Epiphany 5 C - Isaiah 6:1-13

Isaiah 6:1-13
The lectionary gives the option of stopping after verse six and maybe Isaiah would have preferred to end with “Here am I; send me!” as well. Despite his enthusiasm the people to whom he is so anxious to go will be dull, deaf and blind and won’t begin to listen until it is too late. The exile is inevitable and the destruction will be total because they were a people of unclean lips who didn’t know or wouldn’t admit that they were lost. There is no turning, no confession; no cry of “Woe is me!” to move the Lord of Hosts to mercy. But in a far away land they will come to their senses and the prophet’s voice will be heard and understood by the stump that is the seed. “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.” We would do well to listen for when with unclean lips we claim the grace of God without confessing, “Woe is me!” we are dull, deaf and blind and exiled from inhabiting forgiveness. It is the hallmark of the Lutheran expression of the faith that the Law and the Gospel work together as the Law exposes who we are so the Gospel can reveal who God is. From the stump that is the seed will come the One who high and lifted up will cry out “Woe is me” for the world. Confession is the only response when with dull senses we finally understand the truth about ourselves and hear the cry from the throne of the cross and see the agony he endured that our guilt would depart and our sin be blotted out. Woe is me.

Epiphany 4 C - 1 Corinthians 13:1-13

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

It doesn't matter if your language is laced with love if your words fall on deaf ears. Forty years later St. Clement begins his letter to the same congregation “My dear friends, take care to do good and virtuous deeds in unity before him, and be citizens worthy of him; or his many good works towards us may become a judgment on us all” and ends it with “let us not be in two minds, and let us have no doubts about his excellent and glorious gifts.” It sounds like the noisy gongs and clanging cymbals are still drowning out patience, kindness and rejoicing in the right. It is a sad commentary on the church that conflict comes so easily to those the living God has loved into being, but maybe that is because knowing in part and seeing dimly lends itself to limited love. But if with our limited vision we fix our eyes on the limitless One who emptied himself, taking on the servant’s form, suffering the criminal’s death then insisting on one’s own way is much harder to do. In the shadow of the cross the love that bears, believes, hopes, and endures moves the mountain of arrogant pride and selfish ambition so that faith, hope and love abide in us. I think in that moment we know all there is to know and see face to face the one who died so that love would never end. 

Epiphany 4 C - Psalm 71

Jeremiah in the Pit by Marc Chagall 

Psalm 71

We will only recite the first six verses of Psalm 71 but I bet Jeremiah knew the whole psalm by heart. It is a good psalm to know, especially when you've been thrown down a well and left for dead and maybe have begun to doubt the promise of your call, “they shall not prevail against you.” So it is not a psalm to be recited lightly. No. This is a psalm that is cried, or shouted, or groaned in silence. This is a cry for help in a time of trouble, a desperate plea for providence when enemies, the wicked, the unjust, the cruel are prevailing against you with a vengeance. It is not a psalm one wants to recite for real so we will speak the appointed six verses and move on to the epistle. But there are those, too numerous to number, for whom these words are more than a liturgical element in a Sunday service. Maybe those of us who live in warmth and comfort and safety, blessed by lives of relative ease, could speak this psalm on their behalf. Maybe in the reciting of six verses we could remind God and ourselves of the desperate plight of peoples oppressed by war and famine and disease and earthquake and flood in places where the wicked and the cruel and the unjust are free and the innocent are enslaved. And maybe in our remembering we to whom much has been given will live up to much being required and not wait for God to act but do what we were created to do, act on God’s behalf which, of course, is how God answers a plea for help. 

Epiphany 4 C - Jeremiah 1:14-21

                                                         Jeremiah by Marc Chagall -1956

Jeremiah 1:14-21

This is not the kind of call a prophet wants to receive. Given a choice a prophet, or a pastor for that matter, would prefer visions with a happier ending and keep the wickedness and judgments to a minimum. That is because truth telling is never easy for the one who has to tell it or for the ones who have to hear it. So while it might be good news that they will not prevail against Jeremiah the bad news is they will try. In the end Jeremiah will die in obscurity and Judah will receive the judgment he foretold. So where is the good news for those of us who prefer fairy tale endings over tragedy? As difficult as it may be to tell or hear it, the good news is in the truth telling itself. That is because truth is always good news even when it is bad. It is only when we tell and hear the truth about ourselves; that we have exchanged the truth for a lie to chase after idols of our own design and worship at the altars of our ego that we have any hope of finding our way back to the greater Truth. The greater truth is that Jeremiah comes before Jesus. In the end Jesus will die in agony and we will escape the judgment we deserve for sin could not prevail against his sacrifice. When God does the telling there is pardon after judgment, return after exile, life in death and even the tragedy has a fairy tale ending.

