Month: January 2014

Epiphany 4A: A Reversal of What We Know

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Door to new worldOLD TESTAMENT:  Micah 6: 1-8

To read the Lectionary Old Testament passage, click here

The writings known as Micah were probably written during the reigns of three kings of Judah: Jotham (742-735 BCE) was a time of growing fear and unrest, Ahaz (735-715 BCE) came when Israel (the Northern Kingdom) was experiencing internal rebellions and rapid turnover of kings, and Hezekiah (715-687 BCE) was the time when Sennacherib marched on and destroyed most of Judah and Jerusalem barely survived.  Micah is associated with Moresheth, a small town about 25 miles from Jerusalem and probably did most of his writing during the reign of Ahaz, when there was great oppression from the upper class.

His message is assurance that this time of oppression would end and a new ruler would come and usher in a time of salvation.  The prophet is claiming a coming new Davidic king, one that would rule relying on the strength of God.  Keep in mind that in this time of exile, it appeared that the Davidic line would be ending.  The prophecy was a reminder that God would keep the promises that God had made, offering new hope to the people in despair.

This passage that we read ends with one of the most familiar and most quoted lines in the Bible.  It sounds so simple—just do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly.  What more do we need to hear?  But back up.  We are told that God has a problem with the people and is going to deal with them.  The people have actually failed in their covenant to God.  And they know it.  They have looked at their lives through God’s eyes and the scene is not a pretty one.  The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.  Those with power are taking and using the resources of the less powerful and leaving them out in the cold, so to speak.  Wealth is becoming concentrated in the hands of a smaller and smaller group of people while homelessness and poverty are growing at an escalating pace.  Clean water is in short supply.  There were those who do not have education or insurance.  (Oh, sorry, I accidentally jumped ahead about 2700 years!)  But the worshipping community just goes right on worshipping and living piously as though nothing was wrong, wondering when this whole Reign of God thing is going to come to fruition.

So, what, they ask, can they do to make it up to God, to make it up to the community and to God?  Nothing except what God has said—live justice, love kindness, walk humbly.  In other words, our faith is not to be measured in piety but in terms of justice and relationships with others and with God.  The object is to overcome separation from God and from each other.  Our religion should be a religion of mercy and justice.  That is the way that God is made flesh; that is the way that we experience the Reign of God.  The prophet Micah would say that right worship and right conduct are undividable; you cannot have one without the other.  Justice and piety are two sides of the same coin.

The truth is, we people of faith, according to Micah, are called to question those systemic injustices that continue in our world.  That’s hard.  After all, what can we really do about them?  Do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly.  And if you read Micah, you know that it’s not really just a suggestion.  It’s who we are and who we’re called to be.  It’s the Reign of God coming into our midst. 

  1. What  does this passage mean for you?
  2. What  does it mean to do justice? To love kindness? To walk humbly with God?
  3. What  evidence do you see of the Reign of God in our world?
  4. Why is it so difficult to embrace that vision?
  5. What happens when justice and piety become separated?

NEW TESTAMENT:  1 Corinthians 1: 18-31

To read the Lectionary Epistle passage, click here

Once again, Paul is dealing with the people of Corinth.  Earlier in this chapter, he has been bemoaning the divisions in the Corinthian church community.  He starts here not really taking sides, but addressing the issue of wisdom and pointing out that wisdom in Christ is not the same as the wisdom of the world.  He is not attacking being “wise”, but is calling them to a more profound wisdom.

Think about it.  The ugly sight of a mangled human body hanging on a cross confronts normal worldly values.  But these are not worldly values. And this first century church, no less than we, have tried to “clean up” this image and fit it into something that makes sense within the normalcy of the world.  Paul is warning against the structures and intentions of the world that crucified Jesus and that are now trying to make it “presentable”.  Paul is reminding us that for those wise in the ways of God, the cross is salvation.

What the world sees as failure, Paul sees as the beginning of wisdom—real wisdom.  (And keep in mind here that first century Corinth was entrenched in its love for wisdom just like all Greek states.  Paul was hitting them where they lived.)  The cross, the wisdom of God, is downright subversive.  It’s hard to swallow.  In fact, it’s just downright foolishness—the foolishness of a God who would expect those of us living in a world where it’s hard to make a living, hard sometimes to get by, hard sometimes to get what we’re due, to simply do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.

