Romans 12
November 2
David A. Davis
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It occurs to me that we would likely be hard-pressed to find a few verses of scripture that have more variation in translations and paraphrases than Romans 12:1-2. That was evident Wednesday morning as our small group read from the different versions of the bible being used in the virtual room. The variations seem to reflect an attempt to understand what Paul means by “present your bodies as a living sacrifice” and “your reasonable act of worship,” and being transformed rather than conformed. I don’t have time to offer much for your hearing, but I invite you to do a search this week on your device of choice.

I appeal to you, therefore, brothers and sisters, based on God’s mercy, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable act of worship. Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect (NRSV)

An English translation commissioned by the Church of Scotland in 1964:

Therefore, my brothers, I implore you by God’s mercy to offer your very selves to God: a living sacrifice, dedicated and fit for God’s acceptance, the worship offered by mind and heart. Adapt yourselves no longer to the pattern of this present world, but let your minds be remade and your whole nature thus transformed. Then you will be able to discern the will of God, and to know what is good, acceptable, and perfect.

And maybe the most recent published translation to be found is in New Testament scholar Dr. Beverly Gaventa’s hot-off-the-press commentary on Romans:

So I urge you by God’s mercies, brothers and sisters, to present your bodies as a sacrifice that is living, holy, and pleasing to God. That is your reasonable service. And do not be shaped by this age, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind that you discern God’s will for you, the good and pleasing and fully mature

 Do not be shaped by this age. Adapt yourselves no longer to the patterns of this world. Do not be conformed. The gift of the 12^th chapter of Romans. The gift and the wisdom of the Apostle Paul is that he continues in the chapter to describe for the reader what it looks like. A life transformed. A life of reasonable service. A life of sacrifice that is living, holy, and pleasing to God. While translators and scholars attempt to help you and me wrap our heads and hearts around some of Paul’s vocabulary in the first two verses, Paul launches into practicalities, paints a picture. Paul tells the church at Rome, and the church ever since, “here’s what it looks like”. Or as Dr. Gaventa puts it, “Following the summons, with its depiction of life as radical sacrifice, [Paul goes on] to promote an understanding of that life in terms of shared generosity made possible by divine gift and characterized by love”.

“For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly that you ought to think…so we, who are many, are one body in Christ…ministering… teaching… encouragement …. Sincerity …diligence …cheerfulness … Let love be genuine, hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good,; love one another….rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep…. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.”   Interestingly, after the first two verses, there is a remarkable consistency across translations and paraphrases for the rest of the chapter. Paul to the church at Rome and the church ever since: “This is what it looks like!”

When I was in college, an itinerant campus preacher came to visit our Christian fellowship group one Friday night. The next day, Saturday morning, a few of us went with him to the University of New Hampshire. When I describe him as an itinerant campus preacher, I mean he would show up on a campus somewhere, find an outdoor central spot with student traffic, and start preaching. His goal was to get people to engage with him, talk back to him, and even argue with him. It was a form of open forum political debates that seemed to be popular on college campuses today. Even though I was in a different place in my theological journey way back then and felt a call to ministry and preaching way back then, I found it a shockingly strange way to try to share the gospel of Jesus. By means of picking an argument with people. Picking a fight instead of showing someone with your life what being a disciple looks like.

Of course, if we are honest about the tradition, about the history, about the church, in absolutely every generation, in every season, the followers of Jesus, the church, denominations of every persuasion, congregations of every kind, could learn, should learn, a whole lot from Paul and Romans 12.  “Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal; be ardent in spirit; serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in affliction, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints, pursue hospitality to strangers…live in harmony with one another, do not be arrogant, but associate with the lowly….do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good.” A life of shared generosity made possible by a divine gift and characterized by love.

Our theme for this week in the Linked-In Adult Education/Small Group fall series is “Social Gospels and Smaller Tents”. In looking to the evangelical movement in the first half of the 20^th century, Dr. Heath Carter points to the conflict between the ecumenical effort working to serve the common good and improve equality for all people and those looking to draw boundaries and claim the right kind of Christianity. Professor Carter’s use of the metaphor of “smaller tents” is a reference to the beginning of an ongoing obsession for so many about who is in and who is out. Who is right and who is wrong? Who is a proper believer and who is not? The history tells that the arguments and the language and the vitriol were as heated and unchristian in the early and mid-twentieth century as they are today.

It seems to me that the lasting focus in the Christian tradition on who is in the tent and who is out of the tent could not be in greater conflict with the last 19 verses of Romans 12. At the end of the day, isn’t the persistent longing for smaller tents and more and thicker boundary lines inconsistent with lives of shared generosity made possible by divine gift and characterized by love? Or to say it another way, how often does the intramural nastiness in the Christian world distract from and diminish the call of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Understood in Paul’s language: “Let love be genuine; hate what is evil; hold fast to what is good…Contribute to the needs of the saints; pursue hospitality to strangers…. Do not be arrogant but associate with the lowly…. Do not repay anyone evil for evil but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all…if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink….do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

As the infuriating inaction/incompetence/feckless behavior of elected officials in Washington has led to lost jobs, lost pay, and now lost SNAP benefits for upwards of 42 million of our fellow citizens including what must be a terrifying number of children, I found myself drawn to the very last paragraph of Princeton University Professor and Nassau Church family member Matt Desmond’s book Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City. His captivating sociological study of eviction rates and predatory landlord practices is chilling. But this week, his last paragraph is a prophetic, relevant lament about a whole lot more.

“Whatever are way out of this mess, one thing is certain. This degree of inequality, this withdrawal of opportunity, this cold denial of basic needs, this endorsement of pointless suffering—by no American value is this situation justified. No moral code or ethical principle, no piece of scripture or holy teaching, can be summoned to defend what we have allowed our country to become.”

I wonder how the Church of Jesus Christ has any time to be picking fights when there’s so much gospel work to do. Picking fights instead of showing the world what the life of discipleship looks like. The body of Christ is not conformed to this world but transformed to live a life of shared generosity made possible by divine gift and characterized by love.

In Romans 12, the Apostle Paul paints a picture with words describing for his readers, for the church, for you and me, a life transformed. A life of reasonable service. A life of sacrifice that is living, holy, and pleasing to God. “Here’s what it looks like.” Jesus, our Savior, shows us with his teaching, his life, his death, and his resurrection. Way beyond words.

