What Just Happened Out There?
Commentary
Nothing is something because it provides a blank stage for God’s miracles to be clearly seen. One second, we don’t think we’ve got anything. Then we realize we’ve got everything, and more. Joel’s prophecy following a devastating attack on the crops by locusts is a reminder that God will do even more than replacing everything that was physically done to their ravages, in terms of crops and survival – God is planning a new era in which we will recognize the universality of God’s Holy Spirit, and the presence of the Spirit among all in society.
Paul recognizes, waiting on death row, that even though he is reaching the end of the race he is completing, he is ready to be poured out like the drink offering, because of the crown of righteousness that awaits.
And finally, the overflowing abundance of Luke’s account of the parables of Jesus suggests we’ve been shortchanging the miraculous working of salvation in Christ. Not only is the humble tax collector fully justified, but it’s just as probable that both Pharisee and tax collector walked out arm in arm, in God’s good graces, together.
Joel 2:23-32, Psalm 65
This prophecy was likely inspired by the anguish and despair when a plague of locusts destroyed crops and hope among a huge swath of people. They were sharing in universal misery from a natural disaster. Now the prophet says that in God’s time they will share in hope and renewal.
The people will gain back everything they lost with the locusts. Joel says that God’s promise of plenty will give way to a time of overabundance, of feasting. Harvest was a time of excess and celebration when it was over. It would be hard, facing shortages that could lead to mass starvation, to believe they would have full stomachs and full barns, full of hope.
But Joel’s prophecy following a devastating attack on the crops by locusts is that God will do. He will do even more than replace everything that was physically to their ravages, in terms of crops and survival — God is planning a new era in which we will recognize the universality of God’s Holy Spirit, and the presence of the Spirit among all in society. God’s Spirit will be as plentifully present as the excess crops, never going spiritually hungry, celebrating in the Spirit. God’s Spirit will be poured out on all flesh — sons, daughters, male and female slaves, old and young, all will partake in the renewal and restoration. Out of nothing will come something greater than we can imagine.
Psalm 65 celebrates the same abundance, and now the whole world, the cosmos celebrates the fact that God is present on earth, watering, enriching, providing. We must not forget how things were. The ancient wagon tracks keep record of the past, of people on the move, before they are settled in their forever home. The proof of God’s love is visible all around us.
2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18
Paul has run the good race, fought the good fight, finished the course. The ancient athletic games, both the Olympics and competitions modelled after the Olympics, emphasized the first-place winner. The list of champions never included those who finished a close second, much less those who would only have earned a participation trophy, were there such a thing in those days.
But Paul still claims he will gain the victor’s crown, which he shares with his crucified Lord – talk about your ultimate loser — and with all who long for Christ’s reappearing. Death is near, and Paul has no way of knowing he will literally go down in history, that two thousand years later, believers and nonbelievers will read and quote from his letters, that we will take his lessons to heart. In the final verses of this letter the tone is almost pathetic, as Paul lists those who abandoned him and those who stuck by him. In loss he has gained everything. In finishing he is a victor.
These particular words continue to inspire. Only a generation later the martyr Ignatius, the overseer of the Antioch congregation, would write ahead to the Roman Christians, towards whom he was sailing, a prisoner on a ship headed toward Rome where he was condemned to be thrown to the beasts, and he would quote these very words, echoing Paul’s statement that he is already being poured out as a drink offering on the altar, writing, “Grant me nothing more than that I be poured out to God, while an altar is still ready….” (Ignatius to the Romans, 2).
Let us resolve to run our race as well, and finish, regardless of what that looks like the world.
Luke 18:9-14
Wouldn’t it be nice to have the problem of an overabundance of salvation?
Typically, this parable is a slam dunk. Tax Collector rules. Pharisee drools. He shoots. He scores! Everyone goes home for Sunday dinner.
But The New Cambridge Bible Commentary on The Gospel of Luke, co-written by Ben Witherington III, and evangelical New Testament scholar, and Amy-Jill Levine, an acclaimed Jewish New Testament scholar, is filled with insights created by the synergy of their theological conversation. The authors suggest (and please give them credit)
Both individuals belong in the temple for public prayer. They both evidently fulfill the requirements for ritual purity or they wouldn’t have been allowed inside. Many might have considered the tax collector a collaborator with the hated Roman occupiers. They paid the tax for a targeted population, then made a profit by collecting back that money, and then some, from everyone in the district. Notice that in his prayer he does not raise his eyes to heaven. The Greek word hilaskomai means propitiated, wishing to be justified before God, but unlike the tax collector we will meet in the next chapter, Zaccheaus, he does not ask for forgiveness nor does he offer to pay back what he has stolen. He wants to be made right with God without having to do the work.
The Pharisee is tone deaf. Yes, it is right for him to thank God he is not a thief, a rogue, an adulterer, or a tax collector, but in saying all this aloud he comes off as arrogant, clueless, and a little self-absorbed. They suggest Jesus wants us to laugh at him.
