June 28, 2020 David Solidifies Power 2 Samuel 5:1-10

2 Samuel 5:10 marks a major shift in the Bible’s story of God’s interaction with humanity. It is subtle however, and the words, “And David became greater and greater, for the Lord, the God of hosts, was with him,” may not convey the enormity of the shift.

To begin to get at that, and to engage the very sticky part of the other reading we had from 2 Samuel, we’re going to start by taking a look at the scene where the priest Uzzah dies because he touches the Ark of the Covenant. The story shocks us. Is God so mean, so terrible, as to instantly kill someone who simply touches the Ark? We start to think of the Raiders of the Lost Ark movie where the bad guys get what’s coming to them for not treating the legendary ark with respect.

Remember, this Ark of the Covenant is rooted in the story of Moses leading the people of Israel out of slavery in Egypt and into the promised land. According to accounts Moses built this ark, which was a decorative wooden box. Accounts vary as to what it held. Usually it’s the stone tablets with the Ten Commandments on them and sometimes Aaron’s rod and a container of manna. The box had a lid. On the lid where sculptures of two cherubim facing each other. Significantly was the belief that the literal presence of God was to be found just above the ark. So, where the ark was, there God was too.

The ark shows up here and there in biblical texts but its appearances are spotty and fragmented. That such a box actually existed historically is very likely. But beyond that little can be said with any reliability.

The people of Israel coming out of slavery were a nomadic people. They didn’t have homes and they didn’t have houses of worship. The ark was similarly mobile. It was usually housed in a tent. Where the tent was moved it was moved too. It represented God’s presence with the people as they traveled.

Perhaps significantly, and especially for today’s text, when the ark was moved it was not to be dumped onto a cart and towed from place to place. If you remember the scene from the Raiders of the Lost Ark, the good guys never actually touch the ark. And they move it the proper way: carried by people supported by two wooden poles.

Now, has Uzzah, the priest who had charge of moving the ark been following those instructions? No. Whether with ceremony and care or not, he’s loaded it into a cart and is having animals tow it around. That is not proper treatment! So when it slips and he has to reach out and stabilize it you kind of get the sense that God’s already pretty upset about the sloppy service; and zap – dead Uzzah.

Indeed it is harsh. King David gets upset. He also gets scared. The story adds to the ark’s legendary powers. Theologically we run ourselves into a ditch really fast if we make too much of it. However, I do think we can soberly say that God is not to be mocked. People trivialize God’s power, or they make God into a sweet and gentle tame little deity to be called upon in need.

Whatever the historic reality behind the text, we do well to learn from this story and take God’s power seriously. God is loving, yes. God’s grace is powerful, yes. But don’t get arrogant and sloppy. God is God, always and forever, period. It is wise to respect that.

All of this leads to the significant shift that happens in the Bible’s story of God’s interaction with humanity. If you remember the stories of Adam and Eve, their descendants, Noah, the Tower of Babel story, and others you know that God’s relationship with humanity starts off with God wanting to be directly connected to humans. Humans mess up. They mess up over and over again. Sometimes God’s approach is merciful – like not killing Adam and Eve. But humans don’t improve with mercy. So sometimes God’s approach is stern. God punishes – think of the Noah’s Ark story. Does humanity learn? Does it improve? Nope. It seems that whether God is kind or stern humans just don’t improve.

Then God tries a different approach as we reach the Abraham stories. There God decides to pick one person who God will make as a model of faithfulness for others to follow. Abraham has a son Isaac, who has a son Jacob, who has twelve sons; and we begin to see that God’s relationship with one person has now moved to God’s relationship with a chosen family.

The family grows into a group of tribes and God then works through them as a chosen race – an example for the world.

Do they obey or improve? Are they satisfied? Nope.

You remember the stories. God frees them from slavery in Egypt, leads them to the Promised Land. God helps them to conquer and develop it. Are they faithful? Are they satisfied? Nope.

Notice the path that’s developing. We go from a person to a nation, and we go from nomadic tribes to a landed people. By the time we get to the texts of 1st and 2nd Samuel they are asking for a king and a government. The Ark of the Covenant was the presence of God to the chosen nomadic people. Now they are a landed people creating a nation.

The Ark of the Covenant has dropped out of the storyline. But now it reappears. King David has conquered the city of Jerusalem and decided to make it his capital. It was a wise political move for a number of reasons. And David, whether because he truly felt called by God, or whether he saw it as another wise political strategy, decides to bring the ark – the central symbol of Jewish belief in God – into his capital city. Biblical scholars debate what David’s motives really were. I suspect it was a mix.

Whatever the case, David now has a political capital and a religious capital. The ark, which has been traveling around for centuries, will now have a permanent home.

It will be Solomon who actually builds the temple but it is David who decides to make it the central religious symbol of Jerusalem. And with that, we realize the major shift that has occurred in 2 Samuel 5:10. “And David became greater and greater, for the Lord, the God of hosts, was with him.”

God’s relationship with humanity is now no longer with: a nomadic people, the laws through Moses, and the Ark of the Covenant. God’s relationship with humanity is now with a landed nation and its king. Jerusalem as a city takes a central role. The line of David as God’s chosen leaders is God’s new promised relationship.

Theologian Bruce Birch notes, “…God has raised up David. Just as the ark represented God’s presence in Israel, so also God is with David. Significantly in the next chapter David brings back the ark to Jerusalem, but it will no longer be the chief sign of God’s presence. God’s presence in Israel is now seen in David, who grows stronger and stronger.” (New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume 2, Pg. 1237)

Jerusalem and a Davidic king come to be understood as God’s eternal promise to the Israelites. If you know the stores well you’ll know that 400 years later Jerusalem is destroyed and the temple along with it. Most all the leaders in the bloodline of David are killed. Most Israelites of any significance are hauled off to Babylon and live in exile. Then decades later the Israelites are allowed to return. The stories say their first task is to rebuild the city and the temple. There is no mention of the destroyed ark. No mention is made of recreating it or of mourning over its loss. It was no longer seen as important. The city and David were central.