Jesus said, “This is my body broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”

“This is the cup of the new covenant sealed in my blood for the forgiveness of sin. Every time you drink it, do it in remembrance of me.”

Come, people of God. This is what it looks like.

Philippians 3:7-16
October 26
David A. Davis
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Arthur Link was a professor of American Church history at Princeton University and a member of this congregation when it was known as the First Presbyterian Church of Princeton.  In 1967 he edited a volume of the history of First Presbyterian Church that was published in celebration of the congregation’s 200 years. He wrote the first chapter on the earliest history and tells of Presbyterians settling in Princetown, which he described as a “way station on the stage coach line between Philadelphia overshadowed by its larger neighbors of Kingston and Lawrenceville.” Link makes the argument that Presbyterianism in Princeton had a direct correlation to the revivalism of the Great Awakening. “It is entirely possible”, he writes, “that organized Presbyterianism in Princeton was also a child of the Great Awakening.” A movement Link describes as “a revolt against the cold formalism that had begun to ossify the churches and laid great emphasis upon the personal experience of grace.”

 A personal experience of grace. A personal experience of grace, perhaps as opposed to a primarily intellectual exercise, dependent upon the clergy and the hierarchy of the church and the monarchy. Interestingly, Link points out that the Presbytery of New Brunswick turned down the request for a congregation in Princeton before 1755 more than once because of the proximity to existing congregations in Kingston and Lawrenceville. The minutes report that whoever was serving at Kingston might “preach a lecture at Princetown if they can.” “Preach a lecture” sounds like a bit of that cold formalism ossifying the church. A personal experience of grace. That might just be a working definition of the introduction of evangelicalism in this land. A personal experience of grace. An experience of faith that is between someone and God with no need of a clergy conduit. A faith that is not just a matter of the mind but is also a matter of the heart.

In the third chapter of the letter to the church at Philippi, the Apostle Paul comes to both the heart of the matter and the matter of the heart.  “Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ”.  Here in ten verses or so, the core of the letter.  “For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through the faith of Christ” Right here in the reading for this morning, after that great hymn in chapter two, the hymn that proclaims of the self-emptying of Christ on the cross and God’s exaltation of Christ giving him the name that is above every name, after his mention of his co-workers in the faith, Timothy and Epaphroditus, Paul comes to the crux of things. “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection of the dead.”

            After Paul warns the congregation about those who preach what is antithetical to the gospel, after he lists his own stellar credentials, his own CV, his life resume “If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh I have more…a Hebrew born of Hebrews…as to the law a Pharisee….as to righteousness under the law, blameless), the apostle then offers to the believers at Philippi, what is for him, the very center of it all, a center etched forever here in the Living Word. “Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. ..Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” 

These few verses of Paul’s letter, where Paul gets all personal, where Paul opens up about his relationship with Christ, where Paul writes about his own encounter with the gospel, his own longing in a relationship with Jesus, it’s like Act III of a Shakespeare play. The act where the play turns. The act is labeled the climax. Paul tells of what he has let go and considers worthless, how he longs for more of Christ and his resurrection, and how he presses on. These familiar and quotable, and memorable verses are the heart of the letter. It’s what drives the plot. The plot here, it’s not of Paul’s life. That plot line would, of course, tell of his conversion on the Damascus Road. No, it is the movement of the letter, in the structure of the letter; here we have the climax. The core, the key, the transformative part of his correspondence is his own witness to the “prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.” Losing and gaining. Wanting more. Pressing on. Only this, just this, this one thing, Paul concludes, hold fast. Hold fast to this! Losing, gaining, wanting more, pressing on. Hold fast to your own encounter with the gospel of Christ Jesus. It is the heart of the matter and the matter of the heart.

In the small group I am leading on Wednesdays, I tossed out a question about the group’s earliest memory or understanding of the world “evangelical”. For me, as a young person growing up in a Presbyterian congregation in Pittsburgh, much like this one, I was taught that the term was to be understood much like Arthur Link’s brief portrayal of the Great Awakening. In the preaching that shaped me and my faith, a reference to “evangelical” was not political, not theological. It was a reference to the experience of grace in a relationship to God understood through the love of Jesus Christ. Yes, it was the 70s and television evangelists were “legion,” but they didn’t own the word “evangelical.” Pretty much ever since it has frustrated, to say the least, that the term has been co-opted, twisted, redefined, stomped on, misused, abused, and weaponized. I can remember the last time “evangelical” crossed my lips from this pulpit. It is similar to how I feel about the American flag. It is as if one side of the political spectrum thinks it owns the American flag. Anyone who has listened to a season of my preaching can hear that I believe the gospel of Jesus Christ touches the heart and is a personal experience of grace. I believe it because I have experienced it. A faith that moves me and never just stays above the neck.

Last weekend, I was the keynote speaker for another congregation’s Men’s retreat. 38 men staying in three Airbnbs in Avalon at the Jersey Shore and cramming into one large living room and kitchen area for meals and then for worship and my four sermons. I knew the pastor and one other person. They were all certainly welcoming to me, but they were also enjoying each other’s company. So let’s just say there were multiple times when I found myself alone in that crowded room. It takes a little while for that many people to go through a buffet line. On Saturday morning, as I finished my light breakfast and was waiting for the worship time to begin, I found myself sitting next to a young man who was quiet and not talking to anyone either. Instead, he was leafing through his obviously brand-new, big, annotated bible. I am guessing it was purchased or gifted for the occasion. Since the only instructions on the email thread for the retreat were to bring your own linens and your bible. He was not really reading it, he was leafing through it like he was seeing it for the first time.

I introduced myself and asked him how long he had been at the church. “Not long,” he said. “A bit more than a year. I wasn’t raised with any church background or faith. It’s all new to me. We took our 4-year-old daughter to some of the activities that the church advertised in town. Then we started going to worship. We just love it. This is my first retreat.” The rest of the morning, I couldn’t stop thinking about him, glancing over. It was clear that, like me, he was an introvert. Talking to people he didn’t know wasn’t easy for him. When I was preaching, he was hanging on every word. When we were singing from the little prepared songbook, he didn’t know any of the songs, but he was trying. Then, during those breaks or waiting for the next thing, he had that bible. He was enjoying it more than trying to talk to people.

