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John 15
You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. 17I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.”
Jesus told his disciples that he wanted them (and us) to bear fruit, fruit that will last. For those of us in the midlands of South Carolina, it’s strawberry season and before long, it’ll be peach season. Fruit stands pop up on rural roads selling fruit just picked from local fields. Getting a little plastic basket of super-fresh strawberries is such a treat. Buy more than that and you’ve got decisions to make. The problem is, no matter how fresh the fruit, it's hard to make fruit last very long on the kitchen counter. You can put it in the refrigerator to gain a little time, but then you’ll lose a lot of flavor.
If you buy a big bucket of strawberries, you can only “make them last” by preserving them into jam or freezing them for future use in smoothies. Perhaps Jesus taught his disciples to “bear fruit that will last” to challenge them to think of how to make fragile fruit last.
Of course, Jesus was speaking of metaphorical strawberries, peaches, olives, and figs. He was teaching how to be disciples who work for love and justice. How do we bear such juicy fruit and how do we preserve it for future generations?
Let me tell you a story.
As Mother’s Day approaches, I thought about one of the most inspiring women I’ve known. Ruth Youngdahl Nelson was the wife of a Lutheran pastor, a writer, speaker, homemaker, and advocate for justice and peace. Ruth is best known for her protest of nuclear weapons after she visited Hiroshima and stood in solidarity with mothers in Japan. When she was 78 years old, Ruth was arrested because she tried to stop a Trident submarine from entering a port in the northwestern United States. I can still see the picture of her rowing a small boat in her yellow rain slicker with white hair blowing in the breeze as she was dwarfed by that gigantic submarine. When a reporter asked her why she had done such a thing, she just said, “I did it for the children.”
Ruth Nelson was a mentor in preserving the justice fruit of discipleship, not because of this one act, but because of her life-long dedication (fruit that lasts and lasts) to building relationships with all kinds of people. Her parsonage home in Washington, DC, was a house of hospitality where everyone was welcome for meals or for a night’s sleep. In the 1950s their Lutheran church was the first one to integrate racially. Ruth was an inspiration, an encourager, and a pusher – and she was a mother.
I didn’t know Ruth personally, but I did know her children, David and Mary. David was the pastor of Bethel New Life Lutheran Church on the West side of Chicago. That part of the city was full of poverty, unemployment, and racism. His sister Mary, taking up the preserved jars of justice from their mother, founded a faith-based community development corporation that focused on housing and jobs. Under her 27 years of leadership, that organization grew from a $9,000 endeavor to over $14 million a year with 350 employees. Mary didn’t row a little boat in front of submarines, but she rowed a metaphorical one in front of politicians and major corporations. Fruit that will last for sure. Bethel New Life continues to be a powerhouse congregation and corporation of delicious, preserved justice.
I share a reflection on the four scripture readings for the Fifth Sunday of Easter by Austin Shelley. His original title was, “On watch.” I encourage you to read the delightful and powerful story from Acts 8. The last paragraph of this article was meaningful to me as I hear story upon story of church struggles and new possibilities in our season of the church. This is our watch.
Acts 8:26-40; Psalm 22:25-31; 1 John 4:7-21; John 15:1-8
Retired US Coast Guard captain Donald Coffelt once urged me, his pastor, to rest. “On a ship at sea, someone is always ‘on watch,’” he explained. “When one person’s watch is finished, the person coming on duty salutes and says, ‘I have the watch.’ The person leaving salutes back and replies, ‘You have the watch.’ There is never a gap, and everyone gets time to rest.” On the heels of this sage advice, he also issued an accompanying offer to keep watch over a task so that I might step away and trust the necessary work to capable colleagues and lay leaders.
Sharing the watch emerges as a unifying theme across this week’s lectionary texts. Fruitful ministry becomes sustainable when it is shared, person to person and generation to generation, and only when we recognize the idolatry of believing we must discern God’s will—or set out to do God’s will—alone.
The Ethiopian eunuch of Acts 8 is under no delusion that a life of faith is a solo endeavor. A man accustomed to shouldering heavy responsibility, he is unembarrassed by his desire for deeper understanding. Led by the Spirit, he rightly discerns that he needs a guide—a companion—to help him grasp the words of the prophet Isaiah.
When Philip, also led by the Spirit, goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza to function as this guide, he takes up the watch. Beginning with the very scripture with which the eunuch had been struggling, “[Philip] proclaimed to him the good news about Jesus.” It behooves us to note that it is necessary for Philip to meet the eunuch at the place where the eunuch is, not the other way around. When offering to take up the watch, we do well to meet the current watch keepers where they are instead of expecting them to come to us.
Roadside water appears, the sight of which causes the eunuch barely to contain his enthusiasm for receiving the sacrament of baptism. Philip obliges and is immediately snatched away to Azotus to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ all the way to Caesarea. Alone again, but still dripping with baptismal waters, the Ethiopian eunuch takes up the watch once more, this time as one who is claimed by Christ and called to follow in the way of the suffering servant of Isaiah.
This week’s epistle lesson and psalm echo Acts’s call to shared ministry while simultaneously lifting up the source of the love that fuels the mission of the church. 1 John 4:19 succinctly proclaims the order of things: “We love because [God] first loved us.” The final verses of Psalm 22 invite us to consider both the unending love and dominion of God and our role in receiving and extending that love from one generation to another.
Psalm 22 is likely better known for its opening verses, recited by Jesus from the cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” While I do not suggest, as some biblical scholars do, that in his moment of deep agony Jesus is intentionally invoking the entire psalm, I do believe that the ending of Psalm 22 provides perspective when we find ourselves and those we love suffering and feeling forsaken by God.
As the Lord once gave his servant Job the benefit of a tiny glimpse of God’s eye view, so the psalmist herself widens the lens of her experience of suffering without backing away from its gruesome reality. Thus, the psalmist’s lament “I am poured out like water, / and all of my bones are out of joint; / my heart is like wax; / it is melted within my breast; / my mouth is dried up like a potsherd, / and my tongue sticks to my jaws; / you lay me in the dust of death” faithfully co-exists with the promise of God’s ultimate deliverance: “Posterity will serve [the Lord]; / future generations will be told about the Lord, / and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn, / saying that he has done it.”
The gospel text reminds us that even shared ministry will bear no fruit unless it is rooted in God. Disciple to disciple, and generation to generation, may we abide in God, sharing the watch as we traverse the unending sea of God’s abiding love.
Acts 2:42-47
42[The baptized] devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.
43Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs were being done by the apostles. 44All who believed were together and had all things in common; 45they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, 47praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.
For a lot of us church folk this Fourth Sunday of Easter is called “Good Shepherd Sunday.” That’s because every year, like liturgical clockwork, we read some part of John 10, where Jesus declares himself our Good Shepherd. And because of that, we read Psalm 23, and then sing just about every hymn in the hymnbook that has the words “sheep” or “shepherd” in them. We’re sheep, Jesus is our shepherd. We’re provided for and protected in all times and circumstances. Nothing wrong with that message except that we shortchange the scriptural message a bit.
