I Peter 1:17-23 May 8
1) God judges impartially. That is good news in our days of identity politics. Patty McKinnon, Indianapolis attorney, quotes Frank Mansell of John Know Pres at Easter: "If you fear God, you fear no one else." OK, except fear in this passage is closer to revere. I am at a loss why we don;t change the translation to something closer to the meaning.
2) live as strangers-the verb is sojourning/travelling 9 as an alien?) recall that Hebrew ethics is concerned for the resident alien, the traveller as well. this may well pick up on diaspora Judaism, or a sense of not fitting in the world as a Christian, a sort of psychic "exile" as we used to hear a lot from denominational offices that drew on Brueggemann's image.This theme gained traction in the 1980s (Elliot and others).
3) v.18 is a weak translation futile is all right, an ineffective, feckless, groping. My beef is with inherited part- this is closer to the old ways, the traditional ways, but has the sense  of being stuck in a rut, maybe even the lifeless or dead hand of the past would be closer to the mark. gold=perishable so blood=imperishable
4) notice the background of the lamb image here
5) v. 20 is a beautiful construction-Sentences like this made scholars wonder how an illiterate, in all likelihood, fisherman, could write like this, so they doubted that Simon Peter actually wrote this. Notice also the nice balance of the dawn of the ages and the current end times. It then goes on to have Jesus be our catalyst toward god, although the translation believe in God (NIV) may be better have confidence in God (RSV) or trust in God (NRSV). I am struck by the phrase confidence in god, especially with its latin root of faith/belief.
6) v.22 often get shorts attention.
7) what is the imperishable seed. to me the word of God sounds  like a catalyst or  an instrumentality

Ps. 116: 1-4, 12-19 Again context matters. Reading this psalm after Easter takes on a wholly different character than someone who has been at  death's door due to illness.
1) Sheol is the grave, the abode of the dead, a shadow realm like Hades when Hercules enters it.  Sheol  and v. 3 is an invitation to the Holy Saturday Easter nexus. Easter shines light on the descent into hell, and the descent makes Easter dawn all the brighter. recall that the reformers made the move of starting the descent into hell, of being god-forsaken/abandoned at Gethsemane. Barth, von Balthasar emphasized the descent. alan lewis did great work, in my view, on Holy Saturday in that posthumous work. Lauber has recently published his revised dissertation on the topic, and miracle of miracles, I can follow a theology dissertation.
Much fuss is being made over Rob Bell's Love Wins. I haven;t read it. I would say that few practicing theologians imagine hell as a literal fire and brimstone place. Not long ago, the Vatican basically endorsed von Balthasar's view of hell as the place of being God forsaken, a place more of being without the source of being, or the chaos of formless existence.
2)

We should note that thanksgiving is the mode of the last section, obviously. Waht sort of thanksgiving prayer did Jesus utter after the harrowing of hell? A good spiritual practice would be to rewrite this part, or to use it as a structure to write out a thanksgiving in one's own life. thanksgiving does not come naturally, nor easily to some of us, so practice makes it a more integral part of spiritual life.

John 20:19-31 May 1, 2001

John gives us Pentecost early. Jesus breathes on them, gives life as Adam received it. Receive holy spirit/breath/holy life force/itself. then they are to forgive. Forgiveness is living in Easter light. Easter is lived out as a community of forgiveness. Too often the church seems to expect us to know what this is and how to work with it. The Tuesday class is devoting two classes to the topic. This is a good example of Peter's living hope. Jesus appears and says hello/shalom or could it indeed by peace. Forgiveness offers peace in relationships; it allows them to live. Jesus is giving them the authority of rabbis to say what is forgiven or unforgiven as permissible or impermissible. After the footwashing, Jesus gave the command to love one another. To love, to forgive is an Easter sign; forgiveness is love in motion when love is threatened by hurt. Forgiveness revivifies relationship. A friend of mine sent me a prayer from a Methodist bishop. notwithstanding its doubtful pedigree, it had something I liked. Its refrain was Easter us, making Easter an imperative verb. Easter us into forgiving.

We then move right into disbelieving/unbelieving/not believing Thomas. Thomas does not doubt as we would use the word.  The church is guilty of using a poor translation to be an excuse for people to ask questions of the faith. Tillich spoke of doubting as an element of faith, not its opposite. As finite beings, we cannot be certain of the reality of being grasped by the infinite. Indeed what we call faith, he calls a "narrow castle of certitude: (Courage :76) It reminds me  a bit of a a Woody Allen character who says that god regards him a sthe loyal opposition.
 
Thomas now sees what the disciples saw-as he missed the first appearance (why?)? Jesus is no mere spirit, as his body bears the open wounds left from the crucifixion. The past is no illusion; Jesus bears its scars.  Although Jesus moves through doors, his appearance has a palpable reality.  This risen Jesus is aware of what happens here, not distant or removed. Jesus has a talk with Thomas. Jesus doesn't pout or withdraw but engages Thomas where he is, but Jesus does not forget his words. Jesus doesn't criticize him or correct him about some trivial mistake, doesn't complain about him. Forgiveness doesn't wipe away the scars of the past, but it does make them bearable.