One of the dangers of being in church as often as I am is that it all starts to make sense. I speak of the Christian faith so casually and effortlessly that I begin to think, “Fine thing, this Christianity. Makes good sense.” And then I find myself believing all sorts of things in church that I wouldn’t let anyone put over on me in the real world. That which people would choke on in everyday speech, they will swallow if it’s in a sermon. That’s a blessing for those of us who get paid to preach Christ crucified.

And so Kierkegaard could say, “Christianity has taken a giant stride into the absurd,” and again, “Remove from Christianity its ability to shock and it is altogether destroyed. It then becomes a tiny superficial thing, capable neither of inflicting deep wounds nor of healing them.”

It’s when the absurd starts to sound reasonable that we should begin to worry. “Blessed are the meek. . . .”  “Thou shalt not kill.” “Love your enemies.” “Go, sell all you have and give to the poor.” Be honest now. Blessed are the meek? Try being meek tomorrow at work and see how far you get. Meekness is fine for church, but in the real world the meek get to go home early with a pink slip and a pat on the back. Blessed are those who are peacemakers; they shall get done to them what they are loath to do to others. Blessed are the merciful; they shall get it done to them a second time. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake; they shall be called fanatics.

As Paul says, when you hear the gospel not with Sunday-morning ears but with Monday-morning ears, it can sound foolish indeed — tragically foolish or comically foolish, depending upon one’s point of view.

Is the world more like Sunday morning or Monday morning?

A nation that spends billions on sophisticated military hardware and computerized weapons only to be rendered impotent by a mob of poor, screaming Islamic students ought to appreciate the irony of how powerless the powerful can be. Our scientists make medical progress and invent the X-ray, only to find it to be a major cause of cancer. Our advanced technology moves us to the brink of a new Dark Age. It is shocking. how unwise people of wisdom can be…

Along with the world, we expected to see a savior coming to take charge on our terms. Then the parade comes, and we find that we are standing in the wrong place to get a good view. Here comes the carpenter’s son, bouncing on the back of a donkey — not coming for breakfast with [the president and his wife], or dinner with Congress, or [a guest seat with the first lady at The State of the Union Address]. The smart ones, the ones who are well adjusted to the status quo, the ones in the know, neither see nor know — so the story goes. Here is a messiah who does not make sense.

Only the very young, the very old, the women and the simpletons see him. They are standing in the right place to get a proper view. Along with the poor, the maimed, the blind, the lame, the prisoners and the poor old crazed men like Paul, these “fools” see things as they really are.

As for us smart ones, we know better. We know that if we work hard, achieve, get advanced degrees, adjust to the way things are, and act sensibly, we shall be in the know. It all depends on how you look at it.  (Excerpt from “Looking Like Fools”, by William Willimon, The Christian Century, March 10, 1982.)

What it boils down to is that this way of life to which we have become accustomed is possibly not the way of life to which we are called.  We need to look at our lives through the lens of doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God.  What exactly does that mean?  And what do we have to change to do that?

  1. What does this passage mean for you?
  2. What, here, is wisdom?
  3. Do you think we try to “clean up” Christianity or God so that it will fit into our society?  In what ways?

 

GOSPEL:  Matthew 5: 1-12

To read the Lectionary Gospel passage, click here

Most scholars agree that the core of what is known as the Beatitudes goes back to Jesus.  It is essentially a reversal of the usual value system that was in place in the first century.  The Beatitude was present in the Jewish tradition as a form of proclamation found in wisdom and prophetic writings.  They declare an objective reality as the result of a divine act.  Here, the opposite of “blessed” is not unhappy but cursed.

One thing to note is that the form of these Beatitudes uses two verbs:  are and will.  Each beatitude begins in the present and moves to future tense.  They are, then expressions of what is already true in the Christian community not, necessarily, for individuals, but in community.  The move to the future tense indicates that the life of the kingdom must wait for ultimate validation until God finishes the new creation.  There is a resistance, then, against Christianity as a philosophy of life that would make one healthy, wealthy, and wise.  It is not a scheme to reduce stress, lose weight, advance one’s career, make one financially successful, or preserve one from illness.  It is, rather, a way of living based on the sure and firm hope that one walks in the way of God and that righteousness and peace will finally prevail.

