Reading from Acts for May 21, 2023 ASCENSION

The chancel of the medieval church of St Botolph’s in Cambridge was rebuilt by Bodley in 1872. This stained glass window of the Ascension of the Lord, dates to 1886 and is in the east window above the Altar. [photo and description by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P.]

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Acts 1:1-11
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

This week’s lectionary readings focus on the Day of Ascension, which always falls on the Thursday forty days following Easter Sunday. (The lectionary calendar gives the option for using the Ascension of the Lord selections in place of the Scripture selections for the Seventh Sunday of Easter.)

OBSERVE:

The Gospel of Luke and the Book of the Acts of the Apostles occupy a unique relationship in the New Testament canon.  Both books are written by Luke, who is called the beloved physician by Paul (Colossians 4:14); and they are really intended to be read as companion pieces.

I recommend that the reader begin with the Gospel reading from Luke 24:44-53, also included in this week’s SOAR Lectionary Bible Study.  [CLICK HERE for the SOAR study on Luke 24:44-53]

Luke’s Gospel is the account of the birth, baptism, temptation, ministry, teaching, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus.  Luke makes it quite clear that he intends to apply the same scrupulous research in the book of Acts to the work of the apostles after Jesus is taken away from them:

The first book I wrote, Theophilus, concerned all that Jesus began both to do and to teach, until the day in which he was received up, after he had given commandment through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen.

We note that Theophilus in Greek means friend of God, or beloved by God.  Whether this is an actual individual, or is perhaps meant to describe the reader (in much the way 19th century writers might write to their “dear readers”), what is significant is that Luke is continuing his record of Jesus and his disciples.  In fact, it might be argued that as The Gospel of Luke is the story of Jesus, Acts is the Gospel of the Holy Spirit.

In the Book of Acts, Luke asserts that Jesus:

showed himself alive after he suffered, by many proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days, and speaking about God’s Kingdom.

Today’s Lectionary reading describes the final appearance of Jesus in the flesh at the end of forty days.  Although there is overlap between Luke’s Gospel and his Book of Acts, it is clear that this account is more detailed.

Jesus led his disciples to the mountain called Olivet, also known as The Mount of Olives.  We remember that this olive grove on a hillside is just a little more than half a mile from the Temple, and is also where Jesus prayed the night he was arrested.  There seems to be a slight discrepancy with Luke’s Gospel, in which he says Jesus led his disciples to Bethany (Luke 24:50).  Bethany was actually about a mile from the Temple.  What this probably means is that they were on the Mount of Olives, on the way toward Bethany.

What really matters is the content of his message.  He instructs them to wait in Jerusalem for the promise of the Father, which is the same language that he uses in Luke’s Gospel.  However, he then becomes more explicit, and connects events from the beginning of Luke’s Gospel with events soon to take place in Acts:

For John indeed baptized in water, but you will be baptized in the Holy Spirit not many days from now.

We have come full circle from the beginning of Jesus’ ministry and John’s promise of the coming Messiah.  John the Baptist says:

I indeed baptize you with water, but he comes who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to loosen. He will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire, whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly cleanse his threshing floor, and will gather the wheat into his barn; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire (Luke 3:16-17).

However, the disciples are fixated on their own notions of the Kingdom of God.  They ask:

Lord, are you now restoring the kingdom to Israel?

Can it be that even after at least three years with Jesus, and after his cruel death and his glorious resurrection, they are still so slow to understand?  Jesus answers that they aren’t to be concerned about the end times.  They have a job to do:

He said to them, “It isn’t for you to know times or seasons which the Father has set within his own authority.  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You will be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.”

Jesus doesn’t deny the reality of the end of the age.  He is simply telling them that it is not their business.  It is the Father’s business, and it will happen when he is ready.  This is essentially the same teaching we find in Jesus’ doctrine on the parousia (the coming of Jesus at the end of the age) in Matthew’s Gospel:

But no one knows of that day and hour, not even the angels of heaven, but my Father only (Matthew 24:36).

Jesus instead is mapping out his directions for his disciples in the meantime.  When they have been empowered by the Holy Spirit, they will carry the Gospel throughout the world. Implicit in his words is a description of the geographical spread of the Gospel — beginning where they are in Jerusalem, then to the Jewish world of Judea, then even to the non-Jewish world of Samaria, and to all the Gentiles throughout the world.

What happens next can only be described as a theophany — a manifestation of God. Jesus rises up from their sight and disappears into a cloud.  We remember that we have seen something similar in the account of the Transfiguration, except that the cloud — a symbol in Scripture of the presence or shekinah of God — descends upon Jesus.  Jesus had taken three of his disciples to the top of a mountain earlier in his earthly ministry, and he had been transfigured before them in dazzling light; Moses and Elijah had appeared to him and spoke to him of his impending departure in Jerusalem — meaning his death, resurrection and even his ascension. And then:

a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were afraid as they entered into the cloud. A voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him!” (Luke 9:34-35).

In our current passage, the disciples stand transfixed, gazing up at the sky — and then they are spoken to rather curtly:

behold, two men stood by them in white clothing, who also said, “You men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who was received up from you into the sky will come back in the same way as you saw him going into the sky.

Again, we see the completion of a circle.  There are two men in white here — no doubt angels — just as there were two men in dazzling white at the empty tomb who asked the women why they were seeking the living among the dead, and assuring them that Jesus had been raised.

In this case, the angels assure the disciples of the promised age to come — that Jesus will return just as they saw him go.

Clearly, this is not an ending but a beginning.  Jesus is no longer present physically with his disciples, but he has given them the promise of the Holy Spirit, who will be poured out on Pentecost, just ten days later; and they are assured of Jesus’ ultimate return at the end of the age.  And they are given their job description:

You will be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

APPLY:  

There are many layers of application in this passage that will always be relevant to the church:

• We are to wait for the promise of the Holy Spirit so that we can be empowered by him. As Paul says:
  Such confidence we have through Christ toward God; not that we are sufficient of ourselves, to account anything as from ourselves; but our sufficiency is from God (2 Corinthians 3:4-5).
• Our business is not to waste our energy with speculations about the end-times. Jesus and his apostles bear ample testimony to the promise that he will come again — but when and how that will happen is God’s business, not ours.
• What we are to do is be witnesses to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, beginning in our local context (represented by Jerusalem); and to those who share our culture and worldview (represented by Judea); to those who don’t share our culture and worldview (represented by Samaria); and we are to spread the Gospel to the entire world!

If we spend our days in sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with everyone we meet, we won’t have much time to waste on idle speculations about the end of time.  But we will be ready when Jesus does return!

RESPOND: 

I spent about four years living in Wilmore, Kentucky, the home of Asbury University and Asbury Theological Seminary. My family and I worshiped at the Wilmore United Methodist Church.  In the chancel of the church, high above the platform, there is a stained-glass window that I never failed to notice.

There are three words in the window:

Come. Tarry. Go.

This is a fitting message not only to those who come to worship, but also to those who are attending a Christian college and/or seminary:

• Come — and worship and learn.
• Tarry — wait, until you are empowered with the promise of the Holy Spirit.
• Go — and when you are filled, Go and be witnesses for the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

This actually seems to be a pretty fitting mission statement for every Christian and every church!

Lord, we come to you that we might receive forgiveness and grace; we tarry so that we may be filled with the power of your Holy Spirit; and when we receive that power, send us out to go in your name, and share all that we have learned and experienced.  Amen. 

PHOTOS:
"Christ ascending into heaven" by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Gospel for April 2, 2023 (Liturgy of the Palms)

Note from Celeste:

Before we look at today’s lectionary reading, I’d like to draw your attention to my Holy Week Bible Study book.

Go and Find a Donkey is the latest installment of the Choose This Day Multiple Choice Bible Studies series.

The daily devotionals take 10-15 minutes and include:

• Scripture passage (World English Bible)
• Fun, entertaining multiple choice questions focused directly on the Scripture passage
• Short meditation that can be used as a discussion starter.

Use them on the suggested dates, or skip around.  Designed to be used during Holy Week, this nine-day Bible study takes you from Palm Sunday through Easter Monday.

Use this book personally during a coffee break or with the family in the car or at the breakfast table.

Order Go and Find a Donkey  today to prepare your family for this year’s Easter season!
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Kindle book of Go and Find a Donkey.
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Paperback of Go and Find a Donkey.

AND NOW, BACK TO TODAY’S LECTIONARY READING:

Fresco in the Parish Church of Zirl, Austria.

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Matthew 21:1-11
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

Jesus approaches the climax of his earthly ministry.  He has been moving inexorably and deliberately toward Jerusalem.  His pilgrimage there coincides with the annual feast of the Passover, but this week’s events will be the setting for a new “Act” in the Drama of Salvation.

Jesus and his disciples are coming into Jerusalem from the east.  Bethsphage is a village on the east slope of the Mount of Olives not far from Bethany where Jesus’ friends Lazarus, Mary and Martha live.  Bethsphage is roughly two miles from Jerusalem.

It is in Bethsphage that Jesus sends two disciples to find a donkey and her colt tied.  Has he made prior arrangements for these animals, or does he have supernatural insight?  In any event, the “password” to be used by his disciples if anyone objects is direct:

If anyone says anything to you, you shall say, ‘The Lord needs them,’ and immediately he will send them.