Forgiveness could well be the early church's sole resource and maybe ours as well.This passage breaks the third wall with the ending, as we who believe but don't get to see Jesus, are directly addressed. John includes us. Notice that Jesus does not criticize Thomas. One of the things we do constantly that may well require forgiveness is criticize people. Indeed here Jesus gives him precisely what the has asked for. He doesn't say that Thomas has not lived up to his expectations; he doesn't shame him or ;lay down guilt; he is not trying to assert superiority. He accepts him for who he is. David Augsburger has the insight that we resist forgiveness because we do not want to lose the edifying feeling of being one up, one above in the moral realm. It's that cloying sense of someone saying I forgive you for a transgressio, but then bringing it a lot. We're across the river from Missouri, the show me state. We are all tempted to be from Missouri in religion. Thomas would like to see his skeptical nature so honored. If you are the sort who looks for empirical proof in faith, look not to speculation, but to the reality of Christian lives here and now. Learn to embrace the new life with forgiveness.

Tuesday 4/26 Forgiveness


Define forgiveness.

What is not forgiveness?

Should forgive and forget be linked?

How do you know when you have not forgiven?
How do you know when you have forgiven?

Are some things unforgivable? Like what?

When someones asks for forgiveness and you respond with, it's no big deal. is that helpful or not to the process of forgiveness? Is it harder to ask for or to receive forgvieness?

what is the longest time it has taken for you to forgive?

I realize that the readers of this verge on perfection, but when has it been necessary for you to be forgiven for a wrong?

How does forgiveness keep from becoming excusing behavior?

Is is helpful to follow the Baptist notion of love the sinner, hate the sin?

What do we mean in the Lord's Prayer when we say forgive us our debts...?

What are some movies that deal with forgiveness? Books? TV shows? Songs? (I immediately think of Don Henley of the Eagles, The heart of the Matter.)

Acts. 2:14-, 22-32 Ps. 16, I Peter 1:3-9 first cuts

As many of us are reminded when they look at the calendar, the lectionary shifts away from OT after Easter for a while. we do still get a psalm.
Acts

1) If you are so inclined to research,  some good work has been done on speeches, rhetoric, in Acts. to get a good sense of a comparative religion approach see the recent award winning book by Luke Timothy Johnson on Greco/Roman approaches to religion. Let's say that this was written 50-60 years after the death of Jesus. What reactions would Luke wish to see, what reactions could there be to Peter speaking in this way?
2) Notice though, that this is packed with a series of Scripture citations.For instance the oath to David is Ps.132:11
3) Some folks wonder if vv.22-4 are a little catechism on Jesus. If so, what are your early memories of learning in the faith?
4) Next is a classic example of how a reading such as Ps 16 gets transformed in an Easter context.
5) Do you think the psalmist was predicting the resurrection?

 

I Peter 1:3-9
  At the outset, I admit that I am not as aware of this epistle as I should be.

 

1) The use of diaspora puts us in a Jewish context, i would think. However, the theme of exile/homelessness could apply toward economic, political, and indeed spiritual conditions as well.

for a while, we have endured the metaphor of exile being applied to the state of  cultural church disestablishment, for instance, and minority voices will use it withing a particular setting to emphasize their estrangement: right or left wings within the church for instance-notice some rare words for instance newly begotten (my translation) in 3, reserved/kept is closer ot preserved-v. 5 shield has the sense of being in a fort or garrison-v7 proved genuine- comes from metal testing-

2) what is this inheritance in heaven?
3) Notice that it does not promise a rose garden-trial/temptation/testing will continue
4) I don;t do well with the refining of character image to expose the gold beneath-how about you?
5)

Ps. 16 has great images for path/ the way, if you are looking for a sermon with geographic imagery.
1) It is cited as the early church used it as a way to come to grips with the meaning of resurrection.

2) I would think v. 2 was important after the ascension. think of Jesus scaring Peter in John 13's footwashing where he says that Peter will have no part in him without the ritual.

3) vv 5-6 seem to me to be worth working with for a while, and they could be productive of all sorts of ideas. I do think of how salvation in Israel had the sense of plenty of elbow room

4) At the end, what are the guideposts for the path of life? Where does it lead/ Pilgrim's Progress offers all sorts of ways to create a geography here. think also of Norris. Dakota or the Lindvall book on spiritual geography.

Matthew 28:1-10 and Is. 25:6-9

Easter is filled with our pale attempts at life's force with bunnies and their broods, eggs as containers of life, green plastic grass that does indeed seem capable of reproducing. In this account, we get an angel here as an actor and a speaker. Instead of cute,  we get a report of daunting forces of nature: apocalyptic images of earthquake and lightning ( see transfiguration). We get the shock of the new:the women are the first messengers -2X they are told to spread the word to the male disciples, as frozen with fear as the guards. Not only are they open to the message, they move and share it. As they are going to do a good thing the guards, the guardians of the established order,  are frozen with fear -why guard an empty tomb? Guards are custodians of the tomb, custodians of a corpse.
Born in a grave image from Tillich. Frankl story of the globe where loves turns the world.

The Bible has a clear trajectory in grasping the nature of God: god of the living, the god of life, not death. God is a god of open doors. I am reminded me of the president congratulating Congress that the doors were open to the great sites of our nation, but he picked the Lincoln memorial, where no doors are to be found to block one's way.The women came expected a sealed tomb but it was wide open. Easter resurrection is the great reversal a disclosure of the new age- a new world world to transform this one, to restore what was lost

2x we get basically the same message from angel and Jesus, especially to not be afraid and go and tell. I find the casual greeting form Jesus to be hilarious.(laugh track in background) Still, the usual word for greeting here literally means Rejoice.when they grab his feet that is the same word for worship/homage.

