. Make disciples

5. Understand, articulate, and offer baptism as the primary way of becoming a member of God's family

6. glorify God and love neighbor

7. walk with Jesus through life's pilgrimage

I love what Daniel Harrington writes when he describes the nature of what has taken place:

The empty tomb is the necessary presupposition for christian belief in jesus' resurrection.  By itself it does no prove Jesus' resurrection, for the emptiness of the tomb can be explained in several ways. Christian must also appeal to the appearance stories and tot he growth and development of the Church as additional supports for their belief.

The controversy surrounding the empty tomb ought not to obscure the starling content of the early Christian proclamation about Jesus...An event reserved for the end of human history [as believed by most in Jesus' time and in our own] has happened in the midst of human history....To this extent the kingdom of God is among us. (Harrington, Matthew, Sacra Pagina, 413)

This it seems to me is the proclamation of Easter Sunday - Jesus is risen for a purpose.  This resurrection is an apocalyptic event in the lives of those who experience it such that they in turn do these things.  If there were ever an altar call in the Episcopal church (outside of baptism and confirmation) this Sunday is it!

OR

Some Thoughts on John 20:1-18

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

Resources for Sunday's Gospel

We begin with  Mary discovering that the body is not there and reporting it to the disciples.  There is the famous disciple race.  The beloved disciple loves Jesus more and so he arrives at the tomb first before Peter; this is the intent of the story teller at least.  When he arrives he sees the burial clothes and he believes. He sees, he experiences, the resurrection and he believes.

Mary Magdalene then experiences the risen Jesus.  She has been searching for him; she sees him but does not immediately know him.  In fact she does not know him until her name is called.  Raymond Brown points out a number of reasons for this in John, vol 2, 1008ff.  Playing out the reality of Jesus' own words in John 10.3:  "The sheep hear his voice as he calls by name those that belong to him."  "I know my sheep and my sheep know me."  Her response is to announce to the disciples that she has "seen the Lord."

Two different experiences of the risen Christ from two loving followers are what we have to preach on this Easter.  They give us a sense that the risen Lord is known in many ways and experienced in many ways.  While true belief will come with the Holy Spirit, we are given here in John's resurrection account the beginning of the new creation story.

The Victory has been won on the cross. The chasm that separated the earth and the heaven is no breached.  The disciples begin to experience a new order and a new creation. They begin to understand the things which have been told them.

In these resurrection accounts we have the beginning of faith which comes from experiencing the risen Lord.  Their faith will grow even as Jesus continues to make his journey to the father. He remarks that we are not to cling to tightly to these experiences for the unity if fulfilled in the ascension which is soon to come.  Jesus is even now, as he stands before Mary, making his way to the Father.  Then, and only then, will the comforter and Holy Spirit be unleashed in the world.  Then, and only then, will the disciples come to a fullness of belief.

John's Gospel tells us clearly that resurrection is not simply a bodily, this world, experience but it is a resurrection into unity with God.  Only when Jesus is resurrected and unified will the new creation truly spring forth.  So now...on Easter Sunday...as we read John's Gospel we prepare and raise our heads for the coming of the Holy Spirit and the salvation of creation which is even now upon us.

"The first ones ever, oh, ever to know of the rising of Jesus, his glory to be, were Mary, Joanna, and Magdalene, and blessed are they are they who see.  Oh blessed are they who see the Lord, oh, blessed are they who see." (Hymnal 1982, 673)

Some Thoughts on Colossians 3:1-11

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text 

Resources for Sunday's Epistle

"The reference to 'all' may also have a much wider focus: all people and all of creation. That is at least the goal of this love which flows from the heart of God and that needs to be the goal of that love in and through our lives as well, so that no one is beyond it and no part of creation beyond our care and concern."

"First Thoughts on Year C Epistle Passages in the Lectionary," Pentecost 11, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

"Since the author recognizes the ongoing reality of slavery in his instructions to slaves in 3:22-25, the final contrasting pair, slave/free, in 3:11 helps show that for the author what has been negated in baptism is not the existence of such contrasting groups. Rather these contrasts no longer serve as the prime identity of people's separateness since they are all in Christ who gives them their prime identity."

Commentary, Colossians 3:1-11, Richard Carlson, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2013.

The passage we have for today from Paul's letter to the community in Colossia comes after a concern about a bunch of rules or ways of doing ritual that are drawing the members from the real focus of worship and life in Christ.  (2.21ff)  Some scholars believe that these may be rooted in purity laws. Paul offers a very important vision of Christ - he offers freedom and reconciliation. The Christ that Paul and I believe in is one who is not an oppressive liturgical fundamentalist!  Worship itself should mimic a God of freedom and liberation.

Paul then says (in the beginning of our passage) Christ has left the ways of the past behind, we are now able to be joined directly with God through Jesus's work on the cross.  Evil has been trampled and so too any distractions which draw us from the love of God.  So we are to "rise up" as Ray Wylie Hubbard sings and become united to God in Christ Jesus.

Certainly the images of "above" language are about "harmony, justice, and peace" says William Loader.  The things that are below are of a more worldly nature.  These will get in the way of our worship and life with God.

5Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry)...8But now you must get rid of all such things—anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. 9Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices10and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator.

Paul's view is that when these things are set aside, not as new rules or laws, as a way of living together new life is revealed - resurrection life is revealed.  And in this we receive the poetry of love and unity that is found in the last verses:

11In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!

OR

Some Thoughts on Acts 10:34-43

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text 

Resources for Sunday's Old Testament Lesson

We are reading from the book of Acts during Easter. Luke is believed to be the author of this book and so it is a continuation of the story of the Gospel. When we look at it this way we see an important story arc that has been in effect from the earliest passages of the Gospel – Jesus is Lord of all.

Drawing on Richard Hays’ work we easily see a narrative that begins to portray Jesus as Lord – as the Kyrios. Luke begins in 1:16 and carries the term to our passage for today. Of all the Gospel authors, Luke uses the term the most. He ties it into Isaiah’s prophecy and the suffering servant as we discussed in the readings during Holy Week. (Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels, 253ff)

In this Easter reading we have the high point of Luke’s arc in the words of the Peter:

“I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ—he is Lord of all. That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem.

…All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

What is revealed here is the immortal nature of God’s Word – the Immortal Word – the second person of the Trinity. God acting through the word, in this case Isaiah’s prophetic word, long before the unique person of Jesus. God reveals the ultimate unity of God and that just as this God was Lord of Israel so this God in Christ Jesus is Lord of all. The incarnate Word made flesh reigns because God reigns. Jesus is Lord of life and Lord of death it turns out on this Easter day – of all.

We should probably be clear before moving along, we humans are the ones who put boundaries on God. We, the religious, like God to be lord of insider our church walls but not outside. We like our God to be lord of us but not them. We desire a God who is lord of our country but not theirs. We confuse this lordship (with a little “l”) because we think we get to be in charge of God. We believe we get to decide who God likes and doesn’t like. That is of course is all very silly nonsense. We have no control over what God is Lord over. It turns out, as our passage tells us today, that God in Christ Jesus is Lord over all. The scripture says something about this: the son sun rises on both the righteous and unrighteous alike.

Because the Revised Common Lectionary Loves Acts 10 you can chose it for your third reading OR

Some Thoughts on Jeremiah 31:1-6

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text 

Resources for Sunday's Old Testament Lesson

I fear nobody every choses Jeremiah for their Easter Sunday preaching. This, however, is a fantastic text.

Let us begin by rehearsing a bit this Jeremiah person…. Jeremiah had the vantage point of seeing the people wonder this way and that to other gods in times of stress and fear; and he saw his king call people to return to the worship of the Lord too. It was a highly-charged time of politics mixed with religion and foreign diplomacy. We probably underestimate the pressure he felt on every side to offer a vision and path towards God.

Our passage for this Easter Sunday begins by reminding those who hear Jeremiah’s words that God intends to be the God of all the people of Israel – the faithful and unfaithful. God loves his people and wishes to draw them closer to God’s self. God desires that they return and bear fruit of faithfulness and fruit that can be harvested. And, Jeremiah hopes the people will return to worship at Jerusalem – on Zion.

Matthew leans heavy into Jeremiah as a source of prophecy for the Gospel. In particular this passage is rehearsed in Matthew’s birth narrative. Richard Hays writes, “Matthew’s richly allusive citation of Jeremiah 31 in the birth narrative material. If the reader is meant to recall the context of ‘Rachel weeping for her children’ in Jeremiah, the suggestion lies at the hand that Jesus, the Messiah who will bring the end of Israel’s exile, will also establish ‘a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah.’” (Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels, 120)

In this way the new covenant prophesied by Jeremiah is lifted out of the context of return from Babylon and is offered as a vision of the unique incarnation of the Word Jesus as the one to bring all of Israel into a new relationship with God. It is not a prophetic word about how the king of Judah returns people to an old law but to a new law. It is a higher law – as discussed previously on this blog.

God in the work of Jesus upon the cross and tomb roots a new covenant in the earth and upon the resurrection day is raised as a new sign of God’s grace. God draws not only the faithful and unfaithful religious Israelites into God’s bosom but instead through this rebirth draws all people to God’s self.

Liturgy of the Palms, Year A, April 2, 2023

Prayer

You Servant, Lord our God, speak the word that all the weary long to hear. Your Son humbles himself to carry the cross that your people long to embrace. As we enter this holy week, let the same mind be in us that was in Christ Jesus. Empty us of ourselves, and draw us close to his cross, that, comforted by his word of forgiveness and gladdened by his promise of Paradise, into your hands we may commend our spirits.  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 A, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.


The notes for the passion liturgy are below the Palm Liturgy notes.