One thing is clear — this is a prophetic act.  Jesus knows that when he rides into Jerusalem, it is a conscious fulfillment of Zechariah 9:9:

Tell the daughter of Zion,
behold, your King comes to you,
humble, and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

In one sense this is a religious act — but it is also a political statement.  When he rides into Jerusalem on the back of the donkey, he is claiming to be King — Messiah.  This is a challenge to the religious establishment in Jerusalem.  The priests and Pharisees will also present his claim to be King to Governor Pilate as a threat to the Roman military jurisdiction.

The multitude — no doubt aware of the rumors of Jesus’ miracles in Galilee and near Jerusalem — are immediately caught up in a fever of expectation.

A very great multitude spread their clothes on the road. Others cut branches from the trees, and spread them on the road.

Waving branches was a familiar practice during the Feast of Booths, which occurs in the autumn (cf. Leviticus 23:39-43). During this time, Israel was to dwell in tents (booths) made of branches in order to remember that they had been wanderers in the wilderness after their deliverance from slavery in Egypt.  But this is Passover, celebrated in the spring.  Why does the crowd wave them now?

One speculation leads us back to the prophet Zechariah, particularly his apocalyptic oracles.  In Zechariah 14, the prophet envisions a time when Yahweh will triumph over the nations that oppress Israel.  The prophecy describes Yahweh standing on the Mount of Olives to the east of Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives itself is split by an earthquake. But ultimately every nation that remains will pay homage and tribute to Jerusalem:

 It will happen that everyone who is left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, Yahweh of Armies, and to keep the feast of tents (Zechariah 14:16).

It may well be that when the more Biblically literate members of the crowds that day in Jerusalem saw Jesus riding on a donkey, they began to put two and two together.  If Jesus was the Messiah, then the time may have come for the Messianic celebration of the Feast of Booths!  And once a few people broke off the branches to wave, it became contagious with the rest of the crowd.

This seems confirmed when the crowd begins to shout:

Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!

Hosanna may be interpreted save us now! This is a prayer for help that might be reserved for the Messiah of God, who comes in the name of the Lord.  But the real confirmation is in calling Jesus son of David.  David’s royal dynasty was the house of Judah, of which Jesus was a descendant.  And of course David’s royal line was expected to return to power, as Yahweh had promised David nearly 1000 years earlier:

Your house and your kingdom will be made sure forever before you. Your throne will be established forever (2 Samuel 7:16).

This is not merely a religious promise — this is unmistakably a political statement.  The Messiah was to come as a King and re-establish David’s kingdom.

And yet again, someone knowledgeable in the Scriptures quotes a verse from Psalm 118:26 that becomes a catchphrase for the crowd:

Blessed is he who comes in Yahweh’s name!

They may have missed the poignancy of their quote from Psalm 118, which describes the suffering and near-death of the narrator of the Psalm at the hand of the nations. And this Psalm also speaks of the corner stone, which becomes a central symbol of Jesus and his ministry:

The stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner (Psalm 118:22).

All of the excitement of Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem stirs up the city.  The news of him spreads to those who haven’t heard yet, and when they ask who he is, the crowd identifies him:

This is the prophet, Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee.

APPLY:  

The Triumphant Entry into Jerusalem seems to be a very deliberately planned event.  Jesus leaves nothing to chance.  The donkey and her colt are requisitioned.  He rides through the gates into the city in conscious fulfillment of prophecy. And the people in the crowd who are “in the know” get it.  They are hoping for the Messiah, the Son of David, and they greet Jesus as their King who will deliver them.

Perhaps what they miss is the breadth of Jesus’ mission of salvation.  He has come not merely to relieve the oppression of the Jews by Rome.  He has come to release all nations from the oppression of sin and death.

If only they had paid attention to the rest of Zechariah’s oracle.  In Zechariah 9:9, the prophet sees the righteous King offering salvation:

lowly, and riding on a donkey,
even on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

But in the very next verse, the scope of salvation becomes global:

I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim,
and the horse from Jerusalem;
and the battle bow will be cut off;
and he will speak peace to the nations:
and his dominion will be from sea to sea,
and from the River to the ends of the earth (Zechariah 9:10).

To be sure, Zechariah’s prophecy has its share of blood and violence against Judah’s oppressors, but the most hopeful vision is peace and even salvation for all nations.

In order to interpret this symbolic, dramatic act of Jesus properly, we must follow him through the rest of the week — to the cross and the empty tomb.  And then, as if fulfilling the prophesy of Zechariah, we must hear his Great Commission to the disciples at the end of Matthew’s Gospel:

“All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I commanded you. Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen (Matthew 28:18-20).

RESPOND: 

I remember well when I was a kid looking forward to Palm Sunday, when the ushers would hand out palm branches and we got to wave them and shout out loud during church.  I thought that was really great fun.

And I also remember preachers telling us that Jesus wasn’t a “political” figure, but a “spiritual” one.  And I bought it because of course if Jesus was a King, he would probably have come into Jerusalem on a tank, or at least in a chariot drawn by white stallions.

But now I think I understand that Jesus is both a political and a spiritual Messiah.

Spiritually, of course, he delivers us from the power of sin and its lethal consequences through his own death; and through his resurrection he gives us new birth and abundant life.

Nevertheless, I have come to understand that Jesus is also a political Messiah in the best sense possible.  He came to announce that the Kingdom of God was near, and that it was being inaugurated.  It was beginning to grow even then, like the mustard seed that begins as a tiny thing and then grows into a great tree (Matthew 13:31-32).  And the final fulfillment of that Kingdom is drawing ever nearer, when God’s will on earth is truly realized, just as we have learned to pray every Sunday:

Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:10).

Aren’t the promises of God’s Kingdom the same promises that earthly kings and politicians would like to guarantee us?  Freedom from oppression, from hunger, from suffering?  These “freedoms” and much, much more!  Except that the promises of our King will be fulfilled forever.  As the angels proclaim from heaven in Revelation:

The kingdom of the world has become the Kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ. He will reign forever and ever! (Revelation 11:15).

That is a King and a Kingdom I would vote for!

Lord, you are triumphant over sin, death, the devil, oppression, hunger and suffering.  But I do not lose sight of what your triumph cost you — your own suffering and death. I do look forward to the day when we shall no longer shout “Hosanna!” but we shall wave heavenly palm branches and shout “Salvation be to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (from Revelation 7:10).  Amen. 

PHOTO:
“Zirl Parrish Church-Jesus entering Jerusalem 1” by Flying Pharmacist is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

Gospel for March 26, 2023

Note from Celeste:

Before we look at today’s lectionary reading, I’d like to draw your attention to my Holy Week Bible Study book.

Go and Find a Donkey is the latest installment of the Choose This Day Multiple Choice Bible Studies series.

The daily devotionals take 10-15 minutes and include:

• Scripture passage (World English Bible)
• Fun, entertaining multiple choice questions focused directly on the Scripture passage
• Short meditation that can be used as a discussion starter.

Use them on the suggested dates, or skip around.  Designed to be used during Holy Week, this nine-day Bible study takes you from Palm Sunday through Easter Monday.

Use this book personally during a coffee break or with the family in the car or at the breakfast table.

Order Go and Find a Donkey  today to prepare your family for this year’s Easter season!
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Kindle book of Go and Find a Donkey.
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Paperback of Go and Find a Donkey.

AND NOW, BACK TO TODAY’S LECTIONARY READING:

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
John 11:1-45
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

This is a pivotal, dramatic moment in the Gospel of John.  Here we see both the compassionate humanity of Jesus and his divine power.

First, a little background.  Lazarus and his two sisters, Mary and Martha, were close personal friends of Jesus.  They had offered hospitality to Jesus and his disciples at their home in Bethany (as reported in the Gospel of Luke 10:38-42), and of course here in the Gospel of John.  Jesus had likely been a guest in their home on many occasions.  In fact, we receive a little preview of what is to happen in the next chapter, after Jesus performs one of his mightiest miracles:

It was that Mary who had anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother, Lazarus, was sick.

When Lazarus became ill, it was perfectly natural for these sisters to send a message to Jesus when he was across the Jordan River, telling him:

Lord, behold, he for whom you have great affection is sick.

So it may seem understandable that Martha and Mary are perplexed, and perhaps even hurt, when Jesus delays his journey to Bethany by two days! What they don’t know is what he has said to his disciples:

This sickness is not to death, but for the glory of God, that God’s Son may be glorified by it.

Jesus finds it necessary to explain this whole thing to the disciples because they put up a fuss about Jesus returning to Judea.  They have been beyond the Jordan river in order to avoid being arrested for blasphemy.  And now Jesus wants to go back?  They fear he will be stoned to death.

Jesus explains that this is his mission:

Aren’t there twelve hours of daylight? If a man walks in the day, he doesn’t stumble, because he sees the light of this world. But if a man walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light isn’t in him.

This is very similar to his words concerning the healing of the blind man in John 9:

I must work the works of him who sent me, while it is day. The night is coming, when no one can work.  While I am in the world, I am the light of the world (John 9:4-5).

The disciples, typically, are obtuse.  When Jesus says Lazarus has fallen asleep they think he is speaking literally.  Surely he’ll recover, they insist.  Jesus must confirm that Lazarus will die:

Lazarus is dead.  I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, so that you may believe. Nevertheless, let’s go to him.

Interestingly, Thomas, the man who has been given the rap down through the centuries as the “Doubter” is the one who musters up the courage to say to his colleagues:

 Let’s go also, that we may die with him.

Perhaps it would only be fair to also call him “Courageous Thomas” as well as “Doubting Thomas.”

