Bible Study for December 3 for Worship December 16

Bible Study for December 3 for Worship December 16

Luke 3:7  He said therefore to the multitudes that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?

8  Bear fruits that befit repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.

9  Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

10  And the multitudes asked him, “What then shall we do?”

11  And he answered them, “He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise.”

12  Tax collectors also came to be baptized, and said to him, “Teacher, what shall we do?”

13  And he said to them, “Collect no more than is appointed you.”

14  Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Rob no one by violence or by false accusation, and be content with your wages.”

15  As the people were in expectation, and all men questioned in their hearts concerning John, whether perhaps he were the Christ,

16  John answered them all, “I baptize you with water; but he who is mightier than I is coming, the thong of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

17  His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor, and to gather the wheat into his granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

18  So, with many other exhortations, he preached good news to the people.

COMMENTARY

In this passage from Luke we begin to gather enough material to begin to compare and contrast John the Baptist and Jesus.  Of course we are relying solely on the early church’s presentation of John, but the John’s message outlined here does seem to fit a prophet who lived in the desert, wore animal skins for clothes and ate wild honey and dried locusts for his diet.  John as one Bible Study Student put it was “intense,” while Jesus was more laid back.

In verses 7 – 9 John appears to focus on the need for repentance.  John viewed his culture as corrupt.  Jews had been adopting gentile ways and ignoring the requirements of the Mosaic Law.  The Temple authorities had long since done away with the concept of the Jubilee, when all debts were canceled and all land returned to the original owners.  Remember the records of land debt were kept in the Temple, and the Sadducees had conspired with the money changers to foreclose on peasant lands.  They were then incorporating ever larger tracts of land into huge estates, where the former owners of the land were reduced to the status of day laborers.

Like the Essenes John objected to the High Priestly families  monopolizing both the Kingship and the High Priesthood.  One of the reasons John was living in the wilderness was to divorce himself from the corruption of Sadducees who were collaborating with the Romans.  Separate yourselves from the ways of the gentiles and your collaborating leaders.  It is no wonder John was finally beheaded.  He kept pointing out the corruption of the Herod’s and the Temple authorities.

John pictures the coming of the Messiah as a time of angry judgment.  “The Messiah is coming and boy is he/she ______.”  “Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”  At least the way most people at United Church read the gospels, God is loving, forgiving, and cares about all people – love rather than punishment.  On the other hand, for much of the history of Christian Faith God has been portrayed as an angry vengeful God committed to the punishment of sinners.

Perhaps the persecution suffered by early Christians inspired them to seek justice and punishment for their persecutors.  At the same time they were supposed to turn the other cheek and forgive their enemies, perhaps they consoled themselves with repressed thoughts of the tortures their tormentors would suffer in hell.

The church also learned to use the threat of a vengeful punishing God to establish control over its adherents.  Obedience to higher spiritual authority became an important tool in the church’s arsenal of control.  Disobey the priest or the bishop and you could be shunned and excommunicated.  And after the church became the official religion of the Empire, if you were excommunicated, you also became a criminal subject to punishment by the state.  No wonder Constantine embraced Christian Faith.

The other major shift in Christian Faith occurred as the church developed atonement theology.  Jesus was the sacrificial lamb who secures our salvation.  The author of the Gospel of John initiated the symbolism behind atonement theology, by changing the chronology of Holy Week, so that Jesus died on the cross at the very moment the lambs were being sacrificed in the Temple.  This is a contradiction of the chronology in the other gospels that claims that the Last Supper was the Passover Meal.  John’s poetic license sent the church down a theological road, where God must extract suffering and death from Jesus in order to forgive our sins.

Clearly Jesus did not teach atonement theology.  The God of Jesus reached out to people of all kinds, sinners especially.  “Your sins are forgiven, your faith has made you whole.”

Jesus did not preach an angry vengeful God.  Life is tough enough without God exacting a pound of flesh.  Also while Jesus went out into the wilderness to get his act together, he didn’t stay in the wilderness.  Instead he went to the towns and villages to take the Good News of the love of God to the people.

We do not know exactly what John the Baptist preached, but when people asked him, “what then shall we do?” (in response to his call for repentance), his suggestions for behavior worthy of repentance seem practical and not particularly burdensome.  “He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise.”  (To soldiers)  “Rob no one by violence or by false accusation, and be content with your wages.”  (To Tax Collectors)  “Collect no more than is appointed you.”

Again we are hearing John through the filter of the Roman Jewish historian Josephus and the early church both of whom were trying to curry favor with the Empire.  John may have been far more revolutionary in his preaching.  Although we should note that it was Herod Antipas, not the Romans who executed John.  Again through the mists of time it is hard to hear John’s authentic message.

The gospels go to great pains to maintain that John did not claim to be the Messiah.  “I baptize you with water; but he who is mightier than I is coming, the thong of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.”  We should note that even after the death and resurrection of Jesus, followers of John continued to be loyal to John and his message.  Paul traveling in Turkey found a group of followers of John who had been baptized with the baptism of John, but they were not followers of Jesus, nor had they heard of baptism in the name of Jesus.  This was at least 20 -25 years after the resurrection.

John believed that with the Jewish homeland under the occupation of a foreign power, with the leadership of the Jewish people collaborating with the occupying power and profiting from their collaboration, things couldn’t get much worse.  Surely God would intervene.  Hopelessness breeds desperation, and thousands of John’s fellow Jews, including Jesus, were attracted to his message.

LET’S ASK SOME QUESTIONS OF THE TEXT

1. How many people does the text describe as coming out to hear John?

2. According to the text did John compliment his listeners for coming out to hear him?

3. Why does John claim his listeners need to be baptized?

4. According to John what qualifies as fruit that “befits repentance?”

5. In the text how many different groups did John address concerning repentance?

6. What did John say about whether or not he was the Christ?

7. In the text who does John predict will come after him?

8. In the text what does John claim will be the agenda of the figure who comes after him?

LET’S ALLOW THE TEXT TO ASK QUESTIONS OF US

1. Do you think the gospels offer us an accurate portrayal of John the Baptist?

2. What do you think attracted Jesus to John?

3. In what ways do you think John and Jesus were similar?

4. I what ways do you think John and Jesus differed from one another?

5. Why do you think the inclusion of Tax Collectors and Soldiers was so important in the passage?

6. Do you think Jesus’ original message included warnings about judgment?

7. What do you think motivated the church to emphasize judgment in its message?

8. Do you think religion can survive without the concept of divine punishment?

9. How do you feel about “atonement theology?”

10. Do you think an angry punishing God is compatible with a spiritual message of non-violence?

Week of December 10 – December 16:  Third Sunday of Advent – Luke 3:7-18 – Look Forward – Zephaniah 3:14-20, Isaiah 12:2-6, Philippians 4:4-7.

Common Wealth of Light Versus the Empire of Darkness

Common Wealth of Light Versus the Empire of Darkness

Probably none of Jesus’ followers were present at the interrogation of Jesus by the Roman Governor Pilate.  They had all gone into hiding.  This conversation between Jesus and Pilate was almost certainly the creation of the imagination of the author of John.  The conversation reflects the confrontation between the Roman Empire and the followers of Jesus in the late First Century, when the church emerged on the Empire’s radar screen.  The church was considered a Jewish sect, and enjoyed the toleration the Empire had extended to Judaism.  As more and more gentiles were recruited into the life of the church, however, the Romans became aware of this strange sect as a threat to the Empire, when in 64 A.D. the Emperor Nero initiated the first Roman persecution of the Christians.

