Epiphany 4 – January 30, 2011

             It’s a little late in the week, I know, but I spent yesterday evening at a lecture by Bart Ehrman at UT Knoxville – good event, very well attended, and nice to have a NT scholar of this caliber come to town! 

Anyway, you can find this week’s Lectionary readings here: http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=16.  (Hint: right-click the link and you should get the option of opening it in a separate tab or window.)

Micah 6:1-8

            Micah is kind of a fascinating character.  He was active during roughly the same time period as Isaiah (the one of chapters 1-39) – the latter half of the 8^th century BC, the time of the Assyrian takeover of northern Israel.  And like Isaiah, he was active in the southern kingdom of Judah.  But unlike Isaiah, who spent time advising the king in Jerusalem, Micah was a working-class prophet from a rural village called Moresheth-gath.  So while Isaiah preached that God would protect Jerusalem from the Assyrians, Micah’s message was just the opposite: he viewed the political and religious establishment based in Jerusalem as corrupt, exploitative of regular folks, and he believed that God would use the Assyrians to punish the southern kingdom.  (He was wrong, as it turned out, but the Babylonians did the job 150 or so years later.)

            I go into all this background because it helps to set the context for the OT reading, in which essentially God’s people are put on trial before God for their injustice.  It appears to be a kind of breach-of-contract suit where God is saying, “We had a deal, and I held up my end, and I gave you plenty of opportunities to perform your part of the bargain, but now I’ve had enough; I’m taking you to court and I will have justice!”  That’s why, vs. 1-2, God says he has a “controversy” with the people and invites them to “plead your case.”  Then, vs. 3-5, God as Plaintiff recounts all the ways that God has held up his part of the bargain -- rescuing them from bondage in Egypt, giving them leadership, fighting for them -- “the saving acts of the Lord.” 

In vs. 6-7, the people as Defendant answer in a way that’s familiar to lawyers: “What does your client want?  What would satisfy your client?  How can we work this out?”  The gist of these verses is, “Is there a ritual sacrifice great enough to fix this?”  These verses show what Micah thought of the whole sacrificial system: that it drained rural communities of their resources and kept the people from focusing on the heart of the Torah.  Well, finally in v. 8, Micah pronounces the verdict: “The Defendant is hereby ordered to do justice, love kindness and walk humbly before the Plaintiff.  Case closed.”

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

            In the interest of time I’m going to have to skip a long discussion of the Epistle text this week.  I will simply lift up vs. 28-29, where Paul says God has chosen “what is low and despised in the world, things that are not” – i.e., crucifixion – “to reduce to nothing things that are” – i.e., religion characterized by displays of power (wisdom! signs!) – “so that no one might boast in the presence of God.”  In last week’s post I discussed the context of the Corinthian church, where different factions were trying to one-up each other.  Here, Paul is saying there’s no point in vying for influence and power over each other because, with Jesus’ crucifixion, God has made us all equally foolish.  The other side of the coin, though, as he says in vs. 30-31, is that in Jesus we all have equal access to “life”, “wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption….”

Matthew 5:1-12

            The Gospel reading is the opening of the Sermon on the Mount.  I don’t know about you, but my traditional Sunday School-type imagining of the Sermon on the Mount is that there are all these people gathered around listening to Jesus.  (“He said, ‘Blessed are the cheesemakers’…”)  Wrong!  As the first verse says clearly, when Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain and sat down, and his disciples came to him; and he “taught them.”  So these three chapters of teaching are about forming his community of followers.  (For a whole book on this, check out John Howard Yoder’s The Politics of Jesus.)  And Jesus starts off by reorienting how they/we view the world.  He does this by redefining who the “fortunate ones” are, and his basic theme is that the losers in our world will be winners in God’s kingdom.  The word usually translated “Blessed” is makarioi meaning happy/fortunate/blessed.  And notice the verb tenses: “Blessed are the… for they will be….”  Jesus is instructing his disciples not to just see the world in terms of how things look now, but in light of what God has in mind. 

