Daily Devotionals On Holiday

Hello:

The Daily Devotional content will be back next Monday, 3 August.    In the meantime, I’ll be out on Lake Simcoe, trying not to fall out of my kayak.

Blessings,

Michael+

 

 

 

Who Redeems the Hebrew Scriptures? A Sermon for he Eighth Sunday After Pentecost

Preached (via Zoom( on Sunday 26 July, 2020, All Saints, King City, ON, Anglican Diocese of Toronto

 

Readings for the Eighth Sunday After Pentecost: Psalm 128, Genesis 29.15-28, Romans 8.26-39, Matthew 13.31-33,44-53

 

 

And Jacob said to Laban, ‘What is this you have done to me? Did I not serve with you for Rachel? Why then have you deceived me?’

I said last week that much of Genesis has a quality rather like Coronation Street or some other long-running family drama, in that it’s an account of flawed people in intricate relationships, sometimes behaving well, and often behaving badly.  I wonder though if that comparison to a much-loved television series trivializes the problematic aspects of this part of Genesis, particularly gender and servitude as portrayed in today’s reading..   We can’t help but hear today’s lesson as people of our own time, and the way women are manipulated and used in this story, both as daughters and as servants, can be deeply disturbing and even prevent us from hearing anything of value in today’s reading.   So my goal today, an ambitious goal for a summer sermon, perhaps, but done in broad brushstrokes, is to propose a way that we might hear today’s Genesis story as a waypoint on our journey with God to our salvation.   I want to do that by trying to answer three questions:

Why Genesis?

Why Jacob?

Why this portrayal of women and class in Genesis?

First, why Genesis?   At its heart, Genesis is an origin story, the account of how God creates a nation, Israel, to represent God in the world.    God’s motives in doing so flow from his act of creation – Israel is created out of God’s grace and faithfulness to bear the image that God gives to the first humans.   God’s covenant with Israel shows God’s faithfulness and patience with humanity, even when we misbehave.   Genesis is our origin story because, as we’ve heard Paul say in Romans this month, God through Christ brings us the gentiles into Israel and we become one people, the church.

Second, why Jacob and why this particular story?  Because Jacob is part of that larger origin story.  Last Sunday we heard God’s promise to Jacob that his descendants would cover the world like dust and be a blessing to the “families of earth”.  The story of Jacob and his wives advances this story because their sons will give their names to the twelve tribes of Israel. Some of the plot twists in the story, like how Jacob is deceived by his kinsman Laban who switches his daughters on Jacob’s wedding night, must have delighted generations of listeners when this origin story of Israel was recounted.   The idea of the trickster tricked, as the wily Jacob is tricked, must have elicited chuckles around countless campfires over the long centuries.  God’s family, like any family, has its share of scoundrels, and the presence of those scoundrels in our origin story reminds us that God’s plan of salvation is for all of us, and not just for a saintly few.

Third, what do we do with this portray of women and class in today’s story that is, frankly, disturbing?   Laban’s willingness to offer his daughters as barter – one daughter is worth seven years’ of labour – in order to cement an alliance with Jacob and his clan is a patriarchal arrangement that has nothing to do with marriage as we understand it today.   As part of this arrangement, the sisters have very little agency.   While the story does tell us, twice, how much Jacob loves Rachel, we hear nothing about what Leah felt about being substituted for her sister (whereas in Gen 24, their aunt Rebekah at least was asked if she wanted to marry Isaac Gen 24.58).  

Even more troubling is that in the story that follows today’s reading, the two sisters compete with one another for Jacob’s affections, a competition made worse by Rachel being barren, reminding us that women’s primary worth for much of human history lay in their production of heirs.    Likewise the two maids, Zilpah and Bilhah, introduced in today’s reading, are both used by the sisters as surrogate mothers, though we hear nothing about whether they had an opinion about this arrangement.  Thus, the word “maid” here seems suspiciously like “slave” to modern ears. In short, while this is an origin story about the first family of Israel, it's not a story that one could hold up today as an example of biblical family values 

The story therefore raises the question of how we relate to Genesis and to the Hebrew Scriptures and their place in the larger Christian story.   Do we dismiss it because we find its portrayal of sex, gender, polygamy and servitude to be unwholesome or unpalatable?  Do we shrug and say that it is, like much of the bible, a product of its time, and we know better?   Both options, I think, risk that we subject the bible to “cancel culture” and thus only hear those parts of the Hebrew Scriptures that we agree with.   The church has at times over the centuries tried to cancel the Hebrew scriptures, on the grounds that these stories were not our stories (Marcionism), or that they were racially impure (the Nazis considered them non Aryan), or just generally because many bibles contain just the New Testament and the Psalms. 