Palm Liturgy

Some Thoughts on Matthew 21:1-11

"Thus Jesus' approach to Jerusalem has become for many a symbol of the confrontation they must make, including the confrontation with themselves."
"First Thoughts on Year A Gospel Passages in the Lectionary: Palm Sunday,"William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

"Now Jerusalem is not a large city. And what the authors of the Bible take for granted and fail to mention is that while Jesus is parading in on a donkey through one of the back gates, on the other side of the city Pilate is parading in on a war horse accompanied by a squadron or two of battle-hardened Roman soldiers. Do you think anyone at Pilate's parade heard about Jesus' parade? Heard what the crowd had shouted? Let's see what unfolds in the week ahead."
Holy Textures, Understanding the Bible in its own time and in ours, Matthew 21:1-11, David Ewart, 2011.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text



The triumphal entry has been recast from the Markan story and it makes clear the importance of this event as a sign of both who Jesus is as the Messiah and the importance of the event in the continuing story of Israel. (See Zechariah 9.9, Psalm 118:26 and the image of a shaken city welcoming the prophet king Deut 18:15-18)

In Matthew's narrative, these are the very first encounters with Jerusalem and the Temple. It is of eschatological significance, though I really do believe that for Matthew the emphasis is on the prophet king's entry and the importance of connecting his life's journey with that of Israel itself. 

Jesus is fulfilling the scripture's prophetic witness. He is the "meek and humble king." He is the one to guide the searching Israel. He is the Lord and he is the Son of David. 

This witness comes to us as we enter as a church family Holy Week and make ourselves ready to witness to the last days of Jesus' life. So often preachers will spend time on the passion narrative also characteristically read on this day. However, to do so is to arrive at Good Friday too soon. 

I encourage you to preach on the event of Palm Sunday. Use the drama of the liturgy and the lesson from Matthew to draw you ever deeper into the journey yet to be made - the journey to a common meal, a trial, a crucifixion, and a burial. Bear witness to who this Jesus is. He arrives on the doorstep of Jerusalem and the Temple with a life's journey behind him. He arrives there and we join him bearing witness to who he is and what he has done. This is a moment for us to be present with Jesus in his sacred footsteps towards the cross. For us to proclaim and worship our meek and humble King who fulfills all righteousness and makes his way to the Temple of our souls.

Sermon For Palm Sunday
"Everyone Loves The Other Parade"

Heavenly Father, I humbly beseech you to see before you the sheep of your own fold, the lamb of your own flock, and a sinner of your own redeeming. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

On this day in which we remember the palm entry and procession into Jerusalem by our Lord, and on a day in which we come here to re-enact that with palm branches and palm crosses. We also intermingle into that recognition of God's desire to be with us, we have this Baptism and Confirmation.

We have a lot of images going on today in our service. And what—as I was praying and thanking and making notes all week, one of the things that came to me was a very old baptismal spiritual, which some of you will know because Episcopalians will use this and sing this many times, Wade in the Water. Right? The great African-American spiritual Wade in the water, wade in the water children, wade in the water. God is going to trouble the water. God's going to trouble the water. And indeed on this day, our God is a troubling God. God is troubling Jerusalem in this Gospel lesson. God is troubling the world with his love. A troubling God indeed. So let us wade in a little bit.

I know that that hymn itself is about freedom. It is a song that is deeply rooted in our own history and desire for freedom. It is a song that speaks to the freedom of the Israelites, those brought out of Egypt and set free into—through the Red Sea of the water that is divided and they walked through it.

It is also a hymn that refers to John's Gospel, which we read a lot in Holy Week, John's Gospel chapter 5 wherein there is a lame man sitting by a pool. And the words are, "For an angel would come down in a certain season into the pool and trouble the water. And whosever there first would stick themselves in thereafter the water had been troubled for them they were made whole." They were made whole. God is troubling the water.

In our Gospel passage, of course, we have a parade. It's a parade into Jerusalem of Jesus on a donkey and people are throwing down garments and palm branches. But as most scholars say—believe, there were—there was more than 1 parade on that day in Jerusalem. There were 2 parades actually. The other parade was a Roman parade. It was a parade by which Pilate and his guards were coming in from the countryside where they had been residing. They were entering the city of Jerusalem to fortify it, to be present, and occupy it during the Holy season and days around Passover to make it clear, as Marcus Borg points out in his book The Last Week, that they are the ones who are to be adored. They are the ones to be worshipped. And this is their city.

Describing it, he says they enter the western gate and in some kind of imperial procession. So I want you to get your minds around what is happening there. A visual panoply, he says, of imperial power with cavalry on horses and foot soldiers, leather and armor and helmet and weapons. Banners and golden eagles mounted on giant staffs so they would go through the crowd and could be—could be seen on these poles and the sun glinting on those eagles and on the metal of the soldiers. And the sounds of the marching feet and the creaking leather and the chinking buckles of the horses and the beating of drums. The beating of drums.

It was a magnificent parade if you will. And he and other scholars point out that this parade is a display of Roman power of imperial theology if you will. A reminder that their belief was that the emperor himself, the ruler of Rome and all its precincts including this little town over here of Jerusalem belonged to the emperor who they called Son of God. Who they called Lord. Who they called Savior. The story was, of course, his mother, Atia was the human mother Apollo who had come down and given birth to the emperor. Pilate's parade is happening at this same moment. You can't listen to the Gospel parade and hear the images that are swirling around Jesus and not understand that a little over 3,000 feet, only 3/4 of a mile away, there is a rival parade at the same time, happening in the same moment in opposition. A rival social order. A rival theology to what Jesus is presenting. And not think they were troubled in that moment.

