Lent 5

Sunday Ps. 32 is in the lectionary reading for us. Still, I wanted to highlight its early movements, when it may get covered over by other great readings. When we sin, we want it to stay well-hidden. Maybe we especially want to keep sin hidden from our own self.The psalmist says that this will eat us up inside. To deal with the shame and guilt, it is better to confess, to tell the truth. That confession makes God the hiding place, not the inner recesses of the human heart.

 

Monday-Bonhoeffer said that we "participate in the life of Jesus (incarnation,cross and resurrection) by  new life in existence for others thorough Jesus." In other words, we do not transcend into the holy from the human. We transcend ourselves through this life and there encounter the holy. We do not need to wait for heaven for the song's prayer to be answered, nearer my God to thee.

 

Tuesday-Purdue fans are heartbroken about the NCAA chances with a serious knee injury to a star player. Any sports fan is saddened to see a great player injured. Of course some IU fans take delight in the pain of Purdue at any time. At some time, most of us do take some secret delight in the pain of others. Somehow, it feels as if it elevates  our own status. It makes the world seem a little bit more fair, as if the scales are better balanced.

 

Wednesday-Calvin on John 15:4 "Christ has no other aim in views other than to keep us as a hen  keeps her chickens under her wings, lest our indifference carry us away...he did not leave the mission of salvation in mid-course but  the Spirit will always be efficacious in us...all who have living fruit in Christ are fruit bearing branches." Consider reading and singing the hymn, Abide in Me.

 

Thursday-Some Christians emphasize a born again experience.  A piece in Christian Century (1/26/10) speaks of a third conversion in midlife, where the writer notices a sense that one phase is completed and God is calling her to something new. She marks this transition as intensely specific and quotes Lassky:'if Christ came to restore the divine image in all of humankind the Holy Spirit communicates to persons, marking each member of the church with a seal of personal and unique relationship." Do you sense that god may be making some room for some changes in your life?

  

Friday-I've been thinking about the reaction to the Tiger Woods televised apology. It seems that no apology an satisfy people in our media culture. Some say it was too scripted. If he didn't use notes, then it would be said that he was ill-prepared and didn't take it seriously. It seems to me that no apology can satisfy critics. the church is one place where an apology is accepted, by God, if not us, in the liturgy. We are not judged by sincerity, or eloquence, or emotional range. We merely throw ourselves on the mercy of a God who seems to be a far less sever critic than we are.

 

Saturday-Marilyn McEntyre has a new book on language, Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies. "Truth-telling is so difficult because the varieties of untruth are so many and well disguised...in comparison (to media culture) the truth seems pale, understated, or indecisive by comparison." We hear so much bombast that we lose an ear for precision, and indeed, kindness. She is right that words have power, and we do well to "reinvigorate them as bearers of truth and instruments of love." where can you start to use words in that way? To whom should they be directed?

A Lenten Lament 2/28 Phil.3:17-4:2, Lk. 13:31-35

We may well sing O Sacred Head Now Wounded this Lenten season. The third verse asks, "what language shall  borrow?" I admire bob Costas's facility with words on the Olympics. I wonder about the overuse of words such as awesome of late. It is no easy task to find the words or form to express ourselves. In a widely admired essay, Walter Brueggemann spoke of the costly loss of lament. He argued that an insistence of being positive in all circumstances did not fit the realities of life. We were cheating ourselves of expression and mental health if we did not avail ourselves of the biblical tradition of prayer as complaint, as lamenting the absence of good.O Jerusalem, Jerusalem reminds me of O Absalom. Absalom. my son, my son. The same parental impulse is here, that aching pain of a parent who wants to absorb the pain of a child, who wants to steer them away from harmful decisions, but they know that a child has to make their own mistakes. 

 

We get a startling reminder that Jesus is someone under a destiny when he says that he must, must be on his way toward Jerusalem.-redemptive purpose of  God revealed in the life of Jesus.With the image of the mother hen, we have  a wonderful image of alerting us to danger, of soft security under the wings, but also the potent face of danger if it attacks. The fate of Jesus and Jerusalem asserts an intertwined danger. Foxes and birds appear in the vocabulary of Jesus as metaphors for the circumstances of everyday life. "We live in a menagerie" (NIB-283). We are confronted by evils from without.