The good news is that the Greek word para, often translated as “rather than,” (This man went to his home justified rather than the other….”) can also be translated as alongside. The two may have left together. Divine mercy is offered to both. Faults and all, they may have realized that they are both in need of God’s grace. And that we readers, rather than feeling smug in comparison to these two old sinners, perhaps should hope more earnestly that we can join them in their new relationship among the saved.
Paul recognizes, waiting on death row, that even though he is reaching the end of the race he is completing, he is ready to be poured out like the drink offering, because of the crown of righteousness that awaits.
And finally, the overflowing abundance of Luke’s account of the parables of Jesus suggests we’ve been shortchanging the miraculous working of salvation in Christ. Not only is the humble tax collector fully justified, but it’s just as probable that both Pharisee and tax collector walked out arm in arm, in God’s good graces, together.
Joel 2:23-32, Psalm 65
This prophecy was likely inspired by the anguish and despair when a plague of locusts destroyed crops and hope among a huge swath of people. They were sharing in universal misery from a natural disaster. Now the prophet says that in God’s time they will share in hope and renewal.
The people will gain back everything they lost with the locusts. Joel says that God’s promise of plenty will give way to a time of overabundance, of feasting. Harvest was a time of excess and celebration when it was over. It would be hard, facing shortages that could lead to mass starvation, to believe they would have full stomachs and full barns, full of hope.
But Joel’s prophecy following a devastating attack on the crops by locusts is that God will do. He will do even more than replace everything that was physically to their ravages, in terms of crops and survival — God is planning a new era in which we will recognize the universality of God’s Holy Spirit, and the presence of the Spirit among all in society. God’s Spirit will be as plentifully present as the excess crops, never going spiritually hungry, celebrating in the Spirit. God’s Spirit will be poured out on all flesh — sons, daughters, male and female slaves, old and young, all will partake in the renewal and restoration. Out of nothing will come something greater than we can imagine.
Psalm 65 celebrates the same abundance, and now the whole world, the cosmos celebrates the fact that God is present on earth, watering, enriching, providing. We must not forget how things were. The ancient wagon tracks keep record of the past, of people on the move, before they are settled in their forever home. The proof of God’s love is visible all around us.
2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18
Paul has run the good race, fought the good fight, finished the course. The ancient athletic games, both the Olympics and competitions modelled after the Olympics, emphasized the first-place winner. The list of champions never included those who finished a close second, much less those who would only have earned a participation trophy, were there such a thing in those days.
But Paul still claims he will gain the victor’s crown, which he shares with his crucified Lord – talk about your ultimate loser — and with all who long for Christ’s reappearing. Death is near, and Paul has no way of knowing he will literally go down in history, that two thousand years later, believers and nonbelievers will read and quote from his letters, that we will take his lessons to heart. In the final verses of this letter the tone is almost pathetic, as Paul lists those who abandoned him and those who stuck by him. In loss he has gained everything. In finishing he is a victor.
These particular words continue to inspire. Only a generation later the martyr Ignatius, the overseer of the Antioch congregation, would write ahead to the Roman Christians, towards whom he was sailing, a prisoner on a ship headed toward Rome where he was condemned to be thrown to the beasts, and he would quote these very words, echoing Paul’s statement that he is already being poured out as a drink offering on the altar, writing, “Grant me nothing more than that I be poured out to God, while an altar is still ready….” (Ignatius to the Romans, 2).
Let us resolve to run our race as well, and finish, regardless of what that looks like the world.
Luke 18:9-14
Wouldn’t it be nice to have the problem of an overabundance of salvation?
Typically, this parable is a slam dunk. Tax Collector rules. Pharisee drools. He shoots. He scores! Everyone goes home for Sunday dinner.
But The New Cambridge Bible Commentary on The Gospel of Luke, co-written by Ben Witherington III, and evangelical New Testament scholar, and Amy-Jill Levine, an acclaimed Jewish New Testament scholar, is filled with insights created by the synergy of their theological conversation. The authors suggest (and please give them credit)
Both individuals belong in the temple for public prayer. They both evidently fulfill the requirements for ritual purity or they wouldn’t have been allowed inside. Many might have considered the tax collector a collaborator with the hated Roman occupiers. They paid the tax for a targeted population, then made a profit by collecting back that money, and then some, from everyone in the district. Notice that in his prayer he does not raise his eyes to heaven. The Greek word hilaskomai means propitiated, wishing to be justified before God, but unlike the tax collector we will meet in the next chapter, Zaccheaus, he does not ask for forgiveness nor does he offer to pay back what he has stolen. He wants to be made right with God without having to do the work.
The Pharisee is tone deaf. Yes, it is right for him to thank God he is not a thief, a rogue, an adulterer, or a tax collector, but in saying all this aloud he comes off as arrogant, clueless, and a little self-absorbed. They suggest Jesus wants us to laugh at him.
The good news is that the Greek word para, often translated as “rather than,” (This man went to his home justified rather than the other….”) can also be translated as alongside. The two may have left together. Divine mercy is offered to both. Faults and all, they may have realized that they are both in need of God’s grace. And that we readers, rather than feeling smug in comparison to these two old sinners, perhaps should hope more earnestly that we can join them in their new relationship among the saved.