God troubled the waters of Jerusalem at that moment. For Jesus' procession while it is one that is humble on a donkey, no great banners, drums. Just some litter, litter, it's litter that they had grabbed. Just ripping off. Throwing around. Some clothes. But what is powerful are the images themselves. For what is here in their cries as we are told in the Gospel and the image of a Messiah on a donkey are the images from Zechariah and Micah. Powerful prophetic images to the people of Jerusalem reminding them that God loves them in the midst of this oppression that God will free them in the midst of this oppression, that God is troubling that city and offering them a vision of peace. A king who comes in peace to a city that is both the city of faith and the city of faithlessness. An image of a God who longs to gather his people and his children. To gather them in. God has heard the cry of his people in this oppressed city. God is troubling the waters. God is coming down. If they would just wade in a little, they would find the freedom they seek. The wholeness they desire, an image of plenteous food and work. The fortunes of Zion would be restored and peace will reign under vines and the harvest will be plentiful.

God is troubling the waters even in this. Jesus' procession stands in direct opposition. It is an assault Ched Myers, the scholar, says and writes, in direct conflict with a world that says that power is what we use in our economy and wealth. God and Jesus are troubling those images and troubling a world and its politics as a usual idea, its power and greed and consumption, and exploitation. God is dreaming of a different world, a different kind of kingdom. God, in Jesus' coming in this parade, to take on his Father's work. Jesus is giving a physical sign—if you will–memorializing that this kingdom is a different kind of place. It is a place for the least of these and a place for all of God's people.

God's troubling vision of this kingdom will be the kind of vision in which you could tear down the whole temple in 3 days and have it built back up because this is a kingdom for the people. It is a kingdom that will be unleashed across the countryside and not just held in Jerusalem or places of power. But it is a kingdom that will go out to where every human being is and trouble the waters of their lives so that they may be healed and restored and receive freedom. This day, these 2 competing parades are the hallmark of our beginning of Holy Week. They remind us of the struggle that we have living in these 2 worlds. These worlds in opposition to one another. This weekend is Holy Devotions Oh Children of God are about us wading into some deep theology and deep story and deep narrative about how God troubles the world and chooses us in opposition to everything that he sees.

And I think that is what the most miraculous part of the story is. God doesn't somehow wait for us to become perfect. Doesn't kind of wait for the powers that be to get it right. Doesn't wait for you and I to have—somehow become sinless. But this God that we believe in chooses us and all of our brokenness. And the fact that we actually like the other parade better? I mean, come on, face it. Who doesn't like a parade with drums and soldiers and banners and everything else? We should own the fact that Pilate has a better parade, people! I mean that's the whole point is that that's the parade and yet somehow we see a glimpse of how it could be different. And yet no matter how hard you and I try, we are unable to live into that kingdom. I mean—maybe—someone was able to achieve perfect kingdom life this Lent. I'd love for you to come and take my place right now and tell us how you accomplish it. I'm pretty sure—as I've said—almost every week in Lent, I'm pretty sure that my Lenten discipline of holiness lasted less than 24 hours.

We fail to achieve the vision that God has for us, and yet he continues to come down into the world to make himself lower than the angels to greet and meet us and offer us his love. To trouble the waters of our lives and to invite wholeness and healing if we would but take a step towards him into this holy water.

The peace of Philippians is so powerful. It is not that God is somehow—that God somehow is obedient to some vision that he has, but that God is obedient to his love for us. He loves us so much, he can't but help but be with us no matter what we do, no matter how many times we fail. The image that Paul gives us in Philippians is one of a God bound to us and devoted to us. Who keeps parading into our lives on a donkey and offering us healing and wholeness.

It is that season, my friends, in which we stand by the pool. This Holy and deep well of God's story and we rehearse it and we remind ourselves of God's presence. And the waters are indeed troubled. From this point over the next 7 days, they will be troubled and troubled, but God will walk with us all the way into the city. And no matter how many times we ask, "Do you love me?" Jesus will say, "I do." And when we whisper in that dark night, "Would you give your life for me?" And like all human mothers, he says, "Yes," and he does. He is with us even to the end of the ages, and his song is repeated over and over again. Yes, I love you. Yes, I will love. So let us make our way. Let us make our holy way to the water. Let us wade in deep as it troubles us. And let us there find wholeness and healing that is great and glorious. And it is for us and for our people.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Passion Liturgy 

Prayer

O God, for whom all things are possible, you have highly exalted your suffering Servant, who did not hide from insult but humbled himself even to death on a cross.  As we begin the journey of Holy Week, take our sin away by Christ's glorious passion and confirm our worship and witness, so that when we proclaim the name of Jesus, every knee shall bend and every tongue proclaim that Jesus Christ is Lord. 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 A, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Matthew 26:14-27:66

"The killing of love, the killing of Jesus, becomes the would-be killing of God. It is paradigmatic for all time." 

"First Thoughts on Year A Gospel Passages in the Lectionary: Passion Sunday,"William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

"How do we relate a story that much of our audience already knows by heart?" 
Commentary, Matthew 27:11-54, Eric Barreto, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text



All scholars will remind us that the passion narrative that Matthew offers a very close story to the story of Mark.  If we look at the variations what emerges is a very important twist.

