Matthew 1:18-25
Our journey through Advent with Mary has almost come to an end. But not before we let Joseph enter the picture. This week, after 3 weeks of reading Luke’s lead up to the nativity story, Matthew comes in with his precise recounting of the events.
Not in Matthew are the stories of Mary meeting the angel Gabriel and rushing off to see her cousin and singing her song. No, Matthew is more concerned about giving credence to this whole birth story through Joseph.
Last week, you might remember that I went on some about Mary having little to say in the Bible. While Joseph has even less to say! In fact, I read this week about a church putting on a Christmas pageant. Just a day before the pageant, the boy who was supposed to play Joseph came down with a fever. The mother called the director of the pageant, who decided that it was too late to replace the boy with another and just wrote him out of the script. No Joseph in the Christmas pageant. The worst part is that no one noticed!
But Joseph is important to the story. We may not think so, but according to Matthew’s account, he is, because he brings legitimacy to the whole affair. In fact, it is through Joseph that Matthew traces Jesus’ lineage. The first verses of Matthew’s gospel are spent listing out the ancestors of Jesus through Matthew; back to David, back to Abraham. These are the “begats” using the language of the King James Bible that most of us grew up with. According to Matthew, Jesus legitimacy as a ruler of Israel goes back to the fact that Joseph is a descendent of David, the great ruler some 1,000 years earlier. And Matthew doesn’t really pull any punches in this genealogy. He includes the good with the bad: the adulterers, the cheats, the prostitutes and probably a horse thief or two. They’re all there.
Let’s recap the story from Matthew. Joseph and Mary are betrothed; which is an old way to say sort of that they were engaged to be married. Being betrothed then though, carried much more weight than does engagement these days. It’s a legal standing. The two people are bound to each other legally. Of course, it meant that the woman was the man’s property. It’s not a nice way to think about it, but there you have it.
Before they lived together though, Mary gets pregnant; by the Holy Spirit, Matthew is quick to tell us. Joseph is a righteous man; someone who follows the laws of his faith and keeps to Jewish rules. He can’t marry Mary, not in her, as we say, condition. But he’s also a good man who doesn’t want her unnecessarily disgraced. He plans “to dismiss her quietly” whatever that means. It doesn’t mean that he make a public disgrace of her and, at worst, have her stoned to death. Joseph, in his righteousness, is going to follow the rules but he’s not going to go the whole public route.
But just as he’s decided that, one of God’s angels, an unnamed one, but I like to think it was Gabriel again, comes to him; this angel comes to him in a dream and tells Joseph that he should indeed go ahead and take Mary as his wife. The angel explains the whole thing: how Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit and that this child will grow up to be a savior of the people. In fact, the angel tells Joseph what he should name the child: Jesus. Jesus which is the Greek version of Joshua which is an old Hebrew name meaning God saves.
Then Matthew does an interesting thing. He reaches back into Hebrew history again to quote Isaiah; the Hebrew Bible reading that we heard this morning in fact. Matthew uses this quote to bring legitimacy once again to the whole proceedings. Matthew’s book was written around the years 80-90. He has a Jewish audience; those early followers of the Way, as early Christians were called, who had come into the faith from Judaism, as opposed to those who were gentiles. The readers and hearers of Matthew’s gospel would know Isaiah and would get it.
But back to our story. Joseph, awaking from this incredible dream and being a faithful believer, does as he is told: he marries Mary. He takes her as his wife, pregnant as she is and even does name the child Jesus.
And that’s it. That’s the whole of the birth narrative from Matthew. Sure, the visit of the Wise Ones from the East, astrologers likely, not kings as we’ve come to call them, follows in Matthew’s story. But that could have been years later and is for Epiphany Sunday a few weeks from now.
But Matthew begins his Gospel with the genealogy of Jesus through Joseph, this brief birth narrative and then the visit by the Wise Ones from the East. It’s terse and not filled with the emotions of the Luke version that we all know and love.
Matthew’s point is to give authenticity to a Jewish audience of Jesus’ place as a ruler; some 60 years after Jesus was crucified. By that point it was obvious that Jesus had not become the earthly ruler who would overthrow the Roman Empire that everyone had hoped for and expected. Instead, Jesus was born to be a different kind of ruler. And that’s the point that Matthew is making. Jesus rules a heavenly realm; one in which earthly matters aren’t a concern.
On this final Sunday of Advent, when all our candles save the Christ candle are aglow on our wreath, we are called to remember the couple who thousands of years ago were faithful & obedient to their God. We are called to remember Mary and Joseph, who met with angels and became the parents of the one who would grow to be our savior.
As we plunge headlong into Christmas, it is right that we should pause before that happens to remember those who allowed the birth stories to happen. Those who through their willingness to follow God into new and strange territories of their faith can teach us about being faithful.
Both Mary and Joseph were called to do things beyond their faith; they were called to do new things and they did so willingly and unquestioningly. Will we, now and throughout the year, be so willing and unquestioning? Will we, in our attempts to be God’s people, be open to new and different ways of being? With God’s help, I think each of us can.
16 December 2007
Luke 1:46-55
Growing up as I did in the Methodist and Presbyterian churches, I didn’t get much information about Mary. She showed up around this time of the year in the Christmas pageant and that was about all. She sat there, silently behind the manger, never a word crossing her lips.
In fact, throughout the New Testament, she doesn’t say much. In John she has some things to say. In Mark, though, where there is no nativity story, she’s barely mentioned, and she doesn’t utter a single word in Matthew. Paul refers to her as Jesus’ mother but never gives her name. But in Luke, ah in Luke, we have some remarkable words from Mary. Words that have gone done through millennia to provide prophetic hope to millions, by now billions, of believers. I’m talking about those words that were heard this morning known by most Christians as the Magnificat. The word “Magnificat” by the way is the Latin word that begins Mary’s song and has come to identify it.
