Author Archives: Robin Garr

Easter 4B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for April 25, 2021

First Reading: Acts 4:5-12

The Fourth Sunday after Easter is often called “Good Shepherd Sunday” because its readings focus on God’s protective love in the metaphor of shepherd.

The Good Shepherd Lays Down H

The Good Shepherd Lays Down His Life for the Sheep (1616), oil painting on canvas by Pieter Breughel the Younger (1564-1638). Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels, Belgium. (Click image to enlarge.)

In our first reading, Peter has come a long way since having denied Jesus three times on the night of Jesus’ arrest. Peter and John have been arrested by the Temple authorities, who were alarmed because they healed a paralyzed man and took advantage of the attention to preach about the resurrected Christ. Peter responds to the authorities with bold confidence. He declares that the disciples are healing through Jesus – adding pointedly, “whom you crucified” – and whom God raised from the dead as the cornerstone of salvation. What changed Peter? Sent forth by the risen Christ to “feed my sheep,” he is filled with the Holy Spirit.

Psalm: Psalm 23

When Christians read these familiar verses, we tend to visualize the loving face of Jesus as the Good Shepherd who walks beside us. After all, Jesus declares himself the Good Shepherd in the verses of John’s Gospel that we hear today. Originally, however, the people sang this Psalm in the time of the Second Temple as a hymn of praise to the God who brought them out of exile and led them home. We enjoy with the original listeners its comforting hope of a shepherd who keeps us from want and guides us to rest comfortably, fearing no evil. There’s a hint of repressed anger at the one-time oppressors, too, as the Psalmist imagines reclining at a lavish banquet while their vanquished enemies can only look on.

Second Reading: 1 John 3:16-24

Jesus loved us so much that he laid down his life for us. This beloved idea from John’s Gospel – which we see reflected here in the first letter in John’s name – is just about as reassuring as the 23rd Psalm. But the rest of this reading becomes challenging when we hear that we are to lay down our lives for one another too. Just as God loves us, we are to love each other, to help our brothers and sisters in need, not just in what we say but in what we do. We are to be not only sheep, but shepherds, too. Filled with God’s love, we are called to be bold, just as Peter was bold, fired by the Holy Spirit just as Peter was inspired.

Gospel: John 10:11-18

In its context with the verses that came just before it in John’s Gospel, this seemingly simple “Good Shepherd” narrative resonates unexpectedly with Peter and John in Acts: The Pharisees are angry because Jesus healed a blind man on the Sabbath, and they are alarmed that many people, seeing these miraculous healings, are beginning to speak of Jesus as the Messiah. Seen in this light, it appears that Jesus is pushing back. He likens the people to helpless sheep, and the Pharisees to wolves who prey on them. In words that the writer of the later first letter of John will invoke, Jesus declares that he will lay down his life for the sheep – all the world’s sheep, “one flock, one shepherd” – and that he will live again.

Easter 3B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for April 18, 2021

First Reading: Acts 3:12-19

Christ, the Messiah, has come for all the world: This promise resonates through Sunday’s readings.

Christ Appears to the Disciples

Christ Appears to the Disciples at the Table after the Resurrection (1308-1311), panel from the Maesta Altarpiece of Siena by Duccio di Buoninsegna (c.1255-c.1319). Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Siena, Italy. (Click image to enlarge.)

In the first reading from Acts of the Apostles, Peter and John, filled with the Holy Spirit, have healed a man who could not walk. This astounded all those who saw the once-lame beggar walking and praising God in the temple. In words that startle us now with their harsh anti-Judaism, Peter tells the crowd that the man was healed through the power of Jesus, the Messiah, whom they had rejected and had killed, but who will forgive them if they turn to him. Language like this, sadly, permeates Acts, which was written a generation after the destruction of the Temple, when Christians and Jews were angrily drawing apart.

