gregoryjenks

Tag: advent

  • Hark! A herald’s voice is calling

    Advent 3 (B)
    17 December 2017
    Christ Church Cathedral

     

    [video]

    It had been my intention to speak about John the Baptist today.

    For two weeks in a row now, the lectionary has offered us early Christian traditions about the Jewish prophet, John. Last week we heard how Mark describes this John in the opening scenes of his Gospel. Today we hear from a very different perspective within earliest Christianity, the Johannine community.

    Mark and John offer very different portraits of Jesus. Yet they both found it necessary to say something about John as they started to share their story of Jesus.

    John has fascinated people from antiquity through until today.

    He acquired his nickname, ‘the Baptizer’, because of his demand that his followers undergo a water ritual to express their personal response to his prophetic message.

    The most famous of his followers was Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus seems to have been baptised by John in the year 28 of the Common Era.

    That simple fact is one of the most certain things we know about Jesus. None of his followers would ever invent such a story. Indeed, it was something of an embarrassment to them that Jesus had once been a disciple of John, and had been baptised by John.

    That simple fact invites us to explore the relationship between these two Jewish prophets from 2,000 years ago.

    Some of that was what I intended to speak about today. But that can wait until January 7, when we celebrate the Festival of the Baptism of the Lord Jesus.

    In the past few days we have seen the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse complete its careful work extending over the past five years, and present its final report to the Governor-General.

    Given the significance of that report for the community and for the churches, it would be remiss of me to say nothing of its work and to talk about some ‘safe’ Advent topic instead.

    For too long the church has averted its gaze from the horrors of child sexual abuse, as well as the abuse of other vulnerable people.

    We can do that no longer, and in part that is thanks to the impressive work of the Royal Commission.

    There is—I suggest—an unexpected link between John the Baptist and the Royal Commission.

    John was an outsider.

    He opposed the abuse of power and the eager grasping of privileges by the Temple clergy in Jerusalem.

    He may have come from one of those families himself. At least that is what Luke would like us to think. But he broke ranks with the religious institution that operated for its own benefit, and he directed to them a prophetic message about judgment, repentance, and renewal.

    Our opening hymn this morning began with the line: “Hark! A herald voice is calling.”

    Indeed, a herald voice is calling.

    It is the voice of the Royal Commission.

    It is a prophetic voice that names and exposes the sins of our churches, along with other institutions in our national life.

    It is a prophetic voice that speaks words of comfort to the victims. That honours the victims. That treats them with a level of care and respect that our church has failed to do.

    It is a prophetic voice that speaks of restitution, vindication and compensation.

    It is a prophetic voice that calls on churches to change their ways. No more averting our gaze. No more shifting of sexual predators from one parish to another. No more silencing of the victims. No more failure of compassion among the disciples of Jesus.

    It is a prophetic voice that maps out a pathway for restoration and recovery.

    It is a prophetic voice that promises renewal if we are prepared to make these changes.

    So far as I am aware, no cases of sexual abuse of children have happened in this parish. But they have happened in our Diocese and in our national Church.

    For all the evil that has been done—and for all the good that has been left undone—we repent. We apologise. We resolve to make amends.

    Already the contributions by the Cathedral Parish to the Diocesan compensation fund have cost us dearly. Resources that could have funded our ministry have been applied to the more urgent ministry of healing and reconciliation. This is a small price to pay compared to the costs borne by the victims all these years.

    I pray these contributions help the victims to heal, and steel the resolve of our Church to make sure this never happens again.

    As a faith community in Grafton we now need to rebuild our relationship with the city.

    This will take time.

    It will require openness to change on our part.

    And it will require a willingness by the community to trust us again.

    Most of all it will require a change of heart on our part.

    Being a ‘safe church’ is not a compliance issue, it is the very heart of the Gospel. It is in our DNA as a community of Jesus’ followers.

    Jesus gathered broken people into a community. He created a safe place for the broken and wounded to find acceptance, healing and purpose.

    Jesus calls us to that mission.

    John the Baptist challenges us to focus on others and not on ourselves.

    The Royal Commission calls us to account and invites us into a journey of reconciliation and healing.

    Hark! A herald’s voice is calling.

    Let’s not miss what the Spirit is saying to the Church at this time.

     

     

     

     

     

  • Anointed with the spirit of the LORD

    Reflections on the first reading for the Third Sunday of Advent …

    Today’s lectionary offers us a rich set of classic texts for Advent.

    As the sermon will focus on John the Baptizer, this brief note will explore the first reading from Isaiah 61.

    This one of several passages in the central part of the great Isaiah Scroll, that scholars refer to as the Servant Songs. No one is entirely sure how the figure of “the Servant” was understood at the time that the texts were being created, but we know it came to play a significant role in the spiritual imagination of the Jewish people around the time of Jesus.

    Isaiah is one of the three OT books most often cited in the New Testament. (The other two are Deuteronomy and the Psalms.) A similar pattern is found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, where the ancient library of this controversial Jewish sect also has more copies of these three books than any other books from the Hebrew Bible. Indeed, a copy of the Isaiah Scroll was among the first Dead Sea Scrolls discoveries in 1947.

    Who is the Servant of the LORD? Is it a person? Is it the nation as a whole? Is it Jerusalem? From a Christian perspective, we recognise that Jesus of Nazareth is the quintessential Servant of the LORD. But what about us? Are we not also called to be the ‘Servant of the LORD’?

    In today’s passage the Servant is someone on whom the Spirit of God has been poured out. As a result of that anointing with the divine Spirit, the Servant will bring good news to the oppressed, bind up the broken hearted, proclaim liberty to the captives, release to the prisoners, and proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour. In Luke’s account of Jesus’ sermon in Nazareth (Luke 4), he imagined Jesus claiming these same words to describe his own ministry.

    Notice the down to earth consequences of the Servant’s ministry as the Anointed One, the Christ. The mission of the Servant is not to increase attendance at religious ceremonies or raise the level of offerings. Real people will find their own lives turned around. Adverse personal circumstances will be reversed. Destroyed and abandoned towns will be rebuilt. A new beginning for all the people of God, and not simply an increase in religious activity by the faithful.

    May the Spirit of the LORD be poured out upon us all, and may we each claim our vocation as the Servant of the LORD.

  • Advent Sunday | Christ the King

    A lecture presented in the Cathedral Church of St George the Martyr, Jerusalem on Advent Sunday, 29 November 2015 by the Very Revd. Canon Dr Gregory C. Jenks, Dean of St George’s College, Jerusalem.

    Introduction

    This is the first of four lectures to be offered at the Cathedral during Advent, and it has fallen to me to offer the inaugural address. In turn, the following presentations will be by Canon Lawrence Hilditch, Canon David Longe, and the Dean.