Remember the sequence here now. First we have the angel Gabriel arriving to announce to Mary that she will carry God’s only child. Then we have the meeting between Mary and her relative Elizabeth who is carrying John the Baptist. Elizabeth’s words, if you remember from last week’s reading, upon seeing Mary were: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leapt for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.” (NRSV)
Immediately, Mary goes into her song: her song of praise and thanksgiving to God. Now, Mary is not necessarily in what we would call “a good space” to be singing praises and thanksgiving. She’s dirt poor, even according to her own song, and here she is, unmarried and pregnant. She comes from nowhere…Nazareth, a Podunk if there ever was one. Nazareth isn’t mentioned in the Hebrew Bible at all; neither is it mentioned in the Jewish writings nor by the historian, Josephus. Mary is a nobody from nowheresville: a pregnant, unmarried nobody from nowheresville!
So why should such a person sing? What would possess this young woman, in one of the most frightening situations of her life, to come out in song? Well, she knows something that we’ve also been let in on: that God has favored her. God has lifted her up and given her a special status. Her song rings out as she’s standing there with her old cousin Elizabeth, the both of them with child and rejoicing in their state.
These words of Mary’s which come down to us thanks to the foresight of Luke, are indeed important. As Protestants, we’ve lost much of the feeling for Mary that our Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox brothers and sisters have. The Eastern Orthodox, in fact, have a special name for her: Theotokos which means “God-bearer.” But we have much to reclaim if we let Mary into our lives.
Luke reminds us, from the very start of his gospel, through Mary’s song, that God roots for the lesser-thans. First, God picked Mary as the bearer of God’s son. But secondly, the words of Mary’s song remind us of this fact. She sings that God “has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly,” among others.
Mary’s song goes from the personal to the political. She recognizes the extreme favor God has shown her at the beginning and moves to how, through this child whom she is carrying, the status quo will be upended. No more will the powerful reign and the rich control everything. The coming of this child marks the start of a new realm; an everlasting realm that raises up the lowly and sends the rich away hungry.
But wait, you might say, the powerful reign and the rich control everything now. What good is this 2,000-year old song if none of it happens? Why should we listen to Mary now?
Because we all need hope. Because we all need to believe that the status quo is upended in God’s commonwealth. Because we all need to be reminded that God does not operate the way we do.
Mary sings not only for herself but also for all the poor and lowly and meek of all the centuries, of all the places. Mary sings out a warning to rulers and potentates and rich people everywhere. Mary reminds all of us, rich and poor, mighty and lowly, powerful and powerless, that God selects whom God will for God’s work on this earth. And God’s selects in a way that humanity might not understand.
Is Mary’s song our song? Do we sing along with Mary these radical words of justice? Or do the words stick in our throats, maybe just a bit, as we choke out our faint echo of Mary’s soaring descant?
We want our Advent to be soft and easy; like the wrappings on the presents under the Christmas tree. But Mary doesn’t let us off. Mary’s acclamation of God and her praise to the one whose child she is bearing is not the easy carols we love to sing this time of year. Instead, we are dealing with tough issues that unsettle us. Advent is not necessarily all twinkly and bright. Advent can be just as challenging as Lent, that other time of preparation.
Mary sings out from a place of emptiness and, likely, fearfulness. She knows only one thing: that God has chosen her. And that is enough to make her sing; enough to make the song rise and soar from her lips to the heavens.
We are not in such places for the most part. Most of us are safe and secure and not considered among the lowliest of our society. That is why that song might cause us to stumble a bit as we try to sing along with Mary. We don’t know on which side of the dichotomy we fall as Mary sings. We’re not sure whether we’re rich or poor; powerful or powerless. But the important question is whether we are going to join in on God’s side; whether we’ll take up the cause of the poor and powerless, even if we aren’t necessarily counted among them.
Sing out, Mary, continue your song! Sing out across the miles and the centuries. Sing out for the poor and the lowly of every age and place. Sing out for God has chosen you for important work. Sing out your song of joy and hope. Sing out and lead us to the manger where you will bear a savior. Sing out and urge us to join in the song.
Growing up as I did in the Methodist and Presbyterian churches, I didn’t get much information about Mary. She showed up around this time of the year in the Christmas pageant and that was about all. She sat there, silently behind the manger, never a word crossing her lips.
In fact, throughout the New Testament, she doesn’t say much. In John she has some things to say. In Mark, though, where there is no nativity story, she’s barely mentioned, and she doesn’t utter a single word in Matthew. Paul refers to her as Jesus’ mother but never gives her name. But in Luke, ah in Luke, we have some remarkable words from Mary. Words that have gone done through millennia to provide prophetic hope to millions, by now billions, of believers. I’m talking about those words that were heard this morning known by most Christians as the Magnificat. The word “Magnificat” by the way is the Latin word that begins Mary’s song and has come to identify it.
Remember the sequence here now. First we have the angel Gabriel arriving to announce to Mary that she will carry God’s only child. Then we have the meeting between Mary and her relative Elizabeth who is carrying John the Baptist. Elizabeth’s words, if you remember from last week’s reading, upon seeing Mary were: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leapt for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.” (NRSV)
Immediately, Mary goes into her song: her song of praise and thanksgiving to God. Now, Mary is not necessarily in what we would call “a good space” to be singing praises and thanksgiving. She’s dirt poor, even according to her own song, and here she is, unmarried and pregnant. She comes from nowhere…Nazareth, a Podunk if there ever was one. Nazareth isn’t mentioned in the Hebrew Bible at all; neither is it mentioned in the Jewish writings nor by the historian, Josephus. Mary is a nobody from nowheresville: a pregnant, unmarried nobody from nowheresville!
So why should such a person sing? What would possess this young woman, in one of the most frightening situations of her life, to come out in song? Well, she knows something that we’ve also been let in on: that God has favored her. God has lifted her up and given her a special status. Her song rings out as she’s standing there with her old cousin Elizabeth, the both of them with child and rejoicing in their state.
These words of Mary’s which come down to us thanks to the foresight of Luke, are indeed important. As Protestants, we’ve lost much of the feeling for Mary that our Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox brothers and sisters have. The Eastern Orthodox, in fact, have a special name for her: Theotokos which means “God-bearer.” But we have much to reclaim if we let Mary into our lives.