Psalm: Psalm 4

The Psalmist sings for a people who face severe persecution from enemies, yet stand strong in confidence in a loving and faithful God. In contrast with more warlike Psalms that call on God to crush and destroy the foe, Psalm 4 holds up a more quiet and trusting confidence. We ask God to have mercy, to hear our prayers. We ask that the light of God’s countenance shine upon us, and we are grateful that we can sleep in peace, knowing that God is watching over us.

Second Reading: 1 John 3:1-7

In a message that resonates with Peter’s speech in Acts, the author of First John assures the people of the early church that we become the children of God through the gift of God’s love as revealed to us through Jesus. Although the world does not seem to know this yet, the writer assures his audience, the world will eventually come to do so. Meanwhile, doing what is right keeps us in right relationship with God through Jesus. Thus we are free from sin, this passage concludes, for there is surely no sin in Jesus.

Gospel: Luke 24:36b-48

This week we turn to Luke’s Gospel for another story about the resurrected Christ, having heard John’s account last Sunday. The disciples are together again, and Jesus is suddenly among them. Surprisingly, their first response is not joy but surprise and terror, as if a ghost had appeared! Much as he had done for Thomas in John’s Gospel, Jesus invites them all to examine and touch his wounds, Then he asks for something to eat, and takes a piece of fish, perhaps to show that he is no ghost but flesh and blood. He then announces that he is the Messiah foretold in the Scriptures, and declares that repentance and forgiveness of sins will go out in his name to all nations.

Easter 2B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for April 11, 2021

First Reading: Acts 4:32-35

Christ is risen, and we move forward with joy into the 50 days of Eastertide.

Doubting Thomas

Doubting Thomas (1613-1615), oil painting on panel by Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640). Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp, Belgium. (Click image to enlarge.)

Throughout this time, our First Readings will be taken from the Acts of the Apostles, the Evangelist Luke’s story of the life of the early church. In his Gospel, Luke consistently emphasizes Jesus’ command to shun riches and to serve the poor, the weak and the oppressed. It should be no surprise, then, that in Acts Luke presents the practice of sharing all possessions and caring for the poor as the customary lifestyle of the apostles. This practice would be a hard sell in 21st century politics, which might give us food for thought as we ponder Jesus’ promise of good news to the poor.

Psalm: Psalm 133

Sounding a theme that resonates with the sharing lifestyle that Luke presents in the early church, the Psalmist celebrates the joy of a community that lives in unity like brothers and sisters. The earthy image of anointing oil running down Aaron’s head, beard and robe may sound odd to our modern ears. But, also like the Gospel accounts of the woman anointing Jesus with expensive ointment – it reminds us that the most desirable luxuries are not to be hoarded but abundantly shared.

Second Reading: 1 John 1:1-2:2

Our second readings during Eastertide will take us through the First Letter of John. This letter was almost certainly not written by John the Evangelist. Its emphasis on love, and on Jesus as the Word and the Light, is consistent with the style of John’s Gospel, and hints that it may have come later on from the same early Christian community. “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves,” Sunday’s verses tell us, a phrase that the Book of Common Prayer adopts as a Lenten opening sentence for Morning Prayer. When we confess our sins, it continues, God will forgive us and restore our righteousness through Christ.

Gospel: John 20:19-31

Jesus has died. Christ has risen! And now Jesus begins appearing to the disciples, often in mysterious ways that defy imagining. The doors are locked, the apostles are terrified; and suddenly Jesus is there with them in the locked room, and fear is transformed to joy. Thomas, who missed Jesus’ first appearance, remains doubtful, and for this he is remembered forever as “Doubting Thomas.” Who wouldn’t doubt, though? Wouldn’t you? But Jesus surely understands. And Thomas, too, with all the rest, goes on to testify that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that we all have life in his name.

Easter Sunday B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for April 4, 2021

The Resurrection

The Resurrection (1665), oil painting by Luca Giordano (1634-1705). Residenzgalerie, Salzburg, Austria. (Click image to enlarge.)