In our scripture this morning, the moral and intellectual bankruptcy of the Empire was on display, when in verse 38 Pilate admitted that he found no crime in Jesus, but he went ahead and ordered his execution anyway.  The Empire stood convicted of executing Jesus, just as the Empire was guilty of persecuting and executing the followers of Jesus.  And I want to give the author of John some real credit for faith.  John was writing, during the persecution of the Christians under the Emperor Domitian about 90 A.D.  The author could not look ahead and know that ultimately the church would convert the Empire in 323 A.D  (And he also didn’t know that the Empire would co-opt the church under Constantine.)  Therefore this conversation between Jesus and Pilate that played out in the imagination of the author of John was a real testament of faith — faith that ultimately the way of Jesus would prevail over the power of the Empire.

Now let’s pay special attention in the text in verse 36:  Jesus answered, “My kingship is not of this world; if my kingship were of this world, my servants would fight, that I might not be handed over to the Jews; but my kingship is not from the world.”

Verse 36 is often misinterpreted to mean that the Kingdom of Jesus is off in heaven, it is an otherworldly Kingdom that has nothing to do with this earth.  The Lutheran doctrine of the two Kingdoms can be traced to this verse.  But let’s examine the verse more carefully.  Jesus is not claiming that his teaching is only meant to get people into heaven, rather he is saying that his teaching of non-violence means that his followers will not physically or violently contest with Rome’s power.  The spiritual struggle to try to redeem the Empire from its murderous pursuit of power, wealth and oppression will be non-violently pursued by the followers of Jesus.

And that is why the truly great spiritual movements of the 20th  century focused on confronting oppression and violence with love.  Mahatma Gandhi freed India.  Martin Luther King set in motion a movement to end racism in America.  (We still have a ways to go.)  And Nelson Mandela brought down the forces of apartheid in South Africa.  Suffering non-violent love is a costly kind of love.  It cost Jesus his life.  The way of Jesus has cost many martyrs their lives, but in a world that is possessed by the insanity of violent oppression, suffering non-violent love is the only sane way to live.  And that is the message of the gospel as we close out the season of Kingdomtide.

Jesus was the light of the world, the Empire represented the dark side of human nature.  Jesus teaching was always consistently opposed to Empire.  For the moment let’s consider four principles of Empire:

Four Principles of Empire

1. Human beings are best ruled by hierarchy from the top down.  Any other form of governance results in chaos.

2. The top 1% in the hierarchy will accumulate the majority of the power and wealth.

3. The Golden Rule of Empire:  He who has the gold makes the rules.

4. The Social Order is ultimately maintained through violence.

Jesus taught the opposite of hierarchy, the first will be last and the last will be first.  If you would be a leader you must be the servant of all.  Leadership according to Jesus is for the purpose of serving the needs of others rather than self.  Too often we see leadership abused — leadership that is self-serving.  Especially in our current political climate, money buys elections, and professional politicians serve their own ends and the desires of their donors, rather than addressing the needs of ordinary citizens.  The Commonwealth of God on the other hand inspires servant leaders, men and women who use their spiritual gifts to minister to the needs of others.

Can a community survive without hierarchy?  One small way as followers of the way of Jesus we seek to subvert the hierarchies of social status is by welcoming everyone into our community of faith.  At United Church,  “No matter who you are or where you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here.”  A second way at United Church we offer an alternative to hierarchy is the Sharing Table. On Thursday evenings everyone who comes is fed.  There are no distinctions at the Sharing Table – all are welcome.

Two years ago when we invited the congregation to participate in asset mapping, we worked together from the bottom up.  Everyone was invited to bring their gifts and talents to the table, and as we connected the differing gifts of individuals, new projects and ministries began to emerge.  That was a very creative time in the life of our congregation.

Jesus also opposed the concentration of land and wealth in the hands of the Herod’s and the Sadducees.  He advocated for fair wages and for sharing.  When wealth and power become too highly concentrated in a society it leads to stagnation.  Economic growth requires enough money in enough different hands to go out and spend it in order to drive the economy.  When power is more widely shared the decision making process becomes more creative seeking innovative solutions rather than relying upon the same old answers.

Finally, Jesus rejected the use of violence.  You have heard that it was said, “an eye for an eye,” but I say to you if someone strikes you on the right cheek offer him the other also.  You have also heard that it was said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say to you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.  If a Roman soldier compels you to carry his pack one mile, prove to him you are free to love by carrying it two miles.  Jesus rejected the use of violence.  In the words of Mahatma Gandhi, “And eye for an eye only leaves the whole world blind.”  Just look at Israel and Gaza.

Now let’s contrast the principles of Empire with the beatitudes of Jesus.

1. Blessed are those who need God and know it, for theirs is the commonwealth of heaven.

2. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

3. Blessed are the gentle and humble hearted, for they will inherit the land.

4. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.

5. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

6. Blessed are the authentic of heart, for they will see God.

7. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

8. Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the commonwealth of heaven.

How different the way of Jesus is from the way of Empire.  Pilate was speaking on behalf of pragmatic rulers down through history.  “It’s not the earth the meek inherit, it’s the dirt.”  But in a world of nuclear weapons violence has become in the words of Isaac Asimov the last refuge of the incompetent.  The violence of hierarchy may seem practical and pragmatic, but the way of Jesus is the only sane way to live.  The way of Jesus is the way of light.  The way of Empire leads to the dark side and destruction.  “What is truth,” asks Pilate?

And Jesus answers, “Everyone who is of the truth, hears my voice.”  Can you hear the voice of Jesus?  Jesus says, “if you need God and know it, then you are blessed.”  Jesus says, “if you are vulnerable enough to mourn, you will be comforted.”  Jesus says, “If you are gentle and humble hearted, you will inherit the earth.”  Jesus says, “if you seek justice, not revenge, you will receive your heart’s desire.”  Jesus says, “if you are merciful others will treat you with compassion.”  Jesus says, “if you are authentic and transparent with others, you will see God.”  Jesus says, “if you are a peace maker, God will claim you as one of his own.”  Jesus says, “if others persecute you because you seek the way of love, then the commonwealth of God will be yours.”

This is the last Sunday of the church year.  Next Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent, the season of waiting for the coming of Christ into the world.  And how did the Christ come into the world?  As a child of a peasant family cradled in a manger, a feed trough for animals, because his parents didn’t even have the cost of a room in the Inn.  A child whose birth was attended by shepherds, shepherds of all people, about as low on the social ladder as you could get.  The Jesus of the Christmas story tells us that God appears in unlikely places to turn the social order upside down and subvert Empire.  As followers of Jesus let us take heart for we are children of the commonwealth of God.

Bible Study November 26 for Worship December 9

Bible Study November 26 for Worship December 9

Luke 3:1  In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene,

2  in the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the wilderness;

3  and he went into all the region about the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

4  As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.

5  Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways shall be made smooth;

6  and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”

COMMENTARY

John the Baptist didn’t intend to prepare the way for the ministry of Jesus, but sometimes history has a way of creating connections we only recognize in hindsight.  Probably Jesus was a follower of John the Baptist, although, the followers of John the Baptist were a much looser association than the people who later followed Jesus.  One Biblical scholar has claimed that in having people come out in the wilderness to him for baptism, John was like a sole proprietorship, while Jesus in sending his disciples out to spread the message of healing and shared eating to the world was like a franchise.

Sometimes only in hindsight can we see connections.  When Alabama lost to Texas A&M on November 12^{th, after having led in the polls all season as the defending national college football champion, who could have foreseen that the very next Saturday, both Kansas State and Oregon would be upset by their opponents thus re-opening a possible way to the National Championship for Alabama?  Sometimes the story lies hidden until other developments open the way.  Jesus was a poor carpenter living in the hill country of Galilee until John’s voice crying out in the wilderness called him to leave the village of Nazareth and step onto the stage of history.}

John’s message was revolutionary on three levels.  First, he was calling his listeners to a simpler way of life.  Come out into the desert and learn how to simplify your lives.  Since the beginning of the great modern recession many people in our consumer oriented society have become open to a message of simplifying our lives.  Consume less, reuse and recycle, don’t borrow to purchase things we don’t need.  Second, John preached that if everyone shared there would be enough for all.  Jesus enlarged upon this theme by inviting people to sit down and eat together, thus challenging the caste system that had grown up around clean and unclean.  But John’s message originally focused on leveling society by sharing:

Luke  3: 10  And the multitudes asked him, “What then shall we do?”

