Lectionary citations for Sunday, August 19, 2007

Lectionary citations for Sunday, August 19, 2007

Isaiah 5:1-7 with Psalm 80:1-2,8-19 or
Jeremiah 23:23-29 with Psalm 82 and
Hebrews 11:29-12:2 and
Luke 12:49-56

Life has a language.
And Scripture has a word for us.

These Lectionary reflections are based on those two thoughts.

Today's reading catches me off guard and puts me on edge.
The life it describes, and the life around me, is one of ferocious
intensity. As I write on this August evening the sky is a blanket of
smoke. Yet another fire "blew up" this afternoon in a drainage that
was spared last summer. Four church camps were evacuated, among them
the Methodist Camp on the Boulder and the camp of my own
denomination, the United Church of Christ.

When Jesus says, "I came to bring fire to the earth," I
cannot help but be taken aback. I would so much prefer a text that
speaks of healing rivers, of storms that are calmed, of rain that
ends the drought. But this week's Gospel is wrapped in fire as life
itself is sometimes wrapped in fire.

I recall carrying one of our twins under each arm as we fled
a burning house a quarter century ago. I recall the words of a
professor who survived the fire bombing of Tokyo when he gently spoke
to a group in seminary who decided to ritually burn some texts they
found unacceptable. "Be careful of fire," he said. "Handle it
carefully. You must be aware of what you are doing." To believe we
control fire is a mistake. It controls us. The small campfire, the
gas burner, the match and the forest fire lit by a streak of dry
lightening--they all organize our actions.

So does baptism.

The new life it proclaims necessitates the end of one order
and the birth of something new. Jesus minces no words in his
proclamation. He will not let us be distracted by preferable
scripture. He will not allow us to shy away from the forest fires
his baptism kindled.

Will the baptism that organized his life also organize our
lives? And so the terse text begins:




Luke 12:49-56

I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were
already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what
stress I am under until it is completed! Do you think that I have
come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather
division! From now on, five in one household will be divided, three
against two and two against three; they will be divided:
father against son
and son against father,
mother against daughter
and daughter against mother,
mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law
and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.'

He also said to the crowds, 'When you see a cloud rising in
the west, you immediately say, "It is going to rain"; and so it
happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, "There
will be scorching heat"; and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how
to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know
how to interpret the present time?


Calm down, I want to say. Those of us whose lives depend on
the rain are not hypocrites when we learn what the clouds and the
winds portend. But we confess we have often talked more about the
weather than we have searched out and spoken the language of life.
We confess we have been preoccupied with our own affairs more than we
have allowed baptism to order those affairs.

Calm down, I want to say to the arguing family. I confess I
often wish to end the argument more than I want to actually follow
the arduous route that would reconcile the Prodigal and his older
brother.

The hypocrite says one thing and does another. How often do
we acknowledge baptism but fail to live it? How often do we become
fluent in the language of complaint and fail to learn he verbs of
life that demand reconciliation before false agreement; that call for
genuine hope instead of wishful thinking; that require a stream of
blessings that we cannot give ourselves?

How often do we shy away from life? How often is it too raw,
too visceral, too hot to approach? How often will we let it be too
kind to defend itself, too forgiving to hold a grudge, too beautiful
to own?

And so fire sweeps across the landscape of our soul. We know
we should not be afraid. We know it is heat that turns mere flour
into bread. We know it is heat that refines precious metals. We
know ashes are a sign of rebirth. And we know that when we are burnt
by fire there is, after the conflagration, a blessing.

Next June the mountains will reveal their true lines without
the trees to cover the slopes. Next June wild flowers will erupt in
profusions of color just as they did this June where the fires
exploded last summer.

"Don't you know things change?" Jesus seems to say. And so
we have a scripture devoted to agency, the carrying out of mission,
the doing and the receiving of life. Funny thing about agency.
Sometimes we are the actors, and sometimes life happens to us.

Either way change is in the wind.

Readings for Sunday, August 12

Lectionary Readings:

Isaiah 1:1,10-20 with Psalm 50:1-8,22-23
Genesis 15:1-6
Hebrews 11:1-3,8-16
Luke 12:32-40

Life has a language.
And Scripture has a word for us.
Each week these two thoughts frame LCL’s Lectionary Lens.

In every Lectionary there is a thread of coherence that knits together the readings. Each Sabbath the Psalms sing what the Epistles convey, the first readings frame what the Gospels observe. And, in every Lectionary, we can't help but connect it to our personal experience. We do so somewhat carefully, knowing that if there are too many “I's” in the sermon we may have eclipsed part of its message. But we also know that worship is not intended merely to make an interesting point. It runs deeper than that. The world's needs, to say nothing of our own needs, are greater than that. We wonder how we can cling to faith when there are so many circumstances that seem to work against us.

This week's Epistle lesson sheds light on how we navigate the visible and invisible streams of reality. Because the verses are so well known we would be wise to unpack them slowly.

Hebrews 8:1-3, 8-10
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval. By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible.

By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.

In our lives the last three months have led us through the intricate and often daunting maze of the medical world in search of healing. We know chronic diseases preclude healing. I know I must learn to live with the complications that are part and parcel of a half century with Type 1 diabetes, and that my wife and children must live the increasing burden of pain my wife and children experience each day. There is a sense in which we, and all people with chronic disease, have been betrayed by the very body that was designed to sustain us.

