Sermon Illustrations For Proper 9 | Ordinary Time 14 (2017)
Illustration
Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
This passage tells us the happy beginning of the life Isaac and Rebekah share. It recounts their meeting, their betrothal, and their wedding. Things seem to start so well. Laban and Bethuel are good at discerning that God is in this relationship. Isaac is thrilled to have found a wife per the predictions and instruction of his father. Rebekah is happy to be getting married. Everything seems great.
Those of us who know the rest of the story know that things don’t stay this warm, cozy, and happy. There are challenges that come from the birth of their twin sons, domestic misunderstandings, fear, jealousy, expulsion, and theft. As I reflect on this passage I think back to all the premarital counseling I have done. All the couples enter the first session hopeful, deeply in love, and committed to living their lives together. Usually it works out as they plan, but sometimes the domestic bliss they desire is fleeting -- either because infatuation rather than love is the basis for the relationship or because they grow apart over time. It’s worth recounting the story of Isaac and Rebekah whose relationship disintegrates, not to depress young couples but to help us all understand the commitment and dedication, the hard work it takes to retain and nurture personal relationships -- those with our spouses, those with our friends, and those with our God.
Bonnie B.
Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
In the setup to this lection Abraham instructs a trusted servant to seek a wife for Isaac. He does not want him to marry someone local, but a relation, and so he must send this servant back to the land where he came from. Abraham gives him precise instructions. The servant proves himself resourceful, engaging Isaac’s future wife interest with speech and gift, driving a hard bargain with Laban (no slouch himself), and returning home with the goods (if such a term can be used with regards to human beings)!
But the servant demonstrates his competency as much by his oral account shared with Rebeckah’s family as in anything else.
The servant of Abraham does something so adroitly that it sometimes goes unnoticed and even unremarked. In his telling of the story, he retells what we have just read: how he was sent to seek a bride for Isaac, of how he prayed (he is the first person quoted as praying in scripture), and how everything fell into place as it should. The servant repeats fairly closely everything said by his master Abraham -- except that he was to make sure that Isaac didn’t return to the land of their ancestors. Abraham had emphasized this, saying it twice, but the servant seems to know that this might be taken as an insult by Rebekah’s family, or that with Laban in the picture it might mean the price of the bride might suddenly go right through the roof. Instead he mentions how wealthy Abraham has become and that Isaac will inherit all of it. Sometimes what we don’t say is even more important than what we say.
Frank R.
Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
When I was a missionary in Nepal, it was common for the parents of children to choose a mate for them. Sometimes they were good choices, as when I sat next to a couple who met on their wedding day and were getting acquainted. They discovered that they both had degrees and were intellectual. They had many common interests. The more they talked, the more they became happy at their parents’ choice for them. Not all parent choices were that good. Some were based on the lady’s family wealth or on family friendships.
The most important thing that affected the parents’ choice was that the couple be of the same racial and national background. Nepalese married Nepalese -- just like in Israel where Jews married Jews and never Palestinians.
Things have not changed much sine Abraham’s day. Even today some mates are selected by the parents.
The only similarity today is that we want our Christian children to marry Christians.
When a good friend of mine had a daughter who married a Muslim, it was a disaster for them. They still loved her, but they let her know they were not pleased. Even if they were not of the same nationality or even the same race, it might be acceptable as long as they were Christian. She converted, but said she still believed in Jesus!
One of my sons married a Chinese girl and a daughter married a Japanese fellow. Another married an American Indian. The problem with that one was that the Indian was not Christian.
What I am saying is that Abraham’s desire was not that much different from ours today in many ways.
One question I have. It sounds like when Isaac and Rebekah went into the tent and came out married, there was no clergy in the tent. It looks like they did not need a service with family and friends to be married.
An interesting experience that sealed the choice of Rebekah was the kindness of that prospective wife who was willing to get a drink for the man’s camel as well as for him.
The lesson for us is that we have to evaluate our motivations in the choices we make.
Bob O.
Romans 7:15-25a
Imagine this...
There are thousands of people gathered on one side of the street. They are loud and intense. They carry signs clearly identifying what position they hold. On the other side of the street thousands of people have also gathered. They too carry signs declaring their position. It is, of course, the opposite position from that on the signs those in the first group hold. There is shouting and arguing going on between the two groups. It looks as if a fight might break out any minute as these two groups clash.
