By their fruits
Commentary
Object:
Margaret Mead, the world-renowned anthropologist, was speaking at a university and one student asked her what she considered to be the first sign of civilization in any given culture. Everyone expected Ms. Mead to talk about fishhooks or clay pots or grinding stones. Her answer surprised them all. She said that the first sign of civilization was represented, in her mind, by a healed femur. The femur is the human thighbone. At the look of uncertain stares, Ms. Mead went on to explain.
In the law of the jungle, she said, broken femurs never heal. When a person in the jungle suffers a broken leg, he is left to die. On his own no one ever survives a broken leg long enough to have the bone heal. So, said Ms. Mead, where someone takes the time to protect the one who fell from further attacks, carefully binds up the wound, guards the safety of the one who cannot defend himself, brings food and medicine to the sick, and refuses to let the discouragement of pain lead to suicide, this is where civilization starts.
That is a fitting analogy for today's lectionary readings. It is by their fruits that the true heart of people is known. Ahab and Jezebel reveal the lack of civilization in their nasty bones. The Galatian Christians need to be reminded of the true civilization that emerges from God's commitments of love. And Jesus takes the civilization of heaven to the house of Simon the Pharisee, where actions speak much louder than words.
1 Kings 21:1-10 (11-14) 15-21a
After the grand kingdom of David and Solomon became divided, its theological mission was compromised as the new "Israel" wandered in search of other gods. Yet the perspective of kings is that the northern tribes and the southern portion of the old kingdom (now "Judah") were never truly separated. Throughout the rest of these narratives the political fortunes of both territories were equally considered. Furthermore, the kings of both realms were similarly judged by the prophetic author as either following in the ways of David and Solomon (thus seeking to fulfill the destiny intended by Yahweh) or compounding the covenant-breaking of those who caused the nation to stray from its divine calling and mission. This is most obvious in the harsh assessments given at the time of the northern kingdom's destruction by the Assyrians (2 Kings 17).
In this connection it is interesting to note the emerging and changing role of the public "prophets." Moses and Joshua each had a unique and on-going relational interchange with Yahweh that made their leadership positions virtually unassailable (cf. Numbers 12, 16-17). After the nation was settled in Canaan, such clear, regular, and unequivocal communication with Yahweh appears to have been muted. During the times of Eli, we are told, "the word of the Lord was rare; there were not many visions" (1 Samuel 3:1). That is why, when Yahweh began speaking directly with Samuel, the Israelites were ready to follow him (1 Samuel 3:19-21). This seems to be the beginning of a national recognition of the status of prophets as part of the necessary social fabric.
When Samuel's leadership was challenged because the people wanted a king (1 Samuel 8), it caused the first subtle separation of church and state. Samuel was a priest by adoption, and worked within the parameters of the cultic shrine. But the kings were clearly outside of the Levitical priesthood or its extended family. Prophets at first began to bridge the connection, and then later sparred with the kings as the sovereignty role of Yahweh was increasingly forgotten.
This tension is clearly seen in the dominant stories of Elijah and Elisha who battled with the rulers of the northern kingdom in 1 Kings 17--2 Kings 8. Elijah was given the weapons of the curses of the Sinai covenant to bring Ahab and Jezebel to their knees (1 Kings 17:1). He wielded divine power in public displays of combat (1 Kings 18). He was authorized to determine and appoint the leaders of nations (1 Kings 19). And when Ahab and Jezebel presumed that they could displace God-fearing Israelites from their divinely determined inheritance in the land (1 Kings 21), Elijah confronted the pair with stern prophecies that they instead would be removed.
That is the point of this sordid tale. As absolute monarchs, Ahab and Jezebel could do what they wished. Jezebel rightly points this out to her husband when he mopes in wimpy frustration that he would really like a nearby piece of property as his personal garden. She works the local political machine to discredit Naboth, the resident owner who refused to sell and appropriates the land with no recrimination.
