Today in the Spirit: Epiphany 5C
The Church perceives the Gospel narratives of Jesus’ call to his first disciples on the shore of the Sea of Galilee to be so crucial we must hear it on a Sunday in Epiphany every year. In Years A and B, the accounts in Matthew and Mark come up at Epiphany 3. In Year C, this year, we have Luke’s version, but not until Epiphany 5 (As I mentioned in earlier installments, this is because of the importance of the account of Jesus’ preaching in Nazareth that appears in Luke beforehand).
The appointed Gospel reading from Luke 5:1-11 contains the exhilarating narrative of Jesus borrowing Simon Peter’s boat to teach on the shore of the “lake of Gennesaret” (the Sea of Galilee). After speaking, he instructs Simon and his companion to go out mid-morning (the worst possible hour) to make a catch of fish. Humbly, they surrender to Jesus’ instructions and return with a miraculously large catch of fish. Jesus then calls Simon, Andrew (though his name is not mentioned in Luke’s version), James, and John to “be catching men,” and they follow him.
The assigned OT reading is yet another passage about God calling someone to his service. Judges 6:11-24 records the appearance of an angel of YHWH to Gideon the Abiezrite, a young Jewish man who has grown up in Israel under the constant threat of mistreatment by the Midianites. He receives the greeting of the LORD, “The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor” (12). Impetuously, Gideon dialogues with the angel, later called the LORD in the narrative, until, finally, the young man surrenders his will and worships God, building an altar called “The LORD is peace” (24).
Psalm 85 is assigned often over the course of the three-year lectionary (Advent 2B, Advent 3C, Epiphany 5C, and Proper 10B). Probably designed as a dialogue between a pilgrim to Jerusalem and a temple priest, it is a colorful declaration by faith of the steadfastness of YHWH’s presence with and favor toward his people Israel. Having just heard the reading from Judges and the name of Gideon’s memorial stone, “The LORD is peace,” the line in the psalm that will stand out in our worship is, “I will hearken to what the Lord God will say, for he shall speak peace unto his people, and to his saints, that they turn not again” (8).
Continuing the Epiphany series in 1 Corinthians, the assigned NT reading from 1 Corinthians 15:1–11 will move us to that glorious part of the letter in which we hear Paul’s defense of the credal doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, beginning with one of most concise statements in Scripture of the whole gospel of Jesus Christ: “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.”
The appointed collect can be imagined as a mid-Epiphany plea for help from God for perseverance and protection. God is showing us so much of the light of Jesus Christ in this season and the pushback of the world’s darkness against it, so we plea to the Lord, “Keep your household the Church continually in your religion” (meaning the devotional application of truth revealed), and that “we may be defended by your mighty power; through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
The Collect
O Lord, our heavenly Father, keep your household the Church continually in your true religion, that we who trust in the hope of your heavenly grace may always be defended by your mighty power; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever. Amen.
Winepress…Stone…Altar (Judges 6:11-24)
11 Now the angel of the Lord came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, while his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites. 12 And the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, “The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.” 13 And Gideon said to him, “Please, my lord, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his wonderful deeds that our fathers recounted to us, saying, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the Lord has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian.” 14 And the Lord turned to him and said, “Go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian; do not I send you?” 15 And he said to him, “Please, Lord, how can I save Israel? Behold, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house.” 16 And the Lord said to him, “But I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man.” 17 And he said to him, “If now I have found favor in your eyes, then show me a sign that it is you who speak with me. 18 Please do not depart from here until I come to you and bring out my present and set it before you.” And he said, “I will stay till you return.” 19 So Gideon went into his house and prepared a young goat and unleavened cakes from an ephah of flour. The meat he put in a basket, and the broth he put in a pot, and brought them to him under the terebinth and presented them. 20 And the angel of God said to him, “Take the meat and the unleavened cakes, and put them on this rock, and pour the broth over them.” And he did so. 21 Then the angel of the Lord reached out the tip of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes. And fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes. And the angel of the Lord vanished from his sight. 22 Then Gideon perceived that he was the angel of the Lord. And Gideon said, “Alas, O Lord God! For now I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face.” 23 But the Lord said to him, “Peace be to you. Do not fear; you shall not die.” 24 Then Gideon built an altar there to the Lord and called it, The Lord Is Peace. To this day it still stands at Ophrah, which belongs to the Abiezrites.
