Proper 13
Preaching
Lectionary Preaching Workbook
Series VI, Cycle A
COMMENTARY ON THE LESSONS
Lesson 1: Genesis 32:22-31 (C)
This story includes some legendary material which needn't concern us for the matter of sermonizing: belief in a river god, sanction about eating the hip bone of an animal, and so forth. What is significant in this story is the fact that Jacob is finally brought face to face with himself. He has been successful because of his deceit and his cowardice. He has become self-assured, even arrogant, because everything has gone his way for many years. But now, facing a confrontation with Esau, Jacob is afraid. For the first time in his life he discovers his own fear and self-loathing for what he has become. The combatant he faces is, in one sense, an agent of the Lord. But he also represents Jacob's own alter ego, the man Jacob must face if he is ever to become a self-respecting man again. Jacob wins until dawn, at which point the angel asks to be set free. Jacob refuses, and reveals his own determination to persevere. Since his inward battle has been engaged, he is determined to see it through to its final outcome. We could say that in that hour, Jacob became a man. And true to ancient belief, because he is a new man, he receives a new name: Israel.
Lesson 1: Isaiah 55:1-3 (RC)
Because of his love for David, for the people of Israel, God welcomes the people to partake of bread and wine, the spiritual rewards for a faithful people.
Lesson 1: Nehemiah 9:16-20 (E)
God forgives. The people of the Exodus had faltered, failed to heed the word of God, sought to turn back. But God remained faithful.
Lesson 2: Romans 9:1-5 (C)
Paul is devastated by the fact that the Jewish community, by and large, is not persuaded by his message, by the words of Jesus. Paul insists that he would willingly give up his own relationship with Christ, if by doing so he could win his people to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Lesson 2: Romans 8:35, 37-39 (RC); Romans 8:35-39 (E)
Nothing -- nothing at all -- no power upon this earth -- no heavenly force beyond human understanding -- nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Gospel: Matthew 14:13-21 (C, RC, E)
Following a day of ministry to the many sick people who had come to him, Jesus and his friends wish to find a quiet place, somewhere to recover from the exhausting day. But the crowds remain and Jesus, realizing that they must be fed, asks his apostles to see to that. They suggest that the people go to the nearby towns to buy food. They have only five loaves of bread and two baskets of fish, hardly enough to serve some 5,000 people. Yet, after offering what they have, the amazed apostles discover they yet have twelve baskets remaining. Symbolically, this points out that no matter how many of us turn to Jesus for the bread of life, there is plenty for everyone. But there is also another explanation which we shall consider shortly.
SERMON SUGGESTIONS
Title: "Facing Up To Myself"
Text: Genesis 32:22-31
Theme: Jacob is, in a sense, Every Man (or, if you like, Every Woman or Every Person). Heretofore confident, pleased with himself, successful, he suddenly comes up against his fears personified in his brother Esau, and discovers he is not completely self-sufficient. Come nightfall, he must wrestle with those fears.
1. Jacob faced the worst within himself. Perhaps the writer of the passage wished the antagonist to be viewed as an angel. We all know that in ancient times, a person's name was the essence of that person. Even today there are remote tribes whose members carry their true name in a capsule suspended around their necks for purposes of burial. They then use a different, public name, which is not their true essence. So the "angel" refused to give a name, thus concealing his identity, and thus leaving to the reader a certain amount of freedom to identify him. I see him as Jacob's own self, the lesser self with whom he must do battle. Sooner or later, we all must face our true selves, face those things we fear, face those things we have done or left undone which demean us. God sees to it that we are confronted in this way. Call it an angel. Not everyone has the courage to do battle as Jacob did. Those who do become the real person they were meant to be.
2. Jacob fought through until dawn. Symbolically, we have Jacob winning his victory. The angel compliments Jacob, telling the world that Jacob has fought with God and man and won. That is, Jacob is ready now to undergo a change, to face his fears, to confront the worst within. So with us. If we have the courage to face our fears and failures, we too can yet become the best that we can be.