11  And he answered them, “He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise.”

The third revolutionary aspect of John’s ministry was his insistence that faith had to be a decision rather than a matter of birth.  It was not enough to be born Jewish, Luke 3: 8  Bear fruits that befit repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.  The practice of Baptism was a ritual cleansing used in the conversion of gentiles to Judaism.  John’s baptism opened the way for the church to convert the gentiles, and the incredible expansion of the message of the gospel throughout the world.

Again John could not foresee how his revolutionary baptism would open the way for a new and different faith with its roots in the Hebrew scriptures would explode onto the world stage.  Indeed, the franchise aspect of Jesus’ message has made Christianity one of the most flexible religions in the world.  The story of Jesus adapts from culture to culture more easily than any other faith.  While Islam has rivaled Christianity in its evangelistic spread, Islam still refuses to translate the Quran into anything but Arabic, while the Bible has been translated into almost every language in the world.  Jesus has been artistically adapted to every race and culture of the globe.  According to Harvey Cox Christianity is now the fastest growing religion in the world.  While the church in Western Europe and North America struggles to survive, the church in the third World is exploding.  The Christianity is growing so fast in China, some church leaders there speculate that China could become a majority Christian nation.  Of course these churches in the third world look very different from our staid, buttoned up white churches of North America and Europe.  There is discussion in the churches of the third world of the need to send missionaries to re-evangelize Europe and North America.

When the Birmingham 8 met with the Dean of the Waldensian Seminary in Rome, he shared with us that the new life flowing into the Waldensian Church was coming from African immigrants to Italy.  The Waldensians are the descendants of a pre-reformation Protestant movement in Italy and Switzerland.  Thus the Waldensian churches are over 800 years old, and new life is being breathed into their fellowship by converts from Africa who are first and second generation Christians.  Maybe John the Baptist was right:  “God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.”  The energy of the Jesus movement at this point in history is among the poor and the non-white.

Of course one of the problems with the adaptability of Christian Faith has been a tendency for the church to become co-opted by cultural forces that can lead the church into unholy alliances with power and wealth.  The Constantinian sell out, the Holy Inquisition, the use of missionaries to advance colonialism are all examples of times when the church has sold out the message of the gospel for worldly preferment.  Again and again as Christianity adapts culturally we need to re-visit the roots of our faith in the Jewishness of Jesus.  Christmas is a marvelous example of the church’s adaptation to culture and its ultimate corruption by culture.

Somewhere in the third century, the church in Rome decided to begin celebrating the birth of Jesus at the Winter Solstice.  The Romans had a wonderful holiday, Saturnalia, to celebrate the return of the light.  Many Christian converts missed this celebration, so the Church adapted by celebrating the coming of the light into the world in the birth of Jesus.  Great cultural adaptation.  St. Boniface the missionary to the Germans had converts who liked to sneak out into the forest to worship the sacred trees.  So he proposed bringing the sacred trees into the church to celebrate the birth of the Christ child.  Of course that meant the sacred trees had to be cut down which proved to be St. Boniface’s undoing.  He was martyred by enraged Frisians, because he and cut down one too many sacred trees.  But again the Christmas Tree was a brilliant adaptation to culture.  The cult of the Saints in the Catholic Church was another adaptation of the church to culture.  Many of the early saints were simply local gods redressed into Christian clothing.  Of course all we have to do is look at the consumerization of Christmas today, and we can see how adapting to culture can become a sell-out of the gospel message.  But sometimes history has a way of creating connections we can only see in hindsight.

LET’S ASK SOME QUESTIONS OF THE TEXT

1. Who was the Emperor when John began his ministry?

2. Who was the Governor of Judea when John began his ministry?

3. Who was the High Priest when John began his ministry?

4. Where did John preach?

5. According to the text, what was the essence of John’s message?

6. According to the text what prophet best exemplified the ministry of John?

7. According to the prophet, who will witness the salvation of God?

8. What was John’s baptism supposed to accomplish?

LET’S ALLOW THE TEXT TO ASK QUESTIONS OF US

1. How does Luke try to “locate” the ministry of John the Baptist?

2. Do you see any difference between the baptism of John and the baptism of Jesus?

3. Do you think John saw himself as a preparation for Jesus?

4. What has happened in your life, where you did not see the connection to a previous event, until you were able to see it in hindsight?

5. Do you think faith is something you are born and brought up in, or something that requires an adult decision?

6. How do you think the faith of converts differs from the faith of people who receive their faith as an accident of birth?

7. Why do you think Christian faith may be the fastest growing religion in the world right now?

8. How do you think the churches of Europe and North America might adopt some of the energy of third world Christians?

9. What is your fondest memory of Christmas?

10. In what ways do you think the celebration of Christmas can become less consumeristic and more meaningful?

Week of December 3 – December 9:  Second Sunday of Advent – Luke 3:1-6 – Make Ready – Malachi 3:1-4, Baruch 5:1-9, Luke 1:68-79, Philippians 1:3-11.

Praise the Holy One – Giving Back the Gift

Praise the Holy One – Giving Back the Gift

Infertility can be a tragic unbearable sadness in the life of a woman.  I have to readily admit as a man, and my guess is many other men, don’t get it.  In our modern western world we spend so much time and effort trying to avoid conception it is hard for me to understand just our awesomely tragic infertility can be.  Sort of like the old joke about young men who sow their wild oats on Saturday night and then go to church on Sunday morning to pray for a crop failure.  But when I witness the great lengths to which couples will go to conceive and give birth to their own children, then I do intellectually understand that infertility is experienced as a terrible burden.  Perhaps the key is to try to understand that child bearing is part of our DNA.  Our species would not have survived without it.  And many women on a visceral level feel an urge to satisfy the call to motherhood.  In a culture that valued women as the producers of the next generation, the first line of defense against the extinction of the tribe, the call to motherhood was overwhelming.  And then if we add to the cultural mix the need to produce many sons to serve as warriors for the protection of the tribe, we can perhaps understand the high status of women who gave birth to sons.

Of course modern cultures like China and India that practice female infanticide, because they over value male off-spring are running into trouble because they end up with an oversupply of men and not enough women.  In a world where brains rather than brawn have become a society’s most important asset favoring males over females is a recipe for disaster.

Poor Hannah had been unable to conceive.  The assumption was always that the woman was barren, rather than that the man was shooting blanks.  So Elkanah took a second wife Penninah.  Actually the custom of taking more than one wife, in that culture was an attempt to be compassionate and also insure the survival of the tribe.  Because of the higher mortality of males, there was always a greater supply of women than men.  Thus single women were given a protector and provider, and the tribe could put perfectly good breeding stock to work in order to insure the survival of the clan.  When Penninah immediately produced a gaggle of children upon marrying Elkanah, Hannah’s barrenness was confirmed.  She was in the eyes of her culture defective.

Even though the custom of having more than one wife provided for the left over women and kept the tribe alive, there were problems with the practice – jealousy.  Penninah seems to have been jealous of the affection shared by Elkannah and Hannah.  The text tells us that Elkannah always gave Hannah a double portion in order to assure her that she was uppermost in his affections.  After all who wants to be considered the “second wife” a heifer for breeding purposes.  Hannah was also jealous of the attention Elkanah may have paid to Penninah.  After all you don’t produce a gaggle of children without spending time with someone.

Hannah was in such deep distress she turned to God.  When Elkanah took the family to Shiloh to offer sacrifice Hannah prayed before the Ark of the Covenant.  She prayed so fervently the High Priest and keeper of the Ark believed she was drunk, and he scolded her.  But when Hannah opened her heart to Eli he perceived her authenticity and gave her a blessing that the story seems to credit with Hannah then conceiving a son.  In her joy Hannah also swore an oath that if God would give her a son, she would give the son back to God.  And perhaps this is why the lectionary scheduled this passage during Stewardship season.  Hannah was justified by God’s gift of a son.  Midrash goes on to enlarge upon the story claiming that Hannah then had several more children.  But Hannah was willing to give back the gift in order to honor her promise to God.