The Matthean beatitudes are spoken from a mountain, probably since, as one writing to the Jewish community, this would depict that it was something important.  (Reminiscent of Moses on Mt.Sinai.)  The version told by the writer of Luke is spoken from a “level place” (sometimes called the Sermon on the Plain.  Matthew’s beatitudes are spoken to a “crowd”.  When Jesus speaks in the Lucan version, he speaks specifically to his disciples.  Matthew version have no corresponding “woes”.  In Luke, there are four “woes” corresponding to four “blessings”.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer said this:  Humanly speaking, we could understand and interpret the Sermon on the Mount in a thousand different ways.  Jesus knows only one possibility:  simple surrender and obedience, not interpreting it or applying it, but doing and obeying it.  That is the only way to hear his word.  He does not mean that it is to be discussed as an ideal; he really means us to get on with it.

The Beatitudes lay out a vision of a reversal of the world we know.  Jesus calls us to a radical kingdom that is totally different than the world in which we live.  Now don’t think that Jesus is merely laying out the conditions under which we would be blessed.  It is rather a promise of a radical reversal, an upside-down (or right-side-up) world.  It is a promise from a God that wants the best for us, a God that sees that we will indeed be blessed.  That is the promise—a blessed relationship with God.  So this is a picture of what that Kingdom looks like.  It is the way it should be and the way it will be.  The Beatitudes are meant to be descriptive rather than instructive.

Brendan Freeman, a Trappist monk, said that “the Beatitudes draw our hearts out of themselves into a new way of understanding our lives…they are deliberately incomplete.  They wait the inclusion of our lives.  Each person fills in the blank space with the details of his or her own life’s situation.” 

  1. What does this passage mean for you?
  2. What is the most difficult Beatitude for you to grasp?
  3. What difference does it mean to look at them as descriptive rather than instructive?
  4. In what ways might we interpret The Beatitudes incorrectly?

  

Some Quotes for Further Reflection:

More than a few Christian might be surprised to learn that the call to be involved in creating justice for the poor is just as essential and nonnegotiable within the spiritual life as is Jesus’ commandment to pray and keep our private lives in order. (Ronald Rolheiser, The Holy Longing)

Do Justice

If there is any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again.  (William Penn)

Love Kindness

Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real.  (Thomas Merton)

 

Walk Humbly

 

Closing

Because we love the world, we pray now, O [God], for grace to quarrel with it, O Thou whose lover’s quarrel with the world is the history of the world . . . Lord, grant us grace to quarrel with the worship of success and power . . . to quarrel with all that profanes and trivializes [people] and separates them . . . number us, we beseech Thee, in the ranks of those who went forth from this place longing only for those things for which Thou dost make us long, [those] for whom the complexity of the issues only served to renew their zeal to deal with them, [those] who alleviated pain by sharing it; and [those] who were always willing to risk something big for something good . . . O God, take our minds and think through them, take our lips and speak through them. Take our hearts and set them on fire.  Amen.   (William Sloane Coffin, available at http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=3160, accessed 26 January, 2011)

Conversion of St. Paul: A Culture of Change

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Yes, you get a bonus this week!  Our church is using the Scriptures for the Feast Day of the Conversion of St. Paul, so you get extra Scriptures.  The usual Lectionary texts were included in the previous post.

 

"The Conversion of Saul", Michelangelo, 1542-1545, Frescoes, Pauline Chapel, Vatican, Italy
“The Conversion of Saul”, Michelangelo, 1542-1545, Frescoes, Pauline Chapel, Vatican, Italy

OLD TESTAMENT:  Acts 26: 9-21

To read the First Reading for the Conversion of St. Paul, click here

This Scripture is not really the account of Paul’s conversion, per se, but rather a reflection of it in the context of Paul’s defense before King Agrippa.  We know Paul’s story.  His conversion actually occurs in the ninth chapter of Acts, when scales fell from his eyes and he saw his life anew.  At this point, Paul has been a prisoner for more than two years in Caesarea and there is now a hand over of power of sorts to the new Roman Governor, Festus.  The new governor invites the Jewish king Agrippa to hear Paul’s case.  So Paul stands before both the head of the Jewish state and the Roman governor and tells the tale of what happened to him on the Road to Damascus and why he saw himself as being true to the vision of God that had begun the whole thing.

