John Shearman's Lectionary

INTRODUCTIONS TO THE SCRIPTURE

Second Sunday After Pentecost

Proper 5  Ordinary 10

June 6, 2010

(NOTE: During the Season of Pentecost, some traditions follow a different set of readings from the Old Testament and Psalms. These alternate readings will be included in both the brief introductions and the more complete analyses.)

I KINGS 17:8-16. (Alternate 17:17-24) This passage introduces of a series of stories in which Elijah the prophet appears as God’s spokesperson in very difficult times during the 9^th century BCE. Both passages reveal Elijah as a man of God who follows God’s directions. The alternate reading raises the serious question of how we deal with the all too common experience of having good things turn out badly. Does such experiences hinder us from following God’s will to love others with abandon, “wastefully,” as John S. Spong says?

PSALM 146. This brief psalm of praise, one of the five exultant hymns that end the Psalter, celebrates the hopes of Israel in God’s desire for freedom and justice.

PSALM 30. (Alternate) The psalmist praises God for saving him from death in a critical illness. After at first expressing overconfidence about God’s favor, he realizes how much he owes to God for answering his prayer of distress.

GALATIANS 1:11-24. To convince the Galatians of his trustworthiness, Paul reviews his past as a  faithful Jew who first persecuted the Christians in Jerusalem, then received his own call to be an apostle to the Gentiles in a direct revelation from Jesus himself.

LUKE 7:11-17. This passage tells of Jesus raising a widow’s only son is reminiscent of a similar miracle performed by Elijah. Undoubtedly that Old Testament story influenced Luke’s narrative, as the people’s astonished reaction shows.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS.

I KINGS 17:8-16 (Alternate 17:17-24). This passage introduces of a series of stories in which Elijah the prophet appears as God’s spokesperson in very difficult times during the 9^th century BCE. Frequent references to Elijah in the New Testament Gospels indicate how important this cycle of stories was in the Hebrew scriptures.

After the reigns of David and Solomon, a civil war had divided their kingdom in two. The northern ten tribes continued the name of Israel but were ruled by kings not descended from David with Samaria as their capital city. Judah, formed by the southern two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, was smaller and weaker, but maintained the Davidic dynasty and its capital in Jerusalem.

Elijah the Tishbite, came from Gilead, one of ten tribal regions of the northern kingdom Israel. He was a strong leader of Yahwism during a time of serious encroachment by Baalism from the coastal region of Tyre. His dominant opponent was Jezebel, King Ahab’s Tyrian queen. It is manifestly significant that these two incidents took place in Sidon, also on the coast and closely associated with Tyre.

No clear information has ever been found as to the location of Tishbe in Gilead, the name of the town from which Elijah supposedly came. Some maps do show the site of Tishbe near the Wadi Cherith in Gilead, an eastern tributary of the Jordan River. The name may have been related to an occupational name for a tribe of non-native settlers, (“one of the toshab class”) the Kenites, renamed the Rechabites, whom Solomon engaged in the importation of horses and chariots (1 Kings 10:26-29).After following instructions from Yahweh to go to the Wadi Cherith, Elijah was sustained during a severe drought and famine by ravens that brought him food morning and evening (vss. 2-7). A subsequent message from Yahweh sent the prophet to Zarephath, a town near Sidon on the Mediterranean coast. There he asked a widow for food and drink, but she pleaded that she had only enough for herself and her son before suffering from starvation. Elijah promised in Yahweh’s name that her meal and oil would never run out (vss. 8-16) Later, according to the alternate reading (vss. 17-24), the widow’s son became ill and died, but Elijah revived him in a vividly described demonstration of the power of prayer.

Both passages reveal Elijah as a man of God who obeyed divine commands to go wherever he was sent. In doing so, he provided sustenance for a widow whose jars of meal and oil miraculously never failed and subsequently raised the widow’s son from the dead.

PSALM 146. This brief psalm of praise, one of the five exultant Hallel psalms that end the Psalter, celebrates the hopes of Israel in God’s desire for freedom and justice. The prophetic theme of hope of restoration sounds through the latter part of the song. It sings the praise of Yahweh as creator and redeemer, especially of those who are powerless and marginalized.

Vs. 3 points out the sharp contrast between the trustworthiness of Yahweh and the inconsistency of mortal sovereigns. The psalmist knew this from Israel’s long history of monarchs who failed to provide peace and security for their people in violent times much like those of our time in the Middle East.

Vss. 7b-9 repeats the name of Yahweh five times, as always translated “the Lord.” One can imagine those familiar with the words joining their voices to the cantor in a jubilant crescendo as the divine tetragrammaton YHWH was recited in whatever way this sacred name was used. Then in the closing benediction proclaiming the eternal sovereignty of Yahweh, the congregation responds with a final outburst of praise.

PSALM 30. (Alternate) The psalmist praises God for saving him from death in a critical illness. After at first expressing a certain overconfidence about God’s favor (vss. 6-7), he realizes how much he owes to God for answering his prayer of distress.

It is natural for a person to be exuberant about being restored suddenly to good health. Even with modern medicine capable of curing or alleviating many of the most severe illnesses once regarded as fatal less than a century ago, the fear of death persists. The Psalmist’s fear of death was expressed in vs. 2.

The Pit was another common Old Testament term, among several others, for the abode of the dead. Sheol was by far the most common, occurring sixty six times. Unlike the others, however, it was unique to the Hebrew language, and does not occur in any other Semitic language. Generally, the various terms for the abode of the dead conveyed the idea of a permanent, shadowy, chaotic but silent place. No Old Testament reference contains any concept of punishment or torment. The concept of an infernal hell came into existence only during the Hellenistic period probably influenced by Persian ideas.

The traditional concept of illness resulting from divine anger still lingers as the philosophical matrix of the poem (vs. 5). Despite this shadowed background to the psalm and the loss of prosperity, the poet had unmitigated praise for God’s beneficence. His pride had been restored to the extent that he could question divine justice in the death he had so recently escaped (vs. 9). His mourning had been transformed into joy (vs. 11).

In the 2^nd century BC, the psalm came into liturgical use for the rededication of the temple by Judas Maccabaeus now celebrated at the Jewish festival of Hanukkah.

GALATIANS 1:11-24. To convince the Galatians of his trustworthiness, Paul reviewed his past as a faithful Jew who first persecuted the Christians in Jerusalem, then received his own call to be an apostle to the Gentiles in a direct revelation from Jesus himself.

Paul often appeared as a person uncertain of his acceptance in the early Christian Church. In several of his letters, notably Corinthians and Galatians, he tried to reinforce his apostleship by frankly acknowledging how he had persecuted the church. At times he revealed a very low self-image, to use a modern psychological term for this personality trait. (Cf. 1 Cor. 15:9; Eph. 3:8)

On the other hand, Paul did not leave the matter there. He quickly asserted that his call to be the apostle to the Gentiles came directly from Jesus whose risen presence he had experienced in a dramatic epiphany on the Damascus Road. Because he was so deeply conscious of and perhaps still felt guilty about his previous life, he put that experience in the context of grace. In vs. 15 of this passage, he also described his vocation as preordained from birth.

Paul’s further elaboration of what he did after his conversion does not correlate with other summaries we have of that period. Except in this passage, no mention is made of his three year Arabian sojourn. He could have been referring to the vast stretch of territory along the major trade route from Damascus to the Red Sea ,formerly known as Edom/Idumea, then in the hands of the Nabateans whose capital was in Petra southeast of the Dead Sea (Cf. Acts 9:26-30; 26:12-20).

None of the sources should be treated as biography. However, in his Rabbi Paul: An Intellectual Biography, Bruce Chilton states that it was during this time that Paul “worked out the implications of his vision for himself during three years of self-imposed exile from all the people he knew, whether in Jerusalem or Tarsus.” Thus we are left with somewhat incoherent details that must remain forever so, despite the adamant claim in Gal. 1:20, “In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!” Even the apostle must be seen as one who looked back on his life, in this passage at least, with some ambivalence.

LUKE 7:11-17. This passage tells of Jesus raising a widow’s only son was reminiscent of a similar miracle performed by Elijah. (1 Kings 17:17-24) Undoubtedly that Old Testament story influenced Luke’s narrative, as the people’s astonished reaction shows (vs. 16).

The emphasis in the story here was on Jesus’ compassion for the widow, not on his power to raise the dead. It exhibited Jesus’ gracious concern for the most vulnerable and helpless. By touching the bier, he exposed himself to contamination according to traditional Jewish holiness code. At the same time, he demonstrated that liturgical purity yields to the higher law of mercy (cf. Numbers 19:11). It is noteworthy that Jesus’ final action of giving the resuscitated man to his mother repeats the exact words of 1 Kings 17:23.

As Prof. George Caird asserted, there is no doubt the early church did have strong convictions that Jesus did return to life those whom others had declared dead. (Caird, George B. St. Luke. Pelican New Testament Commentaries, 1963, 110) Jesus is the source of life, Luke forcefully asserted in this pericope. So also should we be making the same assertion today.

While the story as Luke told it may cause skepticism to modern minds, there are significant values for our time to be found in his brief narrative of the miracle. To see the relevance of this pericope, we need only think of the contrast between governmental spending on weapons of war and that spent on education, health and alleviation of poverty in many nations including our own. There is also the steadily widening gap and lack of compromise between progressive and conservative political economies in Europe and North America regarding the ways to respond to the current financial crisis brought on by ever increasing national and international debt. Jesus did not offer political or economic solutions to modern problems. He did give us insight into God’s way of dealing with human misery and distress with endless compassion and kindness.

SOME ADDITIONAL PREACHING POINTS.

I KINGS 17:8-16. (Alternate 17:17-24). John Shelby Spong wrote the following in his weekly newsletter for May 5, 2010, in which he discussed the tragic death of a 25 year old daughter of close friends:

“Is it not in loving another and in giving ourselves to another that the essence of living and the joy of meaning are found? It is not easy to be human, but does not the joy outweigh the pain? So we have to choose. I choose life and love. I choose life-giving relationships even though this means that I must eventually endure pain and loss….

“If God is experienced as the source of life, then the only way to worship God is by living fully and, the more fully I live, the more this God, this source of life, becomes visible. I now see God as the source of love that is also in every living thing. Love is the power that enhances life and it is present in plants that turn their leaves to the sun, in the birds that feed their young in the nest, in the cat that licks the fur of its kittens, but this instinctual life-giving power comes to self-consciousness only in human beings. If God is experienced as the source of love, then the only way I can worship God is by loving wastefully, and the more wastefully I love, the more I  make God visible. “(Emphasis mine.)

GALATIANS 1:11-24. One historian described the Paul’s Arabian period as “a mysterious pause, a moment of suspense, in the apostle’s history, a breathless calm, which ushers in the tumultuous storm of his active missionary life.” See this website:

http://www.christiananswers.net/dictionary/paul.html .

Another website elaborates:

(http://www.truthinhistory.org/tracing-the-steps-of-the-apostle-paul.html)

“From the reading of the text in Acts 9:26-28 one would get the impression that Saul went directly from his escape at Damascus to Jerusalem. By his own admission he clarified the fact in his letter to the Galatians (1:16-17) that he “conferred not with flesh and blood” nor consulted with the Apostles in Jerusalem; but the Lord’s choice for him was to go to Arabia to be trained in the school of the Spirit in order that he might receive greater revelations concerning the mysteries of the Gospel of the glorified Christ.

“Nowhere in the Scriptures does it indicate which part of the vast area of Arabia he went to, but we can safely assume it was somewhere east of Damascus. In the writings of Luke in the book of Acts, he omits any mention of Paul’s trip to Arabia. At that time the area known as Arabia included the region governed by Aretas ( II Cor. 11:32) which extended from Damascus and east of the Jordan River south to Edom with Petra as its capital.”

Bruce Chilton added a note to his brief summary of the Arabian hiatus that there was no significant penetration of successful proselytizing among the   Nabateans in Acts. “Not mentioning Arabia would be sensible, however, if an apostle dear to Acts had tried to convert people there and gotten nowhere.” (Chilton, Rabbi Paul: An Intellectual Biography. Image Books, Doubleday, 2004. 276, n.12)

LUKE 7:11-17. Is there some reason to think of Luke’s Gospel as a further extension Mark’s structure of the narrative of Jesus’ life as stories invented by to tie in with the weekly lectionary in the Hellenist Jewish synagogues? In Jesus for the Non-Religious J. S. Spong presents this thesis as the basis for  understanding how the Gospels were composed. The theory was first proposed by Michael Goulder (1974) following Austin Farrer who had discarded the Q theory dating from the early 20^th century (1957, 1966). This highly speculative approach states that Jesus life and death first set forth in Mark can be seen as a interpretive liturgy for Hellenist Jewish Christians of the Diaspora still gathering on the Sabbath in synagogues on the great Jewish festivals from Rosh Hashanah to Passover. Similarly, in Matthew and Luke the scriptures were read and reinterpreted in terms of the period extending from Passover to Rosh Hashanah again.

On May 13, 2010 J. S. Spong summarized the composition of the Gospels In his weekly newsletter published on the Internet:

“What Mark had done was to provide Jesus stories appropriate to the synagogue celebrations from Rosh Hashanah (the John the Baptist story) to Passover (the crucifixion story). Rosh Hashanah, however, comes in the mid fall of the year and Passover comes in the early spring, so the gospel of Mark only covered six and a half months of the twelve month year, leaving out the five and a half months that separate Passover from Rosh Hashanah. There was, therefore, a desire after Mark’s gospel appeared to fill in that blank space with additional Jesus material, which soon became an imperative need. Within about a decade, Matthew wrote the first expansion of Mark and aimed his story at the disciples of Jesus who worshipped in rather traditional Jewish synagogues. Luke wrote the second expansion of Mark and he aimed his story at the community of Jesus’ disciples who worshipped at synagogues that were made up of dispersed Jews and those Gentile proselytes, who were beginning to be drawn into the synagogue community.” (Origins of the New Testament – Part XXIII: Matthew and the Liturgical Year of the Synagogue in An New Christianity For A New World. Subscribe to website at $26 US annually here: http://www.johnshelbyspong.com/publicsite/index.aspx.)

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
Fifth Sunday after Epiphany
Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
February 7, 2010

ISAIAH 6:1-13. Here we have another classic example of a prophet called to a special ministry. As the smoke of the morning sacrifice wafted through the temple, Isaiah had a vision and heard an angelic voice praising the holiness of God. He then realized his own and his fellow Israelites’ unworthiness before God. One of the angelic beings touched his lips with a live coal, thus cleansing him to speak. Isaiah heard the voice of God calling for a messenger and he responded. But the message God gave him to deliver was one of unmitigated judgment.

PSALM 138. Unlike most of the psalms, this hymn of thanksgiving by an individual is thought to be from a small “Davidic collection.” (Psalms 138-145.) This meant that it was ascribed to King David rather than being composed by him. It expresses gratitude for God’s blessing as well as trust in God’s love and purpose.

1 CORINTHIANS 15:1-11. In this passage beginning his great confession of the resurrection, Paul states as simply as possible what he had learned from the apostles. He had met some of them – notably Peter (Cephas) and James – in Jerusalem when he returned there some time after his conversion. First, he concentrated on the facts he had been told. Could this summary have been what the apostles in the earliest Christian community were teaching in the first years after the resurrection? Then he too makes his claim as “the least of the apostles” and reiterates his dependence on God’s grace for that.

LUKE 5:1-11. Behind the gospels as we now have them, there was a long tradition of stories about Jesus’ teaching and miracles repeated by word of mouth before being put into written form. Toward the end of the 1st century CE Luke gave a much more elaborate story than either Mark or Matthew. He connects this story of a miraculous catch of fish with the calling of the first disciples. John tells it as one of Jesus’ resurrection appearances (John 21). Taken together, the tradition represents a promise of the ultimate success of the apostolic mission.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS.

ISAIAH 6:1-13. Here we have another classic example of a prophet called to a special ministry. My OT professor, the late Rev. Dr. R.B.Y Scott, made this passage the starting point for his lectures on prophecy. He had written a highly regarded book, The Relevance of the Prophets, and at the time he was lecturing to us at McGill in 1948, he was writing the introduction and exegesis of Isaiah 1-39 for The Interpreter’s Bible, vol. 5. His analysis of this passage in this latter volume is a valuable contribution to the understanding of prophetic visions and oracles.

The ancient temple in Jerusalem faced east. The daily sacrifice was offered as the sun rose over the horizon formed by the Mount of Olives. Rays from the rising sun flooded into the temple through its great doors causing its burnished gold and copper accouterments to shine gloriously. As the smoke of the morning sacrifice wafted through the temple, Isaiah, saw a vision and heard angelic voices praising the holiness of God.

