Proper 12B/Ordinary 17B/10 after Pentecost, July 18, 2021

Prayer

In the Sunday Pasch, Lord God, you call us to share with one another the living bread that has come down from heaven.  Fill us iwth the charity of Christ and stir us by his own example to break the bread of earth as well adn to share it generously with others, so that every hunger of body and spirit may be satisfied.  We ask this through Christ, with whom you have raised us up in baptism, the Lord 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 B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on John 6:1-21

"Love that feeds hungry crowds cannot be explained. Love that turns no one away cannot be explained. Love that causes one to sacrifice oneself for the sake of another cannot be explained."
"Chasing Jesus," William H. Lamar, IV, "Chasing Jesus," The Christian Century, 2003.

"Who do you relate to in this story? Philip? Andrew? The boy? Someone in the crowd? How does where you enter the story impact your understanding of the meaning of Jesus feeding the 5,000?"

"Jesus and the Feeding of the 5,000 and a Man Named Karl," Janet H. Hunt, Dancing with the Word, 2015.

"Perhaps we can move through these texts, allowing for the bread metaphor to hold them together, but not getting blocked in our interpretations by the dominance of the loaf."

Commentary, John 6:1-21, Ginger Barfield, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

Oremus Online NRSV Text

Ok, so we now switch to John's Gospel.  Today's text is particularly interesting to many scholars because it is right in the middle of a hotly debated section which is arranged and rearranged and so much of the work here is concerned with order and sequence. I am going to leave that up to you if you are interested in going down that particular rabbit trail.

Or, perhaps you may wish to think a little about why these two stories (last weeks and this weeks) are chosen together.

But here is a significant change in the ancient tradition that I do think has more to do with this lesson than last week's lesson, and that is the connection of this feeding with the Eucharistic feast.  This is also highlighted as we pause to notice the mention of the passover.

Here in this passage we see (very differently from the synoptic tradition) that Jesus gives out the bread as he does in the last supper narrative.  "Then Jesus took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated.." (vs 11)

We might read the section on chapter 6 in Raymond Brown (John, vol 1, 348) to see the other places where there are textual parallels between this and the Didache- which was an early church teaching.

They respond to this revelation of who he is by wanting to make him King or by recognizing his prophetic nature. This of course accentuates the reality that he is the incarnate Lord, and that his work in feeding is transformative for the whole world. Jesus, like Isaiah prophesied, is the means by which God feeds the people with good things.

Here then the walking on the sea is again part of the passover theme and offers a glimpse of the promise the meal itself will hold for those who follow Jesus.

In recent weeks there has been a lot of talk about the feeding of people bread.  Here is what is interesting to me, the reality is that we as Christians are called to truly give people good things to eat. We are called to feed the hungry.  It is an amazing thing that we spend so much time figuring out how to feed those who come into our church that we will miss completely the point of the meal here made in the wilderness.  And, that is, that is a meal made in the wilderness. We are called to go out and feed people. We are called to share and to multiply what God gives us. We are to be Jesus' hands in the world.

This passage is echoing the Eucharist because the Eucharist leads to the feeding of the multitudes for Christians.  We are literally to make table in the midst of the community and feed people.  This uniquely Christian understanding of mission is tied into the Gospel. We are to feed their minds and their bodies. And, we are to do it out in the world.

The church can be so very narcissistic sometimes, thinking that it is all about us! The reality is this is all about the world and our call to be agents of feeding in it.  We are the new Eucharistic symbol that is to literally feed people.

To flip this around means that we are completely out of sync with the narrative story and in some ways let off the hook for doing the right thing in the midst of a very private gathering and failing our mission as Christians.

This was so powerful an event, all of Jesus' meals were so powerfully a part of the wholistic mission, that his followers would gather regularly during the week. They understood that feeding people was essential so they found those left out of the Roman daily distribution and fed them. Food and mission are one in the same. The tiny morsel of bread we consume at the Eucharist is to be a reminder of the greater mission all around us. When a church looses its connection to food and a common table for a shared meal it has lost much indeed.

Ephesians 3:14-21

"It is in the community of faith that we experience the love of God. We enjoy this mysterious internal relationship with God as we support and encourage and love one another, as we are "grounded" in the love of God."
"Grounded," Alan Brehm, The Waking Dreamer.

"The question that leaps to mind is, 'How do you preach on an overheard prayer? Should I?' "
Commentary, Ephesians 3:14-21, Sally A. Brown, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

"...it is in our life together as Christians that we find ever new vistas and insights into the vast world of God (Ephesians 3:18). If we have time to listen to one another, we discover stories of faith beyond our own."
Commentary, Ephesians 3:14-21, Arland J. Hultgren, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

Oremus NRSV Text

Several scholars have called this passage the Jewel of Ephesians. It is of course a passage that offers insight into early Christian prayer practice.

The author begins by speaking of the faithful worship of the new Christian community. And, that he himself prays to God for them and for their faithfulness. He is grateful because he shares in Christ's boundless love. 

So, the author kneels before God (v15).

Then he offers four prayers:

1. for inner strength through the gift of the Spirit.
2. for the risen Christ to be present so they may outwardly reveal God's love
3. for understanding and comprehension that God's plan and love may be fully known and shared.
4. for the ability to continue to grow towards God through Christ's love.

The prayer ends with a doxology. 

What appears to be merely a liturgy and a revelation of early church practice is also in fact deep theology. Early Christian theologians, Chrysostom among them, clearly saw the influence of Greek philosophy and platonism on the author's thought. 

The prayer seeks for the individual the grasping of the inner workings of the divine, the four spheres of God's reality punctuate the prayer and the person. The person is speaking as if they themselves may come to know, that Plato's cave may have light, that reason may understand the universe/cosmos. That the individual who prays is opening themselves up to the heavens quite literally in order to participate in the perfection of the divine. 

From Origen, to Aquinas, to Calvin the passage is interpreted as speaking about the divine love in this perfect way. These four dimensions of Christ's love interact with the human being as a vessel and at the same time with the fourths of the cross.

For you budding Greek philosophers out there you will say, "Wait! There were only three dimensions in Greek thought!" Yes, you are correct. but while our author of Ephesians is in fact playing on the deep philosophy of Greek he is in fact updating his own tradition. The wisdom tradition of ancient Judaism offers four dimensions. One for heaven, earth, water, and Sheol. The text is filled with other Jewish wisdom connections. (Markus Barth, Ephesians, 395-396.)

The author clearly wishes to bring into prayer the fullness of God and fullness of God's love and wisdom. When he prays the love that surpasses all understanding, we are to hear help us understand the fullness of your love. 

I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

2 Samuel 11:1-15

"The story of a woman being forced into a situation where she uses her body as a tool for survival is a story as old as time."
"The Story of Patriarchy and HIV/AIDS: 2 Samuel 11:1-15," Melissa Browning, ON Scripture, 2012.


