Fourth Sunday Of Easter
Preaching
Lectionary Preaching Workbook
Series VII, Cycle C
Object:
Theme For The Day
The story of Tabitha/Dorcas teaches us what the truly "good life" is all about.
First Lesson
Acts 9:36-43
Peter Raises Tabitha
In the city of Joppa, Peter is called to the house of a seamstress named Tabitha (Dorcas, in Greek). Tabitha has just died. In the upstairs room where her body is laid out, there is a gathering of mourning women, all of whom are holding up articles of clothing she made for them. It is a poignant, even heart-rending scene. Paul sends the mourners away, prays, then orders Tabitha to get up. He does so, then shows her to the people outside, who understand this as a mighty sign of the Lord's favor. In Luke's Gospel, there were ample opportunities to see Jesus the healer at work. Now, in the second volume, it is clear that Jesus' healing power continues to be at work through Peter and the other apostles. There are parallels, also, with Elijah's raising the widow's son (1 Kings 17:17-24) and Elisha's raising of the Shunammite woman's son (2 Kings 4:8-37). Luke refers to some of the people gathered outside the house as "saints" -- meaning that, even in advance of Peter's arrival, the faith had already spread as far as Joppa.
New Testament Lesson
Revelation 7:9-17
Washed In The Blood Of The Lamb
John pictures, here, another worship scene: a "great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages" (v. 9). They are "robed in white, with palm branches in their hands" -- according to early Christian iconography, these are saints and martyrs. They call out, "Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!" (v. 10). After a hymn sung by the angels and elders gathered around the throne, an elder tells John who these white-robed individuals are: "These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb" (v. 14). Having been through a bloody ordeal of martyrdom, the elder assures John that these faithful believers will be safe forever: "... the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes" (v. 17). This is a powerful message of comfort to the persecuted Johannine church.
The Gospel
John 10:22-30
No One Will Snatch Them Out Of My Hand
At "the Festival of the Dedication" (Hannukah), Jesus is accosted in the temple by some people who ask him to declare bluntly whether or not he is the Messiah. This is the same question the religious authorities will later ask of Jesus, at his trial. Since John describes them as "the Jews" -- a term he uses in most other places in a derogatory way -- it's likely that the question is not entirely friendly. Jesus' response seems to bear this out: "... you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep. My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me" (vv. 26-27). John is eager to draw a distinction between those who are within Jesus' circle, and those who are not. For those who are within the circle, there is a promise of eternal protection: "I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand" (v. 28). These words would have been of significant comfort to the Johannine community, many of whom have had firsthand experience with persecution. "I and the Father are one," Jesus says (v. 30). When such a one as he promises, "no one will snatch them out of my hand," that means that not even the Roman emperor can prevail against this one who holds fast even to those who are being martyred.
Preaching Possibilities
One of the things that "goes with the territory" of ministry is funerals. Some of us lead a great many such services -- and every one of them is a little different. Often, the thing that makes one funeral different from the next is what mementos the bereaved family members bring along with them to the church or funeral home.
It's a common thing these days for family members to assemble a collage of photographs. Sorting through these photos and deciding where they go on the posterboard is a way for the survivors to tell the world how their loved one was special. More than that, the very act of looking through pictures -- of talking and laughing and remembering -- is therapeutic in itself. Often, the photos tell more about the deceased -- and about the family members who chose them -- than any number of conversations.
It's also interesting to observe what sorts of objects people choose to place in or near the casket, when they're having a viewing. Sometimes there's an American flag for a veteran, folded into a crisp triangle. Often there's a cross -- or, if the deceased had some history in the Roman Catholic church, a rosary. There may be such eclectic items as baseball caps from the person's favorite team, crayon pictures lovingly scrawled by grandchildren, or tools of a trade. It's all a part of how people grieve.
In today's reading from Acts, a group of women tearfully hold up some objects that remind them of their loved one. What these women hold up are articles of clothing: everything from humble undergarments -- what Luke refers to as "tunics" -- to more elaborate outer garments. Each of these clothing items was made by the deceased. Her name is Tabitha -- though Luke also gives her Greek name, Dorcas. Since Dorcas is the name he continues to use throughout the passage, it may be the name by which she was better known.
Imagine the scene: the body of a woman, recently deceased, laid out for viewing. Surrounding the body are a bevy of weeping women, widows, Luke tells us. In that society, to be a widow very often means living on the edge of poverty. There are no pensions; no Social Security. In that subsistence economy, widows depend on the generosity of others.