Epiphany 3 C - Luke 4:14-21

 Luke 4:14-21

Jesus ends his preaching tour of Galilee in the synagogue of his bar mitzvah. The standing room only crowd has gathered in eager expectation of seeing the hometown boy made good and Jesus does not disappoint. He unrolls the scroll of Isaiah and finds the words of promise that were the hope of those who sat by the waters of Babylon and wept. The same words that had become the longing of the oppressed under the new management of Rome. For a moment between the reading and the sermon there was silence, every eye fixed, every breath held, every ear attentive. As soon as he spoke, “today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing” the spell was lifted and in the verses that follow the SRO crowd rejects the promise fulfilled and things turn ugly. But in the pregnant pause before he spoke, where anything and everything is possible, the scripture was fulfilled. Maybe that is where freedom and recovery and restoration are real for us as well. When in silent expectation hope is not diminished by attempts to rationalize or explain. Such waiting faith believes God is intimately aware of our deepest need. Waiting faith believes the good news of grace for those impoverished, held captive by circumstance beyond their control, blinded by sin and oppressed by fear. We hold onto such hope with radical trust that the proof is not in the pudding but in the hope that the promise is as good as it sounds. 

Epiphany 3 C - 1 Corinthians 12:12-31

1 Corinthians 12:12-31

Maybe Paul never looked into a mirror that wasn't dim (1 Corinthians 13:12) because while the nose might be necessary the eyes often think it’s too big. Truth is most people can find fault with one body part or another and wish the weaker parts could be dispensed of more easily. And on the flip side - thinking of oneself as Adonis means Narcissus is not far behind. It may be that judging oneself either too harshly or inaccurately is where mistreatment of the body begins and why these words of Paul have too often fallen on deaf ears. When we cannot recognize our own worth we are blind to the worth of others. But if I see myself through the eyes of Christ as worthy of God’s affection and choose to live into that identity then I believe it becomes more difficult to deny others the same honor. And so each member values the other because each member is valued by Christ. To dishonor the other, to think or speak ill of them, to plot and plan and even pray for their downfall is to scorn Christ himself. In the end it is God who is grieved and injured when the body behaves badly towards itself. But it was the grief of God over a creation gone horribly wrong that led Christ to the cross. In love that is the "still more excellent way" his body was broken to make ours whole and his death is our life. So treat yourself well today for your body belongs to Christ. And remember that the body part that had the nerve to sit in your pew last Sunday is dear to the heart of Christ as well.

Epiphany 3 C - Nehemiah 8:1-10

 Nehemiah 8:1-10

The exiles, including the lay reader's nightmare list of names in the omitted verses, have returned from captivity to begin the slow process of rebuilding Jerusalem which includes reestablishing the rituals of the faith community. Outside the gate the preachers preach and the people respond with liturgy, Amen, Amen, lifting hands and bowing down. But when the ritual reading is explained and the people understand they begin to weep and wail and mourn. They weep because they know who they are in the light of the law and how they have grieved the One who brought them out of exile. They weep because they are afraid that God knows what they know. But there is another lesson to learn and if they had seen it coming they would have laughed out loud and shouted alleluia. God is not grieved. God is not angry. God is not weeping. This is God’s day of rejoicing and it is because of them. Surprise! So dry your eyes and wash your face. Break out the bubbly and forget your diet for a day for you are the joy of the Lord and that is your strength. That is a good lesson for us as well. As long as we think of the joy of the Lord as an emotion we have or can get we will inevitably end up weakened and weeping. But since the joy of the Lord is the Lord's joy over us it is constant and can never be diminished or depleted and therein lies our strength. In God’s joy we endure. In God’s joy we persevere. In God’s joy we hope. And yes, in God’s joy we rejoice. The only thing to do with that kind of strength is to share with those who have nothing prepared because, of course, that is what God has done for us.  