First Reading or Alternate Second Reading: Acts 10:34-43

On Easter Sunday we celebrate the victory of Jesus over death through resurrection. In the first reading is from the Acts of the Apostles, Peter is visiting the home of the Roman Centurion Cornelius, who is considering becoming a Christian. Peter has just had a vision in which God told him that he should join the Roman family at table. Now he tells this Roman family the story of Jesus’ life and work. He assures them that salvation through Jesus’ life, death on the cross and resurrection is meant for everyone, not just Jewish Christians. Forgiveness of our sins through God’s saving grace is given to every nation, to all people, to Jew and Gentile alike: Jesus is Lord of all.

Alternate First Reading: Isaiah 25:6-9

The Prophet Isaiah imagines a sumptuous feast – a table piled high with rich food and fine wine – set out for all God’s people as a celebration of victory over death. Isaiah understood this as a national feast in the context of Israel’s dream of return from exile. Looking back through Israel’s tradition, early Christians adopted it as an image of God’s saving grace through Jesus.

Psalm: Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24

A feeling of joy appropriate for our Easter celebration rings through Sunday’s Psalm (which overlaps substantially with last week’s Palm Sunday Psalm). This is originally a Psalm used to celebrate Passover, and we need to honor that context. The Psalmist sings of joy blended with gratitude: Joy and gladness over salvation; delight about victory over death; and thanksgiving for God’s goodness and mercy. God has heard our prayers and responded, the Psalmist sings, laying a new cornerstone for a just world. This is the day that the Lord has made: Let us rejoice and be glad!

Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 15:1-11

As Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians draws to its close, he speaks of the centrality of the Resurrection to Christian belief: Christ died for our sins, was buried, was raised on the third day and seen by the Apostles and by hundreds of followers. Everyone who witnessed the risen Christ, he writes – including Paul himself, remembering his vision on the road to Damascus – now proclaims to the whole world that God’s saving grace comes to us through the crucifixion and the Resurrection.

Gospel: John 20:1-18

Each of the four Gospels’ accounts of the resurrection is slightly different. John’s story gives particular attention to Mary Magdalene. It presents her in beautifully tender verses as the one who remained at the empty tomb after the others had left; the first person to witness the risen Christ, and the one sent to proclaim the good news of his resurrection to the rest. In a narrative similar to other accounts of Jesus’ mysterious appearances after his resurrection, Mary did not recognize Jesus until he called her name.

Alternate Gospel: Mark 16:1-8

The story of Easter morning as told by Mark, the earliest of the Gospels, is brisk and concise. It is sunrise, and three grieving women get up early to take spices to the tomb to anoint Jesus’ beloved body. When they get there, they find that the stone has rolled away from the door! A young man dressed in white tells them, “He has been raised; he is not here. … he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.” It’s not surprising that they were terrified. They ran away and told no one. And just like that, the original version of Mark’s Gospel ends, leaving us to wonder what comes next.

A Kaddish for Jesus: Holy Week repentance and regret for anti-Judaism

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I offer this 2013 sermon as my annual reminder that the Gospels we read during Holy Week reflect a vicious anti-Judaism that has contributed to misunderstanding and even hate by many Christians over the centuries. Let’s commit to hold these thoughts in context, regret and repent our historic institutional anti-Judaism as we gather for Holy Week services.

A Kaddish for Jesus

Maundy Thursday, March 28, 2013
A Kaddish for Jesus
Robin Garr
Sermon at St. Thomas Episcopal Church
Louisville, Kentucky

יִתְגַּדַּל וְיִתְקַדַּשׁ שְׁמֵהּ רַבָּא

Yitgaddal v’yitqaddash sh’meh rabba …  
“Glorified and sanctified be God’s great name …  ”

Apostle St Thomas (c.1830), oil painting on canvas by Jusepe Martínez (1600-1682). Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.