Whenever we read the stories of Jesus conflicting with the religious leaders it is much more than just whether Jesus is an orthodox teacher. What Jesus presents is a challenge to their entire way of understanding God and God’s relationship with people. The religious leaders knew of how God’s promised interaction with people had changed over the centuries: directly with people, then a chosen person, then a chosen nomadic race, then a landed people. And… they knew God’s “permanent” promise of presence and the center of interaction with humanity, was the city of Jerusalem and a king in the bloodline of David as ruler.

Think about what people really expected of Jesus as Messiah. Remember, David was considered a messiah as well, for messiah simply means God’s anointed.

David created the nation, established the religion, drove out enemies, and set the country on a solid path. Thus, the expected messiah would certainly do the same.

Jesus is challenging the entire understanding of God that the Jewish leaders had. Jesus was ushering in a new age, another step, of God’s relationship with people.

We didn’t read it today, but it isn’t an accident that when John’s gospel records the resurrection of Jesus it sets it in a garden. And there a woman is in the garden and talks to someone she thinks is the gardener. Turns out she wasn’t entirely wrong. For the garden echoes Eden. There God and the man and the woman tended it together. In the resurrection God-with-people-in-the-garden is back.

Our Lord Jesus, set up as being in the blood line of David, fulfills all the requirements and the promises. And he moves things forward, which is actually a restoration to the beginning. For as Christians we do not hold to Jerusalem as an essentially sacred place. We do not hold that one blood line is above any other blood line in God’s great work. We believe that we can also connect directly to God, just as in the Adam and Eve story.

May we feel and live that connection always.

June 21, 2020 David Under King Saul 1 Samuel 15:34-16:13

I am not a fan of King David. The Bible says that he is the greatest of Israel’s kings, and therefore I must accept that. However, if it were up to me I’d choose King Josiah, who rules hundreds of years later, to be the best of the kings. Nevertheless, David is the strongest of the kings. He unites the tribes into a nation and creates a central religion, which will become Judaism.

We heard a summary of David’s rise to power earlier (Harper’s Bible Dictionary, 1985, Pg. 208) I want to look at two things in our sermon. The first is a dilemma, which is also kind of funny. I’m going to read a passage from 1 Samuel to you about one incident.

The dilemma is that Saul is anointed by the prophet Samuel as king. But years later while Saul is still king, the prophet Samuel also anoints David as king. So now you have two anointed kings. What to do? As the stories in 1 Samuel go, David knows this. He knows that God has ultimately rejected the kingship of Saul and chosen him instead. However, Saul is still God’s anointed king. That is a role that cannot be lost. And so David has to wait until Saul dies.

Saul is afraid of David’s popularity and his military might. Saul tries to have David killed on a number of occasions but isn't successful. What then would happen if David had a chance to kill Saul? Here this strange account from 1 Samuel 24:1-15. (NRSV)

1 Samuel 24:1-15

When Saul returned from following the Philistines, he was told, “David is in the wilderness of En-gedi.” 2Then Saul took three thousand chosen men out of all Israel, and went to look for David and his men in the direction of the Rocks of the Wild Goats. 3He came to the sheepfolds beside the road, where there was a cave; and Saul went in to relieve himself. Now David and his men were sitting in the innermost parts of the cave. 4The men of David said to him, “Here is the day of which the Lord said to you, ‘I will give your enemy into your hand, and you shall do to him as it seems good to you.’” Then David went and stealthily cut off a corner of Saul’s cloak. 5Afterwards David was stricken to the heart because he had cut off a corner of Saul’s cloak. 6He said to his men, “The Lord forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the Lord’s anointed, to raise my hand against him; for he is the Lord’s anointed.” 7So David scolded his men severely and did not permit them to attack Saul. Then Saul got up and left the cave, and went on his way. 8Afterwards David also rose up and went out of the cave and called after Saul, “My lord the king!” When Saul looked behind him, David bowed with his face to the ground, and did obeisance.

9David said to Saul, “Why do you listen to the words of those who say, ‘David seeks to do you harm’? 10This very day your eyes have seen how the Lord gave you into my hand in the cave; and some urged me to kill you, but I spared you. I said, ‘I will not raise my hand against my lord; for he is the Lord’s anointed.’ 11See, my father, see the corner of your cloak in my hand; for by the fact that I cut off the corner of your cloak, and did not kill you, you may know for certain that there is no wrong or treason in my hands. I have not sinned against you, though you are hunting me to take my life. 12May the Lord judge between me and you! May the Lord avenge me on you; but my hand shall not be against you. 13As the ancient proverb says, ‘Out of the wicked comes forth wickedness’; but my hand shall not be against you. 14Against whom has the king of Israel come out? Whom do you pursue? A dead dog? A single flea? 15May the Lord therefore be judge, and give sentence between me and you. May he see to it, and plead my cause, and vindicate me against you.”


Commentator Bruce Birch notes in the New Interpreter’s Bible (Volume 2, pg. 1157) that this story was told with amazement and humor. It is silly. But it also hints at something serious.

Biblical scholars have spilled rivers of ink trying to make sense of what is going on in the Saul/David dual anointed kings situation. What is God really thinking? What are the Bible’s authors really trying to convey?

Very significant among them, although no ideas are perfect, is that of David Gunn in his writing, “David and the Gift of the Kingdom (2 Sam 2-4, 9-20; 1 Kings 1-2)” Semia 3 (1975) 14-45. There he raises the contrast between gift and grasp for understanding successes and failures of David. When David receives the kingdom as a gift from God and acts accordingly, all is well; but whenever David attempts to grasp the power of the kingdom for his own selfish purposes, all goes awry.

That can be a very important lesson for our own lives.

I think it is important to recognize how David acts. First, he is the Lord’s anointed king. He knows that. With that knowledge what does he do? Does he just sit back and expect the kingdom to come into his lap? No. He knows he has to strive for it.

Indeed, when God calls us to do something that does not mean easy street until it happens. It often means hard, arduous work. But how hard do you work, and to what ends? And do the ends then justify the means?

