Lent 2024 Sampler
A Preview of New Lenten Studies and Devotions from Abingdon Press.
READ THE FIRST CHAPTERS & WATCH FIRST VIDEO SESSIONS FREE! 6-WEEK STUDIES
The Third Day: Living the Resurrection By Tom Berlin
Remember: God’s Covenants and the Cross By Susan Robb
Luke
By Adam Hamilton
DEVOTIONAL The Sanctuary for Lent 2024 By Abigail Browka
For more information, visit Cokesbury.com or call 800.672.1789
On the third day, he rose again. The Third Day: Living the Resurrection, by Tom Berlin In The Third Day: Living the Resurrection, Tom Berlin uses his gifts of storytelling and understanding the Scriptures to connect the reader to the experiences of several individuals around Jesus in his final days, focusing on new life and redemption rather than loss. The six week study includes the book, Leader Guide, and DVD. WATCH FIRST SESSION FREE
Remember the God who remembers us. Remember: God’s Covenants and the Cross, by Susan Robb God’s covenants throughout the Old Testament show the character of God’s promises to God’s people. In this book, Susan Robb leads readers through the covenants with Noah, Abraham, Moses and Israel, and David, followed by the New Covenant established on Maundy Thursday. The Lenten story culminates with an examination of the cross as another example of God’s promise for a new world. The six week study includes the book, Leader Guide, and DVD. WATCH FIRST SESSION FREE
From Birth to Resurrection in the Gospel of Luke. Luke: Jesus and the Outsiders, Outcasts, and Outlaws, by Adam Hamilton In Luke: Jesus and the Outsiders, Outcasts, and Outlaws, pastor and best-selling author Adam Hamilton explores the life, teachings, death, and resurrection of Jesus as told in the Gospel of Luke. Through Luke’s stories we find Jesus’ care and compassion for all as he welcomes sinners and outcasts. As we study Luke and see Jesus’ concern for those who were considered unimportant, we hear a hopeful and inspiring word for our lives today. The six week study includes the book, Leader Guide, DVD, Sermon and Worship Series download, and Worship and Media resources download. WATCH FIRST SESSION FREE
Devotions by Abigail Browka for each day of Lent. The Sanctuary for Lent 2024, by Abigail Browka The Sanctuary for Lent 2024 contains brief readings for each day in Lent, from Ash Wednesday through Easter Sunday, including a suggested Scripture, a short devotion, and a short prayer or practice—all based on the Revised Common Lectionary. This annual favorite helps readers faithfully journey through Lent as they prepare to experience the joy of the Resurrection. Along with being a great congregational resource, it is an excellent gift for family, friends, and those your congregation connects with through outreach.
The
Third Living the Resurrection
TOM BERLIN
with Mark A. Miller
The Third Day Living the Resurrection The Third Day 978-1-7910-2414-7 978-1-7910-2415-4 eBook The Third Day: DVD 978-1-7910-2418-5 The Third Day: Leader Guide 978-1-7910-2416-1 978-1 7910-2417-8 eBook
Also by Tom Berlin Bearing Fruit Courage The Generous Church High Yield Overflow Reckless Love Restored
TOM BERLIN with Mark A. Miller
The
Third
day
Living the Resurrection
Abingdon Press | Nashville
The Third Day Living the Resurrection Copyright © 2023 Abingdon Press All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted by the 1976 Copyright Act, the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission can be addressed to Rights and Permissions, The United Methodist Publishing House, 810 12th Avenue South, Nashville, TN 37203-4704 or emailed to permissions@ abingdonpress.com. Library of Congress Control Number: 2023943936 978-1-7910-2414-7 Scripture quotations unless noted otherwise are from the Common English Bible. Copyright © 2011 by the Common English Bible. All rights reserved. Used by permission. www.CommonEnglishBible.com. Scripture quotations marked (NRSVue) are taken from the New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.TM Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www. zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.TM Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright ©1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Scripture quotation marked KJV is from The Authorized (King James) Version. Rights in the Authorized Version in the United Kingdom are vested in the Crown. Reproduced by permission of the Crown’s patentee, Cambridge University Press. MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
To colleagues in the ministry, past and present, whose collaboration makes the work joyful. I thank my God for every remembrance of you, always in every one of my prayers for all of you, praying with joy for your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. (Philippians 1:3-5 NRSVue)
CONTENTS Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix Chapter 1: Mary Magdalene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Chapter 2: Simon Peter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Chapter 3: Thomas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Chapter 4: Emmaus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 Chapter 5: Paul . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 Chapter 6: Jesus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
INTRODUCTION This is a book about how the resurrection of Jesus Christ profoundly changed the lives of those who followed him and how it can transform ours as well. The first disciples were blown off course when Jesus was crucified. Some thought their journey had ended. Others went back to their old lives, no longer able to navigate in the places Jesus had taken them. The experience of the Resurrection is what put them back on course. It reoriented their lives and enabled them to go places and do things they never imagined. The Resurrection is not a strategy or a product. It is not sold by self-help gurus telling us, “Get some resurrection and you, too, can find a new life!” Instead, we need the Resurrection to be a reference point in our lives rather than one Sunday on our calendars. It is both an experience of the power of God and a truth about Jesus that offers us confidence. Because Jesus was resurrected on the third day, we know that God offers new beginnings, no matter what the facts of our present reality seem to tell us. Everyone needs the power of the Resurrection. It does not matter how smart you are, you will still encounter problems that defy solutions and lead to dead ends. It does not matter how much positivity your personality possesses, there will be times when you will feel despair. You may have the ability to read people and know whom to trust, but someone will let you down so badly that you may give up on them. Likewise, you may disappoint yourself and others so deeply that you will feel beyond redemption or disappointed with God to the point that faith seems impossible to hold. Jesus’ first followers had these experiences, and so do we. This is why the resurrection of Christ and the new life he demonstrated each ix
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time he appeared to them transformed their lives. The Resurrection offered Jesus’ disciples hope, new life, and the assurance that God is present not only in our brightest moments but also our darkest, including the consideration of our own mortality. The Resurrection dispels fear. It resolves anxiety. In the darkness that shrouds death, the light of the Resurrection shines. For all these reasons, we need to think and talk more about what happened on the third day, the day of resurrection, and how that impacts all the days that follow. Having spent time considering Jesus’ resurrection appearances to his disciples and the way it impacted both their lives and the message that they shared with others, I now think it odd how much Christians talk about the crucifixion and death of Jesus compared to how little we talk about the resurrection of Christ. It is even apparent in our jewelry: always a cross, never an empty tomb. While some believe an empty cross is a symbol of the Resurrection, its shape speaks more to death than new life. Theologians, biblical scholars, pastors, and evangelists often speak of the meaning of Jesus’ crucifixion with such interest and devotion that the Resurrection appears to be an afterthought by comparison. The forty-day season of Lent, observed in many church traditions, is typically focused on the difficulty and sacrifice involved in following Jesus. It can be a dark time. Crosses are draped in black. There is lots of music in minor keys and weighty tempos. While Martin Luther may have said that every Sunday is a “little Easter,” the season of Lent rarely speaks of the triumph of Christ over sin and death. For six weeks, services typically focus on sin and forgiveness, the cost of discipleship, and the sacrifice of Jesus for our salvation. Churches culminate this season with Holy Week services that offer ample time to consider the triumphal entry of Palm Sunday, the meaning of the Last Supper, and Jesus’ arrest, trial, and crucifixion. We see dramatic reenactments of these events. Cantatas x
Introduction
and other musical programs remind us of the events of the last days and hours of Jesus’ life. The “Seven Last Words of Christ” are read and preached. All of this is done for the best of purposes. Jesus’ suffering and death are the means through which Christ secured the hope of salvation for all people. Understanding the many dimensions of the rejection, suffering, and death of Jesus during Holy Week enables us to consider our need for God’s love and forgiveness in new ways.
Jesus’ suffering and death are the means through which Christ secured the hope of salvation for all people. The crescendo of this season is to be the joyful celebration of the Resurrection on Easter Sunday. In many churches we limit this celebration to a sixty-minute service before quickly moving on to other matters. In so doing, we lose the deeper lesson. The pivotal event of the Christian story is the Resurrection. When Jesus overcame death, it fully transformed the lives of the first disciples. It is the wellspring of good news that can change our lives as well. With the Resurrection, all the other events of Jesus’ life gain meaning. Without the Resurrection, we have nothing. A cross without an empty tomb on the third day is just bad news. Imagine if the last line of the Apostles’ Creed stated that Jesus “suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried.” The period at the end of that sentence would signal the finality of death. Instead, the text reads that Jesus, “suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; the third day he rose from the dead.” The semicolon changes everything. It tells us that Jesus’ death is not an abrupt and wretched ending, but rather, the splendid light of a new beginning. xi
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When we take time to consider the Resurrection appearances, we find the source of the power that enabled the disciples to move from following Jesus and acting on his directions to disturb the peace throughout the Empire (Acts 17:6). The good news about these disciples is that like us, they were imperfect. They needed forgiveness. They were sometimes fearful. They experienced setbacks and failure. Some had difficult pasts. Few could imagine their future without Jesus. Jesus’ death on the cross was devastating to them. The Resurrection not only restored their hope in what God was doing in the world, it validated everything Jesus had done and taught. Jesus appeared first to Mary Magdalene. She was a woman Jesus had healed and who had been able to reclaim her life. Our first chapter speaks to the hope that Mary regained when she realized that Jesus was alive, and his power could not be broken. If you have ever lost hope, you will be encouraged by her experience. Jesus appeared to his disciples for a period of forty days between the Resurrection and his ascension into heaven. In chapter 2, we will consider the experience of Simon Peter. He was the disciple who first called Jesus the Son of God. Later, Peter denied knowing Jesus three times. When Jesus appeared to him on a beach by the Sea of Galilee, Jesus didn’t come to reinforce his guilt. Jesus came to restore Peter and send him on a grand mission. Peter helps us understand that new life in Christ can restore us and give us a purpose as well. In chapter 3, we will meet Thomas, the disciple whose crisis of faith following the Crucifixion made him doubt the word of his closest friends when they told him that Jesus was alive. God knows we will have moments and seasons when our faith is also in crisis. We sometime drift away from God. Watching Jesus’ patient care for Thomas tells us much about the way the risen Lord seeks us. A pair of disciples on the road to the village of Emmaus is the focus of chapter 4. They were going there after the first news of Jesus’ resurrection. They heard the accounts of Jesus’ presence but seemed to have lost their sense that God was still working in the world. xii
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Jesus came to them as well, offering them Communion in which they experienced the real presence of Christ. Chapter 5 moves to the Book of Acts and the experience of Saul of Tarsus. Saul was not a follower of Jesus. He was a Pharisee who opposed and persecuted Jesus’ disciples. His encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus changed his life and his name. Paul became the key interpreter of the Resurrection to the early church. In chapter 5, we will consider Paul’s life and letters along with key insights that have transformed countless lives in the years since. Chapter 6 provides a summary of the purpose of the Resurrection and how it fulfilled Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom of God. This chapter examines the predictions that Jesus made about his death and resurrection. As we consider Jesus’ observations about the miracle of the third day, we discover the power that makes the kingdom of God possible on earth as it is in heaven. The people who first followed Jesus, the ones who experienced the power of his teaching and miracles, the ones who spent time with him as he walked from one village to another, knew that the Resurrection was the seminal event not just of his life and their lives, but of world history. The author of the Gospel of John wrote, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth” (1:14 NIV). You have known a lot of people and have seen many at their best moments when they cared for loved ones, landed a big contract, won a race, learned a new skill, or recovered from a failure. Perhaps you encouraged them by pointing out how impressed you were by what they did. You may have bragged on them to mutual friends or family members. But have you ever been tempted, even once, to say about such a person, “We have seen his glory?” Me neither. xiii
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The third day is the day of the Resurrection, the beginning of all of our stories and the day when hope broke through so many forms of darkness that attempt to cloak our lives. The author of the Gospel of John is not being hyperbolic. The author is describing the Resurrection, writing the opening paragraphs of this account of Jesus’ life; but the author already knows what is going to happen at the end of story. The end of Jesus’ life is not the day of Crucifixion. It is not the moment his body was laid in the tomb on the first day. It is not the second day, which included the stillness of the sabbath as his followers grieved his death. The end of the story is the third day. The third day is the day of the Resurrection, the beginning of all of our stories and the day when hope broke through so many forms of darkness that attempt to cloak our lives. When we consider the difference the Resurrection made to those who first experienced the risen Christ, our lives will experience the joy of new life as well.
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CHAPTER 1
Mary Magdalene At St. Mary’s Church in Newport, Rhode Island, a woman was discovered hidden in the sanctuary when the church’s organ was removed to be refurbished. It was actually a sculpture of a woman’s head. Half of each side of her face peered out of the end of an arch. “They had been covered up for a very long time,” said Rev. Kris von Maluski, the parish priest at St. Mary’s, Rhode Island’s oldest Roman Catholic parish. There were different theories about the identity of this woman. One suggested St. Cecilia, the patron saint of musicians. But the choir loft and organ were not originally on that end of the sanctuary, and it seemed odd that the musicians would allow their patron saint to be hidden by an organ. Another assumed the sculpture to be Mary, the mother of Jesus. Few believed a Roman Catholic Church would allow Mary to be hidden, or let an architect divide her face with an arch. Father von Maluski believes she is Mary Magdalene. He observes that the other arches are adorned by twelve male figures, representing the twelve male apostles identified in the New Testament. If Father Von Maluski is correct, the architect of the church made a statement that a later renovation of the church covered up: Mary Magdalene is also an apostle. She is the first follower of Jesus who saw the 1
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resurrected Jesus. She is the first to share the message of hope found in the good news that Jesus was resurrected from the dead. Mary Magdalene ministered to the other disciples when she told them that Jesus, who they knew had died, was now alive and had spoken to her.1
Mary Magdalene is also an apostle. She is the first follower of Jesus who saw the resurrected Jesus. Mary Magdalene is often referred to as apostolorum apostola, or “the apostle to the apostles” because of her role in sharing the news of the Resurrection with the male disciples. Given that Mary Magdalene faithfully shared the news of Jesus’ resurrection, it is surprising that the church thought it acceptable to hide her sculpture with a renovation for all those years, while leaving the other twelve fully visible. The good news is that the importance of Mary Magdalene and her unique role following the Resurrection is celebrated in many parts of the Christian community. This has been done in some quarters for many years. Outside the Saints Peter and Paul Church in Krakow, Poland, there are twelve statues of the apostles on pedestals. Judas, who betrayed Christ prior to his arrest, is not present. Those who planned the building and grounds in 1605 decided to give that place to Mary Magdalene, the apostle of hope. Mary Magdalene’s story did not start with a celebration, but it has a lot to teach us about the meaning of the Resurrection. On the morning Mary first met the resurrected Jesus, she had no thought of ever being remembered in statuary. The experience of the Resurrection typically comes at the lowest points of life’s journey rather than the highest. It comes during the worst seasons, not the 2
Mary Magdalene
best. Mary Magdalene was in a personal fog and gloom as she made her way to Jesus’ tomb. The experience of the past two days weighted her every step. We cannot know the power of Jesus’ resurrection in the life of Mary Magdalene until we consider her journey that morning and feel the weight she carries as she makes her way to the tomb that holds the body of her Savior.