What does this paragraph describe? It could easily describe the way things were in our nation in the first few weeks of this year. That’s not, though, what I was thinking. Imagine, if you will, this scene taking place in the mind and heart of one individual. I think, in a small way, this might be what Paul is describing in this familiar passage. There are two sides clashing within him. There is the good which he wants to do on one side. On the other side is the evil that he does not want to do. He delights in the law of God, but another law is at war with the law of his mind. As we read his description, a chaotic riot is taking place within him as he decides what to do.
I’m guessing that all of us recognize that struggle. There are two strong, conflicting sides within us. They clash, argue, and battle to determine which will win out. Paul’s conclusion is one with which most of us can identify. “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” The answer? “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Bill T.
Romans 7:15-25a
Martin Luther very well described what Paul was trying to communicate in this lesson: “...the saints at the same time as they are righteous are also sinners; righteous because they believe in Christ, whose righteousness covers them and is imputed to them, but sinners because they do not fulfill the Law, are not without concupiscence” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 25, p. 336).
Concupiscence: The dictionary definition is a strong, abnormal desire (especially sexual desire). But in Christian theology, we are said to be concupiscent in the sense of seeking to please our desires in everything we do. This entails that no deed we ever do is agape love. Even in loving our children we are concupiscent, for in loving them we are loving our genes. Our other family members give us pleasure. Even my act of writing these words is concupiscent (there is a lot of pleasure in thinking how readers might use my words in many pulpits) and your reading them (you could be helped in the preaching task; it is made easier) are concupiscent deeds.
Even genetic research bears out this Christian insight about the insidious selfishness of our nature since the Fall. We exhibit this selfishness in all we do, for human bodies are prone to see to maximize the production of their DNA. This has led researcher Richard Dawkins to speak of the “selfish gene.” Even altruism serves this selfishness (The Selfish Gene). In this connection, we should note that our brains are structured in such a way that love enhances our exposure to a pleasurable brain chemical, dopamine (Helen Fisher, The Anatomy of Love: A Natural History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We Stray). Thus even love is driven by selfishness.
These apparently pessimistic insights actually strengthen our faith. Martin Luther nicely explains why: “It is our glory, therefore, to be worthless in our own eyes and in the view of the world. We must indeed be nothing in our eyes and in those of the world.... In that extreme despair we hear you are precious in my eyes. ‘Because you are nothing to yourself you are precious to me’ ” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 17, p. 88).
Mark E.
Romans 7:15-25a
On July 11, 1804, in Weehawken, New Jersey -- on the west bank of the Hudson River, opposite New York City’s 42nd Street -- two men faced each other bearing arms. Angered over political differences, the two statesmen could no longer compromise through debate. The death of one would settle the issue. The judge cried the command, and two pistols discharged. Alexander Hamilton slumped to the ground; Aaron Burr walked away in silence.
The bleeding politician was placed in a boat and rowed across the river, docking at the foot of Horatio Street. Lying in the bottom of the rowboat, Hamilton asked to receive the sacrament for a dying man. Episcopal bishop Benjamin Moore was summoned. Upon learning the cause of the wound, the bishop withheld the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, declaring that the stricken man needed time to reflect on the sin that had brought him so low. Hamilton persisted, requesting an old friend, Rev. John Mason, to administer the sacrament. He also refused, for as a pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church he would not allow a private communion. Hamilton panicked, fearing he would die without the blessing of the sacrament.
Shortly the bishop returned. Upon hearing Hamilton’s confession, listening to the sufferer forgive his assailant, and securing the promise that if he should live he would testify against dueling, Bishop Moore offered the sacrament -- which was accepted with gratitude. The next day Alexander Hamilton died, assured of his absolution.
Application: “Forgiven” is a word that must be declared to all. It is the message of grace that we read about in our lesson.
Ron L.
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
More and more contention has been expressed over religion than anything else. We fight to the death for religious ideals. Just look around the world at the “holy” wars that are still ongoing. We Christians have fought and continue to fight our own. Just watch the news or the live feeds from the “conservative” and “liberal” church denominations. For people proclaiming to follow Jesus, we sure don’t agree about much. That maybe what Jesus meant about coming to bring division and to set brother against brother, child against father, etc. How we interpret the teachings of Jesus can cause us grief and disagreement without end. Even the disciples engaged in debate after Jesus ascended, but also while he was walking around with him.
Maybe the message isn’t clear to us. Maybe we misunderstand what Jesus is calling us to do and to be. Maybe when we get engaged in biblical interpretation and doctrinal concerns we miss the point -- you remember the point Jesus made about the two greatest commandments: to love God and to love our neighbor. The divisions we create often have little to do with the love of God or our neighbor. They seem more about proving that we are right and someone else is wrong. This Pentecost season I would encourage us to focus on love rather than dogma. Maybe we can come together after all.