Luke reminds us, from the very start of his gospel, through Mary’s song, that God roots for the lesser-thans. First, God picked Mary as the bearer of God’s son. But secondly, the words of Mary’s song remind us of this fact. She sings that God “has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly,” among others.
Mary’s song goes from the personal to the political. She recognizes the extreme favor God has shown her at the beginning and moves to how, through this child whom she is carrying, the status quo will be upended. No more will the powerful reign and the rich control everything. The coming of this child marks the start of a new realm; an everlasting realm that raises up the lowly and sends the rich away hungry.
But wait, you might say, the powerful reign and the rich control everything now. What good is this 2,000-year old song if none of it happens? Why should we listen to Mary now?
Because we all need hope. Because we all need to believe that the status quo is upended in God’s commonwealth. Because we all need to be reminded that God does not operate the way we do.
Mary sings not only for herself but also for all the poor and lowly and meek of all the centuries, of all the places. Mary sings out a warning to rulers and potentates and rich people everywhere. Mary reminds all of us, rich and poor, mighty and lowly, powerful and powerless, that God selects whom God will for God’s work on this earth. And God’s selects in a way that humanity might not understand.
Is Mary’s song our song? Do we sing along with Mary these radical words of justice? Or do the words stick in our throats, maybe just a bit, as we choke out our faint echo of Mary’s soaring descant?
We want our Advent to be soft and easy; like the wrappings on the presents under the Christmas tree. But Mary doesn’t let us off. Mary’s acclamation of God and her praise to the one whose child she is bearing is not the easy carols we love to sing this time of year. Instead, we are dealing with tough issues that unsettle us. Advent is not necessarily all twinkly and bright. Advent can be just as challenging as Lent, that other time of preparation.
Mary sings out from a place of emptiness and, likely, fearfulness. She knows only one thing: that God has chosen her. And that is enough to make her sing; enough to make the song rise and soar from her lips to the heavens.
We are not in such places for the most part. Most of us are safe and secure and not considered among the lowliest of our society. That is why that song might cause us to stumble a bit as we try to sing along with Mary. We don’t know on which side of the dichotomy we fall as Mary sings. We’re not sure whether we’re rich or poor; powerful or powerless. But the important question is whether we are going to join in on God’s side; whether we’ll take up the cause of the poor and powerless, even if we aren’t necessarily counted among them.
Sing out, Mary, continue your song! Sing out across the miles and the centuries. Sing out for the poor and the lowly of every age and place. Sing out for God has chosen you for important work. Sing out your song of joy and hope. Sing out and lead us to the manger where you will bear a savior. Sing out and urge us to join in the song.
9 December 2007
Luke 1:39-45
We are spending Advent here at Chalice with Mary, the Mother of Jesus. There are few chances, in our male-dominated scriptures, for a female figure to shine as Mary does, especially during this season. Last week we heard, and saw, the Annunciation; the communication between Gabriel, the angel, & Mary informing her that she would become the mother of God’s child.
This week we get the next installment of Mary’s pregnancy; the visit that Mary makes to Elizabeth. Mary and Elizabeth are kinswomen; relatives in some way. Mary has been sent by Gabriel, you might remember from last week’s reading, to Elizabeth.
Elizabeth has her own story to tell, which Luke does recount to us earlier in his gospel account, prior to the annunciation. Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah are childless and beyond normal childbearing years, which makes this meeting all the more poignant.
Zechariah, Luke tells us, is a priest and while he was serving in the Temple had his own visit from the angel Gabriel. Gabriel came to tell him that he and Elizabeth would have a child whom they would name John. Zechariah at first doesn’t believe Gabriel and, in consequence, is made mute for the duration of the pregnancy. And indeed, Elizabeth and Zechariah did conceive. And it was in the midst of this pregnancy, six months into it in fact, that Mary came to visit.
So our actors today are these two women: one the young girl, just of marrying age, which was apparently pretty young in those days, and the elderly woman who should be past her child bearing years. Both are miraculously pregnant: Mary by God Godself and Elizabeth in her old age.
It’s interesting to note how this story is recounted. Both Elizabeth and her in-womb child react to Mary upon her arrival, without knowing yet Mary’s miraculous story. Elizabeth, we are told, in fact was filled with the Holy Spirit when Mary greets her.
Now, Elizabeth, we know is carrying John: John who would become known as John the Baptist. He, the one who would prepare the way for Jesus with his calls for repentance in the desert, is being carried by Elizabeth. He would have his own disciples and followers and make enough of a fuss to cause him to be jailed and executed by Herod. But that’s a story for another time in the year.
Right now we’re focused on Mary and Elizabeth, meeting in that small hill town in Judea. What can this meeting mean to us, some 2,000 years later? Why should we bother with these two women, both probably poor and insignificant in their own culture?
Well, because God has made them significant. God has come into their lives and raised them up. God doesn’t care about their cultural standing. God has special jobs just for them and cares not one whit about their social standing. God did not pick out a queen to bear either Jesus or John. God did not go to the wealthiest class to find women to be the mothers of these two important figures.
The General Minister and President of our denomination, Sharon Watkins, in the video we just watched, spoke of hope in the Middle East. Hope for a brighter future; hope for peace and an end to strife. In many ways, today’s story is similar. For what is a more hopeful time than pregnancy? During this time, one hopes for the future in a personal way: will my baby be a boy or a girl; will it be healthy; how will she or he grow up?
In much the same way, we are in the same situation. I know of a minister several years ago, who got in trouble by getting up in the pulpit during Advent and proclaiming, “People of God, we’re pregnant.” I doubt that I would get into the same trouble as she did for making such a proclamation here. But it’s true; we are pregnant as God’s people; pregnant with the hope of which Rev. Watkins spoke. Pregnant with anticipation of the way things will turn out in our world.
As someone said to Rev. Watkins during her trip to the Holy Land, we don’t have the luxury of losing hoping. It’s as true for us, as Christians awaiting the coming of our savior, as it is for those who deal daily with the violence of the Middle East. As we await, we do not have the luxury of losing hope. We must hold onto hope, as do those in Israel and Palestine, as do those who are pregnant carrying new life in their bodies.