The Weight of Trauma Just two days earlier, Mary endured the hours of Jesus’ crucifixion. Few experiences in life help us understand what she experienced that day. Mary Magdalene stood helplessly at a distance with a small band of women until Jesus took his last breath. It is hard to see someone you love die, to be physically present at a bedside or nearby after an accident. Such moments stay with us. They are sketched on our memory. We carry them in our body and spirit. When death comes in a surprising manner, when a person is too young, or after an accident, so that we have little time to prepare, we experience it uniquely. Imagine, then, what imprint was left in the minds and hearts of the women who witnessed the Crucifixion. Everything that happened in the past three days was unexpected. His arrest, trial, and crucifixion all seemed to come out of nowhere. They saw Jesus tortured. That would have been hard if he had committed a terrible crime that led to this punishment. It would have been remarkably painful to watch knowing that Jesus was innocent of any wrongdoing, that his life was full of miraculous good works and teaching that called people to love and righteousness. Mary’s despair includes the juxtaposition of the perfection of Jesus’ life and the depravity of humanity, which has condemned him. She and the other women marked the hours of his misery and suffering and saw him die. Mary’s experience of this trauma was recent and raw. It was the third day since his death, and she can clearly recall the final indignity 3
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done to Jesus’ body when a soldier pierced his side with a spear to make sure he was dead before his body was taken off the cross. As time ran out for a timely and proper burial, she saw his body brusquely taken to a tomb just before the sabbath began. Nothing else was allowed to be done as the sun began to set. Customs and laws related to the sabbath made it clear that she could not walk that distance, carry spices, or prepare his body. She waited in the discomfort of the unfinished task nearly thirty-six hours from sunset on Friday to sunrise on Sunday. How slowly those hours must have passed for her. Mary slept fitfully and rose early. The first glimpse of the sun signaled that the time had come to make things right.
The Weight of Grief As a pastor I have been with people when someone they love dies. When death is sudden, as with an accident or act of violence, there is one thing people want to do: make sure the body of their loved one is secure and properly laid to rest. They want to be near the one who died. People want to do something. Anything. Waiting is hard. In moments of such deep loss, in a time when everything is upturned and out of control, the first questions often asked are, “Where are they and can we see them?” This impulse is out of the devotion of love that we hold for those dear to us. To be devoted in life is to be devoted in death. We see our obligation clearly. We want to make sure that the person we love is cared for well, so that no further injury can happen to them in death as it did at the end of their life. Sometimes, when a person enters the presence of a loved one who died, whether it is in a hospital room or a mortuary, they do not want to leave. They don’t know how to leave. They will sit and stay until a pastor or nurse comes to say that the time has come for the next step in the arrangements to be taken. Mary, on her way to the tomb to care for Jesus’ body, did not know it 4
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was Easter. She did not know it was the Resurrection day. She just knew that she had to be near Jesus.
To be devoted in life is to be devoted in death. Mary and the other disciples had heard Jesus say that he would rise on the third day. The Gospel writers are clear that none of the disciples understood what he was telling them when he said, “He will be handed over to the Gentiles. He will be ridiculed, mistreated, and spit on. After torturing him, they will kill him. On the third day, he will rise up.” But the Twelve understood none of these words. The meaning of this message was hidden from them and they didn’t grasp what he was saying. (Luke 18:32-34)
There was a range of beliefs among Jews in the first century about what happened to a person after their death. Resurrection was often defined as a time when people who were dead would be reembodied and a new age would dawn that would include the return of the presence of the great men and women of the Hebrew Scriptures from the patriarchs and matriarchs to the prophets. It would be a time when God would reorder the world in justice and righteousness.2 Since this had not happened, Mary probably did not have it on her mind. The third day for her was little more than an opportunity to properly care for the lifeless body of Jesus so that he was respectfully laid to rest. Grief can be hard. But grief for those departed by death that is unaccompanied by hope of eternal life is unusually difficult. I recall standing by a graveside with a young mother whose child had died. It had been a long struggle. A medical team had done all they could 5
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to save the child’s life. Her family, friends, and church had all prayed for a different outcome. She and her husband could not have loved this child more or hoped more that life would be sustained. After prayers were offered, Scripture read, comforting words shared and the other elements of the service were concluded, she stood by the graveside crying. Then she turned to me and said what I have heard others say at such moments: “How do people endure this without any hope of eternal life?” Mary Magdalene, whose grief is infused by nothing but loss, is such a person as she walks to Jesus’ tomb.
The Weight of Anxiety There is one more possible weight that Mary carries that morning. When Mary first met Jesus, she was not well. We know very little about her past. The Gospel of Luke tells us, “After this, Jesus traveled about from one town and village to another, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. The Twelve were with him, and also some women who had been cured of evil spirits and diseases: Mary (called Magdalene) from whom seven demons had come out . . . ” (Luke 8:1-2). The demons that impacted Mary’s life are not named in the Bible. Mary’s condition could have presented as physical, emotional, or spiritual illness. What is apparent is that she could not have been more grateful that Jesus healed her. She gained freedom from her disorders. She knew the power Jesus had to heal her and this gave her a sense of security about her future, that she would no longer be a victim to the whims of her condition. Mary’s gratitude to Jesus for her new life inspired her remarkable devotion to him. With the other women who, like her, had been healed of diseases and cured of evil spirits, she supported Jesus’ ministry from her own resources. Before Mary encountered Jesus, she may have been a broken and lonely person. Her condition could 6
Mary Magdalene
have made her an outsider to those who lived in the town of Magdala, a prosperous community that was able to afford a large synagogue on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. She may have been rejected by her family and friends as a person whose life was so out of control that others simply did not know how to help or manage her. It is possible that Mary, in those days, was hopeless. A reason we believe Jesus to be both fully divine and fully human is that he was not only present to people like Mary but also had the power to restore them to the people God intended them to be. Whatever Jesus did or said to Mary, we know it brought her hope. Jesus set her free of her demons. She could be in community with other people again. We don’t know if her family or friends welcomed her back into their lives. We do know that she was welcomed to a group of women who had also been healed, and she traveled with the larger band of Jesus’ disciples. Mary became devoted to the purposes of Jesus. She wanted other people like her to be healed by him. She supported Jesus and the other disciples so that he could share his wisdom, heal the sick, extend grace to the lost, and help people become whole, well, and alive again. She wanted others to experience the ways Jesus had transformed her life, and she was happy to invest her resources to see that happen.
Whatever Jesus did or said to Mary, we know it brought her hope. One might wonder what else Mary was thinking about as she made her way to the cemetery. It is not uncommon for loss to ignite anxiety or fear. When we depend on someone, and suddenly they are gone, we wonder how our life will continue in their absence. We question if it will. Mary Magdalene’s greatest fear may have been that without Jesus, those demons would have the power to return. 7
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Jesus was dead. He could no longer protect her. The other disciples had never demonstrated the ability to heal people as readily as Jesus did. What would become of her now that Jesus was gone? Most people who have struggled with demons in their past know that anxiety. A man is sitting in traffic. He is a calm person. Cars are not moving, but it is fine, he tells himself. He tells himself this because earlier in his life he did not know how to handle anger. He would yell at his children. He would be furious with his wife. He hid it well at work but would sometimes privately seethe at his workstation after a meeting where he didn’t get his way. When he finally realized that he had a problem, he did the work. He talked to his pastor. He went to the counselor. He read books and shared his struggle with some friends who called out the best in him. That is why he is not worried about this traffic. He is not reactive after ten full minutes of a standstill. But after another ten minutes, when he realizes that he is going to miss his daughter’s program at school, he slams his hand on the steering wheel. He is honking at the universe. The long line of traffic in front of him doesn’t even shrug. He realizes how ridiculous he is being and then says, “I thought I was past this.” Demons come in many forms. Addictions to drugs, alcohol, and pornography surely count. A gambling addiction that destroys trust in a marriage while also making it impossible to pay the rent or buy groceries to feed children is a form of evil. We have demons in relationships in which we choose to pick fights with people we love rather than enjoy time together. Some of our demons are not choices we make but things that have happened in our past. Veterans take years to learn to cope with the trauma of combat. Women who have been the victims of sexual violence find themselves fearful long after the assault. People of color, having endured microaggressions and outright racial slurs, along with other overt acts of prejudice or wrongful associations with crime, can be hypervigilant even in the safety of a social setting. In the best of worlds people are set free of 8
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such things. But the question lingers, “is this the day all of that is coming right back into my life?”
The Hope of the Resurrection Mary doesn’t want it to all come back. Mary is carrying the weight of “what now?” as she completes her journey and stands before the tomb that holds Jesus’ body. Just when she thinks things could not possibly get any worse, she finds the stone that sealed the tomb rolled away. The one thing she thinks she can control and do, honor the one she so appreciated in life by caring for him in death, now seems in question. There are moments in life when all you can do is cry. Mary is suddenly in that moment. She looks inside. There is no body and no indication of what has happened. Mary doesn’t know it, but she is about to have all the weight she carries lifted from her shoulders. Inside the tomb, she sees two figures near where Jesus’ body should have been. One asks, “Woman, why are you crying?” She replies, “They have taken away my Lord, and I don’t know where they’ve put him.” Things are happening fast now. Another voice behind her asks, “Woman, why are you crying? Who are you looking for?” Mary assumes it is the gardener, the man who maintains the cemetery grounds. She pleads, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.” The gardener says to her, “Mary.” It is Jesus. Jesus says to her, “Mary.” This is the experience when one word calms the anxious heart and brings everything in motion to a stop. There is something that happens when someone who cares for you calls out your name. When Mary hears her name, she knows it is Jesus. Startled, she replies, “Rabbouni”, meaning, “Teacher.” Just a moment ago 9
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she was filled with despair. She was dead inside. When she hears the resurrected Christ say her name, she is suddenly alive again. Just as she discovered new life in her first encounter with Christ, hearing Christ speak her name reawakens the hope and possibility she found in life with him. She is alive to hope, alive to discipleship and alive to the knowledge that the death she witnessed on the first day does not rule the third day. (See John 20:11-16.) This is what the Resurrection does in our lives. It establishes hope that death has not ended the story. It brings us life and a more vital faith at the realization that God’s power is ultimately victorious. This hope begins when we understand that while the Resurrection is cosmic in scope, changing the way we understand the rules of life and death for everyone, it is also very particular. It is intimate. It is a proclamation made to the masses. It is also a whisper in our ear. The use of Mary’s name is reminiscent of the title Jesus gave himself months earlier when he said, “I am the good shepherd. I know my own sheep and they know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. I give up my life for the sheep” ( John 10:14-15).
Jesus wanted his disciples to understand that God was not impersonal and disinterested. God knows all of us by name. Jesus tells us that we can have a new kind of relationship with God, one in which we can know and trust God. Jesus wanted his disciples to understand that God was not impersonal and disinterested. God knows all of us by name. This is why Jesus calls himself the good shepherd. “The one who enters through the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. . . . the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out” ( John 10:2-3). 10
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On a trip to see biblical sights in Israel and Jordan, the bus driver pulled over to let everyone stop and take pictures at an overlook. As passengers got off the bus, two boys led a flock of goats over a steep incline above the road. The first shepherd called the goats across the road and down another embankment. One by one the goats disappeared from view as they went down the hill. Suddenly, on the cliff above, a dog began to bark persistently. One boy reappeared on the road and yelled to the dog, which stopped barking for a moment only to disappear and return with two stray goats. The boy looked tired as he contemplated his next move, but he was a good shepherd. He began climbing, returning to the top of the hill so that he could lead these stragglers to the flock below. Beyond being amazed by the teamwork of the two boys and their faithful dog, I realized that the experience brings Jesus’ words about being a good shepherd to life. The shepherd cares for the flock as a whole and members of the flock individually. Just as the good shepherd knows the sheep by name, and they respond to his voice, so Jesus knows our names, and so we can respond as well. Just as Jesus knows us by name, he knows the weight we carry. Others can do their best to understand what drives our behaviors, our frustration or sadness. Jesus knows us. Understanding that Jesus both knows and cares about our lives enables us to trust him as a sheep trusts a shepherd. Hearing our name, we follow his voice. A relationship with Christ that is helpful is one that has grown to the point of being personal to us in the sense that we have experienced the power of God in our lives. When we hear the voice of the Good Shepherd, the trust it engenders changes everything. It is remarkable how just knowing Jesus is present in our lives changes the way we look at our circumstances. It brings us peace. Jesus only said Mary’s name. He did not give her a three-point action plan for her future. He made sure she knew he was there. Following Jesus, she had already learned to stop predicting what he would call them 11
The Third Day
to consider or do on any given day. Being in the presence of Christ brought her a sense of trust and peace that led to her experience of joy. This is critical to the importance of the Resurrection. A relationship with Jesus is not possible or helpful if it is only a memory of a teacher who is now dead. The power of the Resurrection is demonstrated when Jesus remains present in our lives. Hearing her name, Mary is stunned by the reality of the Resurrection. The weight of trauma, grief, and anxiety can now be processed and released. Her grief can be entrusted to Christ to use, heal, and lead into a new life and possibilities where hope is secure. Anxiety over demons that once controlled her life begins to fall away. The Resurrection of Jesus demonstrates his power over death. If death cannot hold him in a tomb, there is no demon she ever struggled with that he would not be able to cast aside again.