On the two-hour drive home from Avalon late Saturday night, I was blasting Bruce Springsteen to stay awake and I kept thinking of this young man. I don’t know if it was admiration, jealousy, or nostalgia. The first for him was a whole lot more than that retreat. A whole lot more. Somewhere, along the Atlantic City Expressway, I thought of this verse from the Book of Revelation. “Don’t abandon the love you had at first.” It is from the second chapter, John the Revelator. His letter to the church at Ephesus. In John’s vision, the letters are the words of the Risen Christ. “I know your works , your toil and your patient endurance….I also know that you are enduring patiently and bearing up for the sake of my name, and that you have not grown weary. But I have this against you. That you have abandoned the love you had at first.”  One paraphrase puts it this way, “you have forgotten your first love”.  They may be able to rob us of the word “evangelical,” but don’t let anyone take away the love you had first when it comes to your journey of faith. Never forget, don’t give up on the matter of the heart and the heart of the matter.

In that letter to the church at Ephesus, John is writing to a congregation about its attempt to remain faithful in a world full of violence, evildoers, false prophets, heretical teaching, and untruth. Sound familiar. Sound eerily relevant? Sound timely? “I know you are enduring and bearing up for the sake of my name.” Don’t forget the first love, the personal experience of grace. When you can’t make sense of the world or what’s going on all around you, when from the neck up it is confusion and discouragement amid a world that seems to be apocalyptically shaking, maybe lead with your heart. Cling to the grace Christ offers. Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, press on, press on. Reclaim his steadfast love for you as if for the very first time.

Luke 18:1-8
October 19
Jess Winderweedle
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Luke 17:11-19
October 12
David A. Davis
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“How about a word or two on behalf of the nine lepers who did not return to give thanks?” That’s how Martin Bell begins his essay on Luke’s familiar passage of the ten lepers in an intriguing collection entitled The Way of the Wolf. “What about the others? It’s simple really,” Bell writes. And then he goes on to tell of the one who was so frightened that he could only look for a place to hide. He describes one of the former lepers who was offended that Jesus didn’t make him work harder in order to be healed. Another one discovered pretty quickly that he didn’t want to he healed. Bell imagines that one was a mother who did not return to give thanks because she was rushing to see her children. One was so happy he just forgot to say thanks. For one of those healed, it was going to take a long time to repair the broken dignity. There’s something that happens to a person forced to beg and shunned by all and still expected to say thank you.

In his sampler of poetic license, Martin Bell writes of a seventh leper who was convinced there would be a perfectly intelligible, scientific explanation for what happened. He didn’t return to give thanks because he believed Jesus had nothing to do with the healing event. And then a leper numbered eight did not return precisely because he did believe Jesus had everything to do with it. To return and give thanks when the Messiah had arrived, when the Kingdom of God was at hand, well that would be unheard of. He ran to tell the news. And one last leper, the ninth leper, Bell invites the reader to just ponder. Because no one really knew what happened to them. If you have ten, one is bound to fade away.

Perhaps you can anticipate this author/preacher’s conclusions. It is much easier to condemn the nine rather than understand them. It is good to give God thanks and maybe understandable sometimes not to because God doesn’t heal people and then stand around just waiting for the note. Jesus knew about the ten and where they were and where they went and why they were and who they were, and he healed them all the same. Martin Bell concludes with the thought; “perhaps the point is not in the one who returns, but in the ten who were healed.”

Perhaps. But then there’s Luke. There’s the author/preacher Luke. The stickler here is Luke. Here in the 17^th chapter of the Gospel of Luke, the account of the ten lepers healed falls smack in the middle of some very difficult teaching from the lips of Jesus.  “Occasions for stumbling are bound to come” That’s how Luke’s Jesus begins the chapter. “It would be better for you if a millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea than for you to cause one of these little ones to stumble!” And the Lord goes on to teach the disciples about sin and forgiveness, repentance and rebuke. The twelve beg Jesus to increase their faith. He tells them about the mustard seed. “If you had the faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, ‘be uprooted and planted in the sea’, and it would obey you’”. Jesus warns them about doing the bare minimum, only what they have to do, when it comes to the life of faith. A life of obedience defined by only what has to be done and nothing more.

It is also here in this chapter that Jesus goes on to describe those days when the Son of Man comes in all glory. “Those who try to make their life secure will lose it, but those who lose their life will keep it.” Jesus tells them. “On that night there will be two in one bed; one will be taken, and the other left. There will be two women grinding meal together; one will be taken and the other left.” And chapter 17, this chapter where Luke the author/preacher tells of  “the Christian life,” ends with this very uplifting quote attributed to Jesus: “Where the corpse is, there the vultures will gather.” Whatever on earth that means?

Luke’s account of the healing of the ten lepers rests at the very center of an entire chapter of challenging teaching about discipleship, God’s future, and figuring out how to live the faith. It is at the center of a chapter full of imperatives from the Teacher. Right in the center of all the tough stuff, between forgiveness and the coming kingdom, comes the healing story. And smack in the middle of the healing story, you will find that one leper flat on their face at the feet of Jesus praising God with a loud voice. While the disciples, and the reader, and the church, and you and I are scratching our heads trying to understand the Savior’s teaching, Luke invites us to see the one. One for ten. Luke crafts the entire chapter, inviting the readers’ eye to the very center, suggesting that we focus on the one. Just as Jesus does.

Ten lepers approached Jesus as he headed for the village that day. Ten lepers obediently kept their distance, living their own identity. Instead of shouting out the expected word of warning, “Unclean, unclean!”, ten lepers give the shout out to Jesus, a shout in response to his identity. “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” Ten lepers were told by the Lord to go and show themselves to the priest. Ten were invited to head down that road toward the proper entry back into community and family. Ten lepers were invited to return to life. Ten lepers were made clean. Ten lepers were healed. Ten lepers were restored to life surrounded not only by the disease and the alienation that defined them, but here in Luke, they were restored to life amid the challenging, complex, even troubling teaching of the Master, teaching about discipleship and the life of faith and living in response to the identity of this Jesus.