We need to ask what it means to not only celebrate the resurrection, but what it means to be Easter people. If we are well-shepherded sheep, what does that mean for our lives moving forward? This passage from Acts 2 is a vivid illustration of what we are to do as ones who follow our risen shepherd.
This account in Acts of the newborn church after Pentecost Day talks about their newly created lifestyle as Jesus-people. We hear of how they created a new household, a family not bound by blood but by baptism. All who came to this new family sold all their possessions and put them in the offering plate. All these resources were used for the common good. What they owned, they owned together. Sharing bread and sharing God’s Word were their top priorities.
What they show us is how sheep led by a Good Shepherd created a shepherding community where all are provided for, protected, and cared for. This isn’t always who we are, but it’s who we are meant to be. Strangely enough, on this Good Shepherd Sunday, we should think less about what it means to be like a sheep and more about what it means to be like a shepherd.
A few days ago, I shared Psalm 23 in my Thursday chapel time with the homeless. Eating the Moon Pies I brought and drinking coffee, there they were: a mentally ill man who couldn’t stop talking, another who couldn’t engage at all, another former gang member from Los Angeles, some who had been in prison, and all who were homeless, of course. I said, if you know this psalm feel free to say it with me. I began, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want,” and they joined in with full voice, “he leads me beside still waters…” I continue to be amazed at their knowledge of scripture and the theology of faith. And after we recited, “I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever,” we talked for an hour about how to shepherd each other since God has done such a good job of shepherding all of us.
Luke 24
36bJesus himself stood among [the disciples] and said to them, “Peace be with you.” 37They were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost. 38He said to them, “Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” 40And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. 41While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” 42They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43and he took it and ate in their presence.
I often remind my parishioners that Easter isn’t one day but is 50 days long. There is “Easter Day” and there is “Eastertide.” The ancient Church’s reason for celebrating for 50 days (something few can sustain), is because the gospels tell stories of the risen Christ walking on wounded feet around the Galilee for 40 days until he ascended into heaven. Fifty days after Easter Day is the Festival of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit comes among us as comforter and challenger.
But Eastertide isn’t about celebrating the empty tomb for 50 days, it’s about an on-going discovery, one Easter dinner at a time. For more on the topic of Easter dinner, I offer excerpts from an article written in 2006 by Bishop Craig Satterlee. He was my professor and doctoral advisor when we were both affiliated with the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago. He is a great preacher and liturgist in our church. This is his reflection on a resurrection story in Luke 24:
The risen Christ breaks bread in Emmaus and then eats fish in Jerusalem. Easter, or at least the first Easter as Luke describes it, is not as much about an empty tomb as about food. Jesus spends Easter Day eating. His followers celebrate Easter not at an empty tomb, but around a table. So, we might consider Easter as a multicourse meal rather than a trip to the empty tomb, and experience resurrection by eating.
We enter Jesus’ dinner party between two of the courses. The 11 are discussing the first of these courses, bread served to Cleopas and a companion. In Emmaus, Jesus took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Cleopas reports that they talked a lot about scripture, and experienced Jesus as risen.
Our minds turn to two other meals, an earlier and a later course in Jesus’ Easter feast. Jesus served the earlier course in an upper room on the night of his arrest. Sitting with the disciples, Jesus took, blessed, broke and shared the bread. He referred to the bread as his body and to the accompanying cup as the new covenant in his blood. It was a Passover meal, so scripture again figured prominently. Jesus serves the later course—Jesus’ body and blood “in, with and under” bread and wine—whenever Jesus’ followers come together to share scripture and gather around the table.
Just as we begin to connect the dots between the meal in the upper room, the meal at Emmaus and our celebration of the Lord’s Supper, we look up and see Jesus standing in the midst of Cleopas and his companion, the 11 and those who are with them. Everyone is terrified, so Jesus shows his hands and feet and invites his friends to touch him. But our minds are on food. What is Jesus doing with the broiled fish? We get it: Jesus has indeed risen from the grave because apparitions do not eat. But is ghost-busting the only reason that Jesus eats broiled fish?
Bread and fish are not much of an Easter dinner. Why bread and fish, loaves and fishes? Our minds race to other meals that appear to be courses in Jesus’ resurrection feast. Jesus served the first of this pairing in a deserted place when he blessed bread and fish and gave them to a multitude. All ate their fill, and there were leftovers to boot. This meal served as a foretaste of the feast that Jesus will serve when the reign of God comes in all its fullness. Surrounded by people of every time and every place, surrounded by all of creation, Jesus will serve up the great and promised feast, the final course of Jesus’ resurrection banquet. No one will be hungry; all will be satisfied. The last will be first and the first will be last, and the feasting will continue forever.
What about all those other meals Jesus attended and served? Could Jesus’ eating and drinking with the poor, the outcast and the despised also be courses in this resurrection feast? Jesus certainly raised people to new life at those dinner parties! And if resurrection happened at those tables, does that mean that Jesus, risen from the dead, is present and bringing new life to every table at which the hungry are filled, the despised are loved, the outcast are welcome, and the poor receive the reign of God?. . .
It may be easier to testify to the risen Christ by making a trip to the empty tomb than by eating around a table. A trip to an empty tomb confines Easter to very early morning on that first day of the week when women went to anoint Jesus’ body. We know when, where and how resurrection happened. We know when Easter is over.
Celebrating Easter by eating means that Jesus could show up, that resurrection could happen, at any table, at every table. We have no way of knowing when, where and how the risen Christ will bring new life. Rather than being confined to one day, or to 50, Jesus’ Easter feast continues as one meal leads to another, and tables get larger and larger, and closer and closer together.
John 20
24But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. 25So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”
Maybe you’ve heard somebody referred to as a “Doubting Thomas”. The story commonly called “Doubting Thomas” is found in the New Testament Gospel of John, chapter 20, verses 19-31. Thomas was one of Jesus’ twelve disciples. A few times in the gospels he is recorded as having spoken up here and there, but this story has made him famous, or perhaps I should say, infamous.
The story starts out on Easter evening. The disciples (minus Judas who has killed himself and minus Thomas who is out and about) are hiding out in a locked room because they know Jesus was crucified and as his closest followers; they figure their photographs are all over the post office. In their hideout, they strategize on how to get out of this mess. The disciple Mary had already discovered the empty tomb, a few other of the disciples had run to the tomb to check it out and found it empty. But apparently, discovering a tomb empty is not really an indicator of resurrection. They might hope for such a thing, but hope isn’t enough to erase genuine fear. The only emotions present in that locked room were anxiety, fear, and unbelief.
It’s into this fearful room that Jesus appears (somehow) and must have shocked the pants off these guys. But fear turned to joy when they recognized him. He offered them his peace and issued a call to get out into the world to declare forgiveness for everyone.
Thomas missed all this. Did Jesus even asked where I was, he might have wanted to know. The disciples tell him all about Jesus showing up, about what he said, what he did. Thomas takes it all in but says he can’t believe it unless he sees for himself. That’s why he’s called a doubter. It’s a bad look for a disciple. But Thomas seems less a doubter and more of a guy demanding equality. He just wants to have a Jesus experience like the others did. Is that so wrong? Isn’t that what most of us want?