As I said at the outset, a summertime sermon is not the time to make a detailed case for why the church needs the Hebrew scriptures but let me try to make a quick summary of why they should matter to us.

First, they stress God’s faithfulness and determination to see the project of salvation through, despite the poor material at hand.   God is willing to work with scoundrels like Jacob and Laban because the end goal is the making of God’s people, first Jew, then Jew and gentile.   The psalmists knew this quality all too well, as in Psalm 145, which says that “The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.  The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made” (Ps 145 8-9). 

Second, there is a certain arrogance in our judging ancient texts like Genesis as being hopelessly patriarchal and brutal, when our own age has abundant examples of its own bad behaviour.    The details from the story of Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein are as horrific in their own way as anything that happened in Laban’s tent, and they have their own sordid, downmarket counterparts in the kinds of human trafficking that routinely come to light across Ontario, where plenty of powerless girls like Bihah and Zilpah are used by others.

Thirdly, these stories are important because they show God’s determination to change the script.   Martin Luther King’s famous quote, “Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice”, is true of the bible as well.   For example, in Genesis, there are love stories (Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel) that begin at wells, where the women in question have little agency and few roles except to produce children.   In John’s gospel,  an encounter at another well, where Jesus meets the Samaritan woman, leads to a long discussion in which the women finds herself treated with dignity, love and redemption by the son of God, and becomes an evangelist in her own right.   Likewise, on Wednesday of this week we celebrated the Holy Day of another women of the gospels, Mary Magdalene, who was healed by Jesus, and who is entrusted in the garden by her risen Lord with spreading the news of the Resurrection.

Likewise, Bilhah and Ziporah have their New Testament equivalents in the slaves of the Greco-Roman world who heard the astonishing message of the Jesus movement, that ^“There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3.28). This revolutionary message of spiritual equality in Christ had practical dimensions that the early church struggled with from the beginning.  We know from 1 Corinthians 11 that at least one of these house churches struggled to reconcile deep class divisions with this good news of equality.   The authors of a Bible Project podcast on the Pauline letters make a really interesting point when they imagine what it would have been like for a believer, a prosperous Roman citizen and businesswoman, finding herself at a house church sharing a meal with fellow believers who happened to be slaves!         That would have been a huge adjustment for her and for believers like her.   We also know from Paul’s letters that some of these house churches were led by women, and that they played a role in worship.   In light of these facts, I find it pleasant to imagine that women descended from Leah and Rachel, Bilhah and Zipporah, all played their part in these house churches, where they could find a new identity and a new kind of equality in Christ.

It may well be, as I have suggested here, that the only way we can redeem stories like Genesis is to see them in the larger context of scripture and of its trajectory towards salvation, but in doing so, it’s humbling to think that we don’t need to redeem these stories.  God redeems them through God’s work of salvation, just as we pray that God will redeem our own society and its deep divisions of class and wealth, sex and prejudice, servitude and inhumanity.   Our greatest lesson in reading these stories is to see that our own age needs God just as much, and that our salvation lies in accepting God’s invitation to our new identity, where all are one in Christ Jesus.

 

Daily Devotional for Friday, 24 July

Prayers at Mid-day for Friday, 24 July, 2020 (Proper 16, Trinity 6)

 

 

Invitatory

 

O God, make speed to save us.

 

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:

as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever.

Amen.

 

The Lord is our refuge and our strength:  O come, let us worship.

 

Hebrew Scriptures

Joshua 8.1-22 (The Israelites Fight the Five Kings)

http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=462461386

 

Psalm

Psalm 130

 

¹ Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. 

²   Lord, hear my voice!

Let your ears be attentive

   to the voice of my supplications! 

 

³ If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,

   Lord, who could stand? 

⁴ But there is forgiveness with you,

   so that you may be revered. 

 

⁵ I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,

   and in his word I hope; 

⁶ my soul waits for the Lord

   more than those who watch for the morning,

   more than those who watch for the morning. 