Isaiah was possibly a cousin and certainly a courtier of King Uzziah, who had just died. Uzziah’s reign was one of the longest of the kings of Judah, 783-742 BCE. In his last years he suffered from leprosy and was replaced by his son Jotham as regent. This was also the time when Assyrian power was on the rise throughout ancient Mesopotamia and the wider Middle East. Uzziah’s reign included an expansion into both Philistine territory to the west that controlled trade routes to Egypt and Edom, to the south where there were valuable trade routes to Arabia. As the prophecies of Amos and Micah also reveal, this was a very prosperous period in the nation’s history.

In this passage Isaiah was in mourning and went into the temple, as was his wont, to offer a lament. As he worshiped in the familiar surroundings, he sensed the divine presence in a dramatic new way. God, of course, is invisible; yet Isaiah did have such a vision. Or was it just the hem of God’s robe and the attending seraphim, which represented the divine presence to him? Quickly afterward, Isaiah recognized his own unworthiness before God and that of his fellow Judeans. The experience overwhelmed him. That he should become the prophet to proclaim God’s judgment on his nation’s moral and spiritual decay was furthest from his imagination. Great revelations come to faithful men and women in the midst of the mundane experiences of life.

In Isaiah’s vision, one of the angelic beings touched his lips with a live coal from the altar, thus cleansing him to speak for God. He heard the voice of God calling for a messenger and he responded, “Here am I, send me.” But the message God gave him to deliver was one of unmitigated judgment. It must have been a fear-filled experience. To be called to speak God’s judgment against his own people would have frightened the most courageous of men or women in that day of woeful events as is in ours. One only has to hear or see to the attack ads created for contemporary political campaigns to realize how much the prophet exposes him or herself to community ridicule.

Yet there are men and women willing to present the divine alternatives to our petty human machinations of history. The people are the ground-breakers for new advances in faith and witness to the purposes of God in the world. It was so for Isaiah, who with Amos and Micah in the late 8th century BCE set forth a vision of divine justice and righteousness which remains as convincing for us as it was for them. These elements of Israelite prophecy had close affinity to the actual events of that time when the great empires of Assyria and Egypt were in conflict. Israel, the northern kingdom, and Judea itself was constantly threatened with invasion and the imposition of foreign religious practices.

PSALM 138. Unlike most of the psalms, this hymn of thanksgiving by an individual is thought to be from a small “Davidic collection.” (Psalms 138-145.) This meant that it was ascribed to King David rather than being composed by him.

There are some twenty such hymns of thanksgiving by individuals preserved in the religious literature of Israel. Isaiah 38:10-20 and Jonah 2:2-9 are examples found in the OT. The apocryphal books of Ecclessiasticus (Sirach), the Psalms of Solomon and the Odes of Solomon contain others.

Like most others, this psalm is from a post-exilic date. The absence of any thanksgiving sacrifice points to an unusual level of spiritual development rarely found except in some of the prophetic literature which condemned the temple sacrifices. Or it may date from a time before the reconstruction of the temple when the normal sacrifices could not be celebrated. It also reflects a universalism echoing that of Second Isaiah (vss. 4-6) for earthly kings are said to worship God as do the humble; and God does not despise their praise. The psalm ends with an declaration of trust in God’s love and purpose. Vs. 8 certainly provides a very preachable text.

1 CORINTHIANS 15:1-11. Paul states as simply as possible what he had learned from the apostles whom he met in Jerusalem when he returned there some time after his conversion. This probably occurred less than a decade after the resurrection. Some scholars believe it may have been no more than a year or two. Could this have been an early Christian creed? It summarizes what the apostles were teaching in those first years after that momentous event when the apostolic church was feeling the full flush of its new faith.

One point stands out in Paul’s repetition of this statement of faith. To him, the resurrection was something experienced by those few who had seen and spoken with the risen Christ. It was also Paul’s firm conviction that the same risen Lord had appeared to him on the Damascus Road. The ambiguity between faith and fact remains with the Christian community to this day. Faith does not attempt to be factual. Rather it expresses a spiritual interpretation of deep and often inexplicable psychic experiences. It uses the language of image, symbol and metaphor to describe what persons of faith have experienced amid the ebb and flow of ordinary events which a reporter or historian might well record differently as observed facts or strange myths.

The resurrection experience symbolized for Paul and the other apostles that Jesus Christ, who had been executed as a criminal, was very much alive. Death had not conquered him; he had conquered death and was now with them in spirit. There were still many living in Paul’s time who could testify to this experience. The reference to the risen Christ’s appearance to five hundred people may be an alternate reminiscence of Pentecost as that event had been told to Paul by the apostolic community.

Quite possibly Paul was the first to connect the death of Christ to the ancient Israelite tradition that sin could be forgiven by the shedding of blood. This belief had its roots in the ancient practices of offering sacrifices to the deity common to all ancient religious traditions. In some traditions human sacrifice had also been quite commonly practiced. Even in Israel as late as the 7th century BCE reign of Manasseh (ca. 687-642 BCE) there had been evidence of this. Among the Jews, animal sacrifice in lieu of human sacrifice was related closely to the celebration of the both Passover and Yom Kippur. In this context Paul interpreted the crucifixion of Jesus as a self-offering which had a similar effect of dealing with the human problem of sin and alienation from God.

Note too that Paul adds himself as “the least of the apostles.” One view of the narrative in Acts presents Paul and Peter as rivals for leadership of the Gentile mission. In Galatians and here, Paul gives some basis for this hypothesis. He numbers himself among the apostles, though with self-deprecating diminution. He goes on to reiterate his total dependence on God’s grace for his status and gives his fellow apostles credit where credit is due. They all share the resurrection faith which is the heart of the gospel for us as well.

LUKE 5:1-11. (Author’s note: This passage is also covered in a new blog posted here: http://studiesinluke.blogspot.com. Look on the list to the left for #7 – Calling The First Disciples. The content of this blog introduced a Bible study with a group of seniors at Glen Abbey United Church, Oakville,ON, Canada.)

Luke tells this story of a miraculous catch of fish in connection with the calling of the first disciples. His version is much more elaborate than the brief accounts of Mark and Matthew. John tells it as one of Jesus’ resurrection appearances (John 21). Behind the gospels as we now have them, there was a long tradition of stories about Jesus’ teaching and miracles repeated by word of mouth before being put into written form. Assuming that all versions referred to the same event, which some commentators doubt, they speak to the future mission of the apostolic church. It appears to be a promise of ultimate success though not without long and difficult toil on the part of the disciple community.

At first, the ekklesia (i.e. the apostolic church) meant simply a group of Jews of humble origins, many of them unlettered and poverty stricken, who had responded to the preaching of Jesus and believed in his resurrection. Then as now, fishing was not always a lucrative occupation, but one which required much skill and patience, hard work and long hours. These men were partners in a small business in which they had invested their whole lives. Catching and marketing of fresh fish, a major food in Galilee at the time, was not always a profitable trade. In that climate, the fish would have to be caught during the night and sold in the marketplace within a few hours. Often the results were disappointing. However, this story is told for its metaphorical significance rather than as a factual vignette of the harsh life of the Galilean fisherman.

Luke has a way of weaving the whole tradition into his story as he tells it. His audience was two generations removed from the events he narrates and unfamiliar with the places in which those events occurred. So he did not have to be concerned about chronological order. His intent was primarily evangelical. For instance, he has Peter call Jesus first “Master,” then “Lord.” Those are titles which Luke reserves for disciples. Non-disciples used the term, “Teacher.” The title “Lord” appears in Luke twenty-one times; twelve of them in pericopes peculiar to Luke. It can be argued that here Luke was thinking in post-resurrection terms when the apostles had fully realized that Jesus was the Messiah for whom such a title was appropriate. As has been pointed out many times, the original creed of the apostolic church was the simple statement, “Jesus is Lord.”

So also Peter’s confession of sinfulness in his plea that Jesus depart from him is appropriate to a post-resurrection attitude. It reiterates the gospel call to repentance as the antecedent to Christian discipleship. Luke had emphasized this as the message John the Baptist had preached (3:1-20) and which Peter had also proclaimed in his Pentecost sermon in Acts 2:38. It may also have some reference to Peter’s denial of Jesus in the court of the house of Caiaphas (22:54-60).

The late Professor G. B. Caird pointed to Jesus’ choice of these “hard-working but intensely loyal men, ever aware of their own shortcomings, as those whom he needed to carry the gospel into the world.” Does not the present evangelistic environment call for a disciple community of similarly dedicated, loyal and hard-working persons? Certainly not those who may lay claim to moral perfection or spiritual greatness would not fit the requirements. Caird’s analysis of this passage is a valuable contribution to the understanding of how prophetic visions and oracles affect us: “On Simon at least the impact he made was a profoundly moral one, resulting in a sense of sin. It was not the miracle that brought him to his knees but the grandeur of sheer goodness.” (Caird, G.B. Saint Luke. The Pelican New Testament Commentary, 1965.)

INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
Twenty-Third Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 27 Ordinary 32
November 8, 2009

RUTH 3:1-5; 4:13-17. The climax to the story comes through a clever plan by Ruth’s mother-in-law, Naomi, to provide Ruth with security by marrying her kinsman, Boaz. Behind this plan lay the ancient Israelite custom of the nearest relative having responsibility for a widow’s care. The child of Ruth and Boaz became the crowning glory of the whole story: he was the grandfather of King David.

PSALM 127. This is another of the Songs of Ascent which may have been sung by pilgrims approaching the temple for one of the great festivals. It celebrates the virtues of strong family life as the basis for national security.

I KINGS 17:8-16. (Alternate) The miracle of the widow’s cruse that did not fail is one of the great stories of the OT. It points to a cardinal doctrine of Israel’s faith tradition: the providence of God under the most extreme circumstances. This doctrine finds expression in concern for one’s family and neighbours implicit in the latter six of the Ten Commandments and the Deuteronomic Law of love for neighbours which Jesus quoted.

PSALM 146. (Alternate) This is the first of the five Hallel Psalms which form the final praises of the Psalter. All are obviously for congregational liturgical use, but this one at least finds it inspiration in individual experience. A faithful Israelite has learned how he had benefited from the eternal goodness of God rather than from occasional favors of powerful princes.

HEBREWS 9:24-28. Reiterating the supremacy of Christ as the only true mediator between God and humanity, this passage points out how the self-sacrifice of Jesus Christ differs from the Hebrew sacrificial tradition. Instead of repeated offerings, the all-sufficient sacrifice of Jesus on the cross has eternal efficacy. The reading also cites the early Christian belief in the return of Christ when the salvation of all creation will be complete.

MARK 12:38-44. Approaching the temple, Jesus condemned the hypocrisy of the scribes who were experts in Jewish religious law. He emphasized the point by drawing attention to the sacrificial offering of a poor widow in contrast to the large donations of the wealthy and powerful. The incident declares a whole new principle for charitable giving which can be used as effectively today as ever. Christian stewardship is best measured not by how much we give, but how much we have left for personal use and discretionary spending.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS.The central focus of the story is clearly stated in vs. 1. Ruth’s mother-in-law, Naomi, had devised a clever plan to provide Ruth with security by marrying her kinsman, Boaz. The barley harvest had arrived and Boaz was busy winnowing the grain. That ancient agricultural process involved throwing the reaped and threshed grain into the air on a windy day so that the wind would separate the grain from the chaff. In the Jewish tradition, this story is read on Shavu’ot (also called the Festival of Weeks or Pentecost) which celebrates the end of the barley harvest.

RUTH 3:1-5; 4:13-17.

Naomi’s scheme was for Ruth to wait until he had retired after his evening meal; then she was to seduce him in his bed. When he discovered Ruth during the night, Boaz dealt gently with her, advised her of a complication in taking care of her as both of them desired, and provided her with food as her cover for spending the night with him. Behind this plan lay the ancient Israelite custom of levirate marriage. This required the nearest relative of a widow to redeem her by marriage. If the next of kin did not choose to do so, he still had the responsibility for a widow’s care. Boaz was not the closest relative of Ruth’s late husband, so he had to negotiate with her next of kin before he could marry her. That process is described in 4:1-16.

The climax to the story comes through the child of Ruth and Boaz: he was the grandfather of King David. But there is a curious twist in 4:16-17. When Naomi became the child’s nurse, the women of the neighbourhood thought the child was hers. Could this have been a subtle way of making the Moabite ancestry of David more acceptable to an Israelite audience?

PSALM 127. While there is no conclusive evidence that the Songs of Ascent (Pss. 120-134) were sung by pilgrims approaching the temple for one of the great festivals, this remains the most likely hypothesis for their collection as a set of liturgical hymns. Several of them are oriented toward the temple (Pss. 122; 125; 129; 134), while others do not have any particular reference to pilgrims. A late Mishnah tract speculates that they were sung by the Levites on the fifteen steps leading from the court of women to the court of Israel (for men only), but this has been regarded as unlikely by most scholars. More probably, they came from several sources and were redacted as a book of devotions for pilgrims.

Ps. 127 celebrates the virtues of strong family life as the basis for national security. It has several characteristics of other psalms in the Wisdom tradition. (Pss. 1; 49; 73 128). These show a concern for moral principles and practices of a secular nature which provide for the greatest possible happiness. This one expresses a strong interest in ordinary family life expressed in very humane terms, yet rooted in a humble piety. The opening couplet makes this very clear as does the very descriptive reference to marriage, sexuality and a large family in vss. 3-5. The mention of male progeny only reveals the typical male-dominant attitudes of the Jewish tradition where only men could be b’nai b’rith – sons of the covenant.

A very colourful set of images lies behind these same verses. A man’s sons came from the marriage of his youth (vs. 4). The greater the number, the better for him, as indicated by the vivid image of a warrior’s quiver full of arrows (vs. 5). In his old age, he took his place as an elder seated at the town gate debating and giving judgments with his contemporaries. He had his opponents, of course. Jewish men loved to argue minute details of the law. The fact that he had many sons gave greater strength to his arguments. His enemies knew that family loyalties had persuasive force. The threat of vengeance prevented them from shaming him.

1 KINGS 17:8-16. (Alternate) There are subtle aspects to this story which ignite the imagination. Elijah, the prophet of Yahweh, was ordered to leave Israel and go to Zarephath, a coastal town between Tyre and Sidon now identified as Sarafannd. Archeologists have discovered that this was an important centre for manufacturing clay pottery and glass. This was foreign territory where other gods were worshiped, more specifically local manifestations of Baal, a Semetic storm god.

Was this pilgrimage made to escape a famine? It would not have been unusual and a very creative inspiration to come to Elijah. His home at Tishbe was some distance to the southeast in Gilead, on the east side of the Jordan. Because of the mountains of Samaria, rainfall was sparse at best in that part of Israelite territory while on the seacoast there would have been greater likelihood of rainfall and better crops.

Was the prophet at the end of his own resources when he asked for succor from the widow whom he met at the gate? She was certainly at the end of her resources. There was no welfare for a widow in any ancient social system unless she could remarry or was redeemed by a relative of her late husband as in the story of Ruth. Was her young son disabled in some way so that she had been rejected for remarriage? She certainly was extremely depressed, even hopeless about her chances for survival (vs.12).

The miracle of the widow’s cruse that did not fail is one of the great stories of the OT. It points to a cardinal doctrine of Israel’s faith tradition: the providence of God under the most extreme circumstances. This doctrine finds expression in concern for one’s family and neighbors implicit in the latter six of the Ten Commandments and the Deuteronomic Law of love for neighbors which Jesus quoted. This social system was proclaimed most clearly in the many of the Psalms and the Prophets, as well as evident in the Torah and here in the histories.

There is a modern parallel for us who live in the rich First World. Our extremities are moral and spiritual in the midst of grave overindulgence in consumer goods while many in our own society and millions elsewhere perish in poverty. What we desperately need in the present global economy when the distance between the haves and the have-nots widens daily, is a penetrating sense of God’s providence for all. Such a conviction would enable us maintain a much more balanced economic system and freely to share our excessive abundance with those who have nothing. The widow’s last handful of meal and a little oil is a common situation in a number of places in the world today. Despite our present difficult economic circumstances we still have much to share and could do so without fear of depriving ourselves and with faith’s assurance of God’s providence.