Can David, as the Lord’s anointed, claim divine authority to just go out and kill his opponent, the person who is in his way to accomplish his goals? No. If you read the stories of David you discover that indeed he does that any number of times. He takes matters into his own hands to get what he wants. David was not afraid to kill people, many people in fact, in order to get what he wants. And when David does things go wrong.

The nation of Israel under David was not a safe, stable, peaceful place. We’ll explore that in the next couple weeks. There were civil wars, coop attempts, and many many many political assassinations. Ultimately when David wants to build a temple to God, God says no. David has been too violent.

Receive from God as a gift and pursue it diligently, yes. But try to grasp and keep and hold and things will go awry.

The other thing overarching thing from David is the way he appears to have put everything together into one whole. We Americans often pride ourselves in separation of church and state. As a power position it has its virtues. In theory at least we do not make our national policies based on religious teachings. And, we do not have our religious teachings reflect national policies. The church is always allowed to choose whether to back or renounce the things of the government.

But there is a drawback too. Sometimes people create a separation in their lives. They put religious things in one box and political things in another. They separate spiritual things from physical things.

The congregation where I did internship was a highly conflicted congregation. There were a lot of problems going on. One thing some church council members said to the head pastor, my internship supervisor, “Pastor, you be our spiritual leader. You take care of spiritual things. We’ll take care of the real things.”

Nope! While there’s a host of things wrong with that statement, the thing I want to focus on is the compartmentalization it creates: spiritual vs. real.

King David combines everything into one whole. He combines: being a political leader, with being a military leader, with being God’s anointed king, with being someone who lives by God’s will. All of it is integrated into one whole.

We do well when we can combine our religious beliefs with our life decisions with our political ideology with our scientific understand, and so on. While there may be tensions within ourselves at times, we want to put it all together into one whole. And finally, as David learned in his role as king, work hard for that which God is calling you to do, but even so receive it as a gift. And never grasp for our own personal agenda or gain. Such grasping will make everything go awry.

June 14, 2020 King Saul 1 Samuel 9-10:8

The story of the choosing and anointing of Saul as the first Jewish king is quirky and unpredictable. It may seem very strange to our ears, but biblical scholar Norman Habel points out that the story is in the typical pattern of a “prophetic call narrative”. I’m not going to go into all the details of that. Let’s just say that the stories of God calling people to leadership like Moses, Gideon, and many of the prophets, are all told with similar elements. This shouldn’t surprise us. We’ve studied ancient Hebrew stories enough to know that they have common elements and patterns.

Anyway, let’s notice some things. Last week’s Bible reading about the people asking Samuel to set up a king for them ended with these words, “Samuel then said to the people of Israel, “Each of you return home.” It was an unusual ending and I left it like that deliberately. We picked up today with the very next verse, “There was a man of Benjamin…”

I hope that all strikes you as odd. Let’s notice what Samuel, as the key prophet God is working through does NOT do. Samuel does not say, “Let the smartest and strongest among you step forward for us to choose as king.” Nor does he say, “Let’s start a campaign to see who the people want as king.” He also does not say, “Each go to your home and make a short list of candidates. We’ll bring them all together in 90 days and decide.” He also doesn’t form a committee. He doesn’t put together a commission. He doesn’t do anything!

That’s not how we understand leadership! I know we’ve probably all made sarcastic comments about the fact that far too many politicians are lawyers, and that other occupations are underrepresented, but for the most part, we seek qualified people to lead. If you are a soldier in the army and you’re going to head into battle would you really want just any old clerk from Wal-Mart to lead you? No, you want someone with training and experience!

I see all the heavy excavation work being done at the end of Lynaugh road for the creation of that traffic circle. You can all be thankful that I’m not the one chosen to operate the big Caterpillar bulldozer they have there! It’d be a colossal mess!

Big tasks take qualified people. Not everyone has those skills. Some may not have them but be able to develop them. Some may not have them and never develop them. One thing I will never be good at is dancing, no matter how hard a try. You don’t want me as a dance instructor. Just ask my kids. At a recent protest on the front lawn of the Ontario County Courthouse the one leader had the whole crowd do a very simple dance. I couldn’t do it!

When it comes to leadership, you need well qualified people to do it. Otherwise things are chaos.

Samuel sends the people home with no plan whatsoever. Let that part of the story sink in deeply.

According to the Bible the choosing of the first king of Israel is entirely God’s work. There is no human wisdom or discernment involved.

God simply chooses Saul. Why? Because God chooses Saul! That’s why!

Whether it’s King Saul, or King David who will follow him, or one of the prophets, many of the people we meet in the Old Testament are chosen by God for no particular reason we can understand. That is a significant theme of the Old Testament – that God does not limit God’s activity to the established leadership. God does not limit God’s activity to the wise, the strong, the rich, the well connected, or the clever. In fact, quite often God raises people from obscurity for the work to be done.

That is an interesting teaching to hear. It is a harder one to believe. God can call you to just about anything at just about any time. Abraham was a quite elderly man before God called him. The same goes for Moses. And Saul was just an ordinary farmer.

There is one very very frustrating thing I find about two of God’s choices, however. They are qualities about the first two kings, Saul and later David. Both of them are described as exceptionally good looking. I’d like to think that God uses more discernment than that in choosing leaders, but that is part of the story. We’re going to find that very puzzling when we look at David next week.

In any event, moving on.

God chooses Saul. Saul has not done any lobbying. He is taken completely unawares. He really isn’t even given the chance to say no. Over and over again in the Bible we find that God’s chosen leaders are reluctant to lead. But they do it anyway. So if your heart feels reluctant to responding to God’s call, you are not alone.

Let’s spend a few minutes outlining Saul’s career as leader before we wrap up. I’m going to skip a lot of details, but you can always read it in 1 Samuel 10-31.