    Last Sunday many churches in the Western Church—whether in communion with Rome, protesting their independence, or assuming to occupy the middle way—will have observed the feast of Christ the King. In at least some of those places, the festival will have been described as ‘The Reign of Christ’. In my view that is a better option than the more common ‘Christ the King’.

    The very concept of monarchy—and especially absolute monarchy with no constitutional balances in place—is problematic in our world. It reflects a pre-modern world order, a world of empire, and a world where might truly is right.

    We may not have moved very far away from such a world even today, as this region reminds us so emphatically. But we aspire to live in a world where individuals and their families matter, where the powers of sovereigns and corporations are limited by constitution and convention, and where the democratic ideal is preeminent.

    In such a world—incomplete and flawed as it currently may be—there is simply no place for a king with absolute powers.

    The incompleteness of our democratic systems and their incapacity to cope with urgent human crises—whether they be climate change, seemingly intractable conflicts in many parts of the world, or the refugees that flee either or both—points to the need for something better yet to arrive. That might almost make the current context an Advent moment, but it is unlikely that many of us will be yearning for a tyrant, however benevolent, to sort out the mess.

    There is a more serious theological point in these introductory observations than the relevance of royal language in contemporary liturgies. How are we to speak of the mysteries of God when the language of faith that we have inherited from the past is so mortgaged to a worldview that no longer holds true for any of us? How are we to engage the contemporary world if we keep offering them tired metaphors at best, and oftentimes broken myths as well?

    I hope then, that in some small ways, this presentation will assist us to engage with the critical missional task of singing the Lord’s song in a strange (postmodern) world.

    I shall pursue that objective by proceeding in a more or less systematic way through four different set of issues, asking in each case what ‘Christ the King’ may have to say to us in each instance.

    Jesus of Nazareth

    The first set of issues that I would like to explore with you concerns Jesus, the Jewish prophet from Nazareth in the Galilee. What does it mean to describe him as ‘Christ the King’ in the first century and in the twenty-first century?

    In first-century terms, to ascribe kingship (basileia in Greek) to Jesus was to create a rival to Caesar. Caesars had many rivals, and many of them had themselves been rivals to a former Caesar before attaining the imperium themselves. So they understood rivals, and they viewed them all with suspicion. When an inscription such as ‘Jesus of Nazareth, king of the Jews’ was placed above the head of a crucified man, it was not so much a royal title as a charge of treason.

    Today ‘Christ the King’ may evoke the comforting words of The King of Love My Shepherd Is derived—gleaned even—from Psalm 23 and John 10, but in the first century such a claim was highly political and a direct challenge to the legitimacy and the potency of the ruling sovereign.

    Had Tiberius ever heard of Jesus, he may well have asked as Stalin is said to have asked of the Pope many centuries later, “How many legions does he have?” The dialogue between Pilate and Jesus in John 18:28–19:22 is really exploring exactly these issues.

    So many of the terms of religious devotion that we now apply to Jesus derive from ancient politics. This should not be a surprise, since the ancient world in which Christianity was born really only had two domains: the family, and politics. When speaking God’s word to the public sphere, it was necessary to use categories and terminology appropriate to politics, the life of the polis.

    In particular, terms such as ‘Son of God’, ‘Lord’ (kyrios in Greek and dominus in Latin), and ‘Savior’ (Soter in Greek) were royal titles. Such titles were to be found in massive inscriptions above city gates and on the tiny coins in a peasant’s pocket.

    When used of Jesus by his earliest followers, these were not innocent terms of devotion. They were political declarations, and the emperors understood them as such.

    Today marks the beginning of the Year of Luke in our three-year lectionary cycle, so it is especially fitting to pay careful attention to the way Luke began his Gospel. Note, first of all, the careful comments that serve as a prologue to his two-volume work, known to us as The Gospel of Luke and The Acts of the Apostles (‘Luke-Acts’):

    Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed on to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, I too decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the truth concerning the things about which you have been instructed. (Luke 1:1–4 NRSV)

    As Luke sets about the task of publishing his account of “the events that have been fulfilled among us”, he is very conscious that others have written on these topics before him. Those accounts—known to us as the Gospel according to Mark, the Gospel according to Matthew, and the Gospel according to John—were already in circulation by the time this opening paragraph of Luke-Acts was composed. Indeed, the Gospel according to Luke may itself be an enlarged edition of an even earlier Christian gospel known to scholars as the Q Gospel.

    Be that as it may, our author knows he is not the first to attempt this task. But he considers his work to be the best available, and clearly wishes his audience not rely on the earlier examples of this genre. He will provide Theophilus—and us—with the definitive Jesus story. An ‘orderly account’. This is the version he would like us to “read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest”; as he doubtless would have said if given the opportunity to read Cranmer’s Book of Common Prayer.

    With those considerations in mind, now let’s observe how he begins his Gospel.

    Luke begins with the tale of two boys, one of whom will become the Savior of World.

    The two boys are close relatives (cousins), and both have mothers with unusual fertility challenges.

    The first is called John, and his parents are aged and childless. Clearly one of them is sterile, but this just heightens the miraculous element. A child born to elderly parents who were unable to conceive when young and healthy is surely a child of promise. Watch this lad. He will count for something when he grows up.

    The second boy is called, Jesus. His mother had a very different problem. She was not yet married. But she is also assured by an angel sent by God that she will bear a son, and the sign of the promise to her being true is that her aged and childless cousin is also pregnant.

    The story of these two boys is woven into a series of seven scenes:

    • Scene 1 – John’s miraculous conception (Luke 1:5–25)
    • Scene 2 – Jesus’ miraculous conception (Luke 1:26–38)
    • Scene 3 – Mary visits Elizabeth (Luke 1:39–56)
    • Scene 4 – John’s birth and naming (Luke 1:57–80)
    • Scene 5 – Jesus’ birth and naming (Luke 2:1–21)
    • Scene 6 – Presentation in Temple (Luke 2:22–40)
    • Scene 7 – 12-year old Jesus in Temple (Luke 2:41–52)

    The sequence of these episodes and the climatic scene in the Temple are carefully arranged to make a theological point. Perhaps several. By telling the story in this way, Luke has asserted the supremacy of Jesus over John; despite Jesus having been a disciple of John. But that was not the main point.