But only one, one out of ten, one in ten, one for ten, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, threw himself at the feet of Jesus and said, “thanks.” Only one. Only one offered praise to God with a loud voice. Only one turned back.  And he was a Samaritan. You may recall earlier in Luke, when Jesus insisted on going with the disciples through a Samaritan town. When the Samaritans didn’t receive Jesus, James and John wanted to invoke the fires of heaven on the town. Jesus rebuked them. You remember the man who was a neighbor to the person in the ditch in the parable in Luke, he was a Samaritan. The lawyer trying to justify himself before Jesus couldn’t even bring himself to say “Samaritan.” No, he could only say “the one who showed mercy” was the neighbor. In John, chapter 4, the disciples were “astonished” that Jesus was speaking to a woman and to a Samaritan. The healed man at the feet of Jesus, shouting praise, was a Samaritan. He was an outcast. He had two strikes against him, on his skin and in his blood. He was a foreigner. He was an alien. He was an other. He was one of them. But only one turned back. He’s the one who came back. And Jesus looked around, and said to no one in particular and everyone all at once: “Only one for ten?”

It is interesting to note that one was heading down the road with the other nine. He was on the way with the others. He was headed in the same direction. Then he saw that he was healed. He had to have looked around. He had to sense the peer pressure to be on the way, to get back to life, to finally fit in. But he stopped, looked around, waited just a moment, and he turned back. I’m curious if that’s the moment of grace. The turning point. The work of the Holy Spirit. The gift of faith germinates like a mustard seed. Yes, he knew Jesus by name, but they all knew. Yes, he begged for mercy, but they all begged. Yes, he was healed, but they were all healed. But in that moment down the road a ways, to use the Apostle Paul’s language, “in the twinkling of an eye,” in that window of opportunity that shuts quicker than an instant, in that moment of grace, the person healed by Jesus decided to be the one. One for ten. He turned back.

A pastor friend of mine shared a story of when she was in high school. She volunteered at a food and clothing pantry in the lower level of the Episcopal Church in her town. It had something to do with community service credit for the National Honor Society. She told of arriving to volunteer on a cold winter afternoon. The line was already forming outside. The first thing she did was invite the folks to come inside out of the cold. As the staff and volunteers were assisting people one by one, an older man came down the steps struggling with several bags of clothes. Every month or so, he made the delivery from his congregation using the church van. he made several more trips. So many trips that some of the other folks waiting in line gave him a hand.

A gentleman came to the front of the line and asked the high school volunteer if she had any shoes, size ten. She went back to the box of shoes to check and came back to apologize to the visitor that there were only women’s shoes in the box that day. It was obvious to everyone in the basement that the man needed a new pair of shoes. My pastor friend recalled that the delivery man from the other church was heading back up the steps, but he turned back and asked the guest, “Did you say size ten? I think I just carried in a pair of shoes. Let me check.” It didn’t take long for the man to come back to the counter with a pretty new pair of size ten heavy-duty shoes. “Well, that’s good timing for me!” the man said, adding a word of thanks and putting them on before heading out into the winter afternoon.

After a few more trips out to the church van, soon void of bags of clothes, the man from the other church offered his thanks and good-byes to the staff and volunteers. It wasn’t until he made his last trip up the stairs that the high school student noticed what she said she would never forget. Yes, the man going back up the stairs was only in his socks. There was no bag of shoes.

Have you ever seen someone who knew what it meant to turn back? I have to admit, they are hard to find sometimes. It’s not because they aren’t around. People who turn back aren’t often seen. They seem to avoid the spotlight. They blend in while standing out. Their lives overflow with thanksgiving. They have learned that when it comes to the Christian life, it’s less about piety, it’s not about self-righteousness, or judgment, or having to be right all the time. It’s about being thankful. Their lives are characterized not just by giving, but by giving back. They embody thankfulness. They give back to God in little ways and big ways as a means of offering thanks and praise. There is a certain recklessness to it, to turning back. It’s daringly counter-cultural and by the world’s measure, makes no sense. No sense at all. That’s why Luke puts the one in ten at the center.

Maybe it’s Luke calling you and me. That amid the very real challenges to understanding the Christian life, the life of discipleship, what Professor Migliore describes in the signature title of his book “Faith Seeking Understanding”, that when it comes to understanding our faith in this world especially these days, still, yet, and always, at the center of it all, is our gratitude and praise to the One who heals us and makes us whole in and through Jesus Christ, the Son of God, our Savior who so loves us and yes, loves this hurting world.

II Timothy 1:1-8
September 28
Lauren J. McFeaters
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I am reminded of your sincere faith — a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois — and your mother Eunice — and now, I am sure, lives in you. 

Faith — we pass it on — one to another. Belief — we share it — generation to generation. Lois — Eunice — You.

For Timothy, it’s three generations. Life grounded in Jesus; passed on — and then passed on again.

Lois — Eunice — You. Who is your Lois? Who has been your Eunice?

My Lois and Eunice take the form of the Canadian Catholic Sisters of St. Augustine, whose Mother House is in Old Quebec City, Canada. Their story starts four hundred years ago when several sisters, 16 years old, left the shores of France by ship, and traveled to the shores of New France.

They traveled with one goal: to serve Jesus Christ and care for Indigenous people and settlers in the colony. And because they were skilled apothecaries, they brought medicines and grew medicinal plants.

They created a church in a tent. They opened a clinic for the healing of bodies and they shaped holy friendships. They mended and bandaged and stitched up the broken and infirm, and built a small hospital in the middle of the settlement. You see the word hospital in French is Hotel Dieu, meaning House of God.

Over the last 400 years they have created an entire hospital system: 12 hospitals stretching north throughout Quebec Province. Each with a free clinic, a sanctuary, and a Monastery.

Our Loises. Our Eunices. Life grounded in Jesus; passed on — and then passed on again.

Whatever the disease, the Sisters found a way to treat. Whatever the condition, they found a way to repair. Whatever the complication, they found a way to soothe.

I think Timothy’s Church needs the ministrations of the Sisters of St. Augustine. The Epistles of 1^st & 2^nd Timothy and Titus are the New Testament writings known as The Pastoral Letters. They give encouragement, thanks, and instruction concerning pastoral issues in the church. I wrestle with some of what’s in the letters, but pastoral care is front and center I love a good pastoral issue. I live for a good pastoral concern.

Here is a church, probably a number of house churches, that need therapeutic intervention. Spirits need reassurance. Hearts need gratitude. Bodies need strength.

What we know is there is distress and anxiety. Times are bleak. The Romans are bearing down, and Christians are swept into prisons to rot, and into Coliseums to be slaughtered.

