When losers become winners
Commentary
Our society is like most other societies in the history of the world. We idolize winners and have little respect for losers. Heroes are those who swing a mighty bat or throw a touchdown bomb or fly through the air from the foul line for a mighty dunk. Losers are those cut from the team or who sit on the bench watching the game like the fans. The winners are remembered, and the losers are forgotten -- until a new team of winners takes over next season.
Imagine the wonderful chaos that would ensue if the losers were those who ultimately win and the winners taste the sting of defeat. While that reversal might never happen in our world, it does seem to be the way of the kingdom of heaven.
Jeremiah 15:15-21
Once again in the Book of Jeremiah appears a lament that is fitting of one called by the Lord to face the world. It is the calling itself that presents the problem, for the call places the lamenter in a precarious situation. Whether this lament is the creation of Jeremiah regarding his own predicament or an insertion into the book because a later editor deemed it appropriate, the issues are nevertheless realistic of the grief that can come with the call to God's mission.
The lament begins with a plea that God "remember me." The cry is a common one in the face of oppression and affliction (Judges 16:28; 1 Samuel 1:11; Nehemiah 13:13, 31; Job 14:13; Psalm 25:7; 106:4). People utter the cry to "forget me not" precisely because they feel "forgotten" by God and need to call God to remember the individual (see Psalm 10:11; 13:1) or the community (Psalm 74:2, 18, 23; 89:47, 50).
The feeling of being forsaken by God and alone even in the midst of other people is typical of people in grief over the death of loved ones or over other kinds of losses. Within the congregation this Sunday morning will be a number of worshipers in such grief, some of whom (by no means all!) will identify with the cry to "remember me." Tread tenderly with these words, for the ground of grief you touch with them is virtually holy.
In spite of the overwhelming odds that face the god-forsaken in our midst, the Lord promises here, "I am with you" (v. 20). The promise of God's presence to individuals and to the community is a powerful theme in the Bible. It occurs frequently in connection with a call to serve the Lord (Jeremiah 1:8; Exodus 3:12; Judges 6:16; Matthew 28:20). Often it occurs as part of a promise of protection in the face of enemies, scoffers, and former friends (Genesis 26: 3, 24; 28:15; Deuteronomy 31:23; Joshua 3:7; 1 Kings 11:38, and frequently elsewhere in Jeremiah). This promise of the Lord's presence in all kinds of situations enables those who are weak and alone to know the confidence of his promises and abiding love. This assurance of God's presence enables people to find strength they cannot imagine if left to themselves. It makes winners out of losers.
Romans 12:9-21
In these verses Paul continues with his "appeal" that in response to God's gift of justification Christians are to "be transformed by the renewing of your minds" (v. 2). After having celebrated the diversity of gifts within the Roman congregation, Paul now offers a list of instructions that are by no means unique in the New Testament.
Indeed the list is quite similar to those at 1 Thessalonians 5:12-22 and 1 Peter 3:8-12. While, on the one hand, the content of the lists do not appear to contain exclusively Christian instructions, it is likely, on the other hand, that they are all dependent on Jesus' teachings in the Sermon on the Mount, especially the section recorded at Matthew 5:38-48.
The derivation of the lists on the Sermon throws them into an eschatological setting, for it is the eschaton about which Jesus speaks on the Mount. Indeed, it is not only the words Jesus speaks on that occasion but that he himself, the Son of God, is the speaker sets the beatitudes and the following instructions in the context of the kingdom of God.
Furthermore, the list here defines life for the eschatological community. Community is the issue as we read through these instructions. Counter to the individualism that pervades our society and others in the present age, the community of the end time is not only to recognize and value the diversity of gifts within it. It is also called to exhibit one characteristic after another of the community that God in Christ promises for the future time: patience, generosity, hospitality, forgiveness, empathy, harmony, peacefulness, caring. While these qualities might stand out in various religions, they are here set within the context of "serve the Lord" (v. 11).
Furthermore, the list here is part of what it means to "present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship" (v. 1). Incarnational commitment to one another in community is the fitting response to the justification accomplished by God in the Incarnate Word, Jesus Christ.
