Lectionary Selections for Sept 8

Jer. 18
I love the idea here of God the artistic creator, the fashioner, the experimenter. One could tell of artists and the artistic impulse for creativity.

We get a parade example of God being willing to change the divine plan.

An artist respects the quality of the material used and surely God is getting used to the obduracy of human material. God may well be surprised at the interaction i of intention, working, and result. God is more flexible here than we would often imagine.

The moment verses (7,9) may indicate a bit of caprice, but the openness to repentance would undercut that notion. Again, the otter notion works here as it is prior to the work being fired.
One could go the art history route and show both fragments and full vessels in the time of Jeremiah.

Do you think God does work for and against nations?
Do you notice that God has reshaped you?
Do you notice that God has been responsive to changes in you?
Has God seen things in your raw material that have escaped your notice?
When we say God has a plan, do you see that plan as firm, even irrevocable, or a work in progress?

Jer. 2:4-13

We start with  a fairly frequent refrain in the OT., God seems utterly frustrated. How could the people find non-existent wrong in the relationship with God? God seems mystified that they would turn their attention to "worthless things." What are those things now?

God is frustrated that they not not link prayer to the one who liberated them. We get a great example of nationalistic history when we hear that the land was empty of inhabitants.From its very start as a people, the chosen people slipped into unfaithfulness or ran headlong toward it.
 What are examples now of idolatry of church and culture?

Instead of gratitude and care, God is met form all sides with unfaithful  worship.
God calls on witnesses from east to west , even the heavens, to inquire about a religious change in a nation. Note well that it denies even reality to those gods,   toward monotheism, certainly.

If this is indeed using the rib/indictment style of speech, it could be interesting to put an indictment for 2019.
The end is  stunning-in substituting idols for the fountain of living water, they have substituted a homemade cistern with cracks.
What would be contemporary equivalents>
Do you see a linkage between religious observance, culture, politics and economics, ro do you keep them in discrete compartments?

A good collection on Jeremiah is Peterson's Run With the Horses

Heb. 13

The beginning is great sermon fodder, let mutual love continue. It is a reminder that church is a community endeavor.Mutual love=brotherly love=philadelphia-Ine oculd play a clip of Springsteen Streets fo Philadelphia In a time of hyer-individualism iit si salutary to be reminded of community and a world beyond narcissism.

Hospitality=xenophilia= love of a stranger. In our time, that is a biblical counter to rampant xenophobia.The prison reminder helps us realize that the ties of mutual love are not affected bty separation, distance, or circumstance. Here the church is called to the preferential option for those on the edges of life.
Ob the other hand, I do not think that hospitality is a particularly helpful point about border policy as hospitality is charitable and border policy concerns more impersonal justice.

The love of money reminds one of the pastoral epistles, but I do not grasp the quick move into the nearness of God that follows.Perhaps it is a way of saying that idolatrous love of possessions excludes God from being a very present help. After all, God si the giver of divine gifts that exceed any material advantage.

On angels unaware-consider a movie clip on Abraham and the scene of the 3 visitors or Ushpitim, an Israeli movie on the theme as well.

V. 7 would  e a good study for church boards, especially in congregations where the pastor is the object of constant complaint.

The next verse (8) doesn't seem to be a natural progression, but its meaning seems open-ended. Beware using this as a tool for glory days as opposed to the present, or sa ralizing the past in favor of the present and future.

Notice at the end, the transformation of sacrifice for Christian community.We share our gifts as a way to actualize pa raise and thanks to God.Note also the emphasis on remembering in this conlcuding section of the "sermon" or sermon series that is Hebrews.

Is. 58:9b-14

This follows directly from God’s insistence that justice be the context for worship. Even good ritual is sullied by injustice. It has the chilling notion that prayers go unanswered due to injustice. Typical of the OT, words of alarm are followed by words of hope.

Now, if justice is central, the prayers are heard (v.9). Not only active oppression but even actions of contempt are not to be countenanced, as well as speaking evil, a dominant mode of discourse on the internet. The series on conditional promises then point to a better day. The images are worth separate mention, but look at them as a series, light, not gloom, a watered garden, repairer of the breach (  Dr Schuller sent  a note to President Clinton on just this phrase), Sabbath as delight, riding on the heights of the earth. One could do well selecting one and working a sermon around the individual image.

Sabbath itself, including worship as honoring it, could be a fruitful topic for sermon or classroom, or private devotions.

Of course, this good open us to a discussion, a serious one, of justice and its connection to religious thought and life. I am afraid that we are substituting current notions of justice as popular policy proposals or bowing to the current mania for identity politics.

The ending of Hebrews 12 offers a fine opportunity to consider the importance of worship, together, on Sunday. I am astonished at the number of social media posts form clergy that downplay worship in favor of being the Salvation Army without the salvation.

The theophany of Sinai receives a negative perspective here, one based on fear. At the same time, this could be an entry point into a discussion of holiness and the chasm between the divine and the human, a la Barth.

We return to the realm of the invisible  of 11:3.Please note that the preacher in Hebrews speaks of heaven as a festal gathering.

The sprinkled blood here of Jesus does not cry out as do the saints in Revelation, or the blood cry of Abel from the ground. One could use this as an entry point for violence in 2019. This could also be a cue to do a bit of work on the meaning of sacrifice in a more sophisticated way.

