A Preacher’s Ponderings

November 3, 2013
All Saints’ Day observed
Proper for All Saints’ C (RCL)
Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18
Psalm 149
Ephesians 1:11-23
Luke 6:20-31

I’ve never particularly like Psalm 149, and yet we hear it (and sing it) every year on All Saints’ Day. I’m not sure what I think about the faithful wreaking vengeance on the nations and punishment on the peoples in general. And even more, it seems to me an odd thing to be associate that with All Saints’. Clint McCann Continue reading “Turning the world upside down”

27 October 2013
Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 25C (RCL)
Joel 2:23-32
Psalm 65
2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18
Luke 18:9-14

On the heels of the parable about the persistent widow, we now have the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, and their prayers. Luke intends both to tell us something about the nature of our relationship to God. In the parable of the widow, God will justify the righteous who call to God day and night. We are to be like the widow and never forget the justice of our case. Even though the world has no reason to pay us any attention, we must stand firm.

The parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector qualifies our relationship to the world. While God’s justice may be with us (with the poor and persecuted), and the world is unjust, we may not simply opt out of the world. The Pharisee is reasonably well off — he can afford to tithe on everything he earns. We don’t learn much about the tax collector’s status. But, as seems likely, because he is in the temple, he is one of those poor small-holders who had been taxed off his own land, and turned to collecting taxes from his own neighbors as a way of keeping food on the table. It is unlikely that someone much higher up the food chain (who had paid a handsome sum for the right to collect taxes — as far as Rome was concerned what the “tax farmers” paid covered the liability; if they could collect more, it was theirs) would feel any sense of compunction as displayed by the man in this story.

It is tempting Continue reading “Life is messy”

20 October 2013
Twenty Second Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 24C (RCL)
Jeremiah 31:27-34
Psalm 119:97-104
2 Timothy 3:14 — 4:5
Luke 18:1-8

Again, we have an optimistic oracle from Jeremiah. For all his doom-saying before the fall of Jerusalem, once it was a reality, he changed his tone. Now, he foretells of a time when God will restore the people, and will not need to make a covenant with them like the old covenant, which promised blessings if they obeyed and curses if they disobeyed. Now, instead, God will write the divine law on our hearts, and each of us will suffer the consequences of our own refusals of God’s love, rather than the consequences extending out through the generations. No longer will the mediation of a priesthood be required to teach the community to know the Lord, for we will all know the ways of the Lord. Jeremiah certainly couldn’t have foreseen (in the same way he foresaw the disaster) the return from Exile, but holds out a hope for an ultimate restoration. We are still waiting. Continue reading “Persistence”

13 October 2013
Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 23C (RCL)
Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7
Psalm 66:1-11
2 Timothy 2:8-15
Luke 17:11-19

The passage in Jeremiah presents a bit of a surprise. Throughout the period after Pentecost, in the Old Testament track, we have been reading about the final events of the Kingdom of Judah. The passages we have read from Jeremiah have been particularly pessimistic. As opposed to other prophets at the time, Jeremiah sees no hope for the kingdom: God is not going to protect Jerusalem just because of the Temple. In fact, God is angry because of this misuse of God’s name. The people have sinned and punishment is coming.

Now that the end has come, and the people have gone into Exile, including the artisans (that’s in the verses we leave out), Jeremiah tells them to work for the good of the city of Babylon. Contrast that to Psalm 137, whose author praises those who will eventually overthrow Babylon and dash her little ones against a stone. No such retribution for Jeremiah.

It would be easy enough to understand that the conquered and exiled people would want to draw the boundaries very tightly, maintain the distinctions between them and the conquering culture. Instead, Continue reading “Who is the foreigner?”

6 October 2013
Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 22C (RCL)
Lamentations 1:1-6
Lamentations 3:19-26 (Canticle A)
2 Timothy 1:1-14
Luke 17:5-10

Throughout the “green” season of Year C in the RCL, we have been reading of the approaching last days of the kingdom of Judah. Now, it has arrived. The book of Lamentations is a collections of songs and poems about the destruction of Jerusalem. All the glory is gone and the people dispersed. It is interesting to me that the verses we use as a canticle this morning are so hopeful: your mercies are new every morning. Contrast that to the other option, Psalm 137 – how happy the one who dashes your little ones against a stone. The two options present two widely different responses to catastrophe: one of hopelessness and one of faithfulness and hope.

The parable of the servant presented in this week’s reading from Luke is no one’s favorite. We don’t like the idea of saying, “We are worthless servants; we have only done what we ought to have done.” We want recognition for our good work. Everybody likes an “attaboy” or “attagirl” once in a while.