On Is.25,the new age is a banquet image.  I remember a Lutheran theologian reading  this and proclaiming with his girth, God loves fatness. I think of the New Orleans motto, let the good times roll. It is a good thing to continue Communion with a big Easter brunch. It underscores the thanksgiving and celebratory aspects of communion. Indeed, we call it a foretaste, an appetizer, for the joys of heaven in C. '67. this morning we match a spiritual banquet with a brunch banquet, an extension of Communion.

The resurrection uplifts the kind of life led by Jesus. solidarity with the dead.  Easter is a promise of a new dawn the future- (Lewis) "as we await a movement into the tearless dawn of God's wrapping up our world into the final embrace of divine love"- no more shroud, but a nice warm blanket over a safe earth. Just like we don;t know of smallpox now, or polio, one day we won;t know of cancer.(65) God's tomorrow is taking up residence in our today.

Easter is God's yes to all of us. Vindication of life itself in a new key/dimension, a real life was vindicated, so not a flight from this world but a deep abiding engagement with it. for god, on Holy Saturday, a day was like 1,000 years. God IDs with "death's defeated ." Easter is more than new birth, springtime, or renewal. it is a new creation, for only god, the god of the living, the living God,  can make a tomb a womb; only God can bring life from death, only God can make grave clothes swaddling clothes; only God can make a bier a manger.
how often to we roll the stone back on our own lives?

 

Tuesday Class 4/19

First Cut, more may follow later today. I will bring in some quotes that help illustrate the models.

 

OK we return to the issue of Holy week and the death of Jesus.

 

1) A suffering savior was not  envisioned by most people. Palm Sunday stands at that point. Within days, Jesus dies, and the early church comes to grips with that death. Like many of us in grief, we search for meaning, for some purpose in a death, especially a cruel one for one so young. The NT, in my view, combs the Scriptures to start to make religious sense out of dashed expectations and hopes.

 

2) On Maundy Thursday we will repeat the explicit linkage of the death of Jesus for forgiveness of sins. One image of forgiveness that remains in Yom Kippur/Day of Atonement/forgiveness/covering is just that. Sin is forgiven by its being forgotten, pushed out of sight. How does the cross do that?

 

If sin is an illness, how does the cross heal?

If sin is a stain, how does it cleanse?

If the issue is guilt, how doe it absolve?

If sin is to be be seen as a civil wrong, a tort, how does the cross make whole, how does it compensate? Whom does it compensate?

Instead of seeing sin as an individual issue, does the cross instead point to social sin, or if you prefer, the sins of humanity as a whole?

 

Some rare instances of the NT speak of propitiation, of appeasing wrath. How would that work?

If sin is addiction, dysfunction, how does the cross heal that? I am thinking in terms of bondage here. Ransom, used by mark, is a word for paying a price for freedom. OK, to whom is it being paid? Why the cross for payment?

Greek word for sin is missing the mark, how does the cross move u on target?

Atonement, at root, means at one-ment, making whole, I suppose. That sounds like reconciliation to me. How does the cross create reconciliation?

 

Notice that answers to these have a lot to say of our image of God.

 

Sacrificial language gets us all hung up. Recall that it is basically away of trying to bridge the gap between the divine and human realms. How is the cross a bridge?

 

I do not know if i will be adding to this long section or not. If i do make changes, i will repost.
Ex, 12

We may well be deep into the mists of history. I was taught, before the enlightenment, that this reflects a spring festival of some sort that morphed into a ritual for Passover. After the exile, this is a festival for the new year, as opposed to an older autumn calendar. Some would cite its connection to a full moon as further evidence of a truly ancient festival. Here we get a good example of biblical stories having layers that are integrated, sewn together, and re-interpreted within a narrative framework

1) I cannot tell if this initial description is before the temple, working with it or after its first destruction. I say this as it is a household feast but also sees a congregation in play. See books such as Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews for a description of the bloody mess the temple precincts must have been for Passover in the time of Jesus. Notice the lamb is to be unblemished, only the best for sacrifice, sheep or goat.

2) I love that it takes into account family size for economy but also waste.

3) Many Jewish entrances feature a mezzuzah, a sense of a sacred entrance to the home. In the same line of thought, the blood, life blood, marks the door. It has a sense, to me anyway, similar to putting wolf bane or garlic around to keep a vampire at bay. BY v. 22 we get mention of a destroyer. Remember how DeMille imagines its tentacles creeping around in 10 Commandments. Hyssop seems linked to ritual of purification.

4) Again, I don;t  have a sense of why the whole animal is roasted but it moves smoothly into becoming food on the run, food for a journey.

5) After all these years, the ordinance proclaimed is still being followed. For me this is a double-edged passover, from death of course, but presage passing form slavery to freedom.

 

Is. 52:12-53:12-How do we keep this from becoming a glorification of suffering?

This is the last of the four servant songs. indeed it seems to serve as a template for the trials of Jesus as much as Ps. 22. Joel Marcus concludes his book the Way of the Lord with some good examination of the passage in the time of Jesus, especially its end times readings for the suffering of the righteous. He has a good chart on noticing Markan use of phrases, perhaps drawn from the passage.
1) We rush into the suffering too quickly. Contemplate, as we are told, the end of ch. 52.

2) Whom do we hold of no account that may well reveal the arm of the Lord?