 

⁷ O Israel, hope in the Lord!

   For with the Lord there is steadfast love,

   and with him is great power to redeem. 

⁸ It is he who will redeem Israel

   from all its iniquities.

 

Epistle

Romans 15.14-24 (Paul’s Reason For Writing So Boldly)

http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=462461534

 

Gospel

Matthew 27.1-10

When morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people conferred together against Jesus in order to bring about his death. ²They bound him, led him away, and handed him over to Pilate the governor.

3 When Judas, his betrayer, saw that Jesus was condemned, he repented and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. ⁴He said, ‘I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.’ But they said, ‘What is that to us? See to it yourself.’ ⁵Throwing down the pieces of silver in the temple, he departed; and he went and hanged himself. ⁶But the chief priests, taking the pieces of silver, said, ‘It is not lawful to put them into the treasury, since they are blood money.’ ⁷After conferring together, they used them to buy the potter’s field as a place to bury foreigners. ⁸For this reason that field has been called the Field of Blood to this day. ⁹Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah, ‘And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of the one on whom a price had been set, on whom some of the people of Israel had set a price, ¹⁰and they gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me.’

 

Commentary (Father Michael)

 

I doubt that Matthew meant for we his readers to spare much thought for the fate of Judas.   My guess is that Matthew felt the need to include the sad end of Judas (Luke and Mark say nothing about his death) simply because it reinforces his theme of how Jesus is the Messiah of prophecy.  In the Hebrew scriptures, thirty “shekels” of silver is mentioned by the prophet Zechariah as the value of the “shepherd of the flock doomed to the slaughter” (Zech 11.4-14).   For Matthew, making this the exact price for Jesus reinforces both the prophetic significance of Judas’ betrayal and the identity of Jesus as the one foretold in scripture.   Interesting, Mark and Luke say nothing about Judas’ suicide, neither do the specify the fate amount of his reward, which in their gospels is only described as an unspecified amount of “money” (Mk 14:11, Lk 22.5).  For Matthew, therefore, Judas’ psychological realism and motivation are unimportant.  The villain merely plays his part in the cosmic drama of Jesus confronting sin and death. 

 

It’s an interesting theological “what-if” question to ask what would have happened had Judas asked God for forgiveness.   Indeed, Matthew tells us that Judas does repent and recognize that he has sinned, which may prompt in us some sympathy.  For Matthew, however, Judas needs to play one more part in the narrative's prophetic machinery, by hanging himself and the money then buying a potter’s field, though as my study bible notes, this is quite a stretch for Matthew, as there are only echoes of Jeremiah here and no one to one correspondence of details  (Jer 32.6-15, Jer 18.1-3,19.1-13). At the end of the day,  Judas’ significance or Matthew is to underscore Jesus’ destiny as the shepherd who is betrayed by Israel in order to bear its sin.

 

Nevertheless, the Passion narratives are fertile ground for repentance and changes of heart.  Beside Judas, who hangs himself in remorse, there is the centurion who recognizes, too late, that Jesus was innocent, and the thief on the cross who turns to Jesus and begs for salvation.   As the Catholic writer Richard Neuhaus liked to say, that thief was granted his place in heaven long before you or I will ever get there!    So perhaps wondering whether God would have had mercy on Judas is not out of bounds.  Indeed, our psalm selection for today, Psalm 130, is a powerful meditation on repentance. Had Judas sought forgiveness, his cry should would have come out the deepest depths imagined by the psalmist.    While we are conditioned by popular culture to think that every story needs the blackest of villains, we may well ask, is it truly beyond the mercy of God to think that at the end, even Judas found forgiveness and love?

 

Questions

Can you imagine God forgiving Judas?   If not, why not?  What other questions come to mind in today’s passages?

 

Intercession

 

Let us pray in faith to God our Father, to his Son Jesus Christ, and to the Holy Spirit, saying, “Lord, hear and have mercy.”