Saul is anointed by Samuel. This is very significant. All the kings are seen as anointed by God’s prophets. Thus the king is given the divine right to rule. Now we’re going to discover that most of the kings were bad and exploited this, but nevertheless, being God’s anointed ruler is being God’s anointed ruler. Good or bad, they were seen as reigning by God’s choosing. There was no separation of church and state. To speak of one was to speak of the other.

Saul does not immediately set about creating a government. In the chapters that follow we discover that he is more of a military general than anything else. The Philistines were a small nation to the west of the Israelites. They were attacking Israeli people and Saul puts together an army that leads to their eventual defeat.

Later on Saul begins to select officials and for the first time an actual government begins to take shape. Then Saul truly becomes the king.

If you know the stories of Saul well you know that he becomes mentally unstable. We’ll look at some more of that next week as we look at David’s rise to power. David becomes a rising leader in Saul’s government. Sometimes Saul praises David. Sometimes Saul tries to kill him.

We don’t have enough details about Saul to know what was really going on. What is important from the stories, however, is that Saul is God’s anointed king and therefore has a legitimate claim to power that no one can take away.

Saul makes a number of rash decisions that the Bible says leads to God eventually rejecting him and his lineage as king. The first big one is before he goes into battle against the Philistines. It was typical for a military leader to make sacrifices to the gods before a battle in order to gain the gods favor. Our final verse in the first reading was 10:8 where Samuel said to Saul, “You shall go down to Gilgal ahead of me; then I will come down to you to present burnt offerings and offer sacrifices of well-being. Seven days you shall wait, until I come to you and show you what to do.”

Those seven days come and go. Samuel doesn’t arrive. Saul’s army is beginning to dessert. So Saul takes matters into his own hands and makes the sacrifices himself. Samuel then arrives and scolds Saul. Personally I think Saul’s actions were justified. Perhaps we the readers are to believe that too. But it is considered a breach of authority by Samuel.

Saul makes some rash oaths that come back to bite him. And what appears to be Saul’s greatest mistake comes in Chapter 28 of 1 Samuel. The prophet Samuel has died. Saul again needs to go to battle against the Philistines. Saul inquires of God for advice and receives no answer. Saul then disguises himself and seeks a medium, a practicer of black magic, to raise the spirit of Samuel from the dead. Read it in Chapter 28 sometime. It is all very disturbing, but it is the ultimate breach of trust with God. The seeking of advice from anything other than God is absolutely forbidden.

I highly encourage you to read 1 Samuel 10-28 in the days to come. We’re going to be looking at parts of it for the next two weeks. You’ll notice the storyline is not consistent. It jumps around chronologically. It’s probably a compilation of a number of sources. Pay special attention to Saul’s mistakes. I hope you find yourself thinking that at least some of them are perfectly reasonable – things that you could see yourself doing if you were in his shoes. Yet they get Saul into trouble.

1 Samuel can greatly trouble our understanding of God. God seems arbitrary and inconsistent. God seems unfair and maybe even cruel. I don’t think 1 Samuel is intended to be deep theology about God’s nature, however. I think 1 Samuel is designed to teach us that God’s ways are not our ways. That God’s wisdom is not our wisdom. That God’s ways are not bound by human logic or a human sense of fairness.

If 1 Samuel were all we had of God we’d have a very troubling picture indeed. However, in our Lord Jesus we have God giving the ultimate revelation. In Jesus God does not give up any of God’s sovereignty, God does not give up any of God’s mystery. But God does show that God is ultimately working out of love for humanity and the world.

When God is frustratingly quiet, or is asking you to do the impossible, or calling you to do something you know you are unqualified for, remember Saul. And remember

that God is always empowering and equipping you; and loving you through every day.

June 7 2020 Pre-Kings (Kings Series) 1 Samuel 8

If you were with us three summers ago you may remember that we looked at the book of Genesis. Two summers ago we looked at Exodus. Last summer we didn’t depart from the gospel, but this summer we will look at the kings of Israelites.

When we looked at books like Genesis and Exodus we discovered they were highly complex literary writings. They use a lot of patterns. They also even sometimes use self-contradictions to teach. We discovered that to read them literally is not only wrong but missing the way the authors originally intended them to be interpreted.

There is a drawback to those books, however. That is that when we study them we have no real outside information about the world at the time. Times, dates, world events and the like are too vague. We are only able to enter the story world and not the greater world around the story. There’s nothing wrong with that, however…

Starting with the kings the historical picture becomes much clearer. We have not only multiple accounts of the kings in the Bible we also have the beginnings of hard archaeological evidence, writings from other cultures that mention the Hebrews, and that sort of thing. We can study not only the authors of the Bible’s words but also others around them. We can compare how one culture is viewing a world event, like say the rise of the Assyrian Empire, and we can also see how the Israelites are viewing the very same event. On the whole then, we are able to get a much richer picture to interpret the Bible.

The first thing to remember is how small they are. From the Bible texts it may appear that these Israelites are a massive empire of regional, if not global, domination. Not so. A look at maps tells a different story. Israel was tiny, insignificant. Some maps of the region don’t even include them because they were so insignificant to the wider world.

Throughout its entire existence the Israelites were bullied around by their neighbors. Small neighbors: the Philistines, the Ammonites, Moabites, and Edomites would make raids and cause problems. Bigger neighbors, like the Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians and the like treated Israel like a vassal state. In fact only in rare times of a regional political power vacuum did the Israelites actually have any independence at all. We’ll get to that in the weeks to come, but let’s just say that even though they had their kings they were only semi-independent at best.

Today we are looking at the situation before there were kings. According to the Bible story line – the books of Exodus through Joshua - the Israelites were enslaved in Egypt, led out by Moses and then conquered the Promised Land under Joshua. I understand that archaeologically there very well could have been a migration of people into the area at that time. Don’t forget though, that the land was not empty. There were other people living there. The Israelites conquered some but not all of them. The book of Joshua gives us a mixed picture. In one some places it depicts vast sweeping annihilation of all the locals. In others they let many live.

What did set apart the incoming Israelites was their belief in one and only one God. The other cultures were polytheistic. The Israelites were monotheistic. It is also worth noting both from the Bible and archaeology that there were already people in the region who were monotheistic. The Bible contains some of their writings. They were also a major group in what would become the kingdom of Israel.