PSALM 146. (Alternate) This is the first of the five Hallel Psalms which form the final praises of the Psalter. All are obviously for congregational liturgical use, but this one at least finds its inspiration in individual experience. A faithful Israelite has learned how he had benefited from the eternal goodness of God rather than from the ephemeral favors of powerful princes. Perhaps he has even suffered personal imprisonment and some visual impairment (vss.7b-8a). Or, as is more likely, he stands in the tradition of the great prophets who discovered the social justice inherent in the Mosaic covenant (vv.7-9).

The late Professor W.R. Taylor, the exegete of the Psalms in The Interpreter’s Bible, had this to say: “We need not ask whether his trust in some time of personal need, or whether he is warning some of his fellows against obsequiousness to temporal powers been shattered. Rather, the psalmist is dealing more generally with the fundamental contrast between God and men when it comes to dependence on them for resolving the basic problems of human society. So viewed, the psalm sets forth its own way of truth which needs fresh emphasis in an era characterized by secular trends in culture and taste.” (IV, 745)

There is music in all of these Hallel Pslams, but the music is that of poetry cast in the characteristic Hebraic style of parallelism and in the sound of the very earliest musical instrument, the human voice. This musical element could be greatly enhanced by antiphonal reading or chanting by clergy and choir, or in the more traditional metrical version by Isaac Watts adapted by John Wesley to the tune “Old 113th” included in the hymnal of The United Church of Canada, Voices United, No. 867.

HEBREWS 9:24-28. Like so much else in the Letter to the Hebrews, this passage exhibits an extensive knowledge of Jewish sacrificial practice. The liturgy of the Day of Atonement is the central focus here. This was the one occasion in the whole year that the chief priest could enter the holy of holies, the most sacred shrine of Israel symbolic of the invisible presence of Yahweh. There he would perform three distinct sacrificial acts to atone for sin.

The first rite used incense and smoking coals to purify the shrine so that the high priest himself might be safe from the divine mystery. After prayer in the large main room of the temple, the high priest returned to the holy of holies to sprinkle the blood of a slain bull as atonement for all the priests. Finally, after slaughtering a scapegoat chosen by lot from one of two victims, the high priest entered the inner shrine a third time to offer its blood on behalf of the people. The second scapegoat was then driven out of the temple and city into the wilderness with a red ribbon tied around its neck. There it was pushed over a cliff to its death and a similar ribbon soaked red in the blood of the sacrificial victim was hung on the door of the sanctuary. The ribbon would be bleached white in the sun as a sign that the sins of the people were forgiven.

Reiterating the supremacy of Christ as the only true mediator between God and humanity, this passage points out how Christian faith and practice differs from the Hebrew sacrificial tradition. Instead of repeated offerings, the one, all-sufficient self-sacrifice of Jesus on the cross had eternal effectiveness. The writer enumerates the differences: (1) The sanctuary Christ entered after his resurrection was heaven itself (i.e. the real presence of God), not a temple built with human hands which supposedly was a copy of the heavenly dwelling of God (vs. 24). (2) Jesus did not offer himself again and again, as in the annual ritual as did the high priest (vs. 25). (3) He offered a single sacrifice, once for all (vs. 26). (4) Having died once bearing the sins of all people, as all mortals die who then face judgment, he will return, not to judge sin, but to save those who in faith eagerly await him (vss. 27-28).

By citing the belief in the return of Christ when salvation of all creation will be complete, this passage draws the indelible boundary of discontinuity between the Christian and Jewish messianic traditions. For Christians, Jesus is the Messiah/Christ. He came, lived and died, as do all humans. But his death was different. Not only did he lay down his life voluntarily to atone for the sins of all people, he will come again to bring them to eternal life in the presence of the eternal God. As Messiah/Christ, he is both high priest and victim, and as such his death on the cross is the divinely appointed means of atonement between God and humanity.

There is only one thing more for the author to add. It is by faith in what Jesus has done by his all-sufficient sacrifice that Christians must live and die. This final thought occupies the author for the remainder of the letter.

Some significance may also be given to the possible historical setting for this letter as an alternative to the traditional scholarly view that it was written for Jewish Christians struggling with the destruction of the temple and their expulsion from Jerusalem. A relatively new hypothesis holds that it was written for a Jewish community struggling with their difficult situation prior to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE. The priesthood was already in serious decline and there was competition within Judaism from many sects, especially the Essene movement which may have been centered at Qumran close to the Dead Sea. That sect looked for an eschatological, end of history era when there would be a royal and a priestly messiah, both subordinate to the archangel Michael. Qumran literature also associated Michael with Melchizedek.

A Jewish scholar, Yigael Yadin, argued that this is the background of the Letter to the Hebrews. Some Jewish Christians may well have been attracted to the Essene movement or were former Essenes tempted to turn back to this sectarian belief. The letter could have been written to counter this compromise to the perfection of their salvation in Jesus Christ.

MARK 12:38-44. Jesus’ pilgrimage to Jerusalem was over. While teaching in the temple precincts, he condemned the hypocrisy of the scribes who were expert interpreters of religious law. This was a very controversial thing for him to do. Undoubtedly rabbis abounded in Jerusalem as did scribes. In Jesus’ time both were important members of the religious and political establishment of Israel. Although highly literate, scribes were much more than mere copyists who transmitted the law on written scrolls. They did not create new law, they merely interpreted both ancient and contemporary understandings of what was written in the Torah. They were also well trained for their task. Frequently, they acted as legal counselors to the priests and to the Pharisees. The gospel narratives usually link the three distinctive groups – high priests, scribes and the lesser priests known as Levites – in uncomplimentary ways. This may have been due more to the bias of the Christian community after the destruction of the temple by the Romans in 70 CE.

Many establishment people other than the priests would have consulted them so as to remain within the religious and moral boundaries set by the law. Transcribing the Torah, for which they may also have been responsible, allowed the scribes considerable room for fudging literal interpretations of the ancient texts. Apparently this had made some of the scribes very rich. Jesus forthrightly condemned their hypocrisy. Note what he criticized most severely: their fine robes; their proud appearance in public, possibly to encourage business; their way of seeking the best seats on the synagogues because being seen was also good for business; their cunning deceit of the most vulnerable to gain control of widows’ property; and their ostentatiously long prayers to display their piety. One is reminded of the public appearances, photo-opportunities and television interviews modern politicians seek as the time for elections comes around.

Mark tells us that Jesus re-emphasized the point he had made about hypocrisy by drawing attention to the sacrificial offering of a poor widow in contrast to the large donations of the wealthy. Every one who entered the temple had to pay temple tithes and taxes. This passage indicates how people made voluntary gifts to the temple treasury, possibly something like a poor box. The collection of Jewish oral law and interpretations known as the Mishnah compiled in the 2nd century CE described a trumpet-shaped vessel atop a chest in the Court of Women into which these monies were cast. Some gave substantial amounts; the poor widow had little to give, but gave what she had nonetheless. Mark did not explain how Jesus knew about her financial status. Perhaps it was no more than her ragged appearance in contrast to the fine clothes of the rich that gave him the clue.

This incident declares a whole new principle for charitable giving which can be as effective today as ever. Good stewardship is best measured not by how much we give, but how much we have left for personal use and discretionary spending. A recent newspaper report told of a Jewish businessman, presumed by many to be very wealthy, but who died leaving a relatively small estate. It soon became public that for years he had engaged his rabbi in helping him direct his fortune to those most needing help in one way or another. He had given his wealth away. This was the kind of private stewardship Jesus authenticated in this pericope. It could well be the guiding principle for all of us as well as for governments to raise and invest public taxation only for the common good and not just in the pursuit of political power.

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
All Saints Day
November 1, 2009


WISDOM OF SOLOMON 3:1-9. Many congregations will find this passage from the Apocryphal Book of Wisdom as a canticle in their hymn books. It is often read at memorial services because of the comforting message it conveys. In some respects it speculates about trials after death, but also presents a view of the righteous ultimately being found worthy to be in God’s eternal presence.

(Please Note: The Revised Common LectiOnary assigns these reading for All Saints Day which falls this year on the Twenty Second Sunday after Pentecost. Some congregations may wish to use those posted separately for this Sunday.)

ISAIAH 25:6-9. (Alternate) The banquet theme described here has antecedents in the literature of several other religious traditions and echoes through several New Testament passages. The uniqueness of this poetic excerpt from Hebrew prophecy rests in its expectation that all peoples will be included at the Lord’s table and all suffering will cease. Jesus practiced eating with outsiders as a symbol of the way things will be in God’s realm.

PSALM 24. This psalm celebrates two crucial elements of Israel’s religious tradition: the whole creation as the possession of God alone and the temple as the visible symbol of God’s presence within creation.

REVELATION 21:1-6. John has a vision of the whole of creation redeemed and renewed. This is what awaits the faithful and thus makes those bitter experiences of persecution endurable.

Many Old Testament references colour this vision – the creation, the city, the bride. Perhaps the most important insight of the passage is that “now God’s dwelling is among mortals.” (vs. 3) This reaffirms Jesus as God’s human representative coming into the world for the single purpose of redeeming the world and reconciling humanity and all creation to God’s original purpose.

JOHN 11:32-44. The passage contains the heart of the story of the raising of Lazarus. It is the sixth of seven signs John gives to prove that Jesus is the Messiah/Christ, Son of God, and that through faith in him believers receive eternal life. Even as the event reveals Jesus’ divine power over death itself, it also shows him as a wonderfully sensitive human being.
The story, which may be a midrash or interpretative story, is also John’s reflection on the significance of the resurrection. Because in John’s view Jesus is fully human and fully divine, life and death are his gifts to give.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS. Written in Greek about 100 BCE, The Wisdom of Solomon (or simply, The Book of Wisdom) was not included in the Bibles commonly used by the Protestant Bibles because it was not included in the Jewish canon. On the other hand, in making up the canon for his Latin Vulgate translation, Jerome did include it after the Song of Songs. Hence it came into use in both the Roman Catholic and most Orthodox Churches. Its content has more affinity with Greek philosophy, literature and science of its time than the Hebrew scriptures. There are no quotations from it in the New Testament, although it does allude to the Hebrew scriptures, especially the Psalms and Isaiah, but in their Greek text from the Septuagint.

WISDOM OF SOLOMON 3:1-9.

Many congregations will find this passage from the Apocryphal Book of Wisdom as a canticle in their hymn books. For example, Voices United, published by The United Church of Canada, has it as #890. This passage is often read in memorial services because of the comforting message it conveys. In some respects, it speculates about trials after death, but presents a view of the righteous ultimately being found worthy to be in God’s eternal presence.

Contrary to Christian faith and modern science, the first few sentences seem to deny the reality of death for the souls of righteous humans. This is closer to the Greek concept of the immortality of the soul, an entity distinct from the human body, which found religious expression the Gnostic heresies of 2nd and 3rd centuries CE. Christian faith in life beyond death is rooted in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, not immortality. No one has yet clarified how that element of our human nature we know as spiritual consciousness experiences resurrection. Some progressive research in the field of psycho-neurology is beginning to throw some light on the experience.

The second set of sentences in this canticle presents an element not recognized by Protestant traditions. In Roman Catholic teaching, Purgatory is “a place or condition of temporal punishment for those who, departing this life in God’s grace, are not entirely free from venial faults, or have not fully paid the satisfaction due to their transgressions.” (Catholic Encyclopedia) This doctrine appears to be very similar to the text from Wisdom. However, the text does leave the final outcome to God as to who shall be ultimately redeemed.

There are several images drawn from the liturgies of the temple. Souls are tested in a golden crucible. The element of sacrifice finds expression in the text as well, likening the souls of the righteous to a burnt offering on the altar which will burst into flame again in God’s presence. Prophetic images of judgment and ruling over the nations also enlighten the text. But the basic religious emphasis is on trust that in God’s grace and mercy the faithful are the chosen ones, or in popular parlance, “the saints.” This is not the NT view. The saints are all God’s people who remain faithful throughout the most difficult times, even persecution and undeserved death.

ISAIAH 25:6-9. Those who do not wish to wrestle with the alternative views of the canticle from Wisdom, have this passage from a special section of Isaiah as the Old Testament reading. Isaiah 24-27 is generally regarded as an eschatalogical collection of prophecy, psalms and prayers dating from the post-exilic period. Similar eschatsalogical appendices were added to the prophecies of Amos, Micah, Zephaniah, Zechariah, Joel and Obadiah.

The banquet theme of this passage has both antecedents in the literature of other religious traditions and echoes in several New Testament passages. The uniqueness of this poetic excerpt from Hebrew prophecy rests in its expectation that all peoples will be included at the Lord’s banquet table and all suffering will cease. Jesus practiced eating with outsiders as a symbol of the way things will be in God’s realm.

The idea that Yahweh will triumph over his enemies is a common OT theme, but the victory over death and pain does take on a deeper meaning. When the passage in again quoted in Revelation 21:4, it was in the light of a new certainty of faith in the resurrection of Christ. The same passage is also referenced in Paul triumphant shout, “O death where is thy sting; O grave where in thy victory.” (1 Cor. 15:54).

PSALM 24. This psalm celebrates two crucial elements of Israel’s religious tradition: the whole creation as the possession of Yahweh alone and the temple as the visible symbol of God’s presence within creation. Although attributed to David in the superscription, it comes from a much later date as evidenced by the references to the temple (vs. 3). Similarly the cosmology of creation is typical of the ancient world-view which saw our plant Earth set in a three tiered universe with heaven above, the place of the dead (Sheol or Hell) below. Modern science following the discoveries of Copernicus, Galileo and Newton have shown that this is not the universe as we know it today.

It would appear that the psalm had liturgical origin and was sung in a procession on some festival occasion. Late Jewish sources regard it as a hymn for the New Year festival when Yahweh’s work of creation was commemorated and the sovereignty of Yahweh over all creation celebrated. There is also a strong element of holiness in vss. 3-6. Ritual purity had special meaning for entrance into the temple because the sacred precincts were regarded as the place where Yahweh dwelt.

The antiphonal song of vss. 7-9 again emphasizes the entrance of Yahweh into the holy place. The gates of the temple are personified and responsive to the approaching worshipers represented by the holy people of Yahweh. Yet the identification of Yahweh and the people of Israel is not altogether complete. Hence the question, “Who is the King of glory?” The poetic image used in answering this question (vs. 8) is that of a victorious monarch leading his triumphant army home. One commentator has suggested that this may have been the point in the procession where the ark or some other symbol of divine presence moved into the temple.

In Jewish history, the temple was the last stronghold to fall to an invading enemy. Its few remaining stones in the Western Wall still form the centre of Jewish religious devotion. In the Scottish Protestant tradition, the antiphonal verses were sung to the tune of St. George’s, Edinburgh, at the evening service in many churches on Communion Sunday.

REVELATION 21:1-6. John has a vision of the whole of creation redeemed and renewed at the end of history. This is what awaits the faithful and thus makes those bitter experiences of persecution endurable.

Many Old Testament references colour this vision – the creation, the city, the bride. Perhaps the most important insight of the passage is that “now God’s dwelling is among mortals.” (vs. 3) This reaffirms Jesus as God’s human representative coming into the world for the single purpose of redeeming the world and reconciling humanity and all creation to God’s original purpose.

The late Principal George B. Caird, of Mansfield College, Oxford, wrote in his magisterial commentary on this passage, “In some ways this is the most important part of the book, as it is certainly the most familiar and beloved.” It is the promised answer to the plea of every martyr, “If only we knew where it is all going to end! Much of John’s vision, and much of the human history it depicts and interprets, becomes intelligible, credible, tolerable, when we know the answer. Here is the real source of John’s prophetic certainty.” (The Revelation of St. John the Divine. London: Adam and Charles Black, 1966.)

The image of the vanishing sea has great significance. It represents the ending of history in the same way that creation out of chaos began history when “the earth was a formless void and darkness was over the face of the deep.” (Gen. 1:1-2) The descent of the holy city, New Jerusalem, and the voice from heaven announcing its meaning, also represents a whole new order that is taking place. The distinction between heaven and earth disappears. No longer is heaven the dwelling of God and earth the dwelling of humans. Now God’s dwelling is with us. The Incarnation has reached its true end: Immanuel, God with us. (Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23) As we have seen above, the bride from heaven are also a quotation from Isaiah 25:6-8.

The voice from the throne is, of course, the voice of God which was first heard at the very opening of John’s visions (Rev.1:8). All things are being made new; a complete transformation is taking place, not just in the seven churches to which John was commanded to write, but in all places of God’s dominion, God is forever making all things new. Paul had the same vision as voiced in 2 Cor. 3:18; 4:16-18; 5:16-17; Col.3:1-4. But John sees it on a cosmic scale whereas Paul saw it in the individual believer. As Caird put it: “Blind unbelief may see only the outer world, growing old in its depravity and doomed to vanish before the presence of holiness; but faith can see the hand of God in the shadows, refashioning the whole. The agonies of earth are but the birth-pangs of a new creation.”