We read this passage as part of the Feast Day celebrating the Conversion of Paul—not Paul himself, mind you, but his conversion, his change, his vision, his sight.  Now we logical Methodists don’t really know what to do with this.  It sounds a little like a super hero who bursts out of his cloths revealing the letter of his true name and true self.  But that’s not really the way it happens.  The change for Paul was surely painful on some level.  After all, he had to take a good hard look at his own life.  And then he had to CHANGE—not just change his place or his clothes or even his name (his name didn’t really change on that road; rather, I think the translation changed later).  He had to CHANGE.  He moved from one that preached against this new way, one that fought tooth and nail to make sure that it didn’t take on, that this Gospel of Jesus Christ would just die a fast death before it messed everything up.  And then he CHANGED.  He saw something differently, something that moved him, perhaps kicking and screaming all the way, to being a witness for The Way of Jesus Christ.  Somewhere along the way, Paul saw something beyond himself.  Somewhere along the way, on that road or perhaps even before, he experienced the Risen Christ in a way that even he could not dispute.  Somewhere on that dusty road in modern-day Syria, Paul experienced the holy and the sacred.

The mystery of God’s transcendence is never static or predictable.  But in the midst of our ordinary and sometimes mundane lives, we are given glimpses of the holy and the sacred.  They come without warning.  They come without bidding.  Sometimes they come when we’re not quite ready.  But life is not just about those pinnacles of holy sightings.  If we spent all of our lives on the mountaintop, we would certainly get a bit of altitude sickness.  Life is an ordinary road on which we travel.  It’s got hills and valleys and a few potholes along the way.  And every once in a while, holiness enters and dances with us.  And then we must return to tell the story.

I must admit that over the years, I have had sort of a love-hate relationship with Paul.  I don’t know if it is his pushiness or his run-on sentences.  I have a feeling that it has more to do with the fact that he DID change.  After all, it is hard to put my own life against his.  When God dances into my path, I probably tend to cower in the corner a little, wanting to change, but not really willing to take the first step.  Maybe this week is not so much a celebration of Paul or Paul’s conversion, but a reminder that we are all called to turn and dance with the Divine.      

  1. What does this passage mean for you?
  2. What is your experience of Paul and his life?
  3. Where do you see your own faith journey in Paul’s?
  4. What does this passage call us to do as followers of this Way of Jesus Christ?

 

NEW TESTAMENT:  Galatians 1: 11-24

To read the Epistle passage for the Conversion of St. Paul, click here

Paul had founded the churches in the area in and around Galatia and then had moved on to do the same in other places.  But after he left, there were those who had questioned his authority, his “pedigree”, so to speak.  Instead, they were insisting that these new Christians had to first become Jews (or, in other words, be circumcised) or they were not really righteous at all.

So Paul begins by first re-establishing his authority not as a rabbi, a trained teacher, but rather as one called by God.  Paul doesn’t talk about his “conversion”, as if he is part of another religion.  Instead Paul refers to his experience as his “calling”, an experience in which his authority came not from human succession but from God.

This letter is odd.  It doesn’t begin with the normal salutation of the day.  Instead, Paul gets right to the point.  He is frustrated and angry that this newly-formed community seems to have gotten so incredibly off-course.

This is a difficult passage.  Paul is insisting that his calling, his authority, is divinely-received.  There is no tradition of the church or teachers.  There is no apostolic authority bestowed or any “laying on of hands” as Paul was ordained.  Paul, in fact, had never met Jesus and had actually spent years fighting against the very version of the Gospel that he was now so vehemently proclaiming.  This passage could very easily be interpreted as one in support of “non-organized” religion.  And yet, Paul is not completely denouncing Judaism; he is instead calling it to renewal.  (Hmm! It seems that most new denominations or new religions begin with a call of renewal for the ones that are already there.)  It’s not really clear if Paul sees himself as called to a revelation about Jesus Christ or a revelation given by Jesus Christ.  But Paul’s understanding of the faith was not one based on a set of rules or traditions but rather one that offered the tradition of faith to those on the outside.  Paul dared to believe that the revelation of God and the love of Christ is not limited by the bounds of our understanding of who God is.

In Feasting on the Word, Wendy Farley says it like this:

If this letter is bad news for authoritarianism, it can be good news for those committed to the constant renewal of Christianity.  It is good news for those outside systems of power who might see more clearly ways in which Christianity has cut off some of its own limbs in the name of tradition.  It is good news for all those oppressed by the church:  women, slaves, the poor.  It is good news for al those lovers of Christ whose wisdom about the Divine is distorted or repressed by leaders of the church.