I once had a conversation with a young man who had grown up Roman Catholic, walked away from it, and now was pretty much a skeptic/doubter. I asked him to imagine Jesus asking him what he was seeking. He gave me a long list of complaint-like questions: Why do babies die? Why is there so much hate in the world? Why do my parents seem to hate me? But after he’d exhausted his big list, he smirked and said, “Well, actually, if Jesus asked me what I was seeking, I’d be thrilled; because what I’m really seeking is some sign of God’s presence in my life.” I know, buddy, it’s what we all are seeking.
Just keep asking God for what you need. And then expect that Jesus will give you some job to do. That’s just the way he rolls the stone away.
This image is of Jerusalem today, not an artist’s rendering of what the old Jerusalem of Jesus’ day might have looked like as he rode into the city on that donkey. Today, the iconic building is not the great Temple (which was destroyed in 70 C.E.) but it is the golden Islamic Dome of the Rock. We enter a very different Jerusalem today.
In our local congregations, we will process with our palms into a different church. It might be the same building that has stood on that same spot since 1869, but the congregation, our Christian ministry, and the entire world are different places. It is into this new day and time that we shout our Hosannas and wave our palms. This Week, we process into our modern rendering of Jerusalem when the beloved church of the 20th C has been admitted into holy hospice. We enter our sanctuaries symbolically following Jesus when the church is visibly pregnant with the new thing God is doing, although its face has yet to be seen.
We enter our Jerusalem in the spirit of protest as Jesus did against the violent empires of this world. We follow a different kind of King in the face of contemporary dictators, near and far. We weep with Jesus over Jerusalem as it presides still over a land torn by ethnic and religious hatred, over a land full of fresh mourners of friends and family lost to brutality.
During this Holiest Week of the year for the Christian community, let us be firm in our understanding that the events of Jesus’ last week brought to life in our many liturgies are not just a remembrance of past events. Hardly.
Let’s be clear on this. Jesus comes riding into our churches and our hearts on Palm Sunday. He washes our feet and feeds us with himself on Maundy Thursday. He dies for us on Friday, March 29, 2024. And on Holy Saturday we will keep vigil in fear and hope waiting anew for God to act.
No matter where we live, we are all walking toward the holy city of Jerusalem. Don’t skip the journey. The best news is in the last few miles.
Hebrews 5:7
In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.
This week, for our SQBS, I’m sharing a reflection piece on the scriptures for Lent 5 just published on-line in “Living Lutheran Weekly Email Digest.” The scholar and writer is Cory Driver, the director of L.I.F.E. (Leading the Integration of Faith and Entrepreneurship) at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Read together, the Sunday scriptures from Jeremiah, Psalms, Hebrews and the Gospel of John, feel like a dense collection of verses, some difficult to understand. I’m appreciative of the way Cory pulls out the emotion in these texts when most of us wouldn’t notice that. This is not his full text, as I’ve deleted some parts. To find the full article, click here: https://www.livinglutheran.org/category/lectionary-blog/.
Cory writes:
My central theological commitment is that God is a God of divine emotions, rather than the impassibility god of the philosophers (and frequently of systematic theologians). I side with Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel in arguing that God is the “most moved mover.”[i]God’s rich emotional life as revealed in Scripture is not somehow anthropomorphizing, but rather some of the clearest and best insight into who God is. When we say, “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,” we are describing how God’s emotions motivate God’s actions in the world. This week’s lectionary passages—again, like most of Scripture—point to God’s vibrant emotional life.
As the Kingdom of Judah was entering its last days before destruction and exile at the hands of the Babylonians, Jeremiah the prophet is overcome by God’s emotions at the senselessness of the tragedy and longing for something better. You can hear God’s nostalgia and deep hurt at betrayal while describing “the covenant which I made with their fathers on the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt: my covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them …” (Jeremiah 31:32; New American Standard Bible; emphasis added).
God took marginalized and enslaved people by the hand to bring them to Godself at Sinai, and there cut a wedding covenant so they would be God’s people and the Lord would be their god. Make no mistake, God’s dreams for the people have been crushed, and God feels that hurt and betrayal.
But God doesn’t give up hope. Instead, God promises to write a new covenant on the hearts of Israel and Judah. No longer carved on stones or inked on vellum, this law will be in the hearts of the people so they no longer even need to teach one another. This is, after all, a God who longs for intimacy with God’s people.
We see God’s rich emotional life in the person of Jesus as well. The author of Hebrews describes how Jesus offered up prayers and pleas with loud crying and tears. Jesus was emotional with his Father in prayer, knowing that God’s emotions, divine compassion and grace that leads to forgiveness all respond to human prayers and petitions. If you think about it, this is why we pray prayers of petition, asking God for help, healing or protection. We hope that God will respond in love to the requests of God’s children.
Jesus openly modeled the full range of emotions with God in the Gospel reading from John. In responding to a request to see Jesus, the Messiah revealed what he was feeling: “My soul has become troubled; and what am I to say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name” (John 12:27-28).
Jesus experienced deep disquiet of soul and dread of the mockery, torture, and execution he was about to face. He didn’t pretend that everything was OK with him or that reliance on God somehow prevents fear, anxiety, or apprehension. Those who would turn “do not fear” or “do not be anxious” into a commandment instead of reassurances must think that Jesus sinned here and in the Garden of Gethsemane when he begged God to find some way to spare him from the horror to befall him in a few hours. Rather than sinning, I think Jesus is demonstrating the very best of what it means to be human (and divine)—allowing emotions to deepen the relationship between God and humans.
Rabbi Heschel, mentioned above, argued that the biblical prophets’ use of emotional language for God was not an attempt to anthropomorphize God. Instead, it was an attempt to “theomorphize” humans. What I experience as anger isn’t really anger in its truest sense unless it motivates me to redeem the enslaved, work against inequity, and free humans from the bondage of sin and death, as God’s anger does. What I experience as love isn’t love in its truest sense unless it motivates me to forgive those who have hurt me, embrace the suffering in compassion and expend myself on behalf of others. That’s what God’s love does! We serve an emotional God and thank God for that.
[i] This is a reference to the famous definition of God by Aristotle who called the Creator the ultimate unmoved mover.
John 2
13The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” 17His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” 18The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” 19Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21But he was speaking of the temple of his body. 22After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.
For the Third Sunday in Lent, many of us will read in church both the giving of the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20, where we hear what God wants us to do to be good; and alongside those words, the story of Jesus’ violent incident in the Temple where he seems to be acting in bad ways. Jesus had a way with God’s Word (the Torah). He took it very seriously. More seriously than the Pharisees who accused him of not taking God’s Law seriously. Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) contradicts this accusation. Jesus doesn’t ignore God’s Law, he extends it like pulling out a tape measure as far as it will go.