And when Jesus does arrive in Bethany, Lazarus has been dead for four days.  Given the travel time, this would explain why Jesus waited two days.  If it took two days for the messengers to reach him on foot somewhere near the Jordan, possibly more than 25 miles away, Jesus may have known through divine means that Lazarus was already dead by the time they arrived. The two-day delay would have made no difference.

Incidentally, the disciples were right to be concerned about their return to Bethany.  Bethany was just a little less than two miles away from Jerusalem, where Jesus had only recently been threatened.  That was a little less than an hour away on foot!

We get the distinct impression that the two sisters are not only grieving for their brother, they also seem angry with Jesus.  Martha, the sister with the reputation for being both practical and outspoken, hears that Jesus is coming.  She proactively leaves the house, where the grieving Mary remains, and comes out to meet him.  She seems rather confrontational, even a little accusatory:

Lord, if you would have been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.

She tempers this harsh tone with a statement that seems as much a matter of hope as faith:

Even now I know that, whatever you ask of God, God will give you.

What ensues is one of the most powerful dialogues in all of Scripture:

 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

Martha is a good Jew, of the school of Judaism which believed fervently in the resurrection.  But she sees this resurrection as something far off in the future:

Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

This becomes the context for one of Jesus’ greatest I Am statements from the Gospel of John:

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies.”

We have learned from the Gospel of John that Jesus is the Word, eternally present from the beginning, and that Jesus is God in the flesh.  And we have heard Jesus claim this identity repeatedly through his I Am statements in the Gospel of John, identifying himself with Yahweh who calls himself:

 I Am (Exodus 3:14).

But Jesus is also the I Am through whom resurrection is to occur.  He himself is life! And Jesus declares that faith in him is the means by which this life is to be grasped.

And Jesus asks Martha the most important question she will ever answer:

Whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?

Martha professes her faith in Jesus, recognizing not only that he is Messiah but also God:

She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, God’s Son, he who comes into the world.”

Martha next does the same thing that others have done — and will do — when they have come to faith in Jesus.  She goes and tells another about Christ.  Andrew goes and tells Simon Peter (John 1:41). Philip finds Nathanael (John 1:45). The Samaritan woman leaves her pitcher at the well and goes and tells her neighbors in Sychar (John 4:28-29). Mary Magdalene tells the disciples that she has seen Jesus after his resurrection (John 20:18).  And here, Martha tells her sister Mary that their Rabbi wants to talk to her.

Therefore when Mary came to where Jesus was, and saw him, she fell down at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you would have been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.”

There is a hint of blame, implying that Jesus was not more responsive to their request that he come. Nevertheless, Mary also expresses her confidence that Jesus could have done something if he had been there.

When Jesus sees the expression of grief by Mary and those who are mourning with her, he is deeply affected:

When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews weeping who came with her, he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled, and said, “Where have you laid him?”
They told him, “Lord, come and see.”
Jesus wept.

The emotional reaction of Jesus provokes a debate among the onlookers:

The Jews therefore said, “See how much affection he had for him!”  Some of them said, “Couldn’t this man, who opened the eyes of him who was blind, have also kept this man from dying?”

There is tension between those who recognize Jesus’ humanity, and those who blame him for doing too little too late.

John tells us that Jesus is still deeply moved:

 again groaning in himself.

We ask ourselves, is he now disturbed because of the grief of the family, or is he disturbed by those who are critical or skeptical?

Jesus comes to the tomb, which is described as a cave sealed with a stone.  Without further ado he commands:

Take away the stone.

We hear again from the other sister, Martha.  As we see in Luke 10:38-42, Martha’s personality is practical and realistic.

She points out the obvious facts here:

Lord, by this time there is a stench, for he has been dead four days.

Jesus reminds her of their previous conversation, and her own confession of faith:

Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?

What happens next is one of the climactic moments in the Gospel of John.  The stone is removed, and Jesus prays:

Jesus lifted up his eyes, and said, “Father, I thank you that you listened to me. I know that you always listen to me, but because of the multitude that stands around I said this, that they may believe that you sent me.”

Jesus has absolute confidence in his relationship with the Father.  And it seems clear that he is praying aloud not for his own sake, but for the crowd.  He knows that the Father will act; but the purpose of the prayer and subsequent answer is to promote faith that he is indeed God’s Messiah, the Son of God.

Jesus then summons Lazarus from the darkness of the tomb:

…he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”
He who was dead came out, bound hand and foot with wrappings, and his face was wrapped around with a cloth.

Jesus has authority even over death!

Jesus instructs them to unwind the wrappings that now imprison Lazarus.  He is free from death.  And the response to this powerful event is faith:

 Therefore many of the Jews, who came to Mary and saw what Jesus did, believed in him.

APPLY:  

This passage seems oddly placed in the season of Lent.  It is still two weeks until Easter, when we will celebrate the resurrection that will change EVERYTHING — the resurrection of Jesus after the Passion and Crucifixion.

Why is this passage read on this particular Sunday?  Perhaps because this is part of the inevitable journey of Jesus toward Jerusalem and the events that will soon begin on the day we call Palm Sunday.  And this event, with so many witnesses watching Lazarus shuffle out of the tomb after four days of death, certainly would have built momentum for the crowds that were soon to shout “Hosanna!” when Jesus entered the city riding on a donkey.

But this passage is also a foretaste.  Lazarus, we presume, would die again.  In fact, when news began to spread that he had been raised from the dead, many began to believe in Jesus.  And John writes:

…the chief priests conspired to put Lazarus to death also, because on account of him many of the Jews went away and believed in Jesus (John 12:10-11).

For some, the resurrection of Lazarus was a source of faith.  For others, it was a pretext for conspiring against Jesus.

This should be a reminder to us that no matter how clear faith may be to us, there will be those who simply cannot see what we see.

Though Lazarus had been raised, Jesus still had to endure betrayal, arrest, torture, trial and death prior to his own resurrection.  But he had given a word of promise to Martha that certainly must have comforted her through those dark events that were to come:

I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies.  Whoever lives and believes in me will never die.

This is also a word of comfort for all who believe — despite suffering, persecution, loss and grief that we may experience in the future.  Because of our faith in Jesus as the resurrection and the life, we will never really die.

At the same time, we need not be ashamed when we grieve for those who die.  Jesus was unashamed to weep for Lazarus, even though he knew that he had the power to raise Lazarus to life. Grief is a normal and natural response to death, even for those who are strong believers.

There is a resurrection that is coming for all of us. Paul describes it this way:

For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with God’s trumpet. The dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. So we will be with the Lord forever (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).

The same Jesus who raised Lazarus with a loud voice will raise us with a shout.   

RESPOND: 

Modern Christians often have a kind of “cognitive dissonance” when we read what the Gospels say about eternal life, and what we hear in most funerals.

Almost without exception, the New Testament teaches that at the end of the age the resurrection of the body will occur, rather than a disembodied immortality.  We are told that the former view is Biblical, but the latter view is a Greek notion.

The Greek notion would have us believe that the body is somehow disgusting, and that true immortality separates the soul from the body.  That isn’t a Biblical view at all.  We remember that when God made the material world and our bodies, he said It is good.

While no one living really knows what happens when we die, we do have confidence that those who have died in Christ are somehow alive in Christ.  We take comfort in Jesus’ words to the thief on the cross:

“Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise” (Luke 24:43).

But we also know that there is a resurrection that will come at the end of the age, when we will be raised, and we will have all the qualities promised in the resurrection of Jesus:  

So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable.  It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body. . . Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven (1 Corinthians 15:42-44, 49).

While we will have a body, it will certainly not be a body like our present bodies, but a transformed, spiritual, glorified body — perhaps not unlike the body of the resurrected Jesus, who could be touched and could eat, and yet seemed to be unlimited by the physical dimensions of space and time as we understand them.

We are venturing into metaphysical speculation here, for which we won’t have answers until Christ comes again.  But I think we can clearly repeat the promise of Jesus to those who have lost loved ones:

“I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die” (John 11:25-26).

Our Lord, as you came to Bethany and brought the comfort of resurrection and life to the family of Lazarus, so you come to us when we stand by the graveside of someone we love. You remind us that you are victorious over death, and that you are the resurrection and the life.  Thank you for that comfort and that promise.  Amen. 

PHOTO:
“Raising of Lazarus (Ravenna)” by Jim Forest is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Gospel for July 17, 2022

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Luke 10:38-42
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

Jesus is on the move.  He has already passed through Samaria, and now he draws closer to his true objective — Jerusalem.  In the previous chapter, we are told:

his face was set toward Jerusalem (Luke 9:53).

But where is this certain village that Jesus now enters with his disciples?  A little detective work suggests that he has arrived in Bethany, probably 2 miles from Jerusalem.  We deduce that from the fact that this is the hometown of Martha and Mary — and we know from the Gospel of John that these two sisters lived in Bethany with their brother Lazarus (John 11-12).  However, Lazarus doesn’t appear in Luke’s Gospel except as the character in a parable (Luke 16:19-31).

What Jesus encounters here is a domestic scene, seasoned with a little sibling tension.  Martha is mentioned first as the hostess.  The home is described as her home, suggesting her preeminence in the home.  She appears to be the matriarch.

After Mary welcomes this distinguished guest into her home, the sibling tension begins pretty quickly.  Mary sits at the feet of Jesus listening to his teaching, while Martha is:

distracted by her many tasks.