 

The lament of Jesus  emerges from disappointment and compassion. Jesus had great hopes for the reception of his message. Still, he could see the road to Jerusalem as one of rejection and his demise. Apparently he could foresee that Jerusalem would fall to the Romans, even though fear of Rome would be used as an excuse to deliver him over to them to the cross.

 

Lament as complaint rarely gets the last word in Scripture. it usually ends with an image of hope. Paul sees enemies of the cross who are unable to face self-denial. That hits us between the eyes with our thoughts of comfort food or retail therapy. Paul's call of the commonwealth of heaven is a wellspring of hope. We are caught between two worlds, where we live in this world but so yearningly hope that it would be more heavenly. We face inner evils just as dangerous as outer ones. We know that our heavenly reward is great but most of us are in no hurry to be there. Still, if we possess what Paul calls the mind of Christ, we know where our allegiance lies. We know that we will share the life of Christ and be transformed into the very presence of the divine. In the face of temptation, Paul offers a simple admonition: to stand firm. I watch in awe how the Olympic athletes stand firm on their ski jump into space or on twisted ankles on the speedskating track. Lamenting prayer is not a failure to stand firm. it is firm perseverance in the faith, in the trust we have in a God with open ears. It is the faith we can have in a God of compassion. It is also the prayer of faith that knows that things are not the way they are supposed to be. it is a faithful prayer that God can work toward the good. God can even transform, in time, the evils that befall us all and weave them into good.

 

A Lenten Lament 2/28 Phil.3:17-4:2, Lk. 13:31-35

We may well sing O Sacred Head Now Wounded this Lenten season. The third verse asks, "what language shall  borrow?" I admire bob Costas's facility with words on the Olympics. I wonder about the overuse of words such as awesome of late. It is no easy task to find the words or form to express ourselves. In a widely admired essay, Walter Brueggemann spoke of the costly loss of lament. He argued that an insistence of being positive in all circumstances did not fit the realities of life. We were cheating ourselves of expression and mental health if we did not avail ourselves of the biblical tradition of prayer as complaint, as lamenting the absence of good.O Jerusalem, Jerusalem reminds me of O Absalom. Absalom. my son, my son. The same parental impulse is here, that aching pain of a parent who wants to absorb the pain of a child, who wants to steer them away from harmful decisions, but they know that a child has to make their own mistakes. 

 

We get a startling reminder that Jesus is someone under a destiny when he says that he must, must be on his way toward Jerusalem.-redemptive purpose of  God revealed in the life of Jesus.With the image of the mother hen, we have  a wonderful image of alerting us to danger, of soft security under the wings, but also the potent face of danger if it attacks. The fate of Jesus and Jerusalem asserts an intertwined danger. Foxes and birds appear in the vocabulary of Jesus as metaphors for the circumstances of everyday life. "We live in a menagerie" (NIB-283). We are confronted by evils from without.

 

The lament of Jesus  emerges from disappointment and compassion. Jesus had great hopes for the reception of his message. Still, he could see the road to Jerusalem as one of rejection and his demise. Apparently he could foresee that Jerusalem would fall to the Romans, even though fear of Rome would be used as an excuse to deliver him over to them to the cross.

 

Lament as complaint rarely gets the last word in Scripture. it usually ends with an image of hope. Paul sees enemies of the cross who are unable to face self-denial. That hits us between the eyes with our thoughts of comfort food or retail therapy. Paul's call of the commonwealth of heaven is a wellspring of hope. We are caught between two worlds, where we live in this world but so yearningly hope that it would be more heavenly. We face inner evils just as dangerous as outer ones. We know that our heavenly reward is great but most of us are in no hurry to be there. Still, if we possess what Paul calls the mind of Christ, we know where our allegiance lies. We know that we will share the life of Christ and be transformed into the very presence of the divine. In the face of temptation, Paul offers a simple admonition: to stand firm. I watch in awe how the Olympic athletes stand firm on their ski jump into space or on twisted ankles on the speedskating track. Lamenting prayer is not a failure to stand firm. it is firm perseverance in the faith, in the trust we have in a God with open ears. It is the faith we can have in a God of compassion. It is also the prayer of faith that knows that things are not the way they are supposed to be. it is a faithful prayer that God can work toward the good. God can even transform, in time, the evils that befall us all and weave them into good.

