Sermons Illustrations for Proper 20 | Ordinary Time 25 (2022)
Illustration
Jeremiah 8:18--9:1
Americans think they are generous. But in the most recent survey conducted three years ago by Indiana University's Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, it was revealed that for the first time in nearly two decades, only half of U.S. households donated to a charity. We need the condemning Word of God implicit in this lesson preached to us.
Criticism is good for us. Church Growth expert Alan Barth put it this way: “Criticism and dissent are the indispensable antidote to major delusions.” Billy Graham’s grandson William Graham Tullian Tchividjian, himself a pastor, expresses similar sentiments as he once stated: “Self-righteousness is the fruit of a low view of God's law and a lite view of your own sin.”
The lesson also points out how Jeremiah is a model for those who must critique others and proclaim God’s law. Abraham Lincoln well summarized this message: “He has a right to criticize, who has a heart to help.” Strive to avoid self-righteousness in your proclamation of the law.
Mark E.
* * *
Psalm 79:1-9
These are difficult times in America. Many of us are losing hope. A 2021 Harvard Youth Poll of Americans ages 18 to 29, found that 51% of young Americans said that at least several days in the previous two weeks they had felt down, depressed or hopeless.
Martin Luther took the reference in verse1 of the psalm to the ruins in Jerusalem to refer to tunnels in the city. He sees the ruins and the tunnels which resulted as a symbol for the human condition:
The soul is placed into tunnels after the structures of virtues have been razed, when it lives in the senses. These are the tunnels of death... (Luther’s Works, Vol.11, p. 92)
John Calvin sees good news and hope in the psalm. He wrote:
From this we learn, that sinners are not reconciled to God by satisfactions or by the merit of good works, but by a free and an unmerited forgiveness. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.V/2, p. 291)
Mark E.
* * *
1 Timothy 2:1-7
I used to live near St. Louis. Like a lot of American cities, St. Louis downtown has many one-way streets. I can remember using my phone’s map to get to a particular location. With all the one-way streets and construction, it was not unusual to hear the voice say, “Rerouting. Follow the route.” In other words, I couldn’t get where I was going from where I was. I think some people do that with coming to God.
John Dyer was a painter and Welsh poet who became a priest in the Church of England. He once wrote, “A man may go to heaven without health, without riches, without honors, without learning, without friends; but he can never go there without Christ.”
Paul reminded Timothy that Jesus was the ransom. He was the one who linked fallen man to God. There is no way to get to God but to go through Jesus. Trying any other way will lead to “Rerouting. Follow the route.”
Bill T.
* * *
1 Timothy 2:1-7
The Apostle Paul reminds Timothy that in the Roman empire, where virtually everyone has no choice over who reigns, the best chance for tranquility and a peaceable life is to make the best of the political situation if this is at all possible. At one point in his career, when his life was in jeopardy at the hands of an unreasoning mob, Paul appealed to Caesar for redemption. That seems to have worked. Sometimes it is. Paul, however, ultimately seems to have been murdered by the state.
In our political system, for all its flaws, there are ways, including the use of nonviolent resistance, to create that quiet and peaceable life we desire by directly confronting the powers, working for their salvation as well as ours.
Frank R.
* * *
Luke 16:1-13
Martin Luther understood this lesson as a text about social ethics and the poor. He wrote:
What then shall we reply to: “Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that when it shall fail, they may receive you into the eternal tabernacles?” We say this: that this passage says nothing about the saints in heaven, but of the poor and needy on earth who live among us. As though He [Christ] would say... do service to your friends, that is, the poor who live in your time and among you, your nearest neighbors who need help. (Complete Sermons, Vol.2/2, p.311.
From a study by economists Indermit Gill and Peter Nagle of the Brookings Institute: "The recent increase in food and energy prices could disproportionately impact the poorest households." While rising prices can be simply inconvenient for those with moderate or higher incomes, they are crushing for those living near or below the poverty line, who typically have far less financial flexibility. "High-income households can easily switch from higher-quality goods to lower-quality goods in times of economic crisis," Gill and Nagle wrote. "They can also take greater advantage of discounts on bulk purchases and sales. Poor households ordinarily don't have those options." With a tighter budget, low-income households often pay higher prices because they cannot travel to cheaper stores, take advantage of seasonal discounts or buy essential items in bulk — a phenomenon that researchers call the "Poverty Tax." Former Secretary of Labor in the Clinton Administration, Robert Reich, claims that too many of us ignore the deeper structural reason for price increases; the concentration of the American economy into the hands of a few corporate giants with the power to raise prices. If the market were actually competitive, corporations would keep their prices as low as possible as they competed for customers.
As we seek candidates sensitive to these issues in the upcoming November elections, the reflections on government power and how to maintain it offered by Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist Papers (p.240) warrants attention. He asserted:
Happy it is when the interest of the government has in the preservation of its own power coincides with a proper distribution of the public burdens and tends to guard the least wealthy part of the government from oppression.
Our founding fathers and the system they created have a bias toward aiding the poor. This seems to accord with Luther’s advice too.