3) vv.4-5 are difficult for me. How and why would this process inhere? I assume sin emphasizes the diseases mentioned in the first set. What does it do to theology to perceive sin more as a disease than a choice?
4) v. 9 clicks in frame Joseph of Arimathea, but I am also struck by linking wicked and rich.
5)

Ps. 116:1-2, 12-19 Again, please be reminded that 113-118, the praise set fo psalms were sung at major Temple festivals, including Passover. Again, this could be a hymn sung before the move to the garden.

1) cup of salvation ma have direct or more tenuous relation to the cup we now see as the communion cup. Indeed, if you are having Communion on Maundy (mandatory0 Thursday, how does this psalm fit into your liturgy?
2) do you think we have relation to the cup of wrath of which Jesus speaks?
3) of all people, Calvin did not see v. 15 as God looking for martyrs, but instead sees it as a protection thanksgiving
4) why do many of us find it hard to make thanksgiving offerings, including prayer?
5) the land of the living at v. 9 gives a good linkage to Easter.

Ps. 22 Along with the Is. passage, this seems to act as a structuring device for the events of the Passion (see Crossan, Who Killed Jesus and the article Costly Loss of lament, its restoration in at least one Montreat program and the Billman/Migliore book) . I am being lazy at this point, but I am confident that the end of the psalm had some end time relevance in the time of Jesus.It is a marvel that the words of this psalm are among the last things Jesus says. i don;t have patience with those who rush to say that ti is not really a lament, given its ending. Jesus could then have quoted that part. Further, if Jesus would pray a lament psalm in anguish, where do we get the notion that lament is not for us? Note also the sense of abandonment/absence of God at the start. for me, this Psalm points us to the concern for anyone who suffers and should not be placed only in the box labelled, atonement for sin.

1) For some media adventure, compare the psalm to Jesus Christ Superstar in the garden and moving toward the end of Jesus of Montreal.
2 Why the doubling of "my God?" (v. 1?) what seems god-forsaken in current conditions where you are right now?
3) v. 6 worm- Isaac Watts would use that line in a psalm, would we self-esteem proponents?
4) Wild packs of dogs would scare me enough, but if we apply them to crucifixion, would they not be the ones that would attack the bodies, dead or alive?
5) the ending certainly has an Easter feel to it, no?

Palm Sunday 2011 Notes
As a kid, I did not appreciate parades. My best guess is that TV exposure ruined them for me. Our biggest procession is moving people to sporting events with tailgate parties.  Maybe three parades or processions entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. One was the one for Jesus; it picks up on a declaration of peace with the donkey; one was a grand religious procession to ascend the steps of the the massive project of enlarging the temple precincts to about 35 acres, and one was a military parade of Roman soldiers and horses coming in to buttress troops in the garrison to get it up to maybe 6,000 troops. Passover had obvious political message, so trouble was always at hand.

Matthew wants to get clear on the reference to Zechariah 9, so he ignores the poetic doubling and has 2 animals. At the same time, he feels the freedom to omit the lines about triumphant and victorious in Zechariah to underscore his point about the peaceful leadership of Jesus,(see Gen. 49:11) but we are getting some royal trappings for the Prince of Peace. Already the gospels are struggling to rework some of the expectations of the messiah as a political power with the reality of Jesus and the early church as under oppression. Even at this moment of triumph, some serious misunderstandings of the mission of Jesus persist, and they may play a hand in his execution by means of disappointed expectations. (I find the colt sequence funny. Why does it sound like a stewardship campaign to me?)

Hosanna means save us in a sense of acclamation but also its root meaning persists. It may have been included in prayers at festivals, including Passover.  In this instance the crowd doe not know the import of what they are saying. the cheers of the crowd will be replaced by the jeers of another crowd within the week. We are told that the city was shaken. This is a similar reaction to the news of the Magi, but the word is related to seismic, more than stirring up but really shaken as by an earthquake.

I can think of few stories that show how a life can go from triumph to tragedy so quickly as this one. Some elements of the church have it quite right when they burn the palms to form the ashes for Ash Wednesday to open the next season of Lent. This is not only a prelude to Easter, but it intensifies the pain of the garden and Good Friday coming so close to this scene of acclamation.In its way, it's like watching scenes of a happy wedding video right before being served with divorce papers.

Palm Sunday moments do not last. We cannot expect life to have only the peak experiences of acclamation. In America, Updike's Rabbit series, or the play A Championship Season, being revived on Broadway, captured the pain of peaking too soon as a high school athlete and spending the rest of one's life disappointed that nothing comes close.
At the same time, we are fickle, unstable,  and prone to shift sides, just as crowds are. We are much quicker to let cheers decay into crucify, but rarely are we quick to reverse the process. We nurture keeping someone down more than we encourage building back up.

Cry hosanna for good things:the signs of spring, for improving economy, for rebuilding efforts,for a child's first steps, medicines that save lives daily, for Christ the Lord, for communion
Cry Hosanna for all the intractable, big issues that afflict us: climate change and intractable partisan strife, cancer and memory loss, for the need for the cross
Imagine a parade of heaven, greeting you every day with encouragement, cheering you when you succeed.