Matthew 16:21-28
With the words, "from that time," Matthew begins a new section of his Gospel. While the earlier use of the same expression introduced the public ministry of Jesus, this time the words begin the private ministry of the Lord. For the most part this ministry is one in which Jesus prepares the disciples for his coming death in Jerusalem, and it gets off to an unambiguous start.
Jesus had just commended Peter's confession that Jesus was "the Messiah, the Son of the living God." On that basis Jesus gave Peter the keys to the kingdom of heaven and the accompanying authority to bind and loose. The commissioning occurred within the context of questions about the identity of Jesus. The first question was, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" The second forced the confession out of Peter: "Who do you say that I am?"
Now the dialogue continues as Jesus answers an assumed question: "Who do I say that I am?" Jesus teaches here that he "must" go to Jerusalem where he will be arrested, killed, "and on the third day be raised." That the teaching about himself does not fit the confession Jesus made is verified by Peter's response. He "began to rebuke him, saying, 'God forbid it, Lord. This must never happen to you.' "
Peter's shock at the prospect of Jesus' words is not surprising. The tradition from which he came, that is, his biblical understanding of the Messiah, contained no prophesies about the suffering of the eschatological Messiah. To be sure, there were prophets who suffered, especially Jeremiah, as we saw in our first lesson. There was a suffering servant, as is evident in the fourth servant song at Isaiah 52:13-53:12. "One like a human being" (literally "a son of man") represented the suffering and martyred Maccabean martyrs (Daniel 7), and the son of man par excellence, namely the prophet Ezekiel, even suffered vicariously for the sins of Judah and Israel (Ezekiel 4). In all the prophecies about the future ideal Messianic king, however, there is no mention of suffering.
Is it any wonder that Peter, having confessed that Jesus was the expected Messiah, could not tolerate Jesus' teaching about suffering and death in Jerusalem? To bring matters to a head, he did the unmentionable: he "rebuked" Jesus. In the Old and New Testaments, God and God's Son have the corner on the rebuke market. The term is a technical one in both Hebrew and Greek for bringing under control the forces of chaos that stand in the way of God's will for people and the divine reign. God rebukes the sea (Psalm 18:15; 104:5-9; Nahum 1:4). God rebukes the forces of chaos that attack Jerusalem, the city from which God ruled the world (Psalm 76:6; Isaiah 17:13). God rebukes those who attack the oppressed (Psalm 9:5). And here comes the punch line: God rebukes Satan when he accuses Joshua ben Jozadak of being unfit for the nomination as high priest in Jerusalem (Zechariah 3:1-2). In the Greek Old Testament the name Joshua appears as Jesus. That Satan stands in the way of God's plan for a Jesus in Jerusalem is probably the reason why Jesus responds to Peter's meddling with the well-known rebuke of his own: "Get behind me, Satan!" In Mark's Gospel (but not here in Matthew's) Jesus rebukes Peter as Satan, just as Jesus rebukes the sea (Mark 4:35-41 and parallels) and the unclean spirits of Satan's army (Mark 1:25; 3:12). Rebuking, in other words, is not an action appropriate for Peter. It is only fitting for God and God's Son who bring chaos under control.
The teaching of Jesus redefines the meaning of the Messiah. By accepting Peter's confession and even affirming it publicly, Jesus could not let the usual interpretation stand. He was indeed on his way to suffering and execution, and so he gave to the concept on Messiah a meaning it never had. Indeed so profoundly did Jesus reinterpret the Messianic reality that the New Testament repeatedly cites Old Testament prophecies quite out of their context to demonstrate that the Christ must suffer or that "Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures" (1 Corinthians 15:4). The reality of Jesus' suffering and the confession of his identity as the Messiah presented a brand new opportunity for the early church to read their scriptures in a different way.
At the same time the radically new twist on the nature of the Messiah paved the way for the disciples of Christ to understand Jesus' call to discipleship as one of similar suffering. He calls his followers to "take up their cross and follow me." This verse is not the first time Jesus used such imagery. During the commissioning of the twelve to go out into the world as lambs in the midst of wolves, he said, "Whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me" (10:38). He said there, too, that ironically "those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it" (10:39), just as he does here in verse 25.
Imagine the power of those words within the world that prides itself on winners!