"The Chronicler probably because of the bad light in which David is portrayed omits this story. The creator of Deuteronomy to 2 Kings has no such hesitation and leaves the story with its great detail about David's manipulative behaviour. We have it in all it gory detail."
2 Samuel 11:1-15, Pentecost 8, Commentary, Background, Insights from Literary Structure, Theological Message, Ways to Present the Text. Anna Grant-Henderson, Uniting Church in Australia.

"In 'public,' sex is a commodity - sometimes literally, sometimes figuratively (a way to sell more magazines, say, or to increase cable TV revenues). In community, sexual love is a 'momentous giving' which depends, as [Wendell] Berry says, on the practice of love as opposed to the mere feeling of love."
"Sex in Public," Debra Dean Murphy, The Ekklesia Project, 2009.

Oremus NRSV Text

So, here is the passage in brief. David is a military victor. He is systematically conqueroring the nations around Israel. He sends Joab and Uriah the Hittite out to siege Rabbah (this is in what is called Amman today). David remains in order to take advantage of the situation and of Bathsheba who conceives a child. David tries to hide this. Uriah comes home and there is big trouble. David in turn tries this way and that to get Uriah killed and in the end hatches a plan with Joab to do so. There are big consequences in store for David in next weeks lessons. Needless to say the passage reveals the sinful brokenness of David and his kingdom.

I know that everyone is going to preach on John this week or the brave on Ephesians. But we have to pause here and consider the story and Bathsheba. Frederick Buechner wrote this about our passage:

"His first trick having failed, David had Uriah bundled off to the front again with a note to General Joab saying to assign him where the fighting was fiercest. Uriah was soon shot down by the enemy, and after a long enough mourning period to make it look respectable, David married Bathsheba himself. If Uriah could have known about the long and illustrious line that was to issue from that unseemly match, the chances are he would have considered his death none too high a price to pay.""Uriah the Hittite," Frederick Buechner, Buechner Blog.

I like Buechner much of the time. However, not in his view of this particular passage. I had to begin here because there is a courageous moment present in this passage the preaching of it which invites truth telling.

The problem we face here in this passage, is that David himself abuses Bathsheba and kills her husband in order to feed the insatiable hunger that comes with power - and it doesn't matter who is the issue of the relationship and what great lineage is hatched. In fact, while Solomon will also be a great king of power, we should remember that he enslaved his own people to do his biding.

Buechner's response is perfectly expected. The succession narrative, written by scribes at a much later date, is recognized as a major piece of literary work within the whole of the Old Testament itself. The authors of successive generations telling the story of both how the reign of Solomon is to be understood and also why its fall is assured because of the sinfulness within.

But let us pause and take a look at it from Rene Girard's perspective. Girard recognizes well within our text the reality that it reveals the struggle with the memetic (repetitive) nature of sexuality, desire, violence, and rivalry. Let us rehearse for a moment the root. Remember that the wisdom tradition of our faith ancestors, the Jews, is that evil enters the world not at the creation of man and woman or the eating from the tree of knowledge. No, evil enters the world through the desire for God's love, to be God's favorite, the rivalry between brothers, and the death of Abel by Cain. This is where it begins. 

What this reveals is that throughout the story we see the repetitive nature of this violence deeply rooted in the human story itself. What David does to Uriah is the same. He wants, like Cain, to have what Uriah has. To possess it and to make it his own. In this particular case that is Bathsheba. Do not make her into some kind of willing participant. No, she is seen in this text as property and as an object to be gained for the purpose of fulfilling desire.

The object of desire, Bathsheba, leads to the repetitive Cain like rivarly and violence. Uriah like Abel must die. We see the same sequence int he story of Amnon and Tamar and Absalom. It will likewise appear again with Solomon and Adonijah who is presented as Absalom's double.

Girard offers an explanation that this desire is rooted in the human psyche. It is metaphysical and repeats itself throughout human history. It is present in the succession narrative as it is in literature as it is in history. Bathsheba is only a pretext, an object, something that is a means to an end. We participate in repeating the damage (as we clearly see visible in the #metoo movement) because we fool ourselves into believing it is love, or that the object will satiate the hunger. Bathsheba does not change David's character. Girard reflects on this and writes:

The disappointment is entirely metaphysical...The subject discovers that possession of the object has not changed his being—the expected metamorphosis has not taken place The greater the apparent virtue' of the object, the more terrible is the disappointment (Girard, Deceit, Desire, ρ 88)

René Girard's theory offers a model in which we can come to see clearly the repetitive, or memetic, nature where in human desire, begets rivalry, begets a crisis that ends in scapegoating (here the scape goat is Uriah), and death. 

Now, my dear friend and Old Testament Scholar Walter Brueggemann differs with me on this take of the story. Brueggemann offers that David is makes theological confession rejecting the royal prerogative making him both a fallen and noble king. Along with others, I think Brueggemann is suggesting that the death of Uriah, among others, is merely an outward result of David's misplaced belief as King he could do anything he wanted. In other words, David repents and returns to the Lord and this makes the narrative reveal David's nature as one of God's people who sins but is forgiven. I would argue, as does Girard and Jensen that the longing and desire for Bathsheba and Uriah's death has nothing to do with his kingship but is rather rooted in his fallen connectedness to Cain. What I am saying here is that Brueggemann, not unlike Buechner, miss the point that there is a dark side, a fallen nature, to the kingship itself. 

We remember God's words to Samuel at this point:

Obey their voice; only you shall solemnly warn them and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over them.”

So Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking for a king from him. He said, “These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you: he will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots. And he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest, and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and to his servants. He will take your male servants and female servants and the best of your young men and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves. And in that day you will cry out because of your king...

Yes, David does what is expected. He acts out what God warns. David inacts the mimetic story in his own life that is rooted in Cain's murderous acts. We can cry out all we want. But rulers will do this and many others things. God has warned us about kings. We are to have no other Lord but God.

(My thoughts above are largely taken from my reading of Girard and a journal article entitled Desire, Rivalry, and Collective Violence by Hans J. L. Jensen on the topic. It is an excellent piece and worth a read if you are interested in diving deeper into this topic.) 

Part of this is simply to say that if we are going to engage in this narrative we must engage in it as it reveals the continuation of a narrative that begins longs before kingship in Israel. We should be weary of how this reveals the nature of the nation state and its power, along with the power of rulers. We should also be clear that Bathsheba is not a willing partner to the great story of David, but is a human being objectified and abused as part of the ever repeating rehearsal human sin: desire, rivalry, and scapegoating. Like other humans objectified by rulers, she is one in a long line of the abused who live out their eternal story in scripture as part of the sacrifice to mimetic violence and the lesser gods of this world.

2 Kings 4:42-44

"Elisha's model offers us a life full of hope. It is not a life without challenges because we see Elisha constantly in the midst of challenges."
Commentary, 2 Kings 4:42-44, Garrett Galvin, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2015.