3. Jacob's story had a happy ending. Perhaps a bit of Hollywood there, but in the passages immediately following, we find Jacob and Esau happily reunited. Jacob had faced his fears, gone on ahead to meet them. And when he did, he discovered he had nothing to fear. That doesn't mean there is nothing to fear in this world, but it does mean that when we face our fears we either find there was nothing to fear (usually) or that we do, indeed, have the courage to face up to those fearsome conditions. But the pathway is that wrestling match within one's soul. So Jacob, now admirable in a way he never could have been before, is a changed man. He is a new person. He is Israel.
Title: "No Greater Love"
Text: Romans 9:1-5
Theme: In one of Graham Greene's novels, The Heart of the Matter, Major Henry Scobie, second in command of a Colonial police force in a town in British-governed West Africa, has constant problems with people because, strangely, he has a compassionate heart. The problem is he often can't say "No!" and the result is sometimes tragic where people's best interests collide. Scobie is Roman Catholic. He has been taught that God will not forgive suicide. Scobie struggles with the growing belief that the kindest thing he can do for all the people he loves is to take his own life. But to do so, he believes, would be to give up not only his life but his eternal soul as well. Nevertheless, he commits suicide. Foolish as that may sound, he was a man who, from his perspective, was willing to give everything for the people he loved. Paul here is offering the same, except he sees the impossibility of such an offer being successful. But there's a sermon in the idea of giving up what means the most for the sake of those we love.
Title: "The Miracle Of Sharing"
Text: Matthew 14:13-21
Theme: One might first turn to Matthew 12:38 where we read that some lawyers decided to make Jesus look bad by challenging him to perform a miracle. They were fairly sure he couldn't do it and thereby hoped to show him up as a fraud. Jesus saw through this, however. First, angrily, he replied: "How evil and godless are the people of this day." Then, addressing their request, he said, "You ask for a miracle? No!"
Clearly Jesus had no intention of winning converts by performing magic tricks. Besides, without any knowledge of natural law, the people would have been unimpressed anyway. I seriously doubt that Jesus somehow manufactured a large food supply for this occasion. There's another, far more believable explanation, one which is not without its miraculous element. People of that era knew food was not easily available. It was no surprise that they would be gone for most of the day, seeking out, then listening to Jesus. Five thousand people must have come, in many cases, from long distances. They would have brought food with them Picture Jesus stepping among a few people, sharing his small supply of food, doing without himself. Picture someone, perhaps an idealistic young person who has heard things he had never heard before, reaching in his purse or his robe and taking the bread and fish he brought along, sharing it, offering it to the person next to him. Picture that person, with gratitude, producing his own store of food and sharing it as well. Picture this slow, generous sharing spreading through the crowd until everyone is fed. But they are fed, not necessarily with their own food but with that of a neighbor. A regular church picnic. We've all been there, seen how much food is left over, as each contributor brings more than a fair share. The miracle is not that Jesus magically produced food out of thin air, but that thousands of people living on meager incomes, hard-working people with modest supplies of their own, chose to share with others. Generosity spreads, its spirit infects and inspires.
1. Generosity influences those around us, making others generous.
2. Generosity brings us close together in friendship.
3. Generosity provides the means of the gospel's spread (could be used as stewardship sermon).
ADDITIONAL ILLUSTRATIONS
Major Scobie in a dialogue with God: "No, I don't trust you. I love you, but I've never trusted you. If you made me, you made this feeling of responsibility that I've always carried around like a sack of bricks. I'm not a policeman for nothing -- responsible for order, for seeing justice is done. There was no other profession for a man of my kind. I can't shift my responsibility to you. If I could, I would be someone else. I can't make one of them suffer so as to save myself. I'm responsible and I'll see it through the only way I can. A sick man's death means to them only a short suffering -- everybody has to die. We are all of us resigned to death: It's life we aren't resigned to." Scobie, unlike Jacob, wrestled with his inner spirit, but he gave up. He couldn't stand the pain and resigned the battle.
