“Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it” (Gen 28:16). Here we wonder about encountering G-d at the intersection of Bible and Life–typically prompted by the (Episcopal) Book of Common Prayer.
Dealing with our vulnerability: this from Ellen F. Davis on the psalms of petition in Opening Israel’s Scriptures, quoting André Chouraqui:
The only thing he [the psalmist] opposes to the arrows that pierce him through, is his own voice[.] His hands are empty; God alone is his weaponry, his fortress. The Innocent never relies on his material strength for deliverance from his enemies…
… Every one of the psalms—and especially the psalms which seem the most bellicose—[all] are animated by an absolute contempt for material brute strength. This is not a question of heroic renunciation, but rather one of objective certitude. Might is good for nothing, serves as the foundation for nothing, and leads to nothing… As for the Just, he is committed to the victorious action of justice and truth.
The Judges reading is puzzling. Why give so much space to the aftermath of the messenger’s announcement to Manoah’s woman? (There were certainly more engaging Samson stories left on the cutting room floor!) Perhaps this: Manoah is not the sharpest knife in the drawer, and seems to distrust the divine. Is the narrator using Manoah to preview Samson’s character?
Faithful Jews—now Christians—responded to Hellenistic culture in divergent enough ways that Luke uses ‘Hellenists’ and ‘Hebrews’ to describe the emerging factions. The response of “the Twelve” is priceless. On the one hand, they get it right, and appoint seven with Hellenist names to deal with the presenting issue. On the other hand, “it is not right that we should neglect the word of God in order to wait on tables” shows why Jesus spent time trying (with at best partial success) to root out status-seeking among his disciples (Mk 9:33-35; Jn 13:1-17). God’s opinion is immediately evident: Stephen, one of the seven, is the first martyr, and Philip, another of the seven, brings the Gospel to Samaria.
Samaria. I wonder if Jesus’ conversations with Nicodemus (Jn 3) and the Samaritan woman (Jn 4) do not form a diptych, both long, contrasting participants, one scene in the darkness, the other in broad daylight. Another layer: John the Baptist had described Jesus as the bridegroom, himself as the friend of the bridegroom (Jn 3:29). Courtship at the well is a classic type scene (Gen 24:10-28; Gen 29:1-12; Exod 2:15b-21), and here’s Jesus at the well. The Gospel’s Prologue: “we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth” (1:14b). In this diptych is John showing us what glory, grace, and truth look like?
The Judges reading begins the story of Samson, the last of the judges profiled in the book, and the longest of the stories. Already we are warned that there will be ambiguities: the boy will “begin to deliver Israel from the hand of the Philistines;” the woman adds “to the day of his death” in recounting the messenger’s announcement to her husband.
“For everything there is a season” (Eccl 3:1)—so also times both to act and to refrain from acting, wisdom that Gamaliel and John the Baptist share. Our culture has trouble recognizing the times to refrain; the preacher in Ecclesiastes would probably have liked these proverbs from Lao Tzu: “The Way is every without action, yet nothing is left undone.” “Use justice to rule a country. Use surprise to wage war. Use non-action to govern the world” (Tao Te Ching chs. 37, 57).
The quotation of John the Baptist’s words: does it stop at v.30 or v.36? The NRSV opts for the first; the content of vv.31-36 may suggest an intentional blend of perspectives. The ending (“the wrath of God abideth on him” KJV) sounds like John the Baptist: this is the only use of ‘wrath’ (orgē) in this Gospel, and two of the other four uses in the other Gospels are quoting the Baptist (Matt 3:7; Lk 3:7). On the other hand, the beginning of v.36 forms an inclusio with v.3, providing, in passing, further evidence that ‘eternal life’ in this Gospel is at least roughly equivalent to ‘the kingdom of heaven/God’ in the other Gospels (boldface mine):
Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” (v.3)
Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure God’s wrath. (v.36)
Judges 2:11-23 is commonly recognized as describing the pattern that plays out repeatedly in the book. Today’s reading: another reminder that the description is perhaps overly optimistic: “he delivered them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge” (v.18) does not, alas, include the occasions in which the Israelites are their own worst enemies.
The Acts reading should, perhaps, get us wondering: why is physical healing so problematic a part of Christian witness in the West? Why is its role noticeably reduced from the role as portrayed in Acts? Figuring out the right questions to ask looks like an important part of the challenge.
The opening moves in the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus are puzzling. The prophets had used different metaphors to talk about God’s future work in Israel (writing the law on the heart, a heart of flesh). Why does Nicodemus not recognize “born from above” as a similar metaphor?
Why Jesus opens with “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above” is perhaps an easier puzzle. Nicodemus’ “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God” sounds like the voice of the gatekeepers. Jesus’ response sounds like a warning that the leaders are in no position to gate keep. The issue isn’t that they need to get themselves “born from above”—that cuts against the logic of the metaphor (we’re not the agents of our own births). “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” The appropriate response, it would seem, is to pray for God’s mercy, a prayer that might be enacted by, say, submitting to John’s baptism.