People of God, we are indeed pregnant. And our pregnancy is one in which we shall wait, hopeful for the outcome and for God’s realm on our earth. Mary and Elizabeth knew of that hope. Both were graced by God and knew that they had hope not just for their family but for all of humanity.
As we remember Mary and Elizabeth meeting in that small hillside village all those years ago, let us live in the hope in which they did and watch for the Holy Spirit to come over us and lead us to leap with joy for the coming of the one who will save us.
We are spending Advent here at Chalice with Mary, the Mother of Jesus. There are few chances, in our male-dominated scriptures, for a female figure to shine as Mary does, especially during this season. Last week we heard, and saw, the Annunciation; the communication between Gabriel, the angel, & Mary informing her that she would become the mother of God’s child.
This week we get the next installment of Mary’s pregnancy; the visit that Mary makes to Elizabeth. Mary and Elizabeth are kinswomen; relatives in some way. Mary has been sent by Gabriel, you might remember from last week’s reading, to Elizabeth.
Elizabeth has her own story to tell, which Luke does recount to us earlier in his gospel account, prior to the annunciation. Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah are childless and beyond normal childbearing years, which makes this meeting all the more poignant.
Zechariah, Luke tells us, is a priest and while he was serving in the Temple had his own visit from the angel Gabriel. Gabriel came to tell him that he and Elizabeth would have a child whom they would name John. Zechariah at first doesn’t believe Gabriel and, in consequence, is made mute for the duration of the pregnancy. And indeed, Elizabeth and Zechariah did conceive. And it was in the midst of this pregnancy, six months into it in fact, that Mary came to visit.
So our actors today are these two women: one the young girl, just of marrying age, which was apparently pretty young in those days, and the elderly woman who should be past her child bearing years. Both are miraculously pregnant: Mary by God Godself and Elizabeth in her old age.
It’s interesting to note how this story is recounted. Both Elizabeth and her in-womb child react to Mary upon her arrival, without knowing yet Mary’s miraculous story. Elizabeth, we are told, in fact was filled with the Holy Spirit when Mary greets her.
Now, Elizabeth, we know is carrying John: John who would become known as John the Baptist. He, the one who would prepare the way for Jesus with his calls for repentance in the desert, is being carried by Elizabeth. He would have his own disciples and followers and make enough of a fuss to cause him to be jailed and executed by Herod. But that’s a story for another time in the year.
Right now we’re focused on Mary and Elizabeth, meeting in that small hill town in Judea. What can this meeting mean to us, some 2,000 years later? Why should we bother with these two women, both probably poor and insignificant in their own culture?
Well, because God has made them significant. God has come into their lives and raised them up. God doesn’t care about their cultural standing. God has special jobs just for them and cares not one whit about their social standing. God did not pick out a queen to bear either Jesus or John. God did not go to the wealthiest class to find women to be the mothers of these two important figures.
The General Minister and President of our denomination, Sharon Watkins, in the video we just watched, spoke of hope in the Middle East. Hope for a brighter future; hope for peace and an end to strife. In many ways, today’s story is similar. For what is a more hopeful time than pregnancy? During this time, one hopes for the future in a personal way: will my baby be a boy or a girl; will it be healthy; how will she or he grow up?
In much the same way, we are in the same situation. I know of a minister several years ago, who got in trouble by getting up in the pulpit during Advent and proclaiming, “People of God, we’re pregnant.” I doubt that I would get into the same trouble as she did for making such a proclamation here. But it’s true; we are pregnant as God’s people; pregnant with the hope of which Rev. Watkins spoke. Pregnant with anticipation of the way things will turn out in our world.
As someone said to Rev. Watkins during her trip to the Holy Land, we don’t have the luxury of losing hoping. It’s as true for us, as Christians awaiting the coming of our savior, as it is for those who deal daily with the violence of the Middle East. As we await, we do not have the luxury of losing hope. We must hold onto hope, as do those in Israel and Palestine, as do those who are pregnant carrying new life in their bodies.
People of God, we are indeed pregnant. And our pregnancy is one in which we shall wait, hopeful for the outcome and for God’s realm on our earth. Mary and Elizabeth knew of that hope. Both were graced by God and knew that they had hope not just for their family but for all of humanity.
As we remember Mary and Elizabeth meeting in that small hillside village all those years ago, let us live in the hope in which they did and watch for the Holy Spirit to come over us and lead us to leap with joy for the coming of the one who will save us.
11 November 2007
Haggai 1:15b-2:9
It was the year 520 that Haggai the prophet spoke to Judah. That’s 520 years before Jesus walked the earth. But more importantly, it’s about 50 plus years after the fall of Jerusalem. Haggai doesn’t take up much room in the Bible; it’s the 2nd shortest book in the Hebrew Bible. It doesn’t even fill 2 pages in my Bible. There are only five sections to the whole book. What we heard this morning is the bridge section between the first two and the last two.
Haggai was prophesying to the community of Jerusalem after they had started to return from their 50-year exile. In fact it was about 18 years after the exiles had started to return. So there had been some time for things to start to take shape and the road the exiles would be traveling would be evident.
We’re used to the prophets speaking out before the big exiles. Isaiah and Jeremiah, the prophets we probably would usually think of, were warning of the fall of the two kingdoms before they happened. They warned that the people had strayed from God and would be punished.
But Haggai was speaking after the exile. What’s the point, we might think? Why bother prophesying to the people after the time of exile? Well, there is something in noting that God speaks to the people at any time. There doesn’t have to be trouble ahead for God to have a message. God speaks in the midst of trouble and beyond it.
And God did have a message for Haggai to give. He gave it to Zerubbabel, who was the Governor of Judah under King Darius of Persia and to Judah, the high priest and to “the remnant of the people.”
God, Haggai said, had looked around Jerusalem and saw all the exiles paying attention to their own homes. They had returned and found things in ruins almost 2 decades earlier. Many of the former exiles probably wondered why they left the comfort and cosmopolitan atmosphere of Babylon in the first place. There they were, in the land promised to their ancestors centuries before, which lay in ruin from the overthrow of their kingdom some 60 years earlier.
