Tuning the fourth turning
Commentary
People often think more highly of themselves than their behavior in fact reflects. This is the conclusion that Nicholas Epley and David Dunning (Cornell University) reached after a series of studies. In a variety of settings, they tested people's ability to predict their own behavior. Most described in a self-flattering way what they would do in a certain situation; but, when it came time to follow through on their predictions, they did not take the higher road they thought they would. It appears that the people did not really know themselves. They thought they were better than their behavior revealed. How easy it is to overestimate our goodness.
The prophet Isaiah stands up and throws the behavior of God's people back in their faces to show them that they are like wild grapes in the vineyard of the Lord. The writer to the Hebrews lifts up true examples of good people, who are such by their trust in the promises of God. Jesus, feeling the angst of his mission, describes households which have not found the higher road, but which are divided because of him.
What will we be like in our behavior at this time in history? Will we be wild grapes in the vineyard of the Lord? Or will we fit in with the great cloud of witnesses who live by faith?
Isaiah 5:1-7
It is hard to imagine the pivotal eighth century B.C. without the prophets' voice giving interpretation to the unfolding events. This watershed time featuring the collapse of the monarchy begged all kinds of questions as to how this came to be. So, the prophets speak forth -- Isaiah, Micah, Hosea and Amos.
Like a mourning dove in the evening hours, Isaiah sings a parable to help the people understand what is happening in their hearts and to their homes. He begins by introducing the beloved, the one who owns, cares for and loves the vineyard. It is pure metaphor, like Jesus' simple pearl-parable of the kingdom. It really needs no explanation. Still, the prophet is compelled to give one, so that there is no misunderstanding. That is why he slips into speaking the voice of God in 5:3-6.
God asks himself two questions: What more could I have done for the people? and Why did they rebel? The first question is rhetorical -- there really is nothing more that God could have done, as if God did not love the people adequately. The second question is accusatory -- the wild grapes are the result of their own doing. Thus, a judgment is announced, couched in metaphorical language, yet with clear meaning. God will remove his protective care from his people. There will be those who will come and trample the people underfoot. There will be no chance of it remaining a vineyard, a community with integrity. Thorns and drought will characterize the land and the people. The image of "waste" conveys the judgment of God upon what once was his pleasant planting.
The parable effectively ends in 5:7 with the voice of the prophet once again chiming in. Isaiah adds a note of clarification for any who may have ears to hear, but do not hear. The antithetical parallelism is striking and explains the coming judgment. So that the people do not think more highly of themselves than they ought to, Isaiah lays their sin before them in two dramatic words: bloodshed and a cry. The rest of the chapter explains in more detail what these words mean in terms of greed, indolence, doublespeak, pride, intemperance and lack of integrity. These are the wild grapes that displease the vineyard's Lord.
Hebrews 11:29--12:2
The Letter to the Hebrews is not shy about lifting up examples of faith to encourage others in their spiritual journey, especially when the going gets rough. Chapter 11 is like a "Who's Who" list in the world of faith. The central focus is on the patriarchs and Moses, with many other people brought in to fill out a cast of faithful witnesses throughout the ages. The verses of our pericope today highlight the Exodus miracle and the miraculous conquest of Jericho. Then, they speak very generally about the hardships and trials that God's people have endured from age to age. A few specific names are mentioned (Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David and Samuel) and many others are alluded to by the nature of their suffering (Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel and Stephen). Some of the examples describe what these people did with their faith. Others, what they suffered for their faith.
All these trusted in the promises of God. They did not receive the complete promise in their lifetime. For as Paul was to write centuries later, "All the promises of God find their Yes in [Jesus]" (2 Corinthians 1:20). That's how the writer to the Hebrews can say, "All these, though well attested by their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had foreseen something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect" (11:39-40).
Jesus is the one at the beginning and the one at the end of faith. He is the originator and completer of faith. He is the one who leads the believer to true faith in God ("I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me," John 14:6) and guarantees the consummation of that faith in truth ("He who has seen me has seen the Father ... I and the Father are one," John 14:9 and 10:30; see especially John 10:27-30).
Luke 12:49-56
One should not mistake Jesus' ardent expression of completing his mission with the zealous fervor of a radical. It is more like an "eager angst." Yes, Jesus is intent on fulfilling his mission; but the depth of suffering that it means for him and also for his followers takes much of the joy out of it. There is a brooding gloom that overshadows Jesus' words today.