And so life has asked us to live in a world defined by a different set of expectations. We do so with the conviction that “it is worth it.” We do so knowing that pretend and denial, to say nothing of magical thinking, are not part of the conversation. Once we are called to a new place we have no choice but to fill that place as best we can. What was familiar must no longer be familiar. Change is in the wind. Had Abraham denied his call his life-changing story that is so deeply shared by three faiths would have no light to shed. But that does not make the journey easy. Indeed, scripture underlines the inherent difficulty of responding to a call. Yes, Abraham set out by faith. Yes, he didn't know where he was going. But once he arrives in the promised land the story line takes a sudden and dramatic turn. He and Sarah are living in this promised land “as in a foreign land.”

This is a tenuous existence. This is a dangerous existence. I happened to visit Lesotho not long after an uprising. The family I stayed with had a special satchel hanging on a hood beside the front door. In it were birth certificates, passports, identity cards, phone numbers, cash, credit cards—emergency supplies they might need if violence once again came there way. Living in a foreign land, be it another country or in our own country, is an “iffy” existence.

I think of the millions of people who claim life in a medical system that must count its costs and finds it hard to welcome their lack of insurance or their incapacity to pay. They are in a promised land of healing but find it a foreign place. What's to be done? They, and we, cling to a dignity that is not material. We live in promise when we find ourselves in a foreign land. In the words of Scripture “We look forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.” The promise does not take away the afflictions of a body that has betrayed us, but it does allow us to not get caught in circumstance. It does allow us to keep despair at bay. Indeed it is comforting to know Abraham found the promised land an uncertain place; that he had to adapt, and re-adapt, adapt again, and then adapt yet again to not lose his life-defining call.

A pastor once said to me, “Never underestimate the burdens people are carrying on their shoulders then they come into worship.” This Sunday, in your church there are some givens:

Someone will wonder how they are to live when their body has betrayed them;
Someone will wonder if they have the courage to live out an authentic call with unknown implications;
Someone will wonder if they can risk a call to live in another country;
Someone will wonder how to live in that land of tenuous uncertainty;
Someone will wonder if faith can quell the chaos that seems to once again swallow the world with each news cycle'
Someone will come to a holy place whose entire architecture is designed to emphasize and inspire coherence, with the hope of restoring their lives;
Someone, you see, is traveling to the promised land and wonders how to get there.

In short, there is a yearning for the coherence of life that transcends circumstance. This Sunday you will name the circumstances that would seek to restrain our lives. And then you may well ask, “Friends, what is it that defines us? We are defined by faith and it is through faith that we receive our approval.”

Thanks be to God.

Larry

Readings for Sunday, August 5

Readings for Sunday, August 5

Hosea 11:1-11
Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14, 2:18-12
Luke 12:13-21

Life has a language.
And Scripture has a word for us.
Each week these two thoughts frame LCL’s Lectionary Lens.

We start with Jesus’ parable of the rich fool.

“Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.’ But Jesus said to him, ‘Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?’ And he said to them, ‘Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.’ Then he told them a parable.
“The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’ Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be? So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich towards God.’”

Blessing is one of the five Leading Causes of Life. Like life the notion of blessing requires some unpacking. We learn in seminary that once blessings are given they cannot be taken away. And, in story after story, we are reminded of their extraordinary power. They derive this power from a configuration that checkmates their indiscriminate use. We can receive blessings. And we can give blessings. But we cannot bless ourselves. At their very core blessings require a community, a relationship, an intrinsic understanding that life is not our own creation.

I wonder in a musing sort of moment, what Jesus would have said had the person in the crowd simply asked for a blessing. What if he had asked, “How am I to use what I hope to receive?” We will never know because his mind was set on things. The rich fool also set his mind on things rather than blessings. Jesus points out that things will ultimately prove empty if they are self-serving. The selfish use of things is akin to trying to bless one’s self. It is an inherent contradiction of life.

The message is important. This is the only parable in which God speaks directly. Jesus talks; the story tells its tale, as stories always do; and God talks. One can’t get much stronger than that. The message requires a weighing of priorities, and a working recognition that the way things are used can be a blessing or a curse.

It is sometimes tempting to make things the enemy. Such an inflection makes for a predictable sermon. But the truth runs deeper than that. Jesus always speaks to our motivations. Will we use the things and the power we have to bless other people? Or will we become self-serving and thereby render both things and our lives impotent?

I write in the aftermath of working with people whose lives have been turned upside down by cancer. So very much of their lives had been taken away. The things they had were not able to forestall the diagnosis and the ensuing avalanche of bills. To say that they have survived by turning their attention to life would be an understatement. The world of things matters, ask anyone who is unable to pay their medical bills. But its power is empty. One family had statements in the neighborhood of two million dollars, all to save the life of their child. What does one do in such a circumstance? One becomes rich in God. And one begins to wonder how other can be blessed. One woman with expensive cancer medications that were for her now departed husband how they might be shared with others. Is there a way? It is a discussion of blessing.

Qoheleth sees vanity on all sides. In our day and age, as perhaps in every day and age, it is tempting to say, “He’s right.”

But today’s readings are not about vanity. They are about blessing. They are about choosing to become rich in God. In our church, and perhaps in yours, we sing every Sunday, “Praise God from whom all blessings flow.” Let us receive the blessings that cannot be taken away; and let us bless others knowing these blessings will last forever.

Amen.

Larry