Light in the Darkness What is true of Mary is true of every follower of Jesus in the time since. Most people carry the anxiety that their past struggles will return to trouble them. Whether it is something as strong as an addiction or as abiding as a grudge, most of us have places in our lives we don’t allow the light of Christ to shine. We lose hope that these issues will ever be resolved and suffer from their effects. One remarkable aspect of the imagery from the James Webb Space Telescope are the black holes identified by astrophysicists and astronomers. A black hole is a place in space where the force of gravity is so great that even light cannot escape. The force of gravity is so strong because matter has been squeezed into a tiny space. This can happen when a star is dying, and its material collapses and falls in on itself. Light can’t get out and everything is very, very heavy. Black holes can be big or small. Scientists think the smallest black holes are as small as just one atom. These black holes are very 12
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tiny but have the mass of a large mountain. The largest black holes are called “supermassive.”3 You can’t see a black hole because its gravity will not allow light to escape. You cannot put one on a scale. What you can see is the way everything near the black hole is impacted by its presence. Its gravity affects the path and orbit of every element of the galaxy in its vicinity. Some people live with the presence of large emotional wounds, deep scars from past trauma, or patterns of sin that continuously wound the people around them. Such supermassive spiritual black holes may not be visible, but they impact every person they know and every organization they enter. They damage relationships and cause self-harm. They take the joy and creativity out of teamwork and suck the energy out of people around them who do not understand what is causing the problem, but vividly feel the effect. Other people have small spiritual black holes in their lives. These include bad habits and unnoticed sins that still create a feeling of heaviness. Large or small, these matters impact the trajectory of human lives and pull them in an unnatural manner toward destructive habits, behaviors, and relationships. These black holes want to suck nearby family, friends, and coworkers into their vortex as well. It sometimes appears that nothing is powerful enough to keep a person from imploding. There is a darkness and weight to life that feels hopeless. When the resurrected Jesus was present to Mary in the garden, he demonstrated the ability to pierce the darkness, lift the weight, and bring new life. No hardship she carried at that moment would ever seem “supermassive” by comparison to the power of Christ to set things right that she found in his resurrection. This is why the presence of Christ in our lives gives us hope. Jesus comes to address the black holes in our lives, the places where sin is victorious, despair brings darkness, and where hope has run out. 13
The Third Day
When the resurrected Jesus was present to Mary in the garden, he demonstrated the ability to pierce the darkness, lift the weight, and bring new life. In the prologue to the Gospel of John, the author introduces us to the power of Christ and foreshadows the Resurrection when he writes, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness doesn’t extinguish the light” ( John 1:5). On the third day, Mary gained a new confidence in Christ’s sufficiency when words like those came to life. She had long trusted that Jesus could do miracles. However, the experience of the Resurrection was not like other miracles he did in the past, including his ability to bring other people back to life. In the cemetery that morning Mary understood God’s power was exhibited in a way that changed the way she saw the world. God had resurrected Jesus from the dead. She called the resurrected Jesus “Teacher” when she first recognized his voice. We can only assume she would never use such a simple title again. While it would take the larger Christian community years to articulate who and what they now understood Jesus to be after his resurrection appearances, it was obvious to Mary that he was Kyrios, or Lord. When Jesus entered Jerusalem a little more than a week before, Mary and the other disciples hoped he was the Messiah. The Resurrection confirmed that he was the Messiah, but very different than they imagined. Jesus was not a conquering king sent to remove the occupying Roman army and restore the former kingdom of Israel. This was 14
Mary Magdalene
a Messiah that would impact the entire world throughout time. The light was not just for Mary. It was for all who trust that Jesus Christ is Lord. The Resurrection confirms this title and gives us the ability to experience the ongoing presence of Christ in our lives and in the church. Standing in the garden, the first person to see the resurrected Christ, Mary could understand that he was the fulfillment of the prophecies of the Hebrew Scripture. The Resurrection would be the central component of her ongoing faith, just as it would be for all early Christian communities. Mary understands that through the Resurrection, Christ’s abiding presence with her will be experienced differently. He was not the same as when she saw him last. His nature has changed. When she went to embrace him, Jesus stopped her. He said to her, “Don’t hold on to me, for I haven’t yet gone up to my Father. Go to my brothers and sisters and tell them, ‘I’m going up to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God’ ” ( John 20:17). He was physically present, but his body was transformed. The rules of the world seemed to apply no longer. Jesus would later appear to the disciples and be described as passing through solid objects like walls and doors. Jesus told her that he would soon ascend to the presence of God. Mary’s resurrection experience foreshadows how Christ’s presence is experienced with us in the years and centuries that followed. We are fully known by Christ, and Christ is with us always in the presence of the Holy Spirit that he promised would be with his followers after he ascended into heaven. Mary had little time to consider this as Jesus gave her the commission to go to the other disciples and tell them the good news. Mary was confused and anxious on the way to the tomb. She is jumbled but joyous in response to the Resurrection as she departs. Mary went and told the disciples that she had seen Jesus and shared all he said to her. This proclamation of hope was her first act as an apostle but was far from her last. All four Gospels note 15
The Third Day
that Mary was present at the Crucifixion, the empty tomb, and the Resurrection, either alone or as part of group. Two of the Gospels share the story of Mary’s past, and the way that Jesus healed her of seven demons. For these accounts to be recorded, Mary must have shared her testimony of her past along with her experience of the suffering, death, and resurrection of Christ with the early church. Mary models an important behavior as she shares her experience of the resurrected Christ with her friends. They are also dealing with trauma, grief, and anxiety. She knows that the news of the power Jesus has over death, and his ongoing ability to abide with them, will bring them hope. Mary wants them to understand that Jesus is Lord and Christ, not because they think so much of him, but because he had demonstrated the power of God in the Resurrection. Undoubtedly the other disciples needed their own experience of the presence of Jesus before they would have the assurance Mary now possessed. Mary’s word provided their first inkling that God was doing a new thing through Jesus. Mary helped them comprehend that the way they understood Jesus was about to undergo a profound change. Jesus’ identity as the resurrected Christ would give each of them a new identity as well. They would become the men and women who would “turn the world upside down” (Acts 17:6, KJV) as they shared the hope of the Resurrection to Jews and Gentiles alike. In the years that followed, Mary continued to share this hope with others in the early church as it grew. The hope of the Resurrection is seen in Mary’s ability to let go of any desire she had to cast an appearance of herself as a person who was doing just fine before Jesus. Mary gained the courage to tell her story as it really was, without image-casting. Her testimony was not that she got it all right, but that before she met Jesus, everything was all wrong. She told others about the power of God she experienced when Jesus healed her, which was fully displayed at his resurrection. Mary’s courage to share openly and honestly about her life is a reason that 16
Mary Magdalene
people wanted to know more about Jesus. Other people knew what it meant to have a life besieged by problems, to be out of control and see relationships broken because of evil they experienced or evil they were doing. Mary was an apostle of hope, both in her own story and her experience of the Resurrection.
Mary was an apostle of hope, both in her own story and her experience of the Resurrection. Many say that they wish the church had more power to transform the world today. We have much we can learn from Mary. Many Christians would never consider sharing where we get it wrong or what sins bring us suffering. Often those who grew up in Christian families learned the importance of looking good and presenting a positive image, no matter what was going on in their homes or churches. Image-casting was valued over repentance. It feels far safer to pretend that one is keeping all the commandments and laws of God, living a righteous life that is innocent of any harm rather than get honest about imperfections, wounds, and the way we have wounded others with our words and actions. We often fear sharing the one thing that would be a gift to someone else: the hope that Jesus changed our lives and showed us how to live. While Mary helped others see the love of Christ in her life and the power of God in Jesus’ resurrection, some Christians today often share little more than a sense of superiority that if only people outside the church would try a little harder, their lives might be better. Mary had nothing to prove but everything to share about the wonder of a life transformed by the Messiah. She knew what it was to be chosen by Jesus, to be healed, redeemed, and welcomed into 17
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the community of his followers where she was treated with respect and appreciation. The hope of her message was in her admission that she needed to be healed by Christ, and he was more than willing to do so. Imagine how many would be attracted to the church if women and men today who followed Christ could learn to share the hope they found in that relationship in a spirit of humility. People always need healing. To give them real hope that such healing can happen is a gift beyond measure.
People always need healing. To give them real hope that such healing can happen is a gift beyond measure. Mary’s life was its own Resurrection story. The witness of the church is strong when people are willing to share the distance Christ has brought them and the new life they continue to find as they give their lives to God. Mary had come from life to death to life again in her newly found vitality after years of being subjugated by the black hole of evil we can’t see but we know by its profound effect on her life. The witness of the church is strong when we are willing to admit sins and hardships in our lives that Christ has healed and is healing. It gives hope to both fellow believers and those who do not yet know Christ who suffer the same condition. The power of the Resurrection is present in us when we look deep enough into our lives to see the black holes and allow God to overcome them with light and bring us new life. This is where hope is found. It is odd that our society will spend billions of dollars to build a space telescope located a million miles from our planet so that we can look deeply into the universe but be unwilling to look 18
Mary Magdalene
deep enough inside our lives to know where to ask God for help. Mary’s genius was that she knew her condition, she told her story, and she gave hope in the testimony that Jesus healed her and had the power to heal everyone. After the Resurrection, Mary and the other disciples had to rebuild their community. They had to forgive some for running away, others for denying they knew Jesus, and one for selling his life for thirty pieces of silver. To the extent that this was done, it required them to be honest about their various forms of betrayal and to forgive one another, as their Lord had forgiven them. Imagine the power of their words on the audience when they later shared the many ways Jesus’ resurrection gave them the hope to do this work and, together, to plan how this news would be shared in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Imagine the interest created when other people saw them live as a hope-filled community. Such examples helped people understand that they worshipped and followed a living Christ whose power was still helping people move from death to life.
The third day, which started so poorly, proved to be the greatest of gifts to Mary. The third day, which started so poorly, proved to be the greatest of gifts to Mary. It provided her with confidence of God’s power that could not be shaken any day that followed. It was the day she found the hope she shared for the rest of her life.
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Remember:
God’s Covenants and the Cross Remember 978-1-7910-3020-9 978-1-7910-3021-6 eBook Remember: DVD 978-1-7910-3019-3 Remember: Leader Guide 978-1-7910-3022-3 978-1-7910-3018-6 eBook
Also by Susan Robb Called: Hearing and Responding to God’s Voice Seven Words: Listening to Christ from the Cross The Angels of Christmas: Hearing God’s Voice in Advent On Purpose: Finding God’s Voice in Your Passion (With Magrey R. de Vega, Sam McGlothlin, and Jevon Caldwell-Gross)
ABINGDON PRESS | NASHVILLE
Remember: God’s Covenants and the Cross Copyright © 2023 Abingdon Press All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted by the 1976 Copyright Act, the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission can be addressed to Rights and Permissions, The United Methodist Publishing House, 810 12th Avenue South, Nashville, TN 37203-4704 or emailed to permissions@abingdonpress.com. Library of Congress Control Number: 2023943934 978-1-7910-3020-9 Scripture quotations are taken from the New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition (NRSVue). Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
For my sisters in covenant, Alice, Sue, Cindy, Beth, Fran, and Elizabeth
CONTENTS Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix Chapter One: N oah: God’s Covenant with Creation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Chapter Two: A braham: A Promise of Nations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Chapter Three: M oses and Israel: Words of Life and Freedom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 Chapter Four: D avid: An Eternal Covenant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 Chapter Five: F rom Jeremiah to Jesus: The Covenant of the Heart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 Chapter Six: Jesus and the New Covenant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97 Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
I NTRODUCTION This book explores the relationship between Lent and memory (God’s and our own), and especially the season’s connection to the covenants in the Bible. While many covenants are mentioned in the Old Testament (also called the Hebrew Scriptures, which were scriptures Jesus knew and cited), there are four major covenants instituted by God. These covenants are foundational to our recognition of the true nature and character of God. God makes covenants through Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David. These four covenants are also primary to our recognition of who Jesus is, and how these covenants relate to the way in which he lived his life, his journey to the cross, his resurrection, and the institution of what the prophet Jeremiah described in his day as a new covenant. We will see that while Jesus becomes and institutes a new covenant with and for us, this covenant does not replace the others. God does not break one covenant to make another. This new covenant is the fulfillment and pinnacle of the other covenants instituted by God out of love for all of God’s creation. Of course, we all know the relevance of Jesus’s journey to the cross and his resurrection as the basis for, and the pinnacle of, our faith as Christians. But if we wish to fully integrate the importance of Jesus’s journey to the cross with our own Lenten journey, it’s not enough to begin with Jesus’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. We must go back to the beginning, to creation in which “the Word made flesh” who dwelt among us was fully engaged. We must remember that he spoke, and all things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being (John 1:3). ix
Introduction We must remember what Jesus himself, as one who was fully human and fully divine, remembered—what he, as a devout Jew and Creator, would have remembered about the salvation history of Israel, the world, and all of creation. What we will soon discover is that when God remembers God’s people, deliverance and salvation begin. And when God remembers us, we are then asked to remember what God has done for us, especially in this season of Lent.
When God remembers God’s people, deliverance and salvation begin. And when God remembers us, we are then asked to remember what God has done for us, especially in this season of Lent. I’ve confessed in the past that, before I became a minister in a church that valued the liturgical seasons of the Christian calendar, I loved to go from the joy of Palm Sunday to the joy of Easter morning. Or, to hear the story of the birth of Jesus and the songs of the angels, without hearing of the death threats of Herod and their foreshadowing of the cross. My desire was to go from joy to joy and avoid the unpleasantness of Jesus’s betrayal, arrest, torture, and crucifixion. However, after leading many services during the Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Easter seasons, I became aware of how engaging fully in the rituals and Scriptures of these seasons helps us better understand the Incarnation, Resurrection, and our own salvation history. More than that, fully engaging in the liturgical rituals and Scripture of each season and understanding their background and importance bring depth and richness to our faith, to our relationship with God and Jesus Christ, and x
Introduction to our relationship with and responsibility toward others in the world and the whole of creation itself—a richness we could never know otherwise. During my last two years in ministry at Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas, I was given the honor of serving as the pastor to its Cox Chapel community. This service within the church is famously known for being steeped in liturgy and the sacraments. My favorite two services of the year are the Lessons and Carols service, held just before Christmas, and the Easter Vigil service held the night before Easter morning. One element I love about these services is that no sermon is necessary. Scripture and song tell the complete story of redemption. Both services, at least for me, are two of the most powerful of the year. The Easter Vigil is actually the first Easter service each year. It is the first service to declare the resurrection of Christ and the first in which we sing Easter’s hallelujahs. The Easter Vigil begins outdoors (in our case, in an actual garden) in the darkness, emulating the darkness and grief of Holy Saturday. The congregation gathers around a small campfire where the Paschal candle (or Christ candle) is lit. The congregation then processes behind the person bearing the Christ candle, as we sing, “The light of Christ rises in glory, overcoming the darkness of sin and death.”1 The procession slowly enters into the completely darkened chapel, signifying the darkness of Jesus’s tomb on Holy Saturday evening. We symbolically enter the tomb of Jesus, where, for the next two hours, illuminated only by the light of the Paschal candle, we will remember through Scripture and hymns the creation and salvation history of the children of God. If you’re not familiar with the Easter Vigil, it is much like Lessons and Carols for Easter. The first reading from Genesis 1 tells of God creating the world, calling forth light, giving order to the waters and land and to night and day, of God speaking plants, then creatures of the earth, sea, and sky into being: “And God saw that it was good” xi
Introduction (Genesis 1:25). “So God created humans in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. . . . God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good” (Genesis 1:27, 31). As we all know, things don’t remain good for very long. Chapters 2 through 11 of Genesis remind us of how humanity seems determined not to live into the image of its Creator, but to spiral back into the primordial chaos that existed before Creation. And that’s the whole point of Lent. Things often do not go swimmingly in our lives or in the world. Sometimes that is due to our own actions, inaction, or the actions of those around us. However, the good news of Easter, as reflected in the Easter Vigil, is that God continuously seeks ways to redeem those whom God has created, to bring them out of their self-induced chaos and back into a rightfully ordered relationship with the One who breathed into them the sacred breath of life—to remind them (us included) of the One whose image they bear. What struck me as I was leading my first Easter Vigil is that the next three readings in the service depict ways in which God attempts to redeem and restore all of creation and humanity. God does this through covenants God makes, first with all of creation (through Noah), then with Abraham, and then with the people of Israel through Moses.2 Actually, many of the Scripture readings during the Lenten season lift up, or hint at, these covenants. Understanding God’s covenants is basic and vital to a deeper understanding of Jesus’s journey to the cross and his resurrection, and to our understanding of God’s deep, abiding love and faithfulness to creation and all of God’s children—even in the midst of our faithlessness.