In that famous sermon, Jesus has a series of “extensions” usually introduced by the words, “You have heard it said, … but I say to you.” In each instance, he quotes from the Law, including the commandments. One example is probably what we consider the easiest commandment to keep, “You shall not murder.” Most of us wouldn’t think of it. But Jesus extends the meaning of it beyond the definition of ending someone’s life. He says, even if we are angry at someone and drag that anger around like an old suitcase, we have broken the commandment. Martin Luther in the spirit of Jesus, extended the commandments as well in his Small Catechism.
He helped us understand that there’s more to breaking the commandments, there’s also keeping the commandments. In teaching about “You shall not kill,” Luther said, of course, we are not to directly end someone’s life, but at the same time we should be about the business of helping our neighbors with all they need to live their lives fully. I often tell my confirmation students that the fact many people die of hunger every day despite the abundance of food in the world is an example of how we as a global society, with our poor stewardship and our greed, cause the death of these people. As a society, we have broken this commandment. These are ways we extend the commandments and laws of God to their fullest extent.
In what some call the “Cleansing of the Temple” story in the Bible, we are presented with an account
of Jesus having a violent outburst in the holy Temple in Jerusalem during the festival of Passover. This story calls into question our commonly held image of Jesus as the emotionally cool Zen master. If nothing else, it seems commandment-breaking. But far too often, it’s preached and taught in a very anti-Semitic way. Most commonly, it’s assumed that Jesus is railing against the Jewish practices of behaving badly at their most holy site, disrespecting God, etc. We’ve taken that so seriously as an interpretation that to this day, many Christians forbid fundraisers at church or the selling of Girl Scout cookies during coffee hour. I think Lutherans are over that now, but it took a few millennia. Jesus is against buying and selling at church, we have said. This is really an unfortunate interpretation of this story.
Here’s the deal, at least from the way St. John shares this story in his gospel. The Passover festival held in ancient Jerusalem every year was a celebration of God’s love and the gift of freedom as the deliverance from Egypt was ritually remembered. When Jesus enters the temple, he sees exactly what would be expected. Many vendors providing goods, including the money-changers who helped exchange the Roman coins in most people’s pockets to the coins allowed to be used as offering in the Temple. Other vendors are there selling animals for sacrifice. All is as expected. This is how the Temple is always organized to carry out the religious duties at Passover. What Jesus rails against is the whole system itself. It’s not about money being exchanged in a holy place but is a call questioning whether the Temple was necessary at all. The question is: Where God is located? Is God in the Temple (which had been destroyed by the time of the writing of John’s gospel) or elsewhere? John’s gospel claims that Jesus replaces the Temple as the place where God is found. This story is not a shaming story of how the Jews desecrated the Temple with money changing or selling of animals. They were following the Law. With the advent of Jesus, the Temple is no longer necessary as the place of God’s abiding. The Temple is no longer a place, but a person, from the gospels’ point of view.
Here again, Jesus doesn’t deny the Law but extends it to its full measure. Often, we prefer to keep the Law on a short leash, its requirements ever so doable. Jesus calls us to honesty in our obedience so that God’s will, not ours, is done.
Genesis 12
4So Abram went, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. 5Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother's son Lot, and all the possessions that they had gathered, and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran; and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. When they had come to the land of Canaan, 6Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7Then the LORD appeared to Abram, and said, "To your offspring I will give this land."
Genesis 17
1When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him, “I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless. 2And I will make my covenant between me and you, and will make you exceedingly numerous.” 3Then Abram fell on his face; and God said to him, 4“As for me, this is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations. 5No longer shall your name be Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations. 6I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you. 7I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.”
This promise in Genesis 12 to give Abram the land of Canaan and the covenant in Genesis 17 that he will be the ancestor of many peoples and many nations, are the scriptural heart of the conflict we continue to witness in Israel and Palestine. In this conflict there is also a political heart and a historical heart, but this is the ancient scripture that is interpreted variously. Not included, because this is after all, a “super quick” Bible study are the stories of Abraham and Sarah’s difficulty in living the covenant due to their infertility. One suspects age might be a factor! The ancient way of dealing with such things was to force a slave girl, like Hagar who belonged to Sarah, to conceive a child with your husband. You may remember that Hagar has a son by Abraham, Ishmael. In Islam, Hagar is the matriarch of monotheism. It is through Ishmael that Muhammad comes. Because of these scriptures, Abraham is claimed as the common ancestor of Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Abraham is truly the father of many peoples and many nations. Not one nation or one people.
Much of the conflict we know of since the Balfour Declaration in 1917 circles around the understanding of the theology of the land. Who owns the land? Did the Lord God give it to Abraham unto eternity? Are the members of the Jewish race the owners of this real estate?
A scriptural question is answered best by scripture. Our sacred texts are clear from Genesis 1 that everything that exists belongs to God the creator. While humankind is invited or commanded to be stewards of God’s gifts, they are always the temporary managers, never the owners. God remains the owner of the land. Abraham is to steward the land. He is never given the deed of ownership. Scripture speaks of this in Leviticus 25:23 -- The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; with me you are but aliens and tenants.Scripture also declares that God as the owner of the land has requirements for the ethics to be lived out among its inhabitants. All are to be welcome including the alien and foreigner. The poor, widow, and orphansare to be cared for. Economic justice is specifically required. The shedding of innocent blood is forbidden. Leviticus declares that if such righteousness is not observed, the land will vomit the people out. It was believed by the Jews of old that their disobedience to God’s will is why they were removed from the land by the Babylonians for 70 years.
Ezekiel 33:24-26 gives a strong warning against those who claim possession of the land through their ethnic relationship to Abraham: Mortal, the inhabitants of these waste places in the land of Israel keep saying, “Abraham was only one man, yet he got possession of the land; but we are many; the land is surely given us to possess.” Therefore, say to them, “Thus says the Lord God: You eat flesh with the blood, and lift up your eyes to your idols, and shed blood; shall you then possess the land? You depend on your swords, you commit abominations, and each of you defiles his neighbor’s wife: shall you then possess the land?”
We know that the conflict in the Middle East is a quagmire of theological, historical, and political twists and turns. I hope this quick Bible study gives some insight as to why lifting one verse or two out of the Bible and declaring a point made is often an unfaithful interpretation. The whole of scripture provides the clearest view of how we are meant to understand the holy Word. Scripture interprets Scripture. From a theological and scriptural point of view, we can quickly and easily answer the question, “Who owns the land?” Yeah, it’s God!
Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them… Matthew 6:1
In an odd circumstance, Ash Wednesday falls on Valentine’s Day this year. Every year for the Ash Wednesday liturgy many church folk read part of the Sermon on the Mount, specifically Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21. As we begin the forty days of Lent, we hear Jesus teach his disciples about proper piety. We don’t use the word “piety” much in our modern speaking. It sounds very 19th C to our ears.
People in love, people in long-term relationships, say they know each other’s love language. Apparently, a common question across the dinner table at first dates now is, “So, what is your love language?” Love language can be romantic things, sexy things, but often I hear couples talk about their love language as very practical things. Old married couples can name all sorts of actions that show their partner knows them, gets them, wants to make them happy. One person’s love language can be “vacuuming the house without being asked.” Or another might be getting a foot rub at the end of a long week. I walked into the house the other night to find my husband making dinner. “What are we having?” I asked. “Salmon patties,” he almost whispered. I remember sucking in my breath and saying, “I love you!”