We can only imagine the rising tension as Martha is busy — perhaps trying to supervise the preparation of a meal for Jesus and his hungry disciples.  The word distracted used to describe Martha can be translated to wheel violently around.  This suggests that she is wheeling around in circles trying to take care of many things.  And anyone who has ever lived in a family might imagine the rising frustration as Martha is rushing about, and casting dirty looks at her sister sitting at Jesus’ feet!

But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.”

When we view this incident from a first-century Jewish perspective, what Mary is doing is really quite astounding.  Sitting at the feet of a rabbi was the posture of a disciple.  As a woman, according to the male-dominated culture of the day, she had no business sitting at Jesus’ feet with the men!  Her place, literally, was in the kitchen, according to the mores of the day.

And Jesus defends Mary!

But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

Jesus makes it very clear that Mary is quite welcome to sit at his feet as a disciple.  In a sense, he is making a statement about the equality of women with men. According to some sources, no woman was allowed to even learn the Torah.  Rabbi Eliezer wrote in the 1st century AD:

“Rather should the words of the Torah be burned than entrusted to a woman…Whoever teaches his daughter the Torah is like one who teaches her obscenity.”

Jesus is inviting Martha to simplify her life and focus on the one thing needed — a relationship with Jesus.

APPLY:  

We must be careful not to over-allegorize this passage, which is a real temptation.  We are tempted to make Martha the symbol of a busy, type-A person who is constantly hurrying, stressed out, and impatient with others.  And to make Mary the symbol of the quiet, contemplative soul who spends much time in prayer and Bible study.  That would be an oversimplification.

Martha’s problem is not that she is task-oriented, but that she resents the choice of her sister.  Philo, the ancient Jewish philosopher, spoke of the balance of the active life and the contemplative life.  He suggested that the active person who is engaged in good works and public life can also have a kind of stillness in the soul even in the midst of busyness.

And, yes, Mary does sit quietly at Jesus’ feet, learning his teachings.  But, like the other disciples, she is getting to know the nature of her Lord so that one day soon she will be able to put her faith into practice.  According to the Gospel of John, it is Mary who recognizes that Jesus is on his way to death and burial.  When he comes to their house again, she knows what will minister to him at that moment — she anoints his feet with oil (John 12:1-8).

Martha tried to serve Jesus according to her own preconceived notions; Mary served Jesus according to his needs because she had spent time with him.

One more thing — we see in this account an example of the trajectory of the gospel in relation to women.  Women in first century Judaism, as well as in the Greco-Roman world, were little more than property.  Equality was unthinkable.

Jesus consistently elevates the status of women throughout the Gospels.  By declaring that Mary, sitting at his feet as a disiciple, has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her, Jesus has declared that a woman’s soul is as important as a man’s soul.

RESPOND: 

There are so many responses that can be made to this account.  What is the one thing needed?  The obvious answer — to spend time with Jesus.  When we do that — through worship, prayer, searching the Scriptures, fasting, and the Lord’s Supper — we can discern how we are to serve him in witness and service.

But there is also another aspect to this story that is fascinating, in addition to what it tells us about the spiritual life and gender equality.  A family systems therapist might have a field day with this account when examining the relationships of Mary and Martha and Jesus.

Obviously, Martha is the dominant matriarch in this story.  And she asserts her authority with many tasks.  Sometimes “busyness” is an instrument that is used for the purpose of manipulating power.  I’m not suggesting that this was Martha’s motive.  But we can track the rise of her resentment toward her sister Mary.

And finally Martha turns on Jesus with her resentments!

Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.

A student of family systems theory recognizes exactly what she is doing — this is called “triangling.”  Rather than addressing her concern directly with her sister Mary, Martha seems to blame Jesus for Mary’s supposed “irresponsibility.”

Is this a psychological ploy to draw attention to herself as the “virtuous, hard-working sister?”  That might be going too far.

Jesus’ response is to “de-triangle.”  He not only tells Martha that she is too obsessed with many things and needs to simplify; he actually praises Mary for choosing more wisely.

It might be said that we need both Marthas and Marys in our churches and communities and families.  Of course we need houses cleaned and meals on the table — as well as cars maintained and roofs fixed and teeth cleaned.  In other words, there are tasks that must be done every day.  But our priority must be to do all that we do as though we have first been sitting at the feet of Jesus — then we know how to serve him and to serve others effectively and with true love.

Lord, it is so easy to be busy with many tasks that distract us from you.  We pray that we may spiritually sit at your feet so that when the time comes to serve we know what you would have us do.  Amen.

PHOTOS:
"Christ in the House of Martha and Mary" by Johannes (Jan) Vermeer is in the public domain.

1st Gospel for April 10, 2022 (Liturgy of the Passion)

This stained glass window is in St Giles’ Cathedral, Edinburgh. [photo by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P.]

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Luke 19:28-40
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

The Final Act of the Salvation Drama opens with a somewhat spontaneous parade.  I say somewhat spontaneous because Jesus is obviously orchestrating events in a very intentional way.

Jesus and his disciples have been on a journey from Galilee and the northern regions, through Jericho, and now they approach Jerusalem from the logical access point just to the southeast — Bethany and Bethpage, just two miles away from the Holy City.

This is logical because of the road that wound through the hills of Judea from Jericho to Bethany.  Pilgrims could then turn to the northwest and make their way toward Jerusalem via the Mount of Olives, and through the Eastern Gate, also known as the Beautiful Gate.

This gate would be the appropriate place for a triumphal procession.

It is interesting to note that Bethany features prominently in all four of the Gospels as a place where Jesus has received hospitality from various sources — it is the home of Simon the Leper (Matthew 26:6), and the home of Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha (John 11:1), where Jesus is a welcomed guest.  In Bethany Jesus was anointed with oil and symbolically prepared for the events about to unfold in Jerusalem.

Jesus is keenly aware of events that are about to unfold.  He tells two of his disciples:

“Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here.  If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it.’”

Astonishingly,  once the disciples explain why they require the animal, the owner consents!  This might lead us to speculation.  Did Jesus already have a prearrangement with the owner of the colt?  Or was he simply confident that the request that The Lord needs it would open the heart of the owner?

Note that he refers to himself as Lord. At that time Lord  is regarded as a political title — used as a title for the Roman emperor, for instance. But it is also a title used by the Jews to describe God.

In any event, Jesus knows exactly what he is doing.  He is obviously aware of the prophecy from Zechariah 9:9.

Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

When he rides into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, he is aware that he is declaring himself to be the king.  The response of the citizens of Jerusalem makes this identification quite clear.  The people of Jerusalem spread their cloaks on the road as a sign of homage to Jesus.

And Luke makes it clear that it is the whole multitude of the disciples who praise God for all the mighty deeds they have seen Jesus perform.  Apparently, this multitude of disciples includes not only the twelve, but many others who have been following Jesus. It would seem that the cue to praise Jesus as king comes from those who know his power and are convinced that he is the Messiah:

“Blessed is the king
who comes in the name of the Lord!
Peace in heaven,
and glory in the highest heaven!”

Despite the acclaim Jesus receives from the people and his disciples, there are those who dissent:

 Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.”

Are they upset because of the lack of decorum as the holy festival of Passover approaches? Are they critical of the claims that Jesus is the Messianic king? Or do they fear Roman reprisal against a political rival of the established order?  They don’t say.

But Jesus makes it clear that this praise is appropriate:

He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”

APPLY:  

Jesus is not manipulating events.  He doesn’t need to. He is the Messiah.  Still, he is very consciously fulfilling the prophecies of the Scripture.

We are reminded as this week begins that Jesus is not a victim.   He is not passively being dragged to his own slaughter. Rather, he is very clearly aware that this has been the divine plan all along, so that he might save the world.

As Jesus declares,  he is the Good Shepherd who lays down his life for his flock:

 For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father”  (John 10:17-18).

While we know what awaits him at the end of the week, Jesus is very clearly aware of his divine prerogatives.  He is worthy of praise, and we do well to shout and praise him.

RESPOND: 

I have heard preachers over the years point out the dramatic irony that Holy Week begins with shouts of “Hosanna”, and ends on Good Friday with cries “Crucify him!”  Usually we hear the rhetorical flourish that “the same people who praised him on Palm Sunday demanded his death on Good Friday!”

Well, maybe not.  According to Luke’s Gospel, it was the:

whole multitude of the disciples

who were shouting joyfully and who recognized Jesus as their king.

Luke describes those who shouted for Jesus’ death as:

the chief priests, the leaders, and the people (Luke 23:13).

It may be a little subtle, but the disciples didn’t call for Jesus’ death.  True, one betrays him, another denies him, and the majority abandoned him.  But it is too much to say that the same folks who wished to crown him also wished to crucify him.

What I do know is that if the disciples had not shouted his praises, then the stones of the temple itself would have cried out.  Even all nature is compelled to acknowledge that Jesus is Lord.

We are reminded that when the storms threatened to capsize the boat holding Jesus and his disciples, Jesus calmed the wind and the waves with a word.  And the disciples posed a question that has only one answer:

They were afraid and amazed, and said to one another, “Who then is this, that he commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him?”(Luke 8:25).

The answer for them, and for us, is the same — Jesus is God in the flesh.

Lord, I love to shout Hosanna on Palm Sunday, although I know what the Man of Sorrows experienced in his Passion.  But I am so grateful that on Easter Sunday I will shout with unrestrained joy, “Christ is risen!”  Thank you for enduring the cross, despising the shame, and finishing the work on our behalf!  Amen. 