The winning, however, is set within an eschatological framework. Our pericope concludes with some powerful promises. First, Jesus speaks of himself as the "Son of Man" who will come at the end in glory. The image of the suffering Son of Man probably derives from the Book of Ezekiel (God calls Ezekiel by this title over eighty times) and from the apocalyptic vision of Daniel 7 where the Son of Man figure ascends to heaven. At the same time another Son of Man who descends to earth probably has its background in the Similitudes of Enoch and is used on several occasions by Jesus to speak of his return at the eschaton.
Second, the role of the eschatological Son of Man here is to act as judge: "he will repay everyone for what has been done." The message, common in the New Testament (see Romans 2:6; 1 Corinthians 3:8; 2 Corinthians 5:10; Revelation 22:12), is actually a quotation of Psalm 62:12 where the context of "For you repay to all according to their work" is only positive; it is payment for trusting in the Lord against all odds. Perhaps that same notion is present here in our pericope, for the coming kingdom provides the context for the act of judging.
Third, the promise of the kingdom is uttered here in words that strike the reader of the Gospel as somewhat unusual. Jesus speaks of "his angels" in verse 27 and of "his kingdom" in verse 28. Certainly the words assume the glorification of Jesus. What is striking is that Jesus and the New Testament writers generally speak of "God's kingdom." There are, however, other instances in which the kingdom is assigned to Jesus the Lord. Most interesting is the argument by the apostle Paul at 1 Corinthians 15:25 where he argues that at the end Christ will deliver "the kingdom to God the Father, after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and every power." The assumption is that the kingdom belongs to Christ until that final victory over all the forces that vie for the kingdom.
As for the promise that some of those present "will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom," one could argue for the authenticity of the saying as Jesus' own simply because it would appear an unlikely saying for Matthew or the church of Matthew's day to invent. If so, we can certainly understand the apostle Paul's conviction that the end would come soon (see Romans 13:11-14). Since it did not, some have labeled Jesus a "disappointed apocalypticist."
The early church's witness to his resurrection removes the label, for whenever the Son of Man comes again, it will be as the resurrected Lord who comes to take with him to eternal life those who have fallen asleep (1 Thessalonians 4:14). There is nothing disappointing about that!
The promise of that everlasting kingdom is the promise for us losers who have died with him at baptism.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Exodus 3:1-15
Moses, who was raised in the palace of the Pharaoh, has had to flee Egypt, because it has become known that he killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew. He takes flight to Midianite territory in the northwestern section of the Arabian peninsula and takes up residence there with the family of Jethro, a priest of Midian. Content to remain in Jethro's camp, he marries Jethro's daughter, Zipporah, and has a son by her (2:11-22). And he becomes one of the herdsmen of that nomadic tribe, pasturing the flocks near the site of Mount Horeb or Sinai. It is a very ordinary, peaceful existence. But Moses' life is not to be ordinary nor peaceful. God encounters him through the medium of a bush that is aflame but not consumed. In simple naivete, Moses turns aside to see what has caused such a phenomenon.
Some commentators would like to turn the bush's flame into a normal happening, maintaining that it possesses a natural flame-like foliage, or that it has a resin that sometimes ignites in the heat. But the point of the story is that nothing here is "natural" and earthly. God is on the scene, and God is not encompassed within the sphere of this world. Moses must remove his shoes, because where God is, there is the supernatural realm of holiness, with all its power, and there Moses must not even look, for no man can see the glory of God and live.
God uses the burning bush to get Moses' attention, but it is with his Word that God communicates with the shepherd, just as it is finally by his Word, speaking through scripture and sermon, that God communicates with us. And the central message of God's Word is always that of mercy. God sees the affliction of his enslaved people, God hears their cry for help from whatever corner, God knows their suffering, and God will come down to deliver them (vv. 7-8; cf. 2:24-25). Is that not always the love of God that is poured out upon us -- that our Lord sees and hears and knows our lives of enslavement to sin and death; that he hears our prayers for deliverance; and that he comes down in his Son to share our suffering and even our death? The love of God is manifested toward his people from the very beginning, here in the Old Testament, and this story foreshadows our lives and our deliverance by our Lord Jesus Christ.
For Israel, the God of love and mercy selects this ordinary shepherd Moses to return to Egypt and to bring his people out of slavery. Moses knows his own capacities and his ordinary station, and not only here, but repeatedly in the accounts that follow, Moses tries to reject the leadership role. The truth is, however, that Moses does not have to rely on himself. "I will be with you," God assures him, "and will lead my delivered people back to this mountain" (v. 12).