"These are no longer just Elisha's own words and command, but are now connected with the word of God, and God's promise that they will eat, and there will be some left over."
Commentary, 2 Kings 4:42-44, Sara Koenig, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

"The passage depicts the miracle of daily existence: human community and holy living are dependent upon the abundant providing of God, human generosity and willingness to share, and attention to equity."
Commentary, 2 Kings 4:42-44, Elna K. Solvang, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

Oremus NRSV Text

Elisha has just finished feeding a ton of people who had been suffering from a famine. Then this man comes to bring food. Elisha says give the food to the people. But there was not enough. The food was but a little bit and there were more than one hundred people there. But Elisha insists. Does the story sound familiar?  The people in fact eat and there is food left over. 

Sometimes the church and her people believe that being a prophet is about preaching, shaking the fist at the man, or giving it to the powers that be. Yes, we are to speak a Godly word. But passages like this remind us that prophecy always goes hand in hand with actually feeding people. It is not enough to tell people how to do this or that. Prophetic people and prophetic churches actually reject the message of scarcity by the powers that be and embrace the notion that there is plenty to go around and because of this view make sure people have food to eat, clean water to drink. 

The prophetic church invites the men and women who enter our churches to bring their first fruits not to the service of the church but instead to feed the people. 

Let me once again lean on Walter Brueggeman about this work:

The present form of that contestation, I propose, is the felt and often denied tension between the gospel narrative that specializes in social transformation, justice, and compassion and the dominant narrative of our culture that I have elsewhere termed “military consumerism.” The contestation that is constituted by prophetic preaching is in our own time, as always, profoundly difficult because the dominant narrative, the one contradicted by the narrative of YHWH, is seldom recognized as a social construction and is almost never lined out in its full clarity and claim. The contestation, moreover, is difficult because the YHWH narrative is rarely recognized as a genuine alternative to the dominant narrative and is more often reckoned as a footnote or a pin prick to the dominant narrative but not a real alternative. In our time and circumstance, the narrative of US military consumerism and the YHWH narrative of social transformation, justice, and compassion are deeply intertwined and there is great resistance to sorting them out.

The narrative that Elisha and all the other prophets undertake is not merely a narrative that contradicts the economic systems of the empire, it is one that actually makes a different economy work in the world. (From Prophetic Imagination by Brueggeman, you can read the first chapter here.)

Proper 11B/Ordinary 16B/9 of Pentecost, July 18, 2021

Jacopo Bassano, "The Feeding of the Five Thousand"

Prayer

As we gather again, O God, to celebrate the weekly Pasch, grant your church the joy of tasting again the living presence of your Christ in the word that Jesus proclaimed and in the bread of life we break. Drawing apart on this day of worship and rest, of refreshment and renewal, let us recognize in Jesus the true prophet and shepherd who guides us to unfailing springs of eternal joys. We ask this through Christ, with whom you have raised us up in baptism, the Lord 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 B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Mark 6:30-56

"The mission is so successful that one could be left wondering where it will end. Mark's hearers then and now know that this is not the whole story, but it does not change the nature of the mission: to offer leadership in teaching and in acts of compassion that bring healing and set people free from what oppresses them."
"First Thoughts on Year B Gospel Passages in the Lectionary," Pentecost 7, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.


"By healing the sick, the weakest and most vulnerable members of a community, in this space, Jesus is subverting the economy of this world through the very inauguration of God's kingdom economy."
Commentary, Mark 6:30-34, 53-56 (Pentecost +8), Elizabeth Webb, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2015.

"Jesus sees the sheep without a shepherd. And sometimes even a shepherd needs a shepherd. Even a pastor needs to be noticed. Even a preacher needs compassion..."
"The Dew of Compassion," Karoline Lewis, Dear Working Preacher, 2015.

Oremus Online NRSV Text

Let us begin first with the meaning of the word "apostles."  I think when we hear this word we immediately think of the chosen and the first 12.  Am I wrong? Nope. That meaning, and that is certainly one way of understanding the word, is correct but it is applied after the church became the Church.  In our reading today we might better read it in the way the gospel means it: those who were sent out.  I think this changes things a bit as we read our text.

So, the ones who had been sent out gathered around Jesus.  They explain all the powerful work they have been doing. They had been participating in the building up of the kingdom of God. They had gone out and done work which Jesus himself had been doing. The power of God was now present in the world and flowing through them as well. They had been sent out to do God's work of building up and proclaiming the good news of the reign of God and it had worked.So they gather and a great many people gather around, as if in a symposium or a teaching time. And Jesus sees them like Moses, as sheep without a shepherd. And, like Moses who see his people hungry and longing he provides for them. This is a miraculous story that synchronizes Jesus with the powers and vision of Moses to see his suffering and lost people and to come to their aid. His followers do not all understand this, nor can they understand the fact that Jesus himself is to be the bread of life. But here for those of us who are also sent out, who are also sent ahead, we are able to see God's compassion and love and care for his people. Neatly tucked in here is this notion that those who are sent and are able to do great things sometimes also need help seeing that those challenges right before them are also theirs to overcome.

Our text today has a one/two punch as we take two specific and different pericopes into consideration.  In the second part of our text the disciples, his inner circle of missionaries, are gathered and are sent out onto the sea to make their way to Bethsaida. It is another crossing and we should know by now that whenever there is a crossing and water that we are about to see again the creative power of God in Jesus. Indeed we do.

They are trying to make their way. The ones who have been sent out, are now sent ahead, and are struggling to make their way across the boiling sea. Again, they are challenged. We cannot dismiss this as simply difficult work.  The image of the sea is always in Mark an image of powers of creation and powers against Jesus. It is the place of leviathon and the deep.  Jesus walks out to them. And, they see him again as the one in whom all creation has its being and for whom even the waves obey.  It is an epiphany event.  In the midst of the feeding we are treated to a vison of Jesus as the bread of life and a new Moses, on the sea we see him as Moses walking through the waters to deliver his people.  This passage is filled with old testament imagery and the linkage of feeding in the desert and the Red Sea crossing should not be dismissed.  Jesus is the "I am."  Jesus is the lord of the Haggadah, the ego eimi, the one who is, and he is the image of God at work in Moses, and in the new law. (Joel Marcus, Mark, vol 1, 431ff)

Just as this motif of Moses and the Exodus looks back it also looks forward.  It looks forward to the reimaging of Christ as the crucified Lord who makes way through the Sheol of death and brings us to a new banquet table which is set on the mountain top and not in the wilderness.  We are given images of Christ as the bread of life. He is our new shepherd and our new deliverer. He is our messiah who leads us all and forevermore out of death into life.

As we pause and think about this for our people today we must ask what are they hungry for? What do they need deliverance from?

Moreover, we might ask as the church who is being sent...what are we being sent out to do?

How do we as church feed the masses with the Gospel of good news? Are we willing to not only change the world; are we willing to transform it through the proclamation of God in Christ Jesus?

This is a both/and scenario.  Mission is at once the feeding of the body, shelter for the head, and healing for the sick.  But mission is also hope for the mind, guidance home for the lost, and restoration for the separated.  It is one thing for people to know that Episcopalians care. It is quite another for people to experience the caring of the Episcopal missionary and their story of transformational life.