They took care of themselves first, apparently. They built and rebuilt their homes of paneled wood, we’re told in an earlier section of the book of Haggai.
But wait, the Temple, the center of worship for the Jews, had been decimated. The Temple, which Solomon built almost 500 years earlier, lay wasted—its treasures looted and the building itself in ruins. God’s very house was a pile of rocks, as far from its former glory as it could be.
And it stayed like that: unrebuilt and unusable. And that was God’s message through Haggai those few months in 520 b.c.e. Why are your houses nice and cozy while mine is untouched? Why have you rebuilt your own homes over the past 2 decades and left mine in ruins? Is not the Temple worthy of your attention? Does not my home deserve to be rebuilt?
Yes, this new Temple couldn’t be as grand as the first Temple was. Resources just weren’t available to rebuild it to its former glory, it was clear. But God’s house is God’s house. Attention must be paid!
Now what can the struggles of a small band, a remnant as they are called, of God’s people some 2,500 years ago mean to us, a small band, a remnant one might say, of God’s people now? What do the prophesies of one man whose only claim to history is a page and a quarter in a holy book say to us, Chalice Christian Church, today?
I think there’s a lot of things to be said to us by Haggai. In fact, if he were with us today, he might be struck by the similarities between these two small remnants of people.
For one thing I think about our personal stances. Do we take care of everything else in our lives before we attend to our spirituality? Do we build our houses before we build God’s house in our own lives?
It’s very easy to neglect our spiritual natures. No bills come for it. No one is after us to clean up our spiritual selves. No one nags us regarding it. We only have God’s voice speaking softly to us that guides us towards caring for ourselves spiritually. And how often do we and how easy is it for us to ignore that still-small voice?
Not attending to our own spirituality while seeing to everything else in our lives is much like those Israelites who built their nice houses after the exile but ignored the temple. Both parties are forgetting the importance of God in their lives; our lives.
But I believe there is another way that Haggai relates to us today and that is corporately, as a congregation. Those ancient Israelites knew that the temple they could build would be nothing as grand as the previous one. They were living on past dreams and hoping that things would turn out better for them. But they knew they wouldn’t and couldn’t. They were realizing that things can’t be as they have been in the past.
In a few moments our board will consider a budget for next year in the midst of a realization that our finances are in a difficult state. How like the Israelites are we going to be, dreaming of past days of splendor and allowing that reverie to freeze us into inaction?
We have a choice when it comes to our actions today and everyday. We can accept what God gives us and do what we can. We must make sure though that we are not building beautiful grand houses while neglecting God’s house. We must ensure that we are building God’s house, bringing about God’s realm now and here with the resources that we have; faithfully following God’s call to us to be God’s people.
Haggai had plenty to say to his folks around him at the time. Would he have as much to say to us? I think his words are still worth listening to.
It was the year 520 that Haggai the prophet spoke to Judah. That’s 520 years before Jesus walked the earth. But more importantly, it’s about 50 plus years after the fall of Jerusalem. Haggai doesn’t take up much room in the Bible; it’s the 2nd shortest book in the Hebrew Bible. It doesn’t even fill 2 pages in my Bible. There are only five sections to the whole book. What we heard this morning is the bridge section between the first two and the last two.
Haggai was prophesying to the community of Jerusalem after they had started to return from their 50-year exile. In fact it was about 18 years after the exiles had started to return. So there had been some time for things to start to take shape and the road the exiles would be traveling would be evident.
We’re used to the prophets speaking out before the big exiles. Isaiah and Jeremiah, the prophets we probably would usually think of, were warning of the fall of the two kingdoms before they happened. They warned that the people had strayed from God and would be punished.
But Haggai was speaking after the exile. What’s the point, we might think? Why bother prophesying to the people after the time of exile? Well, there is something in noting that God speaks to the people at any time. There doesn’t have to be trouble ahead for God to have a message. God speaks in the midst of trouble and beyond it.
And God did have a message for Haggai to give. He gave it to Zerubbabel, who was the Governor of Judah under King Darius of Persia and to Judah, the high priest and to “the remnant of the people.”
God, Haggai said, had looked around Jerusalem and saw all the exiles paying attention to their own homes. They had returned and found things in ruins almost 2 decades earlier. Many of the former exiles probably wondered why they left the comfort and cosmopolitan atmosphere of Babylon in the first place. There they were, in the land promised to their ancestors centuries before, which lay in ruin from the overthrow of their kingdom some 60 years earlier.
They took care of themselves first, apparently. They built and rebuilt their homes of paneled wood, we’re told in an earlier section of the book of Haggai.
But wait, the Temple, the center of worship for the Jews, had been decimated. The Temple, which Solomon built almost 500 years earlier, lay wasted—its treasures looted and the building itself in ruins. God’s very house was a pile of rocks, as far from its former glory as it could be.
And it stayed like that: unrebuilt and unusable. And that was God’s message through Haggai those few months in 520 b.c.e. Why are your houses nice and cozy while mine is untouched? Why have you rebuilt your own homes over the past 2 decades and left mine in ruins? Is not the Temple worthy of your attention? Does not my home deserve to be rebuilt?
Yes, this new Temple couldn’t be as grand as the first Temple was. Resources just weren’t available to rebuild it to its former glory, it was clear. But God’s house is God’s house. Attention must be paid!
Now what can the struggles of a small band, a remnant as they are called, of God’s people some 2,500 years ago mean to us, a small band, a remnant one might say, of God’s people now? What do the prophesies of one man whose only claim to history is a page and a quarter in a holy book say to us, Chalice Christian Church, today?
I think there’s a lot of things to be said to us by Haggai. In fact, if he were with us today, he might be struck by the similarities between these two small remnants of people.
For one thing I think about our personal stances. Do we take care of everything else in our lives before we attend to our spirituality? Do we build our houses before we build God’s house in our own lives?