The reason for this is, of course, his own impending death, on the one hand, and on the other hand, the divisions that will ensue between those with faith in him and those without faith in him. These factors explain why he is "overcome," "hard pressed," "seized" by the reality of it all. One could understandably translate (12:50), "I am so depressed over the matter!" (Or to put it in the vernacular: "I'm really bummed out about this!")
Rather than turn inward upon himself and sulk (which would be typically human), Jesus uses his experience as a launching pad to warn his disciples about the nature of reality when it comes to their faith and the lack of faith within others. People will react to Jesus in very different ways. Even households will experience disunity when it comes to him. That, however, is the dynamic when truth intersects with people's perspective on just about any matter, but most specifically here with people's perspective on Jesus. Truth is not like a big lasso that can capture all and ring it into one cozy corral. If that were the case, Pharaoh would have listened to Moses, Ahab to Elijah, Herod to John the Baptist, the crowd to Pilate.
Implicit in Luke's account here is what Matthew spells out specifically when he clarifies that it is in the name of Jesus that this dissension will happen (Matthew 10:18, 22). One wonders if Jesus already had families in mind when he spoke about the discord that would occur between relatives regarding discipleship. How sad that the Prince of Peace had to admit that due to human hubris his very presence on earth would bring about the opposite of his intentions.
Application
What wild grapes are growing in our vineyards today? There are varieties of rogue crops that can be found in different communities. Where one neighborhood may not have an issue with racism, it may be struggling with economic injustice. Where one area may have drug abuse and violent crime on every corner, another area may be infested with white-collar crime behind boardroom doors. Despite local nuances, the human predicament is quite the same from age to age and from community to community. The grapes are wild! They are manifestations of the Garden's rebellion against the authority of God's will for goodness in life. Hence, the bitter taste in the wine of life. "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God ... [therefore] the wages of sin is death" (Romans 3:23 and 6:23).
What would it mean today to affirm with Isaiah that we are the pleasant planting of the Lord, even as we see and admit the wildness of our present growth? Would it not heighten the personal anguish of one who felt admonished by God? Would this be the groundwork for repentance? Can the love song create a sorrow in the heart of the one who betrayed the love, such that the sorrow will move one to change?
There is a certain maturity that is required for this to happen, however. Initially, people in their infant stage of life and faith, still influenced by the delusion of innocence, will ask the question, "Why me?" whenever it comes to times of crisis, oppression and perceived judgment. It is the more mature person who realizes that the correct question is "Why not me?" Innocence gives way to truthful confession, which in turn can give way to true repentance. This is when God can once again continue the digging and clearing, the planting and the pressing to yield the fine wine that is to his pleasure and for our blessing.
In the midst of all this, there are legends of the Fall (to borrow from a movie title), people who have lived their lives in faith, trusting the promises of God even from the faulty foundation of their own human frailty. We can be encouraged today, regardless of our circumstances, to also lay hold of the promises of God, especially since we have seen their fulfillment, their Yes, in Jesus. He has gone before us, like a drum major in a parade, and he is walking with us, like a fellow corps member.
When we encounter the human predicament in ourselves or in our neighbor, we need not despair. God has addressed our need forthrightly in the cross of Christ. That having been done and with Jesus now "seated at the right hand of the throne of God" (Hebrews 12:2), we can have confidence in the journey of life. Freed from the weight of sin and despair, we can "run with perseverance the race that is set before us" (Hebrews 12:1).
That race may indeed be arduous in the years ahead, as William Strauss and Neil Howe anticipate in their prophetic work The Fourth Turning: What the Cycles of History Tell Us About America's Next Rendezvous with Destiny (Broadway Books, 1997). The two authors posit a provocative theory of American history as a series of recurring 80- to 100-year cycles. Each cycle has four "turnings" -- a High, an Awakening, an Unraveling and a Crisis. The authors see today's America as midway through an Unraveling, roughly a decade away from the next Crisis, or Fourth Turning.
"History offers no guarantees," the authors say. "Obviously, things could go horribly wrong ... We should not assume that Providence will always exempt our nation from the irreversible tragedies that have overtaken so many others."
Yet, even with this foreboding of judgment, there is an ever-present hope of an eternal return to a season of rebirth after a season of death. The responsible thing to do is to prepare for the harshness of the winter in anticipation of the coming spring. To do this takes faith ("by faith"), trusting in the promises of God that take precedence over his acts of judgment.
