Readings

Among the courses in seminary that today I most regret not taking: juggling. Here’s why. Our Old Testament readings take us through Job and Ruth. The Epistle readings, again starting today, take us through the Epistle to the Hebrews. And in the Gospel readings in Mark, Jesus continues his march towards Jerusalem, accompanied by the apostles who continue to argue over whose name will be in the biggest lights on the marquee. So in a now venerable tradition of TV story-telling, we’ll all juggle multiple story lines together, and listen for what our gracious and subtle Lord might be saying to us.

Job

Today’s reading introduces Job and sets up the problem: if God doesn’t protect us –more broadly, if there are no concrete benefits—is God worth serving? That is a question no one wants to be the position of having to answer. But most of the rest of the Old Testament, and, in particular the Book of Proverbs, with its continual emphasis on the correlation between good behavior and good results, forces the question. Do we only serve God because/when it pays? Does God have to buy our love?

In setting the question, the book eliminates two of the three classic responses to the problem of evil: God’s power is unquestioned (Satan has to ask permission to do anything) and God’s knowledge is intact. What we are left to wonder about –and what Job will wonder about very loudly in the coming chapters—is whether God is good, or simply very big. Tune in next week.

Hebrews

Hebrews is one of the least accessible books in the New Testament. It was usually ascribed to Paul, who was almost certainly not its author. It seems to assume that its audience is in danger of abandoning faith in Jesus for some other form of Judaism. In any case, the bulk of the book is devoted to Jesus’ superiority. In the process, it offers perspectives that Christians throughout the centuries have found illuminating and encouraging.

For instance, in the second half of the 20^th Century, Christians in many countries sought –as they have in every time and place—for ways of speaking of Jesus that resonated with their hearts. One of these: Jesus our Brother. Not: our God, our Lord, our Master –all true enough—but Jesus our Brother. And it was in this prickly epistle that we found the richest resources to develop this image: the one who “is not ashamed to call [us] brothers and sisters,” the one who shared our flesh and blood. Jesus is our Brother, who can help us when we suffer and are tested, because he suffered and was tested too; one of the few human beings worthy to be Job’s brother.

Shared our flesh and blood, “so that –listen carefully—through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death.” The New Testament is united in confessing that we are saved through Jesus’ death. But there is no unanimity regarding how Jesus’ death saves us, simply a wealth of different images and metaphors. This image, Jesus’ death effecting the defeat of the devil and our liberation, was perhaps the most frequently image Christians used in the early Centuries of the church’s life.

Chrysostom used to say: “the devil [is like] a creditor, who cast into prison those who are in debt to him; but now he imprisons one who owes him nothing. He has exceeded his rights, and he is deprived of his dominion.” Augustine used to say: “the devil found Christ innocent, but none the less smote Him; he shed innocent blood, and took what he had no right to take. Therefore it is fitting that he should be dethroned and forced to give up those who were under his power.” (Aulén in both cases: Christus Victor 51).

Matthew

One of the jokes about my people, the Scots, is that if there are three of us, there’ll be four political parties. This could have been said of the Jews of Jesus’ day, as illustrated by today’s reading. Moses permitted divorce; on what grounds could a man seek divorce? The School of Shammai said: only for unchastity; the School of Hillel said: for practically anything, including burning the roast. The Pharisees wanted to know what Jesus thought.

Jesus asks what Moses commanded; they reply citing the provision for a certificate of divorce. Jesus interprets that as a concession to their hardness of heart, and returns to the creation story: “‘the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

That certainly sounds as though Jesus is taking a position to the right of Shammai: there are no grounds on which a man could seek a divorce.

So that’s all we need to say about that? Hardly. Matthew tells the same story as Mark, but in his story Jesus says “whoever divorces his wife, except for unchastity, and marries another commits adultery.” So in Matthew, Rabbi Jesus aligns with Rabbi Shammai. Paul takes up marriage in his first letter to the Corinthians, and permits divorce and remarriage in the case of a Christian whose non-Christian spouse wants out.

So how do we respond to the NT as a whole? Over time the Greek-speaking Eastern Church and the Latin-speaking Western Church came to give quite different answers. The Western Church understood Jesus words as transmitted by Mark as canon law: no divorce. Unfortunately, what that often ended up meaning was that if you were well-connected (money helped), you could get an annulment, and if you weren’t, then you could either divorce & remarry or continue to receive Holy Communion, but not both. The Eastern Church read the same texts and concluded that marriages could die, and so divorce and remarriage were permitted as tragic concessions to our continuing hardness of heart. The history of the Western Church has been a history of gradually approaching the Eastern Church’s position; although some parts –most notably the Roman Catholics—continue to prohibit divorce.

Marriages can die. This certainly rings true. But does it really take Jesus’ words as recorded in Mark seriously? Well, yes, for I think what Jesus is doing here is like what he does in the Sermon on the Mount: “if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment;” “everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Does this mean we adjust our laws accordingly? No. Jesus is, I think, making two points: we must not fall into the trap of equating obeying the law with goodness, because anyone with half a brain can figure out how to satisfy the law and still do evil. Second, if we tightened up the law to eliminate this problem, all of us would be locked up.

Marriages can die. The challenge Jesus’ words pose: how do we as a parish support the marriages in our midst and nourish virtues such as honesty, humility, and patience, without which no marriage will flourish?

And this is the point –I do see the light at the end of the tunnel—at which the worlds of our three lessons do converge, with whose convergence we can wrap this up.

In the first conversation between God and the Satan (“the accuser”), the Satan asks “Does Job fear God for nothing?” It’s one of the questions that drives the whole book, and it bleeds over into the rest of Scripture. Recall the ending of our Hebrews reading: “Because he himself [Jesus] was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.” Did Jesus fear God for nothing? Precisely because the answer is yes, “he is able to help those who are being tested.” And the question lies just under the surface of our Gospel reading, for what often—not always—drives divorce is one of the partner’s decisions not to stay in the marriage “for nothing.” But that’s what the vows promise, right? “For better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health” (BCP 427). Whether it’s our relationship with God, with our spouses, maybe even with any serious friendship, “for nothing” isn’t the whole story, but sometimes necessary to keep the story moving forward.

It’s popular to criticize Job’s wife for her “‘Curse God, and die.’” But notice: when Job’s friends start laying into him in chapters 3-37 –that’s right, chapters 3-37—she stays out of it, and she’s still around for Job’s restoration. Their marriage flourishes at the beginning and ending of the story, with a very rough patch in between. O, to be known as a parish that nourished such marriages!

Returning to Paul, he’s clear that both the single and married states are vocations, callings in which we can reflect God’s holiness. So, at a marriage, we’re asked “Will all of you witnessing these promises do all in your power to uphold these two persons in their marriage?” And we respond: “We will.” And we’re reminded of this obligation to mutual support as we celebrate marriage anniversaries. Sadly, there are no liturgical affirmations of this obligation to uphold those whose vocation is the single life. (Perhaps the folk thinking about Prayer Book revision could think about that!) But the obligation’s there, the obligation to uphold each other in either state, married or single. Perhaps today’s texts can encourage us to take this obligation more seriously, particularly when someone’s needle is hovering at “for nothing,” and do better than Job’s friends, who, hovering just offstage, can’t wait to tell Job what he’s done wrong.