 

Is. 55:1-9 Second cut

1) This may flow from the previous chapter.

2) NIB (481)  sees linkage to the waters of ch. 8:6. It is argued that this is another signal that the time of desolation and punishment has come to a close.

3)  This passage speaks of necessities for free, "abundance and no cost" (NIB, 481)

4) the covenant of David has expanded here to include god's people. This could be a good place to consider the waters of baptism.

5) My thoughts are not your thoughts is a classic warning against our pretension to equate our preferences with those of God.

6) Seek the Lord has a good sense of the ineffable  in terms of God's seeming approach or distance.

7) Clifford in Fair Spoken  sees the call to a free banquet going all the way to 1200 BCE. It may be echoing the call of Wisdom's feast. It is a call to life and its source. here of course, God's presence is the source of life. It could also echo ANE temple liturgies, especially for new shrines.

8) To come to Zion is the opposite of life, well, exile, in Babylon.

Lent 4

Sunday-One of today's lectionary readings was Is. 55:1-9. It may reflect a response to an earlier section, where the people have rejected the gentle waters of God instead of the horrific flood of conflict. Like them we buy material that does not satisfy. What have you obtained that did not satisfy but was a fleeting experience of retail therapy? I think of that commercial that  lists the price of an event but notes that some things are priceless. What things in life are free but priceless for you?

 

Monday-Frozen fog makes the sidewalks hazardous, but it is beautiful when it decorates the trees. Sin can be double-sided like that. the fruit of the garden was attractive, but to eat of it meant death. Frozen fog is also evanescent, fleeting, as it melts away with the rest of the frost with the first rays of the warm sun. Where can we allow God's light to melt away the allure of evil?

 

Tuesday-Calvin on judging (Mt. 7) "We flatters ourselves but cast severe censure on others...we are tickled with the desire of inquiring into other people's faults...the greater percentage of people think that when they condemn others that they acquire  a greater liberty of sinning." Christians are often accused of being judgemental. When is this a fair criticism and when is it mere accusation? What pushes us into judgemental postures?

 

Wednesday-A Daniel fast- I noticed this in a Sojourners e-mail as I have tried to exercise more and watch my diet even more closely to lose some weight and to get in better shape, but I gained three pounds. Daniel ate a simpler diet for 10 days. The discipline of fasting is connected with prayer. The idea is to seek a clearer focus, to fight through hunger toward deeper hungers. Would you consider a Daniel period of abstaining from something for ten days during a prayerful time? Why are we willing to try any sort of test diet but reject fasting out of hand for a spiritual diet?

 

Thursday-Purell dispensers have cropped up everywhere due to the flu virus, I suppose. We don;t hold to the purity codes of the Old Testament, but it seems that we have a certain fear of germs. Maybe we could use them as spiritual reminders, secular versions of the holy water founts in Roman Catholic churches. A test for something impure is something that you would not want to be public knowledge and speculation. Let baptism wash away an impure word or deed today.

 

Friday- Nancy Duff cites Christopher Morse (p. 7 in the late Paul Lehman's book, the Decalogue) that moral laws are like buoys that alert swimmers to where the deep waters lie. Lehman wanted to move from moral laws as absolutes but were intended to help us see that the 10 Commandments are less inflexible rules but more descriptions toward the world God desires. For him the 10 Commandments help us see how to make human life more human, more to the ways God intends.