God’s naming of the Alpha and the Omega do not mean that God is just at the beginning and the end, as the deist philosophy would have it, creating then allowing creation to run without intervention. God is the living God who confronts humanity at every step of the way. All that we have and are as humans within God’s creation, and above all our salvation, is the work of God from start to finish. God requires nothing of us but the openness of faith, a thirst for God to be satisfied with nothing less that the water of life.

JOHN 11:1-45. The story of the raising of Lazarus is the sixth of seven signs John gives to prove that Jesus is the Messiah Christ, Son of God, and that through faith in him believers receive eternal life. Hence, the telling of this miracle leads directly to the climax of the gospel story and the greatest sign of all – the resurrection. Throughout the gospel, John’s purpose had been to show that in all that Jesus of Nazareth said and did God was fully present, actively revealing and “glorifying” the redemptive power of God’s love. Of this not even Jesus’ closest friends were fully aware until after the resurrection.

As this story proceeds, Martha gradually becomes aware and believes. That is the significance of the interchange between Martha and Jesus resulting in another of the characteristic “I am …” proclamations found only in John’s Gospel (vs. 25), and Martha’s confession of faith (vs. 27). Yet even she, like countless others since, experiences a moment of real doubt when Jesus orders the tomb to be opened (vss. 39-40).

While the miracle of raising Lazarus from the grave shows Jesus’ divine power over death itself, it also shows him as a wonderfully sensitive human being. His love for Lazarus and his sisters is palpable. Martha’s and Mary’s accusation that Jesus’ presence would have averted Lazarus’ death tells how real their friendship was. So also did Jesus’ tears. All cultural aspects of ostentatious grief aside, the story represents the best of that special human quality of openly expressing their real feelings. This same quality also comes through in Martha’s revulsion at the stench of her brother’s decaying corpse.

Not to be overlooked, however, is the dramatic intensity building throughout John’s narrative. Martha’ s accusation (vss. 21) sets the stage for Jesus to declare, “I am the resurrection and the life,” and for Martha to confess her faith in him. When Mary repeats the accusation, Jesus uses it to reveal his very human feelings (vss. 33-38) and then perform the miracle.

By means of this miracle story, John is telling his own 1st century community and us that because Jesus is fully human and fully divine, life and death are his gifts to give. This too is the meaning of his resurrection and the basis of hope for ours. Yet nowhere in this passage is any attempt made to define what the resurrection life will be like.

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
Twenty First Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 25 Ordinary 30
October 25, 2009.
Job’s story ends with the old man acknowledging his humble status before God and repenting his hostility toward God for not giving him all the answers he sought to the problem of suffering. His fortunes are restored twofold when he prays for his friends.

PSALM 34:1-8. With an assurance that counters the angry doubt of Job, this psalm declares an almost absolute trust in God to provide all the answers to life’s great questions. The caveat remains, however, that only the righteous can have such a relationship with God. This was the message of all of Job’s friends too; and it brought him no comfort in his suffering.

JEREMIAH 31:7-9. (Alternate) This passage predicts the return of the exiles from Babylon, but that very promise raises the question as to its authenticity as a prophecy of Jeremiah. He lived during the beginning of the exile (586 BCE) but nowhere else promised a safe and joyful return.

JOB 42:1-6, 10-17.

PSALM 126. (Alternate) This psalm also celebrates the return of the exiles from Babylon as one of the great acts of God to Israel.

HEBREWS 7:23-28. Behind this passage stands the custom of the high priest of the Jews entering the holy of holies once a year on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) to offer an unblemished lamb to atone for the nation’s sins. The sacrifice offered by Jesus on the cross, once for all, removes the necessity of repeated sacrifices required under the older system. Jesus thus becomes both the eternal high priest and the perfect sacrifice.

MARK 10:46-52. The healing of the blind man in Jericho emphasizes the point that Mark has made throughout his gospel. Faith in Jesus not only gives the man back his sight, but a spiritual healing enabling him to follow him “on the way.” This could mean the way to Jerusalem and the cross; or it could also be interpreted as in later years and today as “the way of discipleship.” In Acts, the early church was described as “the followers of the way.” Since this was the last episode in Mark’s narrative before he began telling of the death of Jesus, we can presume that both meanings were fully intended. The discipleship of true faith is costly. That remains as much so today as it ever was.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS. This reading includes both the poetic and the narrative conclusions to the composite book. The omitted verses 7-9 provide a transition from one form to the other and show how different the two styles were.

JOB 42:1-6, 10-17.

In the poetic segment (vss. 1-6) Job acknowledges his humble status before Yahweh, but first confesses that Yahweh’s purpose cannot be thwarted. By repeating a slight variation of the opening words of Yahweh’s address (cf. 38:1-2), he repents his hostility toward Yahweh for not giving him all the answers he sought.

Vs.5 may well contain the supreme lesson of the whole book. Although its questions have never been answered by any of his friends nor by Yahweh, Job has nonetheless received spiritual insight. His friends, stand-ins for the Wisdom schools, had all touted the traditional wisdom and the ancient beliefs of their ancestors. Confronted by Yahweh in the magnificent theophany from the midst of the whirlwind (chs. 38-40), Job has perceived a new reality which he can only express in the metaphorical statement, “My eyes see you.” Faith is like that. It happens within each person as a whole new set of thoughts are shaped into an abiding conviction.

Recognizing that he has been in the presence of Yahweh, Job finally confesses his sinfulness. None of the polemic accusations of his friends could have brought him to this point. This says something significant to us about the way we preach. Is it ever right to accuse others of sinful behaviour in hopes of convicting them? Is it not the Holy Spirit alone who can convict us of sin? (cf. John 16:7-11) Without naming the Spirit, Job’s metaphor of seeing Yahweh makes this point.

Yahweh restores Job’s fortunes twofold when he prayed for his friends (vs. 10). Here again the concern for the other person rather than oneself clearly expressed in the prophetic literature comes to the fore. If Job’s friends represent the classical attitude of retributive justice, Job represents a radical revolt against such a harsh theological stance. So also concern for justice for the individual person plays a significant part in the theology of the book. As Professor R.B.Y. Scott so ably put it in his study of Wisdom literature, The Way of Wisdom (Macmillan, 1971. 164) , “The Book of Job tells us that the keystone of genuine morality and all true religion is personal integrity, not proud but humble, committed ultimately to truth and love and goodness in the faith that these are what sustain the universe.”

PSALM 34:1-8. With an assurance that counters the angry doubt of Job, this psalm declares an almost absolute trust in God to provide all the answers to life’s great questions. Emphasis placed on humility, however, (vs. 2) almost gets lost amid repeated summonses to praise (vss. 1, 3, 8) and reassurances that God does respond to prayer (vss. 4-6). Nonetheless, the caveat remains that only the righteous can have such a relationship with Yahweh. This was the message of all of Job’s friends too; and it brought him no comfort in his suffering.

Much could be made of the metaphors in vs. 6 and their representation of traditional OT views of how God intervenes within history. An angel encamped around those who fear Yahweh recalls the frequently used military name for Yahweh, “the Lord of hosts.” The epithet occurs no less than 267 times and was originally associated with the tribal confederacy at Shiloh (1 Sam. 3:1, 11). It variously referred to angelic bodies gathered in Yahweh’s name to defend Israel or to the army of Israel itself. “Fear of Yahweh” is often interpreted as reverence, but this is not credible in this instance. Coincidence with the militaristic terminology recalls the ancient narratives about Israel’s struggle to survive throughout the patriarchal period and the millennium before this psalm came into existence.

Although the superscript suggests that it was of Davidic origin, this is not so. The psalm belongs to a limited set using the acrostic format where each line begins with a different letter of the Hebrew alphabet. This artificial form, described by one commentator as a fad, came into use late in the literary history of Israel. It was designed as a pedagogic tool to aid memorization or to give complete expression to an idea or emotion. No question can be raised about the religious fervor of the psalmist in using this poetic style. The superscript itself exemplifies an even later type of Hebrew interpretation. Christians have frequently made use of vs. 3 as a call to worship.

JEREMIAH 31:7-9. (Alternate) This passage predicts the return of the exiles from Babylon, and the wider Diaspora. That very promise raises the question as to its authenticity as a prophecy of Jeremiah. He lived during the beginning of the exile (586 BCE) but nowhere else promised a safe and joyful return of the Diaspora.

The similarity of this passage to the sayings of Deutero-Isaiah, the prophet of the exile, tends to confirm doubt that it is one of Jeremiah’s oracles. There are words and phrases found also in Isa. 40-66 which were not common to Jeremiah. (Cf. vss. 8-9 with Isa. 35:5-6; 40:11; 42:16; 43:6). One brief section of vs. 9c may be from Jeremiah, but not much else. (Cf. vs. 9c with 31:20; 3:19) One scholar has suggested that vs. 9c actually belongs with vs. 20, and probably part of a true Jeremiah poem (vss. 15-22).

In and of itself, however, the passage has a profound beauty to it that cannot be denied. It attributes the homecoming of the remnant of Israel to the mystery of divine salvation (vs. 8) and Yahweh’s unsurpassed kindness for the weak and marginalized.

PSALM 126. (Alternate) This psalm also celebrates the return of the exiles from Babylon as one of the great acts of God to Israel. It belongs to that special set known as “Songs of Ascent,” (Pss. 120-134) which may have been sung by pilgrims approaching the temple at various festivals.

It also shows some of the characteristics of a lament. Scholars suggest that it dates from a time late in the post-exilic period when the fortunes of Israel had been reversed from the golden expectations of return from Babylon (539 BCE). This fits the more difficult times when the Persian empire was breaking down and the Greek empire was on the rise, circa 5th 50 4th centuries BCE. The psalmist is consoled in such desperate times by memories of the joyful return and hopes that the tears of the present troubled times will water the seed of a future glad harvest. Indeed the psalm may have been adapted for liturgical use in a memorial pilgrimage that took place at one of the great festivals when members of Diaspora gathered to celebrate in the temple. John 7 tells of Jesus and his brothers observing such a festival in Jerusalem.

HEBREWS 7:23-28. This brief excerpt continues the author’s discourse about the supremacy of Christ as priestly mediator of a better covenant than that of the Levitical priesthood. Behind this passage stands the custom of the high priest of the Jews entering the holy of holies once a year on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) to offer the blood of an unblemished lamb to atone for the nation’s sins. The argument may seem distressingly complex for a modern audience, but presumably would have seemed quite cogent to those Jewish Christians familiar with their Jewish religious tradition and anxious about its relationship to their new faith.

Several points of reference to both the Jewish tradition and the passion of Christ begin in vss. 23 -24 by noting the temporary character of the Jewish priesthood in contrast to the permanence of the priesthood of Christ. The key to this discontinuity is the resurrection of Jesus Christ, although this is only indirectly stated in the final clause of vs. 24, “because he continues forever.” This immediately relates to Christ’s role as saviour and advocate with God as a result of his ascension (vs. 25).

The next phase of the argument develops around Christ’s suitability for the priestly office. He is unique in holiness, innocence and purity, all of which resulted in his having an exalted position in heaven due to his death, resurrection and ascension (vs. 26). Furthermore, the author’s exposition clarifies another crucial distinction between the Jewish tradition and the Christian faith. Whereas on the Day of Atonement the high priest of Judaism offered an annual sacrifice for his own and the sins of all Jews, Jesus offered himself on the cross, once for all, and thereby removed the necessity of repeated sacrifices required under the older system. Jesus thus became both the eternal high priest and the perfect sacrifice (vs. 27).

Finally in vs. 28, we have an even more obscure reference to “the word of oath (which) appoints a Son who has been made perfect forever.” Oaths had an important place in the life of the Jewish community. They invoked the deity to validate the reliability and permanence of particular relationships, be it a legal, economic or personal relationship. The most common form of oaths in the OT can be found in several passages in 1 Samuel, “As the Lord lives ….” In other words, Yahweh was called to witness that the relationship being sealed by the oath was valid. In NT times, the Qumran Community made prevalent use of oaths; but Jesus urged that they be completely omitted (Matt. 5:34; cf. Jas. 5:12). Paul, however, did use oaths in Gal. 1:20, 2 Cor. 1:23 and Phil. 1:8. It is probable that this statement in Heb. 7:28 refers to God’s validation of the Sonship of Jesus Christ. It was, after all, the story narrated in four gospels and the NT letters which reveal and attest who Jesus is and what God did through him. This is the central message of the Letter to the Hebrews too.

MARK 10:46-52. Mark’s Gospel consists not only of “the Jesus Story,” but also a narrative which described the essence of faithful discipleship for his audience, whoever they may have been. The healing of the blind man in Jericho emphasizes this point which Mark had been making throughout his gospel and will bring to its fulfilment in the Passion narrative he is about to begin.

Bartimaeus of Jericho stands as the last person to respond to Jesus before he began his final approach to Jerusalem and the cross. Since the declaration of his messiahship at Caesarea Philippi (8:29ff), Jesus had been making his way slowly south from Galilee toward the holy city. As he went, he consistently taught his disciples about his pending death and resurrection (8:31). They neither understood him nor recognized the cost of following him. Indeed, the final mistake they made was to fight among themselves who among them would have precedence in the messianic kingdom they believed he was about to establish (10:32-45). How could they have been so blind?

That, of course, was exactly what Mark had been saying. The disciples had been both blind and deaf. Yet many of the miracles of healing Mark reported had been to give sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf (7: 31-37; 8:22-26). Jesus had also reiterated several times the cost of being his disciple (8:34-38; 9:30-32; 10:17-22; 42-45). They just did not get it.

The story of Bartimaeus appears in Matthew and Luke with slightly different details. Matthew has two blind men in his version of the incident. Luke has the same essential information as Mark with some elaboration, but omits the man’s name. He also includes an added note about the praise by both the blind man and the crowd inspired by his regaining his sight. Like Mark, Luke also laid emphasis on the man’s faith as the key to being healed.

Faith in Jesus not only gave Bartimaeus back his sight, but a spiritual healing enabling him to follow him “on the way.” This contrasts dramatically with the spiritual blindness and disbelief of the disciples even though they had been with him all the way from Galilee. In this instance following Jesus “on the way” could mean going with him up to Jerusalem and to the cross. Or it could also be interpreted by Mark’s audience in later years as “the way of discipleship.” In Acts, the early church is described as “the followers of the way.” Since this was the last episode in Mark’s narrative before he began telling of the death of Jesus, we can presume that he fully intended both meanings.

The discipleship of true faith is costly. That remains as much so today as it ever was. During the first decade of the 21st century many hypotheses have been proposed to account for the decline in church membership and participation. This decline has occurred especially in the mainline denominations in North America since the heyday of the post-war boom in church building in the 1950s and 60s. Each person may have his or her own favourite reason. Could the underlying factor be the one which Mark highlights in this final segment of his narrative before beginning the climax to the story (8:22-10:52)? The cost of discipleship is still as great as ever, but fewer people are willing to undertake the self-sacrifice involved. Could it be that they have heard that message, but realize full well how much it will cost to follow Jesus in the way?

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
Fifth Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 9 Ordinary 14
July 5, 2009

2 SAMUEL 5:1-5, 9-10. The first part of this passage is one version of the tradition of how David became king of Israel. As a successful military leader, he was the people’s choice as well the as divinely anointed sovereign. He first established Hebron as his capital; then he captured the fortress of Jerusalem and made it his capital city. The intervening verses between the two segments of the passage are confusing due to a corrupt Hebrew text.

EZEKIEL 2:1-5. (Alternate) The call of Ezekiel to be prophet among the exiles in Babylon included a strong warning that he would encounter much resistance. In spite of their rebellion against God and their impudent and stubborn nature, he was to deliver an outspoken message directly from God, “Thus says the Lord God.”

PSALM 48. This highly nationalistic psalm praises Jerusalem as the holy city of God. It still retains this designation for three great religious traditions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – all for different reasons.

PSALM 123. (Alternate) Assumed to be for pilgrims approaching the temple this “psalm of ascent” saw it as representing the very presence of the invisible God among God’s people. That brought considerable relief from the contempt and scorn of unbelievers who felt no need for God in their lives.

2 CORINTHIANS 12:2-10. In the midst of a conflict with the Corinthian Christian community, Paul tells about two of his deepest spiritual experiences. In one he had an ecstatic theophany when he received an exceptional revelation. He does not say exactly what the revelation was. In the other, he fervently prayed to have the unidentified cause of great suffering removed, but was given instead the reassurance that God’s grace would be sufficient for his every need.