In any event, at the time of our reading from 1 Samuel, which is around 1000 B.C, the Israelites were a disjointed collection of tribes claiming common ancestry. They had no king and no real government. There was no standing army. There were no real cities. And as for religion, while they may have claimed in some form or another to live by the laws from Moses, there was nothing really organized. The were no religious structures, no temples, no organized priesthood or any real leadership. And it is safe to say that very few of these Israelites were actually monotheistic believers.

If you remember the Bible’s storyline you’ll know that instead of a king or government God would raise up a charismatic leader who would take care of any outside threat when they arose. These leaders were called “judges”, even though they weren’t at all like a judge today. You’ll recognize some of the judges: Samson, Gideon, Deborah (Yes, the leaders could be men or women), and Jephthah are the big ones. After the threat went away the judge’s leadership would also end.

Sometimes threats would be taken care of by military might. Sometimes by trickery. Sometimes by doing nothing and just faithfully waiting for God to act.

The point is, that at the time other nations around them were developing governments the little Israelite tribes were not. They were called by God to live in a situation of radical trust. God would be the king. God would provide. Period.

It sounds like a quaint enough idea, but how would you feel if we didn’t have an ongoing government structure? How would you feel if our country had no real central leadership, no standing army, no food safety regulations, no standards for materials, no road system, (no infrastructure at all) no court system or legal records, no police,… and on and on. And very significantly, no currency - no actual money.

Other civilizations around the Israelites were developing these things. It all looked good to the Israelites. But they did not have a king. They did not have an established government. Again, they were called on to put radical trust in God each and every day.

The Bible doesn’t tell us exactly how he emerged as a leader, but Samuel came to be a judge. So in as much as there was a recognized leader among the Israelites it was him.

We’re going to discover as we move forward in 1 Samuel that actually not many Israelites did recognize Samuel as a leader. It won’t be until King David that any central leadership really develops.

For today though, we have Samuel as an old man with at least some leadership respect from at least a couple of the tribes of Israel. The people approach him and say they want to be like the other nations around them. They want a king.

Samuel reminds them that they have a king. God is their king. God has taken care of them in the past and God will take care of them in the future. But they insist that no, they want to be like the other nations around them. They want their own king.

Samuel reminds them of all the things a king will do to them and take from them. He tells them they are better of without a human king. But they insist. Samuel then conveys all this to God. I get the image of a parent reluctantly giving into a child and saying, “Okay, if you’re sure. But don’t come crying to me when it all goes wrong.” But indeed they are sure. They want a king.

What this really is, is a shift away from trusting God and the beginning of trusting a human for leadership. They want leadership that is more regular and that they can see.

They also want leadership they can have more say in. While people may see a king as ruling supreme, a king can also be influenced. A king can be flattered, or if he is corrupt, bought. You can make political deals with a king. You can create strategies that benefit you. That is not possible with God as king.

Now let’s make some theological connections. Jump 1000 years forward to the coming of Jesus. We call Jesus Lord and King. Jesus is cited as being in the bloodline of David, the true bloodline of the Jewish kings. Therefore Jesus is God coming to be king. The sign over Jesus’ head on the cross said it clearly – The King of the Jews.

Right now God is our king. Though we have a government structure we are still called to depend upon God. In the Lord’s Prayer we pray, “thy kingdom come”. We just finished reading through Matthew’s gospel. Over and over again we saw a conflict of kingdoms. It was the kingdom of God vs. the kingdom of this world. It is God’s kingdom we should seek.

But that is hard. It is much easier to seek, and believe in, human institutions. It is easier to sleep at night if your possessions are well insured, or maybe if you have a burglar alarm. It is easier if you have a big investment portfolio to rely on rather than possibly needing support.

It is also easier to believe in religious institutions and become devoted to them rather than to the God who calls us. We maintain our buildings and think that doing so is accomplishing God’s will. We give offerings and somehow think it is automatically making God smile. We believe that attending worship, or having it regularly is somehow a more valid – more faith-filled devotion to God than to not.

But Jesus, our king, does not call us to an hour worship each week, or the maintenance of a building, or a settled life in a snug house with a healthy bank account balance;

or a massive military

or a huge social safety net

or the praise and approval of friends and neighbors

Jesus, our king, calls us to faithful living in his kingdom. And that will take us out of our earthly kingly comfort zones and into the unsteady and downright dangerous.

Don’t get me wrong. That’s not a call to be stupid. But it is a call to the same trust that Samuel was reminding the Israelites to have in God as king.

God – through Jesus – is our king. Let us live in trust knowing that God is a good ruler. God knows our needs. And God will provide, even if our lives feel too small and insignificant to make it on the map.

             

May 31, 2020 Pentecost Matthew 7:13-28

The events of the last couple days have caused me to set aside the sermon I created and write something different. By events I wish I was talking about the Spacex rocket launch yesterday carrying astronauts to the International Space Station. I’m excited that our nation again has the domestic capacity to launch humans into space. No, of course I’m talking about the death of George Floyd and all the protests, riots, looting, and else that has been going on.

Racial relationships are tense and they are complex. I find it an interesting coincidence that we are at the day of Pentecost. We Christians use this old Jewish holiday to celebrate the birth of the Church. The Holy Spirit dramatically came to the disciples gathered in Jerusalem on that day.

We are told there were devout Jews from every nation living in Jerusalem at that time. Yet each one heard the followers of Christ speaking in his or her own language. While they were all devout Jews, they are of different nations and races. While Judaism originated as blood related tribes, it had become a diverse religion.

There is a whole list of nations listed there. Some of those nationalities got along with each other. Some did not. Usually when there are racial disagreements the situation is complex. There is probably plenty of guilt to go around, and who knows where it actually started. There are also stereotypes. And with all stereotypes there are some that may be more accurate than others. As I consider the acquaintances, friends, colleagues, and people I know from different races I find that some do indeed fit negative racial stereotypes. Many do not. And in all cases, it is complex. Sometimes there are overt racial actions done by one side against subtle things done by the other side.