Apostle St Thomas (c.1630), oil painting on canvas by Jusepe Martínez (1600-1682). Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest. (Click image to enlarge)

So begins Kaddish, the traditional Jewish prayer in which family members or friends honor the memory of a loved one who has died.

We gather this evening in memory of Jesus’s last supper with his friends, when he showed them the dignity of service and the meaning of humility by lovingly washing their feet.

Tomorrow, Good Friday, we’ll remember Jesus’s passion and death on the cross.  Tonight,  Jesus and his friends are sharing a Passover dinner. Within 24 hours, Jesus’s friends would have been sitting together, mourning his death with an ancient version of something like the Kaddish.

After all, Jesus and all his apostles were Jewish. They studied the Torah and they worshiped at the Temple in Jerusalem.  Jesus was a rabbi, a teacher; many saw him as a prophet.

As we enter the three holy days of Jesus’s passion and death leading to the Easter joy of Christ’s resurrection, I’d like us to take a few minutes to remember  – and honor – the Jewish tradition that Jesus believed and that Rabbi Jesus taught.

Now, you might be thinking, “Why bring this up?”  Certainly it’s no secret that Jesus was Jewish and that Christianity is rooted in Judaism, sharing the same First Testament. But why go into all that now, during the holiest days on the Christian calendar?

I would suggest that there is no better time for us to think about our relationship with our Jewish brothers and sisters than now, when our scripture readings through Lent, Palm Sunday and Good Friday confront us with the harsh words that the leaders of the early church had for the Temple authorities.

Early in the Gospel of Luke, “the Jews” in Jesus’s home town got so angry with his first preaching that they chased him out of the synagogue and tried to throw him off a cliff. Luke goes on to tell how the Jewish scribes and priests were constantly spying on Jesus and trying to trick him into saying things that would get him in trouble.

In tomorrow’s Good Friday services we’ll hear John portraying “The Jews” as a nasty gang, out to get Jesus. They’re dead-set on making sure that the Roman governor Pontius Pilate won’t let Jesus off on a technicality. Earlier in the Gospel, John calls the Jews “children of the devil,” and warns  that the Jewish authorities were constantly hatching plans to kill Jesus.

We  hear “The Jews … The Jews … The Jews” like the beat of an angry drum. But as we listen to John’s Gospel tomorrow, let’s bear in mind that in Jesus’s time there were many Judaisms, not just one.  Much like the church today, there was a huge variety of Jewish practices and scriptural interpretations, and they didn’t all get along.

Jesus very likely squabbled with a group of Temple authorities who saw nothing but a troublesome uproar over  his active public ministry, his healings and his call for “good news for the poor.” In these days, especially at Passover time in Jerusalem, the Roman rulers weren’t shy about cracking down on anything that looked like trouble. This noisy rabbi was getting a lot of attention, and nobody wanted that!

And when Matthew wrote that “the Jews” shouted out to Pilate, “His blood be on us and our children,” he set down a vicious charge that would be hurled back at Judaism for 2,000 years. Placing the blame for Jesus’s death on “the Jews” set a flame that would ignite a shameful history of pogroms and persecutions and, eventually, the Holocaust.

In this post-Holocaust world, all people of good spirit look back and say, “never again.”  To this end, let’s not just shrug off the anti-Jewish verses that still reside in our scriptural tradition.

It’s important to recognize that the stories about Jesus – the Gospels – were not written down until some 40 to 70 years after the crucifixion. Not many first-hand witnesses were still alive, and bad attitudes and prejudices had already built walls between Christians and Jews.

Forty years after the crucifixion, the Romans had destroyed the Temple, and most of Jerusalem with it. The Christian faith had reached out to embrace Gentile converts and was spreading across the Mediterranean and beyond, but its leaders still thought of the church as “Christian Jews.”

Judaism, meanwhile, focusing on the synagogue as center of community in a world without a Temple, now viewed the Christians as more than heretics.  Christian Jews were thrown out of the synagogues and told to stay out. Everyone involved was human and flawed. Anger and tempers flared. It was in this fiery setting that the Gospel stories were written and the idea of “the Jews” as unrepentant killers of Jesus set in stone.

