Thoughts on Today’s Lessons for Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012.

First Reading: Job 23:1-9, 16-17
Job is still on the ash heap where we left him last week, scratching his sores with a shard of broken pottery. His friends have given up on trying to console him. Job’s words are bitter, angry. He wants a word with God, he wants to argue his case before God, but he can’t find God. In the darkness he is terrified and wants to vanish. Stay tuned as the story continues next week.

Psalm 22:1-15
Jesus, dying on the cross, cried out in his final agony the words that begin Psalm 22: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” So begins this reading, titled “Plea for Deliverance from Suffering and Hostility,” echoing Job’s lament in the cry of one who is strung out, knocked down, worn out, feeling the depth of despair and no place to turn … except to God, who knew him as an infant and who, he prays, will be there for him now.

Second Reading: Hebrews 4:12-16
Hebrews speaks of Jesus – “the word of God” – in language that we seldom associate with the Good Shepherd: “sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow … before him no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare …” God expects much of us, as today’s Gospel repeats. Are we ready to be laid bare before our God?

Gospel: Mark 10:17-31
“Go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor … then come, follow me.” Really? Stewardship season is coming soon, and we’ll be invited to pledge our support of the church. Luckily for us, however, we’re not expected to give everything we own – are we? Perhaps these verses, like the Sermon on the Mount, challenge us by setting Jesus as a standard of perfection that we can aim for but won’t likely reach. Or perhaps we are meant to squirm, remembering just how rich we are, and ask ourselves if our possessions stand between us and real love of God and neighbor.

Thoughts on Today’s Lessons for Sunday, Oct. 7, 2012.

First Reading: Job 1:1; 2:1-10
“Oh, no, a month of Job.” A lot of people find the story of Job and his troubles disheartening. But let’s be positive: Job is a great short story and an important part of the Bible’s “wisdom literature”, books that teach us about life and God. And don’t we all ask why bad things happen to good people? Listen and ponder over the next four weeks.

We hear the beginning of Job today, and it starts off like an ancient folk tale. Remember that at the time Satan was not a red devil with horns, but a sort of prosecutor, or questioner, within the heavenly order.

Psalm 8
This beautiful psalm offers a hymn of praise to the glory of God, our maker. In lyrical poetry it celebrates the beauty of the universe and all that populates it as testimony to God’s majesty. And what better day than our Blessing of the Animals to celebrate “ all sheep and oxen … the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea”?

Second Reading: Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:5-12
Why does God care for mere mortals so much that he sent his son to live and die among us? This letter is thought to have been written to coax back Jewish Christians who had returned to Judaism in the face of persecution. The writer makes the case, says Texas pastor Alan Brehm, that the incarnation “really and truly does show us what God is like” in the form of Jesus.

Gospel: Mark 10:2-16
This is one of those difficult gospels that makes it hard to find the love. Churches that take a hard line on divorce have brought much pain to families trapped in abusive relationships. But is that what we have here? No, it’s Jesus arguing with the Pharisees again, outwitting their plan to trap him. He turns the argument on them by pointing out that their “hardness of heart” should earn them a stricter rule. It’s no coincidence, then, that Jesus smiles and turns to the innocent children.

Thoughts on Today’s Lessons for Sunday, Sept. 30, 2012.

First Reading: Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29
Sometimes the story of the Israelites wandering with Moses in the desert seems like an ancient reality show. Freed from slavery in Egypt by God’s mighty hand, they complain because they miss the good food they used to enjoy. This gets an angry response from God that prompts Moses to bark back. Later, some of Moses’ lieutenants are angry, too, because they see others horning in on their turf. Perhaps the lesson here is simply, “Can’t we all get along?”

Psalm 19:7-14
Today’s psalm urges us to pray, and tells us why we should. God’s commandments are good, and to follow them does us good. It ends with a familiar exhortation that preachers often offer at the beginning of a sermon, and that we might all do well to ponder when we begin to pray: “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.”

Second Reading: James 5:13-20
James, too, exalts the power of prayer. Pray if we are suffering, he advises us, and pray when we are happy, too. Pray when we’re sick, and ask the church to join us in prayer. Pray for healing for our own sins, and pray for each other in community so we might all be healed, our souls saved from death and our sins forgiven. That’s a compelling argument for prayer.