PHOTOS:
“Hosanna!” by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Reading from Acts for May 24, 2020 ASCENSION

The chancel of the medieval church of St Botolph’s in Cambridge was rebuilt by Bodley in 1872. This stained glass window of the Ascension of the Lord, dates to 1886 and is in the east window above the Altar. [photo and description by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P.]

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Acts 1:1-11
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

This week’s lectionary readings focus on the Day of Ascension, which always falls on the Thursday forty days following Easter Sunday. (The lectionary calendar gives the option for using the Ascension of the Lord selections in place of the Scripture selections for the Seventh Sunday of Easter.)

OBSERVE:

The Gospel of Luke and the Book of the Acts of the Apostles occupy a unique relationship in the New Testament canon.  Both books are written by Luke, who is called the beloved physician by Paul (Colossians 4:14); and they are really intended to be read as companion pieces.

I recommend that the reader begin with the Gospel reading from Luke 24:44-53, also included in this week’s SOAR Lectionary Bible Study.  [CLICK HERE for the SOAR study on Luke 24:44-53]

Luke’s Gospel is the account of the birth, baptism, temptation, ministry, teaching, death, resurrection  and ascension of Jesus.  Luke makes it quite clear that he intends to apply the same scrupulous research in the book of Acts to the work of the apostles after Jesus is taken away from them:

The first book I wrote, Theophilus, concerned all that Jesus began both to do and to teach,  until the day in which he was received up, after he had given commandment through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen.

We note that Theophilus in Greek means friend of God, or beloved by God.  Whether this is an actual individual, or is perhaps meant to describe the reader (in much the way 19th century writers might write to their “dear readers”), what is significant is that Luke is continuing his record of Jesus and his disciples.  In fact, it might be argued that as The Gospel of Luke is the story of Jesus, Acts is the Gospel of the Holy Spirit.

In the Book of Acts, Luke asserts that Jesus:

showed himself alive after he suffered, by many proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days, and speaking about God’s Kingdom.

Today’s Lectionary reading describes the final appearance of Jesus in the flesh at the end of forty days.  Although there is overlap between Luke’s Gospel and his Book of Acts, it is clear that this account is more detailed.

Jesus led his disciples to the mountain called Olivet, also known as The Mount of Olives.  We remember that this olive grove on a hillside is just a little more than half a mile from the Temple, and is also where Jesus prayed the night he was arrested.  There seems to be a slight discrepancy with Luke’s Gospel, in which he says Jesus led his disciples to Bethany (Luke 24:50).  Bethany was actually about a mile from the Temple.  What this probably means is that they were on the Mount of Olives, on the way toward Bethany.

What really matters is the content of his message.  He instructs them to wait in Jerusalem for the promise of the Father, which is the same language that he uses in Luke’s Gospel.  However, he then becomes more explicit, and connects events from the beginning of Luke’s Gospel with events soon to take place in Acts:

For John indeed baptized in water, but you will be baptized in the Holy Spirit not many days from now.

We have come full circle from the beginning of Jesus’ ministry and John’s promise of the coming Messiah.  John the Baptist says:

I indeed baptize you with water, but he comes who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to loosen. He will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire, whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly cleanse his threshing floor, and will gather the wheat into his barn; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire (Luke 3:16-17).

However, the disciples are fixated on their own notions of the Kingdom of God.  They ask:

Lord, are you now restoring the kingdom to Israel?

Can it be that even after at least three years with Jesus, and after his cruel death and his glorious resurrection, they are still so slow to understand?  Jesus answers that they aren’t to be concerned about the end times.  They have a job to do:

He said to them, “It isn’t for you to know times or seasons which the Father has set within his own authority.  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You will be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.”

Jesus doesn’t deny the reality of the end of the age.  He is simply telling them that it is not their business.  It is the Father’s business, and it will happen when he is ready.  This is essentially the same teaching we find in Jesus’ doctrine on the parousia (the coming of Jesus at the end of the age) in Matthew’s Gospel:

But no one knows of that day and hour, not even the angels of heaven, but my Father only (Matthew 24:36).

Jesus instead is mapping out his directions for his disciples in the meantime.  When they have been empowered by the Holy Spirit, they will carry the Gospel throughout the world. Implicit in his words is a description of the geographical spread of the Gospel — beginning where they are in Jerusalem, then to the Jewish world of Judea, then even to the non-Jewish world of Samaria, and to all the Gentiles throughout the world.

What happens next can only be described as a theophany — a manifestation of God. Jesus rises up from their sight and disappears into a cloud.  We remember that we have seen something similar in the account of the Transfiguration, except that the cloud — a symbol in Scripture of the presence or shekinah of God — descends upon Jesus.  Jesus had taken three of his disciples to the top of a mountain earlier in his earthly ministry, and he had been transfigured before them in dazzling light; Moses and Elijah had appeared to him and spoke to him of his impending departure in Jerusalem — meaning his death, resurrection and even his ascension. And then:

a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were afraid as they entered into the cloud. A voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him!” (Luke 9:34-35).

In our current passage, the disciples stand transfixed, gazing up at the sky — and then they are spoken to rather curtly:

behold, two men stood by them in white clothing,  who also said, “You men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who was received up from you into the sky will come back in the same way as you saw him going into the sky.

Again, we see the completion of a circle.  There are two men in white here — no doubt angels — just as there were two men in dazzling white at the empty tomb who asked the women why they were seeking the living among the dead, and assuring them that Jesus had been raised.

In this case, the angels assure the disciples of the promised age to come — that Jesus will return just as they saw him go.

Clearly, this is not an ending but a beginning.  Jesus is no longer present physically with his disciples, but he has given them the promise of the Holy Spirit, who will be poured out on Pentecost, just ten days later; and they are assured of Jesus’ ultimate return at the end of the age.  And they are given their job description:

You will be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

APPLY:  

There are many layers of application in this passage that will always be relevant to the church:

• We are to wait for the promise of the Holy Spirit so that we can be empowered by him. As Paul says:
  Such confidence we have through Christ toward God; not that we are sufficient of ourselves, to account anything as from ourselves; but our sufficiency is from God (2 Corinthians 3:4-5).
• Our business is not to waste our energy with speculations about the end-times. Jesus and his apostles bear ample testimony to the promise that he will come again — but when and how that will happen is God’s business, not ours.
• What we are to do is be witnesses to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, beginning in our local context (represented by Jerusalem); and to those who share our culture and worldview (represented by Judea); to those who don’t  share our culture and worldview (represented by Samaria); and we are to spread the Gospel to the entire world!

If we spend our days in sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with everyone we meet, we won’t have much time to waste on idle speculations about the end of time.  But we will be ready when Jesus does return!

RESPOND: 

I spent about four years living in Wilmore, Kentucky, the home of Asbury University and Asbury Theological Seminary. My family and I worshiped at the Wilmore United Methodist Church.  In the chancel of the church, high above the platform, there is a stained glass window that I never failed to notice.

There are three words in the window:

Come. Tarry. Go.

This is a fitting message not only to those who come to worship, but also to those who were attending a Christian college and/or seminary:

• Come — and worship and learn.
• Tarry — wait, until you are empowered with the promise of the Holy Spirit.
• Go — and when you are filled, Go and be witnesses for the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

This actually seems to be a pretty fitting mission statement for every Christian and every church!

Lord, we come to you that we might receive forgiveness and grace; we tarry so that we may be filled with the power of your Holy Spirit; and when we receive that power, send us out to go in your name, and share all that we have learned and experienced.  Amen. 

PHOTOS:
"Christ ascending into heaven" by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Gospel for April 5, 2020 (Liturgy of the Palms)

Note from Celeste:

Before we look at today’s lectionary reading, I’d like to draw your attention to my Holy Week Bible Study book.

Go and Find a Donkey is the latest installment of the Choose This Day Multiple Choice Bible Studies series.

The daily devotionals take 10-15 minutes and include:

• Scripture passage (World English Bible)
• Fun, entertaining multiple choice questions focused directly on the Scripture passage
• Short meditation that can be used as a discussion starter.

Use them on the suggested dates, or skip around.  Designed to be used during Holy Week, this nine-day Bible study takes you from Palm Sunday through Easter Monday.

Use this book personally during a coffee break or with the family in the car or at the breakfast table.

Order Go and Find a Donkey  today to prepare your family for this year’s Easter season!
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Kindle book of Go and Find a Donkey.
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Paperback of Go and Find a Donkey.

AND NOW, BACK TO TODAY’S LECTIONARY READING:

Fresco in the Parish Church of Zirl, Austria.

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Matthew 21:1-11
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

Jesus approaches the climax of his earthly ministry.  He has been moving inexorably and deliberately toward Jerusalem.  His pilgrimage there coincides with the annual feast of the Passover, but this week’s events will be the setting for a new “Act” in the Drama of Salvation.

Jesus and his disciples are coming into Jerusalem from the east.  Bethsphage is a village on the east slope of the Mount of Olives not far from Bethany where Jesus’ friends Lazarus, Mary and Martha live.  Bethsphage is roughly two miles from Jerusalem.

It is in Bethsphage that Jesus sends two disciples to find a donkey and her colt tied.  Has he made prior arrangements for these animals, or does he have supernatural insight?  In any event, the “password” to be used by his disciples if anyone objects is direct:

If anyone says anything to you, you shall say, ‘The Lord needs them,’ and immediately he will send them.