Paul himself writes this letter under extreme conditions. He’s been arrested — again — in Jerusalem, transported to Rome, and is in prison awaiting trial — the outcome is his death. So, when he hears his Companions in Christ, his friends in the Book of Life, are in need of care, he is more than eager for things to be set aright.

Paul becomes The Apothecary. He plants medicinal herbs and sends a prescription to the Hotel Dieu du Timothy; to the Hotel Dieu Nassau.

As the world rages, he gives courage. As our fears soar, he lays on his hands. All the while bearing witness that God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather, a spirit of power — and of love — and of self-discipline.

Just a few paragraphs down, Paul says it like this —  In times of distress, people will be self-absorbed, money-hungry, abusive, unholy, unfeeling, haters of the good, impulsively wild, bloated windbags, swollen with conceit, and making a big show of religion — but denying its power. [ii]

We see this every day: Mockery is a profession. Punishment an amusement. Revenge a career.

Beverly Harrison puts it like this: Our world is on the verge of self-destruction because we have so deeply neglected that which is most basic: the work of human caring and nurturance, by the tending of the bonds of community. Because, according to the loudest voices, that work is too insignificant, too non-dramatic, too distracting, from the serious business of world rule.^[iii]

Who is your Lois? Who has been your Eunice? Who made sure your life grounded in Jesus. Who passed it on — and then passed on again? Who murmurs to you: “Remember the gift that kindles your heart.” Who do you whisper: “Remember, God does not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power — of love — of self-discipline.”  Remember. Remember. Remember.

If it’s hard to remember, you’ve come to the right place. Because here, our Lord remembers for us. Here at this table we are Remembered. Re-Membered. Put back together and fed so that we might be courageous for the living of these days.

When Jesus says, “Do this in remembrance of me,” he isn’t calling us to a Memorial Meal, to gather around a funeral table to grieve.

“Do this in remembrance of me,” is not a command to wrap ourselves in memories of days gone by. This IS the Memory. He is the Memory.

“Do this in remembrance of me,” means, “I remember you – in the present tense – I am here, the Living Lord. This is the Living Meal.  I set this table. I invite you. I welcome you.” “I remember you.” Whatever the disease – Whatever the condition – Whatever the fear – Smell the bread. Taste the cup. Pass it on. Come to the table. Our Lord is here. And he is waiting.

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ENDNOTES

[i]  II Tmothy 1:1-8 [NRSVue] Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, for the sake of the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus, To Timothy, my beloved child: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. I am grateful to God—whom I worship with a clear conscience, as my ancestors did—when I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. Recalling your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands, for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline. Do not be ashamed, then, of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner, but join with me in suffering for the gospel, in the power of God, who saved us.

[ii] II Timothy 3. Adapted from NRSVue and Eugene H. Peterson’s The Message: The New Testament in Contemporary English. Colorado Springs, CO:  NavPress Publishing Group, 1993.

[iii] Beverly Wilding Harrison. Making the Connections: Essays in Feminist Social Ethics. Boston:  Beacon Press, 1985, 12.

 

 

Luke 16:1-14
September 21
David A. Davis
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“There was a rich man…” In the Gospel of Luke, when Jesus begins a parable, “There was a rich man…” one should quickly assume its going to be a tough one, Throughout Luke’s telling of the story of Jesus, the rich are challenged, condemned, indicted, and turned away. From the earliest verses, the song that comes from Mary’s lips when she was “with child”, that song about the Messiah: “He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty.”

In the familiar blessings offered by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, you remember Matthew’s words, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” But in Luke, Jesus removes the spiritual comfort zone. “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.” Luke pairs that blessing with “Woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.”

It is Luke who tells of the poor widow dropping two copper coins in the offering box, putting in “all the living that she had”. Plenty of others were putting their gifts into the alms box. But Jesus proclaims, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them.”  Luke joins Matthew and Mark in telling the story of the rich young ruler who asks what he needs to do to inherit eternal life. “Only one thing you lack,” comes the response from Jesus, who praised the man’s piety. “Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor.” You know that the man turned away in despair. Matthew and Mark record that it was because the man had many possessions. Luke simply reports that he was very rich.

Jesus’ teaching about money, wealth, and possessions is clearer in the Gospel of Luke than in any of the other gospels. So when a parable that only appears in Luke begins with “There was a rich man….”, one should quickly assume it’s going to be a tough one. As you heard, as you read, the parable isn’t actually about a rich man at all. It is about the “dishonest manager”, referred to in older translations as “the unjust steward.” The character in the parable that Eugene Peterson labels in this paraphrase, “The Message”, is the crooked manager.

The crooked manager was charged with mishandling the rich man’s business affairs. “Turn in your accounts and your paperwork. I’m done with you.” The manager had one of those conversations we all have with ourselves. “I can’t dig. I am too ashamed to beg.” The light bulb goes off in his head and he comes up with a plan that he hopes if it won’t save his job, it will score him some points out in the community. In order to collect as much as he could quickly, in order to try to recoup something of the business loss incurred by the owner, in order to try to make some amends with the customers he had strong-armed for years, the manager went door to door, inviting people to pay up a reduced rate. He likely took off his commission and the extra he was trying scam week after week. “If you owe a hundred jugs of oil? Make it fifty. A hundred containers of wheat. Make it eighty. And so and so and such and such.

“And his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light.” And the reader of Luke’s gospel throws up their hands at this point, wondering whether. to be more frustrated with Jesus or Luke. Fifteen chapters in and coming to the clear conclusion that the consistent word for the rich in the Gospel of Luke is one of warning and judgment. And this no good, loan-sharking, price fixing, money-loving, middle-level crooked bill collector receives a word of praise from the boss who just fired him! When Jesus begins a parable with “there was a rich man….”, one should quickly assume its going to be a tough one.

One scholarly approach to the parables is to ponder where the parable proper ends and the commentary of Jesus begins. Here in the case of the dishonest manager, some scholars argue that Jesus’ commentary, Jesus’ midrash (to use the ancient Hebrew term), begins at “And I tell you”. It is as if Jesus knows the disciples (and you and me) don’t get it. So he keeps going, maybe preaching a bit louder. It doesn’t get any easier, really. But by the time Jesus gets to “You cannot serve God and wealth”, you cannot serve God and mammon; Jesus does offer clarity. The reaction of the religious “lovers of money” is to scoff at Jesus and make fun of him.