There have been riots, looting and violence these last days in many cities, Rochester included. While these things are senseless, especially in one’s own neighborhood and against local businesses, there is something to be noted about a suppressed rage that develops. It blows up into irrational action. The surface action is wrong, but you’ll never solve it until you look at what is underneath.

Maris Harvey Taylor was a member of the Pennsylvania State Senate from 1941 to 1964. He became an influential political boss and effectively bullied his way around in many things. The geographic area he represented included Harrisburg and surrounding Dauphin County. If you know the geography of the Harrisburg metropolitan area you know it is split by mile-wide Susquehanna River. With mountains also looming everywhere transportation and development in and around Harrisburg is complex.

I haven’t studied it too carefully, but during Taylor’s time in office there were plans to build a new bridge across the river and improve roads in and around the capitol complex. I understand the simplest and lowest cost option would have been to tear down the houses of a number of affluent white citizens and realign streets there. Taylor however, pressured for a more complicated and expensive option that ran things through predominantly black neighborhoods, effectively destroying those communities. Taylor’s push worked. The few white-owned houses were saved. Streets of black neighborhoods were destroyed.

To add insult to injury the massive 4200 ft. long bridge that was built taking a new road into the destroyed neighborhoods was named the M. Harvey Taylor Bridge. I don’t know about you, but if I lived in one of the destroyed neighborhoods, I don’t know if I’d ever be able to cross the bridge named for the guy who destroyed my neighborhood. Even seeing it would be a constant subtle cause of tension and anger.

How would it feel if your street were to be renamed, Osama Bin Laden Street? …not to draw a parallel between Taylor and terrorist leaders, but you get the point. Tensions build and build. Then they explode in irrational violence.

For the most part we have the luxury of watching riots and acts of violence on our TV’s or computer screens. As far as I know, the only people connected to our congregation who have experienced anything close to him is Mark and Cindy Friga in Rochester. For the rest of us, it is distant; something of conversation. We do not have to deal with the mess. We can afford to ignore subtle policies that make life difficult or impossible for others.

But should we then? Of course not!

In our gospel we read the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus has wrapped up this sermon with a series of teachings about being a committed disciple. He starts off saying the road is narrow and hard that leads to life. However the road to destruction is wide and easy.

Is not being in a position to ignore racial injustice an easy, wide road?

This is companion synod Sunday, and we are connected with the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Zimbabwe. A few weeks ago I had a conversation with one of their pastors – Pastor Mdube. (I won’t pronounce his first name. It’s too complicated.) The Lutheran church in Zimbabwe is growing and vivacious. People travel for miles to attend weekly worship which lasts for hours. Pastor Mdube preaches in four or five languages in order to cover all the languages of those who gather every week. We American Christians have a lot to learn about faith from them. Our faith is so easy. Theirs is challenging. They are also struggling with coronavirus outbreaks and they don’t begin to have the hospital capacities we do.

But the thing is, I can afford to ignore them. As an American pastor I can afford to know one language and preach from the comfort of my living room for several minutes in a week during these times.

I think it is subtle, but the road is easy that leads to destruction.

Jesus also preached that not everyone who says, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven.

As the conference dean I work with the Greater Rochester Community of Churches a bit, although I’m not the official Lutheran representative. Despite Rochester Christians being predominantly African American in heritage there is only one such person on the board. A criticism myself and others have made is that the Greater Rochester Community of Churches is largely driven by suburban white people who like to go in and offer a helping hand to the poor black folks.

But is that really helping? Is that not toxic charity? Is that not saying that you are doing things in Jesus name, but not really. The GRCC needs a leadership overhaul. I doubt it will happen but there are some who are working for it, and I hope they succeed.

Jesus concludes the Sermon on the Mount with the image of the wise and foolish builder. The wise builder builds on rock. The foolish builder builds on sand. When the rains come the house on rock stands. The house on sand collapses.

Those who build their faith on the easy path, taking easy roads of service to feel good about themselves, while ignoring (or overlooking) the more difficult paths that lead to real help, are building their faith houses on sand.

We are strong, creative, and capable people. The problems in our nation are numerous. Racial injustices and inequality are some of the biggest problems. We cannot improve things from safe comfortable distances. Reading a news report, sending a few dollars to help an aid organization, doing a token service project to help the needy, and that sort of thing just doesn’t cut it.

That does not mean you need to feel guilty, or to beat yourself up, or any such thing. What is does mean is to look at where life has given you an easy road. Do you even recognize the road is as easy as it is. Do not be quick to judge those whose roads are harder. Instead, pay attention to them. Invest in them. Don’t be afraid of the harder roads. There are plenty of them, but the harder roads are the roads that actually lead somewhere worthwhile. The easy roads go nowhere.

May 24, 2020 Easter 7 Matthew 6:19-7:12

As we’re in Phase 1 of “reopening” our economy I’ve been thinking about how vast our nation’s economy is and what is the driving force behind it. A great deal of it is what many people never really think of, though they depend on it all the time – the physical infrastructure: pipelines, electricity, highways, communications, water and sewer treatment, and all the machinery needed to keep it working. As far as I know, all of that has continued operating with little interruption. There is also the emergency services like hospitals and garbage collection and the like. I name all of that because I want to isolate the consumer economy and look at it in light of Jesus’ teachings as we continue in the Sermon on the Mount.

When I think about what’s behind the consumer economy I realize that it’s mostly driven by vanity. We’ve talked about this before. I’m not just talking about things like cosmetics and high fashion clothing. I mean about how much of the way we use what we have to make statements about ourselves.

A car is about far more than just getting from point A to point B. A car is a statement about your life. If you drive a rusted out 25-year-old Buick people will think differently about you than if you drive a new Tesla. Your house says a lot about you. How successful are you? What areas would you not want to live in because that address would reflect badly on you.