But as Marcus Borg points out in his recent book, Evolution of the Word, the Gospels don’t indict  all Jews, only the individuals responsible for Jesus’s rejection – and, years later, the Christian community’s rejection from the synagogues. “To fail to recognize the historical circumstances and the limited intention of these passages,” Borg says, “is to perpetuate the long history of Christian anti-Semitism.”1

“His blood be on us and on our children”?  “The scribes and chief priests …       watched him and sent spies”? “The Jews, The Jews, The Jews”? When we hear these words during Holy Week, the holiest week of the year, let’s remember that it would not be inappropriate for us to pray Kaddish for Jesus:

“Yitgaddal v’yitqaddash sh’meh rabba … Glorified and sanctified be God’s great name throughout the world, which God has created according to God’s will. May God establish God’s kingdom in your lifetime and during your days, and within the life of the entire House of Israel, speedily and soon; and say, Amen.”

Think carefully about those words. Hear what they say. And now think about this: That first verse of Kaddish sounds a lot like the words that Jesus taught us when we asked him how to pray:

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.  Your kingdom come. Your will be done,  on earth as it is in heaven.”

Speedily and soon; and say, Amen.

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1Borg, Marcus J. (2012-08-28). Evolution of the Word: The New Testament in the Order the Books Were Written]. HarperOne. Kindle Edition.

Palm / Passion Sunday B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for March 28, 2021

Liturgy of the Palms B

The Last Supper

The Last Supper (c.1560), oil painting on panel by Juan de Juanes (1523-1579). Museo del Prado, Madrid. (Click image to enlarge.)

Psalm: Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29

As we sing this ancient hymn of celebration and praise, traditionally titled “A Song of Victory,” imagine a joyous crowd approaching the Temple, clapping hands and singing out as they celebrate the Lord their God, whose steadfast love endures forever. Its words of joyous praise for God’s works and mercy foreshadow the words we sing in the Great Thanksgiving as our Eucharistic Prayer begins: “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! … Hosanna in the highest.”

Gospel: Mark 11:1-11

Palm Sunday and Passion Sunday were once celebrated on separate Sundays, but the celebrations were brought together in the time of ecumenism that followed Vatican II. As a result, we take a quick and startling turn in the course of one Sunday’s worship. First we hear of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, riding a donkey and greeted as a King by throngs spreading their cloaks and leafy branches in his way, shouting “Hosanna!” But then, later in the liturgy, we undergo a dramatic change of tone when we hear those same crowds angrily shout “Crucify him!” This contrast sets a tone for Holy Week as we follow Jesus to the cross: God is with us in joy. God is with us in sorrow.

Alternate Gospel: John 12:12-16

All four Gospels tell of Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem, riding a modest mount and hearing the acclaim of crowds; as is always the case, each Gospel narrative tells a slightly different story. John’s version, for example, is the only one that explicitly declares Jesus the King of Israel, and the only one that tells us the disciples did not understand what was going on. But all four versions share the triumphantly waving branches – here explicitly described as palms – and the joyous shouts of Hosanna.

Liturgy of the Passion B

First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-9a

These familiar verses from Isaiah introduce us to the suffering servant. Written about the people in exile in Babylon, it prophesies a servant leader who who would receive the enemy’s blows for the people in exile, and eventually guide them back home. While we respect the original intent, Christian readers can hardly encounter these verses without seeing parallels with Jesus, our messiah and king, who suffered for us and taught us to give our backs and turn our cheeks to those who strike us.

Psalm: Psalm 31:9-16

Perhaps the Psalmist had Isaiah’s Suffering Servant in mind as he wrote this Psalm of lament, with its litany of sorrow, distress, grief, sighing, misery, scorn, horror, dread and more. He suffers, his neighbors scheme; they plot his death. Have you ever heard a plaint more pitiful than “I am as useless as a broken pot”? Yet amid all this misery, hope glows like the sun breaking through clouds: Trust in God, place our faith in God’s love, and wait to be saved.