____________
In a splendid (out of print, alas) book by J. W. Stevenson, God in My Unbelief, he depicts a Scottish preacher in the small Highland town of Craigie. Sent there to minister to a community of shepherds and farmers, he soon learns that with all his theological learning, he has a great deal to learn about people -- and about himself. Finally, after many disappointments, he begins to learn how God works there. One day, praying with a deepened self-understanding, he writes: "I gave thanks for my blessings; but usually it was a thanksgiving for what had turned out well for me, for the smoothing of my path, for the overcoming of obstacles. I confessed what I knew to have been wrong; but it was I who was confessing in order that I should be put right and at peace with God, not that He should be given what I had been denying Him. I said my prayers for other people; but often it was my asking for what I felt they needed, what I had decided would be right and good for them -- what I wished, what I thought, was the center of my praying. And sometimes there was a shadow of that dark evil, the thankfulness that I at least had confessed my sin and was not a Pharisee. I at least had struck my breast and said, 'God be merciful to me, a sinner.'
"Right at the very heart of me, where I had assumed that I was being honest before God, I began to see how deep were the roots of the self that seeks its own good; this evil from which I must be delivered there, in the very core of my being. I began to see -- or was shown. Just where it was darkest the light had to break, had to be turned upon me so that I could see myself ... It is our own self-love that must be crucified; we cannot blame others. It is there, at the heart of us, that we must learn to turn away from ourselves and the concern about what we feel and suffer, what we think and wish and do."
____________
Psalm Of The Day
Psalm 17:1-7 (C) -- "Give ear to my prayer ..."
Psalm 78:1-29 (E) -- "He sent them food in abundance."
Prayer Of The Day
God of love, when we turn inward, it is difficult for us to see our own sinfulness. In bright, rare moments, we understand how our prayers are selfish and self-serving so often. Help us to pray only that thy will might be done, that we might become worthy servants. We fall short, we know. We desire those things which do not serve thee, turn away from much that is thy will for us. Forgive us, God, and open our eyes, that we might yet be healed of the spiritual blindness which so easily besets us. In Christ's name we pray.
Lesson 1: Genesis 32:22-31 (C)
This story includes some legendary material which needn't concern us for the matter of sermonizing: belief in a river god, sanction about eating the hip bone of an animal, and so forth. What is significant in this story is the fact that Jacob is finally brought face to face with himself. He has been successful because of his deceit and his cowardice. He has become self-assured, even arrogant, because everything has gone his way for many years. But now, facing a confrontation with Esau, Jacob is afraid. For the first time in his life he discovers his own fear and self-loathing for what he has become. The combatant he faces is, in one sense, an agent of the Lord. But he also represents Jacob's own alter ego, the man Jacob must face if he is ever to become a self-respecting man again. Jacob wins until dawn, at which point the angel asks to be set free. Jacob refuses, and reveals his own determination to persevere. Since his inward battle has been engaged, he is determined to see it through to its final outcome. We could say that in that hour, Jacob became a man. And true to ancient belief, because he is a new man, he receives a new name: Israel.
Lesson 1: Isaiah 55:1-3 (RC)
Because of his love for David, for the people of Israel, God welcomes the people to partake of bread and wine, the spiritual rewards for a faithful people.
Lesson 1: Nehemiah 9:16-20 (E)
God forgives. The people of the Exodus had faltered, failed to heed the word of God, sought to turn back. But God remained faithful.
Lesson 2: Romans 9:1-5 (C)
Paul is devastated by the fact that the Jewish community, by and large, is not persuaded by his message, by the words of Jesus. Paul insists that he would willingly give up his own relationship with Christ, if by doing so he could win his people to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Lesson 2: Romans 8:35, 37-39 (RC); Romans 8:35-39 (E)
Nothing -- nothing at all -- no power upon this earth -- no heavenly force beyond human understanding -- nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Gospel: Matthew 14:13-21 (C, RC, E)
Following a day of ministry to the many sick people who had come to him, Jesus and his friends wish to find a quiet place, somewhere to recover from the exhausting day. But the crowds remain and Jesus, realizing that they must be fed, asks his apostles to see to that. They suggest that the people go to the nearby towns to buy food. They have only five loaves of bread and two baskets of fish, hardly enough to serve some 5,000 people. Yet, after offering what they have, the amazed apostles discover they yet have twelve baskets remaining. Symbolically, this points out that no matter how many of us turn to Jesus for the bread of life, there is plenty for everyone. But there is also another explanation which we shall consider shortly.