Mark's gospel is never only about the wind and the waves, bread and fish, it is also always about the spirit.  These two combined are the key to an incarnational message of the gospel which is apostolic and life changing.


Ephesians 2:11-22

"Behind this statement lies the upside-down idea that such uniting of humanity was won not through the blood of conquest and victory, but through (in the eyes of the world still enslaved to the spirit of the air) the blood of defeat."
Commentary, Ephesians 2:11-22 (Pentecost +8), Kyle Fever, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2015.

"This passage is cause for the people of God to rejoice that God is reconciling, healing and bridging communities in both the spiritual and natural world."
Commentary, Ephesians 2:14-22, Hyveth B. Williams, The African American Lectionary, 2009.

"It is not the mission to recruit strength and build power. It all depends so much on whether you see the goal as withdrawal to another source of power beyond all things or coming home to the source of love within all things which is seeking to bring and hold them together."
"First Thoughts on Year B Epistle Passages in the Lectionary," Pentecost 8, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

"In a world that has grown frighteningly guarded and harsh, Christian congregations are called to imitate the 'table manners' of Jesus by being sacraments of God?s hospitality in the world."
"Hospitality," Christian Reflection, The Center for Christian Ethics at Baylor University, 2007.


Oremus NRSV Text


Wow! There is a ton in this passage. We have everything from circumcision to the mysterious "dividing wall." I wold like to focus on the essential "ecclesiology of hope" that flows throughout this text.

Our context is a divided, broken, and sinful world. Into this world Christ brings the power of the cross and shalom breaks forth. It is in this new community of shalom, of peace, that creates a church. This is a very low doctrine of the church. In the first place God is at work building up the live of this communion not only through Jesus' grace and salvific work, but also through the work of the creative God who makes all things and the Holy Spirit who is enlivening the word in and amongst the people. Markus Barth puts it this way, the church must be a community of listeners. He says:

A church which is in this way bound to God, bound by the brotherly love of former enemies, and engaged in responsibility for the world, cannot resemble a museum, a legal institute, or a dictatorship. Neither can it be a freewheeling association of enthusiasts.

Secondly, the church is growing. If the relationships grow and people listen then growth of the wider body should continue. This does not happen by the work of the people but by Christ. The people are the holy dwelling place and the temple of the Spirit. Again, Barth says:

This community has to develop externally and internally and be perpetually reformed in order to grow. Paul's idea of the church's change and reform is oriented toward the future rather than the past. Eph :21 can be considered a scriptural ground for the adage, ecclesia semper reformanda (always reforming).

 Thirdly, is the idea of the church's being a stranger. I love this. What Barth says about Israel could easily be spoken for the church in our own time. Listen to his words:

They were chosen people called to be faithful witnesses, at home and in exile, and they sought in vain to substitute cheap peace or assimilation to their pagan environment for repentance, obedience, and steadfastness, and hope.

The same could be said for the Christian Church today. Indeed people come into a church that itself has assimilated into the political bickering of the day. We are a people who boast in our being saved. We are a people who believe we have it all sown up. We are a people who believe we are flawless and who don't worship false idols. What we all must remember is that, even as we add to our own number today, we are a people utterly dependent upon God in Christ Jesus and his work. Barth concludes:

If God can and will use people who are as tempted and weak as the Christians are, then he is certainly able and willing to exclude no one from his realm. The church lives by this hope and bears witness to it publicly. (Markus Barth, Ephesians, 323-324)

The question that I have is how are we living this out publicly. How do we reveal that we are bound together beyond our own  brokenness? How do we reveal to others that we are deeply listening to the Holy Spirit? How do we reveal that we are "saved sinners, not sinless saviors"? How do we reveal we are flawed and constantly in need of repentance? How do we reveal that we are often wrong?

You see, the church often gets evangelism backwards. We think it is about what others have to do in order to be saved, instead of what we must do so that others may be saved. What we must do is embody the humility of Christ and reveal our own brokenness and need for grace and forgiveness. Only then are we put in a listening posture both for others and for the voice of the Holy Spirit. If the church in this age truly engages in the work of evangelism we may find and discover that we are to be changed as much as the religious of the first century were changed by the engagement with the gentiles.

2 Samuel 7:1-6


"It would be difficult to overestimate the importance of this passage for both Jews and Christians."
Commentary, 2 Samuel 7:1-14a (Pentecost +8), Ralph W. Klein, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2015.

"Israel's hope does not rest in a dynasty but there is hope that from the house of David will come forth trustworthy leadership, attentive to the voices of those in need, and in faithful service to God's goals for Israel and the world."
Commentary, 2 Samuel 7:1-11 (Advent 4), Elna K. Solvang, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"...the Lord maintains divine freedom to the point which allows him to lead his people and all creation to new life. This is what we anticipate in the annunciation of the birth of Jesus."
The Old Testament Readings: 2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16. Weekly Comments on the Revised Common Lectionary, Theological Hall of the Uniting Church, Melbourne, Australia.


Oremus NRSV Text

Remember last week's spoiler alert? 2 Samuel 7 is an important chapter for Christological reasons. God is soon to make a covenant with David. Chapter 7 will connect all that has come before with all that is about to come after. God's next covenant is with David and commits to bringing about a kingdom and offspring. shortsightedness allows us to see this is about David and Solomon before the fall of the kingdom. But as Paul will make clear the great Dravidic rule will be unraveled and given away to Jew and gentile alike through the grace and power of God in Christ Jesus. Romans 1.3ff:

the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name, including yourselves who are called to belong to Jesus Christ...

This is not an other worldly expectation. Read through the lens of the gospel authors we see clearly that the first Christians believed that this was their inheritance. They were the ones to received the Davidic promise. "The Son of David" or the lineage found in the gospels was not some mere happenstance but a revelation of the fulfillment of this very promise from 2 Samuel.

God in Christ Jesus was before time and with the Israelites. It was his Word that the patriarchs and matriarchs heard speak from burning bushes and in the whisper of a Temple's night. God was with the ancient faith ancestors of David, with David, and now is with all people through the unique birth of the incarnation into the world. Hidden power of God in the man from Galilee, we see that he has come to free them from the evil powers of religious and political oppression. The first followers are the offspring of David, God in Christ will unleash God's love and not take it from them. It is Christ's Davidic thrown that in the end will rule for every.

Jeremiah 23:1-16

While later interpreters will see in this Jeremianic passage a prediction of Jesus Christ as the “righteous branch,” we as readers must also remember that long before the biblical texts of the prophets became religious documents for the early Christians, they were first political documents that reflected the historical realities and concerns of their authors. For the author of our passage in Jeremiah 21:1-6, the kings had failed the people. Nevertheless, there was still hope for a future, legitimate monarch who would restore righteousness and, as shepherds were meant to do, protect the people from threats both external and internal.
Commentary, Jeremiah 23:1-6, Kelly J Murphy, Christ the King, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2016.