Second Reading: Philippians 2:5-11

Might Paul have been thinking of the Suffering Servant, too, as he wrote of Jesus’ death on the cross? We understand Jesus as both fully human and fully divine, and all the Gospels show us glimpses of a Jesus who knew his stature and God-sent mission. Yet in this relatively early letter of Paul, perhaps quoting an even older Christian hymn, Paul tells of a Jesus who willingly set aside his divinity, his equality with God – “emptying himself” – to bear the horrific pain of crucifixion as a vulnerable, frightened human. Jesus took on the full weight of all that suffering to show us the true exaltation of God’s love, calling us only to respond with love for God and our neighbor.

Gospel: Mark 14:1-15:47

Now we come to Mark’s account of Jesus’ passion and death. The palm branches and hosannas are only memories now. We hear the dark, painful way of the Cross as we prepare to walk through Holy Week with Jesus. Watch closely as we see first Jesus’ followers, and then even his friends, slip quietly away, deserting him, leaving at the end only those few most close to him, and a Roman centurion – a pagan, a soldier of the hated empire – whose faith showed him the light and thus opens the way to us all.

Lent 5B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for March 21, 2021

First Reading: Jeremiah 31:31-34

The Lectionary readings during Lent follow a consistent pattern: The Sunday Gospels take us on a quick journey through the life of Jesus, from his baptism in the Jordan to his last week in Jerusalem.

Jeremiah Lamenting the Destruction of Jerusalem

Jeremiah Lamenting the Destruction of Jerusalem (1630), oil painting on oak wood by Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606-1669). Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. (Click image to enlarge.)

The Hebrew Bible readings showcase God’s continuing covenants with the people. In Sunday’s first reading, the Prophet Jeremiah, recognizing that the people suffered exile because they broke the covenant their ancestors made at Mount Sinai, announces a new covenant. This will not be written on mere stone but directly on our hearts. Having God’s love indelibly marked on our hearts offers us a way to remember, even when we’re struggling, that we are commanded to love God and our neighbor.

Psalm: Psalm 51:1-13

This familiar Psalm is attributed by legend to King David himself. It imagines David wracked in repentant guilt over sending his general Uriah to certain death in battle so he can have Uriah’s beautiful wife, Bathsheba, for himself. In poetic words that mirror the promises of the covenants, we hear of David’s shame and grief. He makes no excuses, but begs for God’s mercy and forgiveness. “Create in me a clean heart, O God,” David begs: a clean slate on which God can write a new covenant of love.

Alternate Psalm: Psalm 119:9-16

Psalm 119, the longest of all the Psalms, carries a message of covenant throughout its many verses: Those who follow God’s laws and teaching, modeling their lives on Torah so as to walk in God’s ways, will reap rewards. Within that framework, though, each of its 22 eight-verse stanzas offers its individual approach. Its verses addressed to God, “With my lips will I recite all the judgments of your mouth,” echo Jeremiah’s first conversation with God when he was called to be a prophet: “Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy,” to which God responded, “you shall speak whatever I command you. … Now I have put my words in your mouth.”

Second Reading: Hebrews 5:5-10

The letter to the Hebrews is not a letter to a specific congregation but a broad appeal to formerly Jewish Christians who had returned to their original faith late in the first century to avoid persecution aimed at Christians by Rome. Its unknown author makes the case that Jesus, as Christ, stands in the great tradition of Jewish high priests that extends all the way back to Melchizedek, the king and great high priest, who blessed Abram just before God made the first covenant with Abram and Sarai. Since Jesus has become the source of eternal salvation who intercedes on our behalf forever, the writer tells the people, there is no longer need for priestly sacrifice.

