Call and response
Commentary
Lewis Carroll's Alice bragged that she could believe in impossibles; why, she could believe in six impossible things before breakfast. Her profession did not make her a candidate to be a heroine of faith, but it might have made her worthy to be mentioned in the presence of this Sunday's readings.
The strange world of the Bible often calls us to suspend disbelief; to be upset by realities that differ from our own; to be knocked off balance by stories of miracle healings. But our practice at such suspension sometimes gets pushed very far. Not so much in the wonder stories like the stilling of tempests. We are hit hardest when it comes to the demands made on people to produce faith and hope and respect for the promises of God.
Sarah: We are on her side; at least I am, aren't you? She had been given unkept promises, through her husband. Now it was too late for them to be kept. Really too late. Disciples saw Jesus do wonders. That is not hard to take, since we recognize that they recognized something truly special in the way God worked through him. But we are astonished when he calls disciples to do what he has done. Impossible.
They are to cure as he cured; to raise the dead, as he raised the dead. To cleanse the lepers. To cast out demons. Had we stood among them, no doubt we would have turned realist, turned grudging, or turned away. "Master, it is easy for you to talk as you do. We have lives to live, relatives to whom to explain our ways, common sense that needs consulting." Yet disciples there were, and disciples went. Somehow they must have effected enough of what he asked for to keep the movement of the Spirit alive.
Grist For The Mill
Genesis 18:1-15
One of the first feminist readings of the Old Testament that I came across, decades ago before "the movement," was called Sarah Laughed. The book was a celebration (by a man, back then, yet) of Sarah for her character, her perspective, her sense of irony and folly. Since then I have read numbers of interpretations by men and women, some of which carry on that line and others of which say that no matter how you celebrate her, the story still reflects patriarchal viewpoints.
True, no doubt. But the story we have is the story we have, and like all stories, this one is multi-framed, multi-vocal, open to multi-interpretations because of its multi-accents. Leaving for other commentators in other years other nuances, I would like to pick up on the theme that courses through numbers of scriptures chosen for this season: the issue of calls to faith and promise and the varieties of human response.
If sometimes we are taught to congratulate people for having believed, against many odds, at other times we are allowed to recognize people for having had trouble with belief against all odds. Sarah is told she is to bear a child, but "it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women." The author of Genesis does not duck the problem or minimize the scandalous announcement: he maximizes it. He would laugh, if permitted. Sarah did laugh; who could prevent the laugh? You can't blame her for lying, when challenged; "for she was afraid." But, in the longer telling of this story, nothing was "too wonderful for the Lord." Despite the oh! so wonderfully understandable laugh, the blessing was still to be hers and she was to bear the child, and bore him. You just never know ....
Romans 5:1-8
We dealt with Romans 5 just two or three months ago; the lectionary committee must really have liked this chapter. Now we will look for different things in it. I want to stress one line: "hope does not disappoint us," not because hope is all that hopeful but "because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us."
We have just heard the story of hopes nearly denied in the case of Abraham, who had faith, but it seemed to be unrewarded to go with his hope, which had to be tested. More particularly, we learned of Sarah, who had reason to be hopeless, since her time for childbearing was past. And how she had hoped! What do we do with hope?
We start by recognizing it as a kind of anthropological given. That is, something about human nature seems to demand and supply hope: in concentration camps, some kept it. Defeated armies in devastated lands include some people who have it and impart it. But humanly natural hope is insufficiently powerful for the consequences of faith.
Hope disappoints us. But not the kind Paul describes, because it depends on the more than natural: the love that God pours into us and is given us. I do not find it easy to preach on a hope text such as this one. There is little problem when there are earthly reasons to hope: for a good marriage, a good job, good grades, some victories. Hope comes more easily to middle-class tenured people than to the truly poor. But often it is those in apparently hopeless conditions that best cling to the kind of love imparted by the Holy Spirit. They locate their hope in the promise of a faithful God and they can see, can really see, what hope is and why it does not disappoint.
Matthew 9:35--10:8
Jesus carries on a mission that has "impossible" spelled all over it. That he was able to cure many illnesses is not hard to believe: we know much about how illness connects with faith, body with mind and soul and spirit; most faith-movements begin as healing-movements. But we hear that he cured "every disease and every sickness." The gospels tell us enough about leprosy, mental disease, hemorrhaging, paralysis, and disorders that belong to the "every" class, but do not easily admit of cures. He also assigns impossibles to the disciples: "cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons."
Something is going on here to test our sense of boundaries: of expectation, endeavor, capability. But what makes the description of his work and the assignment of the disciples' credible enough that we can read the chapter without mouths agape is its focus: all this is done because he was and they were to "proclaim the kingdom." The kingdom is the sovereign saving activity of God, and people swept up in it experience life and love and hope.
All this would sound like one more world-historical fanaticism; one more impersonal movement; one more tale of wonderworkers. But there is a difference here. Jesus does not deal with the crowd but with persons; not with the issue of faith and hope but the existence of a person who needs help. "He had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless."