The first is the idea that the world and powers are working intently to deliver Jesus unto his death. (M 26.16.  There is a focus upon those that betray the Son of Man.  (M26.24)  Peter is played up as one who is faithful (M26.35) but who will end the end deny him.  It is clear that it is the power of the state and sinners that have betrayed Jesus. (M26:45-46)   Jesus also clear that God is in control but that he will not beseech him to deliver him but rather that he will be faithful even if it brings death.  (M26.53-56) There is a reality here that Jesus in Matthew reminds us that this is the ancient tradition of the prophets of Israel. We should remember that Matthew has a theme of Prophet King and here in this passage we are reminded that we shall always kill the prophet that comes to us... this is our nature.  This, like Peter's betrayal, is highlighted in Matthew by the fact that even the disciples flee.  Before Pilate Jesus is quiet and committed. (M27.13, 14)  In Matthew, Pilate exonerates himself from culpability over Jesus' death. (M 27.23-26)  The crucifixion and death are the responsibility of the people - of all people. While it is humanity that is responsible for the death of Jesus it is also the broader humanity that is the first evangelist - the Centurion and others say, "Truly this was the Son of God." (M27.54)  

What is highlighted is that we have in Matthew a clear conflict between God's work and humanity's work.  There is a sense that the governance of the realm by Pilate is different (and obviously so) from the governance of the kingdom of God.  That humanity and human ways of judgment and forgiveness are considerably divorced from God's.  William Loader writes:

Matthew reworks the scene with Barabbas. It becomes Pilate’s initiative (not the crowd’s) to bring Barabbas into the equation. Choose Jesus Barabbas (Aramaic: son of the father) or Jesus (Son of God). The effect is to lay the blame squarely on the crowd. By inserting a report about the wife of Pilate and her dream (27:19), Matthew suggests that she, like Joseph and the magi of the birth stories, has a special connection with the divine. It could even indicate that he wants to exonerate Pilate. Washing his hands and declaring Jesus innocent (27:24) might point in that direction. Matthew certainly points to the bloody consequences for Jerusalem and its inhabitants (27:25). But, standing back from the picture, we cannot overlook Pilate’s role. Whatever game he is playing in the narrative, as such leaders are wont to do, he does not escape responsibility. The fundamental conflict remains: God’s way and Rome’s. 

...With these new swathes of meaning on the canvass, Matthew now has the centurion joined by his companions witnessing not only how Jesus died (Mark 15:39), but also the earthquake and its sequels and declaring to all the world that Jesus is truly the Son of God (27:54). As in Mark, here the Gentile response gets it right, but in Matthew the focus is primarily on the fact that Jesus is ‘Son of God’, a designation he has added in both 27:49 and 40. That drives the poetic and had already done so in Mark who surrounds the moment of death in darkness. 

...The killing of love, the killing of Jesus, becomes the would-be killing of God. It is paradigmatic for all time. ‘Son of God’ is Matthew’s way in part of claiming that what happened here happened to God in some sense. This event became a point of revelation of God and evil, of love and hate. It will be mythologised far beyond Matthew’s earthquake and Mark’s darkness and spawn the imaginations of faith. Some will be helpful, some, unhelpful; some, fitting the event back into the values of deals and transactions, some, simply allowing the blood to flow and finding it in all violence and sin; some, putting it into competition with others’ insights, some, seeing it as a light which seeks its companions universally.

This powerful image of Matthew's gospel along with the images from Philippians will make for a transformative message of the Gospel and God's dying love for humanity.  If not we will slide into an old understanding of God's requirement of Jesus to die for our sins type message which is neither scriptural nor revelatory.

Some Thoughts on Philippians 2:1-13

"Like Timothy and like Paul's audience, leaders and members of our own congregations are called to imitate Jesus by refusing to insist on their own prerogatives or status, whatever they may be, and serving others in humility."
Commentary, Philippians 2:5-11, Elisabeth Shively, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2013.

"This revision of a hallowed text throws a monkey wrench into the inner workings of Christian theology. So, let's do it."
Commentary, Philippians 2:1-13 (Pentecost 20), David E. Fredrickson, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2008.

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text 

David Fredrickson has an interesting take on this passage which has influenced me a good deal. He uses this quote which I think is a good place to begin:

Out of love for that likeness, His son took on my limbs, was conceived and born of a virgin, bearing all the attributes of men, and though He is the Lord of all He became a servant to undertake in one body the burdens of all. He who dwelt on high took the likeness of a slave, though he was reigning as God with the likeness of God, in company with His regal Father. He took on the likeness of a slave, and destroyed that guilt by which man of old was a slave to punishment and death. Bearing the form of slave, the Lord became our flesh and restored His servant to freedom, so that through Christ's plundering of the earthly Adam on the cross, my heavenly form might return to me. (tr. P. G. Walsh, The Poems of St. Paulinus of Nola, 310-311)

What lies at the center of this passage is this: did God in Christ Jesus come across the abyss between God and humanity because of God's love for us? Or, did God in Christ Jesus come across in order to show us how to live life as a servant?  The problem with the latter is that it makes the figure of Jesus into a kind of guiding spirit who pedagogically teaches us a thing or two about faithfulness. In the end, this way of living type offering undermines the very core of Christian theology on the incarnation.