Stepping back from the heat of this controversy, it seems that Christianity absorbed more of James than of Paul.  Though the Holiness Code and circumcision did not come to define Christianity, the rest of the Hebrew Scripture remains authoritative for Christians.  The authority of the church and its leaders has also survived just fine, but Paul reminds us that, as important as tradition may be it can never be adequate to the gracious and extravagant love God pours out on us.  For Paul, corralling grace in a particular community or in relation to particular practices will always violate the gospel.

I, personally, love the tradition of the church.  It keeps me grounded.  It gives me a springboard on which to start my journey of faith.  I don’t think Paul was against that.  He just didn’t believe that we should stop there.  So, Paul would probably contend that there was nothing wrong with holding the traditions of the faith and the traditions of the church close.  You just need to let them breathe into the present and leave room for the Holy Spirit to breathe into them a little.

1)      What meaning does this passage hold for you?

2)      What does holding too tightly to traditions do to the church?

3)      What does letting traditions go do to the church?

4)      Why is it that this balance is so difficult for us today?

GOSPEL:  Matthew 10: 16-22

To read the Gospel passage for the Conversion of St. Paul, click here

Well this is something that will just get people to sign right up!  But, seriously, this is not going to be a cake walk.  I think Paul’s ministry proved that.  These uncomfortable words are yet another reminder that this is not easy, that disciples are living an alternative Way in a culture that does not welcome it, that isn’t “built” for it.  But perseverance will depict the Gospel that you are called to preach.  And some way, somehow, you will be given what you need.

Buried in these words of seeming doom and gloom is a promise—that no matter what, God will be with you.  You will never be left alone.  But the Way is not the “easy way”.  It is worth far more than that.  The passage that we read begins with a reminder that the followers of this new way were in the minority.  They were not part of “accepted society”; they were not part of the usual.  They were not going to be welcomed with open arms.  But they had something of vital importance to say, something imperative to do.  It was their reminder to not be swayed, to walk head first into society and be who they were called to be.  God would be with them.  The words and the acts would come.

Now I don’t know if we are uncomfortable because we don’t get this or because we do.  After all, most of us do not live in a faith minority.  There are those who even go so far as to call this country a “Christian nation” (although, they probably should discuss that with our deist fathers who signed the Constitution.)  The truth is, it is NOT hard to call yourselves Christian in this country.  But I would argue that it is still difficult to follow The Way.  After all, we live in a culture of change.  But I heard someone say (and apparently forgot who!) that “in a culture of change, it is the learner that is set for change; the well-learned are poised to accept things as they are.”

I don’t think God came in Christ to create a majority religion but rather to show us another way, to show us a way that is not necessarily easy but one that gives us Life.  We are called to be learners of this new way.  The warning from this passage still holds.  There are still sheep in the midst of wolves. (And probably a few wolves in sheep’s clothing!)  There are still those that will pull you away from who God is calling you to be.  Have faith…persevere…and, most importantly, learn, and listen…listen for the music that calls you to dance a different way and to tell others why you are dancing.  

  1. What does this passage mean for you?
  2. What does this say about discipleship?
  3. How can this passage speak to us in our context?
  4. What does this say about witnessing or proclaiming the Gospel?

Some Quotes for Further Reflection:

 Help me, Lord, to remember that religion is not to be confined to the church, or closet, nor exercised only in prayer and meditation, but that everywhere I am in Thy presence.(Susanna Wesley)

 I found out it is not what happens, it is how you tell it and who does the telling.  (Nancy Willard)

 If I were called upon to state in a few words the essence of everything I was trying to say both as a novelist and as a preacher, it would be something like this: Listen to your life. See it for the fathomless mystery that it is. In the boredom and pain of it no less than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way to the holy and hidden heart of it because in the last analysis all moments are key moments and life itself is grace. (Frederick Buechner)

 Closing

You are the god who makes extravagant promises.  We relish your great promises of fidelity and presence and solidarity, and we exude in them.  Only to find out, always too late, that your promise always comes in the midst of a hard, deep call to obedience.  You are the God who calls people like us, and the long list of mothers and fathers before us, who trusted the promise enough to keep the call.  So we give you thanks that you are a calling God, who calls always to dangerous new places.  We pray enough of your grace and mercy among us that we may be among those who believe your promises enough to respond to your call.  We pray in the one who embodied your promise and enacted your call, even Jesus.  Amen.  ((“A Hard, Deep Call to Obedience”, from Searcy’s Awed to Heaven, Rooted in Earth, p. 90)