I have to laugh sometimes when I tell them my street address: 133 Park Avenue, especially on the phone. Park Avenue sounds like such an upper end address. Of course Park Avenue in Canandaigua is by no means a bad street, but it is a short street with century old ordinary 3 and 4 bedroom houses. It isn’t as ritzy as it sounds.

Of course I’m not talking about the sound of your address, for any name can be given to any road. But there are probably places where if you lived, you would not be happy to let people know your address.

Brand names, clothing, autos, houses, computers, phone brands: it all gives us an image. And if we are honest with ourselves, that image impacts our self-understanding. If all the products and things of the economy around us signal that we are a failure, we probably feel like a failure. And if all the products and things of the economy around us signal that we are a success, we probably feel like a success. There’s nothing unique about that. I believe that goes for all people of all nations and across all of time.

So Jesus’ words from the Sermon on the Mount that we read come across to us as outright scandalous. His teachings, “do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth,” are foreign to everything we experience. We use the consumer economy to define us. Jesus calls on us to live in a very different way.

His thoughts in verse 24 really lay out the reality, “No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.” We may not like stark dualities, but this is certainly one. Either you let God define you or you let the world define you.

In the 2017 version of the movie Ben Hur, Judah Ben Hur, a prominent wealthy Jew tells his poor Roman friend Messala that wealth isn’t everything. Messala replies that’s easy for a rich person to say. It’s different when you are poor.

I believe most of us fall into the category of perhaps not being rich but being well off enough that we do not have to worry about our next meal. We do not fear having everything taken from us or entering abject poverty. And so our faith in God comes from that perspective. We may even look at our wealth and possessions and conclude that they do not own us. That we would not lose our sense of worth if we lost all our stuff. But try that from the perspective of the person who is truly poor – the refugee who has fled leaving behind a home, car, and retirement savings – now having only the clothes on their back. Or the migrant worker who will work his whole life and not get ahead at all.

I don’t intend any of this to make us feel guilty. Rather I believe we all live with a burden in our subconscious that we need to maintain an appearance that solidifies our value in the world. That burden is subtle, so subtle we may not be able to even clearly identify it, but it is there.

Jesus’ teachings about possessions are challenging to be sure. They are also immensely freeing. When Jesus tells people to sell what they have, give it to the poor, and come follow him, he is actually offering them a path to freedom.

You cannot serve two masters. Perhaps you do serve God, but when the needs of keeping your self-worth in the world’s eyes come into play I doubt you will be willing to drop them.

Oh the burdens we bear and we don’t even realize it! We think we are free, but the dualism is there. Either your self worth comes from the world or it comes from the one who made you – God.

A big step we can make to our own freedom is to take to heart what Jesus says later on: “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged.” I think he is primarily talking about judging other people’s sinful actions, but he also means judging people in general.

I think we all contribute to judging appearances. I know I do. If someone looks like me and has the same sort of stuff I have I tend to trust him or her more. And if someone is – let me say – too far “above” or “beneath” me according to worldly standards, I’m not so quick to trust.

I am far more interested making friends with people who can help me than making friends with people who can’t. And yet isn’t that being judgmental? Is that not determining a person’s worth as a friend based upon their worldly standing?

Jesus says, “Or how can you say to your neighbor, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while the log is in your own eye?”

I don’t perceive there to be any logs in my own eyes. And yet, in light of what Jesus teaches, I’m not so sure. What subtle rules and expectations do I have that are out of line with God’s teachings? Who am I to advise someone with a speck in their eye when I unknowingly have my own logs?

Indeed we do need there to be accountability. Destructive behavior is destructive behavior. Abuse is abuse. We should not mistakenly tolerate it in light of what Jesus teaches. But most of judgment is not in this category. It is judging and grading people based on their usefulness to our own lives.

Jesus calls us to take a radical and freeing step towards building ourselves around who God, and God alone, made us. It is an amazing freedom.

And it is probably a freedom that we will fail at. Jesus knows we will fail. Jesus knows how hard it is. And he is not quick to condemn us for it. Instead he will continue to accompany us and challenge us.

This segment of the Sermon on the Mount wraps up with the Golden Rule, “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you…” This concept did not originate with Jesus. It is a common teaching among many religions of that day. There is nothing uniquely Christian about it. But as Jesus uses it here it is the guiding principle underneath all that he said before:

If you judge others based on their level in the consumer economy, are you not also judging and measuring yourself in the same economy?

If you build your self worth based on your stuff are you not also judging others the same way?

If you refuse to forgive others are you not also refusing forgiveness for yourself?

If you cannot acknowledge the log in your own eye how can you take the speck out of another’s?

As Jesus applies it, the Golden Rule is not a strategic principle to ensure good stuff for you. It is a path of freedom from bondage.

May you be truly free – free from the many countless things that would entrap you – and know fully God’s love and intentions for life.

May 17, 2020 Easter 6 Matthew 6:1-18

Last week we looked at how Matthew likes to use nested parallels (a chiasmus) to write about Jesus. The person who wrote Matthew’s gospel was not an eyewitness of Jesus but, like the author of Luke, pulled together a number of sources about Jesus’ life and teachings. While the Sermon on the Mount is an authentic collection of Jesus’ teachings, the way we have it in the gospel is most likely an arrangement made by Matthew. Jesus himself probably never gave such a sermon.

Given the way Matthew likes to use the chiasmus structure, it’s no surprise he uses it for the Sermon on the Mount. When a writer creates a chiasmus the most important point is put at the center. In the center of the Sermon on the Mount we find the Lord’s Prayer. As the center the Lord’s Prayer gives us a lense to view the whole sermons, and actually Matthew’s entire gospel.

We’ll look at the prayer from that perspective, but before we do let’s notice the other teachings that surround the Lord’s Prayer.

We are the point in the sermon where Jesus has moved into how you practice your piety. Three things are brought up in particular: almsgiving (or financial giving), prayer, and fasting.