Tuesday class on Palm sunday
First Cuts, I may repost with more considerations. (Leading First Pres. Biblical student, Carol G., caught me studying for this before Sunday morning class)

 

Our writer makes much of Palm Sunday being a parody of power. Could be, see Borg and Crossan's book on the last week of the life of Jesus. They are thinking that peasants are thumbing their noses at power, like at the carnival atmosphere of the Feast of Fools in the Hunchback of Notre Dame. I tend to think not. It is one of the few scenes that appears in all four gospels. Toward that end, please consider looking carefully at the different accounts: Mt. 21:1-11, Mk. 11:1-10, Lk. 19:29-40, Jn.12:12-19. For instance, where are the palms for this day? Instead, think of this as an alternative to established power.

 

1) vv 35-36 sound less like parody and more like acclamation. He is being seated on the colt, one unridden (see for instance I Sam. 6:7). That is important as it marks it as one suitable for ritual purposes, including  a crowning as a king. (that makes more sense of the tricky phrase, the Lord needs it).See 2 Kings 9:13-14 for a royal homage worthy of Sir Walter Raleigh that looks like v. 36.

 

2) See Zech. 14:2 for the Mount of Olives and 9:9 for the use of a young animal as a royal vehicle for peace. What is left out in the citation? Ps. 118 was sung at festivals, including Passover, see v.26 .See Is. 62:11 on king.

 

3) The people throwing garments is the same word, in Greek, used for Elisha throwing his mantle over Elisha.

 

4) Luke says multitude of disciples. They are all in on a parody? Notice they sound like the angels at the birth of Jesus.

 

5) At v. 40 Jesus seems quite taken with the cheers. (see Hab.2:11)Think about the fear of the Pharisees in a good way. Why would Rome fall on the head of Jesus and on the people, especially on a festival that spoke, speaks now, of the move from slavery to freedom? (At this very moment, what is going in in Syria and Yemen in the face of protests?

 

6) Can you think of a better way to introduce the tragedy of the cross than to juxtapose it with a scene of triumph just days before?

 

7) Lindvall makes some good points about power. Let's extend this. Relate power and love. When is the power of love superior to the power of coercion? Give some examples of people power toppling formal power. When does informal power trump formal power? think of mass media and the power of images to structure our thoughts and feelings. What is the difference between power with and power over?
 

More Holy week Readings

Ps.321:9-16
This can be a reading for the passion Sunday turn many of us prefer. I always recall Bill Clemenson saying that he went that way, for how much could you talk about a parade.
Again, the plurality of psalms are laments. We then learn that we can put even the hardest time into the envelope of prayer.

1) Famed exegete Mick Saunders reminded me of the important of reading in light of context when he applied the Ezekiel 37 passage to folks in a nursing home. In similar fashion, this psalm opens up if we place it in that particular place. of course we have these feeling irrespective of condition, as when we are depressed. when my brother died, for some days, it felt as if I had been elbowed at the sternum, bond-deep hurt. for those whose minds go to illness and emotion, I then got pleurisy some time after.

2) broken vessel could lead to a discussion of feeling useless, or cracking up, of being refuse

3) False accusation continue to be a problem. How do we handle them?

4) After all this we emerge with trust in God. What impact does having one's times in the hand of God affect you? How about a congregation? Perhaps the sheer catharsis brings us to this position. Perhaps it is a counterweight to the misery.

5) Most vividly, apply this section to Jesus in the garden. Consider how some of the Reformers saw the descent into hell as reflecting feeling like this in the garden.

 

Is. 50:4-9

This is part of the 3rd servant song.

1)how do we learn to sustain the weary with a word? When are words insufficient?

2)How are we open to and resistant against God waking the ear? What serves to waken your powers of listening? Look at World Cafe suggestions for learning to waken the ear in listening.

3) V.6 puts us in the place of the good who suffer, including Jesus of course. Those of us with beards get a sense of the eye-watering discomfort of having it pulled out

4) When do we set our face like flint. When should we not? Does Jesus do this in various pieces of his trials?

5) Is v. 8 bravado or not?

6) v. 9 is a sense of a higher law behind the servant. Think of historical figures who were confident they were on the the right side of history and have been vindicated, say in civil rights for women and African-Americans.

Some lesser used Holy Saturday readings
Gen.7-9 selections
Ok, the Noah story is a parade example of different streams of tradition being sewn together into a final form (typically J and P).
7:4-Fretheim, God and Creation- notice the temporal limit placed on the cosmic catastrophe.
7:11 this does not sound like a cleansing at this point but an undoing of creation
One cannot help but think of remnant theology, post exile, being applied to this mythic account. Notice that not only humanity but all of living creatures are kept safe. It is not accident for the church to be an ark, a container, especially with the ritual point of ark of the covenant. In our time, is the church being called as an ark to help save and protect god's creation?
4) All of this water imagery is picked up in baptism for Easter as well.
8:6-18 has a parallel with other ancient Near East creation accounts. All of the sevens may well refer to the seven days of creation in Gen. 1
 When released we return to the fruitful and multiply blessing
9:8-13 note this is a covenant with all creation.God invokes a self-limitation here. Fretheim calls it a recharacterization of relationship (82)
The Ezekiel reading (34:24-28) renews the concerns of the Noah covenant in an exilic framework. It too looks to a covenant of peace. notice that all of nature is safer, not just human violence. How does Easter extend the covenant of peace? the angel tells the women, as does Jesus to fear not, here it is again. How does Easter fit with "none shall make them afraid?"
we also get a limitation of divine arbitrary power with the emphasis on regular, predictable natural law.

