Today’s readings: such a mixed bag! The Gospel continues Epiphany themes—more on that later. The reading from Isaiah: presumably selected because Matthew quotes from it. Psalm 27: perhaps because it’s ‘light’ (“The Lord is my light”) echoes the light in Isaiah and Matthew. 1st Corinthians: well, this is when the lectionary wants us reading 1st Corinthians. Nevertheless, because all the texts are talking about the same God and the same humans, there are some interesting connections.
Today’s psalm: besides the light image, an exploration of what to do with fear. The psalmist celebrates God’s deliverance in the past, but there are still enemies out there. Verse 10: “Hearken to my voice, O Lord, when I call; / have mercy on me and answer me.” Then there’s the psalm’s last verse, omitted by the lectionary: “O tarry and await the Lord’s pleasure; / be strong, and he shall comfort your heart; / wait patiently for the Lord.” The Lord’s timing only sometimes matches our preferred timing, so patience is necessary. What to do with fear? Acknowledge it, but don’t give it the steering wheel. God has been faithful in the past; God will prove faithful in the future; we can bring even our fear before God. Recall the saying attributed to Winston Churchill: “When you’re going through hell, keep going.”
Speaking of fear, our Gospel begins with “When Jesus heard that John had been arrested.” Matthew doesn’t mention it, but John the Evangelist tells us that there was a period in which John the Baptist and Jesus were baptizing in the same region (Jn 3:22-24). You never know how narrow or broad these sweeps are going to be, so Jesus, prudently, leaves Herod’s jurisdiction. Galilee is not safe, but safer.
Matthew then pairs Jesus’ move from Nazareth to Capernaum with a citation from Isaiah. Why? Well, probably for at least three reasons.
First, one of Matthew’s recurrent themes (one of our Epiphany themes) is that this Jewish Messiah is good news for the Gentiles. That’s important to the mixed Jewish/Gentile congregations for whom he’s writing. So the phrase “Galilee of the nations” in Isaiah is important.
Second, Matthew, like John, likes that light image. John the Evangelist has Jesus saying “I am the light of the world” (8:12); the quote from Isaiah is Matthew’s equivalent. It’s also a setup for what we’ll hear in the next chapter, toward the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount: “You are the light of the world” (Mat 5:14). Back in the first chapter the angel said to Joseph “he will save his people from their sins” (1:21); that’s about empowerment.
(Let’s stay with that for a moment. Matthew doesn’t waste time between “the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light” (4:16) and “You are the light of the world” (5:14). It’s the same move made in Isa 61:1ff which lies behind the first three beatitudes in Matt 5:3-5, from “The spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me” (61:1) to “to provide for those who mourn in Zion… They shall build up the ancient ruins, they shall raise up the former devastations; they shall repair the ruined cities, the devastations of many generations” (61:3-4; italics mine). Easy to focus on the benefits of salvation, but without an equal focus on being empowered and sent (John 20:21), we miss the point.)
Third, in the minds of some, Jesus’ association with Galilee counted against him being the Messiah. From John’s Gospel: “Surely the Messiah does not come from Galilee, does he?” (7:41). And here, I think, Matthew is relying not only on the text he quotes, but on the continuation of the text. The reason for the light and joy Isaiah describes: “For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace” (9:6). Galilee is precisely where we should expect the Messiah’s presence to be felt. Matthew sees the situation Isaiah faced prefiguring the situation in Jesus’ time, and builds on it!
Moving on, I think it’s helpful to have Handel’s “For unto us a child is born” ringing in our ears as we read the calling of the disciples, because it gives a sense of the authority of the one doing the calling. One commentator (Boring) sees the story as discipleship stripped down to its essentials. Why are we disciples? Jesus called us.
Circling back to today’s psalm and the beginning of the Gospel text (“Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested”) notice what Matthew leaves implicit. With the combination of Roman occupation and compliant local elites, no occupation is safe, but fishing is usually safer than most. Jesus calls them to leave that, and today’s gradual hymn reminded us of the consequences (“Young John who trimmed the flapping sail, homeless in Patmos died. Peter, who hauled the teeming net, head-down was crucified” [The Hymnal 1982¸ 661].) “When you’re going through hell, keep going.”
After the other readings, the 1st Corinthians reading is almost comic relief. Jesus, “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace,” has called us, and here we are, driven by our fears to seek status through one-upmanship. “’I belong to Paul,’ or ‘I belong to Apollos,’ or ‘I belong to Cephas,’ or ‘I belong to Christ.’” Almost comic relief, because whatever Corinth needs, it isn’t more darkness, and Jesus really needs those folk to be light.
So perhaps our lessons suggest an additional piece of advice to “When you’re going through hell, keep going.” That would be: “Going through hell doesn’t cancel the need to repent.” Matthew summarized Jesus’ message in today’s reading: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” It’s easy to postpone repentance until we’ve—say—gotten rid of the Roman occupation. But that simply guarantees that if we get power, we’ll use it as destructively as the Romans did.
“The Lord is my light.” Let us, with patience, allow that light to continue to do its work within and among us, the work that we know needs doing, the work about which we’re clueless. And we can do so with confidence, for the Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace has promised to be with us always.
With Jacob at Bethel 