Except for one person: Elijah, the true representative of Yahweh, now that Israel's kings have abdicated their ordained mandate, reminds the royal pair that God assigned the land to Israel's families in perpetuity, and no one has a right to displace them. Not only have Ahab and Jezebel committed fraud and robbery, but they have violated the sacred identity of one of Yahweh's own. Maybe they think they can get away with it. But when they sold their true royal birthright, they also became blind to the tenacity of heaven's justice.
Galatians 2:15-21
Paul's letter to the Galatians is the first book of the New Testament to be written. It is also highly autobiographical, detailing many of the specific incidents that gave rise to one of the first major theological conflicts in the emerging church. For that reason it is hard to preach any passage in Galatians without reviewing Paul's first mission journey.
There are few chapters in the New Testament as exciting as Acts 13-14. During a prayer meeting in the Antioch church, probably in early 48 AD, the group received a very strong divine message that their primary leadership team was supposed to be sent on a missionary journey (Acts 13:1-3). They started out across Cyprus, Barnabas' home turf, and it may well be that after they blitzed across that island they intended to travel back to Antioch along the Pamphylian coast, stopping briefly in Tarsus, Paul's home turf, along the way.
Indeed, they evangelized across the entire length of Cyprus, and then boarded boats for the mainland. But at the seaport of Perga, Paul got sick. What the illness was, is not certain, but when he later wrote to those he and Barnabas met in the highlands of central Asia Minor, he reminded them that "it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you" (Galatians 4:13).
After successful preaching in Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe they wended their way home, stopping briefly in each highland community to appoint elders in the new Christian congregations (Acts 14:22-25). Returning to Syrian Antioch, they brought a report of their mission journey to their home congregation (Acts 14:26-28).
That is when the trouble started (Acts 15; Galatians 2). Reports of Gentile converts to Christianity sizzled toward Jerusalem. Peter came up to Antioch to celebrate this exciting mission work, but others with less enthusiasm were soon sent by James (the brother of Jesus and leader of the Jerusalem congregation) to ensure that all was happening in an appropriate manner. These representatives announced that Gentiles had to become Jews in belief and practice before they could become part of the Christian church. After all, Jesus was Jewish, and was being acclaimed as the Messiah foretold by Israel's prophets.
These ambassadors of the Jerusalem church instituted separate meal and communion practices, making it clear that only those who were ceremonially pure could take positions of leadership in the community. Much to Paul's surprise, even Peter allied himself with those advocating these discriminating practices. Paul, of course, was anything but timid and accosted Peter publicly, creating even stronger polarization among the congregations on these matters.
The disease of Jewish superiority spread to the churches of Paul's and Barnabas' recent mission journey, and threatened to split the infant Christian community before it had even an opportunity to get started. In response, Paul dashed off a letter to the churches of "Galatia," the Roman district through which they had traveled on their mission trek.
In the first part of this passionate letter (Galatians 1-2), Paul reviewed his personal journey to an understanding of freedom in Christ, and lamented the recent developments that had seemingly stolen away this freedom from many of them. Next (Galatians 3-4) Paul went into a lengthy Jewish rabbinic argument about how Abraham was counted as "righteous" in his relationship with God already before he entered into the rituals of circumcision. Paul concluded that neither circumcision nor any other ceremonial expression was absolutely necessary for a meaningful relationship with God, and that Jesus' recent teachings, death, and resurrection only reaffirmed and expanded this truth. In fact, said Paul, the "Law" (that is, the ceremonial dimensions of the Sinai covenant) was like a teacher who was no longer needed after a child became fully mature. In the final portion of his letter (Galatians 5-6) Paul used very strong language to urge the expression of true freedom in Christ. This is found in neither the legalism of ritual religious regimens that bind and burden, nor in licentiousness that turns us evil and ugly. Rather, true Christian freedom is experienced when we no longer consider ourselves under external demands that have no important ends in themselves, but when we voluntarily give ourselves as slaves to God and others out of love. In this context there can be no division between "Jewish Christians" and "Gentile Christians," for the church of Jesus Christ has become the new "Israel of God" (Galatians 6:16).
