Today in the Spirit: Proper 25C
At Proper 25C, the church assigns as a Gospel reading the parable immediately following the one from last week in Luke. In Luke 18:9-14, Jesus tells a tale of two men, one a respected religious leader (a Pharisee) and the other a reviled “sinner” (a tax collector), both praying in the temple in plain sight of one another. Each speaks out of his heart to God, the Pharisee from his pride over his religious devotion and the tax collector from his shame as a trespasser unworthy to stand in God’s presence (and yet he does!). In this hypothetical scenario, with the authority of One who forgives sin, Jesus pronounces the tax collector “justified” before God and the Pharisee not.
Jesus’ declaration of the justification of repentant sinners in the Gospel reading will be heard in sharp contrast in our worship to YHWH’s unsympathetic response to the people of Israel who cry out for mercy in the assigned OT reading from Jeremiah 14:(1-6) 7-10,19-22. The people receive no immediate answer to their prayers for an end to drought (3) in the land of Judah: “Have you utterly rejected Judah? Does your soul loathe Zion? Why have you struck us down so that there is no healing for us?” (19).
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The appointed Psalm 84 (also assigned at Christmas 2 and the feast of the Presentation every year) is a praise psalm composed from the point of view of a faithful worshiper who is either in the temple or longing to be there. In our worship, we might imagine ourselves as the tax collector in Jesus’ parable, departing from the temple, knowing in our hearts that we have been justified by God. The psalmist’s elation over God’s forgiveness presents as devotion to the temple courts themselves, the sacred place where he has been renewed in the LORD: “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of ungodliness. For the LORD God is a light and defense; the LORD will give grace and honor, and no good thing shall he withhold from those who live a godly life” (11-12).
We come to the end of our Year C series from 1 and 2 Timothy with the assigned NT reading from 2 Timothy 4:6-18. Paul ends the epistle with personal notes concerning the confidence he has in Christ facing a martyr’s execution, and (perhaps puzzlingly in light of that) his need of personal items for the continuation of his life and ministry.
Our assigned Collect is like others in the calendar (see Propers 5,21) pleading our sovereign God for peace “in our time.” This is not the artificial tranquility that comes with escaping the world, but rather God’s “peace”–peace the world cannot give (see Jn. 14:27)—which is found mysteriously present in the midst of the trouble as we follow Jesus along the way he takes us.
The Collect
Almighty and everlasting God, you govern all things both in heaven and on earth: Mercifully hear the supplications of your people, and in our time grant us your peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
You Do All These Things (Jeremiah 14:[1-6]7-10,19-22)
7 “Though our iniquities testify against us,
Jeremiah 14:7-10,19-22
act, O Lord, for your name’s sake;
for our backslidings are many;
we have sinned against you.
8 O you hope of Israel,
its savior in time of trouble,
why should you be like a stranger in the land,
like a traveler who turns aside to tarry for a night?
9 Why should you be like a man confused,
like a mighty warrior who cannot save?
Yet you, O Lord, are in the midst of us,
and we are called by your name;
do not leave us.”
10 Thus says the Lord concerning this people:
“They have loved to wander thus;
they have not restrained their feet;
therefore the Lord does not accept them;
now he will remember their iniquity
and punish their sins.”
19 Have you utterly rejected Judah?
Does your soul loathe Zion?
Why have you struck us down
so that there is no healing for us?
We looked for peace, but no good came;
for a time of healing, but behold, terror.
20 We acknowledge our wickedness, O Lord,
and the iniquity of our fathers,
for we have sinned against you.
21 Do not spurn us, for your name’s sake;
do not dishonor your glorious throne;
remember and do not break your covenant with us.
22 Are there any among the false gods of the nations that can bring rain?
Or can the heavens give showers?
Are you not he, O Lord our God?
We set our hope on you,
for you do all these things.
Eventually, at the end of this long section of Jeremiah, there is a word of hope for Israel in the form of a return from exile (see 16:14-15). That word appears, however, long after this passage in which we find the wayward people of Judah crying out for help from a drought over the land. They will receive no relief. In our worship, we will shudder to hear: “Why have you struck us down so that there is no healing for us? We looked for peace, but no good came; for a time of healing, but behold, terror” (19). But, even with that, there is a flickering of faith. The people cry out, “We set our hope on you, for you do all these things” (22).
This last line, beloved, should strike us as an extraordinary conviction to hold when God is silent in troubled times. Even when no practical relief is offered from above, hope arises in the knowledge that God himself is the One sovereign over the difficulty: “…for you do all these things” (22). For those with faith, YHWH’s character of mercy is a sure foothold. They discern the face of God even in, as the psalmist sings, “in a dry and weary land where there is no water” (Ps. 63:1).
Jesus is there, though he has ”no beauty that we should desire him” (Is. 53:2). Thus, we must not despair: our Lord Jesus reveals himself in pain and suffering before resurrection. From C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain: “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”
Today, in the Spirit, in our struggles for better days, we hold on to the sight of you holding what we have—“all these things”—in your hand.
They Will Go from Strength to Strength (Psalm 84)
1 How lovely are your dwellings, *
Psalm 84, New Coverdale Psalter (BCP 2019)
O LORD God of hosts!
2 My soul has a desire and longing to enter into the courts of the LORD; *
my heart and my flesh rejoice in the living God.
3 Indeed, the sparrow has found her a house, and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young, *
even your altars, O LORD of hosts, my King and my God.