Jesus says the “kingdom of the heavens” (which is Matthew’s term for God’s reign) belongs not to the strong and well-adjusted but to the “poor/broken in spirit.”  Those who mourn in this world are fortunate because they’ll be comforted in God’s reign; those who are humble in this world are fortunate because they will eventually come into possession of the earth.  Those who are hungry and thirsty for righteousness are fortunate because, in God’s reign, they’re going to be well fed.  (See my discussion of “righteousness” in Matthew in the post for January 9.)  Those who are merciful will receive mercy; those who are clean/pure of heart will see God (note: this appears to be a reference to Psalm 24).  The “peacemakers” (a literal translation of the Greek word) are fortunate because in God’s reign, they will be called God’s children.  Those who are persecuted because of righteousness are fortunate because the “kingdom of the heavens” belongs to them (presumably they will be sharing with the poor in spirit).

This lesson reaches a climax in vs. 11-12 when Jesus speaks directly to the disciples.  He point: if those who have it bad are fortunate, then those who have it really bad are the most fortunate of all.  He says, “You are fortunate when they insult you and persecute you and say all kinds of evil about you because of me.”  This likely reflects the experiences of the Christian community for whom Matthew’s gospel was written – i.e., that others were persecuting them and saying bad things about them.  If you notice, it looks like someone along the way added the word “falsely” just to clarify that the persecution was unjustified.  Anyway, in v. 12 Jesus says to these “Rejoice and be extremely joyful, for your compensation is great in the heavens.”

Works Consulted: Rhonda Burnette-Bletsch, Studying the Old Testament: A Companion

Epiphany 3 – January 23, 2011

This week's readings can be viewed at http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=15

Isaiah 9:1-4

This week’s OT reading promises better times for God’s people.  The “land of Zebulun and Naphtali” refers to parts of northern Israel that were overtaken by the Assyrians, so that the people there then lived in the “darkness” of oppression.  Joy is promised to these people, and I notice that the language is actually in past tense – the “great light” has actually already dawned for the people so that they know a new day is in the making.  We can perhaps relate to this, as we have seen the “light” of Christ but we’re still waiting for the “new day” of his reign to take shape.  I also note that the language of verses 3-4 is strongly social-political – i.e., the promised joy is rooted in God’s victory over the oppressor.  Thus the joy being described as like “people dividing plunder.” 

Finally, this week the OT reading is quoted in the Gospel reading, giving us an explicit interrelationship between the two.

Romans 1:10-18

The situation related in this Epistle lesson is familiar to anyone who has experienced really ugly conflict in the church.  Paul says the congregation should be “united in the same mind and the same purpose”; unfortunately, he’s heard about divisions among them.  The Corinthian Christians have divided themselves into factions, each aligning itself with a different authority figure.  One group claims Paul’s authority for its position; another claims the authority of Peter (Cephas); heck, one group even claims they represent Christ himself (presumably a trump card).  Paul resents the very idea that the body of Christ could be divided in this way; beyond that he resents being co-opted into someone’s agenda (verse 13) – having his words and actions twisted, taken out of context, and used to serve someone else’s purposes. 

Part of what seems to have been going on is that people in the various factions started claiming they were actually baptized in the name of Paul, Apollos, Peter, etc., as a way of bolstering their positions.  For this reason, Paul says he’s glad he didn’t baptize anybody but Crispus and Gaius, so at least nobody else can use that to claim any special authority from him.  Then, realizing someone is likely to go checking his figures, he catches himself (v. 16) and admits he can’t remember the exact number.  