One thing is clear — this is a prophetic act.  Jesus knows that when he rides into Jerusalem, it is a conscious fulfillment of Zechariah 9:9:

Tell the daughter of Zion,
behold, your King comes to you,
humble, and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

In one sense this is a religious act — but it is also a political statement.  When he rides into Jerusalem on the back of the donkey, he is claiming to be King — Messiah.  This is a challenge to the religious establishment in Jerusalem.  The priests and Pharisees will also present his claim to be King to Governor Pilate as a threat to the Roman military jurisdiction.

The multitude — no doubt aware of the rumors of Jesus’ miracles in Galilee and near Jerusalem — are immediately caught up in a fever of expectation.

A very great multitude spread their clothes on the road. Others cut branches from the trees, and spread them on the road.

Waving branches was a familiar practice during the Feast of Booths, which occurs in the autumn (cf. Leviticus 23:39-43). During this time, Israel was to dwell in tents (booths) made of branches in order to remember that they had been wanderers in the wilderness after their deliverance from slavery in Egypt.  But this is Passover, celebrated in the spring.  Why does the crowd wave them now?

One speculation leads us back to the prophet Zechariah, particularly his apocalyptic oracles.  In Zechariah 14, the prophet envisions a time when Yahweh will triumph over the nations that oppress Israel.  The prophecy describes Yahweh standing on the Mount of Olives to the east of Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives itself is split by an earthquake. But ultimately every nation that remains will pay homage and tribute to Jerusalem:

 It will happen that everyone who is left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, Yahweh of Armies, and to keep the feast of tents (Zechariah 14:16).

It may well be that when the more Biblically literate members of the crowds that day in Jerusalem saw Jesus riding on a donkey, they began to put two and two together.  If Jesus was the Messiah, then the time may have come for the Messianic celebration of the Feast of Booths!  And once a few people broke off the branches to wave, it became contagious with the rest of the crowd.

This seems confirmed when the crowd begins to shout:

Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!

Hosanna may be interpreted save us now! This is a prayer for help that might be reserved for the Messiah of God, who comes in the name of the Lord.  But the real confirmation is in calling Jesus son of David.  David’s royal dynasty was the house of Judah, of which Jesus was a descendant.  And of course David’s royal line was expected to return to power, as Yahweh had promised David nearly 1000 years earlier:

Your house and your kingdom will be made sure forever before you. Your throne will be established forever (2 Samuel 7:16).

This is not merely a religious promise — this is unmistakably a political statement.  The Messiah was to come as a King and re-establish David’s kingdom.

And yet again, someone knowledgeable in the Scriptures quotes a verse from Psalm 118:26 that becomes a catchphrase for the crowd:

Blessed is he who comes in Yahweh’s name!

They may have missed the poignancy of their quote from Psalm 118, which describes the suffering and near-death of the narrator of the Psalm at the hand of the nations. And this Psalm also speaks of the corner stone, which becomes a central symbol of Jesus and his ministry:

The stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner (Psalm 118:22).

All of the excitement of Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem stirs up the city.  The news of him spreads to those who haven’t heard yet, and when they ask who he is, the crowd identifies him:

This is the prophet, Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee.

APPLY:  

The Triumphant Entry into Jerusalem seems to be a very deliberately planned event.  Jesus leaves nothing to chance.  The donkey and her colt are requisitioned.  He rides through the gates into the city in conscious fulfillment of prophecy. And the people in the crowd who are “in the know” get it.  They are hoping for the Messiah, the Son of David, and they greet Jesus as their King who will deliver them.

Perhaps what they miss is the breadth of Jesus’ mission of salvation.  He has come not merely to relieve the oppression of the Jews by Rome.  He has come to release all  nations from the oppression of sin and death.

If only they had paid attention to the rest of  Zechariah’s oracle.  In Zechariah 9:9, the prophet sees the righteous King offering salvation:

lowly, and riding on a donkey,
even on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

But in the very next verse, the scope of salvation becomes global:

I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim,
and the horse from Jerusalem;
and the battle bow will be cut off;
and he will speak peace to the nations:
and his dominion will be from sea to sea,
and from the River to the ends of the earth (Zechariah 9:10).

To be sure, Zechariah’s prophecy has its share of blood and violence against Judah’s oppressors, but the most hopeful vision is peace and even salvation for all nations.

In order to interpret this symbolic, dramatic act of Jesus properly, we must follow him through the rest of the week  — to the cross and the empty tomb.  And then, as if fulfilling the prophesy of Zechariah, we must hear his Great Commission to the disciples at the end of Matthew’s Gospel:

“All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,  teaching them to observe all things that I commanded you. Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen (Matthew 28:18-20).

RESPOND: 

I remember well when I was  a kid looking forward to Palm Sunday, when the ushers would hand out palm branches and we got to wave them and shout out loud during church.  I thought that was really great fun.

And I also remember preachers telling us that Jesus wasn’t a “political” figure, but a “spiritual” one.  And I bought it because of course if Jesus was a King, he would probably have come into Jerusalem on a tank, or at least in a chariot drawn by white stallions.

But now I think I understand that Jesus is both a political and a spiritual Messiah.

Spiritually, of course, he delivers us from the power of sin and its lethal consequences through his own death; and through his resurrection he gives us new birth and abundant life.

Nevertheless, I have come to understand that Jesus is also a political Messiah in the best sense possible.  He came to announce that the Kingdom of God was near, and that it was being inaugurated.  It was beginning to grow even then, like the mustard seed that begins as a tiny thing and then grows into a great tree (Matthew 13:31-32).  And the final fulfillment of that Kingdom is drawing ever nearer, when God’s will on earth is truly realized, just as we have learned to pray every Sunday:

Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:10).

Aren’t the promises of God’s Kingdom the same promises that earthly kings and politicians would like to guarantee us?  Freedom from oppression, from hunger, from suffering?  These “freedoms” and much, much more!  Except that the promises of our King will be fulfilled forever.  As the angels proclaim from heaven in Revelation:

The kingdom of the world has become the Kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ. He will reign forever and ever! (Revelation 11:15).

That is a King and a Kingdom I would vote for!

Lord, you are triumphant over sin, death, the devil, oppression, hunger and suffering.  But I do not lose sight of what your triumph cost you — your own suffering and death. I do look forward to the day when we shall no longer shout “Hosanna!” but we shall wave heavenly palm branches and shout “Salvation be to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (from Revelation 7:10).  Amen. 

PHOTO:
“Zirl Parrish Church-Jesus entering Jerusalem 1” by Flying Pharmacist is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

Gospel for March 29, 2020

Note from Celeste:

Before we look at today’s lectionary reading, I’d like to draw your attention to my Holy Week Bible Study book.

Go and Find a Donkey is the latest installment of the Choose This Day Multiple Choice Bible Studies series.

The daily devotionals take 10-15 minutes and include:

• Scripture passage (World English Bible)
• Fun, entertaining multiple choice questions focused directly on the Scripture passage
• Short meditation that can be used as a discussion starter.

Use them on the suggested dates, or skip around.  Designed to be used during Holy Week, this nine-day Bible study takes you from Palm Sunday through Easter Monday.

Use this book personally during a coffee break or with the family in the car or at the breakfast table.

Order Go and Find a Donkey  today to prepare your family for this year’s Easter season!
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Kindle book of Go and Find a Donkey.
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Paperback of Go and Find a Donkey.

AND NOW, BACK TO TODAY’S LECTIONARY READING:

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
John 11:1-45
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

This is a pivotal, dramatic moment in the Gospel of John.  Here we see both the compassionate humanity of Jesus and his divine power.

First, a little background.  Lazarus and his two sisters, Mary and Martha, were close personal friends of Jesus.  They had offered hospitality to Jesus and his disciples at their home in Bethany (as reported in the Gospel of Luke 10:38-42), and of course here in the Gospel of John.  Jesus had likely been a guest in their home on many occasions.  In fact, we receive a little preview of what is to happen in the next chapter, after Jesus performs one of his mightiest miracles:

It was that Mary who had anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother, Lazarus, was sick.

When Lazarus became ill, it was perfectly natural for these sisters to send a message to Jesus when he was across the Jordan River, telling him:

Lord, behold, he for whom you have great affection is sick.

So it may seem understandable that Martha and Mary are perplexed, and perhaps even hurt, when Jesus delays his journey to Bethany by two days! What they don’t know is what he has said to his disciples:

This sickness is not to death, but for the glory of God, that God’s Son may be glorified by it.

Jesus finds it necessary to explain this whole thing to the disciples because they put up a fuss about Jesus returning to Judea.  They have been beyond the Jordan river in order to avoid being arrested for blasphemy.  And now Jesus wants to go back?  They fear he will be stoned to death.

Jesus explains that this is his mission:

Aren’t there twelve hours of daylight? If a man walks in the day, he doesn’t stumble, because he sees the light of this world. But if a man walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light isn’t in him.

This is very similar to his words concerning the healing of the blind man in John 9:

I must work the works of him who sent me, while it is day. The night is coming, when no one can work.  While I am in the world, I am the light of the world (John 9:4-5).

The disciples, typically, are obtuse.  When Jesus says Lazarus has fallen asleep they think he is speaking literally.  Surely he’ll recover, they insist.  Jesus must confirm that Lazarus will die:

Lazarus is dead.  I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, so that you may believe. Nevertheless, let’s go to him.

Interestingly, Thomas, the man who has been given the rap down through the centuries as the “Doubter” is the one who musters up the courage to say to his colleagues:

 Let’s go also, that we may die with him.

Perhaps it would only be fair to also call him “Courageous Thomas” as well as “Doubting Thomas.”

