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Tuesday, October 02, 2012

Tuesday Lectionary Leanings~~Hard texts edition

In my  neck of the woods we've clearly moved into fall--the leaves are turning and the air has a definite chill. And in the church year, we continue to move through "ordinary time," working our ways through some hard readings! As we begin our contemplation of this week's choices, let us begin with prayer:


Sovereign God,
you make us for each other,
to live in loving community
as friends, sons and daughters,
sisters and brothers, wives and husband,
partners and companions.
Teach us to choose love
that is committed and devoted;
teach us like little children
to wonder and to trust,
that our loving may reflect the image of Christ. Amen.

The RCL gives us a choice this week between Job and Genesis. The saga of Job will continue to unfold over the month of October and offers the opportunity and challenge, should you choose it, to delve into the sticky questions of theodicy--never an easy topic but always a compelling one.  Or you may choose the creation story in Genesis, culminating in the creation of Woman. This foundational story is often cited when "biblical marriage" is brought up, and might (or might not!) fit with a discussion of the gospel, that tricky passage from Mark where Jesus is questioned about divorce. 

For me, a divorced priest, preaching this Markan text is a bit daunting, but there is help out there. On Facebook this morning found this excellent piece by Mike Kinman, Dean of Christ Church Cathedral in Saint Louis. And as usual David Lose at Working Preacher has some useful insights on the subject as does Karoline Lewis. If you have other thoughts, questions, or creative ways to preach this text, please share them with us!

And let's not forget our other option--from Hebrews. This opening of this letter is really a treatise on Christology, addressing issues that most of us, I suspect, tend to take for granted: Jesus' status as God's exalted Son, both human and divine, more exalted than even the angels even in his humanity. 


So where are you headed this week, preachers? Some of you may be beginning stewardship sermons, or following the narrative lectionary, or otherwise away from the RCL. Wherever your ponderings are taking you, we're interested. You never know when one preacher's question might become another's "ah-ha!" moment. 

22 comments:

  1. RevDr. I have a hard time preaching on this Mk reading too but because I am not called to be married. I am preaching this week and I think I might just take a look at how we use scripture in our lives--do we see it as a guideline to try to live into or do we see it as the measure by which we see our failure? I would love to preach on Job because I like to teach this story --an allegory to the people who are used to hearing all Scripture as fact.

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  2. Up here north of the 49th Parallel it is Thanksgiving weekend! And so I am going off of Jesus' words in Matthew about lilies and birds and worry.

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  3. Ah, Gord, 'll be doing that for stewardship in a couple of weeks :) At least the storing up treasures part...

    As I noted, these texts are hard for me. I am tempted to tackle Job but I can't do a series on the book as I might like to because I have to do stewardship sermons for the next four weeks after this one. So maybe I'll introduce Job....or maybe I'll find a way to tackle Mark.

    Muthah+, I like your idea about looking at how we use scripture in our lives..that might be a good way to go.

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  4. We are doing Blessing of the Animals this Sunday, with the St Francis Day lectionary texts...I haven't a clue as to what I will do this week!

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    1. I'm with you on the texts and the day. Think I'll weave a few words around the Blessing of the Animals and let that and the community assembled be the homily. Am resting in Francis' much quoted dictum: "Preach always, if necessary use words."

      Martha's beautiful words on the day and the blessings as a window onto God's grace really do frame the day well.

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  5. This is not the year for us to do Mark so I'm focusing in on Hebrews. I am looking forward to talking about Mark in our Bible study on Thursday though. I get the sense that Jesus merely puts up with these earthly kingdom questions in order to try to get those around him to a deeper truth. Interesting that those worrying more about these kind of rules are the Pharisees.

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  6. Rev Dr Mom, thanks so much for the way you've invited us into a week of challenge and possibility in the lectionary, and for your lovely prayer!