Paul reaches his point in verses 17-18, when he calls these quarreling people back to a focus on the message of the cross.  In my experience, the ugly kind of conflict is so often about power – one group trying to gain power over others.  That’s why these last verses are so striking to me: because the “message” Paul is talking about is that God has acted to save the world by the ultimate act of weakness – Jesus’ crucifixion. He adds that his own lack of eloquence in preaching (another “weakness”) keeps the message from being “emptied (kenōthē) of its power.”  He admits that, seen from the outside, the message of the cross is “foolishness” (mōria, as in “moron”), but to us it’s the “power of God.”  In other words, grabbing for power just divides and ultimately weakens the church, but the weakness of the cross unites and strengthens us.  Final note: as I read this passage I’m reminded of Philippians 2:1-11, where Paul encourages another congregation to “be of the same mind” and focuses their attention on Christ who “emptied himself” (ekenōsen) to the point of dying on the cross.

Matthew 4:12-23

Before I get into this week’s Gospel reading, I need to correct something in last week’s post.  In discussing John’s gospel, I seemed to suggest that Thomas doesn’t show up in the other gospels – which is just wrong.  Thomas is listed as one of the twelve disciples in the other gospels; it’s just that John is the only one that gives us the stories about him. 

Anyway, this week’s Gospel reading is Matthew’s story of Jesus calling his first disciples.  Matthew begins (v. 12) by telling us that Jesus returned to Galilee from the Judean wilderness, where he’d gone to be baptized and where he faced temptation.  We then get the interesting note that Jesus moved from Nazareth to Capernaum (incidentally, Mark also at one point refers to Jesus being “at home” in Capernaum).  Matthew makes this point to show fulfillment of today’s OT lesson, since Capernaum was located in the area that had been settled by the tribe of Naphtali, and was also “by the sea.”  And it’s there that Jesus meets his first four disciples while walking on the beach.

After reading last week’s lesson from John, we immediately notice that Matthew tells an entirely different story about Simon and Andrew.  John didn’t mention them being fishermen; he implied that Jesus met them in Bethany, which is in Judea; and he said that John the Baptist introduced Andrew to Jesus, and that Andrew then brought Simon.  Here in Matthew, of course, they meet Jesus while fishing together on the Sea of Galilee.  (Favorite childhood memory: the red leather Bible I got in third grade had a photo of “fishermen on the Sea of Galilee” in a boat with an outboard motor.)

E. P. Sanders points out in The Historical Figure of Jesus that Simon and Andrew are doing a different kind of fishing from James and John.  Simon and Andrew are using a “casting net” - standing in the surf using, casting it out and pulling it back in.  This kind of fishing didn’t require a boat.  James and John, though, have a boat which implies fishing by dragnet – a weighted net that could be dragged behind the boat to catch more fish.  That is, James and John – or more likely father Zebedee – had fancier equipment.  Sanders says, “There may have been a social differentiation between those who could afford boats and larger drag-nets and those who had to cast from the shore.”

At any rate, what gets me in this reading is that Jesus calls, and these four go.  Matthew is very explicit about saying that Simon and Andrew “left their nets,” which were their means for making a living, “and followed him.”  They just quit their jobs and joined Jesus.  (For some reason that flight attendant who slid down the airplane chute into his fifteen minutes of fame just flashed across my mind.)  James and John leave not only their nets but a boat and their father as well.  In other words, they leave a whole family business – which probably made Zebedee none too proud.  Later on in Matthew's story (19:27ff.), after Jesus has compared rich people entering the kingdom to a camel going through the eye of a needle, Peter recalls this episode for him: “Look, we’ve left everything and followed you.  What then will we have?”  Jesus answers that "everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold, and will inherit eternal life.  But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first." 

Epiphany 2 – January 16, 2011

Isaiah 49:1-7

            This reading is the second of the “servant songs” in Isaiah (see last week’s post for general discussion).  Last week I said that it seems the “servant” in these texts is Israel itself as a people; I still think so, but some parts of this week’s lesson complicate that theory a little.  In particular, verses 1-2 sound like classic calling-of-a-prophet stuff, making it seem as if maybe the “servant” is the prophet.  For example, compare verse 1 to Jeremiah 1:5; also, “he made my mouth like a sharp sword” in verse 2 sounds like preparing a prophet to speak God’s word.  But then, in verse 3, the servant is explicitly identified as Israel: “You are my servant, Israel…”  Then again, though, in verse 5, it sounds like the servant’s job was to “bring Jacob back” to God.  And verse 6 is maybe the most confusing of all: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”  It’s confusing because it makes more sense for a prophet to “raise up the tribes of Israel” than for Israel to raise itself up; at the same time, it makes way more sense for Israel as a whole people to be given “as a light to the nations.” 

