Author: appadmin

30 August 2015
Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 17B (RCL)
Song of Songs 2:8-13
Psalm 45:1-2, 7-10
James 1:17-27
Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

It is easy for us to think that the Pharisees are getting hung up on trivial matters, and that Jesus is scolding them for their triviality. Washing hands and cups and pots can seem like small matters, but in fact these sorts of rituals structure the social universe. I learned this the hard way on one of my trips to the Diocese of Lui, in South Sudan. Among the Moru, one does not eat without washing hands. In our guest compound, there was a pot with a spigot sitting on a table, where we all washed our hands before coming into the payat to eat.

However, Continue reading “The great unwashed”

23 August 2015
Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 16B (RCL)
1 Kings 8:1, 6, 10-11,22-30, 41-43
Psalm 84
Ephesians 6:10-20
John 6:56-69

The passage from 1 Kings recounts Solomon’s renewal (change?) of the covenant with God at the completion of the Temple. This passage gives us about as clear an expression of the Temple/King mythology as can be found. It is interesting to note how the terms of the covenant have shifted with the covenant God made with David. When David wanted to build God a house, Nathan reminded him that all the time God had gone with the people in the wilderness and through the time of the judges, God had lived in a tent and had not asked for a house. Instead, God would make of David a house, as long as his descendants walked in the way of the Lord. The covenant was still attached to a people and their representative; not to a place.

Solomon’s covenant changes the terms dramatically. Continue reading “To whom would we go?”

16 August 2016
Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 15B (RCL)
1 Kings 2:10-12; 3:3-14
Psalm 111
Ephesians 5:15-20
John 6:51-58

Our Old Testament reading raises the question, “Who didn’t David sleep with?” But seriously, to read this passage, one would think that David was the most morally upright person Israel had ever seen. I find it intriguing that the editors of the tradition saw fit to keep both aspects of the tradition; pro and con. Even Solomon prays for wisdom at the high place of Gibeon: worship later forbidden. The editors of this tradition could have easily expunged this fact, but chose not to. We are given the history in all its complicated messiness. Neither David nor Solomon is presented as a plaster god.

This week’s Gospel reading Continue reading “Gnawing flesh; drinking blood”

9 August 2015
Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 14B (RCL)
2 Samuel 18:5-9, 15, 31-33
Psalm 130
Ephesians 4:25 — 5:2
John 6:35, 41-51

Nathan’s prophecy to David in last week’s reading comes home with a vengeance in this week’s reading. The sword does not depart from David’s house. We’ve leapt over a lot of material in the story of David’s house, including Absalom’s rebellion. David had been declared king of Israel as well as king of Judah (and Samuel had warned the house of Israel of the consequences of having a king). Now, Absalom has won the loyalty of the men of Israel, and David goes to war against Israel with his own men, his mercenaries and the men of Judah. After the death of Absalom, David will resume the crown of Israel. I am sure the relationship with Israel will be difficult, despite the gauzy filter history will apply. Continue reading “For the life of the world”

2 August 2015
Tenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 13B (RCL)
2 Samuel 11:26 – 12:13a
Psalm 51:1-13
Ephesians 4:1-16
John 6:24-35

The theme of “work” seems oddly out of place in a discourse about bread. And it is introduced in one of John’s seeming non sequiturs. As the people come seeking Jesus, he chides them for seeking him only because they ate their fill of the loaves and then tells them to work for the bread that endures (or remains — the Greek is menein). They respond by asking, “What must we be doing in order to be working the works of God?” Working for bread makes perfect sense, but connecting it to the works of God is a bit of a jump. Jesus replies that the work of God is to trust the one God has sent. Continue reading “The works of God”

19 July 2015
Eighth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 11B (RCL)
2 Samuel 7:1-14a
Psalm 89:20-37
Ephesians 2:11-22
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

Gaaa! Sometimes lectionaries chop the Bible up in inexcusable ways. In the reading from Mark, we jump over the feeding of the five thousand and the second sea crossing (Jesus walking on the water). Mark has arranged the bulk of the material in his Gospel (outside the Passion Narrative) in two major blocks, each bookended by a sea crossing and a feeding in the wilderness. This pairing, of course, reminds us of Moses leading the people across the sea and feeding them with manna in the wilderness. Mark strengthens the association by having Jesus cast out the legion from the Garasene demoniac immediately after the first sea crossing, drowning a legion of the Roman army in the sea in a herd of pigs. The feeding of the five thousand wraps up this first block of material which has included the demoniac, Jairus’ daughter, the woman with the hemorrhage, the sending of the twelve and the death of John the Baptist. Continue reading “The house of God”

12 July 2015
Seventh Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 10B (RCL)
2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19
Psalm 24
Ephesians 1:3-14
Mark 6:14-29

We assume that Michal despises David because she sees him dancing with abandon before the Lord, and even that he shows off his underwear in the dancing. However, he does something much more egregious in this passage. We are told that he distributes to every man and woman in the whole multitude of Israel a loaf of bread, a cake of raisins and a portion of roasted meat. Women received sacrificial meat (so, any meat) through their men — their fathers if they were unmarried, or the husbands if married. Hence, the plight of widows. David is effectively claiming all the women of Israel as his own, either daughters or wives. No wonder Michal despised him.

Herod Antipas Continue reading “True power”

5 July 2015
Sixth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 9B (RCL)
2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10
Psalm 48
2 Corinthians 12:2-10
Mark 6:1-13

The Books of Samuel provide a very ambivalent assessment of the development of the monarchy. At times, they portray the monarch as God’s plan for Israel from the outset; and then again, as a betrayal of God’s plan, demonstrating the people’s lack of trust in God. In the passage we hear today, the nation of Israel finally choose David as their king, and he thereby becomes king of both Judah and Israel, beginning the process of the melding of their various traditions. David captures the neutral city of Jerusalem of the Jebusites (thereby also becoming a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek — possibly a title for the king of Jerusalem). The empire is now a fact. From here on, the history of David’s monarchy is presented almost as a matter of fact, neither as God’s plan or a betrayal thereof. But God does send prophets to David to remind him of the way he came to the throne — by considering the plight of the marginal — something he woefully forgets once on the throne. That would be an enduring theme of both the histories and the prophetic works. Monarchy as an institution in its own right was never the plan, but only for the protection of the least. Continue reading “Imperial implications”

28 June 2015
Fifth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 8B (RCL)
2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27
Psalm 130
2 Corinthians 8:7-15
Mark 5:21-43

Most Sundays, I’m grateful for a lectionary – I don’t have to choose readings. Some Sundays, though, I find the choices maddening. Last week, we heard the story of David meeting Saul after slaying Goliath, and this Sunday, we leap over all the intervening story of the relationship between the two, the different styles of leadership, the whole story of David and Jonathan, and deal with the deaths of Saul and Jonathan. Lectionary whiplash. Also, we heard the story of Jesus crossing the Sea of Galilee in a storm and calming the storm. We leap over the story of the Garasene demoniac (whose name was Legion). We get the story of the crossing of the sea, but not the drowning of the oppressor’s army. The choices make it hard to tell a coherent story. Continue reading “Welcome to the kingdom”