 

For the Church of the living God throughout the world, let us ask the riches of his grace.  Today we pray in the Anglican Communion Cycle of Prayer for the clergy and people of the Diocese of Northwestern Pennsylvania (The Episcopal Church) and their bishop, The Rt Revd Sean Rowe, and the Diocese of Bethlehem (Pennsylvania), (The Episcopal Church) and their Bishop, The Rt Revd Kevin Nichols 

 

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who proclaim he word of truth, especially all who struggle to communicate the gospel within the isolation and restrictions of the pandemic, 

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who have consecrated their lives to the kingdom of God, and for all struggling to follow the way of Christ, let us all the gifts of the Spirit.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For Elizabeth our Queen, for Justin our Prime Minister, and for all who govern the nations, that they may strive for justice and peace, let us ask the strength of God.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For scholars and research workers, particularly for those working on treatments and a vaccine for Covid 19, and for all whose work seeks to benefit humanity, let us ask the light of the Lord.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

We pray to be forgiven our sins and set free from all hardship, distress, want, war, and injustice.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who have passed from this life in faith and obedience,  and for all who have perished from Covid 19 and from diseases that went untreated because hospitals were overwhelmed, let us ask the peace of Christ.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

 

The Lord’s Prayer

 

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

 

 

Collect

 

Almighty God, your Son has opened for us a new and living way into your presence.  Give us pure hearts and constant wills to worship you in spirit and in truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.   Amen.

Daily Devotional, Thursday 23 July

Prayers at Mid-day for Thursday, 23 July, 2020 (Proper 16, Trinity 6)

 

Commemoration of Bridget of Sweden, Abbess (d 1373)

Invitatory

 

O God, make speed to save us.

 

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:

as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever.

Amen.

 

The Lord is our refuge and our strength:  O come, let us worship.

 

Hebrew Scriptures

Joshua 9.3-21 (The Ploy of Gibeon)

http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=462465463

 

Psalm

Psalm 50

 

¹ The mighty one, God the Lord,

   speaks and summons the earth

   from the rising of the sun to its setting. 

² Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty,

   God shines forth. 

 

³ Our God comes and does not keep silence,

   before him is a devouring fire,

   and a mighty tempest all around him. 

⁴ He calls to the heavens above

   and to the earth, that he may judge his people: 

⁵ ‘Gather to me my faithful ones,

   who made a covenant with me by sacrifice!’ 

⁶ The heavens declare his righteousness,

   for God himself is judge.

          Selah 

 

⁷ ‘Hear, O my people, and I will speak,

   O Israel, I will testify against you.

   I am God, your God. 

⁸ Not for your sacrifices do I rebuke you;

   your burnt-offerings are continually before me. 

⁹ I will not accept a bull from your house,

   or goats from your folds. 

¹⁰ For every wild animal of the forest is mine,

   the cattle on a thousand hills. 

¹¹ I know all the birds of the air,

   and all that moves in the field is mine. 

 

¹² ‘If I were hungry, I would not tell you,

   for the world and all that is in it is mine. 

¹³ Do I eat the flesh of bulls,

   or drink the blood of goats? 

¹⁴ Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving,

   and pay your vows to the Most High. 

¹⁵ Call on me in the day of trouble;

   I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me.’ 

 

¹⁶ But to the wicked God says:

   ‘What right have you to recite my statutes,

   or take my covenant on your lips? 

¹⁷ For you hate discipline,

   and you cast my words behind you. 

¹⁸ You make friends with a thief when you see one,

   and you keep company with adulterers. 

 

¹⁹ ‘You give your mouth free rein for evil,

   and your tongue frames deceit. 

²⁰ You sit and speak against your kin;

   you slander your own mother’s child. 

²¹ These things you have done and I have been silent;

   you thought that I was one just like yourself.

But now I rebuke you, and lay the charge before you. 

 

²² ‘Mark this, then, you who forget God,

   or I will tear you apart, and there will be no one to deliver. 

²³ Those who bring thanksgiving as their sacrifice honour me;

   to those who go the right way

   I will show the salvation of God.’

 

 

 

Epistle

Romans 15.1-13

 

 

We who are strong ought to put up with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. ²Each of us must please our neighbour for the good purpose of building up the neighbour. ³For Christ did not please himself; but, as it is written, ‘The insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.’ ⁴For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope. ⁵May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, ⁶so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

7 Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God. ⁸For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the circumcised on behalf of the truth of God in order that he might confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, ⁹and in order that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. As it is written,

‘Therefore I will confess you among the Gentiles,

   and sing praises to your name’; 

¹⁰and again he says,

‘Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people’; 

¹¹and again,

‘Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles,

   and let all the peoples praise him’; 

¹²and again Isaiah says,

‘The root of Jesse shall come,

   the one who rises to rule the Gentiles;

in him the Gentiles shall hope.’ 