Bonnie B.
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
The games children play tell us a lot about the society they are observing closely, even if they themselves go unnoticed. Two of the most popular games for children in the time of Jesus were play-acting the two adult events that involved everyone in society, to which everyone was invited and which took place in plain sight of everyone -- weddings and funerals. The pageantry surrounding both was no doubt well-known, and went beyond simply playing the pipes for wedding and wailing for someone’s death. Children were no doubt as observant then as now, and their funeral and wedding processions probably wound up and down this street and that. And Jesus may be reminding his listeners that impatient adults who told them to be silent were rewarded with these mocking verses. When I see two-year-olds at our church nursery school imitating the elders, picking up a wooden block and treating it like a phone, giving it their full attention to the exclusion of real people near at hand, I wonder what lessons we have taught our children. How are they mocking us? What priorities are we unconsciously promoting through our actions or our inaction?
Frank R.
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
This sounds like a political fight. If you are in my party you must be great, but if not then you are a stupid idiot!
One psychologist wrote that once we make up our minds about where we stand on an issue, we don’t want to hear anything that conflicts with it. As a former secretary of state recently said on the news, “Don’t give me any false facts!” Not to get into politics, but how many of our elected officials won’t accept any untrue facts?
These verses sound like some denominations today who condemn anyone who drinks wine -- even though Jesus drank some at the last supper. He also turned water into wine for a wedding celebration, but those denominations try to claim that it was only grape juice! Some say dancing is evil, or going to some movie is evil.
Some differences are so small that we are willing to compromise. Some differences do not mean those who differ are not Christians. For example, some say that the earth was created in seven 24-hour days, while others compromise because the Bible says “a day to the Lord is as a thousand years.” They change their rule to say that then the world must have been created in 7,000 years.
But we are all Christians. The Bible tells us that Jesus has one bride: his church! He was not a Mormon bishop. There are not Baptist brides and Catholic brides and Lutheran brides, etc. We are all one bride!
Maybe we should be humble like little children. That is the only way we will find rest -- if we allow the Lord to rule our lives. Only he can lift the burdens of life from us.
Bob O.
This passage tells us the happy beginning of the life Isaac and Rebekah share. It recounts their meeting, their betrothal, and their wedding. Things seem to start so well. Laban and Bethuel are good at discerning that God is in this relationship. Isaac is thrilled to have found a wife per the predictions and instruction of his father. Rebekah is happy to be getting married. Everything seems great.
Those of us who know the rest of the story know that things don’t stay this warm, cozy, and happy. There are challenges that come from the birth of their twin sons, domestic misunderstandings, fear, jealousy, expulsion, and theft. As I reflect on this passage I think back to all the premarital counseling I have done. All the couples enter the first session hopeful, deeply in love, and committed to living their lives together. Usually it works out as they plan, but sometimes the domestic bliss they desire is fleeting -- either because infatuation rather than love is the basis for the relationship or because they grow apart over time. It’s worth recounting the story of Isaac and Rebekah whose relationship disintegrates, not to depress young couples but to help us all understand the commitment and dedication, the hard work it takes to retain and nurture personal relationships -- those with our spouses, those with our friends, and those with our God.
Bonnie B.
Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
In the setup to this lection Abraham instructs a trusted servant to seek a wife for Isaac. He does not want him to marry someone local, but a relation, and so he must send this servant back to the land where he came from. Abraham gives him precise instructions. The servant proves himself resourceful, engaging Isaac’s future wife interest with speech and gift, driving a hard bargain with Laban (no slouch himself), and returning home with the goods (if such a term can be used with regards to human beings)!
But the servant demonstrates his competency as much by his oral account shared with Rebeckah’s family as in anything else.
The servant of Abraham does something so adroitly that it sometimes goes unnoticed and even unremarked. In his telling of the story, he retells what we have just read: how he was sent to seek a bride for Isaac, of how he prayed (he is the first person quoted as praying in scripture), and how everything fell into place as it should. The servant repeats fairly closely everything said by his master Abraham -- except that he was to make sure that Isaac didn’t return to the land of their ancestors. Abraham had emphasized this, saying it twice, but the servant seems to know that this might be taken as an insult by Rebekah’s family, or that with Laban in the picture it might mean the price of the bride might suddenly go right through the roof. Instead he mentions how wealthy Abraham has become and that Isaac will inherit all of it. Sometimes what we don’t say is even more important than what we say.