Today Jesus’ words, less helpfully translated as “no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again” (NIV), often commonly serve as a lead-in to a straightforward explanation as to how one gets oneself “born again.” This fits with our culture’s passion for self-help. But does that not get the conversation off on the wrong foot? Is my/our salvation something I/we manage?
We humans are so vulnerable, often heartbreakingly vulnerable. Today’s readings give us an opportunity to reflect on how we deal with that.
Jephthah, facing a very uncertain battle, makes a vow. “If you will give the Ammonites into my hand, then whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return victorious from the Ammonites, shall be the LORD’s, to be offered up by me as a burnt offering.” The vow: generic religious behavior, not mandated, but regulated in the Bible. The narrator is silent at three points: (1) while “the spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah,” silence re whether the vow is at the spirit’s prompting; (2) silence re any evaluation of the vow (wise, foolish, pious, impious, etc.); (3) silence re whether the LORD gave victory because of the vow. Re the third point, we might suspect that the mention of the spirit (v.29) before the vow (v.30) means that the vow was unnecessary. Pulling the camera back, do we assume that in our vulnerability we need to bargain with God to get what we want?
Of course, the tragic vulnerability in the story is that of Jephthah’s daughter. For vows must be fulfilled? The Book of 1 Samuel tells of Saul pronouncing a curse on anyone eating during a battle. His son Jonathan, not having heard the curse, eats. Here’s how it plays out when all is known:
Then Saul said to Jonathan, “Tell me what you have done.” Jonathan told him, “I tasted a little honey with the tip of the staff that was in my hand; here I am, I will die.” Saul said, “God do so to me and more also; you shall surely die, Jonathan!” Then the people said to Saul, “Shall Jonathan die, who has accomplished this great victory in Israel? Far from it! As the LORD lives, not one hair of his head shall fall to the ground; for he has worked with God today.” So the people ransomed Jonathan, and he did not die. (1 Sam. 14:43-45)
Where are “the people” when Jephthah’s daughter and Jephthah most need them? My challenge is not simply dealing with my vulnerability.
Mark tells of the time Jesus and the disciples were crossing the Sea of Galilee. “A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped.” The disciples get the crucial part right: they wake Jesus up—the rest is detail. Before wondering what we might safely conclude from the story, let’s bring Paul into the conversation.
Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I received a stoning. Three times I was shipwrecked; for a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from bandits, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers and sisters; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, hungry and thirsty, often without food, cold and naked.
So “just wake Jesus up and everything will be smooth sailing” is a non-starter. What Paul seems to have concluded: whatever happens, Jesus is in the boat, and it will be more than OK. “But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us” (2 Cor. 4:7). And we, how are we responding to Jephthah’s daughter’s many sisters?
Desire is a sign of life. Our bodies need food, water, protection, embrace…the list could go on. But, offspring of Adam, desire can glide into coveting, the root—so one recurrent biblical tradition—of sin. “You shall not covet” may be the 10th commandment (Exod 20:17), but it shows up in the Garden (“that the tree was to be desired to make one wise” [Gen. 3:6]). The conquest under Joshua is on the fast track—until Achan violates the ban at Jericho: “when I saw among the spoil a beautiful mantle from Shinar, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a bar of gold weighing fifty shekels, then I coveted them and took them” (Jos. 7:21). When Paul reaches for an example of how sin subverts the law: “I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, ‘You shall not covet’” (Rom. 7:7). Thus James “But one is tempted by one’s own desire” (Jas. 1:14).
Almost predictable, then, that in humanity’s new chapter as recorded in Acts, Ananias and Sapphira “channel” Eve and Achan in their accounting. Or that in John’s Gospel Jesus takes aim first at the temple commerce.
When I covet, the needs of the neighbor simply don’t matter. That “you shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Lev. 19:18; Matt. 22:39 etc.) circles back pretty quickly to that challenging border between (legitimate) desire and coveting. There’s personal work to be done. And that $8 billion for weapons systems tucked into the $1 trillion package for COVID response proposed by one of our parties—probably not on the right side of that border. There’s corporate work to be done.
(The Lectionary, oddly, omits vv.17-18; they are retained in the above link.)
Jotham’s parable is powerful, and, like all parables, demanding wisdom in its application. Contrary to the propaganda from the far right, both olive trees and bramble are to be found in government—just as both are present in corporate headquarters. The bad news, as Qoheleth observed: “Dead flies make the perfumer’s ointment give off a foul odor; so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor” (10:1).
In yesterday’s Acts reading (bumped by Transfiguration), Peter and John were arrested in the temple and hauled before the religious leaders, where Peter gave testimony. Particularly noteworthy: the church responded to their experience with a prayer (vv.24-30) which concludes: “And now, Lord, look at their threats, and grant to your servants to speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” In light of persecution in multiple countries (see here and here), this is a prayer we might pray—often.