In his recently published book, entitled Deadheads and Christians: They Will Know them By Their Love, Nassau Church’s own Tom Coogan describes a Grateful Dead concert as an existential experience. He argues that every Deadhead can describe a particular concert experience that was life-changing. They can tell the details, the set list, the names of fellow concert goers because of “how deeply they were affected.” Far less an experience of the head and far more an experience of the heart and soul.

It can and has been argued that it is similar to the parables of Jesus. Listening/reading the parables is less an experience of the head and far more an experience of the heart and soul. Parables do something to the listener. An existential experience. It is not about figuring them out, unlocking the moral lesson like a able. It is more about letting the words of Jesus wash over you. Allow the parable to speak into your life in the here and now. Pondering meaning less perhaps, and focusing more on your own response. The experience, the reaction of the religious lovers of money was far more than an intellectual response to Jesus’ words.

Every week I go back to the Excel spreadsheet that the staff has built for me over the years, which lists every sermon I preached from this pulpit, sorted by scripture text. I look at my old sermons on the text I am preaching. Unlike the Luke text a few weeks ago about hating your family for Jesus’ sake, which I have never preached (and more than one of you suggested maybe I should not preach it again!). I have preached this tough parable of the crooked manager many times. More than half a dozen. You won’t be surprised that all of them had a stewardship sort of theme. Money. Giving. The sinful scourge of poverty all around us. As I said, by the end of Jesus’ brief commentary on the parable, his seemingly intended takeaway is pretty clear. “You can’t serve God and mammon.”

In the here and now of my life, as the parable washed over me early each morning in my sermon preparation, my experience of it had little to nothing to do with money. My head is spinning these days just like yours. I have the same knots in my stomach as most of you. The heaviness of heart is very real. The good news of Jesus came to me in my heart and soul this week through the Word. The promise of the Gospel leapt off the scripture’s page with encouragement and inspiration. One does not often say that about a parable that begins with “There was a rich man….”.

Jesus said, “Whoever is faithful in little, is faithful in much.” I went back and reread an op-ed piece that Anne Lamott wrote last month after the horrifying shooting and murder at the Catholic school in Minneapolis. The essay is entitled “What I Told My Sunday School Children About Death”.  In a way that only Anne Lamott can write, she didn’t mince words. “There should be one inviolable rule: Children are not shot or starved to death.” Later in the piece, she writes, “It is rough and harsh out there, and it seems, to my worried and paranoid self, worse by the day…We have to show up. We want to stay isolated from the suffering, but maybe the answer is to draw close.” Lamott goes to tell of her rabbi friend who, when she is discouraged and feeling hopeless, makes “matzo ball soup for the sick and lonely and friends; in my Presbyterian tradition,” she continues, “we tend toward casseroles. These offer consolation to the soul. There are always a lot of people who need them, like me.”  Jesus said “Whoever is faithful in little, is faithful in much.”

We were having dinner this week at Conte’s Pizza. A family of four came in. The older son was on crutches with a brace on his knee covering pretty much his whole leg. As they came into the restaurant from the Witherspoon Street entrance, they weren’t sure where to go to get a table. I figured it was their first visit. While the injured young man looked 12 to me, he had a Princeton athletics T-shirt. The kind of athletes wear for practice. He was clearly distraught, sometimes holding his head in his hands. The young parents and their little brother are trying to offer comfort. They were all looking very sad. We didn’t speak to them, but in my mind, I picture him as a freshman soccer player at the university who just tore everything in his left knee. I noticed that their server is someone we have come to know over the years. Her son was one of the coaches when our son Ben played soccer for Princeton High School. It is less about what a parable means and more about a parable does to you. On the way out, with the server’s help, we bought dinner for a family whose lives were turned upside down this week, with a young kid whose hopes for this fall seemed crushed. Jesus said, “Whoever is faithful in little, is faithful in much.”

I don’t know if your life in here and now is feeling anything like mine these days, but maybe matzo ball soup, casseroles, and pizza can help. I am guessing that in another season, the parable of the crooked manager will come at me again with Jesus shouting about serving God and serving mammon. But for now, Jesus said, “Whoever is faithful in little, is faithful in much.” And just speaking for me, I experienced these words of Jesus this week as really, really good news. And I offer that for your courage and encouragement. The encouraging good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

Psalm 51
September 14
David A. Davis
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Lord have mercy. Lord have mercy. Lord have mercy on us. Have mercy on us, O God, according to your steadfast love. In the abundance of your love, your love that is constant, your love that never fails, have mercy on us. Your mercy is as abundant as your love. Mercy. Compassion. Understanding. Have mercy on us. Have mercy on all of us, O God. Not pity. Not a feeling sorry for. But an unconditional love that never turns away. An ever-present compassion that brings tears to your eyes, O God. A divine-like patience that will never give up…on us. Your anger lasts but a moment but your favor, your kindness, your embrace lasts a lifetime and more, O God.

Lord, Lord, Lord have mercy. Tradition identifies the author of Psalm 51 as King David. David pretty much begging you for forgiveness, God, after Nathan confronted him about his sinful behavior with Bathsheba. A deeply personal plea. “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you alone, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight”.  Yes, Holy One, I have my sins to bring before you. We all have our sins to lay bare before you. The cleansing baptismal waters of your forgiveness wash over us every day. Every day. It is a deeply personal plea, prayer for all of us. That in and through Jesus Christ your forgiveness and redemption might cleanse us from all sin. Every moment of every day. “You desire truth in the inward being, therefore teach me (teach us) wisdom” deep within. Give us our truth and your wisdom that draws us near to your heart and helps to live a bit more faithfully, enables to do a bit better, inspires what the old gospel song described as “a closer walk with thee.”

But to be honest, Lord God, you can’t really read Psalm 51 this week and just keep it personal. The plea I mean. The cry for your mercy. You who know the inner most parts of every heart. You see the same world we do. A world, a nation, a people, so, so far from what your prophets proclaimed and what Jesus taught and what you intend for your creation. If one were to offer a litany of specifics in the midst of the psalmists prayer to you, God of compassion and mercy, it would be hard to know where to start and it would never end. The petitions. The laments. The plea. You can’t read Psalm 51 this week and hear it as prayer for one heart at a time. It’s not just a prayer for in here. It’s a prayer for out there. It’s a prayer for everywhere. Lord, Lord, Lord have mercy. It’s more than an expression that rolls from the lips of one the saints whose seen more than her share of life and heaves a sigh and shakes her head. No God, it is a deep, authentic cry of a heavy heart when other words just don’t come. A prayer that can help sleep to come at night when worries of the day never cease to mount. Have mercy on us, O God. Have mercy on all of us. Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy. Lord have mercy.