SERMON SUGGESTIONS
Title: "Facing Up To Myself"
Text: Genesis 32:22-31
Theme: Jacob is, in a sense, Every Man (or, if you like, Every Woman or Every Person). Heretofore confident, pleased with himself, successful, he suddenly comes up against his fears personified in his brother Esau, and discovers he is not completely self-sufficient. Come nightfall, he must wrestle with those fears.
1. Jacob faced the worst within himself. Perhaps the writer of the passage wished the antagonist to be viewed as an angel. We all know that in ancient times, a person's name was the essence of that person. Even today there are remote tribes whose members carry their true name in a capsule suspended around their necks for purposes of burial. They then use a different, public name, which is not their true essence. So the "angel" refused to give a name, thus concealing his identity, and thus leaving to the reader a certain amount of freedom to identify him. I see him as Jacob's own self, the lesser self with whom he must do battle. Sooner or later, we all must face our true selves, face those things we fear, face those things we have done or left undone which demean us. God sees to it that we are confronted in this way. Call it an angel. Not everyone has the courage to do battle as Jacob did. Those who do become the real person they were meant to be.
2. Jacob fought through until dawn. Symbolically, we have Jacob winning his victory. The angel compliments Jacob, telling the world that Jacob has fought with God and man and won. That is, Jacob is ready now to undergo a change, to face his fears, to confront the worst within. So with us. If we have the courage to face our fears and failures, we too can yet become the best that we can be.
3. Jacob's story had a happy ending. Perhaps a bit of Hollywood there, but in the passages immediately following, we find Jacob and Esau happily reunited. Jacob had faced his fears, gone on ahead to meet them. And when he did, he discovered he had nothing to fear. That doesn't mean there is nothing to fear in this world, but it does mean that when we face our fears we either find there was nothing to fear (usually) or that we do, indeed, have the courage to face up to those fearsome conditions. But the pathway is that wrestling match within one's soul. So Jacob, now admirable in a way he never could have been before, is a changed man. He is a new person. He is Israel.
Title: "No Greater Love"
Text: Romans 9:1-5
Theme: In one of Graham Greene's novels, The Heart of the Matter, Major Henry Scobie, second in command of a Colonial police force in a town in British-governed West Africa, has constant problems with people because, strangely, he has a compassionate heart. The problem is he often can't say "No!" and the result is sometimes tragic where people's best interests collide. Scobie is Roman Catholic. He has been taught that God will not forgive suicide. Scobie struggles with the growing belief that the kindest thing he can do for all the people he loves is to take his own life. But to do so, he believes, would be to give up not only his life but his eternal soul as well. Nevertheless, he commits suicide. Foolish as that may sound, he was a man who, from his perspective, was willing to give everything for the people he loved. Paul here is offering the same, except he sees the impossibility of such an offer being successful. But there's a sermon in the idea of giving up what means the most for the sake of those we love.
Title: "The Miracle Of Sharing"
Text: Matthew 14:13-21
Theme: One might first turn to Matthew 12:38 where we read that some lawyers decided to make Jesus look bad by challenging him to perform a miracle. They were fairly sure he couldn't do it and thereby hoped to show him up as a fraud. Jesus saw through this, however. First, angrily, he replied: "How evil and godless are the people of this day." Then, addressing their request, he said, "You ask for a miracle? No!"