Moses, however, has no previous acquaintance with this God who has confronted him, and neither do his enslaved people. The Lord has told him that the One who speaks to him is the same God who spoke to his father and grandfather and great-grandfather before him. His forbears knew this God, but the present generation of Israelites do not. How do they know they can trust his Word? -- a question that always arises when we have no acquaintance with God. If Moses can learn the God's name, then he can summon the deity to come to their aid. So Moses asks God's name.
There have been various scholarly translations of what the Lord replies. In Hebrew, he says 'ehyeh 'asher 'ehyeh. Popularly, that has been rendered, "I am who I am." But a lot of linguistic evidence points to the fact that what the name means is "I will indeed be with you," a promise encompassed in "Yahweh," the Hebrew name for the Lord. God has assured Moses that he will be with him, in verse 12. But that hasn't been enough for Moses. He wants a guarantee by learning God's name, in order to be able to command God to his side. The Lord God of hosts is not commanded, however, by any human being. And so, when asked his name, God repeats his promise, "I will indeed be with you." And ever after, Israel is to call God by the name of "He who is indeed with you." With that promise alone, Moses is to return to Egypt and confront the ruler of the Egyptian Empire. Moses' faith is to consist in clinging to God's promise.
Is that not also the one assurance given to us as we struggle through life? Jesus Christ promises us, "Lo, I am with you always, to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:20). We have no other guarantee than that. We are required to walk by faith and not by sight, to cling to that promise, and to believe it when all the evidence seems to contradict it. But the Lord who makes that promise to us delivered us from our slavery to sin and death, and made us children of God, and showed us by an empty tomb that he is the victor over all of life's ills and even death. The Lord is with us. He is faithful. And in the power of his Spirit, we can stand, come what may.
Lutheran Option -- Jeremiah 15:15-21
We know more about the inner life of the prophet Jeremiah than about any other prophet of the Old Testament, because we have this passage and others like it, called "Jeremiah's Confessions" (cf. 17:14-18; 20:7-12, 14-18). They come from the end of the seventh century B.C., when Jeremiah's prophecies of judgment on Judah have not yet been fulfilled.
Jeremiah has preached and preached that disaster is coming upon his sinful people, as the Lord has given him utterance, and nothing has happened. His words haven't come to pass. As a result, he has become a laughingstock among his compatriots (cf. 20:7) and is daily persecuted by them (15:15). In his situation of distress, he therefore becomes blasphemous toward God, accusing God of being to him a "deceitful brook" (v. 18), of being like one of those wadis in the desert that run with water after the spring rains, but that quickly dry up and yield nothing.
Jeremiah cannot understand what God has done to him. God gave him his words. They certainly came from the Lord, from outside of the prophet, and not from his own mind or musings or conscience -- such is the meaning of "Thy words were found, and I ate them" (v. 16). And those words were a source of joy to the prophet, because God paid him the honor of being a servant and prophet of his Lord. Despite Jeremiah's initial hatred of the task, he had found satisfaction in being called by God's name and by entering into intimate communion with his Lord.
His role, however, had been a hard one from the first. Jeremiah had to become a "sign," a sign that God was withdrawing his grace from Judah, and so Jeremiah was allowed no manifestations of the grace of God. He couldn't marry; he couldn't attend a party; he could not even go to a funeral, because all of those were gifts of God's grace. So, he says, "I sat alone, because thy hand was upon me" (v. 17). God had deceived him, he thought, and he cries out in our text in anger and anguish.
Usually such laments are followed in the Old Testament by assurances of God's comfort and salvation, but not here. Instead, God rebukes his prophet. Jeremiah had been unfaithful. He had spoken words that were "worthless" and that were not God's words. He needed to repent and return to the Lord (v. 19). If he would do so, God would be with him and enable him to stand against all his persecutors. God would deliver Jeremiah, but Jeremiah had to be faithful (vv. 19-21).
You and I are not prophets of the Lord, but certainly when we are confronted by the struggles and sufferings of life, we too cry out, "How could God do this to me?" or "God has deserted me!" But perhaps we need to ask ourselves first of all, "Have I deserted God?" The Lord promises always to be with us, but we know joy and comfort and assurance from that fact only when we have not forgotten his presence, but have turned in every circumstance faithfully to him.