Perhaps the story of Hannah can lead us to ask ourselves, what are we willing to give back to God in return for all the blessings we have received?  Perhaps the first challenge is to acknowledge our blessings.  So many of us receive God’s blessings and take them for granted without ever expressing gratitude.  As we consider acknowledging our blessings let me share a devotion by Martin Copenhaver on Psalm 128.  Martin is the Pastor of the Wellesley Congregational Church, where Tom Edwards attended while he was living in Boston.

So much of our scripture is a celebration of abundance. The first chapters of Genesis are a song of praise for God’s generosity. With each act of creation, the divine refrain is, “It is good, it is good, it is very good.” And it pictures the Creator saying, “Be fruitful and multiply.”  Many of the Psalms, including the one for today, survey creation and catalogue this abundance in loving detail and with joyful thanksgiving.

Then, in the Gospels, Jesus multiplies loaves and fishes so that there is more than enough for everyone.  At a wedding feast he turns water into wine, and more wine than could be consumed at a dozen weddings.  These highly symbolic stories speak of God’s abundance. There is enough, there is more than enough.  That’s the biblical narrative.  But the narrative by which we are tempted to live is another story entirely, a story of scarcity, where there is never enough.  In fact, we are tempted to define enough as, “always something more than I have now.”

Do we live out of a sense of abundance or scarcity?  That may be an economic question, but certainly it is a faith question.

Abundance or scarcity how do we behave?  Around the Sharing Table on Thursday nights in October we were talking about the practice of gratitude.  One of the authors we studied was a Benedictine Monk, Brother David Steindl-Rast.

Gratefulness can be improved by practice. But where shall beginners begin?  The obvious starting point is surprise.  You will find that you can grow the seeds of gratefulness just by making room. If surprise happens when something unexpected shows up, let’s not expect anything at all.  Let’s follow Alice Walker’s advice. “Expect nothing. Live frugally on surprise.”

To expect nothing may mean not taking for granted that your car will start when you turn the key.  Try this and you will be surprised by a marvel of technology worthy of sincere gratitude.  Or you may not be thrilled by your job, but if for a moment you can stop taking it for granted, you will taste the surprise of having a job at all, while millions are unemployed.  If this makes you feel a flicker of gratefulness, you’ll be a little more joyful all day, a little more alive.

Once we stop taking things for granted our own bodies become some of the most surprising things of all.  It never ceases to amaze me that my body both produces and destroys 15 million red blood cells every second.  Fifteen million!  That’s nearly twice the census figure for New York City.  I am told that the blood vessels in my body, if lined up end to end, would reach around the world.  Yet my heart needs only one minute to pump my blood through this filigree network and back again.  It has been doing so minute by minute, day by day, for the past 75 years and still keeps pumping away at 100,000 heartbeats every 24 hours.  Obviously this is a matter of life and death for me, yet I have no idea how it works and it seems to work amazingly well in spite of my ignorance.

When we open ourselves to surprise and cultivate gratitude we begin to live out of God’s abundance.  We start appreciating what we do have and stop worrying over what we do not have.  We become generous with the gifts God has bestowed upon us, rather than grasping and hoarding resources in a desperate attempt to acquire stuff we do not need, or a sense of security that can never be satisfied until we learn to trust in God.

What gift are we willing to give back to God?  What return can we make for all the blessings we have received?   Many of us are beginning to fret over whether the Stewardship Drive will raise enough money.  Let me share a story with you.

Tony Campolo is a college professor and a noted advocate for missions and evangelism.  He tells of being invited to speak at a women’s meeting. There were 300 women there.  Before he spoke the president of the organization read a letter from a missionary. It was a very moving letter expressing a need for $4,000 to take care of an emergency that had arisen.  So the president of the organization said, “We need to pray that God will provide the resources to meet the need of this missionary.  Dr. Compolo, will you please pray for us?”

Tony who is very outspoken said, “No.”

Startled, the woman said, “I beg your pardon.”

Tony said, “No, I won’t pray for that.”  He said, “I believe that God has already provided the resources and all we need to do is give. Tell you what I’m going to do.  I’m going to step up to this table and give every bit of cash I have in my pocket.  And if everyone here will do the same thing, I think God has already provided the resources.”

The president of the organization chuckled a little bit and said, “Well, I guess we get the point.  You are trying to teach us that we all need to give sacrificially.”

Tony said, “No, that is not what I am trying to teach you.  I’m trying to teach you that God has already provided for this missionary. All we need to do is give it. Here, I’m going to put down all of the money I have with me.”　 So he took out the $35 he had in his wallet then looked at the president of the organization.  Reluctantly, she opened her purse and took out all of her money, which was about $40, and put it on the table.  One by one the rest of the ladies filed by and put their money on the table, too.  When the money was counted they had collected more than $4,000.

Tony Campolo said, “Now, here’s the lesson. God always supplies for our needs, and he supplied for this missionary, too. The only problem was we were keeping it for ourselves.  Now let’s pray and thank God for what God has provided.”

Friends, God has provided all of the resources United Church needs to perform the mission in the world God is asking us to do.  The resources have already been given.  The resources are in our pockets.  Is the church alive or is it dead?  It’s in our hands.  It’s in our hands.

Bible Study November 19 for Worship December 2

Bible Study November 19 for Worship December 2

Luke 21: 25  “And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and upon the earth distress of nations in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves,

26  men fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

27  And then they will see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

28  Now when these things begin to take place, look up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

29  And he told them a parable: “Look at the fig tree, and all the trees;

30  as soon as they come out in leaf, you see for yourselves and know that the summer is already near.

31  So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near.

32  Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away till all has taken place.

33  Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

34  “But take heed to yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a snare;

35  for it will come upon all who dwell upon the face of the whole earth.

36  But watch at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of man.”

COMMENTARY

The Gospel of Luke was probably written 50 to 60 years after the death of Jesus.  The key date to remember was the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.  In his gospel and his Acts of the Apostles Luke was trying to collect and make sense of the fragments of the early church’s history that were rapidly being lost after the followers of Jesus had scattered from Jerusalem.  Luke tried to find as many eye witnesses, not many, as he could, and he also ended up interviewing many people from the “second generation,” people who had known people who had been eye witnesses.  Of course by that time there were all kinds of apocryphal stories mixed in with genuine testimony.

Another issue that crops up in reading the gospels is how the early church was reshaping their stories about Jesus in order to speak to the issues of their own time.  Our passage today is a case in point.  This section in Luke, Luke 21:8-38, parallels Mark chapter 13, and they are sometimes labeled “the Little Apocalypse.”  The difference between Mark and Luke is that Mark was writing before the destruction of Jerusalem and Luke was writing after the destruction of the City and the scattering of the Jerusalem Church.  As a result Mark was more focused on the unrest in Palestine between 67 and 70 A.D., and the impending Roman dismembering of the Jewish people, and Luke has a more generalized chaos in mind more akin to the apocalyptic vision of the Revelation of John, that bespeaks of the eventual downfall of the Roman Empire.

Jesus seems to have been opposed to the hierarchy and injustice of Empire in general and the violence required to maintain Empire.  Many of his followers began to imagine that “the Day of the Lord,” or the culmination of history would be an end to Empire, not just Roman, and the establishment of the universal commonwealth of peace and justice.  But they rightly foresaw that the transition from Empire to commonwealth would not be easy and might be accompanied by general chaos unrest and hardship.