While “piety” might not be a common word these days, it’s not that far from what we mean by “love language.” Practicing our piety refers to the things we do to demonstrate our faith. We don’t do them so that God will love us but because God loves us. We also do them because they help shape and grow our own faith. Practicing our piety can be things like being observant in our worship attendance, saying prayers before meals, at morning, and at evening, studying scripture, showing acts of mercy
toward our neighbors.
In the Sermon on the Mount, and specifically in the verses for Ash Wednesday, Jesus teaches us that showing that we are his disciples means serving others with no regard for our own recognition. If you are donating 3 million dollars to help build a new wing on the local children’s hospital, is it because you want your name on the outside of the building and your portrait in the lobby? Jesus says our actions and our motivations are both critical to a discipleship with integrity. We love because God first loved us. Serving our neighbor is our love language. Happy Valentine’s Day. Blessed Lenten journey to all who talk the talk and walk the walk.
Isaiah 40
25To whom then will you compare me,
or who is my equal? says the Holy One.
26Lift up your eyes on high and see:
Who created these?
He who brings out their host and numbers them,
calling them all by name;
because he is great in strength,
mighty in power,
not one is missing.
27Why do you say, O Jacob,
and speak, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,
and my right is disregarded by my God”?
28Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God . . .
We humans know our language cannot communicate the greatness of the divine, but we try anyway. We love to use the prefix omni, which takes a common adjective and expands it to the size of the universe: omnifarious, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, omni-loving, omni-merciful, omni-cool.
The prophet Isaiah has an omni-tough assignment. He’s been called to proclaim hope amid despair, to tell the exiles in Babylon that God is on the way to deliver them just when they have begun to seriously doubt it. In this great sermon, the preacher argues that the one who created the vast universe and all that is in it has the power to restore the Hebrews as a people. It is a tough sermon to preach, because during their captivity the people are wondering how their God can be omni-anything when they are so miserable. How can they be the chosen people and the demoralized people at the same time?
In a risky but effective preaching strategy, Isaiah proclaims the greatness of the Lord in contrast to the insignificance of the people. Who are they to question God’s ways, God’s abilities? Earlier in this sermon he asks, “Whom does God consult for enlightenment? . . . Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as the dust on the scales.” Here is a metaphor of our smallness compared to our omni-everything God.
Today preachers can make the same point with new knowledge of the billions of galaxies beyond our own. The universe is beyond our comprehension, and we wonder how much we still have not discovered or experienced. We realize that we are the speck of inconsequential dust on the scales, as Isaiah described.
This prophet is a master at putting God and humankind in perspective. He asks wonderful rhetorical questions: To whom will you compare me? Who is my equal? When we’re asked such questions, we know the correct response, and yet the questions in our souls persist.
The truth is we compare God to ourselves. We measure divine actions against our own. We think we know what we would do, what we would enact or change if we were omni-everything.
Like Aladdin with a lamp, we think we would make wonderful wishes. People would have all the riches they wanted. There would be an end to all strife and disease, and death would be banished from the earth. Do we not all wonder from time to time, from funeral to funeral, from war to war, why God does not fire up that omnipotence and straighten things out?
Such doubts haunt us constantly. We grieve the death of a 32-year-old mother from ovarian cancer and discover we have no explanations that make sense. We are convinced that if we had the power to control this situation, we would produce a cure and a family able to live happily ever after. But we don’t have the power. We know who does, and in our grief, we ask the ancient question, “Where is God?”
For all we know, our struggles with cancer are part of an evolutionary process within God’s billion-year scheme to create a posthuman being. We speak matter-of-factly about the evolutionary process behind us, noting that creatures climbed from the sea onto land, that gills became lungs. But what did these creatures go through one by one over all those years as the Creator continued creating? Can we believe that God is still creating man and woman into something, we know not what?
When the calculations comparing our smallness with God’s greatness are finished, we can react to our position in the universe in several ways. We can slink away in despair and denial, or we can crawl back into God’s big saving hands. Isaiah proclaimed, and the birth, death and resurrection of Jesus confirmed, that this God who knows all, creates all, controls all and plans all; also loves all. God has no inconsequential creatures or untended corners of the universe. God tells us how precious we are in God’s sight.
The proclamation is always a shock because it’s not the way we operate. We who counsel each other to let the little things go, we who can only manage a limited number of details are amazed by God yet again. God has the whole world well in hand. I for one am happy to live inside a wrinkle of God’s palm, content to be a part of an ongoing creation process, amazed to be so loved and, most days, unafraid of what it all means.
This is an edited version of my writing published in The Christian Century magazine, January 26, 2000. Wow, a generation ago!
Micah 6:8
8He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?
For my liturgically tuned-in readers, you’ll know that Micah 6:8 is not one of the scripture readings for this coming Sunday. But the purpose of this Super Quick Bible Study is to provide some increased knowledge of scripture to those who are seeking it. So, this week, I lean toward this popular scripture that has become wall art for many a family room. Is it as easy or sweet as it sounds when written in a lovely italic font on artificially weathered wood?
Many are familiar with Micah 6:8 even if they aren’t familiar with many verses in the Bible, especially ones in the Old Testament/Hebrew scriptures. This verse is in some ways God’s will for us in a nutshell – do justice, love kindness, walk humbly. It’s practically preschool theology. It’s perfect for religious wall art. It’s not rocket science. Except when it is.
You may remember an episode of The Simpsons when Homer is having a nightmare that his evil boss at the nuclear power plant, C. Montgomery Burns, is building a Frankenstein robot and is planning to use Homer’s brain in it. Homer lies unconscious on a gurney as Mr. Burns prepares to remove his brain assisted by his loyal assistant, Smithers.
As he prepares to cut Homer’s head open, Mr. Burns instructs Smithers, “Hand me that ice cream scoop.” Smithers is shocked that for such a delicate procedure, he would start with a clumsy and hardly precise instrument.” Mr. Burns scoffs and says, “It’s not rocket science, Smithers, it’s brain surgery. Now hand me that ice cream scoop!”
As a people, we love bumper sticker, wall art theology and philosophy. After all life isn’t rocket science, not that complicated. Right? All you need to do is just: “Be blessed to be a blessing.” “Love one another.” “Do justice.” “Make love not war.”
If Jesus thought about getting a tattoo, I’m guessing he seriously considered putting on his body the words of Micah 6:8. Do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with your God – ‘nuf said! It’s like the Ten Commandments in concentrated form. It’s the Golden Rule with a warm stain of justice. What we love about such things we lift out of scripture is that they don’t feel like “rocket science.” We find peace in their simplicity. It almost makes them seem doable.
They definitely are not rocket science. But they are heart transplant surgery and brain surgery all rolled into one. And in our innocence or stupidity, we approach life and say, “Sounds easy enough, now hand me that ice cream scoop!”