Enter the scholars.  I find the note in the HCSB helpful: J.J.M. Roberts says that grammatically, the one raising up the tribes of Jacob and restoring the survivors of Israel isn’t the servant, but rather God.  He says a better translation is, “It is too light a thing, you being my servant, that I should only raise up the tribes of Jacob and restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations…”  Finally, in verse 7 it says that right now God’s people may be suffering in exile, but the other nations will eventually stand up and take notice because of God’s faithfulness to them.

What’s the upshot?  I think it’s that (1) God is promising rescue and restoration to God’s people; and (2) it’s not only for their own sake (that would be too light and insubstantial) but for the sake of all the peoples of the world.  In other words, it would seem, God is remaking his people into a “servant” people, a people with a mission beyond themselves.

1 Corinthians 1:1-9

            For this week’s Epistle reading, we have the very beginning of 1 Corinthians.  Just a word about the letters to the church in Corinth: we have more correspondence with this congregation than with any other in the NT.  Of course there’s 1 and 2 Corinthians, which are both pretty long as Paul’s letters go.  Then 1 Corinthians 5 mentions an earlier letter, and 2 Corinthians mentions still another “letter of tears.”  Parts of what we call 2 Corinthians may actually be that letter, or part of it, or (parts of) still other letter(s). At any rate, 1 and 2 Corinthians reveal a depth of relationship between Paul and this congregation – and it’s by no means always easy or happy - that we don’t see as much in his other letters.

            Paul’s letter’s typically start with a greeting and then a prayer of thanksgiving for the congregation to whom he’s writing.  (The notable exception being Galatians, in which he’s so mad he skips the prayer.)  That’s what we have in this reading, and I like to think about it this way: as Paul greets and prays for this congregation, we can also hear him greeting and praying for our congregations.  This is all the more true because in v. 2 he explicitly includes all Christians everywhere.

So what do we hear him saying and praying to and for us?  First, in v. 2 he refers to us as “those who are made holy in Christ Jesus, called to be holy ones.”  This is a good reminder because our day-to-day lives may not feel all that holy much of the time.  What I think it means that we are “made holy and called to be holy ones” is that we are tasked with helping to reveal Jesus in and to the world.  In vs. 4-9, Paul gives thanks for the grace of God given to us in Jesus; he says we have been “made rich” in him so that we don’t lack any grace-gift as we’re waiting for the ultimate revealing of Jesus.  God will strengthen us to the end.  A couple of things to highlight here: first, for Paul there is a trajectory to life and history; we are headed somewhere, specifically toward the “revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ.”  Second, Paul lifts up the richness of Christian life – that we are flush with all these grace-gifts (“charisma,” see 12:1-11) to equip us in our job of revealing Jesus in the world. 

With his reference to “speech and knowledge of every kind” (v. 5) Paul gets in a subtle dig at the Corinthians and their obsession with certain grace-gifts, i.e. speaking in tongues.  I think the dig Paul gets in at our expense has to do with “richness” and our obsessive focus on financial wealth or scarcity.