MARK 6:1-13. Jesus’ hometown folk felt uneasy with him in their midst, especially when he taught in their synagogue on a sabbath. We are not told why they were so offended. Certainly they thought he had far gone beyond what one of his status as a humble carpenter should go. They did not expect him, a mere tradesman, to be skilled in the interpretation of the scriptures.
So Jesus adopted another strategy. He gathered his disciples together and sent them out “with authority over the unclean spirits.” This may have meant that they merely had power to change people’s minds about what they might expect from Jesus. The end of the story tells how successful they were in calling people to repent, casting out demons and curing the sick.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS.

2 SAMUEL 5:1-5, 9-10. The first part of this passage is one version of the tradition of how David became king of Israel. It comes from the Deuteronomic editors who viewed David as the supreme commander of all Israel’s army. This agrees with 1 Samuel 18:5, but not 1 Samuel 18:13. Traces of an earlier source is found is vs. 3 where it is only representative elders of the tribes rather than “all the tribes” (vs. 1) who gather at Hebron to covenant with David and anoint him king. This narrative makes the point that as a successful military leader, he was the people’s choice as well the as divinely anointed sovereign.

Vss.4-5 also give the standard Deuteronomic formula for successive monarchs of Israel. It tells us the duration of his reign which is now calculated as spanning the year 1000 BCE. David first established Hebron as his capital; then he captured the fortress of Jerusalem and made it his capital city. The intervening verses between the two segments of the reading are confusing due to a corrupt Hebrew text. The narrator obviously knew much more about the lay of the land than we are now able to determine from the most advanced archeological data. Scholars still debate how much we can depend on the geographical and historical validity of much of the biblical narrative.

The intent of the Deuteronomic editors of this passage was to tell their generation of Israelites of the utmost significance of David’s reign and especially his relocation of the capital city to Jerusalem. They wrote during the Babylonian exile about 550 BCE when the holy city had very special significance for the nation’s religious tradition. They sought to justify to the exiles in Babylon why their captivity was the judgment of Yahweh, but also that their hope lay in the greatness of David’s reign as the sign of Yahweh’s eternal covenant with Israel.

The stronghold of Zion (vs. 7) was indeed a fortress situated on the southern ridge between the valleys of Tyropoen and the Kidron brook. It later included the whole of the fortifications of Jerusalem. The name Zion subsequently became associated with the sacred site of the temple built by David’s son, Solomon. In religious parlance, it became known as the dwelling place of Yahweh, as evidenced by the numerous reference in the Psalms. Today, it is occupied by two great mosques of Islam, Al Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock.

The reference to “the Millo” in vs. 9 is obscure, but may indicate a particular element of the fortifications which David built. I Kings 9:15, 24; 11:27 attribute its construction to Solomon. The word suggests a place of stamped earth. It may have been a very secure house or perhaps a military barracks and parade ground for gathering the city’s defensive forces.

EZEKIEL 2:1-5. (Alternate) Being a prophet is never easy. The name of this prophet means “Yahweh strengthens.” And that about says it all about this man of whom very little is known except what is found in 1:3 that he was of priestly heritage and may have deported with the rest of the exiles to Babylon in 598/597 BCE after the surrender of King Jehoiachin. Scholars debate whether he was actually among the exiles in Babylon or remained in Jerusalem. According to 29:17 he was still receiving divine revelations as late as 571 BCE.

The call of Ezekiel to be prophet among the exiles in Babylon included a strong warning that he would encounter much resistance. People in deep mourning would likely react negatively to an encouraging message that intended to transform their ancient traditions as did Ezekiel. In spite of their rebellion against God and their impudent and stubborn nature, he was to deliver an outspoken message directly from God, “Thus says the Lord God.”

Note however that his mandate came directly from Yahweh’s Spirit (vs. 2). This form of revelation is repeated many times in the rest of the book (3:12, 14, 24; 11:1, 5, 24; 37:1; 43:5). In short, Ezekiel was commanded to challenge the faith of the exiles in the God who intended only to move them into an entirely new phase of their religious, social, economic and political history. Doesn’t that sound familiar for times such as these?

PSALM 48. In the century after their return from exile in Babylon in 539 BCE, the Jews sought to recover their national identity by rebuilding their temple and their capital city of Jerusalem. The monarchy had ceased to exist, but the temple priesthood replaced royalty as the most prominent leaders of the people. Out of this restored religious culture arose a fundamentally theocratic system which flowered in the elaboration of the cultus of temple sacrifices, the creation of psalmody and other religious literature which subsequently became the canon of scripture. This highly nationalistic psalm praising Jerusalem as the holy city of Yahweh is part of that renaissance.

Believed to be from a collection of “Songs of Zion,” it may well have been sung by pilgrims who came to Jerusalem for the sacred festivals. Many Jews, especially those of the Diaspora, could only afford to make this pilgrimage once in a lifetime. Every stone and handful of dust from the city would be sacred to them. Pilgrims today still return from Jerusalem with souvenirs of all kinds, the more valuable if they are part of the urban fabric rather than commercial trinkets.

The theme of this psalm is Yahweh’s protection for the city itself. It is “his holy mountain” (vs. 2). The second part of that parallelism likens Mount Zion to a mountain in the far north, possibly Mount Hermon, which reaches to heaven. There follows a rewriting of history in vss. 4-8. Israel had suffered from many foreign invasions. Her enemies had all perished but Jerusalem had remained. With poetic hyperbole, the fear and panic of those enemies is ridiculed “as a woman in travail.”

The psalmist was undoubtedly a male who had little regard for the subject of his simile. He drew another derogatory image from the violent storms that drove ships from the eastern Mediterranean bound for the Phoenician port of Tartessus in Spain (Tarshish), frequently wrecking them with its violent east wind (vs. 7). Amidst all this terror, Jerusalem remained safe, at least in the imagination of the poet.

Worshiping in the temple, strolling through the streets, or marveling at the city’s fortification brings to mind why this Jerusalem is so secure: Yahweh loves Israel. There can be only one response to this insight: praise for Israel’s protector.

Despite having been destroyed and rebuilt several times, Jerusalem still retains the designation of “the holy city” for three great religious traditions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – all for different reasons.

PSALM 123. (Alternate) Assumed to be for pilgrims approaching the temple this “psalm of ascent” saw it as representing the very presence of the invisible God among God’s people. That brought considerable relief from the contempt and scorn of unbelievers who felt no need for God in their lives.

Without doubt, the temple when seen from the Mount of Olives would have been an awesome experience for the weary pilgrim. We should note, however, that the psalm makes no mention whatever of the temple. The prayer could have been uttered in any place where the supplicant looked toward the sky and imagined God seated on a throne as the master of a household with a company of servants gathered around him.

The strong emotions of the latter verses suggest the time of the exile when the Jews were treated contemptuously by their neighbours who felt superior to them. This gives us some insight into the personal feelings of Jews subjected to anti-Semitism. Powerless to fight back as in recent times when Israel withstood every assault from hostile neighbours, they could only turn to prayer to avert the pain such attacks inevitably imposed. One hears the same note of despondency in those survivors of the Holocaust remembering the time when six million Jews were left to suffer at the hands of the Nazis.

2 CORINTHIANS 12:2-10. In the midst of a conflict with the Corinthian Christian community, Paul tells about two of his deepest spiritual experiences. In one he had an ecstatic theophany when he received an exceptional revelation. He does not say exactly what the revelation was. Perhaps it was beyond words, as such experiences often are.

Such religious ecstasy brings forth negative attitudes and criticisms in our intellectually sophisticated age. We should neither spurn them nor invent opportunities to create moments such as Paul describes. They can be very real, however or to whom they occur. It may well be that certain people, like Paul and innumerable other saints in the history of the church, have a special gift for or are particularly susceptible to such experiences. There is some recent psycho-neurological research that certain neurological structures of the brain make intense religious experiences not only possible but likely. (See The Global Spiral, monthly online publication of the Metanexus Institute.)
Bruce Chilton adds to the scholarly uncertainty about these experiences in his Rabbi Paul: An Intellectual Biography. (Doubleday, 2000) He believes that Paul, like Jesus and Peter before him, shared in what later became known as the Merkabah tradition. Jey J.Kanagaraj (Mysticism’ in the Gospel of John: An Inquiry into its Background. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998) discussed the Merkabah tradition in positing the theory that “the Gospel John is a “mystical” document, written, at least as one of its purposes, to address with the Gospel those who were preoccupied with Merkabah mystical practice and with cosmological speculations.” It is known that from the 2nd to the 7th centuries CE, Jewish mystics were inspired and guided by the mystical visions of Ezekiel and the divine chariot (Ezekiel 1) to experience direct, personal communion with God.

Modern psychology, psychiatry and neurology have attempted to describe how these mystical experience do happen. One of the best analyses was written nearly fifty years ago by a British psychiatrist, William Sargent, in his book Battle For The Mind. Sargent showed that physiological similarities exist between religious ecstasy and conversion, healing for shell-shocked and battle-fatigued war veterans, forced criminal confessions, and politically motivated brain-washing. He might also add the behavioral compulsions of teenagers in response to their favorite rock stars.

In the other spiritual experience described in this passage, Paul tells how he fervently prayed to have the unidentified cause of great suffering removed. Instead he was given the reassurance that God’s grace would be sufficient for his every need. Much speculation has been expended as to the exact nature of Paul’s problem. These vary from a painful and incurable disease, a physical disability due to paralysis, a facial disfigurement or poor eyesight, all the way to a tendency to homosexuality. Chilton adds to the speculation by proposing that because he was under such constant stress from the time of his conversion onward, he was subject to frequent attacks of shingles (herpes zoster) that left him disfigured. The fact is that we can never know for sure. More important, however, is the way he deals with his “thorn in the flesh.” It became a source of power in that it made possible a deeper spiritual experience enabling him to withstand ever greater hardship in pursuing his mission as an evangelist.

Many ministers can attest to the reality that when they feel most incapable of making an effective witness to faith, others have greatly benefited from their perceived failures. One minister invited to preach in a prominent New York church felt he had utterly ruined the opportunity. Retiring to the vestry after the service, his eye fell on a wall plague bearing the words, “Hallelujah anyway! God is with us.”

MARK 6:1-13. To say the least, Jesus’ hometown folk felt uneasy with him in their midst, especially when he taught in their synagogue on a sabbath. We are not told why they were so offended. Perhaps it was just their jealousy that one whom they knew so well had become so famous. Certainly they thought he had far gone beyond what one of his status as a humble carpenter should go. They would have had respect for him as one skilled in such trades as carpentry that contributed to the general welfare of the community. But they would not have expected him to be skilled in the interpretation of the scriptures or a radical social reformer. One of the contemporary group of Jesus scholars has speculated that although verbally gifted in a predominately oral culture, Jesus may have been illiterate.

Rejected at home, Jesus adopted another strategy. He gathered his disciples together and sent them out “with authority over the unclean spirits.” This may have meant that they merely had power to change people’s minds about what they might expect from Jesus. The gospel authors like Mark who wrote down the tradition for subsequent generations also believed that the disciples possessed the same authority over unclean spirits that Jesus himself had demonstrated. Apparently that is what Mark intended. But was this “authority” (Greek = exousia) a moral and spiritual authority of a pastoral nature or was it something more of a power to effect physical cures? Without question then as now, anyone suffering from an illness, however caused, would seriously affect everyone in the extended family or the immediate community of the sick person. In such circumstances, even death has a healing effect over time.

There is an interesting analysis by John Dominic Crossan of the differentiation between the actual events in Galilee when Jesus lived there during the late third decade of the lst century and the way the story was told by Mark in the seventh decade. Crossan believes that the Markan account described a difference of approach between those who were itinerant apostles and those who were resident followers of the Way. This occurred in the later period when the apostolic church was spreading out into the Gentile world. He elaborates this thesis in his essay “Jesus And The Kingdom” in the volume edited by Marcus Borg, Jesus At 2000. (Westview Press, 1998). He concludes that this passage is Mark’s own description of the kingdom as “companionship of empowerment” rather than the actual historical events of Jesus’ ministry. This is in keeping, Crossan claims, with Jesus’ inauguration of the kingdom as an “interactive social radicalism” consisting of two distinct elements: those who were itinerant preachers of a radical gospel and those who were resident householders who witnessed to it less radically in their normal community living.

The end of the story as we now have it in this passage revealed how successful they were in calling people to repent, casting out demons and curing the sick. This appears to have been a trial run for the post-Pentecost period when Mark was an active itinerant with Paul and Barnabas, at least for while before accompanying Peter to Rome.

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
Fourth Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 8 Ordinary 13
June 28, 2009


2 SAMUEL 1:1, 17-27. David’s lament at the death of his king, Saul, and his close friend, Jonathan, has the majesty of beautiful poetry. Many scholars have attributed it to David himself. If so, it may be one of the earliest pieces of Hebrew literature dating from before 1000 BC. While it mourns the king and his son who were killed in battle, it lacks all religious feeling. It is more of a dirge similar to what one hears when a British monarch or American president dies.

WISDOM OF SOLOMON: 1:13-15, 2:23-24. (Alternate) Most Protestant Christians are unfamiliar with the Wisdom of Solomon. Although attributed to King Solomon it was the work of a well-educated Hellenized Jew written scarcely a century before the birth of Christ. The first segment appeals to the faithful person to live a godly life while the second points to belief in life beyond death despite satanic influences in life now.

PSALM 130: This lovely lament also has a permanent place in world literature. It is one series of psalms identified with the approach of pilgrims to Jerusalem for one of the great religious festivals, possibly the Day of Atonement for the sins of the nation. It ends with a deep expression of hope in God’s steadfast love.

PSALM 30. (Alternate) The psalmist praises God for saving him from death in a critical illness. After at first expressing a certain overconfidence about God’s favor, he realizes how much he owes to God for answering his prayer of distress. In the 2nd century BC, the psalm came into liturgical use for the rededication of the temple by Judas Maccabaeus now celebrated at the Jewish festival of Hanukkah.

2 CORINTHIANS 8:7-15. Paul delicately proposes that the Corinthians complete their collection for the famine-stricken Christians in Jerusalem. He has as much concern that the Corinthians learn how to be generous as he is that they make a large contribution. Gracious giving to help those in need is based on Christ’s own sacrifice for them – and for us.

MARK 5:21-43. Another crossing of Lake Galilee brought Jesus another opportunity for healing. Supposedly the daughter of Jairus, the head of a synagogue was dying. While on his way to heal her, Jesus was pressed by the crowd, but still felt another woman in need seek healing by touching the hem of his robe. The two miracles provide a sharp contrast between the healing of someone who exhibited faith and another who did not. To Jesus human need and God’s willingness and power, not the demonstration of good faith, makes the difference.

This could have a singularly important application for our time. Many political and economic leaders want our national social security and health systems to be transformed from a basis of need in which all share through public taxation to expensive insurance schemes that place limits on many pre-existing illnesses.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS.

2 SAMUEL 1:1, 17-27. David’s lament at the death of his king, Saul, and his close friend, Jonathan, has the majesty of beautiful poetry. Many scholars have attributed it to David himself. If so it may be one of the earliest pieces of Hebrew literature dating from before 1000 BC. While it mourns the king and his son who were killed in battle, it lacks all religious feeling. It is more of a dirge similar to what one hears when a British monarch or American president dies. It might well be read against the background of The Dead March from ‘Saul’ or a highland lament played on bagpipes so often heard at military funerals.

The site where this battle was fought has become a famous Israeli tourist attraction. Mount Gilboa is a limestone ridge thrusting some 1700 feet above the Plain of Jezreel. The more enterprising may climb the ridge by means of a footpath, but from the valley below even the naked eye can see a bare tree marking the place where, as 1 Samuel 31:8-10 has it, the Philistines hung the beheaded bodies of Saul and Jonathan on the walls of the fortress of Beth-shan. Today, at the base of the mountain in Bet-She’an National Park, one can tour the splendid ruins of a Roman and Byzantine city destroyed by a devastating earthquake in 749 CE. It gives the visitor a vivid impression of what a death-place this was from ancient times.

Vs. 21 of this passage is a curse on the place where Saul fell. The previous two verses recall the celebration in the Philistine cities along the Mediterranean coast cited in 1 Sam 31:9.