Imagine the wonderful chaos that would ensue if the losers were those who ultimately win and the winners taste the sting of defeat. While that reversal might never happen in our world, it does seem to be the way of the kingdom of heaven.
Jeremiah 15:15-21
Once again in the Book of Jeremiah appears a lament that is fitting of one called by the Lord to face the world. It is the calling itself that presents the problem, for the call places the lamenter in a precarious situation. Whether this lament is the creation of Jeremiah regarding his own predicament or an insertion into the book because a later editor deemed it appropriate, the issues are nevertheless realistic of the grief that can come with the call to God's mission.
The lament begins with a plea that God "remember me." The cry is a common one in the face of oppression and affliction (Judges 16:28; 1 Samuel 1:11; Nehemiah 13:13, 31; Job 14:13; Psalm 25:7; 106:4). People utter the cry to "forget me not" precisely because they feel "forgotten" by God and need to call God to remember the individual (see Psalm 10:11; 13:1) or the community (Psalm 74:2, 18, 23; 89:47, 50).
The feeling of being forsaken by God and alone even in the midst of other people is typical of people in grief over the death of loved ones or over other kinds of losses. Within the congregation this Sunday morning will be a number of worshipers in such grief, some of whom (by no means all!) will identify with the cry to "remember me." Tread tenderly with these words, for the ground of grief you touch with them is virtually holy.
In spite of the overwhelming odds that face the god-forsaken in our midst, the Lord promises here, "I am with you" (v. 20). The promise of God's presence to individuals and to the community is a powerful theme in the Bible. It occurs frequently in connection with a call to serve the Lord (Jeremiah 1:8; Exodus 3:12; Judges 6:16; Matthew 28:20). Often it occurs as part of a promise of protection in the face of enemies, scoffers, and former friends (Genesis 26: 3, 24; 28:15; Deuteronomy 31:23; Joshua 3:7; 1 Kings 11:38, and frequently elsewhere in Jeremiah). This promise of the Lord's presence in all kinds of situations enables those who are weak and alone to know the confidence of his promises and abiding love. This assurance of God's presence enables people to find strength they cannot imagine if left to themselves. It makes winners out of losers.
Romans 12:9-21
In these verses Paul continues with his "appeal" that in response to God's gift of justification Christians are to "be transformed by the renewing of your minds" (v. 2). After having celebrated the diversity of gifts within the Roman congregation, Paul now offers a list of instructions that are by no means unique in the New Testament.
Indeed the list is quite similar to those at 1 Thessalonians 5:12-22 and 1 Peter 3:8-12. While, on the one hand, the content of the lists do not appear to contain exclusively Christian instructions, it is likely, on the other hand, that they are all dependent on Jesus' teachings in the Sermon on the Mount, especially the section recorded at Matthew 5:38-48.
The derivation of the lists on the Sermon throws them into an eschatological setting, for it is the eschaton about which Jesus speaks on the Mount. Indeed, it is not only the words Jesus speaks on that occasion but that he himself, the Son of God, is the speaker sets the beatitudes and the following instructions in the context of the kingdom of God.
Furthermore, the list here defines life for the eschatological community. Community is the issue as we read through these instructions. Counter to the individualism that pervades our society and others in the present age, the community of the end time is not only to recognize and value the diversity of gifts within it. It is also called to exhibit one characteristic after another of the community that God in Christ promises for the future time: patience, generosity, hospitality, forgiveness, empathy, harmony, peacefulness, caring. While these qualities might stand out in various religions, they are here set within the context of "serve the Lord" (v. 11).
Furthermore, the list here is part of what it means to "present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship" (v. 1). Incarnational commitment to one another in community is the fitting response to the justification accomplished by God in the Incarnate Word, Jesus Christ.
Matthew 16:21-28
With the words, "from that time," Matthew begins a new section of his Gospel. While the earlier use of the same expression introduced the public ministry of Jesus, this time the words begin the private ministry of the Lord. For the most part this ministry is one in which Jesus prepares the disciples for his coming death in Jerusalem, and it gets off to an unambiguous start.