"Judah's experience with bad shepherding - as well as our own - can foster cynicism about leaders. God confronts despair, announcing that there will be a ruler rightly called "the LORD is our righteousness" (Jeremiah 23:6)."
Commentary, Jeremiah 23:1-6, Elna K. Solvang, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

"Just as sheep need a shepherd to guide and protect them, the people of Israel need responsible leaders to provide for them. Wise leadership matters."
Commentary, Jeremiah 23:1-6, Tyler Mayfield, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2015.

Oremus Online NRSV Old Testament Text

The reason why this passage is so important is that it helps sets the stage for Jesus' teaching about the shepherd. 

In this passage God and the prophet speak of the religious leaders and especially the reigning monarchs of the religious state as shepherds. In line with the last four prophesies of Jeremiah about the leaders, this passage continues the theme that the shepherds destroy and scatter God's sheep. God is clear the leaders of the religious state are the ones who have driven away the people by not taking care of them. They have abdicated their responsibility of watching, caring, and feeding the sheep of God's fold.

In this same way, within Jeremiah's prophetic tradition, Jesus speaks of the religious leaders of his day with the same disgust. Like the kings and leaders of Jeremiah's day the people have been led away, sent away hungry, they are lost as if they have no shepherd.

Jeremiah then prophesies saying that God will gather the "remnant of my flock". God will bring them from all the lands where they have wandered. God will bring them back into the fold and they will not "fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing." 

Furthermore, the way that God will do this is by raising up from David's own lineage a faithful, caring, and feeding kind of shepherd. It will be a "righteous branch." And, this shepherd will rule wisely, deal justly and bring faith back to the land from which it has departed. God will gather God's people in and save them by the hand of this good shepherd.

We are here meant to hear clearly the prophesy of the particular revelation of the incarnation - Jesus. This is how the first followers of Jesus heard this passage. They said, "Aha! This is Jesus that Jeremiah and God are speaking about. So it is that then the images of the good shepherd become deeply associated with Jesus are intentionally juxtaposed with the notion of the evil or not-so-good shepherds who lead the religious state in that age or any age. 

Proper 10B/Ordinary 15B/8 after Pentecost, July 11, 2021

Prayer

Famous Actress/Dancer Maude Allen as Salome

Let nothing, O God, be dearer to us than your Son, no worldly possessions, no human honors; let us prefer nothing whatever to Christ, who alone makes known tot he world the mystery of your love and reveals the true dignity of every human person.  Grant us onlyt hre riches of your grace, and pour forth on us the full measure of your Spirit, that by word and deed we may prclaim Chrsit, in whom you betsow forgiveness and redemption on all.  We ask this through Christ, with whom you have raised us up in baptism, the Lord 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 B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Mark 6:14-29

"Just in case we are getting too excited and thinking this business of being a disciple of Jesus is going to be a piece of cake, is going to be a story of ever increasing fame, miracles, and wonders, Mark gives a story of a good man being executed because of weakness, capriciousness, and vengence."
Holy Textures, Understanding the Bible in its own time and in ours, Mark 6:14-29, David Ewart, 2009.


"He turned pale when he heard that a new prophet named Jesus was stirring up trouble because he was sure that it must be John come back from the grave to get even, and he decided to have him taken care of a second time."
"Herod Antipas," "Salome," sermon discussion from Frederick Buechner, Frederick Buechner Blog.

"However one understands the relationship between John and Jesus, one thing is certain: agents of God who challenge those in power usually suffer significant consequences."
Commentary, Mark 6:14-29 (Pentecost 7B), Emerson Powery, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

Oremus Online NRSV Text

A purely historical critical review of the text places this as a mere court legend. It is a kind of rehearsal that makes for good story tellings say some.

However, we read this in context of the Markan text. A story intentionally chosen to sit here in part to transition focus from the Baptist to Jesus. But it plays within the larger frame of martyrdom and its message needs to be tangled with.

Jesus and the disciples have been and are on a missionary journey. We have taken a side trip here in this passage.  Jesus and his followers are making their way to the cross slowly and surely.  Here in the passage today we are told of the martyrdom of John the Baptist who was a "holy and righteous man."  This is a side journey in which we see the powers of this world rebelling and slowing the progress of the kingdom down.  We cannot understimate the thematic battle between the powers that is being shaped in Mark's gospel.  This very wierd detour is an example of just such a battle. Her there is death and martydom in store for the followers of Jesus.  Just like John the Baptist the message is clear that those who choose the way, choose the way of the cross and will loose their life along the pilgrim way.

In Mark's narrative John the Baptist has an important role to play. He is the one who is making way for God.  He is the Elijah of our story.  As the story goes a masterfully gothic tale unwinds itself in the eventual macabre beheading of John.

Again, we see here the powers of the world are rebelling against the mission of God.  This is a stumbling block a moment when the mission is attacked by the forces that would see the reign of God end in favor of a far more worldly reign of Herod.

Ched Myers captures this with the following words:

Mark's account of the death of John is scarcely apolitical! A more sarcastic social caricature could not have been spun by the bitterest Galilean peasant!  Yet it stands well within the biblical tradition that pits arrogant kings against truth telling prophets...it paves the way for Mark's supreme political parody, the trial and execution of the Human One by the collaborative Jewish and Roman powers. (Binding the Strong Man, 214.)

In the other gospel accounts the story of John the Baptist and his death makes room for Jesus to take center stage. Something different is happening in this martyrdom.

John the Baptist, perhaps like all those whose murders go unavenged, dies unjustly at the hands of power, authority, and the pleasures of this world.  His death, and the death of the saints martyred, shall be consummated in the death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus is rejected and dies a death as gothic and macabre as John the Baptist, as many of the saints; Perpetua and her friends for example.  His death though is not rejected by God but is the redeeming act, the new cornerstone, of a new creation.  Jesus' death redeems and makes new the lives of the martyred saints.

This would have been powerful and hopeful news to a community not unlike Mark's own which was most probably in the midst of persecution. 

And, as we are immediately reminded in 6:30ff, out of death and wilderness places comes life and abundance. 

I pause to ask how are we dying today?  How are we dying in our lives? What is dyng?  I find that as I reflect on my own life experience typically what is taking place is that my true self is dying. My imperfect self which desires and hopes for love is dying. My soul which longs to belong and waits for community is dying.  The real me is dying. That is what is being martyred.  It is be martyred in the banqueting hall of my ego.  There my ego enjoys all the false appetites and fake symbols of life lived to the max.  It is the death of the ego that I resist; and it is my heart that I am willing to be pulled out of me.

I live a life where in my true self dies and awaits resurrection by the God who gives mercy and love.  I have hope that God chooses me, the real me, the martyred me.  I await the death of all the false banqueting halls of power in favor of the feeding of the thousands by the bread of life himself - Jesus. 

Ephesians 1:1-14

"Eudokia is a reminder not only of God's purpose, which is also very much emphasized by the long-range planning of God (coming up in a moment), but also the good gifts which it was God's long range plan to impart. God's interaction with humankind, both Jew and Gentile, is based on God's favorable purpose."
Commentary, Ephesians 1:3-14, Sarah Henrich, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2015.