Those who remember as I do the celebrations of V-E and V-J Days in 1945, understand how poignant is David’s horror at the thought of the Philistines rejoicing. Several years later I heard a Japanese woman who lost all her family in the bombing of Hiroshima utter a similar curse and lament for her people at a church conference on group dynamics at Green Lake, WI. Are not the scenes we see televised from the Viet Nam Memorial on Memorial Day or the Canadian War Memorial on Remembrance Day reminiscent of David’s lament? Will we recall the more recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq in the same way? Surely it is from whatever perspective we experience such moments that we can share the deep sense of catastrophic grief this lament expresses.

WISDOM OF SOLOMON: 1:13-15, 2:23-24. (Alternate) Most Protestant Christians are unfamiliar with the Wisdom of Solomon. Although attributed to King Solomon it was the work of a well-educated Hellenized Jew written scarcely a century before the birth of Christ. The first segment appeals to the faithful person to live a godly life while the second scoffs points to belief in life beyond death despite satanic influences in life now.

Coming late in the history of Hebrew literature, Wisdom of Solomon was not included in the Hebrew Bible, but was part of Jerome’s Latin Vulgate translation. So the Roman Catholic tradition considers it Holy Scripture whereas Protestants generally defer it to the apocryphal writings. It is generally thought to have originated in Alexandria where Jewish and Greek thought were considered compatible.

In the Jerusalem Bible, a Roman Catholic translation originating in France and first published in English in 1966, chapter 1 has the headline, “On seeking God and rejecting evil.” Chapter 2 is headed, “Life as the godless sees it.” These two excerpts elaborate these headings very well.

PSALM 130: Some regard this loveliest of psalms as a penitential prayer rather than a true lament. Yet it has a permanent place in the religious literature of the world. It is one series of psalms (Pss. 120-134) identified with either the New Year’s festival or the approach of pilgrims to Jerusalem for one of the great religious festivals. This one may well have been used on the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur. The fact that it omits any reference to atoning sacrifices suggests that it may be a late composition when such rituals had already lost their significance for the most devout.

Although the context reveals nothing about its actual circumstances, it does express a sense of deep devotion as well as a forthright confession of the sin. One might speculate whether it was a prayer of a pious individual or for use by the assembled representatives of the whole nation. It could also have been used antiphonally quite effectively.

In vs. 1, the reference to the depths brings forth the image of the engulfing waters of Sheol into which the dead sink (cf. Isa. 51:10; Jonah 2:3). It also reflects the poet’s deep sense of alienation from Yahweh. So he throws himself on Yahweh’s mercy and forgiveness (vss. 3-4) and realizes that on this alone rests his ultimate security (vss. 5-6).

Even if this prayer originated from the heart of a singularly pious soul, it ends with a plea for all Israel to put its hope in Yahweh’s steadfast love, trusting in Yahweh’s power to redeem the sinful nation from all its iniquities. Many generations in both the Jewish and Christian traditions have found in it solace for the sin-sick soul. John Wesley’s Journal records one of its more significant uses. In Wesley’s time, this prayer entitled De Profundis was sung at evensong on the 27th day of each month. The paragraph in his journal began: “In the afternoon I was asked to go to St. Paul’s.” The psalm in the version from the Book of Common Order follows. He would have known it by heart. This record is found in the paragraph immediately previous to the one in which he tells of his Aldersgate experience when his heart was “strangely warmed.”

PSALM 30. (Alternate) The psalmist praises God for saving him from death in a critical illness. After at first expressing a certain overconfidence about God’s favor (vss. 6-7), he realizes how much he owes to God for answering his prayer of distress.

It is natural for a person to be exuberant about being restored suddenly to good health. Even with modern medicine capable of curing or alleviating many of the most severe illnesses once regarded as fatal less than a century ago, the fear of death persists. The psalmist’s fear of death was expressed in vs. 2. The Pit was another common Old Testament term, among several others, for the abode of the dead. But Sheol was by far the most common, occurring sixty six times. Unlike the others, however, it was unique to the Hebrew language, and does not occur in any other Semitic language. Generally, the various terms for the abode of the dead conveyed the idea of a permanent, shadowy, chaotic but silent place. No Old Testament reference contains any concept of punishment or torment. The concept of an infernal hell came into existence only during the Hellenistic period probably influenced by Persian (i.e. Zoroastrian) ideas.

The traditional concept of illness resulting from divine anger still lingers as the philosophical matrix of the poem (vs.5). Despite the shadowed background to the psalm and the loss of prosperity, the poet had unmitigated praise for God’s beneficence. His pride had been restored to the extent that he could question divine justice in the death he had so recently escaped (vs. 9). His mourning had been transformed into joy (vs. 11).

In the 2nd century BC, the psalm came into liturgical use for the rededication of the temple by Judas Maccabaeus now celebrated at the Jewish festival of Hanukkah.

2 CORINTHIANS 8:7-15. Toward the end of his letter seeking reconciliation with the Corinthians (2 Cor. 1-9), Paul delicately proposes that they complete their collection for the famine-stricken Christians in Jerusalem. This project had been very close to Paul’s heart. He sincerely believed that as the offspring of the original congregation of believers, the Gentile congregations had a duty to help the Mother of all Churches in its time of need. Titus had made this appeal first to the Corinthians (vs. 6). For some reason they had withheld their contribution, probably due to their disagreement with Paul which caused the earlier, painful correspondence.

A personal aside: O my! How we Christians still try to control each other by withholding our stewardship gifts! The very day I first wrote this, I received a series of e-mail messages expressing the fear that if the issue of the blessing of gay and lesbian marriages is raised at the General Council of The United Church of Canada, many more will withhold their gifts to the Mission and Service Fund of our church or withdraw from our fellowship. Possibly 10,000 of more than 700,000 members and ordered ministers withdrew in the 1990s after the General Council adopted a policy accepting gay and lesbian persons who believe in Jesus Christ as full members and eligible for consideration as candidates for ordered ministry.

After first challenging the Corinthians to follow the example of the Macedonian churches in Philippi, Thessalonica and Beroea, Paul sets before them the example of Jesus Christ himself. For Paul, the sacrifice of Jesus did not begin on the cross, nor at this birth. It began when he set aside his godhead and became incarnate as a humble servant of God in the human context of a 1st century Jewish carpenter. (cf. Phil 2:6-8). Gracious giving to help those in need is based on Christ’s own sacrifice for them – and for us.

Paul has as much concern that the Corinthians learn how to be generous as he is that they make a large contribution. He cites their previous eagerness to contribute and asks them to finish what they had begun so well (vss. 10-11). Many a stewardship sermon has been preached on the text of vs. 12-14: One’s readiness to give has to be matched by one’s ability to give. What one has, not what one lacks, is the only balanced measure of our stewardship.

The quotation from Exodus 16:18 in vs. 15 emphasizes Paul’s vision of equality among Christians which requires those who have to share with those who have not. Such an economic policy is anathema in our crazed profit-oriented society, yet it also motivates many to contribute generously to food banks and to send relief to famine- or flood-stricken countries.

In Canada, a modest undertaking by Rt. Rev. Bill Phipps, former Moderator of The United Church of Canada, attracted considerable attention to his Consultation on Faith and the Economy from those outside the church fellowship. For instance, he was invited to be the theme speaker at the annual general meeting of the Halton Social Planning Council, on Oakville, Ontario, on June 26th, 2000. He spoke on A Moral Crisis: God and the Marketplace.

Nearly a decade later, with the whole world in the grips of a devastating recession, there is even greater need for a deep sense of caring and sharing to bridge the gap between those who have something to spare and those who have little or nothing.

MARK 5:21-43. Mark must have had some special purpose for saying many times that Jesus and his disciples crossed and recrossed Lake Galilee. Considering the local geography, these crossings provided no more than easy shortcuts from one town to another along the western and northwestern coast of the lake. Only in the instance of the previous pericope about driving the demon from the man living among the tombs (5:1-20) did he actually cross into foreign territory. Going by boat also provided the means of avoiding crowds.

In this passage, yet another crossing brought Jesus two other opportunities for healing. Supposedly the daughter of Jairus, the head of a synagogue was dying. While on his way to heal her, Jesus was pressed by the crowd, but still felt another woman in need seek healing by touching the hem of his robe.

Jairus was not a rabbi, but the lay president of the synagogue in his community. Mark does not identify exactly in which town or village it was located. The man was desperate about his daughter and pleaded that Jesus come to his house and lay hands on her. In response to this plea Jesus went with him and the crowd followed, probably more curious to see another miracle than to hear what Jesus might say. In small communities, anything unusual draws a crowd.

One of the people in the crowd was a woman who had suffered from a menstrual malady for twelve years. Every attempt she had made to get help from other healers had failed. She was now both desperate and destitute. Hearing about Jesus, she sought to get close enough to touch his garment hoping that it might have the magic that would heal her. When she did touch him, she was instantly healed. Jesus realized that something unusual had happened to him too. Looking around at the crowd, he asked who had touched him, the woman identified herself, but did so in great fear. Jesus had only compassion for her and sent her on her way with the assurance that her faith had been rewarded.

Meanwhile, Jairus’ daughter had already died, or so her caregivers thought. Jesus had to reassure Jairus that this was not so and urge him to let faith deal with his fear. Arriving at the house, he rebuked the mourners who had already begun their funereal wailing. They derided him, so he sent them all out of the house, took the parents into the room where the girl lay, and raised her with a tender word.

The two miracles provide a sharp contrast between the healing of someone who exhibited faith and another who did not. To Jesus, human need and God’s willingness and power, not the demonstration of good faith, makes the difference. The details of these two pericopes should not distract us from the essential point Mark is making: through Jesus the shalom of God has arrived revitalizing the lives of old and young. Wherever and whenever that happens, divine compassion for those in need overcomes fear and restores wholeness to the humblest of human lives.

This could have a singularly important application for our time. Many political and economic leaders want our social security and health systems to be transformed from a basis of need in which all share through public taxation to expensive insurance schemes that place limits on many pre-existing illnesses, thereby leaving many without needed medical care.

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
Third Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 7 Ordinary 12
June 21, 2009

1 SAMUEL 17:32-49. The story of David and Goliath reads as one of the great feats of Israel’s legendary hero-king. It comes from a cycle of early narratives about Israel’s first king, Saul, and his more famous successor, David. Where Saul failed David succeeded in a continuing conflict with invading Philistines, a sea-going people who had settled along the Mediterranean coast.

As it presently exists, the story has been combined with a later source and still later edited into a long narrative that is at times inconsistent. The point of this passage, however, is to show that David triumphed because of his trust in God.

JOB 38:1-11. (Alternate) The great drama dealing with the problem of innocent suffering comes to a crashing climax with God speaking directly to Job in a long series of unanswerable questions. God challenges Job to accept the reality that as Creator, God is more powerful than mere humans like himself. However, the fundamental question of why people suffer is never answered.

PSALM 9:9-20. This is an excerpt from a longer psalm originally consisting of Psalms 9 and 10. It is both a hymn of thanksgiving for God’s help (vss. 9-12), and an appeal for God’s favour (vss. 13-14) and for judgment against wicked enemies (vss. 15-20).

PSALM 107:1-3, 23-32. (Alternate) This psalm celebrates the steadfast love of God toward the redeemed of Israel showing how God brought them through great trials.

2 CORINTHIANS 6:1-13. This passage should be read in connection with the preceding passage beginning at 5:11. Paul had a continuing conflict with the Corinthians Christians. They did not always accept him and his preaching as he would have preferred. Despite extreme difficulties he reiterates his appeal that the Corinthians respond to the message of reconciliation with God through Jesus Christ.

MARK 4:35-41. The question about who Jesus really is comes to the fore in this brief story. He calms a storm which had arisen suddenly as the disciples were taking him across the Sea of Galilee in a boat. Not only did he rebuke the waves, he also rebuked the disciples for their lack of faith. That is the whole point of the story: nothing could harm the disciples while he was with them.

Many people have found great comfort in sensing Jesus’ constant presence in the most difficult and dangerous crises. Mark’s audience in Rome in the 60s AD surely felt that way as they faced persecution by Emperor Nero. It is probable that both Peter and Paul were martyred during this period.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS.

1 SAMUEL 17:32-49. This is surely one of the best loved children’s stories in the Old Testament. It tells one of the great feats of Israel’s legendary hero-king. It comes from a cycle of early narratives about Israel’s first king, Saul, and his more famous successor, David. Where Saul failed, David succeeded in a continuing conflict with invading Philistines, a sea-going people who had settled along the Mediterranean coast. But it is something far more than a simple children’s story.

As it presently exists, the story has been combined with a later source and still later was edited into a long narrative that is at times inconsistent. The point of this passage, however, is to show that David triumphed over Goliath only because of his trust in God.

Archeologists and historians have all but failed to find any significant evidence that David actually existed. The best estimate of the Saul and David cycle of stories likens them to the English legends of King Arthur. Like those traditional patriotic romances, story-tellers used literary imagination to enhance the achievements of their hero for other purposes. Yet there may well have been real tribal chieftans, Saul and David, who like Arthur in times of transition or crisis achieved much on behalf of their people.

Later generations embellished the legendary sagas of these heroes into meaningful and inspirational stories with a religious motif. In the case of Arthur, the stories amounted to a literary enrichment of genteel Victorian morality based on male dominant chivalry. In the case of David, the stories became part of Israel’s faith history based on the covenant relationship of Yahweh to Israel. A good historical-critical exegesis of the stories is found in Professor George Caird’s study in The Interpreter’s Bible, vol. 2. Of particular value is the introductory article, Section VII, on the historical value of the sources from which the present canonical text developed.

Recently an archeological dig discovered a small fortified city, Qeiyafa, strategically located on a hilltop on the northern side of the Elah Valley, on the main highway going east from Philistia and the coastal plain to Jerusalem. It was in the Elah Valley that David fought Goliath. The archeologist who made this discovery called it “a fortified checkpoint on the road to Jerusalem. … It was probably intended to defend Judah against the much larger Philistine city of Gath. Qeiyafa is less than 6 acres in area. The hostile Philistine city of Gath, just 6.5 miles away in the Elah Valley, is about 75 acres. In this sense the Biblical story of David and Goliath, even if legendary, may be understood as a kind of Biblical metaphor, the little David of Qeiyafa versus the Philistine giant of Goliath/Gath.” (Biblical Archaeology Review. 35:1. January-February 2009. 38-43)

All that aside, this story of David slaying Goliath still can be used as lighter sermon fare for topical preaching in summertime. Here are some possible themes: “Little stones make holy weapons;” “How God can multiply the power of the weakest;” “The biggest isn’t always the most powerful;” “Trust in God but load your slingshot!” Note too that Jesus often used rebukes and confronts to get the point of his ministry across, especially in dealing with recalcitrant unbelievers and dangerous opponents. The parable of the wicked tenants in Mark 12:1-12 comes immediately to mind.

JOB 38:1-11. (Alternate) The great drama dealing with the problem of innocent suffering comes to a crashing climax with God speaking directly to Job in a long series of unanswerable questions. God challenges Job to accept the reality that as Creator, God is more powerful than mere humans like himself. The fundamental question, however, is never answered.

Scholars debate whether to regard the Book of Job as a drama or a poem. In dealing with the problem of suffering, Job’s three friends and a fourth, younger participant, Elihu, have all said their set pieces. None have satisfactorily answered the eternal question: Why do the innocent suffer? Job has responded, angrily at times, to each of the first three. Elihu gave a long speech proclaiming God’s justice, condemning Job’s self-righteousness and exalting God’s goodness and majesty. Now God enters the dialogue in response to Job’s hostility.

The soaring rhetoric majestically declares the works of divine creativity and providence. Yet it never answers the fundamental question. It merely humbles Job and illustrates the vast gulf between human and divine understanding. The problem remains a mystery.

PSALM 9:9-20. This is an excerpt from a longer psalm originally consisting of Psalms 9 and 10. It is both a hymn of thanksgiving for God’s help (vss. 9-12); and an appeal for God’s favour (vss. 13-14) and for judgment against wicked enemies (vss. 15-20).

We often forget that the praises of Israel arose out of life situations, most of which are now completely unknowable. The context of this excerpt appears to reflect a time of great national distress, perhaps of imminent danger from foreign invasion. The image of Yahweh as a stronghold in vs. 9 suggests the need for something more than military defenses. In biblical times all cities and even small towns had a fortress into which the people retreated when invasions occurred. The preceding verses reflect a temporary victory of Israel over an unnamed enemy (vss. 3, 5- 6, 13-14). The victory was attributed to Yahweh who sits enthroned as an imperial potentate exercising judgment over the nations (vss. 4, 7, 8, 16).