The whole of Paul's argument hangs together throughout the letter, and is deftly summarized in today's lectionary reading. At some point during the worship service it would be great to have the whole congregation stand and recite Galatians 2:20 together as a shared testimony, confirming the truth of today's message.
Luke 7:36--8:3
John Calvin said that there were two aspects to faith: assentia and fiducia. The first we often translate as "assent." It is in this dimension of faith that we acknowledge something exists. Assentia is knowing something factually, or knowing about someone only from a distance.
Calvin's second aspect of faith might well be termed "trust." It is a heart engagement, involving us personally in an emotional attachment with whatever we might have previously acknowledged only intellectually.
Take a chair, for instance. Assentia is our willingness to say that it could hold the person daring to sit on it. Fiducia, on the other hand, is the act of sitting on that chair ourselves, trusting its sturdiness to hold our bulk. Both are elements of faith. Both are important. But until the latter is added to the former, faith remains inert, distant, intellectual, and impersonal. That is why, as the apostle James once said (James 2:19), the demons, who have no intention of trusting God (fiducia) do still have a kind of faith in God (assentia).
The gospel reading today offers a strong incentive for us to get beyond talking about God and getting on with the business of engaging God as an active partner in our lives. Simon the Pharisee has faith in God, and invites the latest wandering religious lecturer (Jesus) over to dialogue about it. What he learns, however, is that faith talk means little if we carry on conversations one might just as easily hear in hell.
Meanwhile, in the habit of the times, neighborhood people are allowed quietly to sneak into the banquet hall and line the edges of the room so that they might overhear the wonderful erudition of the wealthy and the powerful. One woman doesn't keep to her place. She is a notorious street woman, and she dares to step away from the wall and touch Jesus. In fact, she performs acts of intimacy with him that embarrass all in the room, especially the host. In righteous anger (and perhaps a bit of holier-than-thou one-upmanship indignation toward Jesus) he confronts the guest of "honor" rather than the woman herself. That's where Jesus tells a story about motives that turns the whole episode on its head.
Dr. E. Stanley Jones related an incident from his missionary days illustrating Jesus' point. A young girl got tired of things at home, said Jones. She longed for the freedom of the streets and the excitement of the nightlife. She ran away to a large city. It wasn't long before she fell under the spell of a pimp and was degraded into a prostitute.
The girl's mother was beside herself with anxiety. It was true that things hadn't been going right between them, but a mother's love is restless and protective, and she had to find her daughter again. She remembered the child who sat on her lap, and the daughter who whispered in her ear, and needed somehow to renew their bond of trust.
Yet how should she begin the search? All she had heard were rumors about daughter, thirdhand reports that she was now wasting her body in the red-light district. The mother went to the city and simply began to walk, hoping to stumble across someone who might know her daughter. Up one street and down the next she trudged, talking to anyone who would listen, hoping for a clue to follow.
But to no avail. Her daughter didn't want to be found: shame; rebellion, spite ... Who can say what reasons mingle in our deceptive minds?
Eventually the quest tired even the mother. Before she returned home, she did one more thing. She carried a photograph that had been taken several years before, a picture of the two of them, mother and daughter, at a happier moment in both their lives. She got the photograph enlarged and made dozens of copies. Then she scattered those pictures around the area, hoping that one would catch her daughter's eye. On each photo she penned these five words: "Come home! I love you!"
One day the girl did see. She began to remember what love was all about. A holy restless gripped her soul, battering her resentment until she had to call her mother. The next day she was home.
Never once did the daughter stop assenting to the fact that she had a mother. But it wasn't until her mother's love called out the trust of her heart that she believed in all that "home" and "mother" and "love" could mean to her personally.