Do justice. Love Kindness. Walk Humbly with your God. When we seek to do these things, we run into two big obstacles. One is us. The other is our neighbor. We discover in the application of our innocent wall art, that we are stumped by other things the Bible tells us over and over. If we are hard-hearted, it’s difficult for the will of God to work on us. Hence the necessary heart transplant surgery. And if we do not have the same mind as Christ as Paul said, we discover that loving our neighbor, doing justice, and being humble become real problems. Hence the need for brain surgery to have a “mind of Christ” implant. Doing justice sounds awesome until you count the cost and realize that you might have to give up something (your money, or ego, or prejudice, or classism) for your suspicious looking neighbor to have their supposed justice. Now it’s getting personal.
Frankly if you have a problem with doing justice, you’ll no doubt struggle with being kind and humble. They really are part of a package deal according to Micah and according to our human experience.
Maybe Micah 6:8 is as hard as rocket science or brain surgery. We should probably read this verse and realize that rocket science and Einstein’s theories would be easier to understand and do. Organic chemistry is easier than biblical studies.
Doing justice. Loving kindness. Walking humbly. These are hard things for us selfish, broken, sinful people. And still God loves us. And still Jesus keeps cheering us on. Most things worth doing are difficult. Most difficult things are successfully done when we do them together. That’s why Jesus built a community of people, yes, the flawed church, so that we could learn to walk humbly by walking together, love kindness by learning to love the grumpy people traveling with us and doing justice because we have gotten to know others walking this road and have realized they are just like us.
Keep cheering us on, Jesus. We know we are a “three steps forward, 2.5 steps back kind of people” so we need your grace and forgiveness every step of the way. On we go, together!
Jonah 3:1-5, 10
1The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time, saying, 2“Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you.” 3So Jonah set out and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly large city, a three days’ walk across. 4Jonah began to go into the city, going a day’s walk. And he cried out, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” 5And the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast, and everyone, great and small, put on sackcloth.
10When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it.
I remember the day I received my call—follow me and I will make you fish for people. In my case it was a call to ordained ministry. Although my call was more like a slow culmination of events and experiences, there was one dramatic moment in my senior year in high school. It was 1973, just three years after my denomination officially allowed the ordination of women. At the time, I knew nothing of this historical moment. Since the second grade I had informed those who asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” that I wanted to be a doctor. But it turned out not to be my calling. I tested my professional desire by volunteering for several years as a “candy striper” in our local hospital, and discovered that I became light-headed at the sight of anything sharp and medical. I figured medical school would be rough.
My senior year in high school I, the pre-premed student, was dutifully enrolled in biology. We were on the verge of dissecting cats, an assignment for which I had no stomach or desire.
It was then that I heard of a woman who was enrolled as a student at the Lutheran seminary in my hometown—the first woman ever in the Master of Divinity program in that school. This was all I needed. I put down my scalpel, quit the class and turned my face toward Jerusalem.
It was simultaneously a freeing and frightening moment. I was absolutely convinced of my call and yet absolutely unsure how I would accomplish this new mission. I wondered if the stork had dropped the baby off at the wrong house. The call was there, but it seemed to me the gifts were not. I was terribly shy—how could I possibly preach a sermon in front of people! I had only minimal social skills—how could I possibly manage the dynamics of a congregation? I didn’t know how any of this could work to any good. Every night in college as a religion major, I prayed to God to just give me a sign if I were on the wrong path and I would gladly resign my call. Years later, through times of success and times of despair, I have yet to hear the summons to retreat. What my experience confirms for me is precisely what the scriptures proclaim: when God calls, it is our joyful task to follow. And it is God’s agenda that wins.
Those first fisher disciples left more than their nets by the seashore. The nets were only a symbol for all that must be abandoned in order to follow Christ. Popular psychology counsels the heavy-laden to get rid of their excess baggage. The old spiritual sang it: I’m gonna lay down my burden down by the riverside. Those called to follow litter the riverside and the “fontside” with precisely the kind of stuff Jonah had difficulty giving up. We may be impressed with the valuables Simon and Andrew laid down to follow Jesus—families, homes and jobs—these proved to be mere trinkets compared with what they were ultimately called to lay down at the foot of the cross. The punchline of the Jonah comedy prepares the way. Jonah was a call resister and for good reason: he objected to God’s mercy. In a sermon on God’s mercy, Isaiah once proclaimed of God, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways.”
In the Jonah drama on the character of God, Jonah clearly hears the call of the Lord and even more clearly knows that he will not, cannot, follow. It’s not because he’s too busy or because he has obligations he cannot imagine leaving. He intentionally sails away because he does not agree with God’s ways and God’s agenda. Jonah sees others wallowing in the mud of their disobedience, evil and immorality and believes with all his soul that they should be pelted with fire and brimstone hurled from the hand of God. It’s what they deserve. The evil should be punished and the righteous rewarded. Bad things should happen to bad people and good things should happen to good people. Everybody Jonah had ever lived with, worked with or had lunch with seemed to see the world in the same way—everybody, that is, except the God of the universe. Jonah was an honest man. Although mercy disgusted him, he knew his ways were not God’s ways. If the people of Nineveh repented, Jonah was sure God would embrace them.
When we decide to follow, we are called to lay down some of our most valuable possessions: our understanding of the world, our view of right and wrong, our assumptions about whom God favors and whom God despises, our ways and our thoughts. The Jonah drama ends incompletely yet compassionately as God consoles the pouting Jonah like a mother explaining the justice of the world to an angry three-year-old.
The disciples of Jesus discovered that fishing nets were only the first things they would be called to leave behind for the gospel’s sake. As they traveled and camped around Galilee, they discarded beliefs about the character and will of God. They cast off their assumptions about God’s mercy, love and justice. Judas, of course, clung to his religious-political beliefs until they became a noose around his neck. None of the others were perfect disciples either. Each had his “Jonah moments” of resisting the call and questioning God’s agenda.
And yet for all our imperfect following, for all our resistance, for all our questioning of our capabilities and responsibilities, God’s will is done. Neither Jonah’s resistance and grumpiness nor even his disaster of a sermon could turn aside the river of mercy that was about to rain on that great city. In the end God gets what God wants. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done. As we pray, so shall we follow.
1 Samuel 3
Now the boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord under Eli. The word of the Lord was rare in those days; visions were not widespread. At that time Eli, whose eyesight had begun to grow dim so that he could not see, was lying down in his room; the lamp of God had not yet gone out…
And so, this fascinating story of the boy Samuel and the old priest Eli begins. To hear the full plot, read 1 Samuel 3: 1-20. The description of God’s perceived activity (rare, not widespread) is a description of the relationship between God and God’s people over 3,000 years ago. I have a hunch that many of us would say the same about our season in the church and the world. It makes me wonder if every generation perceives God’s best acts as all past tense.
Old Eli, who was 98 at this time, served as a priest at the holy site of Shiloh. He had two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, who were also priests, but they were the epitome of the kind of pastor no congregation wants. They abused their positions and misused the offerings the people offered.