Therefore, let's go for the first version!

So the passage for today certainly is Paul's teaching to the good people of Philippi that they should be encouraged to continue in their good life together - after all this appears to be the only one of Paul's letters where there is not a conflict raging.  He writes: "If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others."  Paul is clearly making the case for those who follow Jesus are to be obedient to God by loving, by being unified, by serving and working for others - putting self aside, and to be humble.

Who is this God that we believe in? Paul continues... God in Christ Jesus, though he has no need to do so because he is God, loves and so snatches (ἁρπαγμὸν - harpagmos - see scholarly definitions here) out of eager desire humanity. God reaches out and takes hold of humanity by taking on humanity like a lover.  The slavery that he takes on is slavery of love. This is rooted in the Latin tradition of servitium amoris. (Fredrickson)  Here is an interesting essay on this. This is an idea that the lover is tied intimately to the beloved.  Fredrickson here is helpful in this, he writes, "he emptied himself [the phrase in Greek always refers to a bodily occurrence preceded by melting; liquefaction of the body and subsequent draining away of the once-solid self was the poetic way of describing longing, the desire for union with an absent beloved.]."  God empties himself ἐκένωσεν (ekenōsen) out of this longing and servitude to humanity whom God loves and desires.  God in Christ Jesus does this even unto death on the cross.

This is an important and radical shift. Certainly, it is one that is hinted to in Martin Luther's theology of the cross.  Yet, it has also been lost in years past.  Here we are able to see that God in Christ Jesus himself gives himself completely over to us even though his love for us means that we will ultimately kill God - as we do. This reorients and changes the action of the sacrificial center of the cross to God's love and human response.  This hermeneutic shift is and can be a powerful one as we walk into Holy Week.

Some Thoughts on Isaiah 50:4-9

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text 

Resources for Sunday's Old Testament Lesson

The passage from Isaiah is one of the shortest readings in the lectionary, and yet also one of the most profoundly influential in our understanding of the unique revelation of Jesus Christ.

We have not been reading Isaiah for a bit so remember this is a piece of his writing that is most likely brought forth during the Babylonian captivity. It is part of what is commonly called the “servant songs” by most scholars. These are sections that speak of the suffering servant of Israel. It is broken up into an introduction, the abuse of the servant, and the discipline of the servant.

The servant imagery, in the sections in which our passage today is a part, is clearly a reference in Isaiah’s writing to the suffering of the people of Israel at the hands of their captors. Later as the prophecy grew in revelation it would be seen as an image of the new David, the Messiah, who would restore Israel.

What is most important for the Christian reader is to understand that the Gospel authors, especially Matthew, understood Jesus in the light of these servant songs. The trial and the day leading to the crucifixion are seen in this light.

With the catholic/universal mission in one hand and the suffering servant songs in another, the authors of our Gospels reveal the person of Jesus to be the long-awaited Messiah. A Messiah who does more than the resuscitation of Isreal, but instead creates a whole new Israel – creates a whole new lineage of Abraham- that stretches around the known world. It is not the fortunes of an old Zion that is being recreated, but instead a new community of Spirit and truth.

Fifth Sunday in Lent, Year A, March 26, 2023

Prayer

As once in the vision, O God, your prophet summoned the spirit so that dry bones stood up alive, and as once your Son stood fearless at death's door calling Lazarus to come forth alive, raise us up with Christ from the death of sin, that all of us, the elect and the baptized, may be unbound and set free. 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 A, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on John 11:1-45

"That we are raised to life, not as future salvific existence, but to life right now, right here..."
Commentary, John 11:1-45, Karoline Lewis, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2008.

"Lazarus comes forth from death for death, this time not by disease but perhaps by the disturbed Sanhedrin -- to be put to death for responding to life, Just as Jesus would be put to death for bringing forth life." 

"Back to Life," Suzanne Guthrie, The Christian Century, 2005. 

"The point of the saying, and ultimately of the narrative as a whole, is to make and celebrate the claim that people who believe in Jesus find life. It is eternal life, which includes timelessness or eternity in the temporal sense, but the focus is quality not quantity. It is sharing the life of God here and now and forever."

"First Thoughts on Year A Gospel Passages in the Lectionary: Lent 5," William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text



"The point of the saying, and ultimately of the narrative as a whole, is to make and celebrate the claim that people who believe in Jesus find life. It is eternal life, which includes timelessness or eternity in the temporal sense, but the focus is quality, not quantity. It is sharing the life of God here and now and forever." writes William Loader.

John's Gospel is a wonderful proclamation of the power and divinity of Jesus Christ and the transformation that is available to every person. The author has written, among the four Gospels, a compelling witness to Jesus as Lord and Savior, as the giver of light, breath, and life from the very creation of the earth. The story of the raising of Lazarus has never ceased to inspire and enliven both my imagination and my heart for the work of the Gospel. 