    Luke was writing for Christians living in the Roman Empire about 100 years after the death of Jesus. They also knew a story about two boys, one of whom who found the city of Rome. Here is the account of that founding myth as told by Plutarch, ca 75 CE:

    Some again say that Roma, from whom this city was so called, was daughter of Italus and Leucaria; or, by another account, of Telaphus, Hercules’s son, and that she was married to Aeneas, or, according to others again, to Ascanius, Aeneas’s son. Some tell us that Romanus, the son of Ulysses and Circe, built it; some, Romus, the son of Emathion, Diomede having sent him from Troy; and others, Romus, king of the Latins, after driving out the Tyrrhenians, who had come from Thessaly into Lydia, and from thence into Italy. Those very authors, too, who, in accordance with the safest account, make Romulus give the name of the city, yet differ concerning his birth and family. For some say, he was son to Aeneas and Dexithea, daughter of Phorbas, and was, with his brother Remus, in their infancy, carried into Italy, and being on the river when the waters came down in a flood, all the vessels were cast away except only that where the young children were, which being gently landed on a level bank of the river, they were both unexpectedly saved, and from them the place was called Rome. Some say, Roma, daughter of the Trojan lady above mentioned, was married to Latinus, Telemachus’s son, and became mother to Romulus; others that Aemilia, daughter of Aeneas and Lavinia, had him by the god Mars; and others give you mere fables of his origin. For to Tarchetius, they say, king of Alba, who was a most wicked and cruel man, there appeared in his own house a strange vision, a male figure that rose out of a hearth, and stayed there for many days. There was an oracle of Tethys in Tuscany which Tarchetius consulted, and received an answer that a virgin should give herself to the apparition, and that a son should be born of her, highly renowned, eminent for valour, good fortune, and strength of body. Tarchetius told the prophecy to one of his own daughters, and commanded her to do this thing; which she avoiding as an indignity, sent her handmaid. Tarchetius, hearing this, in great anger imprisoned them both, purposing to put them to death, but being deterred from murder by the goddess Vesta in a dream, enjoined them for their punishment the working a web of cloth, in their chains as they were, which when they finished, they should be suffered to marry; but whatever they worked by day, Tarchetius commanded others to unravel in the night.

    In the meantime, the waiting-woman was delivered of two boys, whom Tarchetius gave into the hands of one Teratius, with command to destroy them; he, however, carried and laid them by the river side, where a wolf came and continued to suckle them, while birds of various sorts brought little morsels of food, which they put into their mouths; till a cowherd, spying them, was first strangely surprised, but, venturing to draw nearer, took the children up in his arms. Thus they were saved, and when they grew up, set upon Tarchetius and overcame him. This one Promathion says, who compiled a history of Italy.

    When Luke chose to begin his account of Jesus with a story about two boys, he knew what he was doing. Not for him the Matthean infancy story with its echoes of Moses and the Exodus. He is ‘ordering’ his account so that his intended audience will get the point, right from the opening scenes.

    For Luke, Jesus was the boy destined to be king. This ‘Good News’ will reach all the way to Rome, as it does by the last chapter of Acts.

    The kingship of God in the Old Testament

    The idea of the ‘kingdom of God’ (basileia tou theou) is deeply rooted in the Hebrew texts of the Christian Old Testament. The phrase is perhaps better translated as ‘reign of God’ since it refers to be rule of God as sovereign over creation, rather than the object of God’s authority. Indeed, in the first-century context, ‘empire of God’ would be a better translation, since basileia was the term used for the Roman Empire in the Greek-speaking East.

    Even in the OT, the idea of kingship was problematic. It derives from the world of the city, not the village, and certainly not the world of the pastoral nomads such as Israel imagined her ancestors to have been. The ‘wandering Arameans’ of Deuteronomy 26 had no king, since there was almost other social domain apart from the family. Within the family, the patriarch was the supreme authority. Conflict tended to be between patriarchs, and between aspiring patriarchs.

    When kings first appear in the OT story they are the riles of cities in Canaan and—more particularly—the Pharaohs of Egypt. Such rulers are not agents of grace or foretastes of the messianic age. Yet in 1 Samuel 8 the people demand that they have a king to rule over them, because they wished to be like the other nations.

    Such a request was a category error.

    The covenant people are not to be like the other nations. The very essence of election, promise, and covenant is to be a special people, not a clone of the neighbors.

    In time—despite the profound theological critique of kingship offered by 1 Samuel 8 & 12—kingship became the norm for both the northern kingdom and its more rustic southern cousin. Indeed, in the south the concept of kingship was embraced with even more vigor. The Davidic dynasty secured a theological mortgage on the throne, whereas at least in the north the Yahwistic tradition retained the divine prerogative to dismiss a king and choose a new dynasty.

    Royal models for leadership within the covenant people remained unpopular in some 0f the circles from which we receive these sacred texts. The prophets were critical of the kings and their cadre of officials. Anti-royal sentiments are clearly preserved and promoted in some parts of Samuel and Kings. The Deuteronomist only wants a king who keeps a copy of the law beside his throne, and takes instruction from a Levitical priest. Ezekiel’s vision of the restored Israel has a prince, but no king.

    Despite these reservations, or maybe because of them, the idea of divine kingship became both central to the worship life of the community and also nuanced in some interesting ways. The centrality of the kingship of God is expressed in the many Psalms that proclaim, YHWH melek (The LORD is king). The sovereignty of God over the nations and over creation is especially clear in prophetic texts such as Isaiah.

    At the same time, we find that God’s kingship is described in more pastoral terms, even if the warrior God makes a re-appearance in the apocalyptic traditions that dominate the Jewish mindset in the late Second Temple period.

    In Ezekiel 34 we find God portrayed as the good shepherd, in contrast to the unfaithful and self-serving clergy of the Temple:

    The word of the LORD came to me: Mortal, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel: prophesy, and say to them—to the shepherds: Thus says the Lord GOD: Ah, you shepherds of Israel who have been feeding yourselves! Should not shepherds feed the sheep? You eat the fat, you clothe yourselves with the wool, you slaughter the fatlings; but you do not feed the sheep. You have not strengthened the weak, you have not healed the sick, you have not bound up the injured, you have not brought back the strayed, you have not sought the lost, but with force and harshness you have ruled them. So they were scattered, because there was no shepherd; and scattered, they became food for all the wild animals. My sheep were scattered, they wandered over all the mountains and on every high hill; my sheep were scattered over all the face of the earth, with no one to search or seek for them.

    Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD: As I live, says the Lord GOD, because my sheep have become a prey, and my sheep have become food for all the wild animals, since there was no shepherd; and because my shepherds have not searched for my sheep, but the shepherds have fed themselves, and have not fed my sheep; therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD: Thus says the Lord GOD, I am against the shepherds; and I will demand my sheep at their hand, and put a stop to their feeding the sheep; no longer shall the shepherds feed themselves. I will rescue my sheep from their mouths, so that they may not be food for them.

    For thus says the Lord GOD: I myself will search for my sheep, and will seek them out. As shepherds seek out their flocks when they are among their scattered sheep, so I will seek out my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places to which they have been scattered on a day of clouds and thick darkness. I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land; and I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the watercourses, and in all the inhabited parts of the land. I will feed them with good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel shall be their pasture; there they shall lie down in good grazing land, and they shall feed on rich pasture on the mountains of Israel. I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will make them lie down, says the Lord GOD. I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak, but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them with justice.