"That vision of Christ is then a vision for the church and the whole world. It already shows itself where barriers and prejudice are broken down. The 'you, too' is part of the realisation of the vision."
"First Thoughts on Year B Epistle Passages in the Lectionary," Pentecost 7, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

"In a world full of injustice, pain and division, these words of adoption, grace and gathering all things up are sometimes hard to hear. Indeed, there is tension between what God has already done in Christ and what is left to be done in the world."
Join the Feast, Ephesians 1:3-14, Elizabeth Smith, Union PSCE, 2009.

Oremus NRSV Text

A couple of lessons well learned from scholar Marcus Barth on Ephesians:

1) God as the living Word means that the highest purpose of speech is in fact the praise of God. "Theology is doxology". Not unlike what poet Malcolm Guite rehearses - everything you read in teh scriptures should draw you closer to God.
2) As all things are created by God then all things have a unity through God - specifically through the incarnation. This unity is not "conditioned" by the world. Nor, is it "formless". "in place of determinism and predestination stands the Living Christ," recites Barth. God in Christ Jesus is the one working out the purposes of creation.
3) That there is a unity in witness between the Gentiles and the Jews to Christ's victory of grace and love.
4) God's grace is active with the saints in light as well as on earth. (Barth, Ephesians, 144.)

This is all very deep theology. What Paul is proclaiming is the fact that the work of the theologian is appropriately located within the worshiping community. Theology is praise of God. It is to help us speak and converse of God and Godly things. We are to root ourselves deeply in it because the living word itself is about this work. In other words, one cannot but engage in the work of reasoning about God because the word itself is alive in the reflection itself. While philosopher William of Ockham wished to create a divide between earth and heaven, philosophy and religion, there is no such division for the worshiping community and its theologian(s). For the Christian, since the time of Pauline thought there is no such separation.

I love what theologian Stanley Hauerwas says about the work of theologians in and among the church(es):

In truth, however, without the practice of the faith in Jesus Christ by the church, the work of the theologian is unintelligible. Our job is not to know more than those who gather Sunday after Sunday to worship God, but rather our job is to help us better to know what we do when we are so gathered. 

The work of the theologian, I think, is not unlike English teachers who insist that the noun and verb agree. English teachers do not make us speak and write English with nouns and verbs. Rather they help us speak and write English well. (Begotten, Not Made: The Grammar of the Incarnation)

There is here another something. Paul is not simply claiming that the deep truths of the ages are accessible to all people through Christ and with the help of communal reflection. No. Paul is also offering a vision tied deeply to ancient Platonic philosophy that reveals that the Christ is nothing less than coeternal with God. The Christ exists before time. 

Hauerwas continues with this remark about our passage:

For example, consider Paul's letter to Ephesians (Ephesians 1:3-6, 15-19). After beginning with his usual salutation he provides a blessing, a thanksgiving, to God, the Father of the Lord, Jesus Christ. He continues noting that we have been blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing because we have been chosen "in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love." According to Paul we have been destined, elected, adopted from eternity by Jesus Christ to be God's children. 

Paul's blessing - a blessing he seems to think is not in any way extraordinary - entails what I can only describe as maximalist Christological claims. Paul assumes that Christ was with God before there was a "was." That Christ was before there was a "was" is a grammatical remark that suggests that Christ is not some subsequent thought God might have had, but rather that whatever it means to say God means we must also say Christ. Unlike us, there was or is no time when Christ was not. (Ibid.)

We cannot underestimate the power this hope filled messaged offered the society at Ephesus and across Rome. Embattled, pessimistic, and disheartened, Paul's message was one where everyone (not only the philosopher citizen) could receive the transformative wisdom/knowledge of God but that this same citizen could be part of the community of God. This was a powerful message. It was an answer to a longing that was particularly ripe in the moment. The very God of creation was in fact able to be known and to be part of one's own life: fishmonger, laborer, woman, servant, and slave. This is radical theology indeed!

2 Samuel 6:1-9

"Of course, it is true that the church, and even the synagogue, has tried to flatten the picture out that 2 Samuel has provided. "David is good and beloved of God," we have chanted, "and Saul was weak or arrogant or stupid or plain evil and was rightly rejected by God in favor of the boy shepherd of Bethlehem." Yet, even a cursory reading of the long story should give us pause; is it so simple as all that? Is Saul the equivalent of an ancient pedophile while David is one-step from sainthood? At every step of the way, David acts so as to bring at least a small lift of an eyebrow to any careful reader. And the stories of 2 Samuel 6 are no exception."
"David's Dance," John C. Holbert, Patheos, 2012.

"In other words, David's motives are not pure and yet God is involved. Sin is real and faith is real; at times they are concurrent in one event and one character. The narrative leaves room for both readings. Perhaps it even insists on both readings, and thus depicts a world that has resonance with our own."
Commentary, 2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19, Richard W. Nysse, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

"We have a choice with this text. We can minimize the Michal’s voice, or we can try to understand her through the text. We can see her role as a literary device—a manifestation of the loss of Saul’s kingdom. We can simplistically see Michal as a nagging wife. Or we can see her as a fuller person, justified in her criticism of David."

"Michal" Lia Scholl, The Hardest Question, 2012.

Oremus NRSV Text


This is the story of the fall of the house of Uzzah and it is the rise of the Kingdom of David. The God is present in the ark and is present when it is brought into the city.

I was a student of Dr. Murray Newman and cannot help but read this passage without the historical critical eye that on the one hand we have the tale of David and on another the liturgical rite that was carried out long after David's death to reenact God's entrance into the city. 

Here though is the important key to the text for me, this is a shift from the old Israel to the new. It is a the moment in which the old people's ways and reign up to Saul are coming to an end. It is a culmination and high water mark of David's victory over the past. What is old has now fallen away like Uzzah and now David dances a new dance of victory. Even Saul's Michal cannot rain on the parade.

Internationally known dancer Jodi Falk writes this:

As I asked in the beginning of this essay: who was David dancing for - his God, as he states (2 Samuel 6:21), for the crowd and specifically for the women in the crowd, as Michal suggests (2 Samuel 6:20), or for the sake of celebration? David’s dancing was the catalyst for the transformation of the nation of Israel from Saul’s royal family to his own kingdom. David was dancing for the power change on which the narrator in 2 Samuel 6 is focused. The nature of the dancing itself, the rituals that surrounded it and enlivened it, and the reaction of Michal and the inferred consequences all contribute to creating and then finalizing this historic shift of power and fate for the Israelites. (Dance of Transformation)

This is a particular move, a calculated move, a political move. In his commentary on Samuel Walter Brueggemann writes of this passage:

Now, under David, in order to have access to the ark and to its old significance, even conservative Israelites with long memories and keen theological sensitivity must make their pilgrimage to Jerusalem, the new city with David’s new power and new ideology. They have nowhere else to go. To make contact with the ancient symbol, they must give tacit assent to the new royal apparatus. (Brueggemann, 1 and 2 Samuel, 248).