That was bad enough, but what upset God the most was that Eli never held them accountable for their wicked actions. He was a totally passive parent. He wanted to appease his sons more than he wanted to obey God. Young Samuel was serving in this holy site because his mother, Hannah, brought him there as a dedication to the Lord in thanksgiving for becoming a mother. I know that sounds counter-intuitive, but our ancestors in the faith expressed obedience and gratitude in different ways. So, these two servants of the Lord, who were several generations apart, kept the lamp of the Lord burning in this holy place when God’s voice was hauntingly silent.
The night of this story, young Samuel heard a voice calling his name. A voice he had never heard. While it wasn’t Eli who called, Eli was convinced it must be the Lord. God does not have a comforting word for Eli in his old age, instead he’s told, little Samuel informs him, that because his kids are a total moral and professional mess, and because he didn’t try to stop it, his household will be punished. Eli was not surprised. Samuel, however, will go on to be a respected prophet and the one to usher in the first king of Israel.
It makes us wonder if God’s voice was really rare in those days, if visions truly were not widespread or if it was that God was speaking but the people weren’t listening. It’s hard for us to hear words we don’t want to hear. It would be hard to believe this is the first time God had called Eli on the carpet for his irresponsible parenting. But now he hears because while he’s been deaf to God’s voice, little Samuel is not. The boy hears and delivers the hard word from the Lord.
In these days of ours it can feel that God’s voice isn’t speaking to us, and God’s hand isn’t controlling the crazy divisive times we live in. This story is a cautionary tale that God is always speaking and doing. The problem is that we often turn a deaf ear and a blind eye. Let those who have ears, hear; eyes, see!
Acts 10:34-39a
34Peter began to speak to [Cornelius and his household]: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, 35but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. 36You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ—he is Lord of all. 37That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: 38how 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. 39We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem.
I have the impression that most people don’t have Bible verses memorized from the Book of Acts. I could be wrong. It’s a collection of stories from the beginning years after Jesus’ resurrection and ascension that describes those early issues facing the first church and the ways the Spirit led them through this new Day and new Way. There are some wonderful teachable moments in those chapters that always seem to be relevant for the church of every time and place. This scripture is part of a long story in Acts 10 and 11. You might hear it referenced as the Story of Peter and Cornelius. The Holy Spirit was hard at work leading Peter, a follower of Jesus, to Cornelius, a non-Jew who was a Roman military leader. This story ultimately leads Peter and the early Jewish Christian community to the understanding that the gospel message was also for the Gentiles (non-Jews), not the Jewish community only. While this might seem like a no-brainer to us all these centuries later, it was a huge ah-ha moment back then. But, let’s face it, the church has continued to have periodic ah-ha moments about who is included in Christ’s church – both in the pew and in the pulpit.
A verse I have memorized from Acts comes from this story. It is the first verse of Peter’s witness statement when he realizes that he and Cornelius have been led together by the Spirit. He proclaims: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, 35but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. Wow!
“I understand that God shows no partiality.” In my Lutheran liturgical tradition this passage from Acts is always our first scripture reading on Easter Day. What that means is, before we even hear the story of Jesus resurrection from one of the gospels, we hear the gospel proclamation: God shows no partiality!
God’s work through Christ and the Spirit are not once-upon-a-time events. They continue to occur in the present, including among all of us now. Our faith community isn’t built around the celebration of historical events but the celebration of current events – what God is doing among us right now. One of our gospel celebrations is that God shows no partiality. A core witness of the Book of Acts is that God works in our world and in our church in unexpected ways.
Dr. Virginia Mollenkott was for decades an evangelical lesbian Bible scholar who said she was radicalized by the Bible. She wrote of this verse in Acts 10 saying, Acts 10:34 quotes Peter’s realization that ‘God shows no partiality,’ a realization that should silence any claim that God is only on our side. . . When almost everyone you live and work with believes and behaves more or less the way you do, it is easy to believe that your way is the only way. But in a society in which Protestants, Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, skeptics and atheists rub shoulders with one another at work and school, people start to learn, as Oscar Wilde did, that “the truth is rarely pure and never simple.
I find beauty in the rite of baptism because it is so impartial. As Peter discovered 2,000 years ago, the gift of the gospel is available to everyone. Any questions about gender, race, a difficult past, sexual orientation, age; all wash away in the waters of baptism and fall to the bottom of the bowl. For truly, God shows no partiality.
Luke 1
26In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, 27to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” 29But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. 30The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus.
For the Christian, the celebration of Christmas is a touchstone of our faith. In the New Testament, especially in the Book of Acts and the letters of Paul, the original disciples of Jesus were the touchstone of faith or more generally, it was Jerusalem. Even though Paul was an advocate of preaching among the Gentiles, along with the Jews, the Bible works hard to show that he was not an outlier, not a rogue preacher. He seeks the support of the home church in Jerusalem over and over. What was critical about this was the original disciples (called apostles following the resurrection) were the touchstone with and the eyewitness link to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Two millennia later, we seek to return to our touchstone of faith on a regular basis.
The scriptures certainly provide a ready touchstone to Jesus and to the faith. But traditions of the faith such as liturgy, rituals, and ways of life do as well. Sometimes in our modern era, we assume that ancient traditions are no longer relevant. We’re encouraged to let the old things go in order to progress. But often, we can progress, do better when we return and relearn our traditions. We need these touchstones to ground ourselves. I don’t believe wings can grow strong without roots.
As a parent with adult children, I’ve been surprised by this frequently. Little rituals that we did in our home, religious and cultural, created a framework for their lives. A ritual I thought was no big deal, like tacking up a cheap birthday banner on the fireplace at every birthday; ended up being a treasured memory. So did scones on Christmas morning, Easter bunny bread, Christmas stockings, and lighting a candle at dinner every night. Most valuable in families are the treasured touchstones that connect us to generations past. Maybe it’s great-grandma’s cookie recipe or a Christmas ornament that’s been passed down.
Our Christmas celebrations, especially those in worship, are a touchstone to the very beginning of our faith. We sing hymns we seldom sing any other time of year and hear the traditional Christmas story that was written down near the year 70 C.E. Touchstone.
Celebrating our roots is life giving. Deep roots feed our faith with holy nutrients that give strength to our budding wings. Christmas blessings!
John 1
6There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light.
19This is the testimony given by John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” 20He confessed and did not deny it, but confessed, “I am not the Messiah.” 21And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the prophet?” He answered, “No.” 22Then they said to him, “Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” 23He said,
“I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness,
‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ ”
as the prophet Isaiah said.
24Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. 25They asked him, “Why then are you baptizing if you are neither the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?” 26John answered them, “I baptize with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, 27the one who is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandal.” 28This took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing.
There are many characters in what we call the Christmas Story. Some even have put a kneeling Santa in their nativity scenes. You see most of these characters in children’s Christmas plays, but not all of them. Certain characters in scripture are left out of the script. No children’s play includes King Herod, nor his soldiers who killed all the babies in Bethlehem.
And totally ignored in our decorations, our cookies, our characters, is the figure of John the Baptist preaching at the corner of wilderness and repentance. He wears weird clothes, eats locusts in the desert, and is a fire and brimstone preacher. In some ways, he’s like the streetcorner preacher many of us avoid by passing on the other side of the road.