    As for you, my flock, thus says the Lord GOD: I shall judge between sheep and sheep, between rams and goats: Is it not enough for you to feed on the good pasture, but you must tread down with your feet the rest of your pasture? When you drink of clear water, must you foul the rest with your feet? And must my sheep eat what you have trodden with your feet, and drink what you have fouled with your feet?

    Therefore, thus says the Lord GOD to them: I myself will judge between the fat sheep and the lean sheep. Because you pushed with flank and shoulder, and butted at all the weak animals with your horns until you scattered them far and wide, I will save my flock, and they shall no longer be ravaged; and I will judge between sheep and sheep.

    I will set up over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he shall feed them: he shall feed them and be their shepherd. And I, the LORD, will be their God, and my servant David shall be prince among them; I, the LORD, have spoken. (Ezek 34:1–24 NRSV)

    For Christian readers of these ancient Jewish texts, this resonates with the depiction of Jesus as the Good Shepherd, who lays down his life for the sheep, in John 10:

    I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. 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 10:11–18 NRSV)

    When all the data for divine kingship in the OT is taken into account, we can see a nuancing of the concept from one of awesome power to one of divine care. The pastoral images of the Twenty-Third Psalm displace the warrior God of tribal religion.

    The end result is an invitation to imagine power and leadership in very different terms than ‘kingship’ might suggest. If we imagine God to exercise divine power in ways that are primarily about bringing forth life and serving the vulnerable, then we may also discern an invitation to think differently—and act differently—when exercising power or leadership within the church, within the family, or within the wider society,

    The View from Below

    Having explored some of the issues relating to Jesus and God, it may be timely to think about the significant of this divine kingship language for our understanding of ourselves and our perspective(s) on reality.

    I begin with the question of how we see Jesus. What kind of a ‘king’ do we imagine Jesus to be? If nothing else, the affirmation of ‘Christ the king’ invites us to understand the significance of Jesus in God’s cosmic purposes. But we need not trap Jesus or ourselves in a Byzantine imperial worldview.

    ‘Christ the king’ is also a statement about us, about humanity. It invites us to see that the Human One, the Son of Adam, can be the human face of God. While that may be especially true of Jesus, it is also true for each of us. We can be—and perhaps must be—the human face of God to our family, our neighbors, and even our enemies.

    There is a parallel here to the role of Mary, Theotokos, Mother of God. Mary of Nazareth was uniquely the bearer of the Christ Child. But each of us has that calling as well. Similarly, we may see in Jesus the unique historical revelation of God, but each of us may find that we serve as icons of God for those around us.

    The kingship that Christ embodies is compassionate and life-giving. It is our calling to embody that selfless love seen first in Jesus, as we make the words of 1 Corinthians 13 our personal charter:

    Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. (1 Cor 13:4–8 NRSV)

    In all of this, Christ the king is our model and our pioneer. No longer a source of fear, this ‘king’ encourages us to be all that God knows we can be.

    Reflecting on the deeper significance of Christ the King can also invite us to see God differently. As Christ the King, Jesus is not a distant authority figure, but the God who is with us and among us; indeed, one of us: Emmanuel.

    Another metaphor that I find attractive as I re-imagine the traditional concept of Christ the King, is the suggestion by Bishop John Taylor that we see God as the Go-Between God. This was the title of a book in which he explored the nature and activity of the Holy Spirit, but it comes to mind when I think about the kind of God revealed in Jesus, the one we celebrate now as Christ the King. In many ways, Jesus was the quintessential Spirit-person, and that shapes and reshapes my understanding of ‘Christ the King.

    As Christ the King, Jesus has not peaked. He is not resting on his laurels and enjoying his cosmic retirement after a grueling term of service on the earth. The Spirit of Lord continues to be present and active in the life of the Church, and that is surely an important element of our affirmation that ‘Jesus is Lord’.

    In the end, our reflection on Christ the King must also impact how we see ourselves. What does it mean to be a human being, if Jesus of Nazareth is somehow also the ultimate expression of God’s truth in the cosmos?

    If the Human One can be proclaimed as Christ the King, then that is one big leap for human awareness. The Orthodox speak of divinization as the inner reality of salvation. That may be another way to approach this same mystery. God becomes a human, so that humans can become divine. Emmanuel is more radical and inclusive than perhaps we realized.

    What does it mean for us to be alive and self-aware in this kind of world, where our God becomes one of us and one of us becomes ‘Christ the King’? What value do we place on human life, and always within the context of our own location within the web of creation?

    Is being alive and ever engaged in a process of loving transformation into the character of Christ really what matters most to us? More than success? Than wealth? Than power? Than popularity?

    Can we fashion lives, families, churches, and societies that practice that truth?

    And how would this pan out in the harsh realities of Palestine and Israel now? Where is the kingship of Christ in the streets of the Old City this Advent?

    In conclusion …

    Finally, let me try to bring all this together with some brief reflections on the significance of ‘Christ the King’ for our world.

    In the last week or so, there has been a controversy in the UK about some movie theatres banning the Lord’s Prayer as it was seen to be too ‘political’. This strikes me as an excellent example of how someone can be entirely correct and totally wrong all at the same time.

    The movie chains may have misread the ever-shifting cultural dynamics, but I suspect they did not. Given the growing lack of religious literacy in Western societies, a majority of younger people probably have no real sense of the cultural significance of the Lord’s Prayer in British life. But then they probably do not ‘get’ Shakespeare either. And it may be that the Authorized Version of the Bible—which has already lost its correct name to the more American ‘King James Bible’—is now past of our cultural past, rather than having any current cultural significance beyond the ever diminishing circle of practicing Christians. Among the discarded remnants of yesteryear’s religion, we shall find the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments.

    On the other hand, and for reasons they may never understand, the movie chains probably got this absolutely correct.

    The Lord’s Prayer is a political document. So is the Magnificat that we just sang during Evensong. These are subversive texts. They undermine the cultural assumptions of our pleasure-oriented society. If people took these ancient religious texts seriously they might change the way they vote, and choose to spend their disposable income in different ways. That would be bad for business. But good for the world.

    In a sense, no-one who is doing well from the present world order should allow us to teach people the Lord’s Prayer or chant the Magnificat in our cathedrals. If Christ really is the ‘king’, then things had better change around here.

    Christians—like our Jewish and Muslim cousins—have a higher loyalty than any corporation or any nation. The Roman emperors were on the money when they sensed that the devotees of Jesus were an existential threat to the Empire; to all empire and every empire. Then and now.