¹³May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. 

 

 

Gospel

Matthew 26.69-75

 

69 Now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard. A servant-girl came to him and said, ‘You also were with Jesus the Galilean.’ ⁷⁰But he denied it before all of them, saying, ‘I do not know what you are talking about.’ ⁷¹When he went out to the porch, another servant-girl saw him, and she said to the bystanders, ‘This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.’ ⁷²Again he denied it with an oath, ‘I do not know the man.’ ⁷³After a little while the bystanders came up and said to Peter, ‘Certainly you are also one of them, for your accent betrays you.’ ⁷⁴Then he began to curse, and he swore an oath, ‘I do not know the man!’ At that moment the cock crowed. ⁷⁵Then Peter remembered what Jesus had said: ‘Before the cock crows, you will deny me three times.’ And he went out and wept bitterly.

 

 

Commentary (Father Michael)

 

As he concludes his long and intricate letter to the Romans, Paul begins to conclude his great theme about how God has reimagined race, gender, and class in one new people, the body of Christ.    Here he reminds Jewish followers of Jesus that the gentiles, non-Jews, are taking their places in this new people, just as the Hebrew prophets such as Isaiah foretold.   The coming together of this new people out of such disparate elements will require much more than mere forbearance.  It will require active and generous love.

 

Recently I received an email from Fresh Expressions, an evangelical group working on renewing the mainline churches in Canada.  One of the leaders profiled in the email mentioned that Romans 15.7 was her favourite verse: “Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.”  It’s a brilliant choice, I think.

 

We talk a lot about being welcoming churches, as we should.   The language of welcoming always needs to be theologically underpinned by verses such as Romans 15.7, in the sense that God’s gracious welcoming of us into the Body of Christ obligates us to be as gracious as we can possibly be to others in imitation of Christ, even if that is a poor, human, imitation.  The church, then, is God’s new creation, where we along with other believers are welcomed and brought in by the Holy Spirit, and in that gracious community we show something of the glory of God.

 

Questions

Can you remember a time when you felt God welcoming you into the church as the body of believers?  Who needs to be welcomed into your church?  What other questions come to mind in today’s passages?

 

Intercession

 

Let us pray in faith to God our Father, to his Son Jesus Christ, and to the Holy Spirit, saying, “Lord, hear and have mercy.”

 

For the Church of the living God throughout the world, let us ask the riches of his grace.  Today we pray in the Anglican Communion Cycle of Prayer for the clergy and people of the Diocese of Northwest Texas (The Episcopal Church) and their bishop, The Rt Revd Scott Mayer, the clergy and people of the Diocese Benin (Nigeria) and their bishop, The Rt Revd Peter Imasuen , and the clergy and people of the Diocese of Bermuda (Bermuda) and their bishop, the The Rt Revd Nicholas Dill 

 

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who proclaim he word of truth, especially all who struggle to communicate the gospel within the isolation and restrictions of the pandemic, 

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who have consecrated their lives to the kingdom of God, and for all struggling to follow the way of Christ, let us all the gifts of the Spirit.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For Elizabeth our Queen, for Justin our Prime Minister, and for all who govern the nations, that they may strive for justice and peace, let us ask the strength of God.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For scholars and research workers, particularly for those working on treatments and a vaccine for Covid 19, and for all whose work seeks to benefit humanity, let us ask the light of the Lord.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

We pray to be forgiven our sins and set free from all hardship, distress, want, war, and injustice.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who have passed from this life in faith and obedience,  and for all who have perished from Covid 19 and from diseases that went untreated because hospitals were overwhelmed, let us ask the peace of Christ.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

 

The Lord’s Prayer

 

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

 

 

Collect

 

Almighty God, your Son has opened for us a new and living way into your presence.  Give us pure hearts and constant wills to worship you in spirit and in truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.   Amen.

Daily Devotional for Wednesday, 22 July, 2020

Prayers at Mid-day for Wednesday, 22 July, 2020 (Proper 16, Trinity 6)

A Video Version of this Service of Morning Prayer can be found is also available.

 

Feast of St. Mary Magdalene

 

Invitatory

 

O God, make speed to save us.