This faith, in turn, takes courage. For, in some sense, we may be like our forebearers in faith, who "did not receive what was promised" (Hebrews 11:39). If the analysis in The Fourth Turning is true, and if Jacques Barzun is right in his description of Western cultural life, that we are "old and unraveling," then we'd better be prepared to live and die by the promises of God we hold dear. Jesus is still the "perfecter" (completer) of our faith; we will not see the glory we had hoped for ourselves or for our children or for our children's children on this earth. That will have to wait until it is revealed to us in heaven. If in the near future we fare no better than the "great cloud of witnesses" who have gone before us (see especially Hebrews 11:32-38), we will nonetheless join that cloud for the sake of future generations as we in our day look to Jesus and follow his way into tomorrow, confident that Paul is right when he writes, "in the Lord your labor is not in vain" (1 Corinthians 15:58).
Strauss and Howe, at the conclusion of their book, point out several practical ways in which we can prepare ourselves for the Fourth Turning, which will include personal sacrifice and public authority. The areas in which this preparation should take place are areas where Christians can be active and helpful: values, institutions, politics, economy, defense, and the respective needs of youth and the elderly especially.
Many weather forecasters have wondered if their labor is in vain, when they have predicted a certain weather pattern to sweep across the landscape, only to be fooled by Mother Nature. Yet, it is much easier for us to get a sense of the approaching weather than it is to discern the working of the Spirit in our midst. This is why the prophets have been needed throughout history. They clue the people in on what God is doing and where God is doing it.
Today, there may be voices in our midst that God has raised up to speak forth what God is doing with the divine work of judgment and mercy -- and where God is doing it. Two prophetic icons of recent history who have had a global impact are Martin Luther King, Jr., and Mother Teresa. It would not be gratuitous, however, to say that any Christian can fulfill the prophet's role, especially when working faithfully in the routines of daily life, tending to every-day responsibilities and giving witness to the presence, promises and power of God in the "little things" of life.
As much as people like to have a good grasp on "events and happenings" in the world today, they are most concerned with their own household. Many of those households are divided and need a word of encouragement and guidance in dealing with the division. It may have to do with intra-faith differences within the Christian fellowship. But, more times than not it has to do with inter-faith relationships (Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, Hindu, Shintoist, etc.) and relationships between faith and non-faith, between the religious practitioner and the non-religious person.
How can we help Christians today bear witness in a world that may not be interested in listening to the Christian witness? If offense is going to be taken, even by family members, how can we be sure that it is the gospel itself that gives the offense (as in 1 Corinthians 1:23) and not our way of conveying it? How can we remain in a vital relationship with and witness to people who do not see the significance of what Jesus has done for them and us or who do not care whether God is even partially interested and involved in our daily lives?
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Isaiah 5:1-7
It is quite amazing how many vineyards have been planted in the U.S. It used to be that we looked only to France or Germany for fine wine, but now we can buy equal vintage from California or Virginia or even Pennsylvania. Entrepreneurs have planted lots of vineyards in this country in the last few years.
Our text for the morning tells us that the Lord also planted a vineyard, and the prophet Isaiah turns minstrel to tell us about it. Isaiah of Jerusalem was probably a somewhat wealthy prophet of the eighth century B.C. in the southern kingdom of Judah. He had entrance to the highest circles of Judean society and to the royal court, and so we can well imagine him singing this ballad among the courtiers of the royal court. He tells them he's going to sing a love song about his "beloved," and of course romantic songs always excite interest.
In his song, Isaiah recounts that his beloved had a vineyard of which he took very good care. He cleared out all the stones from a rocky hill of Judah, he planted the finest grape vines. He even built a watchtower in the middle of the vineyard to guard against marauding animals and thieving enemies and prepared a wine vat in which to store the juice of the grapes. The beloved was sure that his vineyard would yield choice grapes ('anavim). But much to the beloved's disappointment, the fruit tasted awful, like tiny wild grapes found in the wilderness (b'ushim). So what more could he have done? bewilderly asks the beloved, now speaking in the first person. His listeners shake their heads and reply, "Nothing."
All right, then, says the beloved. I'll tell you what I will do. I'll give up on that rotten vineyard. I'll tear down the wall and uproot the hedge around it. I'll neglect it totally, so that thorns and weeds and briars grow up its vines. And I'll even command the rain not to rain upon it! Whoa! say the listeners. The beloved controls the rain? We thought only God could do that. So is the beloved God?