    We are advance agents of eternity. We embody the truth that the kingdom of God is drawing nigh, and in some sense is already here among us. We are not content to sell fire insurance for the afterlife, or ring-side seats to Armageddon. We want to change the world now. We want to mortgage the present to God’s future which we glimpse in the affirmation that Christ is king.

    This is exactly what those familiar words in the Lord’s Prayer invite us to imagine:

    … your kingdom come
    your will be done on earth
    as in heaven …

    ©2015 Gregory C. Jenks

  • Advent 2C (9 December 2012)

    Contents

    Lectionary

    • Baruch 5:1-9 (or Malachi 3:1-4) and Luke 1:68-79
    • Philippians 1:3-11
    • Luke 3:1-6

     

    First Reading: The Forerunner

    The book of Malachi (literally, “My messenger”) is the last of the prophetic texts that comprise the Scroll of the Twelve in the Hebrew Bible. The Jewish canon has three parts:

    • Torah (5 scrolls of Moses)
    • Prophets (4 x Former Prophets + 4 x Latter Prophets)
    • Writings (books of different genres that were sacred to Jewish communities around the turn of the eras)

    The Prophets included two very different series of books:

    • What we are more likely to think of as Historical Books (Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings), following the classification of the ancient Greek versions of the Bible, are regarded as prophetic texts in the normative Jewish tradition. Seeing these texts as prophetic writings rather than as historical narratives can open up new ways of approaching these books. They are narratives with an agenda – a prophetic agenda – and do not claim to be critical histories in the modern sense of that term.
    • Matching those four books of the Former Prophets were four great scrolls of the Latter Prophets: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and The Twelve. Each of these scrolls are really compilation albums, gathering up materials connected in some way or other with the legacy of the various named prophets. We note that the Jewish tradition does not distinguish between the “Major” and “Minor” prophets as if size matters. Rather, the majority of the shorter prophetic texts are gathered into a single large scroll to form a body of 12 prophetic witnesses. (The book of Daniel provides an interesting exception, since Jewish tradition does not treat as a prophetic text and assigns it to the Writings.)

    The Scroll of the Twelve comprised the following texts:

    • Hosea
    • Joel
    • Amos
    • Obadiah
    • Jonah
    • Micah
    • Nahum
    • Habakkuk
    • Zephaniah
    • Haggai
    • Zechariah
    • Malachi

    These are all relatively short texts when compared with the collections associated with Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel.

    The twelfth book – Malachi – may have been created by separating a portion of text that originally formed part of Zechariah in order to create, albeit artificially – the symbolic number of twelve prophets. It condemns various signs of decadence among the clergy and the wider society of the prophet’s time (perhaps during the first half of the 5C BCE). As seems always to be the case in apocalyptic literature, the remedy was not seen in political or religious reform but in a dramatic divine intervention:

    See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap; he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the LORD in righteousness. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the LORD as in the days of old and as in former years. (Mal 3:1-4 NRSV)

    In later Jewish tradition, the end-time prophetic sent as the harbinger of the divine Advent would develop as several biblical figures were combined in one form or another:

    • a prophet like Moses (Deuteronomy 18)
    • Elijah returning from heaven (2 Kings 2 and Malachi 4)
    • the voice crying in the wilderness from Isaiah 40
    • the anonymous messenger of Malachi 3

     

    Second Reading: The day of Jesus Christ

    Philippians is one of the seven Pauline letters that are generally accepted as authentic, although even this brief letter may be a composite created from fragments of more than one letter. The passage set for this Sunday is presumably chosen because of its repeated reference to the day of Christ:

    I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ. It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because you hold me in your heart, for all of you share in God’s grace with me, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the compassion of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God. (Phil 1:3-11 NRSV)

    Paul is working with similar categories to the unknown author of Malachi, but his perspective is quite different. He celebrates the faithfulness of his audience and anticipates their vindication on the day of visitation by the divine Lord.

    Gospel: John the Baptiser in Luke-Acts

    John the Baptiser

    In A Marginal Jew (vol. 2: “Mentor, Message and Miracles”), John Meier describes John the Baptist as one of two historical figures that stand at either end of Jesus’ life like bookends. The other is Pontius Pilate. We know of each figure from independent historical sources, although the popular image of both is shaped by Christian tradition that speaks of them only from the perspective of their relationship to Jesus.

    The NT Gospels provide three major blocks of material about John, the Jewish apocalyptic prophet who was a contemporary of Jesus and may also have been something of a mentor to him:

    • Infancy narratives (Luke 1-2)
    • John’s activity culminating in the baptism of Jesus (found in all 4 Gospels)
    • Questions posed by John about Jesus (Luke 7:18-35 || Matt 11:2-19, “Q”)

    John’s death is related in Mark 6:17-29 and more briefly in Matt 14:3-12. There are also a few other passages that mention John or his disciples, sometimes in dispute with Jesus and sometimes in favorable terms.

    The following passage in the first-century Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus, is especially valuable as all our other descriptions of John come from Christian sources and might be expected to promote Jesus while playing down the significance of John:

    [116] Now some of the Jews thought that the destruction of Herod’s army came from God, and that very justly, as a punishment of what he did against John, that was called the Baptist: for Herod slew him, who was a good man, and commanded the Jews to exercise virtue, both as to righteousness towards one another, and piety towards God, and so to come to baptism; for that the washing [with water] would be acceptable to him, if they made use of it, not in order to the putting away [or the remission] of some sins [only], but for the purification of the body; supposing still that the soul was thoroughly purified beforehand by righteousness. Now when [many] others came in crowds about him, for they were very greatly moved [or pleased] by hearing his words, Herod, who feared lest the great influence John had over the people might put it into his power and inclination to raise a rebellion, (for they seemed ready to do any thing he should advise,) thought it best, by putting him to death, to prevent any mischief he might cause, and not bring himself into difficulties, by sparing a man who might make him repent of it when it would be too late. Accordingly he was sent a prisoner, out of Herod’s suspicious temper, to Macherus, the castle I before mentioned, and was there put to death. Now the Jews had an opinion that the destruction of this army was sent as a punishment upon Herod, and a mark of God’s displeasure to him. Antiquities of the Jewish People, 18.116-19: Perseus Digital Library

    We see from Acts 19 that there were followers of John within Jewish circles late into the 1C (or even into the beginning of the 2C), and that they were something of a rival religious community to emerging Christianity.

    John the Baptist in Luke-Acts

    Luke presents John as filling a God-given role in preparing for the ministry of Jesus. He develops the infancy traditions of John and Jesus in parallel to one another:

    • Scene 1 – John’s miraculous conception (Luke 1:5-25)
    • Scene 2 – Jesus’ miraculous conception (Luke 1:26-38)
    • Scene 3 – Mary visits Elizabeth (Luke 1:39-56)
    • Scene 4 – John’s birth and naming (Luke 1:57-80)
    • Scene 5 – Jesus’ birth and naming (Luke 2:1-21)
    • Scene 6 – Presentation in Temple (Luke 2:22-40)
    • Scene 7 – 12-year old Jesus in Temple (Luke 2:41-52)

    As Luke continues his presentation of Christianity in the two volumes we know as Luke-Acts, he gives John the Baptist more attention than in any other NT writing:

    Luke 3:1-22 provides an extensive description of John prior to the baptism of Jesus (of which we read just the opening words this week).