Jesus had just commended Peter's confession that Jesus was "the Messiah, the Son of the living God." On that basis Jesus gave Peter the keys to the kingdom of heaven and the accompanying authority to bind and loose. The commissioning occurred within the context of questions about the identity of Jesus. The first question was, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" The second forced the confession out of Peter: "Who do you say that I am?"
Now the dialogue continues as Jesus answers an assumed question: "Who do I say that I am?" Jesus teaches here that he "must" go to Jerusalem where he will be arrested, killed, "and on the third day be raised." That the teaching about himself does not fit the confession Jesus made is verified by Peter's response. He "began to rebuke him, saying, 'God forbid it, Lord. This must never happen to you.' "
Peter's shock at the prospect of Jesus' words is not surprising. The tradition from which he came, that is, his biblical understanding of the Messiah, contained no prophesies about the suffering of the eschatological Messiah. To be sure, there were prophets who suffered, especially Jeremiah, as we saw in our first lesson. There was a suffering servant, as is evident in the fourth servant song at Isaiah 52:13-53:12. "One like a human being" (literally "a son of man") represented the suffering and martyred Maccabean martyrs (Daniel 7), and the son of man par excellence, namely the prophet Ezekiel, even suffered vicariously for the sins of Judah and Israel (Ezekiel 4). In all the prophecies about the future ideal Messianic king, however, there is no mention of suffering.
Is it any wonder that Peter, having confessed that Jesus was the expected Messiah, could not tolerate Jesus' teaching about suffering and death in Jerusalem? To bring matters to a head, he did the unmentionable: he "rebuked" Jesus. In the Old and New Testaments, God and God's Son have the corner on the rebuke market. The term is a technical one in both Hebrew and Greek for bringing under control the forces of chaos that stand in the way of God's will for people and the divine reign. God rebukes the sea (Psalm 18:15; 104:5-9; Nahum 1:4). God rebukes the forces of chaos that attack Jerusalem, the city from which God ruled the world (Psalm 76:6; Isaiah 17:13). God rebukes those who attack the oppressed (Psalm 9:5). And here comes the punch line: God rebukes Satan when he accuses Joshua ben Jozadak of being unfit for the nomination as high priest in Jerusalem (Zechariah 3:1-2). In the Greek Old Testament the name Joshua appears as Jesus. That Satan stands in the way of God's plan for a Jesus in Jerusalem is probably the reason why Jesus responds to Peter's meddling with the well-known rebuke of his own: "Get behind me, Satan!" In Mark's Gospel (but not here in Matthew's) Jesus rebukes Peter as Satan, just as Jesus rebukes the sea (Mark 4:35-41 and parallels) and the unclean spirits of Satan's army (Mark 1:25; 3:12). Rebuking, in other words, is not an action appropriate for Peter. It is only fitting for God and God's Son who bring chaos under control.
The teaching of Jesus redefines the meaning of the Messiah. By accepting Peter's confession and even affirming it publicly, Jesus could not let the usual interpretation stand. He was indeed on his way to suffering and execution, and so he gave to the concept on Messiah a meaning it never had. Indeed so profoundly did Jesus reinterpret the Messianic reality that the New Testament repeatedly cites Old Testament prophecies quite out of their context to demonstrate that the Christ must suffer or that "Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures" (1 Corinthians 15:4). The reality of Jesus' suffering and the confession of his identity as the Messiah presented a brand new opportunity for the early church to read their scriptures in a different way.
At the same time the radically new twist on the nature of the Messiah paved the way for the disciples of Christ to understand Jesus' call to discipleship as one of similar suffering. He calls his followers to "take up their cross and follow me." This verse is not the first time Jesus used such imagery. During the commissioning of the twelve to go out into the world as lambs in the midst of wolves, he said, "Whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me" (10:38). He said there, too, that ironically "those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it" (10:39), just as he does here in verse 25.
Imagine the power of those words within the world that prides itself on winners!
The winning, however, is set within an eschatological framework. Our pericope concludes with some powerful promises. First, Jesus speaks of himself as the "Son of Man" who will come at the end in glory. The image of the suffering Son of Man probably derives from the Book of Ezekiel (God calls Ezekiel by this title over eighty times) and from the apocalyptic vision of Daniel 7 where the Son of Man figure ascends to heaven. At the same time another Son of Man who descends to earth probably has its background in the Similitudes of Enoch and is used on several occasions by Jesus to speak of his return at the eschaton.