4 Blessed are they who dwell in your house; *
they will be always praising you.
5 Blessed is the one whose strength is in you, *
in whose heart are your ways,
6 Who going through the valley of misery uses it for a well; *
indeed, the early rains fill the pools with water.
7 They will go from strength to strength, *
and the God of gods shall be seen by them in Zion.
8 O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer; *
hearken, O God of Jacob.
9 Behold, O God, our defender, *
and look upon the face of your Anointed.
10 For one day in your courts *
is better than a thousand;
11 I would rather be a door-keeper in the house of my God *
than dwell in the tents of ungodliness.
12 For the LORD God is a light and defense; *
the Lord will give grace and honor, and no good thing shall he withhold
from those who live a godly life.
13 O LORD God of hosts, *
blessed is the one who puts his trust in you.
Or, “They are sustained as they travel along” (7, NET). The Hebrew phrase normally translated in English “from strength to strength” in this verse is found only here in the OT. It could suggest increased “strength” (Heb. ḥayil, meaning also “skill” or “capacity”) compounded over time as one matures, perhaps like “grace upon grace” in John 1:16. But this is a pilgrim’s song: it describes the experience of those “in whose heart are the highways to Zion” (5). For this singer, increased blessing is more a function of place rather than time. As the pilgrim travels along the road he finds by God’s mercy pitstops with a variety of necessary supplies, material and spiritual, to sustain him.
Think about the way we go along our way in the venture assigned us in God’s name. If we reflect carefully, we will find that God’s help has been provided at every point. At the beginning, we find the capacity to initiate the project from scratch; as we go along, we are often surprised by the provision of skill we did not know we had to accomplish the tasks that needed doing along the road; when we meet opposition, rather than become hopelessly discouraged, there is the required peace to pass right through that which would threaten the success of the whole venture.
Here is the “strength” given one after another on the way of the pilgrim. The only way to find them, of course, is to take the first step and start the journey. If we don’t do that, we will never discover the wondrous blessings to be found down the road.
Today, Holy Spirit, in our worship let us apply the experience of the pilgrim in this psalm to aid us in facing whatever new challenges there are to be faced around the next corner.
To Him Be the Glory Forever and Ever (2 Timothy 4:6-18)
6 For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. 7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. 8 Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing. 9 Do your best to come to me soon. 10 For Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. 11 Luke alone is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is very useful to me for ministry. 12 Tychicus I have sent to Ephesus. 13 When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, also the books, and above all the parchments. 14 Alexander the coppersmith did me great harm; the Lord will repay him according to his deeds. 15 Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposed our message. 16 At my first defense no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me. May it not be charged against them! 17 But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. So I was rescued from the lion’s mouth. 18 The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.
2 Timothy 4:6-18
Here it is our privilege to overhear in this closing section of 2 Timothy the overlapping, even jumbled, musings of a man unafraid to express his true feelings in a personal letter to a friend: first, Paul shows his triumphant confidence in Christ over his own destiny after death (6-8); then his yearning out of loneliness (“Do your best to come to me soon, 9); next, his sorrow over having lost companions, some by his own command (Cresens and Tychius) and one by desertion (Demas); then, we hear his resentment over being left alone to defend himself at a trial in Rome (16); and, finally, returning to where he began, there is Paul’s gratitude for the faithfulness of the Lord and the promise of his “heavenly kingdom” (18).
Is this not how our minds work scattered day to day–one moment joyful and the next deeply saddended–one minute warm and confident in faith and the next cold and vulnerable for want of a cloak? The good news is the sustaining power of the Lord. His promises of a “crown of righteousness” are secure. Jesus stands by and strengthens us when no one else stands by our side on trial. He reserves our place in glory, rescuing us from “every evil deed.”
Today, in worship, Holy Spirit, we locate ourselves in the up-and-down emotions of Paul; and we pray for the grace to start and finish as he does–in the confidence of Christ.
The One Who Humbles Himself Will Be Exalted (Luke 18:9-14)
9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: 10 “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Luke 18:9-14
This parable is one of many in the Gospels where Jesus juxtaposes the behavior and fate of one type of character with another, ultimately revealing a clear favorite from his perspective as the Son of God. Two other examples we have heard recently in Year C are the Good Samaritan and Lazarus and the Rich Man. The result often comes across as surprising to the ears of the first-century Jewish listener: “What a Pharisee so arrogant in his prayers, and a tax collector–why would he be in the temple at all?” The question may be asked: Is it fair for Jesus to set up straw men stereotypes like that and damage the reputation of whole groups?
In our search for a devotional application to this passage, one answer to that question might be to say it depends if we are focused on the title (or vocation) of the characters or on their actions. Take away the labels “Pharisee” and “tax collector” and see how our attention is drawn more immediately to the pride of the first person in the temple and the humility of the second. This is where Jesus wants us to go, but the problem is that we immediately associate ourselves with the virtuous form of behavior. Adding “Pharisee” and “tax collector” presents a puzzle: “Well if the Pharisee is the bad actor and the tax collector is the good one, where do I locate myself?
Ahh, now Jesus has got us where he wants us: In the way he tells the parable we are more likely to conclude that, in truth, we are a little bit of both before God—a religious devotee who can be prideful and a notorious sinner who can be humble. Holy Spirit, today I recognize myself in both the Pharisee and the tax collector in this reading. Make me always more honest about myself, granting me the humility by which, by grace, you will lift me up.
Today in the Spirit
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