And when Jesus does arrive in Bethany, Lazarus has been dead for four days.  Given the travel time, this would explain why Jesus waited two days.  If it took two days for the messengers to reach him on foot somewhere near the Jordan, possibly more than 25 miles away, Jesus may have known through divine means that Lazarus was already dead by the time they arrived. The two day delay would have made no difference.

Incidentally, the disciples were right to be concerned about their return to Bethany.  Bethany was just a little less than two miles away from Jerusalem, where Jesus had only recently been threatened.  That was a little less than an hour away on foot!

We get the distinct impression that the two sisters are not only grieving for their brother, they also seem angry with Jesus.  Martha, the sister with the reputation for being both practical and outspoken, hears that Jesus is coming.  She proactively leaves the house, where the grieving Mary remains, and comes out to meet him.  She seems rather confrontational, even a little accusatory:

Lord, if you would have been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.

She tempers this harsh tone with a statement that seems as much a matter of hope as faith:

Even now I know that, whatever you ask of God, God will give you.

What ensues is one of the most powerful dialogues in all of Scripture:

 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

Martha is a good Jew, of the school of Judaism which believed fervently in the resurrection.  But she sees this resurrection as something far off in the future:

Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

This becomes the context for one of Jesus’ greatest I Am statements from the Gospel of John:

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies.”

We have learned from the Gospel of John that Jesus is the Word, eternally present from the beginning, and that Jesus is God in the flesh.  And we have heard Jesus claim this identity repeatedly through his I Am statements in the Gospel of John, identifying himself with Yahweh who calls himself:

 I Am (Exodus 3:14).

But Jesus is also the I Am through whom resurrection is to occur.  He himself is life! And Jesus declares that faith in him is the means by which this life is to be grasped.

And Jesus asks Martha the most important question she will ever answer:

Whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?

Martha professes her faith in Jesus, recognizing not only that he is Messiah but also God:

She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, God’s Son, he who comes into the world.”

Martha  next does the same thing that others have done — and will do — when they have come to faith in Jesus.  She goes and tells another about Christ.  Andrew goes and tells Simon Peter (John 1:41). Philip finds Nathanael (John 1:45). The Samaritan woman leaves her pitcher at the well and goes and tells her neighbors in Sychar (John 4:28-29). Mary Magdalene tells the disciples that she has seen Jesus after his resurrection (John 20:18).  And here, Martha tells her sister Mary that their Rabbi wants to talk to her.

Therefore when Mary came to where Jesus was, and saw him, she fell down at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you would have been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.”

There is a hint of blame, implying  that Jesus was not more responsive to their request that he come. Nevertheless,  Mary also expresses her confidence that Jesus could have done something if he had been there.

When Jesus sees the expression of grief by Mary and those who are mourning with her, he is deeply affected:

When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews weeping who came with her, he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled, and said, “Where have you laid him?”
They told him, “Lord, come and see.”
Jesus wept.

The emotional reaction of Jesus provokes a debate among the onlookers:

The Jews therefore said, “See how much affection he had for him!”  Some of them said, “Couldn’t this man, who opened the eyes of him who was blind, have also kept this man from dying?”

There is tension between those who recognize Jesus’ humanity, and those who blame him for doing too little too late.

John tells us that Jesus is still deeply moved:

 again groaning in himself.

We ask ourselves, is he now disturbed because of the grief of the family, or is he disturbed by those who are critical or skeptical?

Jesus comes to the tomb, which is described as a cave sealed with a stone.  Without further ado he commands:

Take away the stone.

We hear again from the other sister, Martha.  As we see in Luke 10:38-42, Martha’s personality is practical and realistic.

She points out the obvious facts here:

Lord, by this time there is a stench, for he has been dead four days.

Jesus reminds her of their previous conversation, and her own confession of faith:

Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?

What happens next is one of the climactic moments in the Gospel of John.  The stone is removed, and Jesus prays:

Jesus lifted up his eyes, and said, “Father, I thank you that you listened to me. I know that you always listen to me, but because of the multitude that stands around I said this, that they may believe that you sent me.”

Jesus has absolute confidence in his relationship with the Father.  And it seems clear that he is praying aloud not for his own sake, but for the crowd.  He knows that the Father will act; but the purpose of the prayer and subsequent answer is to promote faith that he is indeed God’s Messiah, the Son of God.

Jesus then summons Lazarus from the darkness of the tomb:

 …. he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”
He who was dead came out, bound hand and foot with wrappings, and his face was wrapped around with a cloth.

Jesus has authority even over death!

Jesus instructs them to unwind the wrappings that now imprison Lazarus.  He is free from death.  And the response to this powerful event is faith:

 Therefore many of the Jews, who came to Mary and saw what Jesus did, believed in him.

APPLY:  

This passage seems oddly placed in the season of Lent.  It is still two weeks until Easter, when we will celebrate the resurrection that will change EVERYTHING — the resurrection of Jesus after the Passion and Crucifixion.

Why is this passage read on this particular Sunday?  Perhaps because this is part of the inevitable journey of Jesus toward Jerusalem and the events that will soon begin on the day we call Palm Sunday.  And this event, with so many witnesses watching Lazarus shuffle out of the tomb after four days of death, certainly would have built momentum for the crowds that were soon to shout “Hosanna!” when Jesus entered the city riding on a donkey.

But this passage is also a foretaste.  Lazarus, we presume, would die again.  In fact, when news began to spread that he had been raised from the dead, many began to believe in Jesus.  And John writes:

 ….the chief priests conspired to put Lazarus to death also,  because on account of him many of the Jews went away and believed in Jesus (John 12:10-11).

For some, the resurrection of Lazarus was a source of faith.  For others, it was a pretext for conspiring against Jesus.

This should be a reminder to us that no matter how clear faith may be to us, there will be those who simply cannot see what we see.

Though Lazarus had been raised, Jesus still had to endure betrayal, arrest, torture, trial and death prior to his own resurrection.  But he had given a word of promise to Martha that certainly must have comforted her through those dark events that were to come:

I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies.  Whoever lives and believes in me will never die.

This is also a word of comfort for all who believe — despite suffering, persecution, loss and grief that we may experience in the future.  Because of our faith in Jesus as the resurrection and the life, we will never really die.

At the same time, we need not be ashamed when we grieve for those who die.  Jesus was unashamed to weep for Lazarus, even though he knew that he had the power to raise Lazarus to life. Grief is a normal and natural response to death, even for those who are strong believers.

There is a resurrection that is coming for all of us. Paul describes it this way:

For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with God’s trumpet. The dead in Christ will rise first,  then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. So we will be with the Lord forever (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).

The same Jesus who raised Lazarus with a loud voice will raise us with a shout.   

RESPOND: 

Modern Christians often have a kind of “cognitive dissonance” when we read what the Gospels say about eternal life, and what we hear in most funerals.

Almost without exception, the New Testament teaches that at the end of the age the resurrection of the body will occur, rather than a disembodied immortality.  We are told that the former view is Biblical, but the latter view is a Greek notion.

The Greek notion would have us believe that the body is somehow disgusting, and that true immortality separates the soul from the body.  That isn’t a Biblical view at all.  We remember that when God made the material world and our bodies, he said It is good.

While no one living really knows what happens when we die, we do have confidence that those who have died in Christ are somehow alive in Christ.  We take comfort in Jesus’ words to the thief on the cross:

“Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise” (Luke 24:43).

But we also know that there is a resurrection that will come at the end of the age, when we will be raised, and we will have all the qualities promised in the resurrection of Jesus:  

So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable.  It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body. . . Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven (1 Corinthians 15:42-44, 49).

While we will have a body, it will certainly not be a body like our present bodies, but a transformed, spiritual, glorified body — perhaps not unlike the body of the resurrected Jesus, who could be touched and could eat, and yet seemed to be unlimited by the physical dimensions of space and time as we understand them.

We are venturing into metaphysical speculation here, for which we won’t have answers until Christ comes again.  But I think we can clearly repeat the promise of Jesus to those who have lost loved ones:

“I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die” (John 11:25-26).

Our Lord, as you came to Bethany and brought the comfort of resurrection and life to the family of Lazarus, so you come to us when we stand by the graveside of someone we love. You remind us that you are victorious over death, and that you are the resurrection and the life.  Thank you for that comfort and that promise.  Amen. 

PHOTO:
“Raising of Lazarus (Ravenna)” by Jim Forest is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Gospel for July 21, 2019

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Luke 10:38-42
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

Jesus is on the move.  He has already passed through Samaria, and now he draws closer to his true objective — Jerusalem.  In the previous chapter, we are told:

his face was set toward Jerusalem (Luke 9:53).

But where is this certain village that Jesus now enters with his disciples?  A little detective work suggests that he has arrived in Bethany, probably 2 miles from Jerusalem.  We deduce that from the fact that this is the hometown of Martha and Mary — and we know from the Gospel of John that these two sisters lived in Bethany with their brother Lazarus (John 11-12).  However,  Lazarus doesn’t appear in Luke’s Gospel except as the character in a parable (Luke 16:19-31).

What Jesus encounters here is a domestic scene, seasoned with a little sibling tension.  Martha is mentioned first as the hostess.  The home is described as her home, suggesting her preeminence in the home.  She appears to be the matriarch.

After Mary welcomes this distinguished guest into her home, the sibling tension begins pretty quickly.  Mary sits at the feet of Jesus listening to his teaching, while Martha is:

distracted by her many tasks.