It’s very easy to neglect our spiritual natures. No bills come for it. No one is after us to clean up our spiritual selves. No one nags us regarding it. We only have God’s voice speaking softly to us that guides us towards caring for ourselves spiritually. And how often do we and how easy is it for us to ignore that still-small voice?
Not attending to our own spirituality while seeing to everything else in our lives is much like those Israelites who built their nice houses after the exile but ignored the temple. Both parties are forgetting the importance of God in their lives; our lives.
But I believe there is another way that Haggai relates to us today and that is corporately, as a congregation. Those ancient Israelites knew that the temple they could build would be nothing as grand as the previous one. They were living on past dreams and hoping that things would turn out better for them. But they knew they wouldn’t and couldn’t. They were realizing that things can’t be as they have been in the past.
In a few moments our board will consider a budget for next year in the midst of a realization that our finances are in a difficult state. How like the Israelites are we going to be, dreaming of past days of splendor and allowing that reverie to freeze us into inaction?
We have a choice when it comes to our actions today and everyday. We can accept what God gives us and do what we can. We must make sure though that we are not building beautiful grand houses while neglecting God’s house. We must ensure that we are building God’s house, bringing about God’s realm now and here with the resources that we have; faithfully following God’s call to us to be God’s people.
Haggai had plenty to say to his folks around him at the time. Would he have as much to say to us? I think his words are still worth listening to.
23 September 2007
Luke 16:1-13
When I first read today’s gospel lesson from Luke, I thought, “I’m going to have to wrestle this one to the floor.” Well, after spending time with it, I’m ready to say “uncle” and admit that it’s wrestled me to the floor. For this confusing parable from Jesus is one that I’d really rather not deal with. It begs too many questions. And I can’t hope to answer all those questions. But, as I think about it, it does seem particularly apt on a day when we begin to think about our stewardship and how each of us will support the church in the coming months.
Over one-third of Jesus’ parables and sayings deal with money and faithfulness. Think of the rich young ruler told to sell everything he had; think of the widow who put her last coins in the Temple treasury; think of the eye of a needle and a camel; think of any number of parables and you’ll probably bump up against money.
It’s not surprising. The bible shows that God does have a preference for the poor. Throughout the Hebrew Bible, there are laws upon laws about how your treat the widow, the orphan, the sojourner. And Jesus knew that the poor were all around him during his day and age. It sounds familiar doesn’t it? Jesus would feel quite at home in our day and age, wouldn’t he? He would probably have lots to say about our society and culture and world given the growing divide between rich and poor; between the haves and the have-nots, not only in our world, but right here in our country and state.
So what can this confusing parable say to us in our day and age? Let’s look at it again. Jesus tells this parable following last week’s reading about the lost sheep and the lost coin with the parable of the prodigal son in between. All this lostness. And then comes this parable; a parable in which the hero of the story seems to be dishonest. And he is. Perhaps it’s his way of being lost.
He’s a manager or steward (there’s that word again) of an estate, and a bad one at that. He sees the writing on the wall, as it were, and knows he’s going to get the sack at any point. He recognizes, wisely, that he’s too old to dig ditches (I can agree with him on that) and too proud to beg (which is fair enough). So he has a plan. He goes to the people who are in debt to his master and reduces what they owe from 20 to 50 percent. What a plan. Then, he’s thinking, I’ll be welcome into these homes at least.
Pretty shrewd, isn’t it? But, here’s the catch in this story: his master hears of it and what does he do? He commends him on his shrewdness. He’s just been cheated out of a good portion of his dealings. He has just had this dishonest manager take it away from him, seemingly all square.
The master commends the manager. It’s shocking to us. I wonder if it was as shocking to the disciples’ first-century ears. Did they find the incongruities in this story that we do?
But wait, Jesus tacks a moral onto the story: a moral about serving God and money; about not being able to serve both; about where your allegiances lie. That part I can grasp onto! That’s the part that makes perfect sense to me.
We are much more like the dishonest manager than we would like to think. We are shrewd in our dealings making sure that we are safe and secure before thinking about anything else; before even thinking about God perhaps. And that’s when we realize that we’re trying to serve two masters.
Because we try this impossible task of serving two different masters, we get ourselves into trouble. We flit from one to the other; promising one that we’ll be obedient but tied to the 2nd one like a dog tethered out in the backyard. We run the risk of worshiping wealth in our culture, because it is so prevalent. And that’s bound to get in the way of our worshiping of God.
We have come to the time in our church life in which we are considering stewardship. We face budget difficulties in our congregation and faithfully pray that God will help us out…somehow…someway. You just have to look at the back of your bulletin to see our current state of financial affairs. With faith, we draw up budgets and seek out the assistance we need to carry out those budgets.
It has been said that budgets are moral documents. They point out what people think is important, what is seen as essential. We as individuals who make up the congregation are parts of that moral document. And as such, we are the support to those things that we see as important, as essential.
We cannot serve two masters, it’s true. We cannot serve our own wealth while we try to serve God. If increasing our own wealth is the consideration we take into our minds as we decide about stewardship, we are not serving God. That is a truth we have to take into account.
We have many ways to respond to requests for stewardship. We have our talents, our time as well as our financial resources with which we can respond. We cannot survive without members giving of all three of these categories; especially in a small church such as ours. Most of us give whole-heartedly in many ways. We give what we can and prayerfully think about how we might even add to that.
Each of us is important when it comes to this question of stewardship. Each of us must consider what we have and what we can give out of all of God’s gifts to us. We must recognize that we might be trying to serve two masters at one time. One is going to win and one will lose out. Which will it be?
When I first read today’s gospel lesson from Luke, I thought, “I’m going to have to wrestle this one to the floor.” Well, after spending time with it, I’m ready to say “uncle” and admit that it’s wrestled me to the floor. For this confusing parable from Jesus is one that I’d really rather not deal with. It begs too many questions. And I can’t hope to answer all those questions. But, as I think about it, it does seem particularly apt on a day when we begin to think about our stewardship and how each of us will support the church in the coming months.