The unshakable kingdom is to be contrasted with Haggai where God operates a shakedown fo the nations for wealth to flow into the restored temple area. This is quite the literary lep for unshakeable, to find ti removing that which can be shaken.9V.27)

Consuming fire a quote Dt. 4:24, 9:3.  I would l think one could make this an image of purification, of danger, obviously, or even the divine presence itself, as in the burning bush, even though it did not consume the bush.

Is. 5:1-7 notes for 8/18

This is a broken-hearted love song, filled with hurt and anger at betrayal. We are given only a hint of it the short passage, as it leads into a long lament song. One could use angry heartbreak songs to set the mood.

God seems befuddled here as in  he worked hard  at it (v.2) and knows that nothing more could be done for it (v.4). One could consider linking this to last week where God is weary of worship without justice.

Is. 5  continues last week’s look at God’s disgust with injustice. This time, the surprise is that we are not what God expected.  The image is a gardener who does everything that one should and does not receive the expected crop.  In this case wild grape, (translation guess, could be bad fruit, sour, rotten)  arrive instead of the domesticated grape, the special ones , soreq. In other words the love affair with Israel has gone wrong, as has the vinewyard, itself at times an image of love itself.

The ending is also wordplay justice and bloodshed would be mishpat and mishpah, and righteousness and a cry is tsedaqah and tse’aqah.

You are correct if you hear echoes of the Battle Hymn of the Republic.

Notice the vineyard becomes a wasteland, going all the way to the creation of Gen. 1, where God transforms the wasteland (bohu).

One could do some interesting work on expectations for Sunday-God doesn’t get what God expects in Isaiah, and we don’t get what we expect in Ps. 80, and we get an unexpected side of Jesus in the gospel lesson.

August 18 lections

Heb. 11:29-12:2

First, I got interested in how cloud turned into a multitude, but apparently, it was used to describe a large, shapeless, shifting thong of people in other Greek writing.I thought of a cloud chamber showing particles in physics.I think of the cloud of witnesses when Harry Potter's family offers him a shield of protection and encourage him as he faces his destiny.

Second, one could have fun speculating on the decision to include Rahab in the roll call of faith. She is in the genealogy of David and therefore Jesus. One can read the story in Joshua 2.The name denotes boasting. pride or strength and is connected to Egypt. It also denotes one of the chaos monsters fo the deep.One wonders how the two spies ended up in her house to spend the night.we have another example of the Good Samaritan where the last person one would expect is an agent of good, at least from the perspective of the spies.

Gideon was no prize, just review Judges 4-8. Still, he led a remarkable victory for Israel. Indeed every person named had serious failings, perhaps that itself was of enc ouragement to a dispritied people.

Third, If Hebrews was to be encouraging, I don;t know how encouraging to hear its parade of calamities of the faithful. On ornate stained glass symbols of the 12 apostles, we can see the symbol of St James the dismembered.On the other hand the Martyr's Mirro has inspired generations to courage.

The athletic metaphor may indicate the use of weights in the long jump, and they were released  at some point in the contest. Pioneer= archegos. The archegos is the author, the beginner,leader, the trailblazer as pioneer  In a race, the archegos is the team captain. who acted to encourage other teammates, precisely role of encouragement of this letter.As perfecter/completer, Jesus takes our incomplete lives and makes them  whole. complete, a clearer notion of perfection, as in a perfect fit.

For August 11-Is. 1:10-20, Heb. 11:1-3, 13-16

Is. 1:1-20

The basis for Hebrew ethics is care for the vulnerable: the widow, the traveler, the orphan.  Please do not read into this passage an attack on the sacrificial system itself or worship in general in favor of social justice concerns.

Many of recall the destruction of Sodom in Gen. 19 for its rejection of hospitality for attempted rape of a stranger.  Jerusalem itself, the site of the temple is now called Sodom. (see Ezek 16 on its ill treatment of the poor, however). The people of been worshipping fully, but God sees the offerings as nothing (v.13). God seems to no longer respect worship.

For worship to be proper, the people need to learn justice. Ethics are linked to right worship. As a preliminary to worship in the temple courts, God wants justice in the law courts.

Instead of ritual purity, God is seeking “ethical purity.” The worshippers have sacrificial blood on their hands but the blood of human beings due to injustice.

Some of us are old enough to remember LBJ quoting this passage-come let us reason together. Come to the table and hash this out, but the way they are going will lead to death, and the path of God’s way will lead to life.

Heb.11:1-3, 8-16

vv.1-3 We have a gold mine of material for the invisible to the visible, especially for those interest in natural science and faith (see William Brown), for instance) The eyes of faith see beyond current realities and can glimpse the future, the arc of the universe.

Faith here is relational, a part of fidelity, of abiding trust. (Again, one could go to Erik Erikson on trust as fundamental to personality) Jesus is all the “proof” we require of the substance. After all, hypostatis is Trinitarian language. “Elegchos” has a sense of Jefferson’s self-evident truth. Yet another way to go at this passage is to use its words as law court language even now-martyr after all means witness.

Many think that Hebrews is sermonic for dispirited people. Vv13-16 supports that with its reminder that the roll call of faith is met with trouble and disappointment throughout. Still, they persisted, as they kept their  eye on a brighter future, a different realm.