John 1:29-42

            The gospel of John is some wild stuff.  It’s like a parallel-universe gospel.  The story it tells about Jesus is in many ways the same as that told in Matthew, Mark, and Luke: there’s healing on the Sabbath, walking on water, feeding thousands, triumphal entry into Jerusalem.  Many of the characters are the same: John the Baptist, Mary and Martha, Simon Peter.  Then there are some close-but-not-quite-the-same-elements.  For example, Jesus’ mother is here but she’s never named; he cleanses the Temple but it’s at the beginning of the story instead of toward the end; the Samaritan woman at the well kind of reminds us of the Syrophoenician woman in Mark 7 / Canaanite woman in Matthew 15, but it’s also different.  Then there are some events and characters that are just different: Wedding at Cana?  Nicodemus?  Footwashing?  Thomas?  And there’s a ton of teaching material that is unique to John, from being born-from-above to abiding in the True Vine.  When those wacky cats the Jesus Seminar were casting their votes to decide the relative authenticity of Jesus’ words – a process which resulted in a version of the gospels with his words printed in shades ranging from magenta (yep) to black (nope) – if I’m not mistaken the entire gospel of John came out black.  Not that they were biased or anything.  Because it was a totally objective process.

What I’m driving at here is just that John’s gospel is different from the others.  And I will make just a few observations about today’s reading.  First, John the Baptist calls Jesus the “Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (v. 29) – which is an odd term.  On the one hand, it seems to refer to a ritual described in Leviticus 16 where the priest would ritually place the sins of the community on a live goat and then send it away.  But it was a goat, not a lamb. However, a lamb was used for Passover, and in John’s gospel Jesus is crucified on Passover (instead of the next day, as told by Matthew, Mark, and Luke).  So in that sense John apparently regards Jesus as the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” 

Second, in a case of close-but-not-quite-the-same, John doesn’t explicitly tell about Jesus being baptized or even actually come out and say he was baptized, but John the Baptist comes really close in vs. 32-33 when he relates his experience of seeing the Holy Spirit descend on Jesus and hearing God speak about him.

Third, and connected with #2, words in John’s gospel never mean just one thing, and there’s constantly misunderstanding between Jesus’ hearers who take his words literally and Jesus himself who means something else.  As an example, in v. 32 John the Baptist says the Holy Spirit “remained” on Jesus.  Then in vs. 38-39 those first disciples asking where Jesus is “staying” and then see where he’s “staying.”  Seems innocent enough, but if we turn over to chapter 15 we hear Jesus talking all about how we should “abide” in him and he will “abide” in us.  You guessed it – all these words are the same in Greek, a word meaning remain/ stay/ dwell.  So the idea is, John the Baptist saw the Holy Spirit "remain/dwell" on Jesus - if we know that Jesus "dwells" with the Father and intends for us to "dwell" in him, then the Holy Spirit "dwelling" on Jesus might indicate to us Jesus' "dwelling" with God.  So then, when these disciples ask Jesus where he's "staying/dwelling," and they to go see his house, we understand that they don't get it yet - the house isn't really where he "dwells."  But here at the beginning of John's gospel it's just nicely, subtly confusing.

Baptism of the Lord - January 9, 2010

You can find this week’s Lectionary texts here: http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=13.

Isaiah 42:1-9

This week’s OT reading is the first of Isaiah’s “servant songs” (the others are found in chapters 49, 50, and 52-53).  These pieces of text are referred to this way because they all focus on the identity and role of a “servant” who has been given a special mission by God, but they are not explicit about exactly who the servant is – whether a particular person or perhaps Israel itself. 

The context of this reading within Isaiah suggests that the “servant” refers to Israel itself (the people): see for example 41:8-10 (“But you, Israel, my servant…”) and 44:1-2 (“Do not fear, O Jacob my servant…”).  I should add the caveat at this point that this is poetry, and prophetic literature to boot - rather than just conveying information, the language itself moves us and speaks God’s message through image, metaphor, etc.  The risk of assigning “meanings” to it is that it can take something away from the sheer evocative power of the language.  As Bob Dylan once told an interviewer who asked him what one of his songs meant, (and I’m not quoting him correctly but it was something like) “It means what it says - if I’d meant something else, I would have said it differently.”

Anyway, there’s also historical context to consider with this reading.  The material in chapters 40-55 comes from the period of the Exile in Babylon, a time of basically existential crisis for God’s people.  Having suffered the humiliation of being completely overrun by a foreign power and physically removed from their sacred land, they wondered: Who are we? Who is God? 