Now, why is this all so very important. SPOILER ALERT. This is important because we are on our way to 2 Samuel 7 and the Gospels. This is an important book for Christological reasons. God is soon to make a covenant with David. Chapter 7 will connect all that has come before with all that is about to come after. God's next covenant is with David and commits to bringing about a kingdom and offspring. shortsightedness allows us to see this is about David and Solomon before the fall of the kingdom. But as Paul will make clear the great Dravidic rule will be unraveled and given away to Jew and gentile alike through the grace and power of God in Christ Jesus. Romans 1.3ff:

the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name, including yourselves who are called to belong to Jesus Christ...

Amos 7:7-17


"Amos 7:7-17 describes two episodes in the prophetic career of Amos, set in the northern kingdom of Israel around 750 BCE."
Commentary, Amos 7:7-15 (Pentecost 8c), Blake Couey, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2013.

"Far from wishy washy is the judgment of the Lord that comes from the mouth of Amos. Rather, it is clear, to the point, biting...and surprising as it comes to Israel, the Northern Kingdom, in a time of peace and prosperity."
Commentary, Amos 7:7-17 (Pentecost +7), Samuel Giere, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2010.

"Proclamation in word and deed is scary business."
"Whose Word Is It Anyway?" Jenny Williams, The Ekklesia Project, 2010.

"The similarities of context between the social injustices of Amos? day and our own make an uncomfortable link between the judgment Amos foresaw for his people and the implications of the prophetic word for our day."
Amos 7:7-17, The Old Testament Readings: Weekly Comments on the Revised Common Lectionary, Theological Hall of the Uniting Church, Melbourne, Australia.

Oremus NRSV Text

When in Jerusalem our guide, The Rev. Canon John Peterson, took us to a little hillside near Tekoa. In the hill beneath a mound of rubble and centuries of pot shards was a little cave. The cave is long believed to be a small ancient Christian church site to Amos the prophet. On this hill, and the valley below, one gets an understanding of the man from Tekoa, who was a herdsman and dresser of sycamore trees. Like the fruit of the sycamore tree (which is like a date) and must be punctured in order to be dried and eaten, Amos punctures the pearly visions of the ruling class of his day.

The time in which Amos prophesied is a time of a divided kingdom of Israel. The Northern kingdom and tribes are ruled over by King Jeroboam (786-746 BCE). 

God calls Amos to invite his people to repent. His prophecies are not good for the kingdom.

The reason is the long standing problem with those who chose to follow God - we are a fickle people. We are wont to find other god's who promise us prosperity, power, and health. The religious powers of the court are no different. Whenever the kings of Israel drifted away from their loyalty to the God who freed his people out of Egypt, the prophets were raised up by God to speak a word of return. 

An important piece here is that we easily place our trust in the world and powers of the world. God can become distant and far off. When this happens, and our anxiety rises, we will give ourselves, our wealth, time, and families over to the authorities of the world around us for an economic promise of safety. 

We can easily focus upon Amos proclamation that the kingdom will soon fall because of its prostitution to these ungodly forces. But what seems more important is to wonder out loud about how Amos' prophesy might have a word for us in our own time of anxiety and desire for security?

How are the sanctuaries - institutions of our day - passing away even as they promise security with reinvestment? (v 8,9) What have they promised in the passed and fallen short in their delivery? (7ff) How has our use of violence in order to prosper our own desires brought violence and death to our shores? (v 11) How have we rejected those who continuously invite us to the grace, mercy, forgiveness, and love of God? (v 13) 

Proper 9B/Ordinary 14B/7 after Pentecost, July 4, 2021

Prayer
Remove from before our eyes, O God, the veil that hides your splendor, and flood us with the light of your Holy Spirit, that we may recognize your glory shining in the humiliation of your Christ and experience even in our own human weakness the sufficiency of your grace and the surpassing power of Christ's resurrection.  We ask this through Christ, with whom you have raised us up in baptism, the Lord 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 B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Mark 6:1-13

"Would you agree that we are living in a world that is more and more characterized by unbelief? If so, doesn't it feel as if we are living in a Nazareth-world ? a culture that is, at best, disinterested in Jesus?"

Commentary, Mark 6:1-13, Mark G. Vitalis Hoffman, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

"Whether among the travellers or among those who stayed in their community, Jesus called people to be and bear good news for the poor. No wonder the established power structures of family and land and religion saw only madness and did their best to tame him and his followers. The judgement of history is probably that they have at least succeeded with most of his followers to this day."

"First Thoughts on Year B Gospel Passages in the Lectionary," Pentecost 6, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

"By attempting over and over to make him ‘the Messiah,’ people were missing the point of his message, which was that the Reign of God was present and that they all were invited to participate in it."

"Mission Grounded in Rejection," D Mark Davis, raw translation and exegesis/questions, Left Behind and Loving It, 2012.

"Is there some area – some regret we can't get over, some grudge we can't let go, some hurt that has come to define us, some addiction that imprisons us, some anger that has taken hold of us – that we are having difficulty entrusting to God?"

"Something to Do," David Lose, Dear Working Preacher, 2012.

Oremus Online NRSV Text

Last week the crowds loved this guy, this week they reject him in his home town.  Those who knew him the best, who saw him growing up, those who he perhaps counted as friends - they reject him. He is not able to do any work there in their midst. He is completely "dumbfounded." (Joel Marcus, Mark, vol 1, 377).

There are several powerful themes. The first is that the gospel is not easily heard by the insiders. This is true in the religious authorities and in his closest relatives.  The second theme is that God is at work here, just like the prophets of old.  The third is Jesus' rejection. He is rejected by the demons. He is rejected by the religious authorities. He is rejected by gentiles. He is rejected now by his own people.

God is patient. God is at work. Even though he is rejected here he is not fully without power to do miraculous things.  God in Jesus continues to make his way to the ultimate rejection and crucifixion. But it will be at the cross that he is victorious. 

The message this week is clear to me. God is at work in the world around us. God is at work wether we see it or do not see it. God is at work outside the walls of our churches and outside of our communities. In point of fact some miraculous things are happening inside, but the great work is being done out in the world.  The whole of creation is marching steadily towards fruition of the kingdom of God and his reign.  It is at work and miracles and works of power are being done by God through the power of the Holy Spirit as we speak.

The question is not unlike the dumbfounded Jesus might have posed to his hometown family: cannot you see what I am doing here? Do you not know me?  Don't you want to come with me?

What would it be like this Sunday to preach the newspaper and illustrate where God is at work in the world? Or in music, art, or film?  Where is the language of grace breaking into the culture?  What would it be like to show and highlight those places where the church is following Jesus and is actually out there and working with his miraculous power to change creation?  Yes, that is the inspiration and call to see again for the first time that we need from the pulpit this week. Inspire us to get out there an stop looking for Jesus to be the tame Jesus of our sanctuary.  Inspire us good lord to follow you out into the world and help us to see you at work and to join your efforts there!

2 Corinthians 12:2-10

"And how long was the whole great circus to last? Paul said, why, until we all become human beings at last, until we all 'come to maturity,' as he put it; and then, since there had been only one really human being since the world began, until we all make it to where we're like him, he said - 'to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ' (Ephesians 4:13). Christ's to each other, Christs to God. All of us. Finally. It was just as easy, and just as hard, as that."