Mark E.
Americans think they are generous. But in the most recent survey conducted three years ago by Indiana University's Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, it was revealed that for the first time in nearly two decades, only half of U.S. households donated to a charity. We need the condemning Word of God implicit in this lesson preached to us.
Criticism is good for us. Church Growth expert Alan Barth put it this way: “Criticism and dissent are the indispensable antidote to major delusions.” Billy Graham’s grandson William Graham Tullian Tchividjian, himself a pastor, expresses similar sentiments as he once stated: “Self-righteousness is the fruit of a low view of God's law and a lite view of your own sin.”
The lesson also points out how Jeremiah is a model for those who must critique others and proclaim God’s law. Abraham Lincoln well summarized this message: “He has a right to criticize, who has a heart to help.” Strive to avoid self-righteousness in your proclamation of the law.
Mark E.
* * *
Psalm 79:1-9
These are difficult times in America. Many of us are losing hope. A 2021 Harvard Youth Poll of Americans ages 18 to 29, found that 51% of young Americans said that at least several days in the previous two weeks they had felt down, depressed or hopeless.
Martin Luther took the reference in verse1 of the psalm to the ruins in Jerusalem to refer to tunnels in the city. He sees the ruins and the tunnels which resulted as a symbol for the human condition:
The soul is placed into tunnels after the structures of virtues have been razed, when it lives in the senses. These are the tunnels of death... (Luther’s Works, Vol.11, p. 92)
John Calvin sees good news and hope in the psalm. He wrote:
From this we learn, that sinners are not reconciled to God by satisfactions or by the merit of good works, but by a free and an unmerited forgiveness. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.V/2, p. 291)
Mark E.
* * *
1 Timothy 2:1-7
I used to live near St. Louis. Like a lot of American cities, St. Louis downtown has many one-way streets. I can remember using my phone’s map to get to a particular location. With all the one-way streets and construction, it was not unusual to hear the voice say, “Rerouting. Follow the route.” In other words, I couldn’t get where I was going from where I was. I think some people do that with coming to God.
John Dyer was a painter and Welsh poet who became a priest in the Church of England. He once wrote, “A man may go to heaven without health, without riches, without honors, without learning, without friends; but he can never go there without Christ.”
Paul reminded Timothy that Jesus was the ransom. He was the one who linked fallen man to God. There is no way to get to God but to go through Jesus. Trying any other way will lead to “Rerouting. Follow the route.”
Bill T.
* * *
1 Timothy 2:1-7
The Apostle Paul reminds Timothy that in the Roman empire, where virtually everyone has no choice over who reigns, the best chance for tranquility and a peaceable life is to make the best of the political situation if this is at all possible. At one point in his career, when his life was in jeopardy at the hands of an unreasoning mob, Paul appealed to Caesar for redemption. That seems to have worked. Sometimes it is. Paul, however, ultimately seems to have been murdered by the state.
In our political system, for all its flaws, there are ways, including the use of nonviolent resistance, to create that quiet and peaceable life we desire by directly confronting the powers, working for their salvation as well as ours.
Frank R.
* * *
Luke 16:1-13
Martin Luther understood this lesson as a text about social ethics and the poor. He wrote:
What then shall we reply to: “Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that when it shall fail, they may receive you into the eternal tabernacles?” We say this: that this passage says nothing about the saints in heaven, but of the poor and needy on earth who live among us. As though He [Christ] would say... do service to your friends, that is, the poor who live in your time and among you, your nearest neighbors who need help. (Complete Sermons, Vol.2/2, p.311.
From a study by economists Indermit Gill and Peter Nagle of the Brookings Institute: "The recent increase in food and energy prices could disproportionately impact the poorest households." While rising prices can be simply inconvenient for those with moderate or higher incomes, they are crushing for those living near or below the poverty line, who typically have far less financial flexibility. "High-income households can easily switch from higher-quality goods to lower-quality goods in times of economic crisis," Gill and Nagle wrote. "They can also take greater advantage of discounts on bulk purchases and sales. Poor households ordinarily don't have those options." With a tighter budget, low-income households often pay higher prices because they cannot travel to cheaper stores, take advantage of seasonal discounts or buy essential items in bulk — a phenomenon that researchers call the "Poverty Tax." Former Secretary of Labor in the Clinton Administration, Robert Reich, claims that too many of us ignore the deeper structural reason for price increases; the concentration of the American economy into the hands of a few corporate giants with the power to raise prices. If the market were actually competitive, corporations would keep their prices as low as possible as they competed for customers.
As we seek candidates sensitive to these issues in the upcoming November elections, the reflections on government power and how to maintain it offered by Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist Papers (p.240) warrants attention. He asserted:
Happy it is when the interest of the government has in the preservation of its own power coincides with a proper distribution of the public burdens and tends to guard the least wealthy part of the government from oppression.
Our founding fathers and the system they created have a bias toward aiding the poor. This seems to accord with Luther’s advice too.
Mark E.