So, what does the text say?   It says the servant has God’s spirit and will bring “justice to the nations”(v. 1).  This is interesting because it’s a mission that goes beyond the bounds of Israel to the rest of the world.  Again in v. 4, the servant won’t stop until he’s “established justice in the earth.”  Finally and most significantly, vs. 5-7 say that the same God who created the whole world and all people has given the servant as a “light to the nations,” opening blind eyes and freeing prisoners.  What’s also interesting in this reading is that the servant’s role, while far-reaching, is also gentle and unassuming: see vs. 2-3, he won’t raise his voice, break bruised reeds or blow out dimly burning candles. 

In other words, out of the humiliation of the Exile, God’s people get a surprising new mission – not one of violence and revenge and nationalism, but rather one of universal compassion and justice.  It’s easy to see why the church sees Jesus in the servant songs.

Acts 10:34-43

This reading emphasizes the universal nature of God’s salvation in Jesus.  At this point in Acts, Cornelius – a gentile – has been brought together with Peter and is hearing the news about Jesus.  This meeting is a big deal for both of them, as it realigns Peter’s whole understanding of God’s plan.  The key verses for me are 34-35: that “God shows no partiality” even between Jews and gentiles.  Impartiality was already understood to be part of God’s nature: see Deut. 10:17-18, which says God isn’t partial to the rich but rather takes care of the poor and strangers.  But here Peter comes to understand that God’s impartiality extends even to who can be part of God’s covenant.

Matthew 3:13-17

OK kids, I have to admit that I broke out the Greek NT for this week’s Gospel reading - I figured, it’s short and perhaps my limited Greek skills could handle it.  And I did make a few interesting discoveries. 

As this Sunday is Baptism of the Lord, we get Matthew’s version of Jesus’ baptism by John.  This is a story that it’s good to read in “gospel parallel” – with the versions from the other gospels right alongside.  You can do that at this link:  http://www.utoronto.ca/religion/synopsis/meta-4g.htm - just scroll down the Matthew column until you get to “The Baptism of Jesus” and then click the little book icons there to bring the other gospels’ versions alongside.  Pretty cool.  

The first thing I notice in this text is that, while Mark and Luke just say Jesus came to John and happened to get baptized, Matthew says in v. 13 that Jesus came to John to be baptized by him.  In other words, whereas there might be some question as to why Jesus would receive John’s baptism if he’s the Messiah, Matthew makes no apologies – Jesus came intending to be baptized.  Then, as we see, Matthew gives us this little conversation between the two of them in vs. 14-15.  It says John was preventing him, saying “I need to be baptized by you, and you’re coming to me?”  But answering Jesus said to him, “Let it be for now, for in this way it’s fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”  Then he let him, or he permitted it.  I think this conversation between John and Jesus is pretty significant, because of the words Jesus uses – “fulfill all righteousness.”   These are really important words in Matthew, as a scan of the Sermon on the Mount (chapters 5-7) shows us.  In Matthew’s version of the Beatitudes/blessings (5:3-12), Jesus blesses those who “thirst for righteousness” and those “persecuted for righteousness’ sake.”  (For extra credit you can compare to Luke’s version.)  “Righteousness” means, in Matthew, right relationship with God particularly as shown by our behavior.  Anyway, then in 5:17-20 Jesus says he’s come to “fulfill the law” and that our “righteousness must exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees” for us to enter the kingdom of heaven.  In 6:33, Jesus says to “seek first God’s kingdom and his righteousness” – in Luke it just says “seek his kingdom.”  Finally, Jesus’ climactic parable/vision in Matthew is the “sheep and goats” passage (25:31-46) in which those who enter his kingdom are the “righteous” who “did unto the least of these.”   