So, What Is a Covenant? Beginning in Genesis, God enters into one covenant after another with various humans in order to redeem and save God’s xii
Introduction creation. So, what is a covenant—and why would God choose to reach out to humanity through covenants as a way to prove God’s sincerity and faithfulness in providing what’s best for God’s children and all of creation? Covenant is one of the major theological motifs of the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures. Eventually, the terms “old covenant” and “new covenant,” which once described two eras (Jeremiah 31:3133; 2 Corinthians 3:4-11), came to refer to the two parts of the Christian Bible, the Old Testament (Covenant) and the New. But as the Scriptures employed in the Easter Vigil suggest, there really is one unbroken story—one covenant of love that God continuously reaffirms in response to human failing and faithlessness. The Hebrew word for covenant, berit, means “bond,” or “fetter,” bringing to mind the binding or bonding of a relationship. In Greek, the language of the New Testament, the word for covenant is diatheke, which is also used for “will” or “testament.” We might be tempted to think of a covenant much like today’s contracts, in the sense that a contract provides protection or coverage as we try to meet someone halfway in a legal transaction. However, a covenant was always considered much more than a legal contract. This, of course, is why, when I am officiating a wedding, I remind couples that they are entering not into a contractual fiftyfifty agreement but a covenant relationship. That covenant is one in which God is also a party. God is present as a witness and also as one whose faithfulness, love, and presence will provide the couple with the love, wisdom, patience, and endurance they will need to thrive in their marriage and faithfully meet the obligations of the covenant made between them. During the wedding ceremony, as couples make their promises they are made to realize (or at least hear of) their obligations toward one another. The rite that seals the covenant is the wedding service, complete with vows (sacred oaths). xiii
Introduction The signs of the covenant are exchanged in the form of rings. The wedding ring, as the ritual language indicates, “is the outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace, signifying to all the uniting”3 of this couple—or the “binding” of this couple. The sign of the covenant, the wedding ring, tells everyone that these two persons have entered into a covenant relationship with one another before God. Prayers of blessing follow, along with a celebratory meal. All of this is indicative of the kind of covenant relationship God enters into with people throughout biblical history. Secular covenants between persons are also mentioned in the Bible. There are covenants between two leaders (Abraham and Abimelech, Genesis 21:25-32); between heads of state (Ahab and Ben-hadad, 1 Kings 20:34); between a king and his people (David and the elders of Israel, 1 Chronicles 11:3); and between a conquering king and his vassal (Nebuchadnezzar and a Judean prince, Ezekiel 17:13-19; 1 Samuel 11:1). These covenants, or treaties, were thought to have been overseen by God. This was presumed to have been the case, for example, in the covenant made between Laban and his son-in-law, Jacob. The covenant concluded with a sacred meal where prayers were offered that God would make certain both parties kept the terms of the covenant (Genesis 31:44-54). David and his dear friend Jonathan also made a covenant of loyalty to one another “before Yahweh” (1 Samuel 23:18). You can see how covenants were an integral part of the ancient Near East. They express an important element in the religious life of those living in ancient Israel. Israel saw itself as bound to one God, who, faithfully and lovingly laid claim to their lives and their loyalty. Just as there were different types of covenants executed in the secular world of the ancient Near East, so, too, God institutes different kinds of covenants with God’s people. Some are unilateral, xiv
Introduction meaning that only God has an obligation to the people of God or to creation. Other covenants require fidelity and obligations from both parties (much like the marriage covenant). In what follows, we will explore each of the four major covenants in the Old Testament and see how they impacted the people who entered into those covenants with God, how God remembered each of them, and how each covenant relates to Jesus’s journey to the cross. We also will explore how they impact our own lives and the world today in light of Easter and the Resurrection.
It has eternally been God’s nature to create and to save. It has eternally been God’s nature to create and to save. Out of God’s love for creation, God is always seeking to redeem and make new. Covenants, an integral part of God’s acts in creating, and saving, illustrate how God loves us, remembers us, and calls us to remember too. The bedrock of our salvation history includes those covenants made by God through Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David. These covenants provide a rich biblical understanding of, and serve as signposts to, the “new covenant” (Luke 22:20) and “new commandment” (John 13:34) instituted by Jesus on the night he gave up his life for us. It is a covenant that reveals the infinite depth of God’s love for us from the beginning and demonstrates God’s desire to save and bring new life to all who are created in the image of God. This ultimate covenant’s climactic revelation occurs at the cross. Throughout biblical history, humanity consistently breaks covenant with God, and God inevitably responds by rescuing and redeeming. This begins with Adam and Eve. Although they had no formal covenant with God, Adam and Eve received xv
Introduction instruction and an understanding of how their relationships were ordered: God provided everything they needed, and they trusted in God completely—until they didn’t and broke trust with God by eating the one fruit that was forbidden. They had a harmonious relationship with God until they tried to become like God and usurp God’s place in their lives.
Throughout biblical history, humanity consistently breaks covenant with God, and God inevitably responds by rescuing and redeeming. The story of Adam and Eve sets the tone and establishes the pattern for the succession of broken relationships between God and humans, continuing through the story of the people of Israel (whose very name means to struggle or wrestle with God). Their story is our story. In every instance of rebellion or faithlessness committed by the people, God remains faithful. Or as the Communion liturgy in our church tradition reads: “You formed us in your image and breathed into us the breath of life. When we turned away, and our love failed, your love remained steadfast.” 4 In a way, the cross represents the ultimate breach of the covenant—not just the rejection of Jesus, God in human form, but an attempt to banish God among us forever through physical execution. In spite of this brutal betrayal and rejection, God in Jesus the Christ never stops remembering those whom he loves. God remains faithful as always, loving us to the end. God returns to invite us back into a relationship of love and trust that has been extended to us since the beginning of time. This time, God offers the power of God’s very presence through the Holy Spirit to enable us to remain bound in covenant relationship with God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. xvi
Introduction The Easter Vigil begins in darkness, like the darkness of a tomb, and with stories of God’s redeeming covenants. Those covenants are meant to show the world the deep grief God experiences over our insistence on living our lives in violence and chaos, and the depths God continually plumbs in order to save us from ourselves. But the Vigil ends in light, hope, and Resurrection glory. As the last Scripture, the gospel message declaring the good news of the Resurrection, is read, light is shared from the Paschal candle, passed from one person to the next (much like a Christmas Eve candlelight service), and the darkness of the tomb slowly recedes as each person receives the light of the resurrected Christ. Light fills the “tomb” as we all raise our candles high and sing our hallelujahs in unison to the great Easter hymn, “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today.” I’m excited that we are taking this Lenten journey together to explore the covenants God has made with all of us through Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, and Jesus. These covenants are integral to the arc of our salvation story from Creation through God’s gracious acts in Jesus Christ. May your Lenten and Easter season be richer because of this journey from Creation to the cross. And may you experience the joy, hope, and light of the risen Christ as you remember the God who always remembers you.
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Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, “As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark. I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh, and the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.” (Genesis 9:8-17)
I have spent my entire life as a resident of Texas, and I love it. In Texas, we often say, “If you don’t like the weather in Texas, just wait a few minutes.” Although that seems to be a common motto in other states as well, the truth is that the weather in Texas is relatively predictable—well, most of the time—at least in 1
Remember the summers. It’s almost a certainty that mid-May to at least midSeptember will be hot, extremely hot, and that fall is just a cooler summer, with the changing colors and dropping of tree leaves occurring one day in November. That may be an exaggeration, but not by much. However, winters in Texas can bring great variety in temperatures and weather patterns. On one December weekend, you might experience gorgeous, eighty-degree temperatures as you sit by the pool. The very next weekend, you could be walking in a winter wonderland and shoveling a bit of snow from your sidewalk. The truth about winter in Texas is that temperatures rarely dip below freezing, at least in my neck of the woods, and if they do, it’s not by much, and it doesn’t last long. February 2021 was an exception. Just when we thought we had left the word “unprecedented” behind in 2020 with the COVID19 crisis, the Great Texas Snowstorm arrived. As a friend of mine remarked, “I’m pretty tired of living in unprecedented times and events!” In some respects, we felt as if we were living in the unprecedented times of Noah during that week. Instead of rain falling for forty days and nights, it seemed as if the snow and ice would never stop, or that the freezing temperatures that dropped into the teens and single digits would never end. When the cold abated, the rains came, not pouring from clouds in the sky, but from millions of burst water pipes that froze when the Texas power grid failed and countless homes were left without heat (and then, of course, water). The indoor rains literally flooded thousands of homes and businesses. We all felt more than a little like Noah. You are probably familiar with the story of Noah, if for no other reason than from days spent in children’s Sunday school classes, or from seeing colorful images in children’s rooms and books of animals being led two by two onto the ark. In this biblical flood story, God basically “un-creates” the Edenlike world that God established in Creation in order to reestablish a new creation. But why? 2
Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation
In this biblical flood story, God basically “un-creates” the Eden-like world that God established in Creation in order to reestablish a new creation. Prior to the story of Noah, we discover that humanity, which God created in God’s own image and declared “good,” had become corrupt. Scripture tells us that God “saw that the wickedness of humans was great in the earth,” that it was filled with violence and corruption. There “was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that he had made humans on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart” (Genesis 6:5-6). Notice that this Scripture doesn’t say that God seeks vengeance or is wrathful in response to what has happened. God surveys what has become of God’s beautiful creation and of those who were tenderly entrusted with its care and is grieved to the heart. That grief began with the disobedience of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden after they ate from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The intimacy and trust that had been inherent from the beginning were broken. Humanity began hiding from God, and then blaming one another, and even God, for their own transgressions. While the creation of humanity and the instructions God offers them (the boundaries put in place for their good) is not called or considered a covenant, faith and trust are broken. It’s grievous. And that grief continues as the first child born to Adam and Eve, Cain, murders his brother Abel. Even so, God still provides for Adam and Eve and offers a means of protection for Cain in the midst of his banishment (Genesis 3:21; 4). As an aside, perhaps it’s worth pausing for a moment to reflect that the first murderer does not receive a capital sentence from God; instead, God’s mark warns other humans not to impose such a punishment. As creation 3
Remember multiplies, it seems the growth of civilization only contributes to it becoming less civilized. Its actions are more and more inclined toward evil. God is devastated by grief as the image of the loving and gracious Creator becomes unrecognizable in the ones who have been created. So God decides to “undo” creation. But instead of putting an end to it all, God decides to preserve a remnant of what God had created and start anew with the only person God finds to be righteous and blameless, the only one that “walked with God” (Genesis 6:9): Noah and his family. To begin this undoing of creation God determines to send a torrent of rain, a flood that will wash away all of the evil from the world and make way for a renewed creation. Sometimes the image of God in us seems less visible to others than it should. We wander away from God and become less patient, less kind, less giving, less forgiving, less loving. In that wandering, we sometimes become more demanding, more irritable, more selfish, and more judgmental. We need to be re-created. We need to have God wash away that which makes our true identity as a child of God unrecognizable. We need to die to that which does not look like the love of the Creator in us. In the ancient Near East, turbulent water was the symbol of ultimate chaos. A flood was viewed as a return to the primordial chaos from which God created the world. What is surprising about the story of Noah is not that God grieved over humanity and decided to eradicate it, but that the very people who were called into being out of the chaos and nothingness in creation, and were imbued with the very breath of God, seem determined to return to chaos and nothingness. This wasn’t just the case in Noah’s day. We only have to turn on the television news or open our news apps to see story upon story of violence, corruption, greed, moral degeneration, and environmental abuses to realize that we, too, often choose turbulence and primordial chaos over the Eden-like existence that 4
Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation God desires for us. Our all-too-human behaviors bring about real self-inflicted consequences. Our overt insistence on blaming the other person, the other political party, the other social class, or the other religious group for all of our personal and societal problems has resulted in a stark increase in vitriol toward our neighbors. Our refusal to listen to others’ points of view leads us no longer to see them as our brothers and sisters in creation, as children of God with whom we share this small planet that our Creator made. Our refusal to curb our appetites for consuming fossil fuels and refrain from littering our planet has contributed to rising sea levels, which can eerily remind us of the rising waters in Noah’s day—this time caused by humans. Selfishness and violence have, as in Noah’s time, contributed to fearfulness and suspicion in our communities instead of empathy and sharing. It is easy to see the story of Noah, as many people do, as the act of a vengeful or capricious God. But that is not what is happening here. It’s important to note that many of the ancient Near Eastern cultures had a flood story. Obviously, there was a massive flood (or floods) that affected the region, but each culture had its own story of what caused the flood. The most famous is the Epic of Gilgamesh.