Each of these three things could easily be done in a way to attract attention to yourself. But that raises a question – why are you doing it? Are you doing it for praise and approval of others? Are you doing it so that others say, “Do you see how much he’s giving to the work of God?” Or, “They are such a religious family. Look at how well behaved they all are and how faithfully they live.” Or, are you doing these pious acts for a very different reason? Ultimately, where is your heart?

I think we’ve all done subtle things to make ourselves look good. You see an attractive person you want to impress and so you put on your best face. How many boys and girls have decided to like or dislike something solely for the purpose of appearing attractive to some other girl or boy? People put on a “dating face” when they start a relationship they hope will have promise.

It’s more than just trying to make favorable impressions. A couple years ago when I was shopping for a new minivan I realized how much of a chameleon the salesman had to be. He certainly he had his own taste in cars. He knew what he liked and what he didn’t like. He knew what was a wise purchase and what was foolish. But he kept all that inside. Instead he changed to suit whatever his customer wanted.

For example, say someone like me shows up. I’ve made an appointment and I walk in with a few sheets of paper in hand from the online inventory at the dealership. Almost the first words out of my mouth were that I wanted to look at these vehicles and nothing more. And I said the terms that I would buy under: I wasn’t going to tolerate talking about rust protection, or extended warranties, or any other special deals. I was a potential buyer who knew what he wanted. I had sat down with a calculator before arriving to figure out the lowest cost vehicle that would suit my needs. On the whole, I’m sure I was a very boring customer. The salesman was gracious and did exactly what I asked.

But I’m sure this same salesman also knew how to sell a fancy four-wheel-drive truck to a guy who would probably never take it off a paved surface. He knew how to sell a luxury car to a woman who only cared about how it made her look. And he certainly knew how to sell a simple sedan to a poor college student who just needed a cheap way to get from point A to point B. He could sell to them all, changing himself to have whatever priority his customer had. That’s salesmanship. That’s not, however, how Jesus intends faith to work.

What is Jesus saying about piety – almsgiving, praying, fasting? Don’t do it for the image it creates. Do it as an expression of your faith relationship with God. Don’t worry what other people think – whether it’s positive or negative. Ultimately it is your relationship with God that is important.

I’ve come across sermons that say in Jesus’ day wealthy people would have processions with trumpets to announce particularly big charitable gifts. I suppose it would be akin to a donor banquet thrown by a charity where major givers are celebrated. I’ve also come across sermons where the pastor ways put on airs when they were fasting or doing other religious disciplines. But in truth there is no evidence of anything like that actually taking place. There are no reports of people literally disfiguring their faces when fasting. There are no reports of trumpets being blown ahead of major givers, or people making loud prayers in the synagogues or street corners. Remember, Jesus often taught using parables and extreme exaggerations to make her point. I think he’s doing the same thing here.

When it comes to how you practice your faith it is to be done first and foremost with your relationship with God in mind. Don’t worry about how it makes you look before others, either good or bad.

That takes us to the Lord’s Prayer and its central place.

The prayer starts off with a very simple line, “Our Father…” Jesus does not make prayer an individual thing between you and God. You do not say, “My Father.” No, it’s a communal thing, “Our Father.”

The prayer starts off with this crucial relationship. Jesus says to address God as a Father. The Greek word used here is “Pater”. In Aramaic, the language Jesus actually spoke, it would be Abba – dad or daddy. It shows respect yet is still familial. Jesus does not say address God as: master, as if we are slaves; or king, as if we were subjects; or even Lord. But Father. And a recognition of hallowing, or honoring God’s name.

Moving farther into the prayer remember Matthew’s overall theme of a conflict of kingdoms – the kingdom of God (or heaven) vs. the kingdom of this world (or evil).

“Your kingdom come.” Who’s kingdom? The worldly kingdom? No, God’s kingdom.

“Your will be done.” Again, whose will are we committing to do?

And the next line is very important, “on earth as it is in heaven.”

It is essential when reading Matthew’s gospel, and really much of Jesus’ teachings, that we do NOT get the idea of suffer now to be rewarded later. (Indeed, St. Paul did write about the sufferings of this age being insignificant to the glory that God has in store. His writings are true, but that is not the thrust of the Bible’s teachings for our lives.)

All too often people think life is a test to see if you are worthy enough to go to heaven. That is not, absolutely not, what the Bible teaches. God loves us. All of us! God wants all of us. And God wants us to live in his kingdom – his ways – here on earth. Life is not a test to see if you are good enough.

The Lord’s Prayer is about bringing God’s kingdom to real flesh and blood life for people here and now.

Notice it continues, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Notice two things. One, it is turning to God for daily needs. Daily needs include food, clothing, emotional support, friendship, etc. We turn to God and not the world, not other people, not institutions, or bank accounts, or governments, or anything else. We ask for God’s nurture and nourishment in very real ways here and now for us and for others. God’s kingdom is our life.

The next line takes us central to how our relationship with God and each other is built, “Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” This does not mean to let yourself be walked all over by everyone. But it does put grace at the center of our relationship with God and each other.

“Do not bring us to the time of trial, but rescue us from the evil one.” Use these verses and look both forward and backward in Matthew’s gospel. What happens before Jesus’ begins his public ministry? Forty days in the wilderness – a trial. This is asking God not to try us. Jesus survives that trial.

Look also to the end of the gospel reading. Jesus is in an even deeper trial. Will he go through with it? Will he again stay obedient to God no matter what the cost? Will he allow himself to be arrested and humiliated and beaten and executed?

How do the disciples fair under the same circumstances? What does Jesus say to them at after the Last Supper when he is with them in Gethsemane? “Stay awake and pray that you may not come into the time of trial.” Of course they do fall asleep! They all forsake him. They do fail in the face of trial.

When you look across Matthew’s gospel you see how the Lord’s Prayer, central here, is being lived out. The whole gospel can be faithfully interpreted through the prayer. And the prayer can be faithfully interpreted by the rest of the gospel.

Matthew presents us with the Lord’s Prayer as a simple measure to use for all of life. When you don’t know what to do, consider the Lord’s Prayer. When you don’t know what to pray, use the Lord’s Prayer. It is our relationship with God in a nutshell!