In verses 25 and 26 Luke adopted the apocalyptic imagination that the hardships of the end times will probably be signaled by astronomical and planetary signs:  comets, eclipses, earthquakes, tidal waves, extremes of weather.  The followers of Jesus claimed that a special star appeared at the birth of Jesus and an earthquake accompanied his death.  This paralleled the claims of the Roman State religion concerning the Caesars.  A comet appeared after the assassination of Julius Caesar, and the Roman Senate declared that the comet was the soul of Caesar being elevated to divine status.  The Roman historian Suetonius in his history of Caesar Augustus claimed that a special star appeared to mark the birth of Augustus.

In verse 27 Luke introduced the figure of the Son of man coming in power and great glory.  In the Old Testament and the apocryphal literature of inter-testamental times “Son of man,” means everything from a human being to a semi-divine messianic figure.  Ezekiel employs the term most often using it 94 times.  In Ezekiel the prophet himself is often referred to as “son of man.”

In verse 29 Luke refers to the “fig tree, and all the trees. ”  This is a parallel to Mark 13:28, except that Luke misses Mark’s symbolism. Mark intended to compare the fruitless fig tree with the Temple Authorities, who were fruitless spiritual leaders.  Luke merely uses the fig tree and all the other trees as a harbinger of the change of season.  How do we know when Spring comes?  When the trees put forth their leaves.  How will we know when the  world is going to change?  Pay attention to the signs of the times.

Luke may have been hinting that the Destruction of Jerusalem was a sign that God was working toward the end of Empire.  In the Acts of the Apostles Luke seems to hint that the church needed to reach out from Jerusalem in order to convert the whole world, and the scattering of the Jerusalem church while traumatic certainly served to spread the gospel.  Verse 32 reiterated the promise that the fulfillment of Jesus’ promised return was imminent.  Whether this promise can be traced directly to Jesus or to his followers, we cannot know for sure, but clearly the prediction of an imminent return of the Christ was mistaken.

In verses 34 through 36 Luke warns his readers not to lose faith or relax their ethical life style, or let down their vigilance in the time of waiting.  Keeping faith in the time of waiting is the reason this scripture is included in the lectionary for Advent.  How long oh Lord, do we have to wait?  With all of the talk about secession after this latest election, we might wonder whether or not that question was resolved 150 years ago.  How long will we have to wait for the legacy of racism and hatred to be overcome?  How long do we have to wait?

Do followers of Jesus still expect a return of Jesus coming on the clouds with power and great glory.  Certainly that generation has passed away and Jesus has not returned.  Millions of more fundamentalist Christians still wait expectantly.  Is that waiting anymore realistic, or should progressive Christians begin to use some midrash to reinterpret “end times.”  In Judaism the progressive midrash on this topic is to stop looking for a Messiah, and instead to focus upon a messianic age, when people of faith learn that it is up to us to change the world.  There is the famous story about the young man who went to visit Rabbi Akiba at his cave to ask, “when will the Messiah come?”

Rabbi Akiba told the young man, “The Messiah is already here at the City Gate.”

The young man ran to the City Gate looking for the Messiah, but all he saw were beggars, the blind, the disabled, the poor.  Finally he asked one of the company of the poor, who seemed more able than the rest, “where is the Messiah?”

The man straightened and replied, “I am the Messiah.”

The young man said incredulously, “You the Messiah?  Well if you are the Messiah, why don’t you heal the sick, and wipe out world hunger, and stop all the wars in the world?  What are you waiting for?”

And the Messiah responded, “I wait for you.”

As we are waiting this Advent let each one of us consider, in what way is the Messiah waiting for me?”

LET’S ASK SOME QUESTIONS OF THE TEXT

1. What are some of the signs that are supposed to accompany a change in the world?

2. How does the gospel project the return of the “Son of man?”

3. How should followers of Jesus respond to these signs?

4. What “Parable” does Jesus offer as an analogy for the signs of the end?

5. What is the expectation of the gospel writer?

6. How soon did the gospel writer believe these things might happen?

7. What warnings did the gospel writers give to the followers of Jesus?

8. What spiritual exercises did the gospel writer recommend for preparedness?

LET’S ALLOW THE TEXT TO ASK QUESTIONS OF US

1. Have you ever experienced a stellar event or a natural disaster as a sign of anything?

2. Why do you think weather events or natural disasters are often experienced as signs?

3. Do you think Jesus will return on a cloud in power and glory?

4. Do you think there will be an end to history?

5. What do you think it means to be able to read the signs of the times?

6. What signs have you experienced in your life time?

7. What warnings would you give to people about waiting for things to happen?

8. What spiritual practices sustain you in waiting?

9. What are you waiting for?

Week of November 26 – December 2:  First Sunday of Advent – Luke 21:25-36 – Sign of Things to Come – Jeremiah 33:14-16, Psalm 25:1-10, I Thessalonians 3:9-13.

Risk and Restoration

Risk and Restoration

Ruth is a charming, human and very earthy story. It is a good thing we have the kids out of the sanctuary.  Naomi and Ruth arrived in Bethlehem, and Naomi’s kinsmen recognized her and greeted her.  But Naomi, who was still deeply in grief said, “do not call me Naomi, call me Mara, for I am very bitter over my losses.”  But Naomi could not remain paralyzed by her grief.  She had already picked up and moved from Moab back to Bethlehem in order to try to survive, and like other survivors, she soon had a plan to try to secure her and her daughter-in-law’s future.

Naomi was a wise woman.  She recognized Ruth’s beauty and sent her daughter-in-law to glean in the fields of a relative in hopes that Ruth might be “noticed.”  When Ruth was indeed noticed by Boaz, Naomi made plans to take advantage of the situation.  “Then Naomi her mother-in-law said to her, “My daughter, should I not seek a home for you, that it may be well with you?”

So Naomi had Ruth take a bath, put all of the moisturizer and perfume on her they had left,  washed Ruth’s best outfit, and sent her to Boaz’s threshing floor in the evening with instructions.  “Go down to the threshing floor; but do not make yourself known to the man until he has finished eating and drinking.  But when he lies down, observe the place where he lies; then, go and uncover his feet and lie down; and he will tell you what to do.”

Now we are all adults right?  So let me let you in on a little piece of Bible trivia.  For sensitive or prudish ears, this part of the story may be too risqué.  You may want to put your fingers in your ears.   I know your fifth grade Sunday School teacher didn’t  mention this, but feet in the ancient Hebrew was often a euphemism for genitals.

Naomi and Ruth were using time honored feminine strategy for survival.  Neither Ruth or Naomi, because they were female could make a claim to Elimelech’s land, but Boaz as a male kinsmen could.   As it turned out there was another kinsmen who was a closer relative who was ugly and not nearly as nice as Boaz, who could have claimed Elimelch’s land, if he was willing to marry Naomi or Ruth, so there is in the story a moment of suspense.  Will the two, now lovers, be able to marry?  Or will they be torn apart by the ugly relatives desire to get his hands on Elimelch’s land?  (Marilyn Puett should write this up as a Romance.)   As it turns out the nearer relative would love to have had Elimelech’s land, but he didn’t want the added complication of incorporating two additional women into his family.  He wanted big land but not big love.  So Boaz was able to claim Ruth as his bride and Naomi then had a place in the household.

Naomi ceased to be Mara for her bitterness was gone, and when Ruth gave birth to a son, Naomi became the caregiver prompting her friends to say:  “A son has been born to Naomi.”  All’s well that ends well.  From death and grief Naomi is restored to life and joy.  And one reason the story was remembered is that Ruth was the great-grandmother of the Great King David.  And that is why the story was finally written down in the time after the exile.  For when the scribes began trying to force men to divorce their foreign wives and disown the children of those unions, the writer of the story was reminding everyone that their greatest King had been the descendant of the marriage of a Hebrew and a Moabite woman.