Jesus looked out at them and reached down to them with eyes and hands that dealt with soul and body, with the total person. We get enough glimpses of his one-on-one action to understand why crowds came, but were never treated merely as crowds. He wants to pass on his sense of compassion.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By James A. Nestingen
Hosea 5:15--6:6 (Lutheran text)
Given Hosea's relationship with Gomer, there is a natural frame of reference for this lesson, one that may have been in Hosea's own mind: an old-fashioned but current-as-this-morning marital donnybrook. But here the combatants are God and Israel.
Just listen to the good Lord talking to himself ("herself" would do just fine), "I will return to my place ... in their distress they will beg my favor" (5:15). Sound familiar? Perhaps there is a preacher somewhere who hasn't either spoken such words or heard them, but the word on the street is that monastic population is down considerably.
And now listen to the people, the faithless marital partner, thinking over the possibilities. "All right, he's been pretty rough on us, but with a couple of days to think it over, he'll be back in shape and won't be able to resist us" (6:1-2).
Such a thought wouldn't be complete without a little pious filigree, however. That's just the way it works -- the one who starts the fight, ducking responsibility, comes on like Pilgrim from John Bunyan's great story, Pilgrim's Progress, complete with the resigned, almost fatalistic tone of voice, "Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord ..." (v. 3). It practically drips, like the rain of the next verse.
The good Lord knows the difference between piety, spirituality in contemporary churchspeak, and faith. So Hosea takes us back to the other side of this conflict in verse 4, where God is throwing up his hands in exasperation: "Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes away early"; it is illusory, inducing a momentary hopefulness that simply compounds the disappointment.
But now the humor ends. Fed up with pious pretense, the good Lord becomes deadly serious, using verbs that have a hard edge, "hewn" and "killed," linking them with a judgment that strikes like lightning.
Does God actually hew? The temptation is to dismiss such talk as hyperbole born of a lover's spat even when the forces of our vocations -- in marriage and family, for example, or in work -- are chopping away at rough edges, squaring us to the function God has in mind.
Then does God's word actually kill? Even, maybe especially, the Living Bible Paraphrase wants to treat such talk as metaphorical. Lovers may come to such conflict that they will threaten, but God? Yet the word backs us down, stripping away every pious delusion, every recourse, until finally there is literally nothing left of us -- all our verbs have been taken, we have been left in passivity. "For I deserve steadfast love and not sacrifice" -- the reality of faith rather than the pretense of a nauseous, self-vaulting spirit. Only the dead are raised. It doesn't work any other way.
The strange world of the Bible often calls us to suspend disbelief; to be upset by realities that differ from our own; to be knocked off balance by stories of miracle healings. But our practice at such suspension sometimes gets pushed very far. Not so much in the wonder stories like the stilling of tempests. We are hit hardest when it comes to the demands made on people to produce faith and hope and respect for the promises of God.
Sarah: We are on her side; at least I am, aren't you? She had been given unkept promises, through her husband. Now it was too late for them to be kept. Really too late. Disciples saw Jesus do wonders. That is not hard to take, since we recognize that they recognized something truly special in the way God worked through him. But we are astonished when he calls disciples to do what he has done. Impossible.
They are to cure as he cured; to raise the dead, as he raised the dead. To cleanse the lepers. To cast out demons. Had we stood among them, no doubt we would have turned realist, turned grudging, or turned away. "Master, it is easy for you to talk as you do. We have lives to live, relatives to whom to explain our ways, common sense that needs consulting." Yet disciples there were, and disciples went. Somehow they must have effected enough of what he asked for to keep the movement of the Spirit alive.
Grist For The Mill
Genesis 18:1-15
One of the first feminist readings of the Old Testament that I came across, decades ago before "the movement," was called Sarah Laughed. The book was a celebration (by a man, back then, yet) of Sarah for her character, her perspective, her sense of irony and folly. Since then I have read numbers of interpretations by men and women, some of which carry on that line and others of which say that no matter how you celebrate her, the story still reflects patriarchal viewpoints.
True, no doubt. But the story we have is the story we have, and like all stories, this one is multi-framed, multi-vocal, open to multi-interpretations because of its multi-accents. Leaving for other commentators in other years other nuances, I would like to pick up on the theme that courses through numbers of scriptures chosen for this season: the issue of calls to faith and promise and the varieties of human response.
If sometimes we are taught to congratulate people for having believed, against many odds, at other times we are allowed to recognize people for having had trouble with belief against all odds. Sarah is told she is to bear a child, but "it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women." The author of Genesis does not duck the problem or minimize the scandalous announcement: he maximizes it. He would laugh, if permitted. Sarah did laugh; who could prevent the laugh? You can't blame her for lying, when challenged; "for she was afraid." But, in the longer telling of this story, nothing was "too wonderful for the Lord." Despite the oh! so wonderfully understandable laugh, the blessing was still to be hers and she was to bear the child, and bore him. You just never know ....