    I'm happy to be back in the studio and returning to my blog after a season of traveling. I have World Communion Sunday on my mind, and my post at The Painted Prayerbook this week offers a new blessing especially for the day. It also includes the image "The Best Supper," which depicts the kind of feast I dream about--where the table is wide and welcoming and there's always room for one more.

    I'd love for you to stop by: "And The Table Will Be Wide."

    Many blessings to everyone this week, and may you find a good table that offers the sustenance you need. And Happy Thanksgiving to RevGord and other northern friends!

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    1. I've always loved that artwork of the Table, Jan. Many thanks for its blessings.

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    2. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful poem. Thank you!

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  7. My denomination (PCUSA) has called for a churchwide study on marriage, and this passage seems as good a jumping-off point as any. I plan to delve into some of our history on how our denomination "changed its mind" about permitting divorce and remarriage in light of (or in spite of) this passage. Jack Rogers in his book Reading the Bible and the Confessions: The Presbyterian Way contains a good account of the history. And, oh yes, it's World Communion Sunday, although I don't know how to work THAT into a sermon on marriage...

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  8. I keep pausing at that word "integrity" which is in both Job and Psalm 26. Job's wife asks him "Do you still persist in your integrity? Curse God and die." And the Psalm talks about "living with integrity." When Hebrews says that it was "fitting that God. . ." then maybe this is about God's integrity. In Mark's Jesus perhaps we might be talking about integrity in relationship. Just a few beginning thoughts. . .

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  9. I found a playlet in which two people tell each other the Job story and the section of Mark about the children but doggone it the document is not anywhere in my computer files. I know I wrote it myself, but it is not saved. It tries, in a humorous but not un-serious way to show that God is being portrayed very differently in the two passages. I think it will work, and I have enough readers, but something is holding me back.

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  10. "in my sermon file"--that's where I found it. :-)

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    1. Ooo, is that a sharable, Martha? Sounds fantastic.

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    2. Jen, yes! Sorry I didn't see this sooner. I'll send it to you.

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  11. I really like your idea about the use of Scripture, Muthah+, and will keep it for some other time! This week is a special Sunday School service and the children are doing a play about bullying. For the reading we will have a very abbreviated version of David and Goliath (their choice!) and I will use just vv 13-16 of the Gospel reading. I think I'll take it up from their play and say how God loves them - they are special and accepted in his sight - so they can have that confidence when faced with bullies. Something like that, anyway. Just trying to think of a way to approach it that will be fun for the children. But maybe that isn't needed as their play will be the main focus and I'll only add a comment at the end as it were.
    Jan I simply love your poem. Please may I use it sometime?

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  12. There's some great stuff in Working Preacher on the marriage passage: Jesus seeking protection for the vulnerable and connecting God's hopes for marriage to the creation story. I think I'm going with a lot of that, and tying it in to the meal that he offers to ALL of us -- because his concerns have to do with reconciliation and recreation, not with the brokenness exacerbated by rigid laws and practices.

    I am going to start with some of my own history as a way of trying to convey that I am not at all about judging broken marriages -- my own being my fathers 3x widowhood and 5 marriages/partnerships (the current one, to wife number 3, is not a legal marriage) with my own resulting 2 brothers, 1 half-brother, and 7 steb-siblings from 2 different mothers -- and my years as a family lawyer, which I now understand to have been Ministry, Round One.

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  13. Make that 7 step-sibs from 3 different mothers -- I myself can't even keep them all straight.

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    1. Hi Robyn, I have 2 stepmoms, a stepdad, 3 brothers, 5 stepbrothers and 3 stepsisters. It makes my head swim too...

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  14. I am committed to the Job text for a variety of reasons. However, this is my thoughts on the Mark 10 text - and why I don't think it is at all about divorce. The sermon that I am not preaching, if you will.
    Jesus and Divorce?

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    1. a bit late to commenting for this week. I am going with Mark, looking at what is permitted and what is just. also each of us is in need of blessing.

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