Gospel: Mark 9:38-50
In some ways Mark’s gospel echoes the first lesson: The apostles are angry that others are casting out devils in Jesus’ name. They tell him to make them stop. He encourages them instead to be glad that others are speaking in his name. Then he offers a series of scary warnings: “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off … And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out.” This is not literal advice, fortunately. Jesus is teaching through an old rabbinic tradition of comparing everyday actions to their most extreme alternatives.

Illuminations of readings for Sunday, Sept. 16, 2012.

First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-9a
What could be more important to a community than its teachers, whose words shape our growth and understanding? The Israelites understood this teacher, Isaiah’s so-called “Suffering Servant,” to represent their nation in exile. Christians later found in this suffering servant an image of Christ, who endures opposition, turns the other cheek, and keeps on teaching until we hear.

Psalm 116:1-8
The Psalmist today expresses joy because God has listened to his prayer, made in grief and desperation, and has brought relief from distress and anguish, and the hope of new life. His troubled soul can rest now. God has dealt bountifully in restoring life, and this gift inspires a hymn hailing God in the boldest language we find in Psalms: “I love the Lord.”

Second Reading: James 3:1-12
I hate you! Angry words can spill out of us suddenly, before we have time to think about them. And then how we wish we could take back the hurtful things we said! James reminds us in a series of colorful metaphors that words have power. Echoing the Isaiah reading, he warns us that teachers bear a heavy responsibility to use words wisely. It’s up to us to use them well.

Gospel: Mark 8:27-38
“Who do you say that I am?” Can you picture Jesus, sitting with the apostles and confronting them with this reality check? When Peter, declaring Jesus his Messiah, objects to Jesus’s warning of his coming passion and death, Jesus calls him “Satan!” We see no smiling Jesus hugging children and lambs today, but a challenge: Take up your cross and follow. If you want to save your life in the Kingdom of Heaven, be prepared to lose it now for the Gospel and Jesus’ sake.

Illuminations of readings for Sunday, Sept. 9, 2012.

First Lesson: Isaiah 35:4-7a
Israel gets good news from the prophet Isaiah: don’t be afraid, even though the fortunes of war have sent you into exile, and separated you from home and Temple. God is coming, with healing and comfort, and will lead you back. Earth and waters and all creation will show their joy.

Psalm 146
Traditionally titled “Praise for God’s Help,” today’s Psalm echoes the Isaiah reading: Praise God, who is always there to support us, to care for those in need and those who are oppressed, and who keeps promises. Alleluia!

Second Lesson: James 2:1-10, 14-17
Today’s reading from James repeats God’s commands: love your neighbor; clothe and feed the naked and the hungry; and show your faith by doing good works. Let’s think about James’s question: If a homeless person in dirty clothes were to walk into our service today, pushing a grocery basket, would we greet that person with our fabled St. Matthew’s hospitality? What would you do?

The Gospel: Mark 7:24-37
Jesus surprises us with unexpected actions in two miracle stories from Mark’s Gospel today. Is this the Jesus we love, who seems to sneer as he compares the Gentile woman’s children to dogs? Her simple response persuades him, and shows us the human side of a Jesus who learns. Then Jesus cures a deaf man … but warns everyone to keep quiet about it. This is a consistent theme in Mark. But why would Jesus want his miracles kept secret?

Illuminations of readings for Sunday, Sept. 2, 2012.

First Lesson: Song of Solomon 2:8-13
A love poem – what an unexpected thing to find in the Bible! From the book of love poems that tradition attributes to King Solomon, these verses sing of deep love between a woman and a man, but it can also be understood as telling of God’s love for Israel – and for us.

Second Lesson: James 1:17-27
Christian tradition attributes the letter of James to the apostle identified as Jesus’s brother. Although the time of its writing makes this appealing legend doubtful, the letter remains as one of the New Testament’s strongest calls to the social gospel, urging us to “reach out as Christ’s hands to the world”. As James says, don’t just hear the word, do it.