 

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:

as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever.

Amen.

 

The Lord is our refuge and our strength:  O come, let us worship.

 

Hebrew Scriptures

Joshua 8.30-35 (Joshua Renews the Covenant)

 

Psalm

Psalm 119.49-72

⁴⁹ Remember your word to your servant,

   in which you have made me hope. 

⁵⁰ This is my comfort in my distress,

   that your promise gives me life. 

⁵¹ The arrogant utterly deride me,

   but I do not turn away from your law. 

⁵² When I think of your ordinances from of old,

   I take comfort, O Lord. 

⁵³ Hot indignation seizes me because of the wicked,

   those who forsake your law. 

⁵⁴ Your statutes have been my songs

   wherever I make my home. 

⁵⁵ I remember your name in the night, O Lord,

   and keep your law. 

⁵⁶ This blessing has fallen to me,

   for I have kept your precepts. 

⁵⁷ The Lord is my portion;

   I promise to keep your words. 

⁵⁸ I implore your favour with all my heart;

   be gracious to me according to your promise. 

⁵⁹ When I think of your ways,

   I turn my feet to your decrees; 

⁶⁰ I hurry and do not delay

   to keep your commandments. 

⁶¹ Though the cords of the wicked ensnare me,

   I do not forget your law. 

⁶² At midnight I rise to praise you,

   because of your righteous ordinances. 

⁶³ I am a companion of all who fear you,

   of those who keep your precepts. 

⁶⁴ The earth, O Lord, is full of your steadfast love;

   teach me your statutes. 

⁶⁵ You have dealt well with your servant,

   O Lord, according to your word. 

⁶⁶ Teach me good judgement and knowledge,

   for I believe in your commandments. 

⁶⁷ Before I was humbled I went astray,

   but now I keep your word. 

⁶⁸ You are good and do good;

   teach me your statutes. 

⁶⁹ The arrogant smear me with lies,

   but with my whole heart I keep your precepts. 

⁷⁰ Their hearts are fat and gross,

   but I delight in your law. 

⁷¹ It is good for me that I was humbled,

   so that I might learn your statutes. 

⁷² The law of your mouth is better to me

   than thousands of gold and silver pieces. 

 

Epistle

Romans 14.13-23 (Do Not Make Another Stumble)

 

 

 

Gospel

Matthew 12.15-21 (God’s Chosen Servant)

 

15 When Jesus became aware of this, he departed. Many crowds followed him, and he cured all of them, ¹⁶and he ordered them not to make him known. ¹⁷This was to fulfil what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah: 

¹⁸ ‘Here is my servant, whom I have chosen,

   my beloved, with whom my soul is well pleased.

I will put my Spirit upon him,

   and he will proclaim justice to the Gentiles. 

¹⁹ He will not wrangle or cry aloud,

   nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets. 

²⁰ He will not break a bruised reed

   or quench a smouldering wick

until he brings justice to victory. 

²¹   And in his name the Gentiles will hope.’

 

 

 

Commentary (Father Michael)

 

If you want to understand Jesus, look at his acts of healing.   That seems to be the central point of today’s reading from Matthew 12, which comes after several adversarial exchanges with the Pharisees and religious leaders who only want to look at Jesus as a rule breaker.  In two incidents just prior to today’s reading, Jesus breaks two legal restrictions by gathering food and healing on the Sabbath, leading the Pharisees to start plotting his downfall.   The “this” that Jesus is aware of in the first line of today’s gospel refers to the Pharisee’s hostility.  So Jesus goes off, crowds follow him, he heals them, and then, curiously, says “Shhhhh, don’t speak of this”.

 

Jesus’ apparent secrecy is often noticed in biblical commentaries and preaching, but can still be puzzling.   Why does Jesus seem to want to hide his light under a bushel, to use his own language?  The question often arises.   We saw it in the last two Sundays’ gospel readings from Matthew, which focus on parables and why Jesus uses them as a teaching tool   At one point, during the parable of the Sower and the Seed, the disciples ask Jesus, in effect, why don’t you speak more plainly, and by way of answer Jesus quotes the prophet Isaiah:

 

¹⁵ For this people’s heart has grown dull,

   and their ears are hard of hearing,

     and they have shut their eyes;

     so that they might not look with their eyes,

   and listen with their ears,

and understand with their heart and turn—

   and I would heal them.”  (Mt 13.15)