 Our Gospel this week is the highest of revelationary narratives in the Gospel in both forms and in content. Jesus' raising of Lazarus is a reason why so many follow him and is clear in 12:17-18. He is, as we know and have been experiencing throughout the Lenten readings, the giver of life. (see 5:25-29), and precipitating his death (see 11:53). 

If we were reading along, we would see that this is the last of a second set of miracle stories in John's Gospel that follow and highlight Jesus' teaching and conversation with his followers. The passage begins with Jesus away and teaching; he is not present for his friend or his friend's family. They come to get him and tell him that Lazarus has died. The words used to describe Jesus' reaction to this are words that tell us he was affected greatly by the news. Again Jesus speaks of the work that must be done while he is with them and that the work must be done in the light. Certainly, these are like the other sayings that we have seen in apocalyptic forecasts. Nevertheless, the very real human loss and desire for life is ever present as Jesus leaves to go to where Lazarus is buried.

He is, of course, returning to a place where he has shown power before and a place of danger. You might remember that he was almost stoned though he passed through them. 10:31, 39. Jesus states that Lazarus has fallen asleep. This is a common reference to death in the time of Jesus and after. Chris Haslaam has done some very good research and provides links for other parts of the New Testament that say the same thing: "A common New Testament description of death: see Matthew 9:24; Mark 5:39; Acts 7:60; 1 Corinthians 15:6; 1 Thessalonians 4:14; 5:10. (In several of these verses, the NRSV has died; however, the Greek can also be translated fell asleep.) [NOAB]"

Jesus' words of peace and comfort are kind and simple....things will be better...they will be all right. Yet we must also realize that the word used here is one that means "to be saved." Sosthesetai is translated into "be saved." It is the word for salvation. Our witness to the raising of Lazarus is not simply a witness then to a healing story, or an act of kindness, or a hopeful act, but a transformational act of restoration of health - of true salvation. It is a miracle, which like the other miracles in John's Gospel, clearly represents the work of glorifying God through the ministry of Jesus. We are told that Lazarus had been in the grave for three days. There is a lot written around the idea of the Jewish burial services and the timeliness of such activities once the person has died. But I do not wish to get into this though it is interesting. I believe that the real meat of the text is in the conversation about salvation and resurrection.

As we continue the discourse on the resurrection, we note that the Pharisees believed, along with other popular movements of the day, that all the Jews would be raised. Gentiles, too if their integrity was judged by God to be suitable. I like how Chris Haslaam has written about these next two verses.

Verse 25: Jesus modifies Pharisaic doctrine. His words are not only about resurrection but also about the fate of those faithful to him. Jesus is not only the agent of final resurrection but also gives life now: see also Romans 6:4-5; Colossians 2:12; 3:1. Mere physical death can have no hold over the believer. [NOAB]Verse 26: The believer has passed from the death of sin into life: see also Revelation 2:11; 20:6, 14; 21:8. [BlkJn]

Jesus then gives life now and in the age to come. Immediately Martha offers the same statement as the blind man in last week's lesson. Her words, while a question, refer to previous affirmations in the Gospel. She is convinced...convinced that the proclamation of Andrew on the Galilean shore was true at 1:41. She is convinced that Nathanael's proclamation is true. 1:49. She is convinced that the good news revealed in the feeding of the 5 thousand is true. 6:14. Jesus approaches the tomb and calls Lazarus forth. It is not a resurrection story. But we cannot miss the connections as Jesus calls forth the dead from the tomb, as he will most certainly do in the Easter miracle bringing all of the saints into the light. I also am struck by the reality that Lazarus must be unbound and that many participate with Jesus in this work of freeing him from death into life, from darkness into light.

The Gospel tells us that this miracle of reviving Lazarus is for the glory of God. It also brings many more into the Jesus movement. We cannot see the disturbing events that lay ahead of Jesus without seeing the impact of this great miracle on the movement itself. For surely, as the Gospel testifies, the leaders of the day were worried and concerned. This is a great miracle story. It is one that is rich with intertextual meaning and connections. It highlights Jesus as the one who gives life and breath. As Jesus says in the beginning of the text, day is becoming night, and yet as we read, we see that it will be Jesus who brings us out of the shadow of the darkness of the tomb into the light of day. The witness of this passage is an evangelical one pointing us to the truth of the person of Jesus Christ so that we might believe and then raise the dead ourselves!

We are here hovering at the edge of Lent and preparing for Holy Week. The blogger and pastor Meda Stamper remind us... just as Jesus has met us at our tombs, so we must follow him now to his own."

Some Thoughts on Romans 8:6-11

"Preachers of this text must, therefore, be careful to read it not as an ethically prescriptive text but rather as an anthropologically descriptive text, a metaphor for the act of salvation that only God is able to do."
Commentary, Romans 8:6-11 (Lent 5A), Margaret Aymer, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2011. 

"In our focus during Lent on our individual sins we can center so much on our actions and mix actions that we can miss the larger issue. What is our mindset? What is our orientation toward life?" 

Commentary, Romans 8:6-11 (Lent 5A), Walter F. Taylor, Jr., Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2008. 