Judges 6:11-24
Significantly, three stone (or partly stone) structures come up in this narrative: 1) the “winepress” where Gideon was seeking to remain hidden from the marauding Midianites threshing wheat for his family; 2) the “rock” (20) on which Gideon was instructed to make a sacrifice to YHWH with prepared food he had prepared; and 3) the “altar” (24), probably more a memorial stone, by which Gideon would commemorate his encounter with God in the center of his village in northern Israel.
Devotionally, by these stones, believers can mark themselves, sometimes moving in a progression, and at other times going back and forth, in their heart, allegiance to God. The winepress is for us a container of doubt and fear. Hearing the word of the Lord from that vantage point, we might find ourselves, like Gideon, cynical, doubtful and fearful. The rock of sacrifice is a table of hospitality which, as we note from the story, God himself assigns for us. Take the food, says the angel, “and put them on this rock” (20). Gideon brought the food, and God himself set the stage for accepting the young man’s fellowship. The memorial stone is all Gideon’s initiative, like when we take up a spiritual discipline to remain strong in remembrance of the word of the Lord.
Today, Holy Spirit, move my stony heart from fear and grumbling and, on the strength of the cornerstone of Jesus given by the Father, let me hear and remember your assurance of “peace.”
Indeed, the LORD Shall Show Goodness (Psalm 85)
1 LORD, you have been gracious to your land; *
Psalm 85, New Coverdale Psalter (BCP 2019)
you have turned away the captivity of Jacob.
2 You have forgiven the offence of your people *
and covered all their sins.
3 You have taken away all your displeasure *
and turned yourself from your wrathful indignation.
4 Restore us then, O God our Savior, *
and let your anger cease from us.
5 Will you be displeased at us for ever, *
and will you stretch out your wrath from one generation to another?
6 Will you not turn again and quicken us, *
that your people may rejoice in you?
7 Show us your mercy, O LORD, *
and grant us your salvation.
8 I will hearken to what the LORD God will say, *
for he shall speak peace unto his people, and to his saints,
that they turn not again.
9 For his salvation is near to those who fear him, *
that glory may dwell in our land.
10 Mercy and truth have met together; *
righteousness and peace have kissed each other.
11 Truth shall flourish out of the earth, *
and righteousness shall look down from heaven.
12 Indeed, the LORD shall show goodness, *
and our land shall give its increase.
13 Righteousness shall go before him, *
and he shall direct his going in the way.
This is a corporate psalm of petition, probably a temple liturgy, but with language deeply rooted in the experience of the people of Israel discerning their need for repentance to God and restoration by his hand. The song has three parts: 1) An acknowledgment of sin with the remembrance of mercy from YHWH in the past (1-3); 2) A plea to God for renewed restoration in the present (4-7); and 3) A declaration of intention (probably from a temple prophet, “I,” but speaking for the people) to wait on God with expectation of an answer (8-10). Indeed, if we take the last part (“Mercy and truth have met together…vv. 10-13) as a statement of the mindset with which all the people make their prayer, then we find that they expect that God will respond not only with a return to status quo but unimaginable flourishing.
As for devotional application, since the psalm clearly depicts the prayers of the people, let me go to our practice of corporate prayer. As members of a congregation, we need to ask ourselves if our prayers share the features of this psalm. Is there, first, the humility to acknowledge that we have never been all that we should be, that, even with our successes as a church, we fall short because of our tendencies toward waywardness and negligence in service to Jesus Christ? Second, is there faith in God’s mercy to forgive? Third, is there a spirit of patience to wait before the Lord for an answer to our prayers? And, fourth (and this is most important), is there an expectation of restoration that can take us to a new place of flourishing? The people praying in the psalm know that their generation may not live to see that flourishing, but they “see” it anyway and ask for its realization among those who come.