Jesus brings the same message "home" to Simon's house. If pictures of faith were taken that hour, who would have fiducia added to ascentia? Everyone in the room knew the answer as Simon turned away shamed. But Jesus question lingers with us today. Where is the love…?
Application
Ernest Gordon's book To End All Wars (Zondervan, 2002) is the true tale of what took place in the Japanese prison-of-war camp made famous by the movie The Bridge over the River Kwai. The camp stood at the end of the Bataan death march that brought Allied soldiers deep into the jungles of Asia. Few would survive, and everyone knew it. In order to make the best of a terrible situation they teamed up in pairs, each watching out for a buddy.
One prisoner was a strapping six-foot-three fellow built like a tower of iron. If any could come out of this alive, all felt he would. That was before his buddy got malaria. The smaller fellow was much weaker and very likely to die. Their captors did not want to deal with sickness; so anyone who was unable to work was confined in a "hot house" until he succumbed to heat exhaustion, dehydration, and the collapse of his bodily systems.
The sick man was locked into a hothouse and left to die. Surprisingly he did not die because every mealtime his strong buddy went out to him, under curses and threats from the guards, and shared his meager rations. Every night his strong buddy sneaked from the prison barracks, braved the watchful eyes above that held guns of death, and brought his own slim blanket to cover the fevered convulsions of the sick man.
At the end of two weeks the sick man astounded the guards by recovering well enough to be able to return to work. He even survived the entire camp experience and lived to tell about it. His buddy, however -- the strong man all thought invincible -- died very shortly of malaria, exposure, and dysentery. He had given his life to save his friend.
The story does not end there. When Allied troops liberated that camp at the close of the war in the Pacific virtually every prisoner was a Christian. There was a symphony orchestra in camp with instruments made of the crudest materials. There were worship services every Sunday, and the death toll was far lower than any expected. All this because of the silent testimony made by a strong man toward his buddy facing death.
Jesus, of course is the great example of sacrificial love. Today we have been reminded of the outcome where such behavior is not forthcoming (Ahab and Jezebel), or where it has been quickly forgotten (Galatians), or who in the room knows how best to express its faithful imitation this side of eternity (Luke).
Alternative Application
1 Kings 21:1-10 (11-14) 15-21a. The story of Naboth's assassination by Ahab and Jezebel provides a perfect opportunity to remind the community of faith of its mandate to stand with the poor, the oppressed, the marginalized, the widow, the orphan, and the disenfranchised. Who is Naboth in your community, and who will rise, in the name of God, to his defense?
Preaching the Psalm
Psalm 5:1-8
One of the most fundamental needs in the human psyche is the need to be heard.
This essential reality spreads across the arc of human existence. From infants to children to adolescents to adults and the aged, everyone needs to feel that that they are heard. Few things, in fact, will enrage a teenager more quickly than being ignored. The hormone fueled cry, "You're not listening to me" is heard in many a home across the land.
If we are heard, then we feel that we're part of the reality that influences our lives. At work, when workers make suggestions it goes a long way when a supervisor actually listens. If spouses stop what they're doing and listen to their partners, a healthier relationship will surely result. The list is long and can be applied across human experience. We need to be heard.
How much more does this need show itself when we are relating to God? The words of this psalm express it well. "Give ear to my words … listen to the sound of my cry…." If God is the Creator and the Ruler of the universe; if God is in charge of everything and will not listen to us, what becomes of us? The thought is daunting. Only when we are in dialogue with the holy does our belief in God make sense to us.
So when it appears that God isn't listening, we tend to get a little testy.
Yet perhaps the problem isn't about God listening to us. Maybe the issue is whether or not we are listening to God. Human beings get so busy issuing demands and making petitions to God that seldom do they stop to see if God has anything to say to them. Could it be that the still small voice of God might be attempting to get through to us? Is there a possibility that if humans just stopped with their incessant busy-ness and crying out, God just might be speaking?