The God of Israel created and governed the world with a benevolent purpose. All of the other stories, except for the Old Testament interpretation of this natural disaster, marked the event as the work of capricious and uncaring deities, who made erratic and arbitrary decisions regarding the fate of humanity. However, Israel grounded this story in the God who cared deeply for all of creation and had expectations for righteousness and justice as part of the created order. The God of Israel created and governed the world with a benevolent purpose. 5
Remember There is ample evidence for the judgment and justice that God pronounces through the Flood story. But it also isn’t surprising that God relents from destroying everyone and everything by saving righteous Noah and his family, and two of every animal, in order to begin creation again. While God is definitely just, Scripture constantly reminds us that God is also gracious, merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love (Psalm 86:15; Exodus 34:6; Numbers 14:18; Nehemiah 9:17). It is in God’s very nature to create. It is also in God’s nature to save and seek reconciliation with those who wander from the intention of their original design and blessedness. So, instead of destroying all of creation, God reboots it. Before the rains come, God offers detailed instructions as to how Noah and his sons should build an ark to house their families and all of the animals when the waters begin to rise (Genesis 6:14-16). Just as God created birds of the air and every creeping thing on the earth, God provides for their reestablishment on the earth after the Flood in these words to Noah: “For my part, I am going to bring a flood of waters on the earth, to destroy from under heaven all flesh in which is the breath of life; everything that is on the earth shall die. But I will establish my covenant with you; and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. And of every living thing, of all flesh, you shall bring two of every kind into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. . . . Also take with you every kind of food that is eaten, and store it up, and it shall serve as food for you and for them.” Noah did this; he did all that God commanded him.” (Genesis 6:17-19, 21-22)
Here we see the beginning of God establishing the first covenant in the Bible. While we don’t yet read what it will entail, we do see that this covenant will be a divine response to the tension held between God’s unrelenting purpose to create a peacefilled world and the Creator of the universe’s character of justice, 6
Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation colliding with God’s deep love and compassion for a humanity that insists on bending toward violence, destruction, disobedience, and insubordination. The church in which I served in ministry for 20 years—it is still my home church—is beautifully constructed in Gothic style. The sanctuary, like many churches, is architecturally designed in a cruciform shape. Its ceiling soars in height, seemingly carrying those who gather for worship into the presence of God. In such churches the center aisle is called the nave. The word nave is derived from the Latin, navis, meaning “ship.” I used to love reminding our congregation to look up at the ceiling in the nave of our church because it was intentionally designed to look like the hull of a ship. Every time we gather for worship we are symbolically reminded, not only of the story of Noah, but also of God’s saving grace that continues to carry the community of faith—you and me—to safety through all of life’s deluges, turbulent waters, and storms. We are to remember what God has done in the past, and continues doing, to save us, shelter us, and lead us to life. That beautiful symbolism was derived from and began with Noah, an ark, and a covenant. The symbol of the church is still a ship, an ark. It’s interesting to note that the only other place in the Old Testament where the Hebrew word for ark (tebah) is used is in the story of baby Moses, who is placed in a pitch-coated “basket” (tebah) that protects him and carries him to safety. Pharaoh had ordered all male Hebrew babies to be thrown in the Nile and drowned. But this tiny ark carried Moses safely through the same water meant for his destruction. The same God that provides an ark for Noah and his family provides one for Moses, too. After forty days of deluge, “God remembered Noah” and all the animals with him. “And God made a wind blow over the earth” (Genesis 8:1). After 150 days of roiling water, and months of waiting for the waters to recede, a dove that Noah releases from the ark finally returns with an olive branch signaling that it’s time 7
Remember for the occupants of the ark to make their way into an empty world filled with new, hope-filled possibilities (Genesis 8:10-12). God remembering Noah marks the turning point in the story. We learn here that God’s memory is salvific, offering deeds of love that fulfill God’s promises. For Noah, that promise is that he and his family will be integral in participating in God’s new creation. God’s salvific remembering continues throughout the Bible. God remembers the childless Rachel, and she conceives and gives birth to Joseph (30:22-24). God hears the cries of the Israelites in Egypt, remembers the covenant made with Abraham, and delivers them from slavery (Exodus 2:23-25). The thief on the cross next to Jesus cries out to him, “Remember me when you come in your kingdom” (Luke 23:42). This was more than a throw-away request from a criminal; it was a declaration of faith in Jesus’s identity as the One who can save through remembering the distress of God’s people. God remembers Noah and makes a wind blow over the earth, inviting us to remember the opening verses of the Creation story in Genesis: “When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters” (Genesis 1:1-2). In Hebrew the word translated as “wind” is ruach. It can also mean “breath” or “spirit.” In creation, God’s breath or spirit hovered over the waters of creation. That same breath and spirit breathe life into a lump of clay, causing it to become a human being made in the image of its Creator. That same wind, breath, and spirit will be active in this new creation, calming the waters and bringing new life. Keep all this in mind, by the way, whenever you read the story in John’s Gospel of how the risen Jesus breathed onto the disciples and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit” (John 20:22). God’s Spirit gave life to Adam and Eve, gave new life and power to the disciples, and, here, renews the world God made. 8
Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation As the wind from God dries the earth, and as Noah and his family wait and yearn for new possibilities, we get a sense that God’s grief continues. God realizes that retribution will not resolve humanity’s constant bent toward chaos and destruction, so God makes binding promises to Noah and his family. This covenant actually extends to all humanity, all living creatures, and all creation. As we’ve learned, some covenants require both parties to make an agreement, and if the covenant terms are not met, the covenant becomes void. What is amazing about this covenant that God makes with all of creation—with Noah, with you, and with me—is that it requires nothing from us. It is unilateral. God is the sole actor in this covenant made with creation. It sets limits only on God, who promises never again to destroy all of creation by a flood. God self-imposes limits on God’s power. And God places the rainbow in the sky as a kind of divine memory aid. Nothing is required of Noah and his family or of their descendants to prevent this destruction from recurring. Only God is responsible for keeping this covenant, and the sign of the covenant (if there’s a covenant, there is usually a sign) will be the rainbow. Whenever it appears in the clouds, the rainbow will remind God of the covenant made with Noah and all of creation. Not that God has a poor memory and needs the reminder, but knowing about the sign of the covenant also reminds us that God prefers to bind God’s self to us, regardless of how chaotic, violent, or destructive we become, rather than not live with us. It reminds us of our undeserved blessings and God’s abundant compassion. Just as God expresses sorrow in creating humanity and decides to begin creation anew, I believe God’s initiating of the covenant with Noah expresses God’s grief over the original creation that God loved. Why? Because God promises never again to do such a thing. Many have thought that the covenant given to Noah was a sign of God’s repentance, or turning back toward humanity, even as God knows that this new creation, beginning with Noah’s 9
Remember children and extending through their descendants, will not be as faithful and righteous as Noah. God would rather live with us, despite our disregard for God’s purposes in our lives, than live without us. We can remember this and give thanks every time we see a rainbow. One summer afternoon, as we were vacationing in Colorado, storms blew in over the Rockies, as they often do at that time of day. Just as the rain subsided, a magnificent rainbow appeared in the sky. It was the largest I had ever seen, with the most vibrant colors. It was so huge that it seemed as if you could almost reach out and touch it. The expansive bands were broad and as vivid as if a painter had freshly dipped his largest brush into each vibrant color on his palette. I grabbed my camera to capture the breathtaking moment. Though the images from the photos were impressive, they paled in comparison to the splendor of the reality. And then I thought about Noah. I thought about how breathtaking it must have been for him to hear God’s voice proclaim the depth of God’s love for him, his family, and all of creation. I thought about how powerful and palpable that love must have felt. No doubt, the magnificence of the moment when Noah saw the first rainbow after God proclaimed the covenant with all of creation must have mirrored, or even amplified, the awe he felt at hearing about the covenant from God.
The rainbow was, and is, always there as a reminder that God remembers. And yet, even the story of the covenant, as it was told and read through the years, couldn’t capture the magnificence of that first moment of awe, just as my camera couldn’t capture the full beauty of my rainbow sighting or instill the wonder I experienced from witnessing it directly. People’s memories faded like images in old photographs until humanity turned their eyes, not toward the 10
Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation rainbow in the sky, toward the sign of the everlasting covenant, but inward toward themselves and their desires. They began to forget. Yet the rainbow was, and is, always there as a reminder that God remembers. An archer’s “bow” was an instrument of war. An undrawn bow reminds us that God’s “bow” is hung in the sky as a personal reminder to “never again” destroy the creation. By the same token, the rainbow, that undrawn bow in the clouds, helps us remember the God who remembers us—even, or especially, amid the chaos and rebellion we create. In delving into this story during the first week of Lent, we also begin our journey with Jesus toward Jerusalem and the cross. Through Noah’s story we can better understand not only the love and compassion of the Word made flesh who dwelt among us in Jesus but especially the God who sent him. We can better know the God who became one of us in order yet again to make us see that we are remembered as God’s good creation, and not for our transgressions, our horrible tempers, our insistence on our own way, our violence, our vitriol, and our words. We are redeemed and offered to be re-created, over and over again. We are reminded of the deep, eternal love of our Creator, who will never stop seeking to be reconciled with us and who will suffer death on a cross in proving his love for us. In Jesus we are given a magnificent, vivid, unfading image of the God who remembers us. Our salvation history is really a story of God being faithful to this covenant with humankind. Despite everything we do, God continues to reach out in new ways to preserve and restore the original relationship with humanity. In the story we see God reminding us of this steadfastness. This is evident in God’s reassuring words offered to the Israelites through the prophet Isaiah as they were returning from exile in Babylon: I hid my face from you, but with everlasting love I will have compassion on you,
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Remember says the Lord, your Redeemer. This is like the days of Noah to me: Just as I swore that the waters of Noah would never again go over the earth, so I have sworn that I will not be angry with you and will not rebuke you. For the mountains may depart and the hills may be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed, says the Lord, who has compassion on you. (Isaiah 54:8b-10)
This is the promise we see fulfilled, yet again, on the cross. In a way, the cross becomes our rainbow. The symbol of Jesus hanging on the cross, as represented in the Catholic tradition, reminds us of the steadfastness of God’s love, which was willing to endure for our sake even the agony and torture of a public execution. The symbol of the empty cross, as represented in the Protestant tradition, reminds us that the cross is not the end—that it is actually a defeat for hate and violence and a victory for love that will outlast even the mountains and the hills. Like the rainbow, the sign of the cross is God’s promise to us. Remembering is important. It’s important for us to remember the covenants God makes with us. It is also important to remember the covenants we make and the signs of those covenants. For those of you who are married, if you wear a wedding ring, as mentioned above, it is a sign of the covenant you made with your spouse, in the presence of God, as a witness to that covenant to love and be faithful to one another. It serves as a constant reminder of how couples are to live out their lives toward one another. Seeing that ring on our finger should be a reminder of our vows of fidelity to the ones we love. When we receive Communion, we remember in the cup that this is the sign of Jesus’s blood poured out for us for the forgiveness 12
Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation of sins. We remember his covenant to end our slavery to sin and death, to continue God’s mission to create a peaceful world. Our baptism, of course, is a sign of our entering that covenant. We are a new creation in Christ. The apostle Peter tells us that God’s act of saving Noah and his family through the Flood was a precursor to our own baptism and the memory of our deliverance and salvation (1 Peter 3:18-22). It is important to remember. Salvation is linked to remembering throughout the Bible. What does this mean for us during Lent? Lent begins with Ash Wednesday. On Ash Wednesday we remember our mortality as we hear the words, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”1 These last few years, it seems to me, have been a constant reminder of our mortality. Deaths of ones we loved or knew well abounded because of COVID-19. Health workers succumbed to the disease or the stress of working so close to so much death. We see the horrific skyrocketing deaths due to rampant gun violence, the war in Ukraine, and natural disasters. We are constantly reminded of our mortality. We’ve had ample opportunity to reflect on the brevity of our days. But Lent is more than that.
Lent is a time to look inside to see how we might better spend our days on this earth in light of who and whose we are. Lent is also a call to spend forty days in the wilderness with Jesus as he overcomes the temptations we all face—the temptations to choose chaos over God—and begins his journey to the cross. Lent is a time to look inside to see how we might better spend our days on this earth in light of who and whose we are. It’s a time for us to return to the One who remembers us so that we can live into the 13
Remember image of the One who created us. We are called to remember the cost of the covenants God makes on our behalf. God’s willingness to self-limit God’s power and to sacrifice divine freedom in the story of Noah comes to a climax in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, who consummates God’s relationship with us by embracing all of our life experiences, even death. In Lent, we often commit to giving up things as a way of remembering Christ’s sacrifice for us. I saw a meme in the week after the Great Texas Snowstorm that said, “Texans have Lent covered: We’ve given up heat, showers, and groceries. We do things big in Texas!” The beginning of Lent looked very different for our community that year. Instead of imposing ashes on Ash Wednesday, we prepared to open the church as a warming station, gathering funds, water, blankets, and food for those stranded without power or a roof over their heads. The symbol of that week and that grace, for me anyway, was found in the water valve turn-off key. It’s a large, heavy key, shaped like an anchor (at least in our neighborhood) that must be used to turn off water access to homes, usually in an alleyway. As pipes began to burst and homes in our neighborhoods began to flood, neighbors frantically raced to other neighbors’ doors to see if they had that all-important key to save their homes from ruin. The anchor-shaped key seemed ironically appropriate in the midst of our indoor floods, and everyone wanted one of those anchors. While many of us had been guarding our front doors during the pandemic as if they were bank vaults, in our neighborhoods that week we discovered that those doors were flung open wide for people who needed those keys, showers, or to come in from out of the cold for a few hours. People took on others’ burdens by giving up blankets, diapers, infant formula, and water to help those displaced because of the storms. Some provided transportation to 14
Noah: God’s Covenant with Creation our homeless neighbors to get them to shelter. Neighbors showed up on each other’s doorsteps wielding chainsaws to help clear fallen trees that had toppled from the weight of heavy ice. And I thought, maybe this is the way Lent should look. Instead of just giving up something like candy for Lent, perhaps we would do well to reach out in concern to our neighbors who are suffering. Perhaps we could give up something we have an abundance of that someone else needs. Perhaps we could give up a few minutes or hours of our time to make a difference in someone else’s life. Or as Pope Francis recommends, perhaps we could give up things like fear, impatience, resentment, gossip, negativity, and worry, to name a few.2 Lent calls us to journey with God and one another in a new way. A way that brings order out of the chaos in the world. If we “give up” something for Lent, the things we sacrifice should make a difference in the world. This does not necessarily mean giving up something beneficial to us. It means following Jesus toward a more profound richness in our lives and in the lives of those we touch. It means following in trust the way that Noah did. It means trusting the way that Adam and Eve did originally. It means trusting in the way Jesus encourages us to do when he invites us to consider the lilies of the field: “They neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you?” (Matthew 6:28b-30). What if, instead of giving up chocolate, we decided to give up bitterness and anger or hurting others with our words or actions for forty days? What if we chose not to post derogatory posts on our social media pages? What if we made it a point to reach out to someone who is feeling deluged by darkness and storms in their life? What if we replaced bitterness, anger, political vitriol, pessimism, and hurtful words with kindness, gratitude, patience, 15
Remember and reconciliation? What if we remembered those whom God remembers but most of our society seems to forget? In Judaism there is a concept known as tikkun olam that refers to the repair or healing of the world. In the Jewish understanding, when we reach out to those who are ignored or on the margins; when we comfort those who are hurting; when we lift up those who have fallen; when we bring healing to the sick and food to the hungry; we honor God’s sovereignty by working to restore the beauty and harmony of God’s creation. In our response to a broken world, like the world God saw in the time of Noah, we reaffirm God’s commitment to create anew. As we journey through Lent, may we remember the One who remembers us through the covenant of steadfast love. May the image of the rainbow in the sky prompt us to remember that the covenant applies not just to us as individuals but extends to all of our fellow children of God, created, like us, in the image of our Creator, and to creation itself. Through remembering, may we join in the self-limiting spirit of God’s covenant, setting aside our own power and our own selfish desires, giving up who we have been for who we are yet to become—a renewed creation.
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Adam Hamilton Author of John, The Walk, and 24 Hours That Changed the World
Luke Jesus and the
Outsiders, Outcasts, and Outlaws
Luke:
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Also by Adam Hamilton 24 Hours That Changed the World
Incarnation
Simon Peter
John
Speaking Well
Christianity and World Religions
Leading Beyond the Walls
The Call
Christianity’s Family Tree
The Journey
Living Unafraid
The Lord’s Prayer
Love to Stay
The Walk
Making Sense of the Bible
The Way
Confronting the Controversies Creed Enough Faithful Final Words from the Cross Forgiveness Half Truths
Moses
Unafraid
Not a Silent Night
When Christians Get It Wrong
Prepare the Way for the Lord
Words of Life
Revival
Why?
Seeing Gray in a World of Black and White
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Luke Jesus and the Outsiders, Outcasts, and Outlaws Copyright © 2022 Adam Hamilton All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted by the 1976 Copyright Act, the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission can be addressed to Rights and Permissions, The United Methodist Publishing House, 810 12th Avenue South, Nashville TN 37203 or emailed to permissions@abingdonpress.com. Library of Congress Control Number: 2022946125 978-1-7910-2504-5 Scripture quotations unless noted otherwise are from the Common English Bible. Copyright © 2011 by the Common English Bible. All rights reserved. Used by permission. www.CommonEnglishBible.com. Scripture quotations marked NRSV are taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked KJV are from The Authorized (King James) Version. Rights in the Authorized Version in the United Kingdom are vested in the Crown. Reproduced by permission of the Crown’s patentee, Cambridge University Press. Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www .zondervan.com. The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™ Scripture quotations marked MSG are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Cover Image: Ivan Filichev (1937-2021), Healing, 2014, Painting-Oil on Cardboard, 25 x 28 cm, https://ivan-filichev.pixels.com/featured/healing-ivan -filichev.html. See p. 155 for more information about the artist. MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
To the people of Faith Chapel Assembly of God, who welcomed and loved me when I was a fourteen-year-old outsider and who encouraged me to read and study the Bible, including the Gospel of Luke. I will be forever grateful.
Contents Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix 1. Lifting Up the Lowly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 2. Simon, Do You See This Woman? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 3. Parables from the Underside . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 4. On the Journey to Jerusalem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 5. The Final Week . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 6. Crucified with the Outlaws . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109 Postscript . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137 Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Introduction Jesus’s Friends in Low Places Many people have already applied themselves to the task of compiling an account of the events that have been fulfilled among us. They used what the original eyewitnesses and servants of the word handed down to us. Now, after having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, I have also decided to write a carefully ordered account for you, most honorable Theophilus. I want you to have confidence in the soundness of the instruction you have received. (Luke 1:1-4)
I turned fourteen in the summer of 1978 and was preparing to begin high school that fall. My parents had divorced a couple of years earlier. My mom remarried a guy who was kind and who I really loved . . . when he wasn’t drinking. We’d experienced drunken rages where my stepdad took a sledgehammer to the inside of our house as we were told to be quiet and eat our supper. I’d come home from school with my stepdad’s stuff on the front lawn. We moved to three homes in two years. I knew no one I would be attending high school with. I felt alone, lonely, and sad. And if you would have asked about my faith that summer, I would have told you with great conviction that I was an atheist. Then one day, a man named Harold Thorson knocked on my door while my mom and stepdad were at work. He spoke with
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what looked like a microphone pressed to his throat—it was an electrolarynx—and he invited me and my family to worship at the church he attended. I attended that first Sunday, met three cute girls, and decided I was interested in getting more involved. I didn’t believe in God, but I believed in girls and so I began attending church regularly, and eventually Sunday school and youth group. I ultimately married one of those girls, right out of high school. We just celebrated our fortieth anniversary the year I wrote this book. But while it was my interest in girls that led me to get more involved in church, it was reading the Gospel of Luke that led me to become a follower of Jesus. That summer of 1978, I decided to read the entire Bible, starting with Genesis. By the time I got to the Psalms I had come to believe in God. And it was as I read the Gospel of Luke and saw its emphasis on Jesus’s concern for the lowly, the marginalized, the broken, the picked on and pushed around, that I came to love Jesus. On the night I finished reading Luke, I dropped to my knees next to my bed and prayed, “Jesus, I want to follow you. I’d like to be your disciple. I know I’m just fourteen years old, but if you can use me in any way, I offer my life to you.” My life was changed by reading Luke’s account of the life, message, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus. That decision to follow him did not end the chaos at home. But it did bring a sense of inner peace, a sense of strength, an awareness of God’s care for the broken, the outsiders, the outcasts. In this book we’ll study many of the most loved passages in Luke, passages in which this emphasis on God’s concern for the outsiders is front and center, passages that remind us that Jesus, like Garth Brooks, had “friends in low places.” As a young man reading this Gospel, I felt in its words that Jesus would befriend me. I hope you feel that as you study this Gospel too.
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A Plan for Reading this Book My hope is that you will read the Gospel of Luke alongside this book. I’ve put together a 40-day daily reading plan for Luke’s Gospel. Each daily reading is less than fifteen minutes. If you are reading this book for Lent, plan to read one chapter of it each week along with the daily Gospel readings for that week. Each chapter will correspond to one of the six weeks of Lent, with the postscript to be read the week after Easter. A copy of this reading plan can be found at www.AdamHamilton.com/Luke. If you are reading this book with a group of friends, there are short videos I’ve recorded to go along with each chapter. There will be several thousand churches that will read and study Luke together this Lent, with pastors preaching from Luke, and children, youth and adult study groups studying this book and Luke’s Gospel together. You can find resources for children, youth, and adults at www.AdamHamilton.com/Luke.
Authorship, Dating, and Major Themes Scholarly commentaries on the various books of the Bible typically begin with their own introduction describing what can be known about the book’s authorship, date of composition, and major themes. I’ll give you a very brief summary of the consensus of mainline scholarship. One thing to note as you study these questions about any New Testament book is that conservative scholars tend to defend the traditional authorship of the New Testament’s books and date the books as early as possible. Secular scholars tend to question the traditional authorship claims of the New Testament books and usually make the case for much later dates. Most mainstream evangelical and mainline scholars land somewhere between the two, supporting
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traditional authorship in many cases but questioning it in others. Likewise, they’ll tend to support early dating in some cases; but, with few exceptions, their dating is later than conservative dates and earlier than secular dates. When it comes to Luke, conservative scholars accept the traditional claims that Luke, the beloved physician, composed the book sometime as early as the mid-fifties to the early sixties AD. Secular scholars note that the Gospels were all written anonymously, and that Luke’s name does not appear in the Gospel. The names Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were added later based upon church tradition. They often date Luke to near the end of the first century or the first quarter of the second century. Finally, evangelical mainstream and mainline scholars recognize the Gospels are anonymous, with many accepting that Luke, Paul’s sometime traveling companion, may have composed the Gospel, while some are less certain. The mainstream evangelical and mainline consensus is that the Gospel of Luke was written between AD 75 and 90. Let’s spend a few more minutes speaking about authorship and then I’ll give you a summary of where we’re going in the chapters ahead.
Authorship As noted above, unlike nearly all the letters of the New Testament, none of the New Testament Gospels identify their authors. They are anonymous. But early in church history they became associated with their familiar names: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Matthew and John were apostles, and Mark was believed to have known Jesus. He was a cousin of Barnabas and an early traveling companion of Paul. While Luke’s name appears nowhere in the text of the Gospel or in Acts, he is mentioned by name in Colossians 4:14 where Paul1 writes of “Luke, the dearly loved physician” in a way that makes clear that he was with Paul while in prison as he wrote Colossians. Many point to the interesting medical details and terminology found in the
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Gospel of Luke as being consistent with Colossians 4:14 identifying Luke as a “dearly loved physician.” We also find Luke mentioned in Philemon 24. There Paul mentions his companions who are with him wherever he is imprisoned— perhaps in Caesarea Maritima or in Rome. Paul notes that Luke was among those companions. We read something similar in 2 Timothy 4:11, whose setting is near the end of Paul’s life. He is in prison, awaiting execution, and there Paul notes, “Only Luke is with me.” These references make clear that Luke was seen by the early church as a faithful traveling companion with Paul and a steadfast friend during Paul’s various times of imprisonment. This idea is consistent with multiple passages in Acts where the author speaks in the first-person plural of Paul’s travels. An example of this is Acts 16:11-12 (emphasis added), which begins the “we section” of Acts, We sailed from Troas straight for Samothrace and came to Neapolis the following day. From there we went to Philippi, a city of Macedonia’s first district and a Roman colony. We stayed in that city several days.
The author’s use of “we,” many believe, is not accidental, nor is it a literary device, but indicates that the author, presumably Luke, was traveling with Paul for the events described. The early church accepted that this was evidence of Luke and Acts being written by a traveling companion of Paul: the dearly loved physician, Luke. If Luke did indeed write this book, I can’t help wondering if some of the material in the book came from Paul himself. Paul seldom quotes Jesus, and even less often refers to stories from his life, but Luke’s writing of this Gospel would suggest that Paul knew the Gospel stories as he preached and taught about Jesus. It’s been said that Mark’s Gospel was shaped by Mark’s association with Peter. Perhaps Luke includes much of what Paul knew and preached about Jesus but did not include in his epistles.
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To Whom Was Luke Written and Why? The Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles were written by the same person and to the same recipient, one “Theophilus”—a name that means “lover of God” or “friend of God.” Some believe the name was not that of a person but used to describe anyone who sought to be lovers or friends of God and who were followers of Jesus. If that was the case, then each of us who seeks to know Jesus, or who is already committed to following Jesus, might be Theophilus. Yet the consensus is that Theophilus was a real person, a person wealthy enough to fund Luke’s work in researching and writing the Gospel. This was no small task. Luke tells us he met with eyewitnesses (did he travel to Jerusalem for this?) and acquired copies of other early gospels or pre-gospels in order to write what he hoped would be the most accurate account of the birth, life, teachings, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus. The Gospel may have been commissioned by Theophilus, but it was no doubt intended for a much broader audience. Theophilus certainly got his money’s worth as, nearly two thousand years later, the Gospel has been read by billions of people throughout history. Ultimately, we may not know with certainty when Luke was written or even whether the author’s name was Luke. What we can know is that the author, presumably Luke, took his job seriously. In the introduction of Luke, a passage you’ve seen at the opening of this introduction, he wrote, Many people have already applied themselves to the task of compiling an account of the events that have been fulfilled among us. They used what the original eyewitnesses and servants of the word handed down to us. Now, after having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, I have also decided to write a carefully ordered account for you, most honorable Theophilus. I want you to have confidence in the soundness of the instruction you have received. (Luke 1:1-4, emphasis added)
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Notice that Luke mentions that many had already compiled accounts of the story of Jesus. This is fascinating. The only Gospel we know of that is believed to have been written prior to Luke is Mark. So where are these other compilations? It’s thought that they are preserved in Luke, Matthew, John, and perhaps even Mark. Each of these Gospel writers had sources available to them, some of which were compilations of Jesus’s teachings and stories of his life. Scholars believe that Matthew and Luke had access to Mark. Some suggest that Luke had access to Matthew, or that Matthew had access to Luke (though we might suppose that there would not be so many areas of disagreement between these two Gospels if one relied on the other). More likely, both Matthew and Luke had access to compilations of Jesus’s teaching, his miraculous healings, passion narratives and Easter stories, and more. We know that Luke and Matthew both quote Mark, virtually word for word at times. But they also both seem to quote at least one other source, perhaps more. What is most important to note from Luke’s introduction is that he has carefully researched his Gospel and he wants the reader to have confidence in the veracity of what he has written and ultimately in their faith. Like each of the Gospels, Luke was not merely a biography of Jesus. It was a gospel (which means good news) meant to confirm and deepen the faith of those, like Theophilus, who had already come to believe. It was also meant to persuade those who were interested in or open to hearing the gospel—the good news of Jesus Christ—to become Jesus-followers. Luke sought to paint a compelling picture of Jesus, but this picture of Jesus was particularly compelling to those who identified with Luke’s stories. John tells us at the end of his Gospel that “Jesus did many other things as well. If all of them were recorded, I imagine the world itself wouldn’t have enough room for the scrolls that would be written” ( John 21:25). Even if John deploys a bit of hyperbole, the point is clear: there were many stories from the life and ministry
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of Jesus that could have been told. John chose certain ones for his purpose. Luke chose others for his purposes. And what are Luke’s purposes? He wants to confirm and give confidence to the faith of those who have come to believe. But he also writes to beckon people to put their faith in Christ. In particular, he seems to want to appeal to the same people he notes Jesus appealed to: the outsiders, the outcasts, and even the outlaws, or, said another way, the marginalized, the broken, the poor and pitiable, and all the people who felt unseen or alone, or second class.
A Brief Outline of What’s Ahead Each chapter in this book will tell the story of Jesus as found in Luke by highlighting some of Jesus’s “friends in low places.” As we do this, you’ll come to see just how important this theme is to Luke. It was this idea that won my heart to Christ, just as I believe Luke intended when he wrote this Gospel. Here’s where we’re going as we progress through the book: In chapter 1, we’ll turn to the Gospel’s opening to see how God chose and used the elderly and infertile, as well as the young, the poor, and the powerless, as we turn to the stories surrounding the birth of John the Baptist and his cousin, Jesus. In chapter 2, we’ll turn to Luke’s emphasis on Jesus’s ministry with and for women including the demon-possessed Mary of Magdala with the voices in her head, the sinful woman who wept at Jesus’s feet, and the conflict between two sisters, Mary and Martha, trying to understand how Jesus saw a woman’s role in his ministry. In chapter 3, we’ll consider Jesus’s parables and how often in Luke Jesus makes the sinners, the sickly, the tax collectors, and the Samaritans the heroes of his stories, and the religious hypocrites the villains. In chapter 4, we’ll turn to Jesus’s final journey to Jerusalem, a journey that takes up nearly half of the Gospel. On this journey, Jesus ministered to Samaritan lepers, a chief tax collector named
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Zacchaeus, and others who were outcasts, outsiders, and outlaws to their people, climaxing with his dramatic statement, “the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost” (Luke 19:10 NRSV). In chapter 5, we’ll turn to the events of Holy Week as Jesus entered Jerusalem “humble and riding on a donkey” (Matthew 21:5; see also Zechariah 9:9). There he overturns the tables of the wealthy and powerful merchants in the Temple, praises a poor widow who gave her last “mite” in her offering to God. At the Last Supper, Jesus addresses a debate among his disciples about which one of them was the “greatest.” In chapter 6, we’ll turn to the crucifixion of Jesus, and the words Luke records Jesus saying from the cross—words that only appear in Luke’s Gospel: from the cross, Jesus prayed for the forgiveness of his abusers, offered salvation to an outlaw, and then entrusted his life into his Father’s hands. Finally, in the postscript, we’ll turn to the Resurrection and the meaning of this powerful event, particularly for all who have struggled and felt powerless. We’ll see, in keeping with Luke’s theme, who Jesus chooses to be the first witnesses to the Resurrection and to help his readers see how the Resurrection speaks to them. It was reading this Gospel when I was fourteen—this Gospel for the outsiders, the outcasts, and the outlaws—that I fell in love with Jesus and decided to commit my life to him. My hope is that in studying this Gospel, if you are not yet a Christian, you might hear the good news of Jesus and decide, as I did, you want to follow Jesus and be his disciple. And if you are already a follower of Jesus, I hope your faith grows deeper, and your commitment stronger, as you seek to embody his life and teachings, his death and resurrection, in your life. I’d love to invite you to join me in this prayer, Lord, as I begin this study of Luke’s Gospel, open my ears to hear, and my heart to receive, all that you want to say to me. Help me to see you, to hear you, and ultimately to follow you. Amen.
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Table of Showbread
Lampstand Altar of Incense
Holy of Holies
Holy Place
Laver
Vestibule
Inner Court Bronze Altar Priests’ Hall Israelites’ Hall
Outer Court
A diagram of the Temple in Jerusalem. The angel Gabriel appeared to Zechariah beside the incense altar in the Holy Place (Luke 1:5-25). Simeon and Anna encountered the infant Jesus in the “temple area,” most likely in the outer court (Luke 2:25-38).
1 Lifting Up the Lowly He has shown strength with his arm. He has scattered those with arrogant thoughts and proud inclinations. He has pulled the powerful down from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty-handed. (Luke 1:51-53)
“Line up!” our gym teacher shouted. “It’s time to divide teams for kickball.” I was not particularly good at kickball in third grade. I don’t know if it was a clumsy phase, or my poor hand-eye coordination, or that I was afraid of getting hit by the ball, but even at eight it was clear I was never going to make the world kickball championship team (yes, there are national championship teams in kickball!). I didn’t mind not being great at kickball. What I hated was when we divided up the teams. There were two kids who were regularly chosen to be captains. They were taller, stronger, more athletic, and cooler than the rest of us. They would go back and forth choosing who they wanted on their team. And I’d stand there, a skinny orange-haired kid who hadn’t had a growth spurt yet, a bit awkward in my own skin, hoping and praying that someone would pick me. That was a year of repeated
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humiliation when, on multiple occasions, I was the last kid chosen, the kid one team was forced to take. Now imagine a team captain who looked at the potential players, and her first choice was the scrawny, awkward kids that no one wanted. And with each successive choice she chose the next worst player. She’d have the “Bad News Bears” of kickball, a group of utterly unlikely candidates who were certain to be a losing team, but who, in the end, became the championship team. In a sense, this is how Luke sees the gospel, and God’s character and kingdom as well as the driving passion of Jesus’s ministry, the purpose of his crucifixion, and the victory achieved in his resurrection. Some have called Luke’s emphasis “the great reversal.” You can see it on nearly every page of Luke’s Gospel. Let’s begin our study where Luke begins, with the Annunciation and Nativity stories of John the Baptist and Jesus.
They Were Both Very Old During the rule of King Herod of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah. His wife Elizabeth was a descendant of Aaron. They were both righteous before God, blameless in their observance of all the Lord’s commandments and regulations. They had no children because Elizabeth was unable to become pregnant and they both were very old. (Luke 1:5-7)
With these words, Luke formally begins his account of the Gospel of Jesus by telling us the story of John the Baptist’s parents. No other Gospel, in fact no other New Testament book, mentions Elizabeth and Zechariah. I devote a great deal of time unpacking this story in my last book, Prepare the Way for the Lord: Advent and the Message of John the Baptist (Abingdon, 2022). Here, I’ll only briefly touch on a few of the details Luke wants us to notice as he introduces his theme concerning the unlikely people God favors and chooses to use.
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Notice that Luke tells us Elizabeth and Zechariah were righteous before God, yet “they had no children because Elizabeth was unable to become pregnant.” And he adds “and they both were very old.” The elderly held a place of honor in first-century Judaism. Younger adults were to stand when someone over sixty walked into the room. But it was likely that ageism toward older adults was present then as today. In our hurry-up lives, when we get behind someone who is driving slowly, we say they are “driving like a grandpa.” When we are hiring people for a job, we don’t tend to start with seasoned candidates with a lifetime of experience, people in their sixties or even their fifties. Employers are looking for someone in their thirties. In a recent national study, 80 percent of adults fifty to eighty indicate they have experienced some form of age discrimination. Among the most overt and visible places for age discrimination is in news and entertainment. There is a recognized double standard where leading male actors and anchorpersons are routinely ten years or more older than their female counterparts. There have been numerous lawsuits filed by female anchorpersons who were released from their jobs, or taken off the air, as they aged. One award-winning female anchorwoman who was replaced with a woman ten years younger offered this advice: “Whatever you do, don’t get old.”1 The church world is not immune to this. It has been a standing joke among clergy for years that the average local church has an ideal pastor for their congregation: male, thirty-five years old, with two-point-five children. And, unless the congregation is made up of people of color, the unnamed criterion is usually white. The joke didn’t seem so offensive when I was in my thirties, but today it’s not so funny. The challenge is not just felt by pastors, but by worship leaders and a host of other staff. This tendency to devaluate adults over sixty is felt by parishioners in many congregations as well, who sometimes feel that in the churches they’ve attended for decades, they are now “the last ones picked for the team.”
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But Luke’s Gospel starts with God choosing the “very old” Elizabeth and Zechariah to give birth to the prophet who would prepare the way for the Messiah. Elizabeth and Zechariah are not the only examples of this in the Gospel. If you have your Bible, turn to Luke 2:25 where Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to the Temple. A man named Simeon, grateful to have seen the child, prays that God can now take him for he had “seen your salvation.” Simeon would seem to be an older man. Next, consider Anna, beginning in Luke 2:36: There was also a prophet, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, who belonged to the tribe of Asher. She was very old. After she married, she lived with her husband for seven years. She was now an 84-year-old widow. She never left the temple area but worshipped God with fasting and prayer night and day. She approached at that very moment and began to praise God and to speak about Jesus to everyone who was looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem. (Luke 2:36-38)
God chose the least likely couple in the world to produce a nation that would be God’s special covenant people. In each case, there are older adults, people largely sidelined by society then as now, whom God chose and used. This is nothing new to Luke. God called Abraham and Sarah, at the age of seventyfive and sixty-five, respectively, to leave all that was familiar to them and move to the Promised Land. Sarah was ninety and Abraham a hundred when God finally blessed this infertile couple with a child, Isaac. Now, I’d prefer not to experience this latter blessing of a child at one hundred, but the point is that God chose the least likely couple in the world to produce a nation that would be God’s special
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covenant people. Moses was eighty when he led the children of Israel out of slavery in Egypt. Again and again God chooses and uses those who are “over the hill” to accomplish his greatest purposes. God’s affection for the aging is captured well in Isaiah: Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you. (Isaiah 46:4 NIV)
A Lifelong Struggle with Infertility Notice Elizabeth and Zechariah were not just an older couple, but a couple who had struggled with infertility. They had prayed and prayed and prayed to have a child but had never been able to conceive. This was considered by many at the time to be a sign that God did not favor a woman—a source of shame and disgrace in a time when infertility was not understood. Even today, I’ve known many couples, particularly the woman trying to conceive, who experience infertility as a source of great pain. Many wonder where God is in the midst of their heartache. Scripture does not see infertility as a sign of God’s displeasure or disregard, but often those struggling with infertility may believe it does. Today, we understand many of the physiological causes of infertility and don’t see this as an act of God. But throughout the Bible we do find God’s compassion and concern for those who wrestled with infertility. And often, when some special part of God’s story needed a child to be born, it was couples who had struggled with infertility that God chose for the task. In the Old Testament, God chose Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel, and Hannah and Elkanah, each an infertile couple, for a special role in his plans.
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Nevertheless, in the first-century setting of this story, God’s choice of this elderly couple who had known the pain of infertility is another example of God’s compassion and God’s choosing and using the outsider, for that is what Elizabeth’s infertility left her feeling. We can both see and feel that in Elizabeth’s words after she conceived, “This is the Lord’s doing. He has shown his favor to me by removing my disgrace among other people” (Luke 1:25, emphasis added).
Hitting Your Stride? From the opening chapters of Luke, the Gospel writer shows us God’s choice of those who are older. Our society often values the nimbleness and energy of youth and undervalues the wisdom and knowledge of those who are older. Harvard professor Arthur Brooks recently wrote a book titled From Strength to Strength about finding purpose, meaning, and success as we age. The premise is important and familiar to many of us: the skills, intelligence, and abilities that can lead to certain kinds of success in the first half of our lives and careers will not continue undiminished throughout our lives. Think of Tom Brady, the superstar NFL quarterback who won his seventh Super Bowl in 2021 at the age of forty-three. In his twenties and early thirties, Brady was fast, agile, strong, and quick to make decisions. These skills of his diminished over time, as they do for all of us. In his later thirties and early forties, however, different strengths began to emerge. What Brady came to count on was not speed or strength or quickness of thought, but twenty-two years of experience, wisdom, and knowledge of the game. Brooks doesn’t speak about Tom Brady in his book, but he does describe two kinds of intelligence that I think Tom Brady illustrates. Brooks speaks of fluid intelligence and crystallized intelligence. As one declines, the other continues to grow and expand. Fluid intelligence includes problem solving, quickness of thought, memory, adaptation,
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pliability. Its physical corollaries are strength, speed, and the ability to work seventy hours a week. As fluid intelligence starts to diminish, crystallized intelligence emerges and grows. Crystallized intelligence is the vast body of knowledge you have that continues to grow. It is maturity, wisdom, insight, experience. We see all of this in the Christian spiritual life as well. As we age, we have the potential to have more patience, grace, humility, love, understanding, knowledge, wisdom. A midlife crisis often comes as we recognize the unmistakable decline of our fluid intelligence. We also find that the world can sometimes miss out on seeing the value of crystallized intelligence and all that goes with aging. We can “put people out to pasture” or consider them “all washed up.” It’s important to value youth, but we can so value youth that we miss out on the gifts of age. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers recognized an opportunity in signing Tom Brady. Most of his career was behind him, but he might play a couple of years for them. Crucially, they realized that he could more than make up for his lack of fluid intelligence with his high crystallized intelligence. He still had the gifts to win a Super Bowl for them. Perhaps even more importantly, he would also pass on his wisdom and knowledge—his crystallized intelligence—to an entire team of younger players. There are fields where crystallized intelligence is prized and essential. We don’t allow people to run for president of the United States before the age of thirty-five. We feel a position this important needs a certain level of wisdom, and we don’t elect people until they are capable of having a fair amount of crystallized intelligence. College professors tend to be more valued the longer they’ve been researching, writing, and teaching—most get better with age. Doctors are valued in so many ways the more experience they have. The same is true of football coaches. The average age of an NFL head coach is forty-nine. Andy Reid, coach of the Kansas City Chiefs, is sixty-four as I’m writing this book. His last five years have been his best years ever as an NFL head coach.
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I think this is part of why God so frequently chooses older adults in scripture. I think God often chooses people who have the humility to say “It’s not about me,” who have gained a lifetime of wisdom, and who have put their trust in God. When we reach the point in life where crystallized intelligence surpasses fluid intelligence, we should be thinking about how we can use our crystallized knowledge to have the greatest possible impact. Many, at this point, consider launching a new career in the ministry. Any guess what is the average age of a seminary student? It’s right around forty. While you’ll find students who are twenty-two, fresh out of college, you’ll also find students who are in their sixties. In fact, one Resurrection member who is sixty recently started seminary. God often chooses and uses people the world might see as “over the hill” to do God’s greatest work. I see it every day at the church I serve. Older adults provide most of our volunteers in nearly every ministry area. They pack backpacks to relieve hunger each week. They chair many of our committees. They coordinate our mission trips, lead Bible studies, teach children, and mentor others. They sing in the choir, drive and operate our mobile food pantry, our book mobile, and our furnishings truck. The church could not survive were it not for the older adults who give such great leadership. At Resurrection we require that all our leadership teams be comprised of one-third people over fifty-five, one-third people thirty-five to fiftyfive, and one-third people fifteen to thirty-five. Why? Because we need the leadership and mentoring of those who are over fifty-five, and the perspective, energy, and passion of those under thirty-five, and everyone in between. If you are an older adult, God is not finished with you yet. It may be your most productive, influential, and fruitful years are all ahead of you. The most important, meaningful, and joyful years in Elizabeth and Zechariah’s lives all occurred when they were “very old.”
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Lifting Up the Lowly
God Chooses and Uses Young Adults Luke 1–2 also points out that God chooses and uses young people, preteens, and young teens—people who in the first-century world had not yet earned the respect or right to be heard. Mary was engaged to Joseph, a carpenter and handyman2 from Nazareth. Girls were typically married shortly after their first period, around age fourteen, perhaps younger. After the annunciation to Zechariah and Elizabeth, Luke shifts to thirteen- or fourteen-year-old Mary, to whom the angel Gabriel appears one day in her town of Nazareth saying, “Rejoice, favored one! The Lord is with you!” (Luke 1:28). Mary was understandably perplexed! Read to what happens next: The angel said, “Don’t be afraid, Mary. God is honoring you. Look! You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great and he will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of David his father. He will rule over Jacob’s house forever, and there will be no end to his kingdom.” Then Mary said to the angel, “How will this happen since I haven’t had sexual relations with a man?” The angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come over you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the one who is to be born will be holy. He will be called God’s Son. Look, even in her old age, your relative Elizabeth has conceived a son. This woman who was labeled ‘unable to conceive’ is now six months pregnant. Nothing is impossible for God.” (Luke 1:30-37)
For the single most significant event that will happen on earth since creation, the Incarnation—God coming to us, as one of us, to save, deliver, and redeem the human race—God chose to use a thirteen- or fourteen-year-old girl from an insignificant family who lived on the “other side of the tracks.”
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I often remind our confirmation class at Resurrection that Mary was their age when she was chosen by God for this important task. I remind them that God chooses and uses young adults throughout scripture, people in their teens and twenties. David was just a boy when he fought Goliath, the giant Philistine. It was the young princess Esther who worked up the courage to save the Jewish people from genocide. It was Timothy whom Paul left to pastor in Ephesus, to whom Paul would write, “Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young. Instead, set an example for the believers through your speech, behavior, love, faith, and by being sexually pure” (1 Timothy 4:12). Paul’s words to Timothy illustrate an attitude we sometimes see toward people who are young: older people might look down upon them, dismiss them, patronize them, or fail to take them seriously because of their youth. We might think a young person hasn’t lived long enough, hasn’t learned enough, hasn’t experienced enough to lead or contribute meaningfully. Ageism works in both directions. But Luke’s account of Mary, as well as the other stories of young people in scripture, shows that God chooses and uses those whom others might regard as “too young.” I felt called to be a pastor when I was sixteen, but there are many who first hear the call to be in ministry before that. Anna Sarol is a member of Resurrection who was paralyzed from the waist down in a tragic gymnastics accident when she was fourteen. Out of that tragedy, she focused on what God could do with her life. She said, “I never thought, ‘Why me?’ I knew I had a bigger purpose: to use this pain and all these hard times. I hope to inspire other people’s lives and show them I’m still smiling.” Anna is amazing. She speaks to schools, advocating for persons with disabilities and encouraging people who are facing struggles. She uses social media to encourage and lift others up. She also serves on our church council, our senior leadership team at Resurrection. God uses her in profound ways. She feels called to a life of service, either in medicine or some other field.
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Anna felt called at the age of fourteen, out of her tragedy, to use her experience to minister to and encourage others. Do a Google search of her and you’ll find video clips and stories about this amazing young woman.
When you feel God calling you to do something that requires courage, or sacrifice, or faithfulness, join in Mary’s words, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” When God called Mary at the age of thirteen or fourteen to this frightening task that would be filled with challenges and joy, a task that would end in pain as she watched her son die, this was her response: “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said” (Luke 1:38). Mary’s words reflect a prayer I’ve taught our congregation to pray. When you feel God calling you to do something that requires courage, or sacrifice, or faithfulness, join in Mary’s words, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” When, in the midst of a sermon or while reading scripture, you sense the gentle nudge of the Holy Spirit or the urgent plea for help, may you say with Mary, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” Would you pause right now to pray these words aloud to God: “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” Whether you are very young, very old, or somewhere in between, I hope that Mary’s words would come freely to your lips, and to my lips, and as they do, you’ll find that God uses you to accomplish his purposes no matter how unlikely a candidate you might be.
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God Lifts Up the Lowly That leads me to Mary’s powerful hymn, the Magnificat. Immediately after Mary discovered she was pregnant, she went to find her older cousin, or perhaps aunt, Elizabeth. Elizabeth is, by now, in her sixth month of pregnancy. Elizabeth was an older mentor to Mary.3 And upon hearing Elizabeth bless her, Mary shouts the beautiful words of the Magnificat. I want you to notice, in particular, the words in plain type: “With all my heart I glorify the Lord! In the depths of who I am I rejoice in God my savior. He has looked with favor on the low status of his servant. Look! From now on, everyone will consider me highly favored because the mighty one has done great things for me. Holy is his name. He shows mercy to everyone, from one generation to the next, who honors him as God. He has shown strength with his arm. He has scattered those with arrogant thoughts and proud inclinations. He has pulled the powerful down from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty-handed. (Luke 1:46-53, emphasis added)
It is on the lips of Mary that Luke lays out the theme of his Gospel, the theme of this book: God looks with favor on those of low status. God brings down the powerful from their thrones. God lifts up the lowly. God chooses the people others think are washed up or have no value. God values and uses those who have been pushed down, oppressed, or disdained. This one line captures Luke’s theme. Read it aloud with me, “God lifts up the lowly.” But who are the lowly, and how does God lift them up?
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The ‘Am ha-Arez Let’s start with the who. The Greek and Hebrew words for lowly both signify humility, of a humble state, but also those whom others consider lowly, or who have been pushed down by others. This includes the poor, the powerless, and those who struggled with a variety of physical and mental illnesses. It could be the uneducated as well as the religiously unobservant—the nonreligious or nominally religious people of the day—as well as those others considered sinners. In Hebrew the phrase ‘Am ha-Arez—“the people of the land”—was often used for many of these types of people. It was a condescending and derogatory phrase that the educated, sophisticated, wealthy, and religiously devout used to describe those who were none of these things. They used it in the sense that someone might use the word bumpkin today, or ignoramus. It meant vulgar, uncouth, uneducated. It was used of the masses of people who did not show up at synagogue, or who did not observe all the laws and rules the religious leaders taught. The online Jewish Encyclopedia notes that by the first century, “the faithful observers of the law (Pharisees) shunned any contact with an ‘Am ha-Arez.”4 These ‘Am ha-Arez included most of the people Luke describes Jesus ministering with. As we will see, he is constantly lifting up these lowly. While Mary was undoubtedly religiously devout, because of her standing in society, a servant girl from the no-account village of Nazareth, she, too, may have been seen as an ‘Am ha-Arez in the sense of a “bumpkin,” lacking sophistication and appearing uncouth. God, in choosing her, has lifted up the lowly. Mary’s son will devote his ministry to doing the same for the ‘Am ha-Arez he encounters. Interestingly, the Jewish Encyclopedia notes, There can be no doubt that it was this contemptuous and hostile attitude of the Pharisaic schools toward the masses that was the chief cause of the triumphant power
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of the Christian church. In preaching the good tidings to the poor and the out-cast, Jesus of Nazareth won the great masses of Judea. The Pharisaic schools, laying all stress on the Law and on learning, held the ‘Am ha-Arez in utter contempt. The new Christian sect recruited itself chiefly from the ranks of the untaught, laying special stress on the merits of the simple and the humble.5
The paragraph above was a Jewish scholar’s assessment of the appeal of the Christian faith in the first century. Luke’s Gospel is a chief champion for this emphasis of the Christian gospel.
How Does God Lift Up the Lowly? While God directly lifts up Mary, the Gospel focuses on Jesus’s work of lifting up the lowly. But following Jesus’s death and resurrection, he passes this calling on to us. We are called to lift up the lowly as we seek to follow Christ. The church, Paul tells us, is the “body of Christ”—we continue to incarnate his presence. We continue to pursue his work of lifting up the lowly. And there is something in us followers of Christ that compels us to do this work. In February 2022, Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, sent troops to invade Ukraine under false pretenses. Many of us were stunned to watch, in real time, as one of the most powerful nations on earth sent tanks and fighter planes and missile batteries to wage war against a neighbor who had done nothing to provoke the attack, a neighbor who was far weaker. Ukraine heroically sought to resist and repel the Russians. As we watched these events, most were inspired by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and the Ukrainian people. We found ourselves tying ribbons around our trees, sending aid, supporting military assistance, giving millions of dollars to stand with the Ukrainians. Why? Because we were created in the image of a God whose nature is to lift up the lowly and to stand against bullies.
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Hear Mary’s words again: He has pulled the powerful down from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. As I write these words, I still don’t know how this conflict will end. What I know is that, in a sense, President Putin has already lost. He has become a pariah in the world’s eyes. Countries that never thought about joining NATO are now contemplating it. He is weakened as a global leader. And I am certain that one day, in some way, he will find himself brought down from his throne.
He has pulled the powerful down from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. How does God lift up the lowly and send the hungry away with food? He does it by moving our hearts and calling his people to help. But this only works when we say, with Mary, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” During the opening months of this war, I traveled with a small team to the border between Poland and Ukraine. Three million refugees crossed the border into Poland and beyond. We saw the aid tents, visited the temporary shelters, and met some of these refugees, listening to their stories. We communicated our concern and care for them, and God’s care for them. We came back with a clear idea how our congregation and others could “lift up the lowly,” sending significant amounts of aid so that the hungry would “be filled with good things.”
O Holy Night I’d like to end this chapter with Luke’s telling of the Christmas story. The story of the birth of Jesus appears in Matthew and Luke’s Gospels. But their telling of the story is so very different, and in the
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differences, you can hear Luke’s emphasis on God lifting up the lowly and befriending the outsiders. In Matthew, there is no census by Caesar Augustus, no holy family unable to find a room in the “inn,” no birth in a stable, no manger for a crib, no night-shift shepherds. Matthew only mentions a home where the wealthy wise men find the Holy Family, bringing their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh to them. In Luke, we see the lowliness of Jesus from his birth. He was born to a carpenter-handyman and a peasant girl, forced by a census to travel days before the child’s birth. Upon arriving they find there is no place for Mary to give birth, and they are forced to give birth in a stable where the animals slept. For Christ’s bed there was an animal’s feeding trough—a manger. Luke mentions the manger three times in the story as if to say, “Notice how lowly the circumstances of his birth!” In Luke, it is not wise men, but night-shift shepherds whom God invites to welcome the Christ Child. Shepherds were the epitome of the ‘Am ha-Arez that Jesus came to reach. They were typically uneducated, uncouth, and considered among the lowly. That night that Jesus was born, as the shepherds came to see the Child lying in a manger, he had already begun to lift up the lowly, to befriend the outsiders and outcasts, and to draw them to his Father. As we turn to the rest of the Gospel, we’ll find this theme again and again. Are you “very old”? Good! God is choosing you! Are you too young to be taken seriously by others? Terrific, you are exactly the kind of person God chooses for his team! Have you struggled in life, been rejected by others, known your share of humiliation? Jesus wants to use you. Conversely, are you among the powerful, the wealthy, the revered? God loves and wants you too. “Humble yourself in the sight of the Lord,” knowing that God longs to use your power, influence, and resources to lift up the lowly.
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The Sanctuary for
Lent
2024 Abigail Browka
The Sanctuary for
Lent 2024 Abigail Browka
Ash Wednesday . . . . . . . . 2 First Sunday in Lent. . . . . 6 Second Sunday in Lent. . 13 Third Sunday in Lent. . . 20 Fourth Sunday in Lent. . 27 Fifth Sunday in Lent . . . 34
Palm Sunday. . . . . . . . . . 41 Maundy Thursday. . . . . . 45 Good Friday . . . . . . . . . . 46 Holy Saturday. . . . . . . . . 47 Easter Sunday . . . . . . . . . 48
Copyright © 2023 by Abingdon Press All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted by the 1976 Copyright Act, the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission can be addressed to Rights and Permissions, The United Methodist Publishing House, 810 12th Avenue South, Nashville, TN 37203-4704 or emailed to permissions@ abingdonpress.com. 978-1-7910-3130-5 (Single) 978-1-7910-3012-4 (Pack of 10) 978-1-7910-3011-7 (epub) Scripture quotations unless otherwise noted are taken from the Common English Bible, copyright 2011. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NRSVue are taken from the New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
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ASH WEDNESDAY
Wednesday, February 14 Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your hearts, with fasting, with weeping, and with sorrow; tear your hearts and not your clothing. Return to the Lord your God, for he is merciful and compassionate, very patient, full of faithful love, and ready to forgive. (Joel 2:12-13)
Today is Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day. You might not think it, but Ash Wednesday has a lot to do with the heart. Lent is the season of the Church when we intentionally turn our heart towards God, not just for one hour on Sunday but for forty days. In Joel 2 God says change your heart, not your clothes. Let’s admit it: one is easier than the other. Ashes smudged on our face may be a striking change to our outward appearance, but it means nothing if we are not also open to inward change. Receiving the mark of ashes or giving something up for Lent has value only if it ultimately draws us closer to the heart of God. But today rest assured that no matter what, God is patient, full of faithful love, and ready to forgive. Even though we are dust and to dust we shall return (Genesis 3:19), life is more than this ash, far deeper than dust. The Spirit wants to breathe new life into us. So God, open our mouths to sing your praise. This Lent, open our hearts. Deep Breath Prayer Breathe deep using the IN phrase for your inhale and the OUT phrase for your exhale. IN | Open OUT | My Heart
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Thursday, February 15 Isn’t this the fast I choose: releasing wicked restraints, untying the ropes of a yoke, setting free the mistreated, and breaking every yoke? Isn’t it sharing your bread with the hungry and bringing the homeless poor into your house, covering the naked when you see them, and not hiding from your own family? Then your light will break out like the dawn, and you will be healed quickly. (Isaiah 58:6-8a)
During the season of Lent, we are called to reflect, repent, and draw closer to God. In the passage from Isaiah, we read a powerful message about the kind of fast that God desires. The fast God desires is an unbinding of the yoke of injustice. Through today’s scripture, we are reminded of our world’s poverty and asked to work towards its full liberation. In faith we share our bread and belongings so that all are provided for. This is how light comes and how healing happens. What are we meant to let go of this Lent? And how can this letting go break us open to God? By letting go of selfishness and embracing acts of justice and compassion, we create space for God to be at work in our lives. Through the fast of sharing and releasing, we work to surrender our pride, our prejudices, and our attachment to possession. Today We Pray God, unbind the yoke of injustice. Help me let go and embrace charity and compassion this Lent, to allow space for your transformative work.
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Friday, February 16 “Be careful that you don’t practice your religion in front of people to draw their attention. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven." “Whenever you give to the poor, don’t blow your trumpet as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets so that they may get praise from people." (Matthew 6:1-2a)
In today’s scripture from Matthew, Jesus cautions us against practicing our faith in a way that seeks attention and praise from others. Jesus warns against grandstanding and the temptation to display our religious acts for public admiration. Companies today often have what is known as their public-facing image. It is the part of their identity others get to see and that is chiefly on display for the viewers’ benefit. Something about today’s scripture reminded me of this and another word, grandstanding. Grandstanding is the act of behaving in a showy or pretentious manner to attract favorable attention from others. Jesus is telling his audience, no grandstanding. Don’t practice your faith for the attention, admiration, or approval of others. The root cause of grandstanding is our misdirected appetite for glory. We want praise for our piety. Rather than our own internal appreciation, the “hypocrites” have this appetite for an audience. Today, may we appreciate ourselves for our faith, charity, and conscientiousness. Rather than for show, may these qualities come from within us. Deep Breath Prayer Breathe deep using the IN phrase for your inhale and the OUT phrase for your exhale. IN | From OUT | Within
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Saturday, February 17 We were seen as both fake and real, as unknown and well known, as dying—and look, we are alive! We were seen as punished but not killed, as going through pain but always happy, as poor but making many rich, and as having nothing but owning everything. (2 Corinthians 6:8c-10)
In today’s scripture from 2 Corinthians, we encounter a profound paradox. The apostle Paul describes the contrasting experiences of those who follow Christ. It is a collection of seemingly contradictory statements that challenge our conventional understanding of success, happiness, and fulfillment. These paradoxes speak to the transformative power of God’s grace and the upside-down nature of the kingdom of God. In verse 9, Paul highlights the contrast of dying and being alive. As believers, we are called to die to ourselves, to surrender our selfish desires and ambitions. In doing so, we paradoxically find true life and experience the transformative power of Christ’s resurrection. In verse 10, we are described as going through pain but always happy. This doesn’t mean that we deny or dismiss the struggles and hardships we encounter in life. Rather, it speaks to the deep joy and peace that surpass circumstances, as we find solace and hope in our relationship with Christ. In him, we can experience a lasting happiness that is not dependent on external factors. I personally can think of many times in my life that my faith has gotten me through. Today We Pray God, help me hold the paradox of the world’s condition and the power of my faith.
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FIRST SUNDAY IN LENT
Sunday, February 18 About that time, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and John baptized him in the Jordan River. While he was coming up out of the water, Jesus saw heaven splitting open and the Spirit, like a dove, coming down on him. And there was a voice from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I dearly love; in you I find happiness.” At once the Spirit forced Jesus out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan. (Mark 1:9-13a)
In this passage, Jesus gets that Holy Ghost glow, the heavens burst open, and the Holy Spirit descends on him like a dove. But he doesn’t get to bask in the glow for long, for “at once the Spirit forced Jesus out into the wilderness.” What do we learn in the wilderness? We learn that being God’s beloved, God’s people, makes us glow. And we learn that immediately the Spirit drives us back into the world, back into what feels like unpleasant circumstances with things that make us think, “something seems broken.” Jesus went from the dove to the desert. Why would the Spirit do this?! The Spirit does this so we can learn, just as Jesus did, that our glow is not for our glory. Read that again: our glow is not for our glory. Our identity as God’s people, as Spirit-led as it might be, isn’t for our glory but God’s glory. Today Set This Intention “My glow is not for my glory.”
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