Scripture Lesson
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Just us.
Parable of the Lost Sheep
Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
So he told them this parable: “Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my lost sheep.’ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
Parable of the Lost Coin
“Or what woman having ten silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
Luke 15:1-10 NRSVUEIt’s easy enough to put ourselves in the shoes of the shepherd who ended up one sheep short, or of the woman who lost her coin, and we take some measure of joy when the lost things are found. I think, though, that these illustrations from a different time don’t hit with quite the desired impact in these times. When I think of loss/relief/rejoicing episodes, I think of
- watching your child at the lake, and she is suddenly not there, then a few seconds later casually swims out from under the pier
- learning that your loved one was not on that particular part of campus when the active shooter appeared
- confirming that the Marine Osprey that crashed in Afghanistan was not piloted by your nephew
That is gratefulness in finding. “Thank God,” we say, but I’m not sure it’s exactly what we mean.
So those situations, the ones just above, along with the original ones from Luke, are fine as far as they go, but in driving home the point Jesus was trying to make, I think they all fall a little short.
The issue for the Pharisees was that Jesus was consorting with sinners and other unsavories. Them, distinct from us. The point to be made is that Jesus doesn’t see any them, he only sees everyone, every single one, as us. “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them,” he teaches in Luke 6:32.
Both Christian essayists Max Lucado and James W. Moore arrived at the notion “If God had a refrigerator, your picture would be on it,” and that is charming to think about. The challenge for us, though, is not to take joy only when the various people that are pictured on our refrigerators end up safe and sound, but to view, as Jesus does, each of the messy others out there to be worthy of a spot on our crowded fridge and in our heart. There is no them. Just us.
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On Making Pots
Old Testament Lesson for 04 September 2022: Jeremiah 18:1-11
Jeremiah received the Lord’s word: Go down to the potter’s house, and I’ll give you instructions about what to do there. So I went down to the potter’s house; he was working on the potter’s wheel. But the piece he was making was flawed while still in his hands, so the potter started on another, as seemed best to him. Then the Lord’s word came to me: House of Israel, can’t I deal with you like this potter, declares the Lord? Like clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in mine, house of Israel! At any time I may announce that I will dig up, pull down, and destroy a nation or kingdom; but if that nation I warned turns from its evil, then I’ll relent and not carry out the harm I intended for it. At the same time, I may announce that I will build and plant a nation or kingdom; but if that nation displeases and disobeys me, then I’ll relent and not carry out the good I intended for it. Now say to the people of Judah and those living in Jerusalem: This is what the Lord says: I am a potter preparing a disaster for you; I’m working out a plan against you. So each one of you, turn from your evil ways; reform your ways and your actions.
Jeremiah 18:1-11 CEBIn technology we use metaphor frequently as we are engaged in abstract concepts and endeavors and frequently need support and approval from those ensconced in the more real, less abstract world. We talk about how developing software is like constructing a building, or growing a crop. Sometimes software with hostile intent is a virus, or a tapeworm, depending on how it behaves. Information security is regularly compared to home security. In fact I think we rely less on metaphor in technology these days, as the workforce now has never known a world in which technology and its attendant development and maintenance is not a part of everyday life [1].
The role of the metaphor is to make the abstract more accessible by employing familiar terms. In Jeremiah, the potter/clay metaphor is invoked to help God’s dazed, disheartened, and doubting Chosen People, exiled to Babylon, understand how and why this terrible thing could happen to them [2]. If the clay fails to become a beautiful pot, it can be a do-over. Likewise for the Judeans.
The clay and the potter is a popular metaphor in the Bible; you can see it plainly in Isaiah 68 and Romans 9, and see it suggested in other places as well. In 2 Corinthians 4:7, Paul famously refers to our earthly bodies “earthen vessels” or “clay pots”, entrusted in containing our true selves. Pottery was the concrete image for Biblical communicators and, perhaps as a consequence, there are scads of sermon illustrations involving, just like in Jeremiah, the potter and the clay.