Jesus: the Word, the True Light, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, the Son of God, the Messiah, the King of Israel. After all of these designations in the first chapter, what does Jesus do? Provide about 150 gallons of first-class wine for a local wedding. This is what the High King does: set a generous table. This, the first of Jesus’ signs, announces the endgame: “You show me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy; in your right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Ps. 16:11).
From Michael Ramsey’s Be Still and Know (reprinted in Celebrating the Seasons):
In Saint Luke’s account of the transfiguration of our Lord, we see his characteristic relating of a scene to prayer and to the mission of Jesus as he moves toward death and glory. Jesus is praying, and the light shines on his face. We do not know that it is a prayer of agony and conflict like the prayer in Gethsemane, but we know that it is a prayer near to the radiance of God and the prayer of one who has chosen the way of death. Luke tells us that the two witnesses, Moses and Elijah, were conversing about the exodus which Jesus would accomplish in Jerusalem: not death alone, but the passing through death to glory, the whole going forth of Jesus as well as the leading forth of the new people of God in the freedom of the new covenant. Luke tells us that after the resurrection Jesus spoke of the witness of Moses and of all the prophets to his suffering and glory.
It was not a glory which the disciples at the time could fathom. No doubt they would have welcomed a glory on the mountain far away from the conflicts which had happened and the conflicts which were going to happen as Jesus sets his face toward Jerusalem. Yet when Jesus went up the mountain to be transfigured he did not leave these conflicts behind, but rather carried them up the mountain so that they were transfigured with him. It was the transfiguration of the whole Christ, from his first obedience in childhood right through to the final obedience of Gethsemane and Calvary
The disciples could not grasp this at the time, but the writings of the apostolic age were to show that the link between the suffering and the glory came to be understood as belonging to the heart of the Christian message. Glory belongs to the plain as well as to the mountain. The scene on the mount speaks to us today, but we are not allowed to linger there. We are bidden to journey on to Calvary and there learn of the darkness and the desolation which are the cost of the glory. But from Calvary and Easter there comes a Christian hope of immense range: the hope of the transformation not only of mankind but of the cosmos too.
In Eastern Christianity especially there has been the continuing belief that Easter is the beginning of a transformed cosmos. There is a glimpse of this hope in Saint Paul’s Letter to the Romans, a hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain “the glorious liberty of the children of God.” The bringing of mankind to glory will be the prelude to the bringing of all creation. Is this hope mere fantasy? At its root there is the belief in the divine sovereignty of sacrificial love, a sovereignty made credible only by transfigured lives.
(The Lectionary, oddly, omits vv.13-21; they are retained in the above link.)
Gideon (“Hacker”)/Jerubbaal (“Let Baal contend against him”) becomes a more ambiguous character as the story proceeds. The hacking moves from the Baal altar and sacred pole to the Midianites with their leaders Zebah and Zalmunna, to the officials and elders of Succoth and Penuel. Commentators argue about the latter: personal vengeance (Boling) or military justice (Alter); perhaps the ambiguity of the action is equally important. There’s no celebration of the God-given victory, simply a quick return to the local rivalries and jockeying for status.
As speeches aiming at repentance go, Peter’s is one of the gentlest: you’re in the inside lane, you acted “in ignorance,” repent so that “the times of refreshing may come.” At the other end of the spectrum, Stephen’s combative sermon, which, not surprisingly, lead to his stoning (Acts 7). Is Luke inviting us to wonder about how the Gospel is proclaimed?
John the Baptist does his work, pointing folk to Jesus (vv.35ff), and now it’s Simon who acquires a new name (‘Cephas’ in Aramaic, ‘Peter’ in Greek [recall ‘petrify’, ‘petroleum’, etc.]). Vv.29-34 are curious stylistically, with no indication of John’s audience. Probably the author is reporting of John’s testimony to us, the readers. Jesus: “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” “the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit,” “the Son of God:” The author is, as it were, writing checks; let us see how he cashes them, how he shows Jesus enacting these descriptions.
Judges: one of the challenges in the story is how to make God’s action visible (“You have too many people on your side. If I were to hand Midian over to them, the Israelites might claim credit for themselves rather than for me, thinking, We saved ourselves.” [CEB]). To play—shamelessly—with Gideon’s jars (vv.16, 19f), “But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us” (2 Cor. 4:7 NRS). What does this suggest for interpreting our own experiences of weakness?
Another challenge: Gideon’s lack of confidence. Here God’s humility is on full display: one would think that God’s word would be more impressive than an enemy conversation about a dream, but if what Gideon needs is the latter, God accommodates. This humility shows up often enough that we might wonder why it’s not more prominent in our descriptions of the divine character.
Acts: there were various non-risky ways Peter could have responded to the lame beggar. But this is the Peter who, in the middle of a storm no less, said to Jesus “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water” (Matt. 14:28). “…in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk.” In our context (COVID 19, again), what might Jesus desire to heal?
John: a cautionary story re the importance of asking the right questions. The folk from Jerusalem have their set questions—and the entire conversation is an exercise in talking past each other.
With Jacob at Bethel 