 

Saturday-Doing less instead of doing more for Lent seems counter-intuitive. I don't mean doing less of sinning, although that is a always a good idea. I mean doing less, because the shape of our harried lives gives us insufficient time for attention, rest, and reflection. Perhaps we could go through our color-coded itineraries and start to cross some out. Maybe Lent is the best time for us to capture some Sabbath magic, to learn to rest in God, to rest with God.

Gen. 15:1-12, 17-18 second cut
1) Abram means father is exalted. it is possible that the ram part refers to a deity, but that is strictly a guess by some.

2) "After these things" refers to the Melchizedek story in ch. 14.

3) It sounds as if Abram is being promised spoils of war of some sort

4) Abram is frustrated. What good are goodies if he has no one to give them to down the road?

5) Typically, God promises the stars in terms of abundance.

6) v. 6 is cited in the NT. I take it to mean that Abram's faith places him in right relationship with God. At the same time, Abram wants assurance, so it is certainly not the blind faith that many desire. this tension is a good place to speak of faith and doubt, not faith vs. doubt. the new epistolary book by Michael Jenkings, Austim Seminary, ahs a god discussion on this with the Jessica sections of the book.

7)Abram wants some sort of proof, a sign.Sometimes this is frowned upon, but at other times not. when is it putting god to the test?

8) This is a mysterious rite, walking through the divided animal. I take it as a curse. May we never be so divided. It takes the phrase to cut a covenant quite literally, no? could it be that we are two halves of a whole, undivided, but alone we would become a mere half?

9) God engages in the rite also. this is a great example of divine voluntary commitment to human needs

-Lent 3

Sunday-Dt. 26 was one of the readings for Feb. 21. Embedded in it is a small creed of faith. It emphasizes the humble origins of the people and the acts of God to move them to freedom. We have our confirmation folks present a statement of faith to the session. It is a good way to see what you hold dear and what you see as more expendable in your beliefs. Consider writing a short statement of faith for yourself. We could use it as an affirmation for worship, perhaps.

 

Monday-Doubt is thought to be the opposite of faith.  I think faith is in constant tension with doubt, especially in terms of how we grasp doctrine. Longing for the divine presence, even in its felt absence, is a faithful response. For me faith is staying in relationship with God, even when the ties that bind are frayed. George MacDonald wrote" peoplemust beleive what they can, and those who believe more must not be hard on those who believe less."

 

Tuesday-Calvin famously started his Institutes by saying that "true and sound wisdom is the knowledge of God and ourselves. This wisdom, true and sound is joined by many bonds." In a way, his view is similar to our view of Jesus, where the sacred and the human are joined. We come to know God in worship and sacrament, in Bible reading and prayer. Would you say that the two are joined that we need both types of knowledge to attain wisdom for full human life here?

  

Wednesday Michael Jinkins has witten a series of books in the form of letters to young people. His new one is directed at his grown children, mostly about religious struggle and a sense of vocation, of calling..In writing of grace, he reminds his daughter that grace cannot be permitted to beocme merely an abstract concept, or even within the character of God. Grace is seen in the person of Jesus Christ. In other words, Jesus embodies grace.

 

Thursday-I heard it again at a funeral, the baby boomer clarion call that we cannot mourn but only celebrate a life. We were made to feel guilty about being sad, because the deceased would not have wanted us to be sad. A life worth celebrating is a life worth mourning. We rush everything, but some things do take time, and grief is not to be rushed through. God loves us in all of our emotions, tears and ache included. God embraces the joyful and the grieiving.

 

Friday-We had a talent presentation in lieu of a formal sermon recently. Talents, like love, find richness in sharing them. I like that it was a resposne to the reading on the transfiguration, as teachers became musicians; lawyers became drummers; students became composers. As we grow older, we may well regret not pursuing a talent, or knowing that we have some so deep down that they have been buried. What talents do you have that you like or don;t like to share? What talent would you like to have?

 

Saturday-Children's books are a great way to engage spiritual themes, both in the illustrations and the stories.  Over the years, we have heard a number of children's stories during the time for the young people. Are there storybooks you remember from childhood or that you prized reading to children? I remember our daughter's beginning of categories for the world when she read the Phantom Tollbooth and its word and number people. In our region, Rabbi Sasso writes some beautiful books for children. I like two books on Old Turtle by Douglas Wood.