"In the moment when we feel separated from God, meaningless in our lives, and condemned to despair, we are not left alone. The Spirit, sighing and longing in us and with us, represents us."

"The Witness of the Spirit to the Spirit," Paul Tillich, from The Shaking of the Foundations, 1955. At Religion Online.

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text 


For Paul, the life of the Christian is one lived in response to God's love.  He writes, "There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ." (8.1). The death and resurrection of Jesus are the liberating faithfulness of God.  It is the freedom to live "life in Christ Jesus" (8.2). We are not condemned, so our response to this freedom is to live.  The law itself would have brought death, to be sure.  The law was unable to bring life.  Christ, however, has in fact, done what he law could not.  

Paul then speaks about what it means to live in response to God's love - which is to live a life of the spirit.  God dwells within the life of the Christian.  Our response to God's love is buoyed up within us by the spirit working in us.  Though our flesh is to die, Paul is clear that it is Christ in us and the Spirit in us that will be redeemed on the last day.  

Those who do not live in response to God in Christ Jesus will forever be doomed to trying to live in the law and perfect the flesh.  Paul is clear the flesh itself is even now corrupting.  The flesh is animated earth, and to earth, it shall return.  To try and perfect that which is not perfectible and to try and live by a test which is un-passable is to live a life of futility. 

Christ frees us from both of these requirements.  Christ offers us the spirit.  Christ gives us the opportunity to have a different life.  What is essential here, though (and Paul would be keen to point this out), is that it is only Christ working in us that makes this life possible. It is only the spirit in us that is bringing salvation.  Though new life is available to us all, the reality is that we inherit this life, and we receive reconciliation and redemption always and only by the hand of God.

Some Thoughts on Ezekiel 37:1-14

"The Bible uses “bone and flesh” as a motif for kinship. To take just one example, in Genesis 29, when Jacob comes to stay with Laban, Laban welcomes him with these words: “‘Surely you are my bone and my flesh!’ And [Jacob] stayed with him ...” (Genesis 29:14) And the same two Hebrew words are used in Ezekiel for the bones and flesh that God brings back together in the valley."
Ezekiel 37:1-14 (Lent 5A), Christopher B. Hays, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2020.

"This new heart is nothing the people can obtain for themselves. The new spirit is not their own, but God’s, a spirit enabling them to do what they could not before, to live as holy people before Holy God. The prophet spells out the divine intent in these two sayings, and in the story of the dry bones he shows it."

Ezekiel 37:1-14 (Lent 5A), Patricia Tull, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2017.

"And it is in this sense that breathing becomes a metaphor for divine presence. Despite the exiles’ fear of being cut off from God, God is as near to them as their own breath. Ezekiel’s vision does nothing to alleviate them of their present difficult circumstances, though it does promise them a future in their own land."

Ezekiel 37:1-14 (Lent 5A), Margaret Odell, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2017.

 

 

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text 

Set in the midst of the exile of the people of Israel in Babylon, Ezekiel offers hope of God’s individual and mindful intention to each individual person. Ezekiel was completely devoted to the centrality of the worship on the Temple mount and sees the people’s return to that central religious site as an ingredient to their return not only to God but a restoration of the kingdom. Many scholars note that this perspective is rooted in Ezekiel’s own priesthood. So it is his prophecy offers a longing hope for a return to the religion of his inheritance.

From Ezekiel, we receive the very clear idea that the temple is the centre of the people’s concern, the centre of their faith, the centre of the nation, and the centre of their world. (Jon Levenson, Sinai & Zion, 115)

It is also clear that Ezekiel, throughout the text, but especially in our text for this Sunday, believes the only solution to returning to the centre of the world where God firmly plants God’s feet is through religious practice. As a mouthpiece for religion, Ezekiel tells the people that there is great hope for deliverance. However, their attempts to make this happen politically will not work. Instead, the whole community should be put in the mind of a faithful response to God’s continued companionship. God will breathe new life into the dry bones of Israel. There is more here than resuscitation. What is needed is reanimation and a quickening of the spirit. Only then will restoration occur.

When we read the text, as do many of the descendants of Ezekiel, what we see is an overlay of the apocalyptic. We see a seed of the idea of resurrection.

With this, then, many preachers will stick to inviting us to hold on with our Lenten disciplines (for this comes in Lent), for God is even now resurrecting us. And, because this is read at the vigil, a heavy dose of end-time resurrection talk will be combined with Jesus’ own resurrected bones.

John’s Gospel rests on the idea that this new shepherd, who is the archetype of David who united the northern and southern kingdoms, is to unite the godly and ungodly, the righteous and unrighteous, the faithful and unfaithful. The new life that is being breathed into a community, the new life of being raised from the dead, and the new life of resurrection mean that the people will be brought out of their tombs and graves into one community. Our passage today is the prefix to the passage of a united people of God from inside the religious community and from outside. The God who has come for all people and even now is gathering them in. The Good Shepherd in John is saying, “I know my people, and my people know me.” (Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospel, 340)

New life for those who are even now lying in death is a promise for all who come to God in Christ Jesus. Regardless of where you start your journey, this God is breathing new life into you, putting flesh and spirit on your bones, and raising you into one flock.