    In 5:33-39 Luke uses the material from Mark about the divergence in religious practice between John’s disciples (“always fasting and offering prayers”) and Jesus’ disciples (“yours just eat and drink”). Instead of reading that simply as a question directed to Jesus by the crowds, perhaps it should be understood (as Luke’s readers most likely appreciated) as a reference to the sustained rivalry between John’s people and the Jesus people? Did John’s disciples observe more traditional Jewish practices, while the Jesus people gathered for Eucharists in which the fellowship of the kingdom was experienced (but which their critics derided as “just eat and drink”).

    Luke 7:18-35 directly addresses the relationship of John and Jesus. Luke asserts the primacy of Jesus, while affirming the importance of John. Yet Luke is also making the point that the least significant person in the Kingdom is greater than John. Once again the contrast between the asceticism of John’s followers and the exuberant celebrations of the Jesus people is clear.

    Luke 9:7-9,18-21 preserves a tradition that some thought Jesus to be John returned to life following his murder by Herod Antipas. When introducing the Lord’s Prayer (Luke 11:1), Luke has the disciples request Jesus to teach them how to pray just like John had taught his disciples how to pray. This detail is only found in Luke. Matthew’s account simply has Jesus deciding to give some instruction on prayer (and the contrast is not with the prayer tradition of John’s people, but with those of the Gentiles). Once again we glimpse a profound tension between John’s followers and the Jesus movement.

    Luke 16:16 treats John as the final prophet, and the one whose ministry marks the transition from the time of Law and the Prophets. In contrast, Luke presents Jesus as the one ushering in the Kingdom era. Luke’s version of this tradition differs significantly from Matthew’s (Matt 11:1-15): Matthew dates the breaking in of God’s Kingdom “from the time of John the Baptist until now.” He also explicitly identifies John with the Elijah figure expected to appear at the end of time. Luke does not allow John to be the Elijah figure since he will keep that function for Jesus himself.

    In the Book of Acts the first of several references to John is found in Acts 1:4-5. Here (as if anticipating 19:1-7) Jesus contrasts John, who baptized with water, to the coming “baptism with the Holy Spirit.”

    Jesus’ baptism by John is mentioned as the beginning of Jesus’ ministry in key speeches Luke creates for Peter and Paul in his narrative: Peter calling for a new apostle to replace Judas (1:21-22), Peter preaching to Cornelius (10:34-38), and Paul’s sermon to the Pisidian Jews (13:23-25).

    In Acts 11:15-17, Luke has Peter cite the difference between John’s water baptism and the Spirit baptism of early Christianity when defending his decision to baptize Cornelius and his household.

    The second-last reference to John the Baptist occurs in Acts 18:24-28. In this passage two of Paul’s associates put a fellow Christian missionary through a crash course in theology. Apollos “had been taught the way of the Lord and was on fire with the Spirit.” Better still, “he used to speak and teach about Jesus correctly.” However, Apollos had one shortcoming: “he knew only the baptism of John.”

    Finally we have Acts 19:1-7, where the disciples of John need to move beyond John’s “baptism of repentance” (presumably expressed in fasting and prayers?), to a more eucharistic faith that celebrates the gift of the Spirit at the shared table (“just eating and drinking” to their detractors?). In this unique passage, Luke portrays Paul coming across a small community that is centered around the teachings of John the Baptist. This is the only time that the NT admits such groups existed and were rivals to the Jesus communities within Judaism. This episode allows Luke to assert the primacy of the Jesus movement over John’s followers: John’s people (described as disciples) are quite unaware of the Holy Spirit until Paul lays hands on them. Like the conversion of the first Gentiles (Acts 10), there is miraculous confirmation of their inclusion in the kingdom as they speak in tongues and prophesy. Significantly, Luke tells us there were about 12 people involved: sufficient for a properly ordered apostolic community.

    Needless to say, we do not have any direct evidence of how John or his own disciples understood his place in the scheme of things.

     

    John’s Message in Luke 3

    Luke’s description of John’s message is outlined in Luke 3:1-20:

    [A] First of all, Luke carefully locates John by reference to several public figures that might be known to his audience:

    3:1 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, 2 during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. 3 He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins …

    In contrast, notice how Mark and Matthew introduce John the Baptist, without even the infancy traditions that precede his public activity in Luke-Acts:

    Mark 1:4 John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5 And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. 6 Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey.

    =Matt 3:1: In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, 2″Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” 3 This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’” 4 Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. 5 Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, 6 and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

    [B] Then Luke follows Mark and Matthew, by interpreting John through the lens of Isaiah 40 (and correcting Mark’s inaccurate inclusion of words from Malachi as well as Isaiah):

    as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah,
    “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
    “Prepare the way of the Lord,
    make his paths straight.
    Every valley shall be filled,
    and every mountain and hill shall be made low,
    and the crooked shall be made straight,
    and the rough ways made smooth;
    and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”

    [C] At this point, Luke introduces material not found in his earlier sources, as he describes the message proclaimed by John and indicates how it was received by the people:

    7 John said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. 9 Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”
    10 And the crowds asked him, “What then should we do?” 11 In reply he said to them, “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” 12 Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, “Teacher, what should we do?” 13 He said to them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.” 14 Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”

    [D] In words reminiscent of his description in the Gospel of John (1:26-27 & 3:28-30), Luke portrays John as looking for someone greater to succeed him and act as God’s agent of judgment:

    15 As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, 16 John answered all of them by saying, “I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

    [E] Finally, Luke notes that a corrupt Herodian prince had ordered John’s execution — an event he refrains from describing, unlike Mark (6:17-29) and Matthew (14:3-12a). He mentions this outcome twice (see also Luke 9:7-9) but seems to play it down. It was perhaps a fate that might have suggested to Luke’s readers that there was something of the rebel about both Jesus and his mentor, John. Luke seems to have been at some pains to represent both John and Jesus as model citizens with a pedigree that featured family connections in Jerusalem and its Temple.

    18 So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people. 19 But Herod the ruler, who had been rebuked by him because of Herodias, his brother’s wife, and because of all the evil things that Herod had done, 20 added to them all by shutting up John in prison.

     

    Jesus Database

     

    Liturgies and Prayers

    For liturgies and sermons each week, shaped by a progressive theology, check Rex Hunt’s web site

    Other recommended sites include:

     

    Music Suggestions

    See David MacGregor’s Together to Celebrate site for recommendations from a variety of contemporary genre.