Second, the role of the eschatological Son of Man here is to act as judge: "he will repay everyone for what has been done." The message, common in the New Testament (see Romans 2:6; 1 Corinthians 3:8; 2 Corinthians 5:10; Revelation 22:12), is actually a quotation of Psalm 62:12 where the context of "For you repay to all according to their work" is only positive; it is payment for trusting in the Lord against all odds. Perhaps that same notion is present here in our pericope, for the coming kingdom provides the context for the act of judging.
Third, the promise of the kingdom is uttered here in words that strike the reader of the Gospel as somewhat unusual. Jesus speaks of "his angels" in verse 27 and of "his kingdom" in verse 28. Certainly the words assume the glorification of Jesus. What is striking is that Jesus and the New Testament writers generally speak of "God's kingdom." There are, however, other instances in which the kingdom is assigned to Jesus the Lord. Most interesting is the argument by the apostle Paul at 1 Corinthians 15:25 where he argues that at the end Christ will deliver "the kingdom to God the Father, after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and every power." The assumption is that the kingdom belongs to Christ until that final victory over all the forces that vie for the kingdom.
As for the promise that some of those present "will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom," one could argue for the authenticity of the saying as Jesus' own simply because it would appear an unlikely saying for Matthew or the church of Matthew's day to invent. If so, we can certainly understand the apostle Paul's conviction that the end would come soon (see Romans 13:11-14). Since it did not, some have labeled Jesus a "disappointed apocalypticist."
The early church's witness to his resurrection removes the label, for whenever the Son of Man comes again, it will be as the resurrected Lord who comes to take with him to eternal life those who have fallen asleep (1 Thessalonians 4:14). There is nothing disappointing about that!
The promise of that everlasting kingdom is the promise for us losers who have died with him at baptism.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Exodus 3:1-15
Moses, who was raised in the palace of the Pharaoh, has had to flee Egypt, because it has become known that he killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew. He takes flight to Midianite territory in the northwestern section of the Arabian peninsula and takes up residence there with the family of Jethro, a priest of Midian. Content to remain in Jethro's camp, he marries Jethro's daughter, Zipporah, and has a son by her (2:11-22). And he becomes one of the herdsmen of that nomadic tribe, pasturing the flocks near the site of Mount Horeb or Sinai. It is a very ordinary, peaceful existence. But Moses' life is not to be ordinary nor peaceful. God encounters him through the medium of a bush that is aflame but not consumed. In simple naivete, Moses turns aside to see what has caused such a phenomenon.
Some commentators would like to turn the bush's flame into a normal happening, maintaining that it possesses a natural flame-like foliage, or that it has a resin that sometimes ignites in the heat. But the point of the story is that nothing here is "natural" and earthly. God is on the scene, and God is not encompassed within the sphere of this world. Moses must remove his shoes, because where God is, there is the supernatural realm of holiness, with all its power, and there Moses must not even look, for no man can see the glory of God and live.
God uses the burning bush to get Moses' attention, but it is with his Word that God communicates with the shepherd, just as it is finally by his Word, speaking through scripture and sermon, that God communicates with us. And the central message of God's Word is always that of mercy. God sees the affliction of his enslaved people, God hears their cry for help from whatever corner, God knows their suffering, and God will come down to deliver them (vv. 7-8; cf. 2:24-25). Is that not always the love of God that is poured out upon us -- that our Lord sees and hears and knows our lives of enslavement to sin and death; that he hears our prayers for deliverance; and that he comes down in his Son to share our suffering and even our death? The love of God is manifested toward his people from the very beginning, here in the Old Testament, and this story foreshadows our lives and our deliverance by our Lord Jesus Christ.
For Israel, the God of love and mercy selects this ordinary shepherd Moses to return to Egypt and to bring his people out of slavery. Moses knows his own capacities and his ordinary station, and not only here, but repeatedly in the accounts that follow, Moses tries to reject the leadership role. The truth is, however, that Moses does not have to rely on himself. "I will be with you," God assures him, "and will lead my delivered people back to this mountain" (v. 12).