This can be a reading for the passion Sunday turn many of us prefer. I always recall Bill Clemenson saying that he went that way, for how much could you talk about a parade.
Again, the plurality of psalms are laments. We then learn that we can put even the hardest time into the envelope of prayer.

1) Famed exegete Mick Saunders reminded me of the important of reading in light of context when he applied the Ezekiel 37 passage to folks in a nursing home. In similar fashion, this psalm opens up if we place it in that particular place. of course we have these feeling irrespective of condition, as when we are depressed. when my brother died, for some days, it felt as if I had been elbowed at the sternum, bond-deep hurt. for those whose minds go to illness and emotion, I then got pleurisy some time after.

2) broken vessel could lead to a discussion of feeling useless, or cracking up, of being refuse

3) False accusation continue to be a problem. How do we handle them?

4) After all this we emerge with trust in God. What impact does having one's times in the hand of God affect you? How about a congregation? Perhaps the sheer catharsis brings us to this position. Perhaps it is a counterweight to the misery.

5) Most vividly, apply this section to Jesus in the garden. Consider how some of the Reformers saw the descent into hell as reflecting feeling like this in the garden.

I will try to include some of the readings for Thursday and Friday in time. If I'm not too lazy, I may try to select some of the vigil readings.

Ps. 118:1-2, 19-29 this is the last of the praise psalms 113-118 that were recited on important festivals, including Passover. Think of it as a psalms version of the song of Miriam and Moses from Exodus.  It makes sense that it is quoted on Palm Sunday, as it would be fresh in the minds of the people there. In that light, it is possible that this was the last thing sung by Jesus and the disciples on the way to the garden.
1) Here is a good example of context and reading. Do the first two verses sound different on Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday or Good Friday? In particular consider how hesed/steadfast love is reflected in these vastly different days.

2) Look at how the gospels apply the words of the liturgy/procession into temple to be applied to Jesus.

3) While v.22 is a favorite applied to Jesus, it would not work well on Palm Sunday. Would it not be more nationalistic then, that the one put down is shown to be the most important? If the words were an old proverb, what would be a contemporary way of expressing the same thought-such as who would think little Butler could be in the finals two years running?

4) Hosanna means save us (now) . it may have come to mean Hurray by the time of Jesus. One can play with the double meaning. Again look at how it sounds on Palm Sunday v. Thursday and Friday.

5) Jesus uses the v.26 to either predict palm Sunday or in announcing the reign of God.

6) I would assume that light may reflect the Aaronic benediction. Again the multiple ways we can speak of Jesus as the light would open some doors. Scientifically minded people could speak of light acting as wave and particle. We return to hesed at v. 29.

Sermon notes for Jnb. 11 and Ezek. 37:1-14
Some time ago, in my mother's assisted living home, one of the ladies asked me to do a series on heaven. As she put it, we only hear about at funerals, and I'm too upset to hear much of what is being said. Today we hear of eternal life and have 2 forms of new life. When Jesus responds to Mary and Martha with tears and inner turmoil s that divine or human or both? We may well have the curtain pulled back from how God reacts and responds to the continuing threat of death and its impact on the grieving, whose grieving members could well include God. Tears are right and proper in grief, and we do well to resist the cultural push to move rapidly through grief with little signs of disturbance.  (but snorting in response-(2X)torn up-agitated- disturbed) at what or whom? At the suffering of the world, of the loss of his friend, of his own impending doom, as he feels the cold breath of death moving in on him as well? Sometimes we blow by that Jesus was a friend of Lazarus. Later, Jesus will say for all of us, that we are no longer disciples, students, but friends. Frances Taylor Gench of Union Seminary emphasizes the adult quality of this friendship, its willingness to push at Jesus, not to exist in quiet acquiescence.
In Hebrew his name would be Eleazar, God helps.

 

Dry bones live through the Spirit; this passage is directed to a collectivity.The fresh breeze of the spirit gives new life. No mere wish, no mere nostalgia, but it is movement that puts meat on the bones, a plan goes into action-This is the word made new flesh. When  the spirit of life is involved, even death is not ultimate. If dry bones can be given life, certainly a struggling group, a struggling church,  can be brought up to flourish once again. Surely a group in tune with the words of life can find a quicker pulse. The Bible uses organic images to capture the growth, the change, the abundance, of the very force of life itself. the spirit opens the door to new birth, to rebirth, to new life all of the time.

 

Grave cloths, grave wrappings,  are now swaddling cloths- The tomb is now a womb; the grave a manger. Jesus wants him to be able to live again, so he orders the unbinding
 4 days-stink-somehow Martha can still engage in a theological discussion with Jesus and manages to give the fullest expression of faith in Jesus in the gospel, beyond the hopeful questions of the woman at the well.What does  it mean for Jesus to identify himself as the resurrection and the life. even if they die/will never die- back with Nicodemus, so resurrection is new birth. In John's gospel eternal life is not only a ticket to heaven. Eternal life means that the dividing line between heaven and earth has Jesus as the doorway. We can enjoy eternal life in these mortal bodies before our deaths. The presence of God is with us now. We can approach our own lives with heaven's glasses. the quality of our life here and now is open to the rich and full relationship with god that is the essence of heaven. We live in the preview of the grave that some call a rut. We are bound up inside and out, so we can't live, and breathe and move, perhaps no more so than in our lives as Christians.