  • Advent 1C (2 December 2012)

    Contents

    Lectionary

    • Jeremiah 33:14–16 and Psalm 25:1–10
    • 1 Thessalonians 3:9–13
    • Luke 21:25–36

     

    Introduction – Celebrating the One Who Comes

    During the period that begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day, communities that observe Advent have an opportunity to reflect on a significant dimension of faith: God as the Anticipated One.

    So much of religion seems to be concerned with the past. Tradition plays a large (and vital) role in most people’s spirituality. Intense debates rage over the historicity of certain (alleged) events from the past. The creedal and liturgical formulations that so largely define contemporary forms of faith are themselves legacies from the past. The Scriptures, necessarily, are documents of the distant past rather than ring binders in which we are expected to collect future issues from an ongoing series.

    Christmas itself is a celebration of a particular past event: the birth of Jesus. Even if we consider the canonical stories to be symbolic narratives that disseminate theology more than history, there is little doubt that Jesus was born. Anyone whose death is well attested can be assumed to have been born.

    Advent is unique in that it celebrates the incomplete and the not-yet. Advent draws us beyond a fascination with the past, and invites us to consider the possibility that the God of sacred tradition might also be a part of our immediate experience, as well as having something far greater to reveal in the future. Advent can name the reality that we do not have the final word. There is always more to God, and to life, than what we have seen so far.

    Advent is not simply a preparation to celebrate Christmas. It is an invitation to welcome the One Who Comes. It is rightly designated a prophetic season, for this is a time to identify with the prophets of all times as people who have ears to hear and eyes to see; people who are awake to the possibilities of God’s dynamic presence in our own circumstances.

    Over the four Sundays of Advent this year, as we begin a year that will focus especially on the Gospel of Luke, the themes will be as follows:

    • Seeing beyond the horizon of humanity (Luke 21:25-36)
    • John the Baptist: prepare the way of the Lord (Luke 3:1-6)
    • Responding to prophetic voices (Luke 3:7-18)
    • The child of promise (Luke 1:39-45)

     

     

    First Reading: The days are surely coming …

    The brief passage from Jeremiah 33 designated for the first reading for RC and RCL communities, captures the essence of the Advent theme. It looks to a future time of blessing when a Davidic ruler will executive justice and righteousness in the land.

    Several aspects of an ancient world view are encapsulated in this brief text:

    • The idea of the ruler as a divine delegate who serves as an agent to implement divine justice. Such a “lord” is acclaimed as “savior” (Greek: soter) and celebrated as a divine “son” of the community’s patron deity (“God our Father”). Notice, in Paul’s formula from 1 Thessalonians, how these ideas are applied to God and Jesus by the earliest Christian communities known to us.
    • The role of the prophetic oracle promising dynastic succession as a guarantee of divine blessing.
    • The powerful tradition of Davidic descent for an authentic claim to Jewish leadership.

    A text such as this can also invite us to think about the role of prophecy in ancient Israel and in post-biblical times:

    • The original prophet seems to have been a recognized figure who could be invited to speak a word “from the LORD.” Such characters could be on the ruler’s staff, and receive their living from the state. But they could also be independent charismatic figures who sometimes acted in opposition to the ruler and the official cult.
    • In time prophetic texts are produced: a scroll for Isaiah, a scroll for Jeremiah, a scroll for Ezekiel, and another collecting the words of “the Twelve” into a single work. These “Latter Prophets” excluded Daniel, but were matched by another set of “Former Prophets:” Joshua, Judges, Samuel & Kings. The origins of the Latter Prophets are a puzzle, but each of the four scrolls appears to be an anthology of texts designed to fashion a self-conscious prophetic voice apart from the historical deeds and words of the named prophet. What, if anything, was the relationship between the historical figure of Isaiah or Amos and the books that have become their legacy to humanity?
    • Centuries later when Tiglath-Pileser and Nebuchadnezzar are but vague memories, the prophetic texts are appropriated in new circumstances. Often they were reduced to catalogues of predictions and employed in theological confrontations between opposing factions of the pious. At times they tapped deep wellsprings of the human spirit. The prophetic books of Scripture have been both springs of fresh water and poisoned wells fostering hatred between different human communities.

    The difference may depend on the spirit in which we approach these texts. When approached with an Advent mind \set — in anticipation that the God Who Comes is also the God Beyond All Names and the God who has yet more (new) truths to reveal — these ancient texts can draw us into the liberty of the children of God.

     

    Zechariah 14:4-9 – On that day

    The ECUSA lectionary designates Zech 14:4-9 as the first reading. This passage provides another example of Jewish apocalyptic anticipating a collapse of the natural order as the eschatalogical moment draws near:

    On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives, which lies before Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley; so that one half of the Mount shall withdraw northward, and the other half southward. And you shall flee by the valley of the Lord’s mountain, for the valley between the mountains shall reach to Azal; and you shall flee as you fled from the earthquake in the days of King Uzziah of Judah. Then the LORD my God will come, and all the holy ones with him. On that day there shall not be either cold or frost. And there shall be continuous day (it is known to the LORD), not day and not night, for at evening time there shall be light. On that day living waters shall flow out from Jerusalem, half of them to the eastern sea and half of them to the western sea; it shall continue in summer as in winter. And the LORD will become king over all the earth; on that day the LORD will be one and his name one.

    This passage has many affinities with the Apocalyptic Discourse in Mark 13=Luke 21=Matt 24 and also with Paul’s apocalyptic instruction as seen in 1 Thessalonians.

     

    Second Reading: Ready for the coming of our Lord Jesus

    Advent themes are not central to this passage from 1 Thessalonians 3, but that makes this an even more significant passage for gaining a perspective on Paul’s own thorough-going apocalypticism. Even when not especially focusing on such issues, Paul reveals by his choice of words how deep is his debt to older prophetic and apocalyptic texts.

    Notice Paul’s familiar way of mentioning God and Jesus in the same phrase. As also seen in the opening and closing formulae of his letters, Paul limits “God” to “the Father” while typically speaking of Jesus as “our Lord.” The following examples come from the opening paragraphs of Paul’s letters:

    1 Thessalonians 1
    Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace.

    Galatians 1
    Paul an apostle—sent neither by human commission nor from human authorities, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead—and all the members of God’s family who are with me, To the churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to set us free from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

    1 Corinthians 1
    Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes, To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    2 Corinthians 1
    Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the church of God that is in Corinth, including all the saints throughout Achaia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, …

    Philippians 1
    Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the bishops and deacons: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    Romans 1
    Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures, the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name, including yourselves who are called to belong to Jesus Christ, To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    Philemon
    Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our dear friend and co-worker, to Apphia our sister, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    These phrases have become familiar religious texts to us, but in 1C they were formulations that reflected current political terminology. They represented not so much a subordination of Jesus to God as an elevation of Jesus over against the emperor. Such talk could cost people their lives. And it did.