Moses, however, has no previous acquaintance with this God who has confronted him, and neither do his enslaved people. The Lord has told him that the One who speaks to him is the same God who spoke to his father and grandfather and great-grandfather before him. His forbears knew this God, but the present generation of Israelites do not. How do they know they can trust his Word? -- a question that always arises when we have no acquaintance with God. If Moses can learn the God's name, then he can summon the deity to come to their aid. So Moses asks God's name.
There have been various scholarly translations of what the Lord replies. In Hebrew, he says 'ehyeh 'asher 'ehyeh. Popularly, that has been rendered, "I am who I am." But a lot of linguistic evidence points to the fact that what the name means is "I will indeed be with you," a promise encompassed in "Yahweh," the Hebrew name for the Lord. God has assured Moses that he will be with him, in verse 12. But that hasn't been enough for Moses. He wants a guarantee by learning God's name, in order to be able to command God to his side. The Lord God of hosts is not commanded, however, by any human being. And so, when asked his name, God repeats his promise, "I will indeed be with you." And ever after, Israel is to call God by the name of "He who is indeed with you." With that promise alone, Moses is to return to Egypt and confront the ruler of the Egyptian Empire. Moses' faith is to consist in clinging to God's promise.
Is that not also the one assurance given to us as we struggle through life? Jesus Christ promises us, "Lo, I am with you always, to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:20). We have no other guarantee than that. We are required to walk by faith and not by sight, to cling to that promise, and to believe it when all the evidence seems to contradict it. But the Lord who makes that promise to us delivered us from our slavery to sin and death, and made us children of God, and showed us by an empty tomb that he is the victor over all of life's ills and even death. The Lord is with us. He is faithful. And in the power of his Spirit, we can stand, come what may.
Lutheran Option -- Jeremiah 15:15-21
We know more about the inner life of the prophet Jeremiah than about any other prophet of the Old Testament, because we have this passage and others like it, called "Jeremiah's Confessions" (cf. 17:14-18; 20:7-12, 14-18). They come from the end of the seventh century B.C., when Jeremiah's prophecies of judgment on Judah have not yet been fulfilled.
Jeremiah has preached and preached that disaster is coming upon his sinful people, as the Lord has given him utterance, and nothing has happened. His words haven't come to pass. As a result, he has become a laughingstock among his compatriots (cf. 20:7) and is daily persecuted by them (15:15). In his situation of distress, he therefore becomes blasphemous toward God, accusing God of being to him a "deceitful brook" (v. 18), of being like one of those wadis in the desert that run with water after the spring rains, but that quickly dry up and yield nothing.
Jeremiah cannot understand what God has done to him. God gave him his words. They certainly came from the Lord, from outside of the prophet, and not from his own mind or musings or conscience -- such is the meaning of "Thy words were found, and I ate them" (v. 16). And those words were a source of joy to the prophet, because God paid him the honor of being a servant and prophet of his Lord. Despite Jeremiah's initial hatred of the task, he had found satisfaction in being called by God's name and by entering into intimate communion with his Lord.
His role, however, had been a hard one from the first. Jeremiah had to become a "sign," a sign that God was withdrawing his grace from Judah, and so Jeremiah was allowed no manifestations of the grace of God. He couldn't marry; he couldn't attend a party; he could not even go to a funeral, because all of those were gifts of God's grace. So, he says, "I sat alone, because thy hand was upon me" (v. 17). God had deceived him, he thought, and he cries out in our text in anger and anguish.
Usually such laments are followed in the Old Testament by assurances of God's comfort and salvation, but not here. Instead, God rebukes his prophet. Jeremiah had been unfaithful. He had spoken words that were "worthless" and that were not God's words. He needed to repent and return to the Lord (v. 19). If he would do so, God would be with him and enable him to stand against all his persecutors. God would deliver Jeremiah, but Jeremiah had to be faithful (vv. 19-21).
You and I are not prophets of the Lord, but certainly when we are confronted by the struggles and sufferings of life, we too cry out, "How could God do this to me?" or "God has deserted me!" But perhaps we need to ask ourselves first of all, "Have I deserted God?" The Lord promises always to be with us, but we know joy and comfort and assurance from that fact only when we have not forgotten his presence, but have turned in every circumstance faithfully to him.