What kind of life did Lazarus lead? Legends of being a bishop in Cyprus say some; in France say others.  Carrie Newcomer, the fine Indiana folk singer, has  lyrics where Lazarus feels caught between both sides of the veil, somewhat like Buffy.-We are not given an account of his death experience. It is said that he gave a relic of the tears of Jesus, a piece of cloth said to be woven by Mary, mother of Jesus. Inother words, he continued to live a baptized life.

Additional points.
Why the delay.? It appears that Jesus will not let circumstance hurry him. He does not let anxiety control his movements.
To what degree is this an apocalyptic event, similar to what Matthew has at the cross?
Should we import Luke's little story of Mary and Martha into our reading here?
Note the irony of the raising of Lazarus puts both Jesus and Lazarus in jeopardy for their lives.

Some time ago, in my mother's assisted living home, one of the ladies asked me to do a series on heaven. As she put it, we only hear about at funerals, and I'm too upset to hear much of what is being said. Today we hear of eternal life and have 2 forms of new life. When Jesus responds to Mary and Martha with tears and inner turmoil s that divine or human or both? We may well have the curtain pulled back from how God reacts and responds to the continuing threat of death and its impact on the grieving, whose grieving members could well include God. Tears are right and proper in grief, and we do well to resist the cultural push to move rapidly through grief with little signs of disturbance.  (but snorting in response-(2X)torn up-agitated- disturbed) at what or whom? At the suffering of the world, of the loss of his friend, of his own impending doom, as he feels the cold breath of death moving in on him as well? Sometimes we blow by that Jesus was a friend of Lazarus. Later, Jesus will say for all of us, that we are no longer disciples, students, but friends. Frances Taylor Gench of Union Seminary emphasizes the adult quality of this friendship, its willingness to push at Jesus, not to exist in quiet acquiescence.
In Hebrew his name would be Eleazar, God helps.

 

Dry bones live through the Spirit; this passage is directed to a collectivity.The fresh breeze of the spirit gives new life. No mere wish, no mere nostalgia, but it is movement that puts meat on the bones, a plan goes into action-This is the word made new flesh. When  the spirit of life is involved, even death is not ultimate. If dry bones can be given life, certainly a struggling group, a struggling church,  can be brought up to flourish once again. Surely a group in tune with the words of life can find a quicker pulse. The Bible uses organic images to capture the growth, the change, the abundance, of the very force of life itself. the spirit opens the door to new birth, to rebirth, to new life all of the time.

 

Grave cloths, grave wrappings,  are now swaddling cloths- The tomb is now a womb; the grave a manger. Jesus wants him to be able to live again, so he orders the unbinding
 4 days-stink-somehow Martha can still engage in a theological discussion with Jesus and manages to give the fullest expression of faith in Jesus in the gospel, beyond the hopeful questions of the woman at the well.What does  it mean for Jesus to identify himself as the resurrection and the life. even if they die/will never die- back with Nicodemus, so resurrection is new birth. In John's gospel eternal life is not only a ticket to heaven. Eternal life means that the dividing line between heaven and earth has Jesus as the doorway. We can enjoy eternal life in these mortal bodies before our deaths. The presence of God is with us now. We can approach our own lives with heaven's glasses. the quality of our life here and now is open to the rich and full relationship with god that is the essence of heaven. We live in the preview of the grave that some call a rut. We are bound up inside and out, so we can't live, and breathe and move, perhaps no more so than in our lives as Christians.

What kind of life did Lazarus lead? Legends of being a bishop in Cyprus say some; in France say others.  Carrie Newcomer, the fine Indiana folk singer, has  lyrics where Lazarus feels caught between both sides of the veil, somewhat like Buffy.-We are not given an account of his death experience. It is said that he gave a relic of the tears of Jesus, a piece of cloth said to be woven by Mary, mother of Jesus. Inother words, he continued to live a baptized life.

1) This is directed at the community of Israel, as good as dead. The setting is clearly exilic. I suppose it could be a legitimate jump to apply it to another nation or a group, oh such as the local congregation. The image lends itself to Martha's viewpoint in the Lazarus passage of John 11 for Sunday.
2) Do you think that this is an image of resurrection or something else? Compare v. 13 and v. v.3.
3)Notice that the image puts flesh on the bones. This is no airy spirituality, is it?
4) Part of the change comes from speech, so the word makes flesh here. so, the old spiritual, Dem Bones would be apt.
5) The spirit/breath nicely applies to both the 4 winds and the breath of life and God's own Spirit. Where would you like the fresh breeze of the spirit to blow through your congregation and your own life?
6) v. 11 is a description of desolation, dry bones, lost hope,cut off. part of the hope here then is connection. that reminds me. Hope is not the same as optimism that looks for the good and expects it. in spite of the facts at hand, hope looks toward better days.
7) Since it is a valley,(but elsewhere, a plain)  can we make a link to the valley of the shadow of Ps. 23?

Sunday April 4-Ps. 23 is perhaps the best-known, best-loved psalm. The choir is singing a number of different settings for this psalm during Lent. I'm not sure why it is so loved, save for its touching the chord of dependence and protection that we may all crave at some level. Sometimes church seems to be the only place where we admit that we are dependent sometimes.With our passion for clean hair, we recoil at oil being poured on our hair when a guest. It looks to a wonderful feeling of being honored at a banquet in the presence of one's enemies. Maybe the feeling is a bit like winning an Academy Award.