And indeed he is. When the prophet Isaiah sings this ballad, he sings about the God, the Beloved, the Lord of Israel, and about Judah who is compared to a vineyard. And he tells about the centuries of care that God has lavished on his vineyard Israel -- redeeming their life from Egyptian bondage, guiding them through the wilderness to a promised land, giving them a davidic king, constantly forgiving and guiding, struggling and weeping over them.
And in return for all of that care and love that God poured out on Israel, he expected them faithfully to return his love by exercising his justice (mishpat), that is, his order in Judean society. But instead their common life was marked by bloodshed (mitzpach). The Lord, who loved Israel, expected that in gratitude toward him, the Judeans would practice righteousness (tzedekah), i.e. covenant faithfulness, toward all. But all they did was prompt cries (tz'akah) of alarm and violence among the populace. So, proclaimed Isaiah, the Lord was going to neglect and destroy his vineyard Judah, and they would fall victim to the armies of the Assyrian Empire.
Throughout the scriptures, the people of Israel are called God's vine or vineyard, whom he has lovingly planted in the land of Palestine (Psalm 80:8-13; Isaiah 27:2-6; Jeremiah 12:10; Mark 12:1-12 and parallels). And throughout the scriptures, the rottenness of the vine is seen. One of the remarkable facts about the story of Israel is that its authors consistently state that the people have never been faithful to their Lord.
And that's pretty much our story too, isn't it? When we Christians are compared to plants in the New Testament, we're described by the Apostle Paul as "wild branches" (Romans 11:17-24). Or, teaches our Lord Jesus, we can become like grape vines that bear no fruit and so are fit for nothing but to be thrown into the fire and burned (John 15:1-6). Surely God has lavished on us the most loving care, and we too, in utter ingratitude, have often brought forth injustice and bloodshed and cries for help in our society.
But there is one wholesome vine among us, friends -- one fruitful planting of God who brings forth good fruit of faithfulness and justice and peace. And his name is Jesus Christ. "I am the true vine," Christ teaches (John 15:1), the final incarnation of everything that the vine of Israel was meant to be. And the Lord Christ tells us that by abiding in him, clinging to him and his ways in faith and obedience, we too can bring forth the good fruits of righteousness and peace and justice. "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing" (John 15:5).
Lutheran Option -- Jeremiah 23:23-29
Re-imagining God. That is a great fad in our time, to turn the Lord God into an object of our speculations. Many persons do not know very much about the God of the scriptures these days, because they have rarely studied and absorbed the Holy Writ. Or, some who have read the Bible do not like what they have read. The portrayal of God in the Old and New Testaments does not conform to whom they think God should be. As a result, such persons have set out to re-imagine God, to conjure up out of their own minds and experiences a deity more suited to their liking and to their situation.
That is not a new phenomenon, because we find prophets in the Judah of the eighth century B.C. doing exactly the same thing. Our text for the morning is a portion of the prophet Jeremiah's words in 9:9-40, concerning the false prophets in his country. Such false preachers have thought to bring God down to their level and to re-imagine him anew. They justify their prophecies by saying they have had a dream or a new revelation of God, when what they are really doing is inventing words out of their own hearts and minds and claiming them to be the Word of the Lord, much like some in our time who claim to know who God is only on the basis of their own experiences. In other words, they construct an imaginary God. They re-imagine him. And then they claim to speak the truth about the Lord.
In our text, God himself, through his prophet Jeremiah, says two things. First of all, we cannot bring God down to our level, to be re-imagined and manipulated at our will. The Lord is a transcendent God, a holy God, who is not at the beck and call of human beings. To be sure, in his mercy he lowers himself to be with us in his Spirit. But he does so only when he wills to do so. We do not command him. He is Lord of heaven and earth, not the servant-boy of human beings (vv. 23-24).
Second, the true words of God are powerful words that can be compared in their force to a sledge hammer that breaks rocks in pieces. God's words bring about results. They pluck up and break down, they destroy and overthrow, they build and they plant (Jeremiah 1:10). They are words that created the universes and that gave life to all being. They are words that set a slave people free and turned them into a nation. They are words that enthrone kings or make the rulers of the earth as nothing (Isaiah 40:22-23). They are a Word that overcame all sin and defeated the power of the death. Yes, they are words that can transform your life and mine. And they are not to be compared with human words and opinions, with vague dreams and re-imaginings of sinful human beings (Jeremiah 23:28-29).