We can only imagine the rising tension as Martha is busy — perhaps trying to supervise the preparation of a meal for Jesus and his hungry disciples.  The word distracted used to describe Martha can be translated to wheel violently around.  This suggests that she is wheeling around in circles trying to take care of many things.  And anyone who has ever lived in a family might imagine the rising frustration as Martha is rushing about, and casting dirty looks at her sister sitting at Jesus’ feet!

But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.”

When we view this incident from a first-century Jewish perspective, what Mary is doing is really quite astounding.  Sitting at the feet of a rabbi was the posture of a disciple.  As a woman, according to the male-dominated culture of the day, she had no business sitting at Jesus’ feet with the men!  Her place, literally, was in the kitchen,  according to the mores of the day.

And Jesus defends Mary!

But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

Jesus makes it very clear that Mary is quite welcome to sit at his feet as a disciple.  In a sense, he is making a statement about the equality of women with men. According to some sources,  no woman was allowed to even learn the Torah.  Rabbi Eliezer wrote in the 1st century AD:

“Rather should the words of the Torah be burned than entrusted to a woman…Whoever teaches his daughter the Torah is like one who teaches her obscenity.”

Jesus is inviting Martha to simplify her life, and focus on the one thing needed — a relationship with Jesus.

APPLY:  

We must be careful not to over-allegorize this passage, which is a real temptation.  We are tempted to make Martha  the symbol of a busy, type-A person who is constantly hurrying, stressed out, and impatient with others.  And to make Mary the symbol of the quiet, contemplative soul who spends much time in prayer and Bible study.  That would be an oversimplification.

Martha’s problem is not that she is task-oriented, but that she resents the choice of her sister.  Philo, the ancient Jewish philosopher, spoke of the balance of the active life and the contemplative life.  He suggested that the active person who is engaged in good works and public life can also have a kind of stillness in the soul even in the midst of busyness.

And, yes, Mary does sit quietly at Jesus’ feet, learning his teachings.  But, like the other disciples, she is getting to know the nature of her Lord so that one day soon she will be able to put her faith into practice.  According to the Gospel of John, it is Mary who recognizes that Jesus is on his way to death and burial.  When he comes to their house again, she knows what will minister to him at that moment — she anoints his feet with oil (John 12:1-8).

Martha tried to serve Jesus according to her own preconceived notions; Mary served Jesus according to his needs because she had spent time with him.

One more thing — we see in this account an example of the trajectory of the gospel in relation to women.  Women in first century Judaism, as well as in the Greco-Roman world, were little more than property.  Equality was unthinkable.

Jesus consistently elevates the status of women throughout the Gospels.  By declaring that Mary, sitting at his feet as a disiciple, has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her, Jesus has declared that a woman’s soul is as important as a man’s soul.

RESPOND: 

There are so many responses that can be made to this account.  What is the one thing needed?  The obvious answer — to spend time with Jesus.  When we do that —  through worship, prayer, searching the Scriptures, fasting, and the Lord’s Supper —  we can discern how we are to serve him in witness and service.

But there is also another aspect to this story that is fascinating, in addition to what it tells us about the spiritual life and gender equality.  A family systems therapist might have a field day with this account when examining the relationships of Mary and Martha and Jesus.

Obviously, Martha is the dominant matriarch in this story.  And she asserts her authority with many tasks.  Sometimes “busyness” is an instrument that is used for the purpose of manipulating power.  I’m not suggesting that this was Martha’s motive.  But we can track the rise of her resentment toward her sister Mary.

And finally Martha turns on  Jesus with her resentments!

Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.

A student of family systems theory recognizes exactly what she is doing — this is called “triangling.”  Rather than addressing her concern directly with her sister Mary, Martha seems to blame Jesus for Mary’s supposed “irresponsibility.”

Is this a psychological ploy to draw attention to herself as the “virtuous, hard-working sister?”  That might be going too far.

Jesus’ response is to “de-triangle.”  He not only tells Martha that she is too obsessed with many things, and needs to simplify; he actually praises Mary for choosing more wisely.

It might be said that we need both Marthas and Marys in our churches and communities and families.  Of course we need houses cleaned and meals on the table — as well as cars maintained and roofs fixed and teeth cleaned.  In other words, there are tasks that must be done every day.  But our priority must be to do all that we do as though we have first been sitting at the feet of Jesus — then we know how to serve him and to serve others effectively and with true love.

Lord, it is so easy to be busy with many tasks that distract us from you.  We pray that we may spiritually sit at your feet so that when the time comes to serve we know what you would have us do.  Amen.

PHOTOS:
"Christ in the House of Martha and Mary" by Johannes (Jan) Vermeer is in the public domain.

1st Gospel for April 14, 2019 (Liturgy of the Passion)

This stained glass window is in St Giles’ Cathedral, Edinburgh. [photo by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P.]

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Luke 19:28-40
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

The Final Act of the Salvation Drama opens with a somewhat spontaneous parade.  I say somewhat spontaneous because Jesus is obviously orchestrating events in a very intentional way.

Jesus and his disciples have been on a journey from Galilee and the northern regions, through Jericho, and now they approach Jerusalem from the logical access point just to the southeast — Bethany and Bethpage, just two miles away from the Holy City.

This is logical because of the road that wound through the hills of Judea from Jericho to Bethany.  Pilgrims could then turn to the northwest and make their way toward Jerusalem via the Mount of Olives, and through the Eastern Gate, also known as the Beautiful Gate.

This gate would be the appropriate place for a triumphal procession.

It is interesting to note that Bethany features prominently in all four of the Gospels as a place where Jesus has received hospitality from various sources — it is the home of Simon the Leper (Matthew 26:6), and the home of Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha (John 11:1), where Jesus is a welcomed guest.  In Bethany Jesus was anointed with oil and symbolically prepared for the events about to unfold in Jerusalem.

Jesus is keenly aware of events that are about to unfold.  He tells two of his disciples:

“Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here.  If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it.’”

Astonishingly,  once the disciples explain why they require the animal, the owner consents!  This might lead us to speculation.  Did Jesus already have a prearrangement with the owner of the colt?  Or was he simply confident that the request that The Lord needs it would open the heart of the owner?

Note that he refers to himself as Lord. At that time Lord  is regarded as a political title — used as a title for the Roman emperor, for instance. But it is also a title used by the Jews to describe God.

In any event, Jesus knows exactly what he is doing.  He is obviously aware of the prophecy from Zechariah 9:9.

Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

When he rides into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, he is aware that he is declaring himself to be the king.  The response of the citizens of Jerusalem makes this identification quite clear.  The people of Jerusalem spread their cloaks on the road as a sign of homage to Jesus.

And Luke makes it clear that it is the whole multitude of the disciples who praise God for all the mighty deeds they have seen Jesus perform.  Apparently, this multitude of disciples includes not only the twelve, but many others who have been following Jesus. It would seem that the cue to praise Jesus as king comes from those who know his power and are convinced that he is the Messiah:

“Blessed is the king
who comes in the name of the Lord!
Peace in heaven,
and glory in the highest heaven!”

Despite the acclaim Jesus receives from the people and his disciples, there are those who dissent:

 Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.”

Are they upset because of the lack of decorum as the holy festival of Passover approaches? Are they critical of the claims that Jesus is the Messianic king? Or do they fear Roman reprisal against a political rival of the established order?  They don’t say.

But Jesus makes it clear that this praise is appropriate:

He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”

APPLY:  

Jesus is not manipulating events.  He doesn’t need to. He is the Messiah.  Still, he is very consciously fulfilling the prophecies of the Scripture.

We are reminded as this week begins that Jesus is not a victim.   He is not passively being dragged to his own slaughter. Rather, he is very clearly aware that this has been the divine plan all along, so that he might save the world.

As Jesus declares,  he is the Good Shepherd who lays down his life for his flock:

 For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father”  (John 10:17-18).

While we know what awaits him at the end of the week, Jesus is very clearly aware of his divine prerogatives.  He is worthy of praise, and we do well to shout and praise him.

RESPOND: 

I have heard preachers over the years point out the dramatic irony that Holy Week begins with shouts of  “Hosanna”, and ends on Good Friday with cries “Crucify him!”  Usually we hear the rhetorical flourish that “the same people who praised him on Palm Sunday demanded his death on Good Friday!”

Well, maybe not.  According to Luke’s Gospel, it was the:

whole multitude of the disciples

who were shouting joyfully and who recognized Jesus as their king.

Luke describes those who shouted for Jesus’ death as:

the chief priests, the leaders, and the people (Luke 23:13).

It may be a little subtle, but the disciples didn’t call for Jesus’ death.  True, one betrays him, another denies him, and the majority abandoned him.  But it is too much to say that the same folks who wished to crown him also wished to crucify him.

What I do know is that if the disciples had not shouted his praises, then the stones of the temple itself would have cried out.  Even all nature is compelled to acknowledge that Jesus is Lord.

We are reminded that when the storms threatened to capsize the boat holding Jesus and his disciples, Jesus calmed the wind and the waves with a word.  And the disciples posed a question that has only one answer:

They were afraid and amazed, and said to one another, “Who then is this, that he commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him?”(Luke 8:25).

The answer for them, and for us, is the same — Jesus is God in the flesh.

Lord, I love to shout Hosanna on Palm Sunday, although I know what the Man of Sorrows experienced in his Passion.  But I am so grateful that on Easter Sunday I will shout with unrestrained joy, “Christ is risen!”  Thank you for enduring the cross, despising the shame, and finishing the work on our behalf!  Amen. 

PHOTOS:
“Hosanna!” by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.