This psalm marks a whole new trail for our congregations to take in corporate prayer. Today, in the Spirit, we ask you, Lord, to give us the mindset of faith expressed in this psalm in our prayer life.
As of First Importance (1 Corinthians 15:1-11)
1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. 8 Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. 9 For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. 11 Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
1 Corinthians 15:1-11
Paul declares that the gospel he proclaims–that of Christ dying and rising–is “of first importance.” We do well to consider all the ways that phrase might be interpreted. First , the gospel is the highest priority of Paul himself, and he says so often in his writings. Earlier in this letter, he writes: “Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!” (9:16).
Second, it is also implied that Paul means for the gospel to be the Church’s highest priority. In that famous passage from 2 Corinthians, Paul teaches how God has drawn the whole body of believers into his own gospel ministry: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation” (2 Co. 5:17-18).
Finally, Paul’s wording reveals that the good news movement is of first importance to God. The high priestly prayer of Jesus makes a clear connection between the mission of Jesus in the world and the highest of heavenly mandates–the glory of the Father and the Son: “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him’” (Jn. 17:1-2).
Devotionally, seeing that the gospel is “of first importance” to the apostle, the church, and God, we must take account in our own hearts of the priority of the gospel. As we mature in Christ, growing more and more into his character, we will find ourselves setting aside interests and affinities we had when we were young and sacrificing them for the gospel. Depending on what they are, we may find some things harder to put down than others. Strangely, though, we do find glorifying Jesus and declaring the good news of his work in the world pushing lesser things aside and out. In the first entry of his famous devotional, we read these words by Oswald Chambers which became the title for the entire collection: “Shout out every other consideration and keep yourself before God for this one thing only–My Utmost for His Highest. I am determined to be absolutely and entirely for Him and for Him alone.”
Today, in the Spirit, while confessing that I am not there yet, I know that, by your sanctifying grace, I will arrive at the place where you, Lord Jesus, and your gospel are “of first importance” to me.
I Am a Sinful Man O Lord (Luke 5:1-11)
1 On one occasion, while the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, he was standing by the lake of Gennesaret, 2 and he saw two boats by the lake, but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. 3 Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat. 4 And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” 5 And Simon answered, “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.” 6 And when they had done this, they enclosed a large number of fish, and their nets were breaking. 7 They signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink. 8 But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” 9 For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken, 10 and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men.” 11 And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him.
Luke 5:1-11
In Luke’s version of this story, Jesus is busy teaching a “crowd” on the lakeshore. But Simon, who has already had an encounter with Jesus (Jn. 1:41-42), is introduced as one in a group of “fishermen” cleaning their nets. We might ask, Why is Simon so aloof here with the one he calls “Master” (5)? Yes, in the early morning, fishermen in this time needed to complete their work, but clearly, there was something off. The reader gains the impression that Jesus is poised to make a serious alteration in the relationship between himself and Simon. And he does that, not by giving a simple command (“Ok, you leave everything and come with me), but by provoking in Simon a profound experience of repentance, by performing a great miracle leaving Peter aware that he is unworthy. In Luke, “Simon” becomes “Simon Peter” only when he stands before Jesus, no longer just a student with his rabbi, but a “sinful man” in the presence of his “Lord” (8).
Devotionally, we need to recognize in this a pattern of discipleship found often in Scripture. Consider any significant character in the New Testament we read about walking with the Lord–the twelve disciples, Mary, mother of Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Paul. What do we discover? For all of them, what moves the meter spiritually for them is repentance from sin and heart transformation by the power of the Christ.
Beloved, at any time, we may find Jesus walking on our beaches and noting that we, too, are distracted and aloof. Today, Holy Spirit, humbly, but also eagerly, I look forward to my next encounter with the Son of God, taking me down so that he may be lifted up.
Today in the Spirit
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