So the call of Jeremiah to us is to seek out the true Word of God, that was incarnated for us in Jesus Christ, and that is spoken to us through the scriptures. For only that Word is truth, good Christians, and the way to God and life.
The prophet Isaiah stands up and throws the behavior of God's people back in their faces to show them that they are like wild grapes in the vineyard of the Lord. The writer to the Hebrews lifts up true examples of good people, who are such by their trust in the promises of God. Jesus, feeling the angst of his mission, describes households which have not found the higher road, but which are divided because of him.
What will we be like in our behavior at this time in history? Will we be wild grapes in the vineyard of the Lord? Or will we fit in with the great cloud of witnesses who live by faith?
Isaiah 5:1-7
It is hard to imagine the pivotal eighth century B.C. without the prophets' voice giving interpretation to the unfolding events. This watershed time featuring the collapse of the monarchy begged all kinds of questions as to how this came to be. So, the prophets speak forth -- Isaiah, Micah, Hosea and Amos.
Like a mourning dove in the evening hours, Isaiah sings a parable to help the people understand what is happening in their hearts and to their homes. He begins by introducing the beloved, the one who owns, cares for and loves the vineyard. It is pure metaphor, like Jesus' simple pearl-parable of the kingdom. It really needs no explanation. Still, the prophet is compelled to give one, so that there is no misunderstanding. That is why he slips into speaking the voice of God in 5:3-6.
God asks himself two questions: What more could I have done for the people? and Why did they rebel? The first question is rhetorical -- there really is nothing more that God could have done, as if God did not love the people adequately. The second question is accusatory -- the wild grapes are the result of their own doing. Thus, a judgment is announced, couched in metaphorical language, yet with clear meaning. God will remove his protective care from his people. There will be those who will come and trample the people underfoot. There will be no chance of it remaining a vineyard, a community with integrity. Thorns and drought will characterize the land and the people. The image of "waste" conveys the judgment of God upon what once was his pleasant planting.
The parable effectively ends in 5:7 with the voice of the prophet once again chiming in. Isaiah adds a note of clarification for any who may have ears to hear, but do not hear. The antithetical parallelism is striking and explains the coming judgment. So that the people do not think more highly of themselves than they ought to, Isaiah lays their sin before them in two dramatic words: bloodshed and a cry. The rest of the chapter explains in more detail what these words mean in terms of greed, indolence, doublespeak, pride, intemperance and lack of integrity. These are the wild grapes that displease the vineyard's Lord.
Hebrews 11:29--12:2
The Letter to the Hebrews is not shy about lifting up examples of faith to encourage others in their spiritual journey, especially when the going gets rough. Chapter 11 is like a "Who's Who" list in the world of faith. The central focus is on the patriarchs and Moses, with many other people brought in to fill out a cast of faithful witnesses throughout the ages. The verses of our pericope today highlight the Exodus miracle and the miraculous conquest of Jericho. Then, they speak very generally about the hardships and trials that God's people have endured from age to age. A few specific names are mentioned (Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David and Samuel) and many others are alluded to by the nature of their suffering (Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel and Stephen). Some of the examples describe what these people did with their faith. Others, what they suffered for their faith.
All these trusted in the promises of God. They did not receive the complete promise in their lifetime. For as Paul was to write centuries later, "All the promises of God find their Yes in [Jesus]" (2 Corinthians 1:20). That's how the writer to the Hebrews can say, "All these, though well attested by their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had foreseen something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect" (11:39-40).
Jesus is the one at the beginning and the one at the end of faith. He is the originator and completer of faith. He is the one who leads the believer to true faith in God ("I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me," John 14:6) and guarantees the consummation of that faith in truth ("He who has seen me has seen the Father ... I and the Father are one," John 14:9 and 10:30; see especially John 10:27-30).
Luke 12:49-56
One should not mistake Jesus' ardent expression of completing his mission with the zealous fervor of a radical. It is more like an "eager angst." Yes, Jesus is intent on fulfilling his mission; but the depth of suffering that it means for him and also for his followers takes much of the joy out of it. There is a brooding gloom that overshadows Jesus' words today.
The reason for this is, of course, his own impending death, on the one hand, and on the other hand, the divisions that will ensue between those with faith in him and those without faith in him. These factors explain why he is "overcome," "hard pressed," "seized" by the reality of it all. One could understandably translate (12:50), "I am so depressed over the matter!" (Or to put it in the vernacular: "I'm really bummed out about this!")