What do we learn from this story?  Faith is not a bunch of ideas – faith is not beliefs.  Faith is life lived out in relationships – earthy, messy relationships in covenant with other people and ultimately with God.  Faith is Naomi sending Ruth to the threshing floor, Ruth obeying Naomi out of love, and Boaz knowing what to do.  It’s complicated.  And faith is also the assertion that in this very human covenant making God was somehow in the midst of it.  Faith is recovery from grief and restoration of land and promise.  Faith recognizes that great leaders can come from irregular liaisons.  (Just check out Jesus’ pedigree in Matthew chapter 1.  It’s not just a bunch of begats.)  Faith also involves risk taking.  Will Boaz still respect Ruth in the morning?  Will the claim of the nearer kinsmen prevent the two lovers from marrying?  We live by faith and not by sight.  It’s messy!  So all of the play it safe, no nonsense, prove it to me, neat and tidy people just need to get over it!

Risk and restoration, is there some risk God might be calling you to make?   Risk is hard.  On Thursday nights I am constantly asking people around the sharing table to pray for me for courage and faith.  Human relationships are so messy.  I feel special compassion for young people today, because they are setting out in life in a culture that is even messier than the world in which I began my life.  The younger generation does not rush to make commitments.  Maybe today’s young people are just smarter than I was.  When many of us were young we thought we could choose a career and a life partner, and those decisions would hold us for the rest of our lives.

Today young people expect they will not only change jobs, they will probably change careers at least four or five times in their lives.  There are some estimates that suggest  most people will change careers not just jobs as many as seven times in their lives.

Even churches are being called upon to change and take risks.  Part of the cautiousness of the younger generation in making commitments means that younger people are not joining churches.  They don’t want to make a commitment to an organization that may not fully embrace them, and will probably inevitably disappoint them.  And because relationships are messy even in congregations most churches will at times disappoint us.  We can’t keep doing what we have always done, and expect the church will continue.  We will have the risk change.

Even for those of us who are older change is all around us.  Assumptions we made only a few years ago about retirement age, health care, 401K’s, pensions are all shifting and changing.  When I started working the retirement age was 65.  Now I am supposed to work until I am 66 and 2/3’s might as well call it 67, and who knows what will happen after congress is done trying to fix the fiscal cliff.  Also as we get older despite our best efforts our bodies change.  These wonderful bodies that are God’s gift to us.  We are awesomely and wonderfully made.

Like it or not, however, bodies are messy.  All of the emotions, appetites and drives that go along with our wonderful bodies are messy.  And as we get older our bodies get messy, a keratosis here and keratosis there, warped joints from arthritis, blood struggling to supply enough oxygen to our brains, bladder and bowel control, cataracts, memory loss, we become a mess.  Thank God for modern medicine that keeps us alive, but when we live long enough, we are no longer smooth and beautiful.

So if our theme is risk and restoration, where is the restoration?  Where is the hope, the good news?  Let me start with the wisdom of the Velveteen Rabbit.  You remember the story?

The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the other toys.  He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces.  He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else.   For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room.  “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse.  “It’s a thing that happens to you.  When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse.  “You become.   It takes a long time.  That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept.   Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby.  But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

“I suppose you are real?” said the Rabbit.  And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive.  But the Skin Horse only smiled.

“The Boy’s Uncle made me Real,” he said. “That was a great many years ago; but once you are Real you can’t become unreal again.  It lasts for always.”

Risk and restoration, the promise of faith, earthy, messy, human faith, is that if we take the risk of loving of being vulnerable, we become real.  Not the materialist kind of real you can see, or touch or put your hands on, or deposit in the bank.   No, a spiritual real, that lasts for always.  Follow the way of love, and trust the kind of real that is for always.

Bible Study November 12 for Worship November 25

Bible Study November 12 for Worship November 25

John 18: 33  Pilate entered the praetorium again and called Jesus, and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?”

34  Jesus answered, “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?”

35  Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me; what have you done?”

36  Jesus answered, “My kingship is not of this world; if my kingship were of this world, my servants would fight, that I might not be handed over to the Jews; but my kingship is not from the world.”

37  Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice.”

38  Pilate said to him, “What is truth?” After he had said this, he went out to the Jews again, and told them, “I find no crime in him.

39  But you have a custom that I should release one man for you at the Passover; will you have me release for you the King of the Jews?”

40  They cried out again, “Not this man, but Barabbas!”

COMMENTARY

Our scripture is designated as the assigned passage for the Sunday before the beginning of Advent.  In the Church Calendar this Sunday is the end of Kingdomtide, and so a strange passage from the gospel of John focusing on the Kingship of Jesus is used as a bridge between Kingdomtide and Advent.

Probably none of Jesus’ followers were present at the interrogation of Jesus by the Roman Governor Pilate.  They had all gone into hiding.  This conversation between Jesus and Pilate was almost certainly the creation of the imagination of the author of John.  The conversation reflects the confrontation between the Roman Empire and the followers of Jesus in the late First Century and Early Second Century, when the church emerged on the Empire’s radar screen.  Up until the end of the First Century the church was considered a Jewish sect, and enjoyed the toleration the Empire extended to Judaism.  As more and more gentiles were recruited into the life of the church, the Romans became aware of this strange sect as a threat to the Empire.

Now there may be some link to actual history in this passage.  According to the early church tradition the governor had decreed that the charge against Jesus should be nailed to his cross, and the charge read:  “the King of the Jews.”  This little nugget of information may have some historical accuracy.  The Roman Governor would delight in needling the Temple authorities and proving that Roman had the power to execute Jewish Kings.

We should also take note of John’s use of the word truth.  The word truth is used twenty-four times in the gospels, and twenty- one of those occurrences are in the Gospel of John.  Truth as a disembodied intellectualized ideal was primarily a product of Greek philosophy and culture.  By the time of the First Century skepticism had led philosophical speculation into a cynical dead end.  According to skepticism Truth cannot be established with any degree of certainly because all knowledge is subject to doubt.  Even information derived from our physical senses is subject to doubt, because the senses can be fooled as in the case of illusions.  Even the existence of reality can be doubted.  After all who can prove that the world is really a dream?  When Jesus said,  “You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice.”

Pilate was naturally skeptical and retorted with the cynic’s question:  “What is truth?”  As if to say, “What are you talking about anyway, we all know there is no truth, only naked power.”

Again the moral and intellectual bankruptcy of the Empire was on display, when in verse 38 Pilate admitted that he found no crime in Jesus, but he went ahead and ordered his execution anyway.  The Empire stood convicted of executing Jesus, just as the Empire was guilty of persecuting and executing the followers of Jesus.  And I want to give the author of John some real credit for faith.  When John was written, the Empire was still persecuting the church.  The author could not look ahead and know that ultimately the church would convert the Empire.  (He also didn’t know that the Empire would coop the church.)  Therefore this conversation between Jesus and Pilate that played out in the imagination of the author of John was a real testament of faith.  Faith that ultimately the way of Jesus would prevail over the power of the Empire.

Now let’s pay special attention to verse 36:  Jesus answered, “My kingship is not of this world; if my kingship were of this world, my servants would fight, that I might not be handed over to the Jews; but my kingship is not from the world.”