    Finally, it is worth noting how Paul recycles older ideas. The reference to “the coming of our Lord Jesus …” in 1 Thess 3:13 can be placed alongside the tradition already known to us from Daniel 7 and Zechariah 14:

    Dan 7:13-14 – As I watched in the night visions, I saw one like a human being coming with the clouds of heaven. And he came to the Ancient One and was presented before him. To him was given dominion and glory and kingship, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not pass away, and his kingship is one that shall never be destroyed.

    Zech 14:5 – Then the LORD my God will come, and all the holy ones with him.

    1Thess 3:13 – that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints (Greek: hagioi = holy ones, or angels).

    2Thess 1:7 – … when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels

     

     

    Gospel: Natural calamities and the End

    The core of this week’s Gospel, and the only portion used in the RC lectionary, is Luke 21:25-28:

    There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in a cloud’ with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.

    The ECUSA and RCL selections include the following “parable” of the fig tree (which is not really a typical parable and lacks the hallmarks of a classic Jesus’ saying) and the RCL also includes vss 34-36 (a concluding call to personal watchfulness lest one be caught unawares by “that day”).

    Luke 21 represents a re-working of the apocalyptic discourse taken from Mark 13. Both Matthew and Luke have taken over this tradition from Mark and each given it a slight edit to focus on themes of concern to their communities.

    Underlying this portion of the discourse is the common view of the world as a structure put in place — and kept there — by divine command. The ancient priestly account of creation (Gen 1:1-2:4a) assumes that the natural condition of the world without God’s intervention is watery chaos. As part of creation, God separates the waters and sets boundaries to restrain the sea (often imagined as a fearsome Dragon or some other “monster of the Deep”). When God later punishes the world for human sin, in the flood story, in effect the divine ordering that kept creation in place is suspended. The waters flood back in and destroy everything God has made — except for the handful of people and animals on board the Ark.

    These images may derive from the irrigated agricultural societies of ancient Mesopotamia, where human life was sustained by a constant struggle with river and sea. The levy banks that were essential for irrigation imposed a human order on nature. But the floods could sweep them all away, and sea monsters (crocodiles) could emerge from the deep to devour the unwitting farmer. Ancient archetypes are to be found in these biblical texts. The dragon in Revelation 12 and its servant, the “monster from the sea” in Revelation 13, are 1C Christian expressions of the same primal mythology.

    In this week’s Gospel, the created order is imagined as coming apart prior to the arrival of the Son of Man. This is an ancient expression of the eternal human wish for order and predictability. That deep desire for order allowed the Nazis to take power in a Germany weakened by its defeat in World War One and devastated by economic distress. The current “war on terror” may be playing into some of the same ancient dreams of a savior/ruler who could eradicate chaos and guarantee the regular cycles of “normal life.”

    Although Jesus does not seem to have invoked these mythological themes in his own prophetic role as the child of Wisdom/Sophia, his followers soon reverted to traditional apocalyptic categories to celebrate his significance for them and to quieten their own deep-seated fears. In early Christian apocalyptic texts, the Christ figure always takes on the role of the conquering hero who saves God’s people. In most other respects, Christian apocalypses are indistinguishable from their Jewish antecedents.

    In the Synoptic Apocalyptic Discourse, the image of “a son of Man” (ie, one in human form) from Daniel 7 has now been reinterpreted as a specific individual coming from God to rescue the elect, rather than as a positive metaphor for the covenant people in contrast to the monstrous beasts that emerge from the sea and were used as symbols for Israel’s imperial oppressors:

    • Dan 7:4 – lion with eagle’s wings (Babylon)
    • Dan 7:5 – bear (Medes)
    • Dan 7:6 – leopard (Persia)
    • Dan 7:7 – ten horned monster (Alexander and the Greeks)
    • Dan 7:13 – human-like figure (Michael=Israel)

    The original referent of the one like a human being in Dan 7:13 was probably Michael, an Archangel once thought to have special responsibilities to protect the people of God (see also Dan 12:1 and his similar role on Rev 12:7-9). In Daniel 7, Michael represents the people of God who will receive an eternal empire. Over the 200 years or so between Daniel 7 and the earliest Christian apocalypses (see Mark 13 and parallels, Didache 16, Revelation to John, and 2 Thessalonians 2), this figure ceases to be a metaphor for the nation and becomes an heroic individual sent from heaven to rescue God’s people. We can trace something of this transformation in the earlier layers of 1 Enoch, a book long revered by the Ethiopian church but now known to have been influential in Jewish circles such as the Qumran community.

    These ancient apocalyptic texts reflect the best historical and scientific knowledge of their time. While often understood as the literature of the marginalized, their authors must have been well educated. They had both the skills and the time needed for literary efforts, and their writings sometimes drew on current descriptions of the physical universe as well as historical archives.

    The ancient imagery of a collapsing cosmic infrastructure no longer speaks to us, but we can still ask what ways of speaking about justice and hope do speak to the contemporary person? How do we “sing the Lord’s song” in this strange 21C world in which we find ourselves? What does faithfulness mean for us — here and now?

     

     

    Jesus Database

    • 002 Jesus Apocalyptic Return: (1) 1 Thess 4:13-18; (2) Did. 16:6-8; (3) Matt 24:30a; (4) Mark 13:24-27 = Matt 24:29,30b-31 = Luke 21:25-28; (5a) Rev 1:7; (5b) Rev 1:13; (5c) Rev 14:14; (6) John 19:37.
    • 007 Of Davids Lineage: (1a) Rom 1:3; (1b) 2 Tim 2:8; (2) Matt 2:1-12; (3) Luke 2:1-20; (4) John 7:41-42; (5a) Ign. Smyrn. 1:1a; (5b) Ign. Eph. 18:2c; (5c) Ign. Trall. 9:1a.
    • 188 The Unknown Time: (1a) Mark 13:33-37; (1b) Matt 24:42; (1c) Matt 25:13; (2) Luke 12:35-38; (3) Luke 21:34-36; (4) Did. 16:1.
    • 265 Within this Generation: (1) Mark 13:28-32 = Matt 24:32-36 = Luke 21:29-33.

     

     

    Liturgies and Prayers

    For liturgies and sermons each week, shaped by a progressive theology, check Rex Hunt’s web site. See also:

    • Advent Wreath – a liturgy for the Advent Wreath on Australian themes and prepared by Rex Hunt, Canberra (Australia)

    Other recommended sites include:

     

    Music Suggestions

    See David MacGregor’s Together to Celebrate site for recommendations from a variety of contemporary genre.

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