Rather than turn inward upon himself and sulk (which would be typically human), Jesus uses his experience as a launching pad to warn his disciples about the nature of reality when it comes to their faith and the lack of faith within others. People will react to Jesus in very different ways. Even households will experience disunity when it comes to him. That, however, is the dynamic when truth intersects with people's perspective on just about any matter, but most specifically here with people's perspective on Jesus. Truth is not like a big lasso that can capture all and ring it into one cozy corral. If that were the case, Pharaoh would have listened to Moses, Ahab to Elijah, Herod to John the Baptist, the crowd to Pilate.
Implicit in Luke's account here is what Matthew spells out specifically when he clarifies that it is in the name of Jesus that this dissension will happen (Matthew 10:18, 22). One wonders if Jesus already had families in mind when he spoke about the discord that would occur between relatives regarding discipleship. How sad that the Prince of Peace had to admit that due to human hubris his very presence on earth would bring about the opposite of his intentions.
Application
What wild grapes are growing in our vineyards today? There are varieties of rogue crops that can be found in different communities. Where one neighborhood may not have an issue with racism, it may be struggling with economic injustice. Where one area may have drug abuse and violent crime on every corner, another area may be infested with white-collar crime behind boardroom doors. Despite local nuances, the human predicament is quite the same from age to age and from community to community. The grapes are wild! They are manifestations of the Garden's rebellion against the authority of God's will for goodness in life. Hence, the bitter taste in the wine of life. "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God ... [therefore] the wages of sin is death" (Romans 3:23 and 6:23).
What would it mean today to affirm with Isaiah that we are the pleasant planting of the Lord, even as we see and admit the wildness of our present growth? Would it not heighten the personal anguish of one who felt admonished by God? Would this be the groundwork for repentance? Can the love song create a sorrow in the heart of the one who betrayed the love, such that the sorrow will move one to change?
There is a certain maturity that is required for this to happen, however. Initially, people in their infant stage of life and faith, still influenced by the delusion of innocence, will ask the question, "Why me?" whenever it comes to times of crisis, oppression and perceived judgment. It is the more mature person who realizes that the correct question is "Why not me?" Innocence gives way to truthful confession, which in turn can give way to true repentance. This is when God can once again continue the digging and clearing, the planting and the pressing to yield the fine wine that is to his pleasure and for our blessing.
In the midst of all this, there are legends of the Fall (to borrow from a movie title), people who have lived their lives in faith, trusting the promises of God even from the faulty foundation of their own human frailty. We can be encouraged today, regardless of our circumstances, to also lay hold of the promises of God, especially since we have seen their fulfillment, their Yes, in Jesus. He has gone before us, like a drum major in a parade, and he is walking with us, like a fellow corps member.
When we encounter the human predicament in ourselves or in our neighbor, we need not despair. God has addressed our need forthrightly in the cross of Christ. That having been done and with Jesus now "seated at the right hand of the throne of God" (Hebrews 12:2), we can have confidence in the journey of life. Freed from the weight of sin and despair, we can "run with perseverance the race that is set before us" (Hebrews 12:1).
That race may indeed be arduous in the years ahead, as William Strauss and Neil Howe anticipate in their prophetic work The Fourth Turning: What the Cycles of History Tell Us About America's Next Rendezvous with Destiny (Broadway Books, 1997). The two authors posit a provocative theory of American history as a series of recurring 80- to 100-year cycles. Each cycle has four "turnings" -- a High, an Awakening, an Unraveling and a Crisis. The authors see today's America as midway through an Unraveling, roughly a decade away from the next Crisis, or Fourth Turning.
"History offers no guarantees," the authors say. "Obviously, things could go horribly wrong ... We should not assume that Providence will always exempt our nation from the irreversible tragedies that have overtaken so many others."
Yet, even with this foreboding of judgment, there is an ever-present hope of an eternal return to a season of rebirth after a season of death. The responsible thing to do is to prepare for the harshness of the winter in anticipation of the coming spring. To do this takes faith ("by faith"), trusting in the promises of God that take precedence over his acts of judgment.