Over one-third of Jesus’ parables and sayings deal with money and faithfulness. Think of the rich young ruler told to sell everything he had; think of the widow who put her last coins in the Temple treasury; think of the eye of a needle and a camel; think of any number of parables and you’ll probably bump up against money.
It’s not surprising. The bible shows that God does have a preference for the poor. Throughout the Hebrew Bible, there are laws upon laws about how your treat the widow, the orphan, the sojourner. And Jesus knew that the poor were all around him during his day and age. It sounds familiar doesn’t it? Jesus would feel quite at home in our day and age, wouldn’t he? He would probably have lots to say about our society and culture and world given the growing divide between rich and poor; between the haves and the have-nots, not only in our world, but right here in our country and state.
So what can this confusing parable say to us in our day and age? Let’s look at it again. Jesus tells this parable following last week’s reading about the lost sheep and the lost coin with the parable of the prodigal son in between. All this lostness. And then comes this parable; a parable in which the hero of the story seems to be dishonest. And he is. Perhaps it’s his way of being lost.
He’s a manager or steward (there’s that word again) of an estate, and a bad one at that. He sees the writing on the wall, as it were, and knows he’s going to get the sack at any point. He recognizes, wisely, that he’s too old to dig ditches (I can agree with him on that) and too proud to beg (which is fair enough). So he has a plan. He goes to the people who are in debt to his master and reduces what they owe from 20 to 50 percent. What a plan. Then, he’s thinking, I’ll be welcome into these homes at least.
Pretty shrewd, isn’t it? But, here’s the catch in this story: his master hears of it and what does he do? He commends him on his shrewdness. He’s just been cheated out of a good portion of his dealings. He has just had this dishonest manager take it away from him, seemingly all square.
The master commends the manager. It’s shocking to us. I wonder if it was as shocking to the disciples’ first-century ears. Did they find the incongruities in this story that we do?
But wait, Jesus tacks a moral onto the story: a moral about serving God and money; about not being able to serve both; about where your allegiances lie. That part I can grasp onto! That’s the part that makes perfect sense to me.
We are much more like the dishonest manager than we would like to think. We are shrewd in our dealings making sure that we are safe and secure before thinking about anything else; before even thinking about God perhaps. And that’s when we realize that we’re trying to serve two masters.
Because we try this impossible task of serving two different masters, we get ourselves into trouble. We flit from one to the other; promising one that we’ll be obedient but tied to the 2nd one like a dog tethered out in the backyard. We run the risk of worshiping wealth in our culture, because it is so prevalent. And that’s bound to get in the way of our worshiping of God.
We have come to the time in our church life in which we are considering stewardship. We face budget difficulties in our congregation and faithfully pray that God will help us out…somehow…someway. You just have to look at the back of your bulletin to see our current state of financial affairs. With faith, we draw up budgets and seek out the assistance we need to carry out those budgets.
It has been said that budgets are moral documents. They point out what people think is important, what is seen as essential. We as individuals who make up the congregation are parts of that moral document. And as such, we are the support to those things that we see as important, as essential.
We cannot serve two masters, it’s true. We cannot serve our own wealth while we try to serve God. If increasing our own wealth is the consideration we take into our minds as we decide about stewardship, we are not serving God. That is a truth we have to take into account.
We have many ways to respond to requests for stewardship. We have our talents, our time as well as our financial resources with which we can respond. We cannot survive without members giving of all three of these categories; especially in a small church such as ours. Most of us give whole-heartedly in many ways. We give what we can and prayerfully think about how we might even add to that.
Each of us is important when it comes to this question of stewardship. Each of us must consider what we have and what we can give out of all of God’s gifts to us. We must recognize that we might be trying to serve two masters at one time. One is going to win and one will lose out. Which will it be?
16 September 2007
Luke 15:1-10
I hate to lose things. Of course, being who I am, I lose things…often. Too often. Way too often, I’m searching our apartment for that one important document that I know I put in a safe place which I just can’t remember. Or for a particular item that is the only one that will do what I need to do at the moment.
Of course, I don’t do this on purpose. I don’t hide things from myself deliberately; at least I think I don’t. Now my mother would say, “if you just put things where they belong…” But that’s the problem. Sometimes I forget where something belongs. Or I’ve put something in a logical spot and the spot changes. In short, I am no stranger to losing things.
So I suppose that today’s Gospel reading is made just for me. And those just like me. (And I’m sure there are a few of us around here.) It seems it, doesn’t it? A shepherd losing a sheep? A woman who misplaces one tenth of her wealth? What are these people thinking? Shepherd’s jobs are to keep track of sheep. That’s what they do. And a woman alone losing a coin is catastrophe. Who do these people think they are, losing valuable things like that?
Jesus is telling this parable, remember, to the Pharisees and scribes. They were complaining that Jesus is spending too much time with tax collectors and sinners. Of course, that’s what Jesus did. He spent time with the people on the fringes; those on the margins of their culture; the lost people as it were.
And he uses these same lost people, these marginalized folks of their society, in his parables. For here is a shepherd. Shepherds are the lowest of the low. They have a job that requires them to be out in all weather. They tend their group of sheep 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. They smell and they’re dirty and they just aren’t the type of people you’re supposed to care about.
Or a single woman. A single woman, for crying out loud. Who knows why she’s single or how she became single? There’s a hint that she has some money, but who knows how she got it? Who would care about a single woman in that culture? Or her money, for that matter.
But Jesus uses these outsiders as an example to those who are in the religious power in their society, those Pharisees and scribes. They would prefer, it seems, to ignore those who are not in the midst of religious purity. They don’t want to associate with tax collectors and other sinners, no doubt including shepherds and single women.
But Jesus uses them as an example. And they aren’t even the focus of the story. It’s the lost items which hold our attention. Those items that have been misplaced; or wandered off. Even the lowest of the low care about the lost items; more than the Pharisees and scribes, by inference.
Jesus talks about these lost items as precious things. Something you leave 99 sheep alone in the fold for; something you turn your house upside down for. Things that make you forget about everything else and seek out.
