Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for June 27, 2021

First Reading (Track One): 2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27

We hear both cries of lamentation and words of quiet joy throughout Sunday’s readings.

Jesus healing the bleeding woman, ancient drawing in the Roman catacombs. (Click image to enlarge.)

In our Track One first reading, we have jumped forward from the first book of Samuel, in which Saul began to fear David while Saul’s son, Jonathan, and David became close friends. Now, after a series of additional conflicts between Saul and David, King Saul has died in battle against the Amalekites, and to David’s grief, Jonathan was killed too. Now David is king in his own right, and in spite of their troubled relationship, in these verses David mourns the death of Saul. Then that grief is eclipsed by David’s deep grief over the loss of his beloved friend, Jonathan. the reading concludes with a long, loving ballad in which David declares Jonathan’s love for him “wonderful, passing the love of women.”

First Reading (Track Two): Wisdom of Solomon 1:13-15; 2:23-24

Love is so strong that it has power even over death, and God desires neither death nor destruction for us. We hear these hopeful ideas in Sunday’s Track Two first reading, and they recur through the day’s readings. First we read the Wisdom of Solomon (often simply called “Wisdom”) from the apocrypha, the 15 deuterocanonical books included at the end of the Hebrew Bible. These verses follow just after God warned an earthly ruler not to invite his own death or destruction by behaving badly. The passage reminds us that God’s creation celebrates our life, not our death. God’s creation is a thing of beauty, and righteousness lives forever.

Psalm (Track One): Psalm 130

This beautiful psalm of faithful hope in God may be most familiar for its use – under the Latin title “De Profundis” (“out of the depths”) – as one of the Psalms recommended for the liturgy for the burial of the dead. In its verses we hear this hopeful prayer: Out of the depths we call out to God, knowing that we will be heard, for there is always forgiveness in God. We wait for God, as even in night’s darkest hours we wait for morning light.

Psalm (Track Two): Lamentations 3:21-33

This short, song-like passage is taken not from the Psalms but from Lamentations, a short book traditionally attributed to Jeremiah. This passage echoes the hope and trust in God’s love that we heard in the first reading. In these verses we sing our hope in God’s steadfast love that never ends, love that is renewed every morning. In words reminiscent of the Sermon on the Mount, we sing of giving our cheek to the one who smites us while we wait for our loving God who will not willingly afflict us.

Alternate Psalm (Track Two): Psalm 30

Like the Wisdom passage in the first reading, this alternate to Sunday’s Track Two Psalm – traditionally understood as a hymn of thanksgiving upon recovery from illness – contrasts the joy of life in God’s favor against the grief of death under God’s wrath. Happily, God’s anger endures only for seconds, while God’s favor lasts a lifetime. “Weeping may spend the night,” the Psalmist memorably exults, “but joy comes in the morning.” God turns our weeping into dancing, the Psalmist sings, and clothes us with joy.

Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 8:7-15

Paul loved the people of this little early church community in Corinth, but they were often cranky, quarrelsome, difficult to persuade, and sometimes got on his last nerve. Many of the members of the community were poor and often hungry. But there were comfortably wealthy members too, and sometimes they weren’t eager to share with their hungry neighbors. Holding up the example of Christ, who Paul says was rich yet became poor for our sakes, he urges them all to live by Jesus’ example: Do your work, earn what you deserve, but give according to your means so all may have enough.

Gospel: Mark 5:21-43

Jesus and the apostles have just returned home from their trip across the Sea of Galilee. Jesus hurries to get to the bedside of the desperately ill child of Jairus, a synagogue leader. On their way, they encounter a woman who had been suffering hemorrhage for a dozen years. Ritually unclean because of her condition, poor, and rejected by her neighbors, she touches Jesus’ robe in hope of being healed. Jesus pauses, tells her that her faith has made her well; then they rush on to find Jairus’ daughter already dead. The crowd laughs when Jesus declares that the child is not dead, only sleeping, but Jesus takes the child’s hand and brings her back to life. Rich or poor, powerful or weak, Jesus heals both without question.