Luke also tells us Dorcas is "devoted to good works and acts of charity." Put two and two together: Dorcas is a skilled seamstress, who sews clothing not only for her own family, but also for the needy. At her wake, these weeping, keening women show up holding samples of clothing Dorcas has made for them.
No display of photos was possible in that day and age, but even if it had been, the poster board and snapshots would hardly have been necessary. When it came time to bear witness to the love and generosity of this generous Christian disciple, those articles of clothing say it all.
As we look to the future and try to imagine our own funeral, what photos or objects will our loved ones choose to display? And what will their choice say about the kind of life we've led? Will they all agree it was a good life? That's what we all aspire to, isn't it? Yet, in the context of our larger culture, there's a fair bit of ambiguity when it comes to defining what "the good life" really means.
Ask the proverbial "person on the street" what he or she understands the good life to mean, and the answer you get back will probably have something to do with material wealth, and all the splendidly diverting toys it can buy. Yet, as Luke writes about Dorcas, the good life clearly means nothing this pious woman earned or owned, but rather what she gave away. Those articles of clothing, worn or carried by a legion of poor widows, bear silent testimony to the essential goodness of this sainted woman's life: a life of service to others.
In recent years, Sears, Roebuck, and Company has been using a marketing slogan that goes something like this: "The good life at a great price. Guaranteed." Washing machines, big-screen televisions, and lawn furniture -- as attractive as such items may be -- do not constitute the kind of good life Luke's talking about. Objects like these are quite beside the point.
More than being beside the point, the single-minded pursuit of pleasure through consumer spending is a significant detour away from the life of the Spirit. Remember that rich young man who comes running up to Jesus, asking, "Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" Jesus tells him, "Sell what you have and give it to the poor." That young man "goes away sorrowful" -- the only recorded example in scripture of anyone offered a blessing by Jesus who subsequently turns it down. That rich young man is distracted, big time, and Jesus knows it. What distracts him is the good life (or at least his spiritually impoverished idea of what the good life is all about).
The church, at its best, is a place where people who are trying to kick the consumerism addiction can come together and find strength and support from one another -- not to mention from their "higher power." The church, at its best, holds up before hesitant and fearful disciples the assurance that what the world considers the good life is not much good at all. It's but a pale and poor imitation of the true good life of service to others. The church, at its best, reminds us that, in the words of Harvard chaplain Peter Gomes, "A good person is one who is good at being a person" -- and that the purpose of us all is "not to make a living, but to make a life."
Prayer For The Day
Lord, teach me to be generous. Teach me to serve you as you deserve; to give and not to count the cost, to fight and not to heed the wounds, to toil and not to seek for rest, to labor and not to ask for reward, save that of knowing that I do your will. Amen. (Ignatius of Loyola)
To Illustrate
The great heresy of our time is the belief that having more can substitute for being more.
-- French philosopher Gabriel Marcel
***
I couldn't remember the point anymore; a lot of rewards had come my way, but I felt like a veteran greyhound at the racetrack who finally figures out that she's been chasing mechanical bunnies; all that energy, and it's not even a real rabbit.
-- Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies (New York: Pantheon, 1999), p. 266
***
There's a story of a tourist from the United States who was visiting a famous, open-air street market in Mexico City. There he encountered an old Native American named Pota-lamo, who had twenty strings of onions hanging up for sale.
The tourist engaged him in conversation: "How much for a string of onions?"
"Ten centavos," replied Pota-lamo.
"How much for two strings?"
"Twenty centavos."
"And how much," asked the U.S. citizen with a twinkle in his eye, "for all twenty strings?"
A dark look came over the face of the street merchant. "I would not sell you my twenty strings," he replied, brusquely.
"Why not? Aren't you here to sell your onions?"
"No," explained the old merchant. "I am here to live my life. I love this marketplace: its crowds and the red serapes. I love its sunlight and the waving palmetto trees. I love to have friends come by and say "Buenos dias," and talk about their babies and their work. That is my life. For that I sit here all day and sell my twenty strings of onions. But if I sell them all to one customer, my day is ended. Then I have lost the life I love -- and that I will not do."
The Norteamericano went away marveling that he had met a truly happy man.
***
The most prophetic thing that Thomas Merton ever did was to say to a drugstore clerk who asked him which brand of toothpaste he preferred, "I don't care." Intrigued by the clerk's response, Merton wrote, "He almost dropped dead. I was supposed to feel strongly about Colgate or Pepsodent or Crest ... and they all have a secret ingredient." He concluded that "the worst thing you can do is not care about these things."