Frank R.
Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
When I was a missionary in Nepal, it was common for the parents of children to choose a mate for them. Sometimes they were good choices, as when I sat next to a couple who met on their wedding day and were getting acquainted. They discovered that they both had degrees and were intellectual. They had many common interests. The more they talked, the more they became happy at their parents’ choice for them. Not all parent choices were that good. Some were based on the lady’s family wealth or on family friendships.
The most important thing that affected the parents’ choice was that the couple be of the same racial and national background. Nepalese married Nepalese -- just like in Israel where Jews married Jews and never Palestinians.
Things have not changed much sine Abraham’s day. Even today some mates are selected by the parents.
The only similarity today is that we want our Christian children to marry Christians.
When a good friend of mine had a daughter who married a Muslim, it was a disaster for them. They still loved her, but they let her know they were not pleased. Even if they were not of the same nationality or even the same race, it might be acceptable as long as they were Christian. She converted, but said she still believed in Jesus!
One of my sons married a Chinese girl and a daughter married a Japanese fellow. Another married an American Indian. The problem with that one was that the Indian was not Christian.
What I am saying is that Abraham’s desire was not that much different from ours today in many ways.
One question I have. It sounds like when Isaac and Rebekah went into the tent and came out married, there was no clergy in the tent. It looks like they did not need a service with family and friends to be married.
An interesting experience that sealed the choice of Rebekah was the kindness of that prospective wife who was willing to get a drink for the man’s camel as well as for him.
The lesson for us is that we have to evaluate our motivations in the choices we make.
Bob O.
Romans 7:15-25a
Imagine this...
There are thousands of people gathered on one side of the street. They are loud and intense. They carry signs clearly identifying what position they hold. On the other side of the street thousands of people have also gathered. They too carry signs declaring their position. It is, of course, the opposite position from that on the signs those in the first group hold. There is shouting and arguing going on between the two groups. It looks as if a fight might break out any minute as these two groups clash.
What does this paragraph describe? It could easily describe the way things were in our nation in the first few weeks of this year. That’s not, though, what I was thinking. Imagine, if you will, this scene taking place in the mind and heart of one individual. I think, in a small way, this might be what Paul is describing in this familiar passage. There are two sides clashing within him. There is the good which he wants to do on one side. On the other side is the evil that he does not want to do. He delights in the law of God, but another law is at war with the law of his mind. As we read his description, a chaotic riot is taking place within him as he decides what to do.
I’m guessing that all of us recognize that struggle. There are two strong, conflicting sides within us. They clash, argue, and battle to determine which will win out. Paul’s conclusion is one with which most of us can identify. “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” The answer? “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Bill T.
Romans 7:15-25a
Martin Luther very well described what Paul was trying to communicate in this lesson: “...the saints at the same time as they are righteous are also sinners; righteous because they believe in Christ, whose righteousness covers them and is imputed to them, but sinners because they do not fulfill the Law, are not without concupiscence” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 25, p. 336).
Concupiscence: The dictionary definition is a strong, abnormal desire (especially sexual desire). But in Christian theology, we are said to be concupiscent in the sense of seeking to please our desires in everything we do. This entails that no deed we ever do is agape love. Even in loving our children we are concupiscent, for in loving them we are loving our genes. Our other family members give us pleasure. Even my act of writing these words is concupiscent (there is a lot of pleasure in thinking how readers might use my words in many pulpits) and your reading them (you could be helped in the preaching task; it is made easier) are concupiscent deeds.
Even genetic research bears out this Christian insight about the insidious selfishness of our nature since the Fall. We exhibit this selfishness in all we do, for human bodies are prone to see to maximize the production of their DNA. This has led researcher Richard Dawkins to speak of the “selfish gene.” Even altruism serves this selfishness (The Selfish Gene). In this connection, we should note that our brains are structured in such a way that love enhances our exposure to a pleasurable brain chemical, dopamine (Helen Fisher, The Anatomy of Love: A Natural History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We Stray). Thus even love is driven by selfishness.
These apparently pessimistic insights actually strengthen our faith. Martin Luther nicely explains why: “It is our glory, therefore, to be worthless in our own eyes and in the view of the world. We must indeed be nothing in our eyes and in those of the world.... In that extreme despair we hear you are precious in my eyes. ‘Because you are nothing to yourself you are precious to me’ ” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 17, p. 88).
Mark E.