Epiphany 2 C - John 2:1-11

John 2:1-11

The wine has run out and with one more “l’chaim” the guest’s goblets will go dry and the party will be over ahead of schedule. Mary is determined to do something about it and counting on those things she has treasured in her heart she gets Jesus to serve the good wine before his time. John records this as the first sign of many and even though the other Gospels remember more pressing first signs, like healing diseases and casting out demons, turning water into wine is the sign for the time to come. It might not seem so in a world where more important things than wine run out, where a surplus of sorrow and suffering beg God to heal and cast out evil before filling the carafe with Cabernet  But the miracle of water into wine is more than a story of good timing for a worried wine steward and it is Mary who gives it to us. Like Jesus in the garden she asks for what she wants and accepts his rebuff. In the same way Jesus will ask for what he wants, “Take this cup from me” but accept “Thy will be done.” And so Jesus in faith will leave the garden for the cross and Mary, with every reason to believe the answer is no, tells the servant, “Do whatever he tells you.” She has no idea what he will do but believes he will do something. Faith in the face of jugs gone dry is what is called for in the face of circumstances that drain reserves, sorrow that consumes joy, questions empty of answers, which is why water into wine is a sign of the time to come. Without knowing how or when, we believe God will do something like Isaiah imagined; a feast of rich food and fine wine for all people where God will dine on death for when Jesus' time finally came the One who asked for the cup to be taken from him is the One who filled it. 

Epiphany 2 C - 1 Corinthians 12:1-11

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

“I do not want you to be uniformed, brothers and sisters.” I imagine that line didn't go over so well with the sisters and brothers in Corinth. They imagined themselves not only very well informed but well endowed, thank you very much. But like noisy gongs and clanging cymbals they were all show and no substance and the gifts meant to bless and unite were used to curse and divide. But then pride always corrupts the good gifts of God and blinds the puffed up to their spiritual poverty. Divisions follow as one claims spiritual superiority over the other and the church that is the body of Christ performs communal amputation upon itself. It is a sad state of affairs that despite centuries of being informed, congregations continue to be led astray by idols that make a lot of noise but cannot speak the language of love. Being informed is not enough, just like knowing something is a good thing to do doesn't necessarily lead one to embrace a healthy diet and exercise. But sometimes the mind informs the heart and heart knowledge leads to repentance which is able to heal divisions within the body of Christ as Spirit activated spiritual gifts are put to their proper use. Of course it is never that neat or easy but the good news is that after centuries of informing people who prefer idols that make a lot of noise the church is still here, the Gospel is still being proclaimed and Spirit hasn't given up activating gifts for the common good. 

Epiphany 2 C - Psalm 35:5-10

Psalm 36:5-10

You save humans and animals alike. While we depend on God to do the first, Possum Rescue of Fort Worth saves the less than attractive marsupial. God saves in that way as well. Salvation is not only for the cute and cuddly. All people are invited to take refuge. All people are invited to the feast of abundance. All people are invited to drink from the river of God’s delights. That is because the steadfast love of God extending to the heavens, stretched above the clouds, plunging to the depths of the ocean has no limit. We are the ones who qualify and quantify love by making a list and checking it twice to exclude the naughty and welcome the nice. It is our capacity for love that is limited, not God’s. And it is that same limited capacity for love that leads some to leave the invitation unopened or discard it as irrelevant. But God’s love remains steadfast waiting to save those whose eyes have grown accustomed to darkness imitating light. But God’s waiting is rewarded when our capacity to love becomes more like God’s and in living limitless love with upright hearts we become part of the saving for someone else.

Epiphany 2 C - Isaiah 62:1-5

Isaiah 62:1-5

The people to whom these words were addressed have grown weary of hope. They were promised a return to Zion with singing but when they got home the only song they could sing was a lament and Lord knows they knew that song by heart. The burning sand has dried up the promised pool, the haunt of jackals is still just as dangerous and the ruins they will have to rebuild are inhabited by hostile residents. It will take more than hope to make Jerusalem hospitable to the prophet’s vision. And maybe that is how hope works. We might prefer the fairy tale, close your eyes and click your heels three times and "no place" turns into home, but truth is hope just gets us to believe again that not all the songs we will sing will be in a minor key. And so the forsaken who have returned to a desolate land change their tune and start singing as those who are the delight of the Lord in a land that is "married." But what if the prophet’s vision is beyond our ability to hope? Truth is all the visions of the future are beyond our ability to hope which is why God sings lead. For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent.