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Today’s readings

God says to Moses today, “I AM who am.” God cannot be known as something or someone static or even two dimensional. Our God is a God who is active, relational, transcendent and yet immanent, our God is not something or someone, but is in many ways a verb: I AM who am.

Our God is a God who saves. He took the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt and delivered them to a land flowing with milk and honey. Just so, he takes us out of slavery to this world and out of slavery to our sinfulness and delivers us to a life of grace and true joy. We have nothing in heaven or on earth that has not come from God and our God is faithful in giving, faithful in saving, faithful in relating to his people, the people he has chosen for all time.

Our God gives us rest from our burdens. He replaces the burdens of the world and the burdens of our sinfulness with the burdens of following him. His burdens are easy and light, not necessarily in and of themselves, but they are easy and light because the burdens God gives us, God also helps us carry. Only by taking on the burdens of our God can we ever truly find rest for ourselves.

We gather to give thanks to our God today, our God who remembers his covenant forever.

Today’s readings

It’s a frightening thing, I think, to hear Jesus say in today’s Gospel reading, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth. I have come to bring not peace but the sword.” And it’s frightening not because of some actual sword that might impale us, but instead because of the havoc a statement like that could wreak in our spiritual lives. There’s an old trite saying that says Jesus didn’t come just to comfort the afflicted, but also to afflict the comfortable. It may be trite, but there is truth there.

The spiritual life is one of precarious balance. Things can be going along alright, much as the relationships the Jews had with the Egyptian government while Joseph was alive. But then something can change in our lives: in the words of our first reading today, a new king, who knows nothing of Joseph, can take over. In the context of that first reading, the new king taking over didn’t know Joseph and thus have all the good feelings toward the Jews that Joseph inspired. In the context of our spiritual lives, the new king is whatever new distraction may come our way and, knowing nothing of Joseph, that is, knowing nothing of the harmony that can be part of our lives when we follow the right way, that distraction takes over and tears us away from our God.

In that light, the first reading today is a discussion of the seductive power of sin. Just as the new king wanted to stop the increase of the Jews, so sin wants to stop our increase in the spiritual life. Just as the Egyptians oppressed the Jews with hard labor, so sin oppresses us by affecting our work, our relationships, and our life of faith. But just as the more the Jews were oppressed, the more they multiplied, so the more that we are oppressed by sin, the more we can multiply grace by turning back to God.

Sin is a dreadful power in our world. Sin knows nothing of Joseph, knows nothing of the life of grace and its joy. But we don’t have to let it oppress us. We can let Jesus bring the sword to afflict the comfort of our sin and help us to multiply and increase in the life of grace and faith. As our Psalmist says this morning, “Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth.”

Today’s readings

“Without cost you have received; without cost you are to give.”

Joseph realized what this Gospel statement of Jesus meant long before Jesus himself ever uttered it. Given his position of power, he could have had all of his brothers imprisoned or worse because of what they did to him. But he doesn’t do that. Instead, the anger in his heart is broken, and he realizes that what happened to him since being sold into Egypt was eventually a very great gift. In fact, it was such a great gift that it fulfilled God’s plan for the people. And he was glad to be reunited with them. He realized that he had been given many blessings without cost, and he was now prepared to bestow them on his brothers in the same way.

We too have received so much without cost. Think about the place we live. We are in one of the richest cities in one of the riches counties in what is, hands down, the richest nation on earth. Not only that, we are able to worship freely here today, without fear of persecution or any kind of danger. This church building provides refuge from the weather, be it hot or cold, snow or rain. We have places to live and food to eat, and freedom to do whatever pleases us. Whatever we have worked hard for, even the ability to work that hard was given to us. We have talents and gifts that we could never have produced in ourselves. Even our ability to think, reason and communicate comes from God. Without cost we have received indeed.

And now we, like the Apostles, are being told to give without cost. To use our talents and gifts to build up the kingdom and not just our own interests. To take advantage of our ability to worship freely and let the Lord mold us into disciples who can make an impact on the world. To share our incredible resources with all God’s people. Because there has been no limit to God’s lavish giving, there can be no limit to our grateful sharing. Without cost we have received, without cost may we give.

Today’s readings

Some people think that the spiritual life should be easy. Today’s readings prove to us that it’s not that way. Jacob wrestles with “some man” in today’s first reading; ostensibly, it’s God himself. They tussle all day long and finally they declare it a draw, but leave poor Jacob injured from the battle. But, in the end, Jacob receives a blessing. That’s the way, brothers and sisters, the spiritual life works. We often wrestle with God in some way or another, and occasionally the battle marks us, but we always end up blessed by the experience, that is, if we’re ready to do battle for the long haul.

I think what’s hard about this is that first you have to identify what the battle is, and then you have to have the courage to stick with it. Maybe you’re struggling with God because he’s calling you to do something new; something you’re not sure if you want on your plate. Or maybe your prayer life has grown stale and you are being called to revitalize it. Or maybe he’s encouraging you to move to a new place in a relationship or in your vocation or whatever it may be. It’s a struggle, and there could be considerable wrestling with God. But you have to identify it. And then stay with it.

All the saints have had to wrestle with God at some point or another. It’s a process of getting over our own inhibitions to the spiritual life and passing the obstacles that we put in the way of our relationship with God. It’s difficult, and it’s scary, and it needs to be surrounded with prayer. Only then can you stay with it and bear its marks, and receive God’s blessings.

Today’s readings

If we want to know if we are doing God’s will, I think, we need to examine our lives for evidence of joy. The disciple who goes about his or her work in this world grudgingly and amidst a total disconnect with other people isn’t much of a disciple at all, I’m afraid. I have been a priest now for just over a year, as you know, and lately I have been examining my vocation and how it’s been going. I wanted to see what I need to spend more time on and what I need to perhaps let go of. One of the great barometers for me has been to look at what gives me joy in my ministry. Not that every moment is supposed to be a picnic, that’s not the point at all. But God speaks through joy in our lives because joy is an indication that we’re doing what God wants from us. And I can find joy in doing some pretty hard things, like anointing a person near death, or ministering to a family who has come to the Church to arrange a loved one’s funeral. Joy doesn’t necessarily mean doing things that are easy and fun, but it means more that we are doing what we were created for, that we are using our time and our talents to build the kingdom in the particular way God has called us to do that, that we are living our discipleship in a way that gives honor and glory to God.

Now discipleship is not a popular term these days, I’m afraid. Maybe that’s because it comes from the same root as the word discipline which can be such an ugly word for us sometimes. And in a world where people do pretty much what they want, when they want and where they want, the idea of discipline doesn’t really work. But all of us who are followers of Jesus are disciples, and as such, we are subject to the discipline of the One we follow, Jesus Christ. So let’s take a look at today’s Liturgy of the Word and see what we can find out about the discipline that Jesus teaches us, and perhaps where we can find joy in following that discipline.

Now, before I launch into that study of the readings, I should point out that this is one of Fr. Ted’s favorite Gospel readings. He is so aware of the many needs of our parish and the difficulty of fulfilling them all, that he points to this reading as a reason to have two priests in a parish. “The Lord sent them out two by two,” he often tells me, “so I am so glad to have an associate to go out and do the Lord’s work with me.” Now, a little further down in the reading, the Lord says he was sending them out “like lambs among wolves.” So guess what that makes all of you… But I digress….

There are three specific disciplines that Jesus teaches the seventy-two that I want to reflect on today. First: don’t rely on yourself. Second: go in peace. And third: eat and drink what is set before you.

So first, don’t rely on yourself. Listen to the instructions Jesus gives the seventy-two before they leave: “Carry no money bag, no sack, no sandals; and greet no one along the way.” Now that all seems pretty impractical to those of us who have to travel in the twenty-first century, doesn’t it? I mean, the only possible instruction in there that would make our travel at all easy is to wear no sandals – bare feet sure travel easier through security checkpoints! But we definitely need a money bag to carry what we’d need to pay tolls and buy fuel, and certainly we’d need a sack to carry identification as well as just basic things we’d need for the journey. And greeting no one along the way just seems downright inhospitable.

And this is worse for me, because I always overpack for a trip! But I think we’re missing the point here. If we take the time to bring everything with us that we’d ever need for the journey, we’d never get on the road. It’s much like the disciples in the Gospel reading last Sunday who wanted to bury their dead or greet their family, all at the expense of following Christ. At some point we have to stop thinking about maybe doing God’s will and just get out there and do it. Another point is that if we were even able to foresee every possibility and pack for every possible need, we would certainly not need Jesus, would we? Jesus is telling the seventy-two, and us as well, to stop worrying and start following. Rely on Jesus because he is trustworthy. Experience the joy of letting Jesus worry about the small stuff while he is doing big things in and through you.

Second, go in peace. Jesus says to the seventy-two: “Into whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace to this household.’ If a peaceful person lives there, your peace will rest on him; but if not, it will return to you.” Those disciples were sent out with the peace of Christ, and were told to expect to be received in peace. The source of the peace they were sent out in was, of course, Jesus himself. He is the one who greets the disciples after the Resurrection by saying “peace be with you.” The peace he is offering is not just the absence of conflict. In fact, their journeys may indeed involve some conflict: conflict with demons, conflict with illness, conflict with those who may not receive them. No, the peace he sends the seventy-two out with is a peace that they receive from knowing they are doing God’s will and that souls are coming back to God. It is a peace that says that everyone and everything is in right relationship, the way things are supposed to be.

The disciples are told to enter a place and say “Peace to this household.” So we too must also offer this greeting of peace to those we come to work with. There are a lot of ways to make this greeting, though. We could say it in those words, or perhaps through our actions: in not returning violence with violence; doing our best to diffuse anger and hatred; treating all people equally; respecting the rights of both the well-established and the newcomer; working to make neighborhoods and communities less violent; protecting the abused and the ridiculed. This peace is a peace that brings true joy.

And third, eat and drink what is set before you. This is again a trust issue. The seventy-two are to trust that since the laborer deserves his payment, the Lord will provide for what they need. But there’s a bit more to it, I think. Eating and drinking what is set before them meant that if they were to be given ministry that is difficult, they needed to stay with it, because that’s what was set before them. If they have been received in peace, then they need to know that they are in the right place. That doesn’t mean that the mission would be easy, though, and they need to take what’s given to them. We too have to know that our mission may not be easy, but if we have been given it in peace, we have to accept the mission we have. Taking things as they are and trusting in God to perfect our efforts is a path to true joy.

Blessed Mother Teresa once said, “Joy is prayer – Joy is strength – Joy is love – Joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls.” For the disciple, the life of prayer must lead us to this kind of joy. Because joyous disciples are the ones who bring unbelievers to the faith. They are the ones that bring God’s love to the forgotten and the sorrowful. They are the ones that make God’s presence and care known to those who have been marginalized and exploited. Following the discipline of Christ by relying on Christ – not ourselves, by bringing the peace of God to our missionary encounters, and by eating and drinking what the mission sets before us, this is the way to true joy. This is the joy of which the Psalmist sings, “Shout joyfully to God, all the earth, sing praise to the glory of his name!”

Today’s readings

Today’s readings are, well, interesting. It’s hard to know in today’s first reading if the Lord is blessing dishonest conduct, or if it’s the providence of God that is working its way out. All of us must surely bristle a bit when we see Esau cheated out of his father’s blessing, and Jacob and Rebekah’s dishonest conduct blessed. Secretly we all must have been waiting for the wrath of God to come down upon the two of them and turn them into a pillar of salt, like Lot’s wife. But that’s not what happens here. And we know that Jacob is blessed as the father of a nation. What the message seems to be here is that God does not let an accident of birth order stand in the way of blessing one he has chosen.

If our Gospel reading today could shed any light on this conundrum, perhaps it is that we cannot put new wine into old wineskins. The new wine of God’s justice and omnipotence just won’t be contained in the old wineskins of our understanding. Instead, that new wine bursts forth from those wineskins and saturates the earth with mercy and justice.

Today, may we rejoice with our bridegroom that God’s mercy and compassion never end and that our limited understandings cannot be the containers of God’s ways.

Today’s readings

For those of us who think we have it all together, that we are righteous in and of ourselves, well, today’s Gospel isn’t Good News, is it? Jesus says, “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” But for those of us who know we need our Savior, what great joy to know that our Savior will come and dine with us!

That Jesus would call a man like Matthew to come and follow him is news of redemption and hope for all of us. Tax collectors in those days, as you may know, were notorious for exploiting the people they were collecting from, taking far over and above what their tax should be. The occupation of tax collector was synonymous with the name “sinner.” Clearly such a man was unfit for the kingdom of God. But to him, the Lord Jesus says, “follow me.”

The redemption we have in Christ is a complete healing and change from the inside out. We aren’t just forgiven and sent out to continue living our lives as we always have. No, we are forgiven and then told to “follow me.” Because following Christ is the only way that our broken lives can be reclaimed and drawn back to God who made us. And following Christ is the only way that we sinners can be part of the Kingdom of God.

Today’s readings

God is always most concerned about what is going on inside of us. Which is why Jesus says to the paralytic, “Courage, child, your sins are forgiven.” It would have been easy for Jesus to snap his fingers and heal the man’s paralysis, but that is not what he was most concerned about. Sometimes when a person has been sick a long time, there are resentments toward God and toward other people that have added to the misery of their illness. Jesus knew this, and took the opportunity to heal the man of those maladies as well. Saying to him, “Rise and walk” was merely incidental, and Jesus does that too. What we see in today’s Gospel reading is that our God longs to heal us from the inside out.

The incident with Abraham and Isaac feels like something else, though, doesn’t it? It almost seems as if this is a manipulative attempt on God’s part to see if Abraham was really on his side or not. But I don’t think that’s what God is doing here. I think this encounter shows us our God who is aching to pour out his blessings on us. If we will but give him everything, he will choose not to take it from us, but to work through our gifts and blessings to bless us even more. Listen to the promise he makes to Abraham: “I will bless you abundantly and make your descendants as countless as the stars of the sky and the sands of the seashore; your descendants shall take possession of the gates of their enemies, and in your descendants all the nations of the earth shall find blessing.” Finally, God provides the lamb for the sacrifice, which is a foreshadowing of the way that he himself will give his own Son, Jesus Christ, to be the lamb of sacrifice for our sins.

Just as Jesus healed the paralytic from the inside out, so God blesses Abraham from the inside out, giving him knowledge of a God who longs to provide blessing and healing for his people. In our offering today, we too can come to be fed from the inside out, by giving God whatever we hold most dear, knowing that he intends not to take it from us, but to use it to bless us beyond our wildest imaginings.

Today’s readings

This morning’s Gospel reading is the Matthew version of the Gospel reading we had yesterday from Luke. So I’m going to bracket that, and reflect this morning on the first reading instead.

This first reading has always intrigued me, ever since I can remember hearing it as a child. God intends to destroy the city of Sodom because of its pervasive wickedness. Abraham, newly in relationship with God, stands up for the innocent of the city, largely because that was where his nephew, Lot, had taken up residence. In what seems to be a case of cosmic “Let’s Make a Deal,” Abraham pleads with God to spare the city if just fifty innocent people could be found there. God agrees and Abraham persists. Eventually God agrees to spare the city if just ten people could be found in the city of Sodom.

Now we don’t know how many people were living in Sodom, but it was certainly a great many more than fifty. But God agrees to spare the city if just ten just people could be found, a number that was probably some fraction of one percent of the population. Now, we know the rest of the story without even having heard it today, don’t we? Sodom is eventually destroyed for its wickedness, along with the city of Gomorrah. So let’s think about that for a minute. Not even ten good people were found in that area, so great and widespread was their wickedness!

Now the Old Testament has a number of stories like this where a great many people are destroyed in their wickedness. From this we should not draw the hasty conclusion that we worship a wrathful God. Instead, we worship a God who is just and merciful, not punishing the great many innocent for the wickedness of but a few. The guilty are punished, but the just are not. And in Christ Jesus, we have the great grace of one being punished for the great wickedness of all of us. So merciful and gracious is our God that in these days after the birth of our Redeemer, we have been granted forgiveness for our sins, because the guilt was borne by our Lord Jesus.

That is why the Psalmist is quick to sing today, “The Lord is kind and merciful!”