“Create in me a clean heart, O God and put a new and right spirit within me.” Create in us, all of us, clean hearts, O God put a new and right spirit with us, all of us. Not clean as sinless or perfectly pure or even spotless. That won’t happen until the other side of glory, until we come into your presence, until we rest eternally in your very heart God. No, this is more like clean as in heal. Like when Jesus healed the ten lepers. They were made clean. A clean heart healed from its woundedness. A clean heart mended from its brokenness. A clean heart lift from its despair. A clean heart freed from all that separates us from you, Merciful God. That’s our plea. That’s our prayer. That’s your promise. Because you, Creator God, you who created the heavens and the earth, you who created each one of us, are creating…still. For the love of God, for the love of you, don’t stop creating now. As the psalmist said, “I lift mine eyes to the hills- from whence will my help come. My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth.” Our help is the work of your ongoing, still creating Spirit on the loose in each one of us and in the world. Our help. Our hope, O Spirit of the Living God.

Clean hearts and new and right spirits. Put new and right spirits within us, all of us. New, like the promise Isaiah proclaimed: I am the Lord, your God, your Holy One…I am about to do a new thing: now it springs forth.” God of every blessing, allow new spirits to spring forth. A new spirit within fed by your peace, not as the world gives, but the peace Jesus gives unto us. A new spirit that flows with joy the world can never crush. A spirit kept by your light, the light of the world. A spirit that shall never be crushed by the present and future darkness. Overwhelmed. Yes. Distraught. Maybe. But in your wisdom and by your grace and with your love that will not let us go, put that new spirit within us.

New and right spirits. Right spirit. I don’t know God, but these days it seems like a right spirit is less about not being a wrong spirit and more about being aligned with your Spirit. Right, not as in right or wrong. But right more like the root of righteousness. Like when Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” Put right spirits within us God. Spirits that long for the world Mary sang about in the Magnificat. The world Jesus described when he stood in the synagogue and read from the scroll of Isaiah. Put right spirits within us that yearn for justice to roll down and the poor to be lifted up. Right spirits that help us see the world like Jesus sees the world and work for the world Jesus paints with his words. Put new and right spirits within us, O God of all righteousness. Clean hearts and new spirits.

“Do not cast [us] away from your presence and do not take your holy spirit from [us]’.  It’s like we don’t even need to ask. We know that. But along with the resurrection hope that Christ is Risen, the assurance of your presence with us always, O Emmanuel, that’s what carries us. That’s what sustains us. That Christ is with us always until the end of the age. That your Holy Spirit is at work advocating, guiding, sanctifying us. That even in the most difficult seasons of our lives, the most discouraging times when it comes to longing for peace, the most frightening days of mass shootings and political violence in the land, you are with us. The world and everything in it still belong to you. That you still hold each of us, all of us, in the palm of your hand. Not going lie Lord, our hands are raised with all sorts question you about all we see around us. Our prayer fists are clinched in frustration and anger about the hatred, the bigotry, the absolute neglect of the common good, but you still are God in heaven and the God who comes all the way down in Jesus Christ who anointed our brokenness with his human flesh and bones. He stretched out his arms to embrace to save this blasted world. It is your presence that carries us these days. As the psalmist says “If I ascend to heaven you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me and your right hand shall hold me fast. Don’t cast us away from your presence and do not take your holy spirit from us. For your Holy Spirit intercedes for us. Every moment of every day.

Blessed Savior, still our refuge, I officiated at a wedding yesterday. I was reminded how life-giving, redeeming, restoring the taste of a bit of joy can be. A glimpse of joy and love is such a gift. A gift to not be taken for granted. So yes, give us a fresh dose of the joy of your salvation. Help us not to forget to find joy in the little things and in the big things. Knowing that the world cannot take away the joy we have in Jesus Christ. Like your peace, it is a joy not as the world gives. Give us joy, Holy God. It seems almost like a subversive prayer request or even a selfish one. But joy as resistance is one of the ways you sustain us God. A bit of joy to face to tomorrow. A little foretaste of glory divine to inspire us for another day. A glimpse of joy so we can tackle some of the hard stuff.

Sustain us with willing spirits. Willing spirits that find a way, even the simplist of ways to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with you. Willing spirits that are open to a nudge from you to say yes to an ask, or to discover a new way to love a neighbor, or to offer some extra gratitude to someone behind a register or serving a table or taking a temperature. Sustain us with willing spirits, Loving God, that remind us that we are called to be the hands and feet of Christ not just when we are in here but when we are out there. And we are called to see the very face of Christ in those around us. Give us the eyes and hearts that come with willing spirits.

Lastly, with our plea, with our prayer, comes our praise. The wisdom of scripture reveals, and lives of the saints that have gone before us testify, and the witness of the great cloud affirms you can’t have one without the other. Prayer and praise.

So, Lord, “open [our] lips, and our mouths will declare your praise.” For our chief end in this life and the life to come is to worship you and enjoy forever.

Lord, Lord, Lord have mercy.

Create in us clean hearts and right minds.

 

Luke 14:25-35
September 7
David A. Davis
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I don’t like that Jesus uses the word hate. I would say that “I hate that Jesus uses the word hate,” but we taught our children that we didn’t use that word in our house. Same with “shut up”. The expression was not/is not welcomed in our home. “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.” Seriously, Jesus! Jesus is surely not the only one in the bible to use the word. “ I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies…Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. But let justice roll down like water, and righteousness like and everflowing stream.” The Hebrew prophet Amos. “The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me, he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners…For I, the Lord, love justice, I hate robbery and wrongdoing.” Isaiah, chapter 61.

“Those who say, ‘I love God’ and hate their brothers or sisters are liars, for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from God is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.” The epistle of I John. Did you hear that one, Jesus? “Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good.” The Apostle Paul in Romans. Hate what is evil. That sounds better. In the Gospel of John, Jesus says, “The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify against it that its works are evil.” I’m okay with that one. The Sermon on the Mount in Matthew: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” That’s a very tough ask, but at least I get it.