It is said in some circles that God no longer speaks to humanity. One has to wonder if that is the case, or if humanity just doesn't listen anymore. Maybe it should be God is pouring out the words of this psalm. Maybe God is saying, "Give ear to my words, O humankind … listen to the sound of my cry…."
In the law of the jungle, she said, broken femurs never heal. When a person in the jungle suffers a broken leg, he is left to die. On his own no one ever survives a broken leg long enough to have the bone heal. So, said Ms. Mead, where someone takes the time to protect the one who fell from further attacks, carefully binds up the wound, guards the safety of the one who cannot defend himself, brings food and medicine to the sick, and refuses to let the discouragement of pain lead to suicide, this is where civilization starts.
That is a fitting analogy for today's lectionary readings. It is by their fruits that the true heart of people is known. Ahab and Jezebel reveal the lack of civilization in their nasty bones. The Galatian Christians need to be reminded of the true civilization that emerges from God's commitments of love. And Jesus takes the civilization of heaven to the house of Simon the Pharisee, where actions speak much louder than words.
1 Kings 21:1-10 (11-14) 15-21a
After the grand kingdom of David and Solomon became divided, its theological mission was compromised as the new "Israel" wandered in search of other gods. Yet the perspective of kings is that the northern tribes and the southern portion of the old kingdom (now "Judah") were never truly separated. Throughout the rest of these narratives the political fortunes of both territories were equally considered. Furthermore, the kings of both realms were similarly judged by the prophetic author as either following in the ways of David and Solomon (thus seeking to fulfill the destiny intended by Yahweh) or compounding the covenant-breaking of those who caused the nation to stray from its divine calling and mission. This is most obvious in the harsh assessments given at the time of the northern kingdom's destruction by the Assyrians (2 Kings 17).
In this connection it is interesting to note the emerging and changing role of the public "prophets." Moses and Joshua each had a unique and on-going relational interchange with Yahweh that made their leadership positions virtually unassailable (cf. Numbers 12, 16-17). After the nation was settled in Canaan, such clear, regular, and unequivocal communication with Yahweh appears to have been muted. During the times of Eli, we are told, "the word of the Lord was rare; there were not many visions" (1 Samuel 3:1). That is why, when Yahweh began speaking directly with Samuel, the Israelites were ready to follow him (1 Samuel 3:19-21). This seems to be the beginning of a national recognition of the status of prophets as part of the necessary social fabric.
When Samuel's leadership was challenged because the people wanted a king (1 Samuel 8), it caused the first subtle separation of church and state. Samuel was a priest by adoption, and worked within the parameters of the cultic shrine. But the kings were clearly outside of the Levitical priesthood or its extended family. Prophets at first began to bridge the connection, and then later sparred with the kings as the sovereignty role of Yahweh was increasingly forgotten.
This tension is clearly seen in the dominant stories of Elijah and Elisha who battled with the rulers of the northern kingdom in 1 Kings 17--2 Kings 8. Elijah was given the weapons of the curses of the Sinai covenant to bring Ahab and Jezebel to their knees (1 Kings 17:1). He wielded divine power in public displays of combat (1 Kings 18). He was authorized to determine and appoint the leaders of nations (1 Kings 19). And when Ahab and Jezebel presumed that they could displace God-fearing Israelites from their divinely determined inheritance in the land (1 Kings 21), Elijah confronted the pair with stern prophecies that they instead would be removed.
That is the point of this sordid tale. As absolute monarchs, Ahab and Jezebel could do what they wished. Jezebel rightly points this out to her husband when he mopes in wimpy frustration that he would really like a nearby piece of property as his personal garden. She works the local political machine to discredit Naboth, the resident owner who refused to sell and appropriates the land with no recrimination.
Except for one person: Elijah, the true representative of Yahweh, now that Israel's kings have abdicated their ordained mandate, reminds the royal pair that God assigned the land to Israel's families in perpetuity, and no one has a right to displace them. Not only have Ahab and Jezebel committed fraud and robbery, but they have violated the sacred identity of one of Yahweh's own. Maybe they think they can get away with it. But when they sold their true royal birthright, they also became blind to the tenacity of heaven's justice.