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

"It may be timely for the preacher to focus less on individual experience and more on a congregation's collective experience."

Commentary, 2 Corinthians 12:2-10, Sally A. Brown, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

"Gratitude and generosity - two virtues that acknowledge we are not all strength and independence, but also (and very basically) weakness and dependency - prepare us for better adjustment in situations of loss."

"Declining with Grace," Robert C. and Elizabeth V. Roberts, (other resources at)"Aging," Christian Reflection, The Center for Christian Ethics at Baylor University, 2003.

Oremus Online NRSV Text

Buried in the reading for this week is a real gem. Paul writes, "'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.' So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong."

As an Episcopalian this passage from Corinthians reminds us that we are broken and fallen creatures. Our reason is deficient to understand the divine intent its fullness and that we are always powerfully controlled by our ego and selfish desires. In this I know I am weak. I do things I do not wish to do - Paul claims. So my weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions (done to me and inflicted by me) and calamities are so very real. So very real are my weakness that I am saved solely by the grace of God. God's grace is sufficient.

We has Christians struggle though because while we understand that God's grace is sufficient for me - it is rarely sufficient for you.

Today, as we think and ponder the culture all around us we might be challenged to truly accept God's sufficient grace for ourselves and for others.

2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10


"With all the difficulties of this text, it is important that the juxtaposition that the text itself gives us of David's coronation, his conquering of Jerusalem and this oddly prominent prohibition of the blind and the lame from the house (of the LORD) be held together."
Commentary, 2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10, Samuel Giere, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

"How do we know that God is with us? It all starts with our naming at our baptism."

"David Becomes King," Faith Element Discipleship System, "Setting the Bible Free," 2012.
Commentary, 2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10, Ralph W. Klein, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

"...the lectionary choices this week, following on from last week, result in a picture of the kingdom moving from Saul's death to David's crowning as a relatively smooth transition. The David who graciously laments the deaths of Saul and Jonathan appears this week as the natural heir. The intervening chapters present a much more complicated, interesting, if sanguinary, tale."

2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10, Pentecost 5, 2009, The Old Testament Readings: Weekly Comments on the Revised Common Lectionary, Howard Wallace Audrey Schindler, Morag Logan, Paul Tonson, Lorraine Parkinson, Theological Hall of the Uniting Church, Melbourne, Australia.

Oremus NRSV Text

David is now in Hebron. He is recognized as the leader and publicly anointed by the heads of the tribes of the tribes of Judah. This is important as it reveals the unification of the people...a unity that will not last long as a split will occur after David's reign. Saul tries to mess this up by having Abner create a kind of figurehead leader in Ishbaal. Too bad for him, for as they fighting breaks out it will be Ishbaal who will be one of the casualties. In the end, seeing the future potential, he is murdered by a few of his own folks. David though is quick to act and has the assassins killed for having murdered a "righteous man." David is eventually made king and he sets up a new city as a unifying capital for the province. There is a lot of trash talk and David's army prevails. As the narrative of the king goes this is a key chapter in the building of a unified kingdom and the wooing of powers and supporters.

Then David does a weird thing and prohibits the blind and the lame from worshiping with everyone else. Now we well remember this passage:

For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach: a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose … –Leviticus 21:17

Now, we know that when David came to take Jerusalem from the Jebusites they taunted him saying that the lame and blind could beat this guy! It is possible that the text is a play on words where by David is mocking the Jebusites themselves, but the Leviticus quote makes this unlikely. The truth is that such people were seen as unclean and so in context his pronouncement is not particularly odd - though it is odd to our modern hearing. But that is because living in the West does weird things to you and we think everyone should be able to go everywhere as free individuals and have largely cast off any sense of holiness codes like this one.

Also, as Christians we remember that Jesus goes to the Temple and undoes this prohibition.  After throwing out those who have made a living on religion we are told:  “Then the blind and the lame came to Him in the temple, and He healed them.” –Matthew 21:14

Ezekiel 2:1-7

"Preachers may "understand" this text too quickly -- as in, Yes, I get it: The preacher is called, like Ezekiel, to proclaim a hard word of God to a recalcitrant people..."
Commentary, Ezekiel 2:1-5, Fred Gaiser, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2012.

"Passages like this one can lead in two very different directions."
Commentary, Ezekiel 2:1-5, John C. Holbert, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2009.

Oremus NRSV Text

The prophet says that he has received a word from God, to stand up and listen. God has sent the prophet to the people with a message. And, well, it isn't good. The people are rebellious and in need of a prophet. They, like their parents, have transgressed. "When you are done, Ezekiel," God says, "They will know a prophet has been in the midst of them."

God invites Ezekiel to fear not. He isn't very hopeful as he says to Ezekiel, "though briers and thorns surround you and you live among scorpions!" God promises Ezekiel that God will be with him all along the way.

I wonder sometimes if after preaching to our people if they think that a prophet has been among them? Who are the rebellious in our own midst? 

Now, I am not talking about fussing at your people. I have in mind here something more akin to what Walter Brueggeman offers in his book, The Prophetic Imagination (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001).

When I ponder what the ancient prophets in Israel are doing as we have them in the text, I arrive at this judgment that will serve as my guiding thesis: prophetic proclamation is an attempt to imagine the world as though YHWH—the creator of the world, the deliverer of Israel, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ whom we Christians come to name as Father, Son, and Spirit—were a real character and an effective agent in the world. I use the subjunctive “were” because such a claim is not self-evident and remains to be established again and again in every such utterance. 

The key term in my thesis is “imagine,” that is, to utter, entertain, describe, and construe a world other than the one that is manifest in front to us, for that present world is readily and commonly taken without such agency or character for YHWH. Thus the offer of prophetic imagination is one that contradicts the taken-for-granted world around us.

So, to answer what rebellion looks like, is to see clearly what in the world around us is acceptable/unacceptable within our society but is wholly unworthy the kingdom of God. I am thinking here of the separation of families at the boarder of the US. It can be all kind of legal to do so but, does this action represent the kingdom of God - the rule or riegn of God? And, if it doesn't how will you, like Ezekiel approach this.

Again, Brueggeman:

At the outset, it is clear that this way of putting the matter refuses two common assumptions. On the one hand, it rejects the more conservative assumption that the prophets were predictors, those who tell the future, with particular reference to predictions of the coming Christ. On the other hand, this thesis refuses the common liberal assumption that the prophets were social activists who worked to establish social justice. It strikes me that the ancient prophets only rarely took up any concrete social issue. 

More important to them than concrete social issues is the fact that they characteristically spoke in poetic idiom with rich metaphors, so that their language is recurringly teasing, elusive, and evocative, with lesser accent on instruction or didacticism.

This Sunday may not be a Sunday to preach prophecy but to actually preach about what it means to be a prophetic preacher, prophetic listener vs a rebellious one, and the meaning of being a prophetic witnessing church.