“Whoever comes to me does not hate…father and mother…and even life itself.”  So I went looking for other translations to help me feel better about the hate. I typed in Luke 14:26 and then clicked on “All English Translations”. It didn’t help. A handful, as in three or four, offered an alternative. The rest stuck with “hate”. The Common English Version reads “You cannot be my disciple, unless you love me more than you love your father and mother, your wife and children, and your brothers and sisters. You cannot follow me unless you love me more than you love your own life”. That helps a bit, but the Greek text is very clear. I went to the Greek dictionary in hopes of variation on a verb. It didn’t help. Definition: “hate, detest, abhor”.  The example Jesus gives about a king going to war against another king isn’t all that great either. But there is even more battle in the bible than there is hate. Then there’s the selling of all your possessions. Jesus isn’t just talking to the rich young ruler as he does later in Luke, telling him to sell all his possessions and give them to the poor. Hating those you love. Carrying the cross. Building a tower. Going out to wage war. Selling all your possessions. Salt with no taste. “Let anyone with ears to hear listen!” Seriously, Jesus!

In his commentary on Luke in the Interpretation series, Fred Craddock points out that the use of the word “hate” in the ancient Semitic world was a common expression that was not about emotion or matters of the heart. It is more related to turning away from or detaching. If Jesus’ intended connotation here was just “hate” being “hate”, Craddock points out, this one verse would be in contrast to all the calls to love and kindness that fill the verses of both testaments, including the verses behind me on the chancel wall. Maybe the word functioned back then, something like the word “sick” today. When someone decades younger than me refers to something as “sick”, I have to stop and think whether they are referring to something as good or bad. “That is so sick!” Craddock makes the argument that “hate” had a whole other meaning. “What is demanded of disciples”, he concludes, “is that in the network of many loyalties in which all of us live, the claim of Christ and the gospel not only takes precedence but, in fact, redefines the others.”

This difficult teaching from the lips of Jesus reminds me of a similarly perplexing part of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew. In the midst of that sermon, Jesus preaches, “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell.” And somewhere on that hill, someone in the congregation shouts “Amen!” “Come on now,” “Preach, Jesus Preach!” Where are the biblical claims to inerrancy and literal interpretations when Jesus is talking about lopping off body parts? It’s not about plucking your eye, it is about having the ears to hear. “Let anyone with ears to hear listen!”.  Jesus often repeated expression that reflects his call to his disciples to hear, understand, and so live the gospel he teaches with a longing for depth and maturity. To daily yearn for faith that leaps off the scriptures’ page and empowers you to live in the ever more complex, confusing, and confrontational world all around us. Or as the Apostle Paul puts it in Ephesians, “I pray that you nay have the power to comprehend, with all of the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the LOVE of Christ which surpasses all knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” Having ears to hear.

Part of having ears to hear for the reader of the bible is to pay attention to Jesus’ audience. If we were to keep reading here in Luke, the next chapter is Jesus teaching tax collectors and sinners the parables about lost things. One sheep. One coin. One son. “Joy in the presence of the angels of God” for just one. A father’s compassion and joy for the lost son who has come home. The Pharisees and the scribes grumble because Jesus welcomes “them”. He eats with “them”. Preaching about “I once was lost but now I am found” to an audience of sinners. Here in chapter 14, before our puzzling, confounding text for today, Jesus heals an infirm man on the sabbath as the religious leaders rage. He then tells the Pharisees a parable about the lowliest being given the places of honor at a banquet and challenging those who lust for and brandish power and prestige. “When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind”, Jesus says. Jesus then tells about the great dinner with the invited guests, offering various legitimate reasons why they can’t make it. Jesus tells them about the owner of the house who sends for the neediest and most vulnerable to fill the house. Preaching to the Pharisees about lavishing hospitality on the least of these.

To have ears to hear includes noting Jesus’ intended audience. Pharisees listened to the parables of banquets. Tax collected and sinners listening to parables about lost things. In our text for the morning, just as Jesus begins to drop the hate word,  don’t miss the reference to a different audience. Luke, the narrator, writes, “Now large crowds were traveling with him, and he turned and said to them.”  Not tax collectors. Not Pharisees. “Now….large crowds were traveling with him.” Crowds that witnessed not just one being healed but lots being healed. People in the crowd who say or maybe were told about miracle after miracle. A large crowd who have heard sermons full of parables and watched confrontations with religious leaders. “Now….large crowds were traveling with him.” It seems to imply people who want to hear, who want to be with Jesus. A pro-Jesus crowd. People who are drawn to Jesus, not to confront him but perhaps to hear more. Maybe some were just intrigued by the good preaching. Maybe people are going along for the ride, for the fascination of it all.  Maybe others in the crowd were waiting for their turn to be healed. Maybe some only hear bits and pieces along the way.  Maybe there are those who have suffered, been injured, and abused by the religious establishment and are longing for something new. Maybe others in the crowd were taking a “what’s in it for me approach.”

“Now….large crowds were traveling with him.” Jesus turns to them and talks about hating those you love. Carrying the cross. Building a tower. Going out to wage war. Selling all your positions. Salt with no taste. “Let anyone with ears to hear listen!” Jesus turns to them and says “Let me take a moment to make sure you understand where this is headed. Where we are going. Where I am going. Jesus stops to give a nod to the gospel in all of it’s fullness, discipleship that is life transforming, and a kingdom that is intended to turn the world’s ways upside down. No, it won’t be easy. It isn’t easy. It was never intended to be easy. Jesus turns to the “now…large crowds” and talks about what Dietrich Bonhoeffer identified as “the cost of discipleship.”

I still wish Jesus didn’t use the word hate when it comes to the people you love most. But what if having ears to hear when it comes to the most difficult parts of the teaching of Jesus is less about understanding it all and more about clinging to even the smallest of takeaways for living the Christian life. For instance, when you are a follower of Jesus, it can’t always be about you first. Or when it comes to discipleship, parts of the teaching of Jesus ought to make us squirm once in a while. Or the cross to carry isn’t ours, it is his. For here in Luke, before Jesus tells the two on either side of him there on the cross, “Today you will be with me in paradise”, and in Matthew, before Jesus tells the disciples to go make disciples of all nations and “I will be with you always, even to the end of the age.”  Before the promise of resurrection life, Jesus says to the disciples, to the church, and to you and me, “This is my body broken for you.”

Let anyone with ears to hear, listen.

Micah 6:1-8
August 31
Andrew Scales
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