Galatians 2:15-21
Paul's letter to the Galatians is the first book of the New Testament to be written. It is also highly autobiographical, detailing many of the specific incidents that gave rise to one of the first major theological conflicts in the emerging church. For that reason it is hard to preach any passage in Galatians without reviewing Paul's first mission journey.
There are few chapters in the New Testament as exciting as Acts 13-14. During a prayer meeting in the Antioch church, probably in early 48 AD, the group received a very strong divine message that their primary leadership team was supposed to be sent on a missionary journey (Acts 13:1-3). They started out across Cyprus, Barnabas' home turf, and it may well be that after they blitzed across that island they intended to travel back to Antioch along the Pamphylian coast, stopping briefly in Tarsus, Paul's home turf, along the way.
Indeed, they evangelized across the entire length of Cyprus, and then boarded boats for the mainland. But at the seaport of Perga, Paul got sick. What the illness was, is not certain, but when he later wrote to those he and Barnabas met in the highlands of central Asia Minor, he reminded them that "it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you" (Galatians 4:13).
After successful preaching in Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe they wended their way home, stopping briefly in each highland community to appoint elders in the new Christian congregations (Acts 14:22-25). Returning to Syrian Antioch, they brought a report of their mission journey to their home congregation (Acts 14:26-28).
That is when the trouble started (Acts 15; Galatians 2). Reports of Gentile converts to Christianity sizzled toward Jerusalem. Peter came up to Antioch to celebrate this exciting mission work, but others with less enthusiasm were soon sent by James (the brother of Jesus and leader of the Jerusalem congregation) to ensure that all was happening in an appropriate manner. These representatives announced that Gentiles had to become Jews in belief and practice before they could become part of the Christian church. After all, Jesus was Jewish, and was being acclaimed as the Messiah foretold by Israel's prophets.
These ambassadors of the Jerusalem church instituted separate meal and communion practices, making it clear that only those who were ceremonially pure could take positions of leadership in the community. Much to Paul's surprise, even Peter allied himself with those advocating these discriminating practices. Paul, of course, was anything but timid and accosted Peter publicly, creating even stronger polarization among the congregations on these matters.
The disease of Jewish superiority spread to the churches of Paul's and Barnabas' recent mission journey, and threatened to split the infant Christian community before it had even an opportunity to get started. In response, Paul dashed off a letter to the churches of "Galatia," the Roman district through which they had traveled on their mission trek.
In the first part of this passionate letter (Galatians 1-2), Paul reviewed his personal journey to an understanding of freedom in Christ, and lamented the recent developments that had seemingly stolen away this freedom from many of them. Next (Galatians 3-4) Paul went into a lengthy Jewish rabbinic argument about how Abraham was counted as "righteous" in his relationship with God already before he entered into the rituals of circumcision. Paul concluded that neither circumcision nor any other ceremonial expression was absolutely necessary for a meaningful relationship with God, and that Jesus' recent teachings, death, and resurrection only reaffirmed and expanded this truth. In fact, said Paul, the "Law" (that is, the ceremonial dimensions of the Sinai covenant) was like a teacher who was no longer needed after a child became fully mature. In the final portion of his letter (Galatians 5-6) Paul used very strong language to urge the expression of true freedom in Christ. This is found in neither the legalism of ritual religious regimens that bind and burden, nor in licentiousness that turns us evil and ugly. Rather, true Christian freedom is experienced when we no longer consider ourselves under external demands that have no important ends in themselves, but when we voluntarily give ourselves as slaves to God and others out of love. In this context there can be no division between "Jewish Christians" and "Gentile Christians," for the church of Jesus Christ has become the new "Israel of God" (Galatians 6:16).