So what does it mean that Jesus’ baptism “fulfills all righteousness”?  I think it means that Jesus accepts baptism by John, who embodies the OT prophetic tradition, in order to take that tradition further, reveal its purpose and bring it to fruition.  This makes sense, I think, when we consider what Jesus says about John in chapter 11: “There’s been no one greater than him up to this point, but “the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” 

To finish out the reading, it says after he was baptized he “immediately” came up out of the water, and - Look! – the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the spirit of God coming down like a dove and coming on him; and – Listen! – a voice from the heavens saying, “This is my son the beloved, in whom I take delight.”  Incidentally, the “Look!” and “Listen!” are right in the Greek text – traditionally they’re translated as the bland “behold” or “lo,” and for some reason the NRSV ignores them completely.  The same word is used in the birth story (1:20) when the angel comes to Joseph, and then again when the magi show up (2:1).  It adds drama and indicates that something big is happening, like “Check it out!”

Works Consulted:

J. J. M. Roberts’ notes on the Isaiah text, and Dennis Duling’s notes on the Matthew text, in the HarperCollins Study Bible

HarperHaa

Synopsis of the Four Gospels

Daniel Harrington’s Matthew commentary in the Sacra Pagina series

Special Edition! Epiphany - January 6, 2010

Matthew 2:1-12
I have already made a few observations applicable to this text (see the post for December 26), but some more reflections seemed appropriate since Epiphany is so important in the Christian year.  Having grown up Methodist, I remember I was surprised in divinity school to learn that Epiphany was actually a much more important celebration in the church year, historically speaking.  James White says in his Introduction to Christian Worship that the observance of the Epiphany of the Lord dates back t least to the fourth century (300s) AD, and that it combined the celebrations of Jesus' birth, the arrival of the Magi, Jesus' baptism and his traditional first miracle at Cana (John 2:1-11).  Sometime around the middle of the fourth century, probably in Rome, Christians began celebrating Christmas as a separate festival.  White says, "The Epiphany, then, is older than Christmas and has a deeper meaning.  For instead of simply being an anniversary of the birth of Christ, it testifies to the whole purpose of the incarnation: the manifestation of God in Jesus Christ, beginning both with his birth and with the beginning of his ministry."

So, to the text.  I always refer to these foreigners who come to visit Jesus simply as the Magi because "wise men" seems way too vague to me.  (And "kings" is nowhere near right.)  Daniel Harrington tells us "Magi" originally referred to certain Persian priests who were dream interpreters - and of course that aspect does come into the story in v. 12.  But Matthew portrays them also as stargazers - guys who follow the movements of the stars and planets as indicating significant events in history.  The basic theological point of the Magi's visit seems pretty clear: just as Matthew's gospel ends with Jesus' Great Commission to make disciples of all nations (28:20), so here at the beginning there is this inexorable pull of the Gentile nations (represented by the Magi) to Jesus.  I am struck by how innocent the Magi seem - they are driven by nothing other than what the star indicates to them, i.e. that the King of the Jews has been born and that they should come and worship him.  They don't consider that there might be any problem with asking Herod, the Jewish ruler, about this momentous event.  Herod's response is completely different, as I suppose it should be: if these guys over in Persia or Arabia have received intelligence of the birth of a new King of the Jews, this could be a big problem for Herod!  So he calls together the "chief priests and scribes" (ding! ding! ding! no accident, as these authority figures will be opposing Jesus throughout Matthew's story) to find out where the Messiah was to be born.  Bethlehem was the expected birthplace of the Messiah since that was David's hometown, so that's where the Magi are sent.  Matthew says Herod "secretly" called the Magi together - who was he keeping it a secret from?  The chief priests and scribes, I suppose, so at this point apparently they don't know why Herod's asking about the Messiah.  Anyway, Herod "secretly" tells the Magi to go to Bethlehem and find Jesus, then to come back and tell him so that he can also go and "pay him homage."  By the way, "pay homage" means to bow down and worship, and this is also something that happens throughout Matthew's story, right up to the end when the disciples worship the risen Jesus (28:17).  It strikes me as a little bit funny that, after stopping and asking Herod where they could find Jesus, the star takes the Magi straight to his house (v. 9), where as we know they fall down and worship him and offer him these three gifts, before getting a little angelic help to keep them from betraying Jesus' secure location to Herod. 