 

Monday-Lent is a time when many of us try to give some extra support to charity. it becomes an issue with me when I start making distinctions among the poor. I get so annoyed at gaming the system. I think of the sequence in My Fair Lady where the father argues that the undeserving poor have as many needs as the deserving poor. Jesus is clear; give money to those who ask. Still, the obstacles emerge; am I enabling a chemical dependency; am I rewarding irresponsible behavior? As Mary Chapin Carpenter sang, we may well give money and pray that we don;t look the person in the eye.

 

Tuesday-Out the office window, I can see work being done restoring two brick buildings that had fallen into disrepair. Maybe that's a good image for Lent, repairing parts of our lives that have fallen into disrepair or disuse. Sometimes, a building has to be gutted; sometimes a little exterior or interior work needs to be done. sometimes we return a building to its original state, and sometimes we far exceed the original intention and design.

 

Wednesday-Bonhoeffer wrote a poem in prison as he struggled with his public self and the unseen questions, fears, and doubt that haunted him. All of us seek to project a public self that we feel is superior to our own sense of self. We find dissonance when the two selves don't seem to match up. At the end, he asks again, "who am I." He concludes, "I am thine, O Lord." Maybe it doesn't matter that one seems to exceed the other. in the end, "in life and death, we are the Lord's."

 

Thursday-I went to see Philip Newell at Lindenwood University for a presentation on Celtic spirituality. It emphasizes the natural world as a focus for our prayers and praying in the midst of everyday chores. Here's an ancient prayer: you are the peace of all things calm...you are the door that opens wide...you are my Lord and with me still...you are my savior this very day." How about this one: "may the blessing of the rain be upon you/the soft sweet rain/may it fall upon your spirit/so that all the ittle flowers may spring up/and shed their sweetness on the air."

 

Friday-Abba Apollo of the desert fathers was happy to have some work to do, for he he said, "I go to work with Christ today." I so admire the ability to see Christ as a companion throughout the day. Some days it is hard to seek the Christ in others. It may be particularly difficult on days when one has a hard time seeking the Christ in oneself. If that's a bit much fo ryou, consider that you are doing the work of the 12 for Christ as you bloom where you are planted.

 

Saturday-Patience seems to be an admired virtue that few of us admit to having. The pace of 21st century life makes it difficult, as we strum our fingers waiting for money to pop out of the ATM and more amazingly speak of computers being slow this morning. We want things to happen in the blink of an eye. In the New Testament, the word patience can be long-suffering, an ability to take the curves that life throws at us and endurance, the ability to keep on keeping on. After all, we worship a god for whom a day is like a thousand years. Some things take time.

April 3, 2011 Sermon Notes John 9, I Sam. 16
Again, we get a parade example of John using the physical as a gateway to the spiritual, where physical blindness leads us to consider spiritual blindness. .
We get insight into the theodicy question, the question of God and human suffering,  and the attitude of Jesus. In the Tuesday class we looked at Luke 13 and Jesus refuses to link trouble and punishment for sin or permitting us to blame the victim for their plight. The explicit response of Jesus is to heal, to make well.

the blind man is being talked about as an object, or an object lesson, not a person. Jesus makes a paste that may allude to the creation of Adam and then sends him off to wash in the pool of Silo am, which we learn means sent.How did the blind man manage to get to the pool? Jesus has just been sent out from the temple for preaching about God's generous grace to all. After all Jesus is the living water, Jesus is the one sent (recent discoveries of steps by the pool)-I always admired the scene in the original silent King of Kings where the face of Jesus slowly appears.
when do we not want to see? They didn't see the blind man; they saw a symbol, a fixture in the community, a role. They weren't sure it was he when he was sighted. I remember when I taught school that students would do a double take if they saw me in a supermarket as they assumed that I lived on print.when things are too close we can't focus-we need help-we miss the treasures all around us. We miss the treasures that connect us to God right inside each one of us.
Is sight spiritual apprehension-blind to the light of the world-people were blind to him; he had become a cipher, a road ornament-he says he was anointed by Jesus with the allusion to creation of mud on his eyes-that's ironic in itself that an opaque paste would give sight.

God sees past the obvious in the brothers of David-is washing a type of anointing, a type of baptism? We know Samuel is a seer. Samuel is kept in the dark, as much as old Eli was when Samuel himself was called by God when he was but a young boy-David was invisible at this point-he wasn't even considered. Being invisible is difficult to our self-image.Samuel is told explicitly that God does not view by appearances as we often do. God looks upon the heart, the fullness of what is inside we suppose. (Still, appearance is emphasized when describing David).

 We do well to realize how easily we use stereotypes, labels, and in general, are willing to judge others on appearance or other simple cues. those cues make us blind to others. Even though we are social creatures, we cannot fully enter into the mind and heart of another person. part so another person will always be unseen and unknown by us. Many of us are convinced that there's a lot more to us than is commonly supposed., but we remain burdened by being picked last for the team or not being homecoming queen. we get ourselves into trouble when we assume we know more about someone than we are capable of knowing. Expectations can be dangerous to relationships.The religious leaders have trouble putting the healing into their frame of reference, the box to which they have become accustomed.Insisting that our angle of vision is the one right way is a hazard that leads to hubris, to an overweening pride, to coercion of others. just maybe we are called to regard each other with the eyes of love, (I typed the yes of love, just as good)  blind to faults, with our focus on the good that dwells within.