This faith, in turn, takes courage. For, in some sense, we may be like our forebearers in faith, who "did not receive what was promised" (Hebrews 11:39). If the analysis in The Fourth Turning is true, and if Jacques Barzun is right in his description of Western cultural life, that we are "old and unraveling," then we'd better be prepared to live and die by the promises of God we hold dear. Jesus is still the "perfecter" (completer) of our faith; we will not see the glory we had hoped for ourselves or for our children or for our children's children on this earth. That will have to wait until it is revealed to us in heaven. If in the near future we fare no better than the "great cloud of witnesses" who have gone before us (see especially Hebrews 11:32-38), we will nonetheless join that cloud for the sake of future generations as we in our day look to Jesus and follow his way into tomorrow, confident that Paul is right when he writes, "in the Lord your labor is not in vain" (1 Corinthians 15:58).
Strauss and Howe, at the conclusion of their book, point out several practical ways in which we can prepare ourselves for the Fourth Turning, which will include personal sacrifice and public authority. The areas in which this preparation should take place are areas where Christians can be active and helpful: values, institutions, politics, economy, defense, and the respective needs of youth and the elderly especially.
Many weather forecasters have wondered if their labor is in vain, when they have predicted a certain weather pattern to sweep across the landscape, only to be fooled by Mother Nature. Yet, it is much easier for us to get a sense of the approaching weather than it is to discern the working of the Spirit in our midst. This is why the prophets have been needed throughout history. They clue the people in on what God is doing and where God is doing it.
Today, there may be voices in our midst that God has raised up to speak forth what God is doing with the divine work of judgment and mercy -- and where God is doing it. Two prophetic icons of recent history who have had a global impact are Martin Luther King, Jr., and Mother Teresa. It would not be gratuitous, however, to say that any Christian can fulfill the prophet's role, especially when working faithfully in the routines of daily life, tending to every-day responsibilities and giving witness to the presence, promises and power of God in the "little things" of life.
As much as people like to have a good grasp on "events and happenings" in the world today, they are most concerned with their own household. Many of those households are divided and need a word of encouragement and guidance in dealing with the division. It may have to do with intra-faith differences within the Christian fellowship. But, more times than not it has to do with inter-faith relationships (Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, Hindu, Shintoist, etc.) and relationships between faith and non-faith, between the religious practitioner and the non-religious person.
How can we help Christians today bear witness in a world that may not be interested in listening to the Christian witness? If offense is going to be taken, even by family members, how can we be sure that it is the gospel itself that gives the offense (as in 1 Corinthians 1:23) and not our way of conveying it? How can we remain in a vital relationship with and witness to people who do not see the significance of what Jesus has done for them and us or who do not care whether God is even partially interested and involved in our daily lives?
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Isaiah 5:1-7
It is quite amazing how many vineyards have been planted in the U.S. It used to be that we looked only to France or Germany for fine wine, but now we can buy equal vintage from California or Virginia or even Pennsylvania. Entrepreneurs have planted lots of vineyards in this country in the last few years.
Our text for the morning tells us that the Lord also planted a vineyard, and the prophet Isaiah turns minstrel to tell us about it. Isaiah of Jerusalem was probably a somewhat wealthy prophet of the eighth century B.C. in the southern kingdom of Judah. He had entrance to the highest circles of Judean society and to the royal court, and so we can well imagine him singing this ballad among the courtiers of the royal court. He tells them he's going to sing a love song about his "beloved," and of course romantic songs always excite interest.
In his song, Isaiah recounts that his beloved had a vineyard of which he took very good care. He cleared out all the stones from a rocky hill of Judah, he planted the finest grape vines. He even built a watchtower in the middle of the vineyard to guard against marauding animals and thieving enemies and prepared a wine vat in which to store the juice of the grapes. The beloved was sure that his vineyard would yield choice grapes ('anavim). But much to the beloved's disappointment, the fruit tasted awful, like tiny wild grapes found in the wilderness (b'ushim). So what more could he have done? bewilderly asks the beloved, now speaking in the first person. His listeners shake their heads and reply, "Nothing."
All right, then, says the beloved. I'll tell you what I will do. I'll give up on that rotten vineyard. I'll tear down the wall and uproot the hedge around it. I'll neglect it totally, so that thorns and weeds and briars grow up its vines. And I'll even command the rain not to rain upon it! Whoa! say the listeners. The beloved controls the rain? We thought only God could do that. So is the beloved God?
And indeed he is. When the prophet Isaiah sings this ballad, he sings about the God, the Beloved, the Lord of Israel, and about Judah who is compared to a vineyard. And he tells about the centuries of care that God has lavished on his vineyard Israel -- redeeming their life from Egyptian bondage, guiding them through the wilderness to a promised land, giving them a davidic king, constantly forgiving and guiding, struggling and weeping over them.