Clearly Jesus had no intention of winning converts by performing magic tricks. Besides, without any knowledge of natural law, the people would have been unimpressed anyway. I seriously doubt that Jesus somehow manufactured a large food supply for this occasion. There's another, far more believable explanation, one which is not without its miraculous element. People of that era knew food was not easily available. It was no surprise that they would be gone for most of the day, seeking out, then listening to Jesus. Five thousand people must have come, in many cases, from long distances. They would have brought food with them Picture Jesus stepping among a few people, sharing his small supply of food, doing without himself. Picture someone, perhaps an idealistic young person who has heard things he had never heard before, reaching in his purse or his robe and taking the bread and fish he brought along, sharing it, offering it to the person next to him. Picture that person, with gratitude, producing his own store of food and sharing it as well. Picture this slow, generous sharing spreading through the crowd until everyone is fed. But they are fed, not necessarily with their own food but with that of a neighbor. A regular church picnic. We've all been there, seen how much food is left over, as each contributor brings more than a fair share. The miracle is not that Jesus magically produced food out of thin air, but that thousands of people living on meager incomes, hard-working people with modest supplies of their own, chose to share with others. Generosity spreads, its spirit infects and inspires.
1. Generosity influences those around us, making others generous.
2. Generosity brings us close together in friendship.
3. Generosity provides the means of the gospel's spread (could be used as stewardship sermon).
ADDITIONAL ILLUSTRATIONS
Major Scobie in a dialogue with God: "No, I don't trust you. I love you, but I've never trusted you. If you made me, you made this feeling of responsibility that I've always carried around like a sack of bricks. I'm not a policeman for nothing -- responsible for order, for seeing justice is done. There was no other profession for a man of my kind. I can't shift my responsibility to you. If I could, I would be someone else. I can't make one of them suffer so as to save myself. I'm responsible and I'll see it through the only way I can. A sick man's death means to them only a short suffering -- everybody has to die. We are all of us resigned to death: It's life we aren't resigned to." Scobie, unlike Jacob, wrestled with his inner spirit, but he gave up. He couldn't stand the pain and resigned the battle.
____________
In a splendid (out of print, alas) book by J. W. Stevenson, God in My Unbelief, he depicts a Scottish preacher in the small Highland town of Craigie. Sent there to minister to a community of shepherds and farmers, he soon learns that with all his theological learning, he has a great deal to learn about people -- and about himself. Finally, after many disappointments, he begins to learn how God works there. One day, praying with a deepened self-understanding, he writes: "I gave thanks for my blessings; but usually it was a thanksgiving for what had turned out well for me, for the smoothing of my path, for the overcoming of obstacles. I confessed what I knew to have been wrong; but it was I who was confessing in order that I should be put right and at peace with God, not that He should be given what I had been denying Him. I said my prayers for other people; but often it was my asking for what I felt they needed, what I had decided would be right and good for them -- what I wished, what I thought, was the center of my praying. And sometimes there was a shadow of that dark evil, the thankfulness that I at least had confessed my sin and was not a Pharisee. I at least had struck my breast and said, 'God be merciful to me, a sinner.'
"Right at the very heart of me, where I had assumed that I was being honest before God, I began to see how deep were the roots of the self that seeks its own good; this evil from which I must be delivered there, in the very core of my being. I began to see -- or was shown. Just where it was darkest the light had to break, had to be turned upon me so that I could see myself ... It is our own self-love that must be crucified; we cannot blame others. It is there, at the heart of us, that we must learn to turn away from ourselves and the concern about what we feel and suffer, what we think and wish and do."
____________
Psalm Of The Day
Psalm 17:1-7 (C) -- "Give ear to my prayer ..."
Psalm 78:1-29 (E) -- "He sent them food in abundance."
Prayer Of The Day
God of love, when we turn inward, it is difficult for us to see our own sinfulness. In bright, rare moments, we understand how our prayers are selfish and self-serving so often. Help us to pray only that thy will might be done, that we might become worthy servants. We fall short, we know. We desire those things which do not serve thee, turn away from much that is thy will for us. Forgive us, God, and open our eyes, that we might yet be healed of the spiritual blindness which so easily besets us. In Christ's name we pray.