Romans 7:15-25a
On July 11, 1804, in Weehawken, New Jersey -- on the west bank of the Hudson River, opposite New York City’s 42nd Street -- two men faced each other bearing arms. Angered over political differences, the two statesmen could no longer compromise through debate. The death of one would settle the issue. The judge cried the command, and two pistols discharged. Alexander Hamilton slumped to the ground; Aaron Burr walked away in silence.
The bleeding politician was placed in a boat and rowed across the river, docking at the foot of Horatio Street. Lying in the bottom of the rowboat, Hamilton asked to receive the sacrament for a dying man. Episcopal bishop Benjamin Moore was summoned. Upon learning the cause of the wound, the bishop withheld the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, declaring that the stricken man needed time to reflect on the sin that had brought him so low. Hamilton persisted, requesting an old friend, Rev. John Mason, to administer the sacrament. He also refused, for as a pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church he would not allow a private communion. Hamilton panicked, fearing he would die without the blessing of the sacrament.
Shortly the bishop returned. Upon hearing Hamilton’s confession, listening to the sufferer forgive his assailant, and securing the promise that if he should live he would testify against dueling, Bishop Moore offered the sacrament -- which was accepted with gratitude. The next day Alexander Hamilton died, assured of his absolution.
Application: “Forgiven” is a word that must be declared to all. It is the message of grace that we read about in our lesson.
Ron L.
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
More and more contention has been expressed over religion than anything else. We fight to the death for religious ideals. Just look around the world at the “holy” wars that are still ongoing. We Christians have fought and continue to fight our own. Just watch the news or the live feeds from the “conservative” and “liberal” church denominations. For people proclaiming to follow Jesus, we sure don’t agree about much. That maybe what Jesus meant about coming to bring division and to set brother against brother, child against father, etc. How we interpret the teachings of Jesus can cause us grief and disagreement without end. Even the disciples engaged in debate after Jesus ascended, but also while he was walking around with him.
Maybe the message isn’t clear to us. Maybe we misunderstand what Jesus is calling us to do and to be. Maybe when we get engaged in biblical interpretation and doctrinal concerns we miss the point -- you remember the point Jesus made about the two greatest commandments: to love God and to love our neighbor. The divisions we create often have little to do with the love of God or our neighbor. They seem more about proving that we are right and someone else is wrong. This Pentecost season I would encourage us to focus on love rather than dogma. Maybe we can come together after all.
Bonnie B.
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
The games children play tell us a lot about the society they are observing closely, even if they themselves go unnoticed. Two of the most popular games for children in the time of Jesus were play-acting the two adult events that involved everyone in society, to which everyone was invited and which took place in plain sight of everyone -- weddings and funerals. The pageantry surrounding both was no doubt well-known, and went beyond simply playing the pipes for wedding and wailing for someone’s death. Children were no doubt as observant then as now, and their funeral and wedding processions probably wound up and down this street and that. And Jesus may be reminding his listeners that impatient adults who told them to be silent were rewarded with these mocking verses. When I see two-year-olds at our church nursery school imitating the elders, picking up a wooden block and treating it like a phone, giving it their full attention to the exclusion of real people near at hand, I wonder what lessons we have taught our children. How are they mocking us? What priorities are we unconsciously promoting through our actions or our inaction?
Frank R.
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
This sounds like a political fight. If you are in my party you must be great, but if not then you are a stupid idiot!
One psychologist wrote that once we make up our minds about where we stand on an issue, we don’t want to hear anything that conflicts with it. As a former secretary of state recently said on the news, “Don’t give me any false facts!” Not to get into politics, but how many of our elected officials won’t accept any untrue facts?
These verses sound like some denominations today who condemn anyone who drinks wine -- even though Jesus drank some at the last supper. He also turned water into wine for a wedding celebration, but those denominations try to claim that it was only grape juice! Some say dancing is evil, or going to some movie is evil.
Some differences are so small that we are willing to compromise. Some differences do not mean those who differ are not Christians. For example, some say that the earth was created in seven 24-hour days, while others compromise because the Bible says “a day to the Lord is as a thousand years.” They change their rule to say that then the world must have been created in 7,000 years.
But we are all Christians. The Bible tells us that Jesus has one bride: his church! He was not a Mormon bishop. There are not Baptist brides and Catholic brides and Lutheran brides, etc. We are all one bride!
Maybe we should be humble like little children. That is the only way we will find rest -- if we allow the Lord to rule our lives. Only he can lift the burdens of life from us.
Bob O.