And in return for all of that care and love that God poured out on Israel, he expected them faithfully to return his love by exercising his justice (mishpat), that is, his order in Judean society. But instead their common life was marked by bloodshed (mitzpach). The Lord, who loved Israel, expected that in gratitude toward him, the Judeans would practice righteousness (tzedekah), i.e. covenant faithfulness, toward all. But all they did was prompt cries (tz'akah) of alarm and violence among the populace. So, proclaimed Isaiah, the Lord was going to neglect and destroy his vineyard Judah, and they would fall victim to the armies of the Assyrian Empire.
Throughout the scriptures, the people of Israel are called God's vine or vineyard, whom he has lovingly planted in the land of Palestine (Psalm 80:8-13; Isaiah 27:2-6; Jeremiah 12:10; Mark 12:1-12 and parallels). And throughout the scriptures, the rottenness of the vine is seen. One of the remarkable facts about the story of Israel is that its authors consistently state that the people have never been faithful to their Lord.
And that's pretty much our story too, isn't it? When we Christians are compared to plants in the New Testament, we're described by the Apostle Paul as "wild branches" (Romans 11:17-24). Or, teaches our Lord Jesus, we can become like grape vines that bear no fruit and so are fit for nothing but to be thrown into the fire and burned (John 15:1-6). Surely God has lavished on us the most loving care, and we too, in utter ingratitude, have often brought forth injustice and bloodshed and cries for help in our society.
But there is one wholesome vine among us, friends -- one fruitful planting of God who brings forth good fruit of faithfulness and justice and peace. And his name is Jesus Christ. "I am the true vine," Christ teaches (John 15:1), the final incarnation of everything that the vine of Israel was meant to be. And the Lord Christ tells us that by abiding in him, clinging to him and his ways in faith and obedience, we too can bring forth the good fruits of righteousness and peace and justice. "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing" (John 15:5).
Lutheran Option -- Jeremiah 23:23-29
Re-imagining God. That is a great fad in our time, to turn the Lord God into an object of our speculations. Many persons do not know very much about the God of the scriptures these days, because they have rarely studied and absorbed the Holy Writ. Or, some who have read the Bible do not like what they have read. The portrayal of God in the Old and New Testaments does not conform to whom they think God should be. As a result, such persons have set out to re-imagine God, to conjure up out of their own minds and experiences a deity more suited to their liking and to their situation.
That is not a new phenomenon, because we find prophets in the Judah of the eighth century B.C. doing exactly the same thing. Our text for the morning is a portion of the prophet Jeremiah's words in 9:9-40, concerning the false prophets in his country. Such false preachers have thought to bring God down to their level and to re-imagine him anew. They justify their prophecies by saying they have had a dream or a new revelation of God, when what they are really doing is inventing words out of their own hearts and minds and claiming them to be the Word of the Lord, much like some in our time who claim to know who God is only on the basis of their own experiences. In other words, they construct an imaginary God. They re-imagine him. And then they claim to speak the truth about the Lord.
In our text, God himself, through his prophet Jeremiah, says two things. First of all, we cannot bring God down to our level, to be re-imagined and manipulated at our will. The Lord is a transcendent God, a holy God, who is not at the beck and call of human beings. To be sure, in his mercy he lowers himself to be with us in his Spirit. But he does so only when he wills to do so. We do not command him. He is Lord of heaven and earth, not the servant-boy of human beings (vv. 23-24).
Second, the true words of God are powerful words that can be compared in their force to a sledge hammer that breaks rocks in pieces. God's words bring about results. They pluck up and break down, they destroy and overthrow, they build and they plant (Jeremiah 1:10). They are words that created the universes and that gave life to all being. They are words that set a slave people free and turned them into a nation. They are words that enthrone kings or make the rulers of the earth as nothing (Isaiah 40:22-23). They are a Word that overcame all sin and defeated the power of the death. Yes, they are words that can transform your life and mine. And they are not to be compared with human words and opinions, with vague dreams and re-imaginings of sinful human beings (Jeremiah 23:28-29).
So the call of Jeremiah to us is to seek out the true Word of God, that was incarnated for us in Jesus Christ, and that is spoken to us through the scriptures. For only that Word is truth, good Christians, and the way to God and life.