 

Feb.21

This section of Deuteronomy takes some time with each one of the Ten Commandments. It has the name, second law, not only because of the repeat of the Ten Commandments, but its commentary on them. The entire section is framed by worship, and this last section touches on coveting. Coveting has to mean more than mere desire, or we would all be guilty of it all of the time.  In a conservative mood, I see coveting as something that cannot be eradicated merely controlled. It is the desire for something that we do not have that can threaten to consume our good sense. In a more liberal mood, I see coveting as planning  or better, scheming, to obtain something not ours by any means necessary. It is close to obsession, perhaps. It is a step past desire into preparing for action. Perhaps coveting could be the start of yielding to temptation for possessing something or someone over whom we have no right. It crosses the line from mere acquisition to greed. Coveting threatens to make us see people not in the image of God, but as mere things, simple objects,  a means to an end, or obstacles really, to our own selfishness. Coveting places  rights in collision, or ignores the rights of others, especially when we have no right to what we so desire.

 

Lenten observance could be facing our desires, especially when they threaten to overwhelm us. It is a good time to reflect on our weak spots, where our buttons get pushed, where we most easily succumb to trials and temptations. In AA participants have to learn to change their locale and even their friends as the environment is often based on drinking. I wonder if we can or should covet the presence of God. The tempter in the wilderness is counting on Jesus coveting power, even good power, even if power would be to use God's protection. Jesus quotes from this book of the Bible in his encounter with the temptations to succumb to the desires of the people for a powerful magician instead of a suffering servant.

 

One response to coveting is a sense of gratitude. To see life itself as a gift, creation as a gift, Scripture as a gift, energizes that sense of gratitude, of being thankful for this gift. In our tradition, faith itself is a gift. It is with good reason that the church has called the Lord's Super the eucahrist, the Greek word for thanksgiving, good grace. The main prayer in the liturgy is called the Great Prayer of Thanksgiving. On the surface, the sacrament  is so unimpressive as it would not cause much coveting. These are indeed simple gifts, this bread and cup. Communion  the sharing of Jesus, sharing between and among each other and sharing sharing self and sharing possessions. Perhaps that is the best answer to the issue of coveting. It gets displaced by sharing. I still remember the look of absolute bafflement on our eldest's face when I tried to introduce the idea of sharing to her. In time, maybe even the desires would lessen. Coveting comes from isolation, a sense that we do not belong. We trick ourselves into thinking that belongings can fill that gap inside. Traditionally, we speak of Communion as a glimpse of heaven. Maybe that can help our coveting by showing how our desires pale in the face of heaven. We won't have to stand on our rights there. The push for coveting will be gone. At long last we will find peace within ourselves, peace in the presence of God. What more could we possibly need or desire?

Lent Feb.24th

Sunday Feb.24-Phil. 3:17 -4:2 is one of the lectionary texts. We certainly regard our feeding as important, given the rise of foodies and a multitude of diets. As Calvin said, our minds are factories of idols, of replacements for God. The passage speaks of us being in two worlds, this one and the commonwealth of heaven. Coming from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and living north of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, I  like that word. Especially so, because the common good, the common well-being is important to me. What public good are you willing to make some sacrifices for?

 

Monday- Connections and the need for them seem built into the creation. We live in a sea of interdependence. Sin can be the denial of connections and their impact, or the insistence that we live as we are unconnected. Indeed that could be a good ethical restraint: "what would I say to my loved one about what I am going to do?" As an exercise, jot down 5 people or things that connect you to the past, then  the present, then the future. How have they connected you to others and to God? What is the basis for those connections?

 

Tuesday Calvin wrote on Ps. 121 "we are naturally more anxious than is needful in seeking alleviation and redress to our calamities, especially when any imminent danger threatens us, we act a foolish and mistaken part in running up and down through tortuous mazes. ..No matter how high we look we find salvation only in God." Here is a view that faith can alleviate anxiety. Where does anxiety threaten your enjoyment of life?