The whole of Paul's argument hangs together throughout the letter, and is deftly summarized in today's lectionary reading. At some point during the worship service it would be great to have the whole congregation stand and recite Galatians 2:20 together as a shared testimony, confirming the truth of today's message.
Luke 7:36--8:3
John Calvin said that there were two aspects to faith: assentia and fiducia. The first we often translate as "assent." It is in this dimension of faith that we acknowledge something exists. Assentia is knowing something factually, or knowing about someone only from a distance.
Calvin's second aspect of faith might well be termed "trust." It is a heart engagement, involving us personally in an emotional attachment with whatever we might have previously acknowledged only intellectually.
Take a chair, for instance. Assentia is our willingness to say that it could hold the person daring to sit on it. Fiducia, on the other hand, is the act of sitting on that chair ourselves, trusting its sturdiness to hold our bulk. Both are elements of faith. Both are important. But until the latter is added to the former, faith remains inert, distant, intellectual, and impersonal. That is why, as the apostle James once said (James 2:19), the demons, who have no intention of trusting God (fiducia) do still have a kind of faith in God (assentia).
The gospel reading today offers a strong incentive for us to get beyond talking about God and getting on with the business of engaging God as an active partner in our lives. Simon the Pharisee has faith in God, and invites the latest wandering religious lecturer (Jesus) over to dialogue about it. What he learns, however, is that faith talk means little if we carry on conversations one might just as easily hear in hell.
Meanwhile, in the habit of the times, neighborhood people are allowed quietly to sneak into the banquet hall and line the edges of the room so that they might overhear the wonderful erudition of the wealthy and the powerful. One woman doesn't keep to her place. She is a notorious street woman, and she dares to step away from the wall and touch Jesus. In fact, she performs acts of intimacy with him that embarrass all in the room, especially the host. In righteous anger (and perhaps a bit of holier-than-thou one-upmanship indignation toward Jesus) he confronts the guest of "honor" rather than the woman herself. That's where Jesus tells a story about motives that turns the whole episode on its head.
Dr. E. Stanley Jones related an incident from his missionary days illustrating Jesus' point. A young girl got tired of things at home, said Jones. She longed for the freedom of the streets and the excitement of the nightlife. She ran away to a large city. It wasn't long before she fell under the spell of a pimp and was degraded into a prostitute.
The girl's mother was beside herself with anxiety. It was true that things hadn't been going right between them, but a mother's love is restless and protective, and she had to find her daughter again. She remembered the child who sat on her lap, and the daughter who whispered in her ear, and needed somehow to renew their bond of trust.
Yet how should she begin the search? All she had heard were rumors about daughter, thirdhand reports that she was now wasting her body in the red-light district. The mother went to the city and simply began to walk, hoping to stumble across someone who might know her daughter. Up one street and down the next she trudged, talking to anyone who would listen, hoping for a clue to follow.
But to no avail. Her daughter didn't want to be found: shame; rebellion, spite ... Who can say what reasons mingle in our deceptive minds?
Eventually the quest tired even the mother. Before she returned home, she did one more thing. She carried a photograph that had been taken several years before, a picture of the two of them, mother and daughter, at a happier moment in both their lives. She got the photograph enlarged and made dozens of copies. Then she scattered those pictures around the area, hoping that one would catch her daughter's eye. On each photo she penned these five words: "Come home! I love you!"
One day the girl did see. She began to remember what love was all about. A holy restless gripped her soul, battering her resentment until she had to call her mother. The next day she was home.
Never once did the daughter stop assenting to the fact that she had a mother. But it wasn't until her mother's love called out the trust of her heart that she believed in all that "home" and "mother" and "love" could mean to her personally.
Jesus brings the same message "home" to Simon's house. If pictures of faith were taken that hour, who would have fiducia added to ascentia? Everyone in the room knew the answer as Simon turned away shamed. But Jesus question lingers with us today. Where is the love…?