It's understandable that we don’t include the more disturbing parts of Luke and Matthew in our stories for children. But as adults, we need the whole story because part of coming to maturity is discovering that Christmas isn’t all glitter and sleigh bells. Christ comes at Christmas not to give us a merry holiday, but because as John preached, the world needs repentance and salvation. Jesus came to give us those Christmas gifts.
The Lutheran Palestinians in Bethlehem have created a new manger scene for this year as they live during warfare. Instead of laying Baby Jesus in a manger of straw, they have laid him amid a bed of rubble gathered from all the bombing. (Pictured here is that creation inside Christmas Lutheran in Bethlehem). It is a reminder of all the children who have been killed in the conflict between Israel and Gaza.
As adult disciples, we know that as Herod killed all the babies under two in Bethlehem, such slaughter is still going on. We know that as the Holy Family escaped this slaughter by escaping to Egypt, people still run for their lives to other countries for safety. We know we are broken people in need of repentance and renewal as John preached millennia ago. We don’t need to share all that with our kids at Christmas. It's best to start with the beautiful gift that is Christmas which endures forever.
Later we can learn about the other characters of scripture we once wrote out of the script. When we are afraid, desperate, or hopeless, John will be there with a finger pointing to Christ, the gift of Christmas. That, after all, was his calling: to point to the One who comes in the name of the Lord. We still need such preachers.
Isaiah 40
6A voice says, “Cry out!”
And I said, “What shall I cry?”
All people are grass,
their constancy is like the flower of the field.
7The grass withers, the flower fades,
when the breath of the Lord blows upon it;
surely the people are grass.
8The grass withers, the flower fades;
but the word of our God will stand forever.
9Get you up to a high mountain,
O Zion, herald of good tidings;
lift up your voice with strength,
O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings,
lift it up, do not fear;
say to the cities of Judah,
“Here is your God!”
Before we hear a cry in the Bethlehem stable, we hear a cry in the wilderness. The first Advent cry from the wilderness comes from the iconic fortieth chapter of Isaiah. This part of scripture is the essence of Advent as much as Luke 2 is essence of Christmas.
Centuries later, we hear the gospeler Mark narrate the story of John the Baptist. John is named the voice crying in the wilderness. He tells God’s people to prepare for and repent in expectation of the coming of God. His preaching puts up the Christmas decorations as we get ready to hear a baby’s cry.
John was a harsh, but honest, preacher and a citizen of the wilderness. No doubt many were turned off by him. But the baby who cried in the manger grew up to be John’s number one fan. Jesus admired his straightforward sermons, his laser-focused theology, and the ethics he demanded. We should be curious to know why Jesus admired him so.
Perhaps he admired John’s altruism, his consistent focus outside of himself. He didn’t make any of his preaching about him. For John the Baptist the only thing that mattered was what God was doing in the world. And what matters for us is how we will actively participate in what our God is doing and desires.
The season of Advent ramps up the call to get out of ourselves, out of our bubble; calls us to stop making all our excuses for non-action or apathy like: I’m so busy, I’m too old, I don’t have time or I don’t have much money. We need to repent of even entertaining these as legitimate reasons for ignoring our discipleship.
The voice of one crying in the wilderness is still crying to us now: Prepare, repent, stay alert. God has things for us to do in this world. Let’s all get going! Honey- covered grasshoppers, anyone?
Mark 13
[Jesus said:] 24“In those days, after that suffering,
the sun will be darkened,
and the moon will not give its light,
25and the stars will be falling from heaven,
and the powers in the heavens will be shaken.
26Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in clouds’ with great power and glory. 27Then he will send out the angels, and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.
When many of us finish reading a book, we often have an opinion about whether we liked the ending. One of the reasons folks love Christmas Hallmark movies is that we know no matter how many broken relationships are in the plot, no matter the crazy misunderstandings along the way; by the end of the movie all will be made right. Happy Endings are one of our favorite holiday snacks! Perhaps some love these rather sappy stories because they hope their broken relationships and the misunderstandings in their families might be right one day as well.
I don’t hear such appreciation or disappointment around the way movies or stories begin. Except, for the meh beginning notes around the season of Advent. We start by lighting a lone candle on very dark nights in our religious lives while our secular lives have decked every hall and turned on every string of lights we have. Now, I don’t think we need to shame and blame culture for celebrating Christmas with Santa Clauses rocking Baby Jesus. I don’t think those shaming sermons work one bit here in 2023, if they ever did. But, as Christians, we do have a religious tradition with roots in the 5th C that has a different purpose in our discipleship. For many of us, we can engage in somber Advent and crazy Christmas at the same time. When we can hold these two things in balance while standing on one foot, we are better equipped to teach and mentor others who have never seen an Advent wreath or Chrismon Tree.
Advent was established 1.5 millennia ago as a penitential season just as Lent is. And, both Advent and Lent are periods of time originally set aside to help new Christians prepare for their baptisms on either Epiphany or Easter Day. During these weeks they would engage in fasting, praying, and study of the Christian life. Not quite how we live through the weeks before Christmas, right? For us not so new Christians, it remains a time of waiting and watching for the coming of Christ – at Christmas and at the end of time. Frankly, no one is going to help you with that kind of Advent other than the church and its liturgy. Welcome to worship.
As we gather for the First Sunday of Advent, we are far removed from the stories we long to hear of Mary and Gabriel, Joseph and Baby Jesus, shepherds and wise men. Those will come, but not for a few weeks. This story opens with the end of time rather than with the beginning of a baby. Instead the opening chapter of Advent is the 13th chapter of Mark.
Here the adult Jesus speaks of the end of the age imagining the stars shaking out of the sky. He’s vague on when these things will happen. It’s an odd-sounding scripture on a Sunday when we are suddenly surrounded by the church’s decorated trees and swags of garland. My preference is to have no decorations for the first two Sundays of Advent except for the lone Advent wreath. But liturgical preferences must sometimes give way to practical concerns of times to decorate and the fact that most folks won’t be in worship all the Sundays of Advent, so we need to be always ready with our seasonal finery.
Given all that, we will place side-by-side scriptures about the end of time with decorations celebrating the coming Christmastide. It’s not perfect but placing two different things side by side and seeing how it strikes you or how it teaches you something makes for a great point. In fact, the placing of different things side-by-side and learning something new is the very definition of the word “parable.’
The congregation for whom Mark is writing would likely have experienced the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. This was their September 11th but even more so. For the Jews, Rome destroying the Temple was like killing God since God abiding in the Temple was a deep part of their piety and religion. It seemed both like the end of the world and the end of God.
Jesus certainly acknowledges that there are many endings – to empires, to traditions, to rulers, to peaceful times, and to our very lives. Everything has an end, even things that have very long lives. But to people surrounded by the ruins of the Temple, to people who had living memories of the crucifixion, these words of Mark 13 were vessels of hope in hopeless times. God will have the final word and will have a stunning victory over all that grieves us and drains our hope.
This is the beginning chapter in the Advent/Christmas story. We begin with the hope that comes at the end. It is our brightest light of the season.