Romans 5:1-8
We dealt with Romans 5 just two or three months ago; the lectionary committee must really have liked this chapter. Now we will look for different things in it. I want to stress one line: "hope does not disappoint us," not because hope is all that hopeful but "because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us."
We have just heard the story of hopes nearly denied in the case of Abraham, who had faith, but it seemed to be unrewarded to go with his hope, which had to be tested. More particularly, we learned of Sarah, who had reason to be hopeless, since her time for childbearing was past. And how she had hoped! What do we do with hope?
We start by recognizing it as a kind of anthropological given. That is, something about human nature seems to demand and supply hope: in concentration camps, some kept it. Defeated armies in devastated lands include some people who have it and impart it. But humanly natural hope is insufficiently powerful for the consequences of faith.
Hope disappoints us. But not the kind Paul describes, because it depends on the more than natural: the love that God pours into us and is given us. I do not find it easy to preach on a hope text such as this one. There is little problem when there are earthly reasons to hope: for a good marriage, a good job, good grades, some victories. Hope comes more easily to middle-class tenured people than to the truly poor. But often it is those in apparently hopeless conditions that best cling to the kind of love imparted by the Holy Spirit. They locate their hope in the promise of a faithful God and they can see, can really see, what hope is and why it does not disappoint.
Matthew 9:35--10:8
Jesus carries on a mission that has "impossible" spelled all over it. That he was able to cure many illnesses is not hard to believe: we know much about how illness connects with faith, body with mind and soul and spirit; most faith-movements begin as healing-movements. But we hear that he cured "every disease and every sickness." The gospels tell us enough about leprosy, mental disease, hemorrhaging, paralysis, and disorders that belong to the "every" class, but do not easily admit of cures. He also assigns impossibles to the disciples: "cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons."
Something is going on here to test our sense of boundaries: of expectation, endeavor, capability. But what makes the description of his work and the assignment of the disciples' credible enough that we can read the chapter without mouths agape is its focus: all this is done because he was and they were to "proclaim the kingdom." The kingdom is the sovereign saving activity of God, and people swept up in it experience life and love and hope.
All this would sound like one more world-historical fanaticism; one more impersonal movement; one more tale of wonderworkers. But there is a difference here. Jesus does not deal with the crowd but with persons; not with the issue of faith and hope but the existence of a person who needs help. "He had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless."
Jesus looked out at them and reached down to them with eyes and hands that dealt with soul and body, with the total person. We get enough glimpses of his one-on-one action to understand why crowds came, but were never treated merely as crowds. He wants to pass on his sense of compassion.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By James A. Nestingen
Hosea 5:15--6:6 (Lutheran text)
Given Hosea's relationship with Gomer, there is a natural frame of reference for this lesson, one that may have been in Hosea's own mind: an old-fashioned but current-as-this-morning marital donnybrook. But here the combatants are God and Israel.
Just listen to the good Lord talking to himself ("herself" would do just fine), "I will return to my place ... in their distress they will beg my favor" (5:15). Sound familiar? Perhaps there is a preacher somewhere who hasn't either spoken such words or heard them, but the word on the street is that monastic population is down considerably.
And now listen to the people, the faithless marital partner, thinking over the possibilities. "All right, he's been pretty rough on us, but with a couple of days to think it over, he'll be back in shape and won't be able to resist us" (6:1-2).
Such a thought wouldn't be complete without a little pious filigree, however. That's just the way it works -- the one who starts the fight, ducking responsibility, comes on like Pilgrim from John Bunyan's great story, Pilgrim's Progress, complete with the resigned, almost fatalistic tone of voice, "Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord ..." (v. 3). It practically drips, like the rain of the next verse.
The good Lord knows the difference between piety, spirituality in contemporary churchspeak, and faith. So Hosea takes us back to the other side of this conflict in verse 4, where God is throwing up his hands in exasperation: "Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes away early"; it is illusory, inducing a momentary hopefulness that simply compounds the disappointment.
But now the humor ends. Fed up with pious pretense, the good Lord becomes deadly serious, using verbs that have a hard edge, "hewn" and "killed," linking them with a judgment that strikes like lightning.
Does God actually hew? The temptation is to dismiss such talk as hyperbole born of a lover's spat even when the forces of our vocations -- in marriage and family, for example, or in work -- are chopping away at rough edges, squaring us to the function God has in mind.
Then does God's word actually kill? Even, maybe especially, the Living Bible Paraphrase wants to treat such talk as metaphorical. Lovers may come to such conflict that they will threaten, but God? Yet the word backs us down, stripping away every pious delusion, every recourse, until finally there is literally nothing left of us -- all our verbs have been taken, we have been left in passivity. "For I deserve steadfast love and not sacrifice" -- the reality of faith rather than the pretense of a nauseous, self-vaulting spirit. Only the dead are raised. It doesn't work any other way.