Application
Ernest Gordon's book To End All Wars (Zondervan, 2002) is the true tale of what took place in the Japanese prison-of-war camp made famous by the movie The Bridge over the River Kwai. The camp stood at the end of the Bataan death march that brought Allied soldiers deep into the jungles of Asia. Few would survive, and everyone knew it. In order to make the best of a terrible situation they teamed up in pairs, each watching out for a buddy.
One prisoner was a strapping six-foot-three fellow built like a tower of iron. If any could come out of this alive, all felt he would. That was before his buddy got malaria. The smaller fellow was much weaker and very likely to die. Their captors did not want to deal with sickness; so anyone who was unable to work was confined in a "hot house" until he succumbed to heat exhaustion, dehydration, and the collapse of his bodily systems.
The sick man was locked into a hothouse and left to die. Surprisingly he did not die because every mealtime his strong buddy went out to him, under curses and threats from the guards, and shared his meager rations. Every night his strong buddy sneaked from the prison barracks, braved the watchful eyes above that held guns of death, and brought his own slim blanket to cover the fevered convulsions of the sick man.
At the end of two weeks the sick man astounded the guards by recovering well enough to be able to return to work. He even survived the entire camp experience and lived to tell about it. His buddy, however -- the strong man all thought invincible -- died very shortly of malaria, exposure, and dysentery. He had given his life to save his friend.
The story does not end there. When Allied troops liberated that camp at the close of the war in the Pacific virtually every prisoner was a Christian. There was a symphony orchestra in camp with instruments made of the crudest materials. There were worship services every Sunday, and the death toll was far lower than any expected. All this because of the silent testimony made by a strong man toward his buddy facing death.
Jesus, of course is the great example of sacrificial love. Today we have been reminded of the outcome where such behavior is not forthcoming (Ahab and Jezebel), or where it has been quickly forgotten (Galatians), or who in the room knows how best to express its faithful imitation this side of eternity (Luke).
Alternative Application
1 Kings 21:1-10 (11-14) 15-21a. The story of Naboth's assassination by Ahab and Jezebel provides a perfect opportunity to remind the community of faith of its mandate to stand with the poor, the oppressed, the marginalized, the widow, the orphan, and the disenfranchised. Who is Naboth in your community, and who will rise, in the name of God, to his defense?
Preaching the Psalm
Psalm 5:1-8
One of the most fundamental needs in the human psyche is the need to be heard.
This essential reality spreads across the arc of human existence. From infants to children to adolescents to adults and the aged, everyone needs to feel that that they are heard. Few things, in fact, will enrage a teenager more quickly than being ignored. The hormone fueled cry, "You're not listening to me" is heard in many a home across the land.
If we are heard, then we feel that we're part of the reality that influences our lives. At work, when workers make suggestions it goes a long way when a supervisor actually listens. If spouses stop what they're doing and listen to their partners, a healthier relationship will surely result. The list is long and can be applied across human experience. We need to be heard.
How much more does this need show itself when we are relating to God? The words of this psalm express it well. "Give ear to my words … listen to the sound of my cry…." If God is the Creator and the Ruler of the universe; if God is in charge of everything and will not listen to us, what becomes of us? The thought is daunting. Only when we are in dialogue with the holy does our belief in God make sense to us.
So when it appears that God isn't listening, we tend to get a little testy.
Yet perhaps the problem isn't about God listening to us. Maybe the issue is whether or not we are listening to God. Human beings get so busy issuing demands and making petitions to God that seldom do they stop to see if God has anything to say to them. Could it be that the still small voice of God might be attempting to get through to us? Is there a possibility that if humans just stopped with their incessant busy-ness and crying out, God just might be speaking?
It is said in some circles that God no longer speaks to humanity. One has to wonder if that is the case, or if humanity just doesn't listen anymore. Maybe it should be God is pouring out the words of this psalm. Maybe God is saying, "Give ear to my words, O humankind … listen to the sound of my cry…."