Verse 36 is misinterpreted to mean that the Kingdom of Jesus is off in heaven, it is an otherworldly Kingdom that has nothing to do with this earth.  The Lutheran doctrine of the two Kingdoms can be traced to this verse.  But let’s examine the verse more carefully.  Jesus is not claiming that his teaching is only meant to get people into heaven, rather he is saying that his teaching of non-violence means that his followers will not physically or violently contest with Rome’s power.  But the spiritual struggle to try to redeem the Empire from its murderous pursuit of power, wealth and oppression will be non-violently pursued by the followers of Jesus.  And that is why the truly great spiritual movements of the 20^{th century focused on confronting oppression and violence with love.  Mahatma Gandhi freed India.  Martin Luther King set in motion a movement to end racism in America.  (We still have a ways to go.)  And Nelson Mandela brought down the forces of apartheid in South Africa.  Suffering non-violent love is a costly kind of love.  It cost Jesus his life.  The way of Jesus has cost many martyrs their lives, but in a world that is possessed by the insanity of violent oppression, suffering non-violent love is the only sane way to live.  And that is the message of the gospel as we close out the season of Kingdomtide.}

LET’S ASK SOME QUESTIONS OF THE TEXT

1. Where does this interview between Jesus and Pilate occur?

2. What is Pilate’s question to Jesus?

3. How did Jesus answer Pilate’s question?

4. Where did Jesus seem to locate his Kingship?

5. In verse 36 what was Jesus saying about the nature of his followers?

6. Based on Jesus’ response what conclusion does Pilate draw?

7. According to Jesus, who hears his voice?

8. How did Pilate respond?

9. Who did the author of John end up trying to blame for the crucifixion of Jesus?

LET’S ALLOW THE TEXT TO ASK QUESTIONS OF US

1. King is a concept that is relatively alien to people living in a modern democracy.  How would you reinterpret “king” to make this passage more understandable for unchurched folks in America?

2. Rome of the dominant Empire in the Mediterranean world at the time of Jesus.  What “Empires” or regimes of oppression have we known in our modern era?

3. Pilate is the representative of the Empire in this passage.  How would you contrast Jesus and Pilate?

4. What do you think Jesus was saying when he said, “My Kingdom is not of this world. . .?”

5. Do you think Jesus was teaching non-violence?

6. What do you think Jesus means when he says, “Everyone is of the truth hears my voice?”

7. How would you answer the question:  “What is truth?”

8. Why do you think Pilate kept referring to Jesus as “the King of the Jews?”

9. In what ways might following Jesus lead us into suffering for love?

The week of November 19 – November 25:  Thanksgiving Sunday – John 18:33-37 – A Wise Reign – II Samuel 23:1-7, Psalm 132:1-12, (13-18), Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14, Psalm 93, Revelation 1:4b-8.

Wherever You Go

Wherever You Go

According to some commentators the Story of Ruth is very old probably 1100 years before Christ. In its present form, however, it may not have been written down until post-exilic times, about 400 years before the birth of Christ, in the time when Ezra the Priest was insisting that the men of Israel should divorce their foreign wives in order to preserve racial and spiritual purity. Ruth the Moabite woman, the Great Grandmother of the Great King David provided an excellent counter to Ezra’s inhuman treatment of these gentile women. The story is also about immigration. A prolonged drought had driven Elimelech, his wife Naomi and their two sons Mahlon and Chilion to leave their native Bethlehem and go to the country of Moab as economic refugees. We should note that their status in Moab would have been similar to illegal aliens coming into the United States trying to make a living. We can also observe that the names of the two boys were not auspicious for this story, Mahlon meaning “sickly,” and Chilion meaning “weakling.”

While the family was in Moab, the two boys married Moabite girls, Orpah and Ruth. The text does not tell us who was married to whom. Elimelech died leaving Ruth a widow and then Mahlon and Chilion died leaving Orpah and Ruth widows. With no male protection and no share in the land, Naomi concluded she must leave and go back to Bethlehem in the hope that some family would take her in and perhaps lay some claim to Elimelech’s land. She encouraged Orpah and Ruth to go back to their families for that was their best prospect of avoiding starvation, and perhaps they could remarry. Under Hebrew law if one brother died without children the other brother inherited the wife. Since both sons were dead, if Ruth had another son, he would have been obligated to care for both widows, but as Naomi points out, she was past the age of child bearing, and even if she wasn’t Orpah and Ruth would not be able to wait for another son to grow up to take care of them.

Naomi must have been a pretty good mother-in-law, because both Orpah and Ruth refused at first to leave her. Mother-in-laws get a lot of bad press, and they are often the object of the proverbial mother-in-law joke like these:

My mother-in-law’s other car is a Broom!

My mother-in-law said to me, “I’ll dance on your grave.”

I said, “I hope you do. I’m being buried at sea.”

My mother-in-law and I were happy for 20 years, and then we met each other.

Naomi’s relationship with Orpah and Ruth was full of love reinforced by shared sorrow. Out of love Naomi encouraged her daughters-in-law to leave her, because she knew she could not provide for them. Finally Orpah turned, said goodbye, and went back to her family, but Ruth steadfastly clung to Naomi. Ruth’s extreme loyalty was the result of compassion, and the bond of shared grief. Ruth sealed her pledge to stay with Naomi with her famous oath:

1:16 “Entreat me not to leave you or to return from following you; for where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God; 17 where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the LORD do so to me and more also if even death parts me from you.”

This was a powerful oath. In this promise Ruth bound herself through Naomi to a land, a people and a God she had never seen. There also seemed to be little hope for Ruth in this promise. The people of Bethlehem might refuse to receive Naomi, and even if they accepted Naomi back there was no guarantee they would accept Ruth the foreigner. And what prospects did they have? Naomi was certainly past her prime. Ruth was an alien in a strange land. Both women might be treated as little more than slaves.

So this passage is about grief, faith and moving on. Grief can forge powerful bonds. Grief can be transformative. Grief can midwife faith. Most importantly like many people in grief Naomi was angry and bitter about her fate. When she returned to Bethlehem and her relatives greeted her, she said, “do not call me Naomi, call me Mara, (meaning bitterness), for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me.” Despite her anger and grief Naomi did not remain stuck. She picked up and moved on. That was a tribute to her faith.

I am reminded of Jimmy Carter’s mother, Miz Lillian. When she was asked, if she was angry after the death of her husband, Earl, she replied, “No, but I chopped a lot of wood that winter.” Like Naomi, Lillian did not remain stuck in grief. Instead she picked herself up, left Plains, Georgia and became the house mother of a fraternity at Auburn University. She also went on to administer a nursing home and then served in the Peace Corps as a nurse in India.

On remembrance Sunday we remember the faithfulness and loyalty of Ruth. She was not deterred by her grief but instead remained true to Naomi even though there appeared to be little hope for her in her choice. As we grieve for our loved ones we can see in Ruth and Naomi an example of faith working through the challenge of grief.

Because our hearts are laid bare and vulnerable by loss, we become unusually open to making new or deeper bonds of relationship as we grieve. Loss also opens us up to the possibility of change. We have to reinvent ourselves when we suffer a major loss. All change is hard, but some change is unavoidable like when we lose a spouse, or a parent, or a child, or a job, or a dream. Life will never be the same again. In adjusting to our loss we have to think of ourselves differently.

When tragedy is common and hardship is shared whether an attack like 9/11 or a weather disaster like Hurricane Katrina, the Alabama tornados, or now Hurricane Sandy, we pull together, we share, we reach out to one another and grow stronger in the midst of devastation. Wherever you go, I will go. We come to worship on this Remembrance Sunday because of our covenant to pray with and for each other. We pray this liturgy together in order to allow our shared grief to strengthen the bonds of love between us.

Not only do we draw strength from one another as we share the liturgy of remembrance, through memory we bridge time and space drawing strength from past members of the community of faith. Jesus promised us that he would be with us always to the end of the age, and through Christ all those who have died in faith are also with us in our remembering.

For all the saints who from their labors rest,
Who Thee by faith before the world confess,
Thy name, O Jesus, be forever blest,
Alleluia! Alleluia!

The miracle of the resurrection assures us that we are never alone. In the words of Ruth, “wherever you go, I will go.”

This morning is a time of remembering — remembering loved ones and good friends who have died in this past year. Remembering living together, working together, praying together. We remember the good things we have shared, and we give thanks to God for each other, and treasure the memories of the love we have shared.

We come today to say good-bye.

There are people we will not see again in this life time. We need to be able to say good-bye and move on. Living lies ahead and not behind. Saying good-bye is sad, but we must answer God’s call to move on into the future.

Let us give thanks to the God who promises us that good-bye is not forever. For through the resurrection of Christ we will live again. Praise God. Amen.