A couple of final points.  First, notice the contrast between the Magi and Herod.  Whereas the Magi are portrayed as quite innocent (see above), Herod is fearful (v. 3) and devious (vs. 7-8) and finally, terribly violent (vs. 16-18).  This stark difference sets us up for the conflicts (and finally violence) yet to come in Matthew's gospel.  Second, in spite of Herod's scheming and violence, he is clearly outmatched by the powers at work here as the nations are already being drawn to acknowledge the Messiah and angels keep intervening to protect him.

Christmas 2 - January 2, 2011

John 1:1-18

OK folks, I realize it's already Sunday as I'm posting this - could it be a New Year's Resolution is in order?  I'll just say I won't make it a habit.  (Did I ever write sermons on Sunday morning before church? Yes, yes I did.)  Anyway, on to the text!  It is fitting that we have the prologue to John's gospel today, as this rounds out the Christmas Gospel readings nicely: we had Luke's birth story on Christmas Eve, Matthew's last Sunday, and today we have John's take on Jesus' origins.  It is notable first off that John skips the whole question of Jesus' birth - presumably that's because he has bigger fish to fry (pun on John 21:9-14 fully intended).  John is not particularly concerned with Jesus' human lineage, e.g., with showing how he's descended from David.  He does not name Jesus' mother, although she figures pretty heavily in the story (wedding at Cana 2:1-11, crucifixion 19:25-27).  And the first followers do identify Jesus as "son of Joseph from Nazareth" (1:45). 

The bigger fish with which John is concerned is Jesus' divine lineage - his origins as the Son of God.  Accordingly, John reaches all the way back to the beginning, alluding quite explicitly to the opening verse of Genesis with his "In the beginning was the Word..."  He does something quite clever here, as he not only makes a statement about the Son of God (that he was present with God at the beginning) but about the whole creation story (that the Son of God was part of it).  I would note at this point that the idea of the preexistent Son of God taking flesh in Jesus was apparently a pretty early one - see for example Philippians 2:6, only 25-30 years after Jesus.  Anyway, what John is saying here is quite profound: that the Word, or the Son of God, has been present with God, or the Father, from the very beginning and has been intimately involved in everything that has happened.  As John says, "without him not one thing came into being."  I think this is a really important point for us, because it means that as Christians we mustn't make sharp distinctions between the Old Testament and the New; if the Word has been around all along, then the Word is implicated in all of it.  Once again I'll give a little shout-out for the theologian Robert Farrar Capon, who has written quite a bit on this subject--see, for example, his book The Fingerprints of God.

The other thing that John accomplishes with this text is that he introduces us to some of the images and concepts that are going to be explicated in the rest of his gospel.  "Life," for instance, which Jesus starts talking about with Nicodemus (see 3:15) and with the religious authorities (5:19-47); which also becomes the point of Jesus' discussions with the Samaritan woman (4:14), the crowds who are fed (6:35), and Martha (11:25); and which is finally identfied as the whole point of John's story (20:31).  Then there's "Light," which comes up in the Nicodemus passage (3:19-21) and is discussed further in chapter 8.  There's also new birth (verse 13), which again Jesus discusses with Nicodemus and which I think is implied in Jesus' subsequent encounters with the Samaritan woman, the man born blind (chapter 9), Lazarus (chapter 11), and others.  There's belief (verse 12), which is everywhere in John's gospel.  There's "glory" (verse 14) which comes up again at 2:11, 5:41-44, 7:14-18, 8:54, 12:27-32 and all of chapter 17.  And finally, there's "Word" (logos)itself: Jesus' words are all-important in John's gospel.  As Jesus says in 14:23, "Those who love me will keep my word (logos), and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them."