Merton wrote in the early 1960s, long before the art of making us care about "the secret ingredient" had so aggressively entered into every aspect of American life. We can't ride a bus, open a magazine or go online without being asked to consider which insurance company offers the best rates or which paper towel picks up the most dirt. [Now] is a good time to reclaim our senses and reply with a resounding, "I don't care!"
-- Kathleen Norris, "Apocalypse Now," in the Christian Century, November 15, 2005
***
We have many commodities but little satisfaction, little sense of the sufficiency of anything. The scarcity of satisfaction makes of our many commodities an infinite series of commodities, the new commodities invariably promising greater satisfaction than the older ones. In fact, the industrial economy's most marketed commodity is satisfaction, and this commodity, which is repeatedly promised, bought, and paid for, is never delivered.
-- Wendell Berry, cited by L. Shannon Jung in Food For Life (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Augsburg Fortress, 2004), p. 3
***
To be where God is -- to follow Jesus -- means going beyond the limits of our own comfort and safety. It means receiving our lives as gifts instead of guarding them as our own possessions. It means sharing the life we have been given instead of bottling it for our own consumption. It means giving up the notion that we can build dams to contain the bright streams of our lives and letting them go instead, letting them swell their banks and spill their wealth until they carry us down to where they run, full and growing fuller, into the wide and glittering sea.
-- Barbara Brown Taylor, in The Seeds of Heaven (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster, 2004)
***
There was a college professor who taught freshman English. The first assignment in his class was a 500-word essay on the topic, "Why are you attending college?"
The results were predictable: there was a certain sameness to most of these papers. They seemed to have been written according to a formula. In paper after paper, students described college as a means to an end, a way of achieving success, status, prosperity, and security. Only two essays stood out from the rest. These went beyond individual needs and desires. They spoke of how college would help the writers make a difference in the world, working for the good of others.
The professor felt mightily encouraged to read these two essays -- until he realized who had written them. The authors were not from the United States. These students who valued service over success came from Angola and Lebanon.
-- Adapted from an item by Mark Trotter, cited in Homiletics Online
***
One Thanksgiving dinner, a young boy heard for the first time about the custom of breaking the turkey wishbone. He and his grandfather squared off, each gripping one end of the bone. They pulled back, in unison. It snapped. The grandfather won.
The little boy felt terribly disappointed as he looked at the splintered, small end of the bone he was still holding in his hand. His eyes began to fill with tears.
"Don't be sad," said his grandfather, smiling. "My wish was that you would get yours."
The story of Tabitha/Dorcas teaches us what the truly "good life" is all about.
First Lesson
Acts 9:36-43
Peter Raises Tabitha
In the city of Joppa, Peter is called to the house of a seamstress named Tabitha (Dorcas, in Greek). Tabitha has just died. In the upstairs room where her body is laid out, there is a gathering of mourning women, all of whom are holding up articles of clothing she made for them. It is a poignant, even heart-rending scene. Paul sends the mourners away, prays, then orders Tabitha to get up. He does so, then shows her to the people outside, who understand this as a mighty sign of the Lord's favor. In Luke's Gospel, there were ample opportunities to see Jesus the healer at work. Now, in the second volume, it is clear that Jesus' healing power continues to be at work through Peter and the other apostles. There are parallels, also, with Elijah's raising the widow's son (1 Kings 17:17-24) and Elisha's raising of the Shunammite woman's son (2 Kings 4:8-37). Luke refers to some of the people gathered outside the house as "saints" -- meaning that, even in advance of Peter's arrival, the faith had already spread as far as Joppa.
New Testament Lesson
Revelation 7:9-17
Washed In The Blood Of The Lamb
John pictures, here, another worship scene: a "great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages" (v. 9). They are "robed in white, with palm branches in their hands" -- according to early Christian iconography, these are saints and martyrs. They call out, "Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!" (v. 10). After a hymn sung by the angels and elders gathered around the throne, an elder tells John who these white-robed individuals are: "These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb" (v. 14). Having been through a bloody ordeal of martyrdom, the elder assures John that these faithful believers will be safe forever: "... the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes" (v. 17). This is a powerful message of comfort to the persecuted Johannine church.
The Gospel
John 10:22-30
No One Will Snatch Them Out Of My Hand
At "the Festival of the Dedication" (Hannukah), Jesus is accosted in the temple by some people who ask him to declare bluntly whether or not he is the Messiah. This is the same question the religious authorities will later ask of Jesus, at his trial. Since John describes them as "the Jews" -- a term he uses in most other places in a derogatory way -- it's likely that the question is not entirely friendly. Jesus' response seems to bear this out: "... you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep. My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me" (vv. 26-27). John is eager to draw a distinction between those who are within Jesus' circle, and those who are not. For those who are within the circle, there is a promise of eternal protection: "I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand" (v. 28). These words would have been of significant comfort to the Johannine community, many of whom have had firsthand experience with persecution. "I and the Father are one," Jesus says (v. 30). When such a one as he promises, "no one will snatch them out of my hand," that means that not even the Roman emperor can prevail against this one who holds fast even to those who are being martyred.
Preaching Possibilities
One of the things that "goes with the territory" of ministry is funerals. Some of us lead a great many such services -- and every one of them is a little different. Often, the thing that makes one funeral different from the next is what mementos the bereaved family members bring along with them to the church or funeral home.
It's a common thing these days for family members to assemble a collage of photographs. Sorting through these photos and deciding where they go on the posterboard is a way for the survivors to tell the world how their loved one was special. More than that, the very act of looking through pictures -- of talking and laughing and remembering -- is therapeutic in itself. Often, the photos tell more about the deceased -- and about the family members who chose them -- than any number of conversations.
It's also interesting to observe what sorts of objects people choose to place in or near the casket, when they're having a viewing. Sometimes there's an American flag for a veteran, folded into a crisp triangle. Often there's a cross -- or, if the deceased had some history in the Roman Catholic church, a rosary. There may be such eclectic items as baseball caps from the person's favorite team, crayon pictures lovingly scrawled by grandchildren, or tools of a trade. It's all a part of how people grieve.
In today's reading from Acts, a group of women tearfully hold up some objects that remind them of their loved one. What these women hold up are articles of clothing: everything from humble undergarments -- what Luke refers to as "tunics" -- to more elaborate outer garments. Each of these clothing items was made by the deceased. Her name is Tabitha -- though Luke also gives her Greek name, Dorcas. Since Dorcas is the name he continues to use throughout the passage, it may be the name by which she was better known.
Imagine the scene: the body of a woman, recently deceased, laid out for viewing. Surrounding the body are a bevy of weeping women, widows, Luke tells us. In that society, to be a widow very often means living on the edge of poverty. There are no pensions; no Social Security. In that subsistence economy, widows depend on the generosity of others.
Luke also tells us Dorcas is "devoted to good works and acts of charity." Put two and two together: Dorcas is a skilled seamstress, who sews clothing not only for her own family, but also for the needy. At her wake, these weeping, keening women show up holding samples of clothing Dorcas has made for them.
No display of photos was possible in that day and age, but even if it had been, the poster board and snapshots would hardly have been necessary. When it came time to bear witness to the love and generosity of this generous Christian disciple, those articles of clothing say it all.
As we look to the future and try to imagine our own funeral, what photos or objects will our loved ones choose to display? And what will their choice say about the kind of life we've led? Will they all agree it was a good life? That's what we all aspire to, isn't it? Yet, in the context of our larger culture, there's a fair bit of ambiguity when it comes to defining what "the good life" really means.
Ask the proverbial "person on the street" what he or she understands the good life to mean, and the answer you get back will probably have something to do with material wealth, and all the splendidly diverting toys it can buy. Yet, as Luke writes about Dorcas, the good life clearly means nothing this pious woman earned or owned, but rather what she gave away. Those articles of clothing, worn or carried by a legion of poor widows, bear silent testimony to the essential goodness of this sainted woman's life: a life of service to others.
In recent years, Sears, Roebuck, and Company has been using a marketing slogan that goes something like this: "The good life at a great price. Guaranteed." Washing machines, big-screen televisions, and lawn furniture -- as attractive as such items may be -- do not constitute the kind of good life Luke's talking about. Objects like these are quite beside the point.
More than being beside the point, the single-minded pursuit of pleasure through consumer spending is a significant detour away from the life of the Spirit. Remember that rich young man who comes running up to Jesus, asking, "Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" Jesus tells him, "Sell what you have and give it to the poor." That young man "goes away sorrowful" -- the only recorded example in scripture of anyone offered a blessing by Jesus who subsequently turns it down. That rich young man is distracted, big time, and Jesus knows it. What distracts him is the good life (or at least his spiritually impoverished idea of what the good life is all about).
The church, at its best, is a place where people who are trying to kick the consumerism addiction can come together and find strength and support from one another -- not to mention from their "higher power." The church, at its best, holds up before hesitant and fearful disciples the assurance that what the world considers the good life is not much good at all. It's but a pale and poor imitation of the true good life of service to others. The church, at its best, reminds us that, in the words of Harvard chaplain Peter Gomes, "A good person is one who is good at being a person" -- and that the purpose of us all is "not to make a living, but to make a life."