 

Wednesday- I grow tired of being a classical music philistine (although i have yet to reach that stage in modern art or dance) and picked up a Teaching Company music appreciation set. Classical music has an extensive vocabulary to describe what the composer is up to. A part of  a musical idea is called a motive:think Bah bah bah bum in Beethoven's 5th. these pieces are massaged and transformed t eventually form a whole. it sound like the mosaic of one's life, no?

 

Thursday-Changes in church size seem constant but different overall. At present, large churches are growing larger, small churches are stable but threatened as usual, but mid-sized churches are in uncertain territory. God's love may by unchanging, but the structures of church life do not have to be so. The evidence would suggest that no one is satisfied with the size of their church. Susan Nienaber of the Alban Institute suggests displacing that anxiety with a focus on what God is calling us to be and to do in our particular church setting.

 

Friday- Home towns are the crucible of our lives. They form many of our assumptions and expectations of social life. We may remain in a psychic version of them, wherever we live, or we may well be seeking to escape from them. Just recently, we read of Jesus having a hard time in his home town when he did not fit the categories they had placed around him. Jeffrey Johnson writes of "reading a home town like a poem." When you think about growing up what are the mental pictures that spring to mind? What do you miss? What don't you miss?

 

Saturday-Joy of giving is a difficult phrase. I rarely feel it if I am being manipulated or even coerced into giving. On the other hand, I do find real pleasure in giving, whether it's a kettle at Christmas, making a pledge to NPR, or making something special for our children. Maybe it is a sign that my heart is too small when I need to be coerced into giving.When I was young, people gave for things that would last, institutions or projects like the March of Dimes. now they seem to demand a personal connection and want to  dictate the terms of their gift.

 

Right after Jesus announces that he will be a suffering Messiah, the scene shifts to this mountaintop experience. We use the word, Transfiguration=metamorphosis. Jesus shines like an angel, or better the gleaming presence of God. We sing, Shine Jesus shine.or, this little light of mine.

 

At the dawn of creation, God said let there be light. Some rabbis see that as a sharing of the divine light with all of creation. The Psalms proclaim God as the light of our salvation and Jesus is called the Light of the World. Radiance as sign of God's presence. Adam Thomas (CC 2/9.p.18) says that Moses shines because God sees him. By the time of Jesus both Moses and Elijah were thought to be assumed into heaven. They were also apocalyptic figures and heroes of the Bible. I would assume that they entered into the radiance of heaven and that radiance was reflected in their appearance.

 

Paul warps the story of Moses and the veil by making it a story of the people being shielded from the divine radiance out of awe into one of a darkened understanding of revelation. The meaning lurks in the old phrase, a veiled hint. The  veil and the attitude of Middle East toward women (mixture of religion and culture) adds to our disquiet with the image. When something is veiled it is kept under wraps

An old song speaks of being blinded by the light. Part of our defensiveness is being afraid of the light, in ourselves and others. So we replace it with different glitter of cars. We veil the light by not acting out of awareness of the presence of God. Maybe blinders is another word picture, where we don't notice the pageant around us. The Serendipity Bible uses the image of cobwebs that need to be cleared out of our thoughts. The transfiguration is of course a preview of the resurrection. it is also a preview of the baptismal life. Baptismal life ended in persecution and martyrdom for many. At the same time, baptism and its promised forgiveness polish us.

 

Aging can be transfiguration . You look at an infant picture and barely can recognize that it is you. When you get older sometimes, you are shocked at the face staring at you in the mirror.Still, it's the same you and wonder why a nineteen year old face is not staring back from the mirror or where did that bulk come from when you are in a three way mirror

Inner transformations occur in us all of the time without any visible change in us. I think of the great movie Tender Mercies, where the little boy looks at himself in the rear view mirror to look for the change promised him when he would be baptized.  As Paul says in the Corinthian letters, the truth is that we have, indeed, we are, treasures in earthen vessels but the radiance is there, waiting to break through We talk about a diamond in the rough.