The religious response to these events requires that the faithful put greater trust in Yahweh. The suffering poor, possibly those widows and orphans who lost husbands and fathers in battle, or those wounded and no longer able to provide for themselves, have special need for this assistance (vs. 12). Yet they are often forgotten and rejected (vs. 13, 18). Anyone who has visited a hospital where dismembered, disfigured or demented veterans of war must live out their days knows how these pitiful human sacrifices have been isolated from public view. For selfish political reasons, governments often try to hide these terrible costs of war from their public.

Ultimately, of course, the psalmist’s hope rests on his trust in Yahweh (vs. 20). At the same time, his narrow ethical viewpoint prevents him from recognizing “the nations” (i.e. other nations which are Israel’s enemies and lack Israel’s covenant faith) as being of any value to Yahweh. He also sees Israel as righteous people who draw superhuman strength from Yahweh. This attitude is reminiscent of the “evil empire” attitudes of many toward the Soviet Union during the Cold War of the late 20th century and of the earlier republican vs. loyalist conflicts of the American War of Independence.

PSALM 107:1-3, 23-32. (Alternate) This psalm celebrates the steadfast love of God toward the redeemed of Israel showing how God brought them through great trials. The whole of this beautiful litany of thanksgiving celebrates several instances when faith was tested and God’s redemptive grace relieved distressed souls. After the opening summons to praise (vss. 1-3), the psalm is divided into a number of discreet segments with almost no relation.

There are several references to Israel’s sojourn in the wilderness. The one exception appears to be in this reading (vss. 23-32) referring to a sea voyage on stormy waters. Generally speaking, the Jews were not a sea-going people. Was this passage linked in some way to the parable of Jonah? But that story was only superficially about a sea voyage as an allegory of the exile. Some scholars regard it as an addition from the Hellenistic period (after 330 BCE) when sea-borne commerce had become common. Vs. 3 refers directly to the widespread Diaspora of Israel which also indicates a relatively late date for the composition of the psalm.

Structurally, the psalm may or may not have been a unity. The antiphonal responses of vss. 8, 15, 21 and 31 give evidence of it having been composed for congregational worship, possibly at the time when sacrifices were offered in the temple. Of particular significance is the prophetic sense of social justice that permeates the psalm recalling Isaiah 61:1-4.

2 CORINTHIANS 6:1-13. This passage should be read in connection with the preceding part of the letter beginning at 5:11. Paul had a continuing conflict with the Corinthians Christians. They did not always accept him and his preaching as he would have preferred. Despite extreme difficulties he reiterates his appeal that they respond to the message of reconciliation with God through Jesus Christ.

Faced with their determined opposition to his ministry, Paul sought a cooperative rather than a confrontational relationship with the Corinthian community (vs. 1). He saw them “working together” in a common mission, to make God’s reconciling love in Christ known everywhere and to everyone. To him that was the only possible human response to what God had done in Christ. Any other response to this grace would be utterly in vain.

To emphasize his point that the time to respond is now, as they heard the gospel preached, Paul quoted from the Greek version of Isaiah 49:8. His urgency reflected his view that the end was near, i.e. Christ would soon return to judge the living and the dead. Then it would be too late for the recalcitrant to repent and turn to God.

At this point Paul launched into a defense of his ministry with particular emphasis on his diligence and how much it has cost him in personal suffering. He set this in the context of the general apostolic mission, as if his experiences had not been particularly unique. Hence the use of the phrase “as servants of God” and the first person plural in vs. 4. It makes quite a list of what the sincere evangelist in those times might well expect. Was he just boasting as he denied he was doing in 3:1 and 5:12? Is it still possible in our own time to face similar privations? Some newly ordained pastors and their spouses appointed to hinterland parishes far away from their urban roots might well wonder, as many can attest from their own experience.

Commentators have noted that this is the one place where Paul addressed the Corinthians by name (vs. 11). Thus the citation of general apostolic sufferings had a particular reference to this community. It was for them that he endured so much. Paul’s main purpose in listing these ordeals was to reassure the Corinthians that he truly did love them for Christ’s sake and to remind them that their problem was with their own attitudes (vs. 12). In other words, “It’s your problem, not mine!” The text conveys a not so gentle sense of rebuke.

William Barclay’s Daily Study Bible commentary on the Corinthians letters (p. 9) cites this passage as part of a reconciling letter Paul wrote after having written a much more severe letter now contained in (2 Cor. 10-13). While other scholars differ as to the exact divisions of Paul’s correspondence, the general consensus is that we now have a “scribal compilation” of at least three letters woven into a well-constructed whole. This would have been done as part of a general incorporation of the Corinthian correspondence into a Pauline corpus prepared for a wider circulation.

We, of course, have only the canonical version of this complex collection. Brevard Childs discusses the significance of the canonical text as it now stands in his The New Testament as Canon: An Introduction (Fortress Press, 1984). “The ministry about which the apostle is talking is not just a defense of his actions before the Corinthians, but relates to the gospel in the eternal purpose of God…. Far from being an idealization of the apostle, it explains why his suffering was not simply an unfortunate accident, but offered as the true evidence of his divinely commissioned apostolic office.”

In an age when secular culture concentrates on entirely different and selfish values, the spiritual insight of this passage may bring certain inspirational comfort (i.e. strength as well as compassion) to Christians striving to live by the sacrificial values God set before us in Christ Jesus.

MARK 4:35-41. The question about who Jesus really is comes to the fore in this brief story. He calms a storm which had suddenly arisen as the disciples were taking him across the Sea of Galilee in a boat. Not only did he rebuke the waves, he also rebuked the disciples for their lack of faith.

That is the whole point of the story: nothing could harm the disciples while he was with them because he exercised divine control over the forces of nature. Many people have found great comfort in sensing Jesus’ constant presence in the most difficult and dangerous crises. Mark’s audience in Rome in the 60s CE surely felt that way as they had faced persecution by Emperor Nero. It is probable that both Peter and Paul were martyred during this period.

Two other aspects of this pericope bring to the fore different and perhaps more primitive interpretations about Jesus. He was at once a miracle worker and had dominion over both natural and demonic forces. Yet there is also a remarkable depth to the story offering many homiletic opportunities.

In The Complete Gospels (Robert J. Miller, ed.. Polebridge Press, 1992.) A note on this passage makes several significant points: This is one of several lake crossings in Mark’s Gospel, which he calls a sea (thalassa – a term usually referring to the Mediterranean Sea). The term may be an exaggeration for emphasis. It “resonates powerfully” with “God’s creative and redemptive control of the waters (Gen. 1; Ex. 14; Pss. 69, 89, 93, 104-107; Isa. 43; 51:9-10).” It develops Mark’s theme of “faltering trust and faulty comprehension of Jesus’ band of followers.” The words the disciples used to waken Jesus were usually addressed to God (Ps. 44:23). Jesus stilled the storm as if exorcising a demon in much the same way as he did in many of Mark’s miracle stories.

Donald Spotto has an important comment on Jesus as a miracle worker in his The Hidden Jesus: A New Life (St. Martin’s Press, 1998). He notes that our understanding of the word “miracle” contains a notion that would be incomprehensible to the world of the Bible. “For the Jewish and Christian people of biblical times, God was trusted as the Lord of everything created; nothing was outside the range of his power.” In this instance, Mark was saying this about Jesus. The pericope is a metaphor for the early Christian confession, “Jesus is Lord.” If John had used this story in his gospel, he would have included it as one of the signs Jesus gave to declare openly who he is. Mark, on the other hand, keeps that truth hidden even from the disciples (vs. 41). Experienced boatmen though they may have been and knowing full well the dangers of a sudden squall sweeping down from the Golan Heights, they were simply awed and confused by what had happened to them.

Tourists who have taken the boat ride to Capernaum on Lake Galilee and have been caught in one of these squalls can attest to the sense of terror that the disciples must have felt. It takes a very few minutes for a storm to develop from dead calm to a raging torrent of rain, mighty waves and contrary winds. Galilean fishing boats of that era with oars and flimsy sails were much smaller vessels than the diesel-driven tourist boats now plying these waters. One tourist who had such an experience said that it was a moment of revelation for her despite her reassuring trust in the skill of the helmsman and the size of the vessel. As the psalmist sang in Ps. 46:7 “The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.”

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
Second Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 6 Ordinary 11
June 14, 2009

1 SAMUEL 15:34-16:13. The story of how Samuel was led by God to anoint David as king of Israel instead of Saul may sound strange to our modern ears. Yet it fits well with the theological viewpoint found throughout the Old Testament that God is very much involved in the working out of human history.

EZEKIEL 17:22-24. (Alternate) In a metaphor of God planting a tree on a high mountain this poetic prophecy again expresses the view of God as Lord of Israel’s history. The metaphor refers to Israel’s return from exile in Babylon to rebuild their capital city, Jerusalem.

PSALM 20. Like a number of psalms, this one offers prayers for an anointed king. It pleads for God’s help at a time when the monarch is menaced by foes from within and without his country.

PSALM 92:1-4, 12-15. (Alternate) The psalmist has occasion to offer thanks to God. His gratitude arises out of long experience of God’s goodness during a long life.

2 CORINTHIANS 5:6-17. Paul confidently celebrates faith in the love of Christ that has motivated and sustained him through years of difficult ministry to the Gentiles. He fervently proclaimed that anyone who believed and followed Christ had become a new creation and could see the whole of life in this world from a spiritual point of view.

MARK 4:26-34. Because we do not think in spiritual terms, Jesus’ parables of the kingdom of heaven often seem to defy interpretation for modern readers. In these two brief vignettes drawn from the rural life of Galilee, Jesus spoke about the way faith can provide those who believed in and followed him with a full and abundant life.

A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS.

1 SAMUEL 15:34-16:13. In these times when governments are change by democratic vote or by violent revolution, this passage may seem to have no message for us. The story of how Samuel was led by God to anoint David as king of Israel instead of Saul may sound particularly strange to our modern ears. Yet it fits well with the view found throughout the Old Testament that God is very much involved in the working out of human history, especially that of God’s chosen people, Israel.

The concept of God as Lord of history is not easy to understand in today’s global political situation. We tend to think either in terms of God being on our side or favouring the most militarily powerful empire, especially in times of war. The story of Samuel anointing David reveals that God is not interested in either prestige or power. As 16:7 declares, “the Lord does not see as mortals see.” It was the youngest of Jesse’s son, the shepherd boy, David, whom God chose to succeed Israel’s first king Saul after he had departed from God’s purpose.

Another aspect of this story is the reality of Samuel’s fear. At first he was loath to do as God had directed him. The aging prophet knew that Saul would kill him if he found out that God had rejected him as Israel’s leader. God saw things differently and gave Samuel an alternative way to do God’s bidding. When Samuel arrived in Bethlehem, the elders of that city were similarly fearful of Saul until the prophet advised them of the ruse to conceal his real intention.

More often than not fear is a significant factor in human relations, be it among individuals or nations. Fear of hostile neighbours led Israel to aggressive wars on many occasions. Fear of losing the competition for imperial power led to the two costly global wars of the 20th century. As the 21st century began, a pre-emptive war against terror became a further reason for more futile bloodshed to the Middle East.

Surely God has another purpose and plan for the nations and the religious traditions that motivate them to take up arms against one another. The working out of God’s purpose to create a universal reign of love in this world is the task to which all peoples of faith must now turn. But will we ever find the courage to do so?

EZEKIEL 17:22-24. (Alternate) In a metaphor of God planting a tree on a high mountain this poetic prophecy again expressed the view of God as Lord of Israel’s history. The metaphor referred to Israel’s return from exile in Babylon to rebuild their capital city, Jerusalem, in the latter part of the 6th century BCE.

The poet Ogden Nash once wrote, “How odd of God to choose the Jews.” Yet the biblical narrative assures us that God chose Israel to be a light among the nations that the whole world might learn God’s way to live in neighbourly peace. This divine purpose lies behind Ezekiel’s metaphor of a small sprig of a lofty cedar tree planted on a high mountain to grow and give shade for the birds to nest in.

In vs. 24, speaking for God, the prophet depicted as trees that either flourish or fail to declare how God uses the rise and fall of nations and empires to bring about the end to which history moves.

PSALM 20. Like a number of psalms, this one offers prayers for an anointed king. It pleads for God’s help at a time when the monarch is menaced by foes from within and without his country.

It is never wrong to pray for our government and our country. On the other hand, we should beware the blatant nationalism of the false patriot who declares, “My country right or wrong; but right our wrong, my country.” In fact, that bit of bravado is a misquotation of statements with quite different meaning made by several British and American authors including Charles Churchill (1731-1764); Stephen Decatur (1779-1820); John Quincy Adams (1767-1848); Carl Schurz (1829-1906); and G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936).

This prayer for a king probably dates from the period prior to the Babylonian exile (586-539 BCE) when Judea, the southern part of the original kingdom, still had a ruling monarch. The performance of religious rites seeking God’s favour comes through the early verses. A sense of trepidation lies behind the latter verses. As God’s anointed, the monarch’s safety and victory were of paramount importance to the nation and its security. Whoever the enemy was, they were presumed to have more powerful armaments (vss. 7-8). Therefore the appeal for God’s help in gaining victory was far from assured.

Offering prayers for victory in battle may be as old as human religious traditions. How God is to deal with the fervent prayers for victory offered by both combatants is a theological puzzle that no one can satisfactorily solve.

PSALM 92:1-4, 12-15. (Alternate) The psalmist has occasion to offer thanks to God. His gratitude arises out of long experience of God’s goodness during a long life. His joy in praising God comes through vividly in the opening verses.

The mood changes in vss. 5-8 to a traditional contrast of those who are faithful and those who are not. The right to make such judgments still belongs to God. Victory over enemies is also seen as the victory of God (vss. 9-11). Finally, vss. 12-15 lift up the benefits of living righteously. Such benefits rest on God’s righteousness and justice, not on human behaviour.

2 CORINTHIANS 5:6-17. In this excerpt Paul confidently celebrated faith in the love of Christ that had motivated and sustained him through years of difficult ministry to the Gentiles. He fervently proclaimed that anyone who believed and followed Christ had become a new creation. This gave him a whole new perspective on life in this world and life eternal from a spiritual point of view.

Paul had a very troubled relationship with the Corinthians, but he constantly strove to bring them to a new life of faith. The early part of this passage (vss. 6-10) deals with the subject of our unavoidable mortality which he had begun to discuss in the previous chapter, 4:7 – 5:5. Facing death was nothing new for him. Many times he had been threatened with imminent demise, yet he had never been afraid of it. Early in his life as a Pharisee and much more so after his conversion, he had devoutly believed in resurrection and life beyond death. This faith gave him the confidence to say what for any other person might be regarded as death wish (vs.8). His one desire was to serve Christ as long as he had breath, knowing full well that judgment awaited him as it did for every other human being. Beyond that too lay the glorious experience of the eternal presence of God and Jesus Christ.

The expression “the fear of the Lord” occurs many times in the Old Testament. In many respects it was the familiar way of describing the religious tradition of post-exilic Judaism. Its central meaning can be understood best as mysterium tremendum. Much more than reverent piety, it meant a sense of supreme awe in the presence of Yawheh. It was the essence of wisdom in approaching everyday life and the ethical motivation for an absolute moral monotheism determining the behaviour of every believer. Even the Messiah would sense the spirit of the fear of the Lord (Isa. 11:2).

Paul shared this classical theological and psychological point of view. At the same time, his approach to life and to his mission had been filtered through his conversion experience. He had come to see that above all else the life, death and resurrection of Jesus conveyed the love of God for sinful, selfish humanity. “He died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised for them.” Nothing else mattered. This became the fundamental motivation for his ministry to the Gentiles and his continual conflict with both Peter and James about that mission.

Verse 16 contains a profound retrospective of his conversion experience. He certainly had seen Jesus “from a human point of view.” The apostolic claim that Jesus was the Messiah/Christ had so threatened Paul’s rabbinical ambitions that he had become a violent persecutor of the Christian community in Jerusalem. He had obtained permission from the high priest to extend his campaign against those messianic heretics to Damascus. Whatever that experience may have been in modern psychological terms, his meeting with the risen Christ on the Damascus Road had totally transformed his life. He became, as vs. 17 avers, “a new creation.”

Perhaps the most significant element of this compact passage is the simple word “anyone” in vs. 17. Paul did not regard the conversion experience as exclusive to himself. It was for everyone who believed that Jesus had indeed risen from the dead. It was the power of the Spirit of God available to Jew and Gentile alike.