Bible Study November 5 for Worship November 18

Bible Study November 5 for Worship November 18

I Samuel 1: 4  On the day when Elkanah sacrificed, he would give portions to Peninnah his wife and to all her sons and daughters;

5  and, although he loved Hannah, he would give Hannah a double portion, because the LORD had closed her womb.

6  And her rival used to provoke her sorely, to irritate her, because the LORD had closed her womb.

7  So it went on year by year; as often as she went up to the house of the LORD, she used to provoke her. Therefore Hannah wept and would not eat.

8  And Elkanah, her husband, said to her, “Hannah, why do you weep? And why do you not eat? And why is your heart sad? Am I not more to you than ten sons?”

9  After they had eaten and drunk in Shiloh, Hannah rose. Now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat beside the doorpost of the temple of the LORD.

10  She was deeply distressed and prayed to the LORD, and wept bitterly.

11  And she vowed a vow and said, “O LORD of hosts, if thou wilt indeed look on the affliction of thy maidservant, and remember me, and not forget thy maidservant, but wilt give to thy maidservant a son, then I will give him to the LORD all the days of his life, and no razor shall touch his head.”

12  As she continued praying before the LORD, Eli observed her mouth.

13  Hannah was speaking in her heart; only her lips moved, and her voice was not heard; therefore Eli took her to be a drunken woman.

14  And Eli said to her, “How long will you be drunken? Put away your wine from you.”

15  But Hannah answered, “No, my lord, I am a woman sorely troubled; I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the LORD.

16  Do not regard your maidservant as a base woman, for all along I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation.”

17  Then Eli answered, “Go in peace, and the God of Israel grant your petition which you have made to him.”

18  And she said, “Let your maidservant find favor in your eyes.” Then the woman went her way and ate, and her countenance was no longer sad.

19  They rose early in the morning and worshiped before the LORD; then they went back to their house at Ramah. And Elkanah knew Hannah his wife, and the LORD remembered her;

20  and in due time Hannah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Samuel, for she said, “I have asked him of the LORD.”

COMMENTARY

Infertility can be a tragic unbearable sadness in the life of a woman.  I have to readily admit as a man, and my guess is many other men, don’t get it.  In our modern western world we spend so much time and effort trying to avoid conception it is hard for me to understand just our awesomely tragic infertility can be.  But then I witness the great lengths to which couples will go to conceive and give birth to their own children, and I do intellectually understand that infertility is experienced as a terrible burden.  Perhaps the key is to try to understand that child bearing is genetically programmed into women, and most women on a visceral level feel an urge to satisfy the call to motherhood.  In a culture that valued women as the producers of the next generation, the first line of defense against the extinction of the tribe, the call to motherhood might become overwhelming. And then if we add to the cultural mix the need to produce many sons to serve as warriors for the protection of the tribe, we can perhaps understand the high status of women who gave birth to sons.

Poor Hannah had been unable to conceive.  For the time it sounds like she and her husband Elkanah enjoyed a mutually affectionate relationship for the time.  But in keeping with the culture, when Elkanah and Hannah had been unable to produce children, Elkanah took a second wife Penninah.  The assumption was always that the woman was barren, rather than that the man was shooting blanks.  Actually the custom of taking more than one wife, in that culture was an attempt to be compassionate and also the survival of the tribe.  Because of the increased mortality of males, there was always a greater supply of women than men.  Thus single women were given a protector and provider, and the tribe could put perfectly good breeding stock to work in order to insure the survival of the clan.  When Penninah immediately produced a gaggle of children upon marrying Elkanah, Hannah’s barrenness was confirmed.  She was defective.

Even though the custom of having more than one wife provided for the left over women and kept the tribe alive, there were problems with the practice – jealousy.  Penninah seems to have been jealous of the affection shared by Elkannah and Hannah.  The text tells us that Elkannah always gave Hannah a double portion in order to assure her that she was uppermost in his affectgions.  After all who wants to be considered the “second wife” a heifer for breeding purposes.  Hannah was also jealous of the attention Elkanah may have paid to Penninah.  After all you don’t produce a gaggle of children without spending time with someone.  Actually the text does not tell us exactly how many children Penninah had, but the text uses the plural “sons” and “daughters,” perhaps implying a minimum of four?  Some midrash claims Penninah had produced ten sons, because of Elkanah’s remark in verse 8:  “Am I not more to you than ten sons?”  Such claims are probably stretching the point.

Obviously Elkanah did not understand Hannah’s distress.  He didn’t get it.  And he perhaps turned a blind eye to Pinninah’s harassment of Hannah not wanting to insert himself in what he considered to be a woman’s squabble.  Anyway, poor Hannah was in complete distress, when she approached the tent of meeting at the special sacrifice at Shiloh.

Turning for a moment from Hannah’s distress we can note that at this time in the history of Israel the ark of the covenant was not in Jerusalem (Jerusalem was Jebusite rather than Israelite territory, and instead the sacred symbol of the Israelite people resided in the cult center of Shiloh in the Central Highlands in the allotment for the tribe of Ephraim.  We should note that the village of Ramah is on the Western edge of Ephraim overlooking the escarpment that plunges down to the coastal plain.  So the journey from Ramah to Shiloh was perhaps ten to fifteen miles.

At this time in the development of Judaism the Ark was a common national and spiritual symbol for the Israelite people, and it was readily available for anyone to pray in its presence.  As a sacred object people were forbidden to touch it, and it had to be carried using poles and rings attached to it, because it was believed that if someone touched it they would die.  But it was still available to be seen by ordinary people, rather than tucked away in the inner sanctums of a temple and kept behind a curtain separating the people from the object of their worship.

Hannah prayed so fervently that the High Priest and keeper of the Ark believed she was drunk, and he scolded her.  But when Hannah opened her heart to Eli he perceived her authenticity and gave her a blessing that the story seems to credit with her then conceiving a son.  In her joy Hannah also swears and oath, this helps to link Hannah’s story to Ruth, and in the oath she promises to give the gift God has given her back to God.  And perhaps this is why the lectionary scheduled this passage for Stewardship Sunday.  Hannah is justified by the God’s gift of a son.  Midrash goes on to enlarge upon the story claiming that Hannah then had several more children.  But Hannah is willing to give back the gift in order to honor her promise to God.  Perhaps it is enough to simply ask ourselves what are we willing to give back to God in return for all the blessings we have received?

LET’S ASK SOME QUESTIONS OF THE TEXT

1. On what day did Elkanah offer sacrifice?

2. Where did Elkanah offer his sacrifice?

3. Who was included in the sacrificial ritual?

4. How would you describe the relationship between Elkanah and Hannah?

5. Who was Hannah’s chief rival?

6. How did her rival taunt Hannah?

7. Where was Hannah praying when she made her promise to God?

8. What promise did Hannah make to God?

9. Who thought Hannah was drunk?

10. What blessing did the High Priest give to Hannah?

11. What was the result of the oath and the blessing?

LET’S ALLOW THE TEXT TO ASK QUESTIONS OF US

1. Do you think women today are as motivated to have children as in the time of Hannah?

2. Do you think most women experience an innate desire for children apart from cultural expectations?

3. What insight do you think the story of Hannah may offer concerning plural marriage?

4. In Tibetan culture several brothers may simultaneously share one wife.  How do you think that works out?

5. In cultures that regularly practice female infanticide, what do you think will be the effect on the institution of marriage?

6. Many gay and lesbian couples want to have children.  How do you think our culture is adapting to that desire?

7. On what occasion or occasions have you prayed most fervently?

8. Have you ever made a promise to God?

9. What can you give back to God?

10. Have you ever considered your children to be a gift?

The week of November 12 – November 18:  Twenty-fifth Sunday After Pentecost – I Samuel 1:4-20 – Praise the Holy One – I Samuel 2:1-10, Daniel 12:1-3, Psalm 16, Hebrews 10:11-14, (15-18), 19-25, Mark 13:1-8.