 

Sacramental transfiguration takes the ordinary and it open the extraordinary.The simple physical element becomes a gateway to the spiritual level.Next week, we will receive Communion. A table becomes a Communion table, a resting place for the divine. Bread and cup are touched by the Spirit to transport us into the heavenly realms, even though we may appear the same. How can we receive Communion and not be part of a transfiguration? How can we receive Communion and not be aware of a transfigured reality? In that sacrament we are reminded not to hide our light under a basket. We are led to see the light that is inside each one of us, trying to burst forth.

.

 

 

Dt. 26:1-11 second cut

 

1) NIB (479) notes that this forms a frame of legal material with chapter 12, with their shared emphasis on worship. Dennis Olson (Dt. and the Death of Moses (115) links it to the  sacrifice of bounty in ch. 14. he sees it as part of the legal expansions of the meaning of the Decalogue. So, here, sharing helps to prevent coveting of goods.

2) Back in the dark ages, we were taught that his includes an early credal statement. Apparently, more support now exists for a later, post-exilic composition.

3) It starts with a good example of a thanksgiving offering as sacrifice. It is a decisive reminder that God is king, that the land is God's not ours. We hold it in trust, as Jefferson said, the land belongs in usufruct to the living, meaning that the fruits of it, not the land itself were ours.

4) The credal statement is noteworthy for its humble opening, but rooted in history, or at least historical memory.

5) God is a god of "all good gifts.' Further, while this God is enthroned int he heavens, the divine presence is also clear in the central sanctuary. God is not limited to the place of worship, but God is intensely sensed and present there.

6) If brave, one could make a recitation of the hand of God in American history.

7) Some folks make a lot out of the omission of the Sinai covenant in the creed,but a creed can;t have everything, can it?

8) At a different level, this is a bot the move from small to large, from slavery to freedom, and the election of Israel.

9) Notice the alien is part of the ceremony of thanksgiving.

 

Ash Wednesday- We do well to reflect on the usual readings for today . They speak of ritual disciplines such as fasting. They make it clear that they are not ends in themselves. They cannot displace the purpose of a contrite heart. Joel 2:13 does call a fast, but  the people are to tear their hearts, no their garments.Every day at the end of the school day, we recited an act of contrition in Catholic school, but we rushed through it and did not really hear it. We look for contrition and more often see scripted half apologies. To feel the guilt of doing wrong is a step toward change, toward repentance. Sin is breaking God's heart.

 

Thursday- Frugality is a virtue so far down the list, that many would see it as a vice for the demand growth our economy demands. I don't think that it means being cheap, but more along the lines of careful with resources and avoiding waste. Frugality may come back into style as we consider that we are burning through so many natural resources. Respect for God's creation could well include the old virtue of frugality. When I was a child, we saved pennies and put them in a container, much like our One Great Hour of Sharing fish. The point was to sacrifice some treat for the poor. Perhaps, we could consider looking at what we waste, say the soda pop we don't really need on a trip to Indianapolis, save it, and give it to the poor.

 

Friday-Adam Thomas writes of Lent as a period to remember who and whose we are (2/9 Christian Century, p.19). In the same issue, Margaret Bendroth writes of the weight of the past in an age of amnesia.Craig Barnes bemoans the distaste for history among seminary students. It reminds one of the Greek saying that not knowing of people before you were born renders one forever a child. Make a timeline and jot down some significant moral events in your life, where you acted in terms of baptism or not.

 

Saturday-Greg Grandin has written of a failed experiment in Fordlandia, Henry Ford's own enormous rubber plantation in the Amazon. He's been interviewed on NPR about it  Huxley made fun of the adulation of Ford when people invoked the name our ford, instead of our Lord in Brave New World. (Ford was called the Jesus Christ of industry by some). This industrial Eden fell apart rather quickly, and soon the jungle moved back in. At the same time, he made Greenfield Village reflect a past that the assembly line had changed. Now we can look at Michigan and see some of the same rusting industrial plant as in the Amazon. Our Honda plant has robots displacing skilled welders for the car bodies. The future rarely goes as we predict. It is therefore good to know that God is moving ahead of us, all the time.