I think it makes sense to read these verses with the first four verses of the seventeenth chapter of Luke. Jesus Continue reading “Increase our faith”

September 22, 2013
Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 20C (RCL)
Jeremiah 8:18-9:1
Psalm 79:1-9
1 Timothy 2:1-7
Luke 16:1-13

In the RCL Old Testament track, we’ve been reading passages relating to the history of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel in year C. We are coming to the end of that history. The passage from Jeremiah is God’s response to the siege of Jerusalem. Even after all the warnings of all the prophets, when we would almost expect God to say, “I told you so,” God instead is weeping over the ruin of Jerusalem. The psalm echoes the same events, but as so often happens in the psalms, expressed from the point of view of the people, they begin to seek God’s vengeance on their conquerors. Monotheism requires an answer to the catastrophe of God’s people. If there are many Gods, then catastrophe is easily explained: the God of some other people proved stronger. But if only our God, then why did this happen. The prophets, especially Jeremiah, began groping their way toward a response: God was angry at us because of our sins. The psalms take this a step further and suggest that once we have learned our lesson, and repented of our sins, the God will turn the tables, and punish those whom God used to punish us. Jeremiah, instead, takes the view that God grieves along with God’s people

The Gospel passage is one that people react against. Jesus appears to be approving of dishonesty Continue reading “Prudent uses of wealth?”

15 September 2013
Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 19C (RCL)
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28
Psalm 14
1 Timothy 1:12-17
Luke 15:1-10

Jeremiah’s prophecy for this week is almost unremittingly pessimistic. He does include the line, “Yet, I will not make a full end,” but without any further detail, and it appears to be a later insertion. Jeremiah had good reason for his predictions — he was probably writing between Babylon’s first conquest of Jerusalem, when they made it a client state, and its final destruction. Jeremiah could see the political writing on the wall.

It would be easy, during this time, to take Jeremiah’s pessimism and run with it. We have Continue reading “Lost sheep”

8 September 2013
Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 18C (RCL)
Jeremiah 18:1-11
Psalm 139:1-5, 12-17
Philemon 1-20
Luke 14:25-33

My preaching professor in seminary said if you have a text to preach on that you don’t like, you should begin with your text, depart from your text, and never return to your text — he was joking of course. This is one of those Gospel readings no one likes: “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, cannot be my disciple.” Even Matthew didn’t like it — that Gospel changes this pronouncement to “Whoever loves father and mother more than me is not worthy of me.” How do we set the pronouncement about hating parents alongside the commandment to honor father and mother?

Commentators try to wiggle out of the shock of this saying. The word “hate” is a bad translation from the Aramaic into the Greek (unfortunately, there is no evidence that Q ever existed in Aramaic). It is intended to be hyperbole. One can find any number of attempts to skirt the difficulty of this saying. This pericope comes just after the parable of the king’s banquet: those invited declined, and so the servant compelled people to come in off the highways and byways. Jesus told that parable in response to someone’s exclamation, “Blessed is the one who will eat bread in the kingdom of God.” The parable suggests that the people eating bread in the kingdom aren’t who we might expect.

The meal context shifts, in the first verse of this passage, to the journey motif Continue reading “Count the cost”

1 September 2013
Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 17C (RCL)
Jeremiah 2:4-13
Psalm 81:1 10-16
Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16
Luke 14:1, 7-14

Much of the teaching in Luke’s Gospel takes place at a meal. This reflects Luke’s awareness of and participation in the culture of his day. Most of Plato’s dialogs take place at meals. It was a standard cultural form: banquet and symposium. Those who could afford it went to dinner parties, and then after all the food and entertainment were out of the way, the conversation would begin, lubricated by judicious application of wine. Topics of conversation included love, manners, philosophy, poetry — any number of things. The task of the leader of the symposium was to keep the conversation flowing.

In the Gospel reading for today, we have a standard trope of table conversation: how to avoid being shamed at a dinner party. Continue reading “Places of honor”

25 August 2013
Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 16C (RCL)
Jeremiah 1:4-10
Psalm 71:1-6
Hebrews 12:18-29
Luke 13:10-17

This passage from Luke is not one we have read liturgically until the switch to the Revised Common Lectionary. It’s always refreshing to read something new. At first glance, this seems like a simple little story, without much to commend it a place in Luke’s narrative other than the escalating conflict with the synagogue officials. Yeah, so Jesus healed someone: what’s new about that?

In the Gospels, there are several accounts of healing on the sabbath which get Jesus in trouble with the authorities Continue reading “Bent over”