Prayer For The Day
Lord, teach me to be generous. Teach me to serve you as you deserve; to give and not to count the cost, to fight and not to heed the wounds, to toil and not to seek for rest, to labor and not to ask for reward, save that of knowing that I do your will. Amen. (Ignatius of Loyola)
To Illustrate
The great heresy of our time is the belief that having more can substitute for being more.
-- French philosopher Gabriel Marcel
***
I couldn't remember the point anymore; a lot of rewards had come my way, but I felt like a veteran greyhound at the racetrack who finally figures out that she's been chasing mechanical bunnies; all that energy, and it's not even a real rabbit.
-- Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies (New York: Pantheon, 1999), p. 266
***
There's a story of a tourist from the United States who was visiting a famous, open-air street market in Mexico City. There he encountered an old Native American named Pota-lamo, who had twenty strings of onions hanging up for sale.
The tourist engaged him in conversation: "How much for a string of onions?"
"Ten centavos," replied Pota-lamo.
"How much for two strings?"
"Twenty centavos."
"And how much," asked the U.S. citizen with a twinkle in his eye, "for all twenty strings?"
A dark look came over the face of the street merchant. "I would not sell you my twenty strings," he replied, brusquely.
"Why not? Aren't you here to sell your onions?"
"No," explained the old merchant. "I am here to live my life. I love this marketplace: its crowds and the red serapes. I love its sunlight and the waving palmetto trees. I love to have friends come by and say "Buenos dias," and talk about their babies and their work. That is my life. For that I sit here all day and sell my twenty strings of onions. But if I sell them all to one customer, my day is ended. Then I have lost the life I love -- and that I will not do."
The Norteamericano went away marveling that he had met a truly happy man.
***
The most prophetic thing that Thomas Merton ever did was to say to a drugstore clerk who asked him which brand of toothpaste he preferred, "I don't care." Intrigued by the clerk's response, Merton wrote, "He almost dropped dead. I was supposed to feel strongly about Colgate or Pepsodent or Crest ... and they all have a secret ingredient." He concluded that "the worst thing you can do is not care about these things."
Merton wrote in the early 1960s, long before the art of making us care about "the secret ingredient" had so aggressively entered into every aspect of American life. We can't ride a bus, open a magazine or go online without being asked to consider which insurance company offers the best rates or which paper towel picks up the most dirt. [Now] is a good time to reclaim our senses and reply with a resounding, "I don't care!"
-- Kathleen Norris, "Apocalypse Now," in the Christian Century, November 15, 2005
***
We have many commodities but little satisfaction, little sense of the sufficiency of anything. The scarcity of satisfaction makes of our many commodities an infinite series of commodities, the new commodities invariably promising greater satisfaction than the older ones. In fact, the industrial economy's most marketed commodity is satisfaction, and this commodity, which is repeatedly promised, bought, and paid for, is never delivered.
-- Wendell Berry, cited by L. Shannon Jung in Food For Life (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Augsburg Fortress, 2004), p. 3
***
To be where God is -- to follow Jesus -- means going beyond the limits of our own comfort and safety. It means receiving our lives as gifts instead of guarding them as our own possessions. It means sharing the life we have been given instead of bottling it for our own consumption. It means giving up the notion that we can build dams to contain the bright streams of our lives and letting them go instead, letting them swell their banks and spill their wealth until they carry us down to where they run, full and growing fuller, into the wide and glittering sea.
-- Barbara Brown Taylor, in The Seeds of Heaven (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster, 2004)
***
There was a college professor who taught freshman English. The first assignment in his class was a 500-word essay on the topic, "Why are you attending college?"
The results were predictable: there was a certain sameness to most of these papers. They seemed to have been written according to a formula. In paper after paper, students described college as a means to an end, a way of achieving success, status, prosperity, and security. Only two essays stood out from the rest. These went beyond individual needs and desires. They spoke of how college would help the writers make a difference in the world, working for the good of others.
The professor felt mightily encouraged to read these two essays -- until he realized who had written them. The authors were not from the United States. These students who valued service over success came from Angola and Lebanon.
-- Adapted from an item by Mark Trotter, cited in Homiletics Online
***
One Thanksgiving dinner, a young boy heard for the first time about the custom of breaking the turkey wishbone. He and his grandfather squared off, each gripping one end of the bone. They pulled back, in unison. It snapped. The grandfather won.
The little boy felt terribly disappointed as he looked at the splintered, small end of the bone he was still holding in his hand. His eyes began to fill with tears.
"Don't be sad," said his grandfather, smiling. "My wish was that you would get yours."