Ex. 34:29-35 First Cut

1) Paul refers to this passage in one of the NT readings for today, but, as usual, he does some remarkable gymnastics with it. While we would see this as special pleading, it does fit wonderfully with the end of last week's Is. 6 reading.

2) Being veiled is a more provocative image now with our awareness of Muslim attitudes toward women combined with cultural views.

3) Recall that this is the second trip up to Sinai, after the golden Calf episode.

4) Holiness has an element of awestruck fear connected to it, the often quoted dynamite of Annie Dillard in  Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. This radiance could strike us as a transfer of sorts (thanks to famed exegete Mick Saunders, CLP, Trinity, Rushville) of divine radiance.

5) to get at this sense of holiness as beyond common touch, this is the place where qaran means shone (LXX has glorified) and not horn the root means to shoot out like a horn, or I suppose, a beam of light) and masweh =veil is the only occurrence.

6) here Moses is a vehicle of glory. of course, Christ is the vehicle of God's glory, indeed, its embodiment.

7) In the 2/9 Christian Century Adam Thomas says that the face of Moses shone because God saw him. His little piece there plays with the image of light and sight. He has a vision of a sort of original righteousness that gets defaced or dirtied by sins of omission as well as commission.

holy fish Is. 6/Lk. 5:1-11 February 7, 2010

We have two stories of encounter with the holy this morning, the sense of the ineffable, the great beyond, the whole new level of being.  I assume Isaiah is having a vision of the holy connected to the temple, maybe while he is praying i n the temple. to be able to speak the message of God, his lips are cleansed by a heavenly being. Still his call. is one destined to be frustrated call. Typically Isaiah resists the call of God, as he feels unworthy. Recently we reflected on the lack of ritual in our time. We've lost a good bit of the sense of the holy. It's reflected in malls and sports arenas more than in churches. Isaiah's call is to frustration. he will tell people the truth but they will be unable or unwilling to hear the message until they reach bottom like an alcoholic.Every time we cross the threshold of the church for worship, we enter into a holy space. That is when this space is a sanctuary.The prelude and the call to worship mark a dividing line between one world and another world.Isaiah has his vision in the temple or with the temple as a focal point in his sense that this was the nexus between heaven and earth.
 

Simon reacts like Isaiah, with trepidation of being unworthy in the sight of the holy. As far as I can tell, Jesus never brings this issue up. Here we see Jesus in the midst of everyday life, where people can gather and fisherman are at work on their nets. . Jesus deals with frustration of working hard and not receiving, of working hard for no apparent benefit, so from emptiness to fullness.. Jesus points to a different sort of fishing, where the fishing boat is the church. They will go far from shore to the ends of the earth.they will move from emptiness to abundance. They will need help with the haul in that their nets will break and the boats will threaten to submerge.  nets to the breaking point, but they leave everything to follow Jesus. Instead of them asking to follow Jesus, Jesus asks them to follow, leaving everything for the new path of Jesus. What do we need to leave behind?

 

Some of our brothers and sister emphasize the call of Christ so much that they lose the rest of life in seeing it as the culmination of the faith. The Christian work, the Christian vocation is fraught with difficulty and frustration as well. The new way of life that Jesus offers is a new way, the willingness to try the other side. With the promise of heaven, we can face the inevitable frustrations of life. I don't see how we can go through the gospels and see it as a sees of triumph after triumph.Yet we can dare to go out into the deep water, because we are the the little boat of the church. We don't have to live out life hugging the shore any more than we feel we need to use a medicine dropper to dispense our love to one another. With the Incarnation, it is my contention that the church has us do holy work wherever we find ourselves. We can bring the holy even  in unholy places to unholy people. After all, we are all unholy in thought, word, and deed, but it is the sheer graceful gift of god to make us all the biblical kingdom of priests, a holy people.-In that sense we are charged with grace, so that every act, every gesture can be a prayer in action, a clear communication of our call as disciples of god in everyday life.