 

Again today we note Jesus quoting Isaiah, in one of the passages on a figure called the Servant, who God chooses to bring justice and hope to all the nations.   Jesus here seems to say that like the Servant, he will do his work quietly:

 

He will not quarrel or cry out;

    no one will hear his voice in the streets. (Mt 12.19)

 

In these two quotations from Isaiah, packed close together by Matthew, Jesus is making it perfectly clear who he is, for those to care to know.  He clearly identifies himself in general with the prophetic tradition represented by Isaiah, and specifically with he Messianic servant figure in Isaiah.   If you were paying attention to Matthew’s use of prophecy thus far, and if you understood that prophetic tradition as Matthew’s first Jewish readers would have understand it, then you’ve made that connection already.   But in quoting Isaiah, Jesus is speaking to insiders who already know and believe Jesus.  The point of these quotations is to denounce his opponents, the Pharisees, who will reject Jesus just as Israel rejected and killed the prophets (Mt 23.31).

 

Where Jesus never hides his light under a bushel is in his acts of healing.  Again to quote today’s reading:  “A large crowd followed him, and he healed all who were ill” (Mt 12.15).   These are not acts done in secret.  Jesus clearly wants to be known by his actions, which is presumably why the crowds follow him.   If you want to know me, Jesus seems to say, pay attention to what I do,  and what I say, not so much.  In this respect, Jesus quoting of Isaiah in Mt 13.15 might be reinterpreted:  

so that they might not look with their eyes,

   and listen with their ears,

and understand with their heart and turn—

   and I would heal them.”

 

It’s not that he withholds healing from people who don’t agree with him, as an act of punishment, but rather, he can’t heal those who don’t wish to be healed.

 

For the church, an understanding that Jesus’ intelligibility resides in his acts of healing is, I suggest, the key to evangelism.  A church which insist on righteousness and rule keeping will never be more than an isolated group of insiders, irrelevant and perhaps even disliked by its neighbours.   A church which seeks to meet the deepest needs of its neighbours will embody Jesus in its love and desire to bring God’s healing to the world.   Our mission must be founded on Christ the healer, and not on God the rulemaker.  Whenever we want to show Jesus to the world, we can’t go wrong if we focus on his acts of grace and healing.  If we can embody them in some way, so much the better.

 

 

Questions

Where do you see Jesus healing in you life?  In the life of your church?   What other questions come to mind in today’s passages?

 

Intercession

 

Let us pray in faith to God our Father, to his Son Jesus Christ, and to the Holy Spirit, saying, “Lord, hear and have mercy.”

 

For the Church of the living God throughout the world, let us ask the riches of his grace.  Today we pray in the Anglican Communion Cycle of Prayer for clergy and people of the Diocese of Northwest Ankole (Uganda) and for their bishop, The Rt Revd Amos Magezi, as well as for the clergy and people of the Diocese of Bendigo (Australia) and their Bishop, The Rt Revd Matt Brain 

 

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who proclaim he word of truth, especially all who struggle to communicate the gospel within the isolation and restrictions of the pandemic, 

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who have consecrated their lives to the kingdom of God, and for all struggling to follow the way of Christ, let us all the gifts of the Spirit.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For Elizabeth our Queen, for Justin our Prime Minister, and for all who govern the nations, that they may strive for justice and peace, let us ask the strength of God.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For scholars and research workers, particularly for those working on treatments and a vaccine for Covid 19, and for all whose work seeks to benefit humanity, let us ask the light of the Lord.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

We pray to be forgiven our sins and set free from all hardship, distress, want, war, and injustice.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

For all who have passed from this life in faith and obedience,  and for all who have perished from Covid 19 and from diseases that went untreated because hospitals were overwhelmed, let us ask the peace of Christ.

Lord, hear and have mercy.

 

 

The Lord’s Prayer

 

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

 

 

Collect

 

Almighty God, your Son has opened for us a new and living way into your presence.  Give us pure hearts and constant wills to worship you in spirit and in truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.   Amen.

 

Almighty God, whose Son restored Mary Magdalene to health of mind and body and called her to be a witness of his resurrection, forgive us and heal us by your grace, that we may serve you in the power of his risen life; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.  Amen.