One such illustration that has stuck with me over the years imagines the clay and the potter together with the potter’s wheel, just as in Jeremiah. To make the pot rise to life from the inert, spinning clay, the potter applies pressure from the outside of the nascent vessel, and pressure from the inside as well, in order to form up the walls and make beauty. Both pressures must be present and balanced, otherwise the clay will not respond. Pressure from the outside balanced by pressure from the inside. A vessel emerges.
I don’t know if life is harder today than it was in times past, but I’m pretty confident it is faster. Challenges and demands for our attention arrive constantly through our various devices. News no longer arrives in cycles, but constantly. Our favorite diversions, available at our fingertips, call to us. These pressures from the outside need to be met with pressures from the inside. We could insist on device-free periods. We can keep our commitment to date night. We can resist meaningless demands on our time that take us away from family, and remember that in the end, we really are in charge of what we do and don’t do.
And the vessel of our lives will emerge.
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- [1] Linguistically I think “virus”, for example, along with “hub” and “gateway”, cease at some point to be metaphors and become instead additional true implementations of the term. Code that co-opts other code to make instances of itself really is a virus of sorts.
- [2] This is again the theodicy question as Krishna discussed in a recent sermon.
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The Probability of Luke 11:9 in English
Part of the Gospel lesson (Luke 11:1-13) for the seventh Sunday after Pentecost – Year C – common lectionary
“So I say to you, Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.”
Luke 11:9, also Matthew 7:7
Likely you recall that the first letters of Ask, Seek, and Knock compose an acronym (ASK) that is a mnemonic device for helping us remember the elements of the verse, and remarkably, the same as the first element in the acronym. Have you ever considered how improbable it is for the words Ask, Search (or seek), and Knock to form the work ASK as an acronym of the key words? Obviously, it only works in English, however the choice of words is apparently not a work of translation trickery.[1, 2]
For sophomoric analysis, the likelihood of any three words together starting with A, S, and K appears to be (11.7% x 6.7% x .86%) [3] which calculates to about 1 in 15,000, not an overly staggering number; but to have the three words appear in A-S-K order, the chances become about 1 in 100,000 (there are 31,102 verses in the Bible, for reference).
Here is a picture of 1 in 100,000. Can you find the red dot?
see https://anthonybmasters.medium.com/understanding-one-in-100-000-a2aa5556235 As for the acronym (ASK) being the same word as the first element in the three word expression, we really will require the services of a real lexicographer-mathematician.
Might this be a case of Divine design? Just asking the question…
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- [1] https://biblehub.com/interlinear/luke/11-9.htm
- [2] https://www.transcripture.com/english-francais-luke-11.html
- [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_frequency
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Living in the Moment
Gospel lesson (Luke 10:38-42) for the sixth Sunday after Pentecost – Year C – common lectionary
Living in the moment is a refrain from ancient schools of thought and behavior that has gained renewed traction in the today’s hyper-stimulated environment. While not necessarily an organizing principle of Christianity, the concept is nevertheless frequently evident in both Old and New Testaments [1], and indeed in Jesus’s explicit teachings, exampled in today’s Gospel lesson.
38 Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village where a woman named Martha welcomed him. 39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at Jesus’s feet and listened to what he was saying. 40 But Martha was distracted by her many tasks, so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her, then, to help me.” 41 But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things, 42 but few things are needed—indeed only one. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”
Luke 10:38-42 NRSVUEHere the teaching concerns living in this moment through identifying the essential thing distinct from the distractions of busy-ness and lesser endeavors. How to know the essential thing? In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed — Mark 1:35
Elsewhere, Jesus’s teachings on Living in the Moment come in the form of not worrying about the future. Recall the teaching in the Sermon on the Mount concerning the lilies of the field, culminating with “So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.”— Matthew 6:43.
A memorable lesson in Living in the Present was delivered at Edenton St. UMC by Bishop Marion Edwards (1929-2011) using Psalm 118:35 as his text – This is the day which the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. We allow our narratives of the past to become idyllic, bearing little resemblance to what really happened. We fret about the future to the point that we miss the day that is given us. But emphasizing each element of the verse, he drove home the message that This Is the Day.
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[1] see Isaiah 43:18-19; Ephesians 5:15-16; James 4:14; also Matthew 24:42-44;