In his Rabbi Paul: An Intellectual Biography (Image Books, 2004), Bruce Chilton has described Paul in this passage as “thinking on so cosmic a scale, linking God’s Spirit to humanity’s and both to the transformation of the world.” Chilton elaborates: “The same Spirit that made the world, hovering over the face of the primeval waters and descending upon each believer at baptism, infused the meetings of every congregation, joining Paul’s spirit and Jesus’ power in the judgment that would free the world of its old shape and give it new form. That transformation was doubly powerful because at the same time it occurred at the intimate level of each believer’s own body. The transformation of body, self and world were all happening at once, ‘in Christ.’”

Is it too much to believe that even the least noticed transformation of any person that leads to deeper and more faithful discipleship is a step toward remaking this sin-sick old world?

MARK 4:26-34. Because we do not think in spiritual terms, Jesus’ parables of the kingdom of heaven often seem to defy interpretation for modern readers. In these two brief vignettes drawn from the rural life of Galilee, Jesus spoke about the way faith can provide those who believed in and followed him a full and abundant life.

As a young carpenter of Nazareth Jesus would have met and chatted with innumerable peasant farmers of Galilee. Seedtime and harvest would have been natural topics of conversation then as they are today among farm folk. In that region, especially in the Plain of Esdraelon nearby, there was abundant good soil for raising abundant grain crops. Because of the mountains of Lebanon to the north, rainfall was plentiful. He might well have turned his own hand to the sickle to aid his neighbours at harvest time. This set of parables reflects that rural scene with sharp realism.

The time between seedtime and harvest also come through almost as clearly in the words of vs. 27. It takes approximately ninety days for the farmer to sleep and rise before a field crop can ripen to maturity. Much can happen in the interim to prevent a fruitful harvest. That requires both faith and patience from the farmer.

The second parable is less illustrative of rural Galilee. Once cultivated for the oil of its very small seeds, the mustard plant (brassica nigra) is now a common weed. It does exceed most other weeds in height, projecting above the level of the grain it contaminates. With large leaves, bright yellow flowers and small seeds in pods, it can be easily distinguished from crop surrounding it. However, it is not as large as a small tree or shrub and certainly could not hold up even a small bird’s nest. At most, a tiny bird might settle on its branches for a few seconds rest. It is even possible that the parable drew on a well-known image found in Daniel 4:10-12 and 20-22.

So Jesus must have been exaggerating to make his point. But why the hyperbole? To emphasize the significance of faith. “The kingdom of heaven” is no earthly nation with exact geographic location on this planet or elsewhere in the vast universe. It is spiritual in nature and can only be accessed by those who are spiritual. It is located wherever God’s love reigns. In these parables Jesus was saying that only those with a deep, abiding and patient faith in him and his way will find themselves citizens of that sacred, spiritual realm.

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INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE
First Sunday After Pentecost – June 7, 2009
[Also known as Trinity Sunday]

ISAIAH 6:1-8. These few verses describe the call of Isaiah to his ministry of speaking for God to Israel during a critical period of its history in the late 8th century BC. Amid the smoke from the sacrifice on the altar in the temple, Isaiah had a vision of God attended by heavenly creatures. One of the heavenly beings touched his lips with a live coal symbolizing his freedom from sin and worthiness to proclaim God’s message to Israel. Then Isaiah heard the voice of God calling for someone to speak for God to God’s sinful people; and he responds.

PSALM 29. Although beginning with praise to God, the emphasis in this psalm is on the voice of God as if heard in the violence of a thunderstorm.

ROMANS 8:12-17. Paul claims that having the Spirit of the risen Christ is the key to Christian discipleship. The Spirit dwelling within us enables us to live as the people of God rather than as slaves to the value system of the world around us.

JOHN 3:1-17. Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews, learns from Jesus how the Spirit makes us new spiritual persons through faith in the crucified and risen Christ. This comes about because God loves the world so much that God sent Jesus into the world to save us with this faith.

This majestic passage is one of many in the New Testament witnessing to what subsequently became the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. It describes the ministry Jesus and the work of the Holy Spirit as God at work in the world.

Some people look at verse 16 as the secret for obtaining eternal life beyond death. In this passage, however, John makes the point that God is as much concerned about how we live in this life now as with what happens to us afterward. As the subsequent verses 18 to 21 explain, God’s judgment occurs and eternal life begins when we believe who Jesus is and what his coming into the world really means.

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A MORE COMPLETE ANALYSIS

ISAIAH 6:1-8. These few verses describe the call of Isaiah to his ministry of speaking for God to Israel during a critical period of its history in the late 8th century BC. The late Dr. R.B.Y. Scott, my professor of Old Testament at McGill University, Montreal, later of Princeton University, wrote an exceptional exegesis of this passage in The Interpreter’s Bible (6: 204ff) which is well worth reading in full. Scott described this as an ecstatic vision, “one of the outstanding passages of the Bible which justify a doctrine of revelation in and through recorded spiritual experience…. We can participate imaginatively in Isaiah’s vision and feel the same pang of conscience in the presence of the unutterable and sovereign glory of the goodness of God.”

Amid the smoke from the sacrifice on the altar in the temple, Isaiah had a vision of God attended by heavenly creatures. One of the heavenly beings touched his lips with a live coal symbolizing his freedom from sin and worthiness to proclaim God’s message to Israel. Then Isaiah heard the voice of God calling for someone to speak for God to God’s sinful people; and he responds.

The event has a specific historical context: “the year that King Uzziah died.” The year 742 BCE was the approximate date, although biblical historians cannot be altogether sure. II Kings 15:1ff gave the king another name, Azariah (cf.14:21; 15:13). Isaiah may have been one of the courtiers or a member of the priesthood. He had contact with several kings of Judah, the southern kingdom, through perilous times until at least 701 BCE. His oracles often met with royal displeasure because they counseled actions which, however spiritually motivated, were politically unpalatable (chs. 36-39).

The passage emphasizes the holiness of Yahweh in that in the intensity of his vision when Isaiah “sees” Yahweh and hears the divine summons, Yahweh’s face and feet are hidden from him. It is the six winged seraphim, the heavenly attendants of Yahweh, of which Isaiah catches sight. In other words, spiritual being can only be spiritually encountered. The experience can only be expressed in humanly relevant terms. As Scott said, “Holiness is the essential quality of deity, glory is the manifestation of deity in the natural world.”

Isaiah’s familiarity with the cult of Yahweh underlies the ritual act of mouth-purification (vss. 6-7) symbolizing divine forgiveness enabling the prophet to speak in Yahweh’s name, “Thus saith the Lord ….” Contact with the holiness of Yahweh sanctified Isaiah for his prophetic mission. His humble response, “Here am I! Send me,” represents total commitment that countless others have made in similar circumstances. Vocation remains our best human response to a divine summons.

Not all prophets or pastors, from ancient times to the present day, have been called in such dramatic fashion. This brief narrative gives scriptural credibility to the ecstatic nature of some calls to ministry. It may be easy for modern secular minds the cast doubt on the validity of such calls. For those to whom it has happened, it has been a life-changing experience, not the hallucinations of religious fanatics. For me, the compelling power of the experience has lasted for sixty-five years.

PSALM 29. Praise for the glory of God in a thunderstorm? That is an imaginative interpretation of a very natural occurrence in almost any part of the world. Yet that is the chief emphasis in this psalm.

The power of a storm attracted the poet’s attention. In ancient times, nature’s mighty elements had the status of demi-gods. It was they who are addressed in vss. 1-2 as “heavenly beings” and summoned to ascribe glory to Yahweh, their “holy array” in the heavens worshiping as if in the temple.

Storms of great violence still occur in Palestine. Sweeping down from the heights of Mount Lebanon, strong cold fronts collide with warm air from the deserts of the Arabian and Sinai peninsulas. This results in furious storms which can do great damage to the unwary, especially those poor enough or foolish enough to build their fragile shelters in the wadis of the wilderness or the valleys of spring-fed mountain streams. Such disasters still happen in even the most modern urban communities of California and in the barrios of Central and South America. Those who live in “Tornado Alley” on the plains of the American midwest can also attest to the violence of such storms. Insurance policies still include a clause defining some destructive events as “acts of God.”

The psalmist heard the majestic voice of God in the sound of thunder as the storm rolls closer (vs. 3-4). The cedars of Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon (Sirion) bent before the wind, skipping like a calf or a young wild ox. The psalmist may have referred to wild aurochs, from which cattle were domesticated, that may not have been entirely extinct in the more remote foothills of the Bekah Valley in Lebanon (vss. 5-6). Lightning appeared as flames from the same mouth from which the voice of Yahweh thunders (vs. 7). The references to Lebanon in the north and the wilderness of Kadesh in the southern desert on the borders of Sinai (vs. 8) represent the expanse of the whole nation over which the storm spreads its fury.

Due to the absence of vowels in Hebrew, some versions translate vs. 9 differently. The KJV has it, “The voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to calve.” The Hebrew word chuwl or chiyl has many meanings, but essentially means “to twist or whirl.” Another meaning is “to writhe in pain as in giving birth.” The KJV sense might be possible in a heavy storm if the deer were as terrified as some humans were at such times. The more exact translation in the NRSV and several other modern versions better serve the intended poetic parallelism. A tornado whistling through a forest has the power to strip leaves from trees or uproot great oaks and whirl them to the ground. That would appear to be the image the poet has in mind.

As the storm passed, reflection on its meaning calmed the poet. The One who is sovereign over all the most powerful forces of nature was also able to give strength and peace to Israel, Yahweh’s chosen people.

ROMANS 8:12-17. Here Paul claims that having the Spirit of the risen Christ is the key to Christian discipleship. The Spirit enables us to live as the people of God rather than as slaves to the value system of the world around us.

A good deal of scholarly effort has concentrated on what Paul meant by “the flesh.” Most probably, his concept of the term arose from his early life in Tarsus famous for its Stoic philosophers as well as his long, intense association and training with the Pharisees. In contrast to the Hebrew concept of a unified human nature, the Greeks believed that the spiritual and the physical aspects of human beings were totally separate and impossible to unite in the same person.

In a word, “the flesh” (Gk. = sarx) meant sin, anything that separates us from God and spiritual life. To quote William Barclay in his The Mind of Paul (Harper, 1958. 190): “Sin is not simply an influence or a force; it is a kind of personal demonic power which invades a man and takes up residence in him. It is in fact there that Paul’s whole conception of the body and the flesh comes in. Any invading enemy requires a bridgehead; it is the flesh which gives sin a bridgehead. The flesh is not simply the body; and the sins of the flesh are not simply fleshly sins. Idolatry, hatred, strife, wrath, heresy are all sins of the flesh (Gal. 5:20). The flesh is the human nature apart from God. And it is just there that sin obtains the bridgehead for the invasion whose end is the occupation of the human personality.”

Putting that in terms of contemporary thought, “the flesh” represents the value system of the dominate culture to which everyone is attracted and subjected, consciously or unconsciously. The moral and spiritual power that enables us to live free of the dominating influence of the culture in which we live is the Holy Spirit (vss. 12-13). But as the whole body of his correspondence with the apostolic churches makes abundantly clear, Paul had no illusions about the challenge of living by the Spirit and not the flesh in that era and in this.

E.P Sanders carried Paul’s understanding of “the flesh” even farther: “His penetrating observations have to do with how it is that the man who does not have faith in Christ is not only lost in a formal and external sense – handed over to destruction – but even lost to himself, being unable to achieve the goal which he so ardently desires. For that which is desired – life – can only be received as a gift, so that the effort to attain it is self-defeating.” (Paul and Palestinian Judaism. SCM Press, 1977. 509)

The antidote to this universal human predicament is found in vs. 14 of this passage. Those who through faith in Christ receive the gift of the Holy Spirit “are the children of God.” In vs. 15, Paul uses the metaphor of adoption into the family of God in contrast to slavery as the means by which the gift is given to us. Anyone, parent or child, who has experienced adoption senses immediately the difference. The adopted child in regarded as a member of the family as much as if born into the family naturally. However intimately a slave or servant may be regarded, or how long he or she may serve in a household, that person never becomes a member of the family with all the incumbent rights and privileges of an adopted child. The adopted child can never be removed from the family circle. As Paul described this intimately spiritual experience in vs. 17: “if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ.”

Paul ends this segment of his message with the startling affirmation of the implications of being a member of the family of God with Christ: “If, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.” We receive everything that accrues to the family, whether great riches and honour, or as the Romans may well have been about to experience when Paul wrote to them, persecution, privation and unjust punishment for crimes they did not commit. Tradition holds that not long after Paul wrote this letter, he arrived in Rome and suffered martyrdom there during Nero’s persecution of the Christian community for the great fire instigated by the mad emperor himself.

There is one more brief reference in vs. 15b-16 which bears investigation. At one time or another, every Christian feels frustrated by his or her feeble efforts to pray. When crises come upon on us, many feel especially bereft of the spiritual connections that make prayer meaningful and helpful. Like terrified children we can only cry out, “Daddy, help me!” It is then, in our moments of terror, we most need the Spirit to interpret our cries for help and to reassure us that we are indeed the children of the living, loving God who knows our plight and will not desert us in our need.

Had Paul heard what was happening to the Christian community in Rome under the mad emperor Nero? Had he determined to appeal to the emperor himself so that he might join them in their time of danger? Nero was fiercely anti-Semitic as had been his adoptive father, Claudius, whom he succeeded as emperor. Paul met two of his closest co-workers in Corinth, Priscilla and Aquila, after Claudius had banished them from Rome with other Jews in 49/50 CE. The postscript to the Letter to the Romans (16:3) includes a warm greeting to Priscilla and Aquila which indicates that there were once again back in the capital of the empire. We can only speculate how Paul may have intended his reference to Spirit-assisted prayer to be understood by his audience. Our own interpretation of it, however, may yield a fruitful homily for the early summer.

JOHN 3:1-17. Reading this fourth and last gospel in New Testament nearly two millennia after it was composed, we need to remember that those who wrote the gospels knew about, believed in and assumed they were inspired by the Holy Spirit of God as they created these texts from the oral traditions to which they had access. And who is to say that they were not? This majestic passage is one of many in the New Testament witnessing to what subsequently became the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. It describes the ministry Jesus and the activity of the Holy Spirit as God engaged in God’s redeeming work in and for the world.

The story is a simple one: Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews, learns from Jesus how the Spirit makes us new spiritual persons through faith in the crucified and risen Christ. This comes about because God loves the world so much that God sent Jesus into the world to save us humans and this planet through this faith.

Some people look at John 3:16 as the secret for obtaining eternal life beyond death. In this passage, however, John makes the point that God is as much concerned about how we live in this life now as with what happens to us afterward. As the subsequent verses 18 to 21 explain, God’s judgment occurs and eternal life begins when we believe who Jesus is and what his coming into the world really means.

In the theological struggles of the 20th and 21st centuries, “born again” has become the rallying cry of conservatively minded Christians, the magical open sesame to salvation. In many respects it has the same force as the synoptic gospel proclamation, “repent and believe the gospel.” The phrase is not a magic ticket to enter “that better life in the great beyond.” It is a metaphor for a new moral and spiritual beginning which comes about for those who have faith that Jesus is the one to whom the early Christian community witnessed: the Messiah/Christ, Son of God. As Messiah, Jesus came to show us the way of life God requires of us all. Was it not out of such a context that Jesus chided the doubting Nicodemus, “Are you a teacher of Israel and you do not understand these things? (vs. 10)

In all of the discourses of Jesus which John includes in his gospel, it is difficult to distinguish how much are remembrances of what Jesus may have actually said or the commentary of John himself. Obviously is vss. 11-17, Jesus, or more probably John, was thinking about the whole story of incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension of God’s sovereign love made manifest in Jesus. Another metaphor of universal salvation comes in the comparison of the crucifixion to Moses’ elevation of the serpent which prevented the Israelites from dying of a plague of poisonous snakes (vss. 14-15 cf. Numbers 21:4-9). John reiterates that this is God’s intention in the classic statement about salvation in vs. 16.

If that were not enough to convince the unbelieving, and especially the Jewish element of his audience, John drives his point home in vs. 17-21 by introducing the constant Old Testament theme of divine judgment on sin. Yet here John differentiates Christian from Jewish theology. God’s judgment does not come for the purpose of condemning the wicked who transgress a moral law or ritual code, as so often stated in the Old Testament. The purpose of divine judgment is to bring the whole world to faith and spiritual fellowship with God. This reaffirms in a remarkable way that Jesus is the full expression of divine love in human form as stated so exquisitely in vs. 16.

What, then, is the Holy Trinity but God who is love coming to us in whatever way we humans can receive the gift of God’s own spiritual life and thereby be recreated as new persons who express love in all our relationships?

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