Gospel: John 12:20-33

In the verses just before these (which we will hear next week on Palm/Passion Sunday), Jesus has arrived in Jerusalem, riding a young donkey through joyous, palm-waving crowds. This week hear about a group of Greeks who ask Philip to arrange a meeting with Jesus. When Philip and Andrew take the request to him, Jesus responds with a surprising reply: “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” Just as Jesus must die to bear the fruit of salvation through his resurrection, Jesus says, we are the seeds of faith, called to grow in discipleship like kernels of wheat that must fall on the ground and die in order to grow.

Lent 4B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for March 14, 2021

First Reading: Numbers 21:4-9

In Sunday’s first reading we hear a strange account of poisonous snakes sent by God to punish an ungrateful people – and a curative bronze serpent that seems suspiciously like an idol.

Moses and the Brass Serpent

Moses and the Brass Serpent, (late 16th century), oil painting on oak wood, by the flemish painter Jacob de Backer (c.1555-c.1591). Schorr Collection, United Kingdom. (Click image to enlarge.)

This might just strike us as another of Scripture’s ancient legends, easily ignored. But then we turn to John’s Gospel and find Jesus alluding to this strange passage to set the context for his famous words in John 3:16, “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son”! This connection makes the serpent story a little more difficult to ignore. Perhaps it’s as simple as this: When we feel that we’re surrounded by serpents, look up and remember that God is with us.

Psalm: Psalm 107:1-3, 17-22

Following that startling passage about poisonous snakes and bronze serpent idols in the first reading, the Psalm appointed for this day provides some relief. Give thanks for God’s enduring mercy, the Psalmist tells us. Even when we are foolish; when we rebel and when we sin, and even when we are afraid, once we cry out for God and repent, return, and give thanks for God’s mercy, God hears our prayers and showers us, like children, with healing and salvation.

Second Reading: Ephesians 2:1-10

We find no actual serpents in the Letter to the Ephesians, a document likely written in Paul’s name by a later follower. But it imagines something just about as frightening and potentially deadly: a shadowy spirit, a “ruler of the power of the air.” Those who prefer passion and the flesh to life in Christ can be lured by this spirit, the writer says. But like those healed by gazing at Moses’ bronze serpent, we are saved by God’s mercy and raised up by God’s gift of grace through Jesus; not by anything that we can do to try to earn salvation.

Gospel: John 3:14-21

“God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” For many Christians, this week’s lessons could start and finish right there. But wait! What is that serpent doing there? We might wonder if Jesus is teaching from Torah, with which he and his followers would have been intimately familiar, and Numbers is his text. We cannot yank John 3:16 out of its context without considering the verses that surround it. In his nighttime conversation with the Pharisee Nicodemus, Jesus makes clear that we all have power to choose between darkness and the light. Just as God provided the Israelites a way to repent and be healed, so God offers us healing grace through Jesus.

Lent 3B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for March 7, 2021

First Reading: Exodus 20:1-17

During the first three weeks of Lent we remember God’s three great covenants with the people: God’s promises through the ages given to Noah, Abraham, and now Moses.

Christ Driving the Money-changers from the Temple

Christ Driving the Money-changers from the Temple (1626), oil painting on oak wood by Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606-1669). Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow. (Click image to enlarge.)

God’s thunderous voice shakes Mount Sinai as the awed people hear the Ten Commandments that sum up the principles by which we live with love for God and each other. Hear God’s voice and follow these commandments, God has told Moses in the verses just before these bedrock principles, and you will be God’s treasured possession among all the people.

Psalm: Psalm 19

In an appropriate sequel to the first reading, we hear this familiar hymn of praise and thanksgiving, sung in beautiful, poetic language, exulting at the beauty and wonder of all God’s creation, God’s gift to all the people of the world and to all the span of the universe. Within that creation, the hymn sings on, God’s laws and statutes – the great commandments – give us wisdom and joy and lead us to righteousness.

Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 1:18-25

Paul’s first letter to the people of Corinth begins with a simple but challenging pastoral issue: The community is splitting into factions, each following a different leader. Paul urges them to stay united by following the Cross, Paul urges them. Never mind if their Jewish and Gentile neighbors mock Christians as foolish for worshiping a man who was brutally executed on the Roman cross, he says. The cross was a symbol of pain, shame and degradation, a seemingly foolish conclusion in the eyes of people who were expecting a warrior Messiah who would overthrow Rome with power and might. But that doesn’t matter, Paul writes, because Christians prefer God’s foolishness to mere human wisdom. God’s weakness far outweighs human strength.

Gospel: John 2:13-22

During the first weeks of Lent we quickly touched on Mark’s narrative of Jesus’ public ministry, from his baptism and prophetic teaching to Peter’s recognition that Jesus is the Son of Man, the Messiah. Now we turn to John’s Gospel for the rest of the season, beginning with John’s colorful account of Jesus throwing the money-changers out of the temple. This narrative appears in all four Gospels, but curiously, while Matthew, Mark and Luke all place it at the beginning of Holy Week, in John we find it near the beginning of the Gospel, during an earlier trip to Jerusalem for Passover that none of the other Gospels mention. Moreover, John alone goes into such detail: Not only did Jesus throw over the money changers’ tables, but he made a whip of cords to lash them in his anger at their exploiting the poor in the name of God. At the end, Jesus foreshadows his own passion and death. To the outrage of temple leaders, Jesus likens his own body to the temple and declares that he will raise it up three days after its destruction.

Lent 2B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for Feb. 28, 2021

First Reading: Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16

The lectionary readings for Lent continue recalling God’s covenants with the people.

Abraham, Sarah and the Angel

Abraham, Sarah and the Angel (1520s), oil painting on panel by Jan Provoost (1462-1525 to 1529). The Louvre, Paris. (Click image to enlarge.)

This week our attention turns to Abram and Saraai, the Aramean couple called by God to go to a new land at a great age. God gives them new names – Abraham and Sarah – and promises that they and their offspring will yield a great multitude of nations. This seems surprising, since Abram is 99 and they have had no children, but all things are possible with God. In contrast to the unconditional covenant with Noah, the covenant with Abraham requires reciprocity: In order to gain the Promised Land (a promise made in verses that the lectionary reading skips over), Abraham and his people are to “walk before God and be blameless.”

Psalm: Psalm 22:22-30

Today’s Psalm repeats the theme of God’s covenant from Abraham and Sarah through their son Isaac and grandson Jacob, who God later renamed Israel. The Psalmist exults in the eternal nature of that covenant, shouting thanks and praise that Jacob’s descendants will serve God and will be known as God’s own forever. Even today we remember those words in baptism, when those being welcomed into the household of God are anointed with blessed oil, sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked as Christ’s own for ever.

Second Reading: Romans 4:13-25

Paul recalls God’s eternal promise to Abraham’s descendants in his letter to the people of Rome, but he adds something new: He extends that covenant to include Gentile Christians as well. While Abraham’s descendants received God’s covenant through the law, Paul writes, the Gentiles who become Christians now receive it through their new faith. Seeking to unify a faith community in Rome that included both Jewish and Gentile Christians, Paul assures them that all are now children of Abraham and Sarah through faith in Jesus’s death and resurrection.

Gospel: Mark 8:31-38

In Sunday’s Gospel we find Jesus telling the disciples things that they do not want to hear. In the verses just preceding these, Jesus asked them who they think he is, and bold Peter blurted out, “You are the Messiah!” Now, Jesus warns that the road ahead will not be easy. He will face rejection, punishment and death before rising again after three days. Peter argues with Jesus, taking him aside to challenge that approach, but Jesus’ quick response to Peter is startling: “Get behind me, Satan!” If you want to follow me, Jesus tells them, you must deny yourself. Take up your cross. You will have to give your life if you wish to save it.