It’s just grace at its purest. The sheep and the coin aren’t repentant. They don’t even know they’re lost, perhaps. But they’re precious to someone; precious to the point of an all-out search. This coin, that sheep, is longed for by a woman with only 9 other coins; by a shepherd who has a whole flock of other sheep.
Our God, Jesus is telling us, goes to all lengths to seek us out. When we are lost or we are wandering away, God’s grace brings us back and joyfully celebrates at our return.
But I don’t think we’re actually meant to think we’re the lost items in these parables. We may at times be lost and wandering, but when it comes to coins and sheep, we are probably more like the 9 coins or the 99 sheep back in the fold.
So where does that leave us? Remember that Jesus is telling this story to the Pharisees and scribes in response to the charge that he hangs out with sinners too much. We’re more like the Pharisees and scribes of our day than we’d like to think. We’re the keepers of the faith; the ones who are working to preserve our religion as it is. And as such, we need to identify with the seeker of the lost items more than anything else.
We are called to go after the lost: those on the margins and the outcasts of our culture. We are called to be the shepherds and women of our own age, seeking after the lost so we can rejoice in their finding. We are called to be seekers; those who realize that there are those on the margins who need to hear about God’s grace and love.
We are God’s agents, just as those Pharisees and scribes were too; charged with keeping the faith, as it were. And as such, we must heed Jesus’ call to us to join him in being with the tax collectors and sinners of our age.
We have lots of outcasts in our society. Many are lost; too many are on the fringes. We have a predilection to draw boundaries around ourselves and those like us. But Jesus calls us to new ways of being; new ways of acting that include rather than exclude. Jesus calls us to seek out those who are out there and bring them in; including the lost.
Be the seekers our society needs. Be the shepherds who are looking for their sheep one sheep at a time; be the women who turn everything upside down in order to find one coin. And then rejoice. Don’t sit on your laurels, but celebrate. Celebrate with the God who also rejoices with you.
I hate to lose things. Of course, being who I am, I lose things…often. Too often. Way too often, I’m searching our apartment for that one important document that I know I put in a safe place which I just can’t remember. Or for a particular item that is the only one that will do what I need to do at the moment.
Of course, I don’t do this on purpose. I don’t hide things from myself deliberately; at least I think I don’t. Now my mother would say, “if you just put things where they belong…” But that’s the problem. Sometimes I forget where something belongs. Or I’ve put something in a logical spot and the spot changes. In short, I am no stranger to losing things.
So I suppose that today’s Gospel reading is made just for me. And those just like me. (And I’m sure there are a few of us around here.) It seems it, doesn’t it? A shepherd losing a sheep? A woman who misplaces one tenth of her wealth? What are these people thinking? Shepherd’s jobs are to keep track of sheep. That’s what they do. And a woman alone losing a coin is catastrophe. Who do these people think they are, losing valuable things like that?
Jesus is telling this parable, remember, to the Pharisees and scribes. They were complaining that Jesus is spending too much time with tax collectors and sinners. Of course, that’s what Jesus did. He spent time with the people on the fringes; those on the margins of their culture; the lost people as it were.
And he uses these same lost people, these marginalized folks of their society, in his parables. For here is a shepherd. Shepherds are the lowest of the low. They have a job that requires them to be out in all weather. They tend their group of sheep 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. They smell and they’re dirty and they just aren’t the type of people you’re supposed to care about.
Or a single woman. A single woman, for crying out loud. Who knows why she’s single or how she became single? There’s a hint that she has some money, but who knows how she got it? Who would care about a single woman in that culture? Or her money, for that matter.
But Jesus uses these outsiders as an example to those who are in the religious power in their society, those Pharisees and scribes. They would prefer, it seems, to ignore those who are not in the midst of religious purity. They don’t want to associate with tax collectors and other sinners, no doubt including shepherds and single women.
But Jesus uses them as an example. And they aren’t even the focus of the story. It’s the lost items which hold our attention. Those items that have been misplaced; or wandered off. Even the lowest of the low care about the lost items; more than the Pharisees and scribes, by inference.
Jesus talks about these lost items as precious things. Something you leave 99 sheep alone in the fold for; something you turn your house upside down for. Things that make you forget about everything else and seek out.
It’s just grace at its purest. The sheep and the coin aren’t repentant. They don’t even know they’re lost, perhaps. But they’re precious to someone; precious to the point of an all-out search. This coin, that sheep, is longed for by a woman with only 9 other coins; by a shepherd who has a whole flock of other sheep.
Our God, Jesus is telling us, goes to all lengths to seek us out. When we are lost or we are wandering away, God’s grace brings us back and joyfully celebrates at our return.
But I don’t think we’re actually meant to think we’re the lost items in these parables. We may at times be lost and wandering, but when it comes to coins and sheep, we are probably more like the 9 coins or the 99 sheep back in the fold.
So where does that leave us? Remember that Jesus is telling this story to the Pharisees and scribes in response to the charge that he hangs out with sinners too much. We’re more like the Pharisees and scribes of our day than we’d like to think. We’re the keepers of the faith; the ones who are working to preserve our religion as it is. And as such, we need to identify with the seeker of the lost items more than anything else.
We are called to go after the lost: those on the margins and the outcasts of our culture. We are called to be the shepherds and women of our own age, seeking after the lost so we can rejoice in their finding. We are called to be seekers; those who realize that there are those on the margins who need to hear about God’s grace and love.
We are God’s agents, just as those Pharisees and scribes were too; charged with keeping the faith, as it were. And as such, we must heed Jesus’ call to us to join him in being with the tax collectors and sinners of our age.
We have lots of outcasts in our society. Many are lost; too many are on the fringes. We have a predilection to draw boundaries around ourselves and those like us. But Jesus calls us to new ways of being; new ways of acting that include rather than exclude. Jesus calls us to seek out those who are out there and bring them in; including the lost.
Be the seekers our society needs. Be the shepherds who are looking for their sheep one sheep at a time; be the women who turn everything upside down in order to find one coin. And then rejoice. Don’t sit on your laurels, but celebrate. Celebrate with the God who also rejoices with you.
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