A Reflection for XXIII Pentecost (Proper 28) All Saints’ Church, Southern Shores,
NC November 16, 2014 Thomas
E. Wilson, Rector
“The Summons”
One of the things I like about preaching on the
Lectionary is that every three years I come back to the same lessons and it is
like I meet old friends and discover how they
have changed since I last saw them. Obviously their words have not
changed but I have, and I get different insights and surprises.
In the lesson from the Book of Judges for today,
three of the judges are mentioned, and I am again aware of how God uses all
sorts of people. The Book of Judges is a collection of hero stories that are
passed down by the various tribes of Israel. These hero stories are set after
the time of Joshua, which we looked at last week, when the tribes co-existed in
a loose confederation in the Promised Land and pretty much went their own way
until they were united by the Kingdoms of Saul and David. This collection of
stories was probably first put into written form during the time of the
Babylonian exile to remind the exiles that they need to stick together to keep
from losing their identity.
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| Deborah, Judge of Israel under Deborah's Palm |
The stories follow a cyclical pattern which begins
with the people getting sloppy and ceasing to listen, forgetting their
relationship with God. Their failure to maintain their community’s spirit
allows them to be dominated by one of the neighboring countries that oppress
them. A hero is called forward by the Spirit of God who liberates the people,
and then after the Judge dies, the people go back to their old ways. Judges, in the Book of Judges, are people who
listen for God and are open to receive the Spirit of God. There are 12 Judges
in this book, from Gideon to Samson. The Judges like Ehud and Barak mentioned
in this lesson are people who hear God’s call to rise up against the oppressors
of the people and lead the people, or they are like Deborah, a person noted for
wisdom and discernment. People come to
her to lay out their cases against each other and she listens to God and determines
what the resolution will be.
This particular story comes at the end of the Ehud
story, and the thing about Ehud is that he is called ‘Ehud – the Left-Handed”. Being
left-handed, there is a trick he is able to pull – he is able to kill Elgon,
the King of the Moabites, who is oppressing the people. As you know, left-handed
people are only about 10% of the population, and they find it more difficult to
fit in a society that is dominated by right-handed folk; they are often seen as
abnormal. While the story is a nice gory tale, it is interesting to note that
God seems to pick the most unlikely people to use to make a point. In the same way, it is unusual to see Deborah
as God’s vessel to lay out military plans in a society in which women were not
usually taken seriously. I think one of the messages of the Book of Judges is
to remind the stories’ listeners that God uses all sorts of folk to be leaders.
Their leadership is not about who they are but about how God uses them, even
people who the society looks down upon. God is the Judge behind all of the
Judges, and this is a theme throughout the entire Bible - that there is no
greater Judge than God. It is a lesson we need to keep learning as we elect
leaders in this country - for there is a higher law than the Constitution, a
greater Judge than the Supreme Court.
The other surprise in the Gospel lesson was about
the talents, and this was the first time I noticed the line the third slave
says: “`Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not
sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed; so I was afraid, and I went
and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.” I started to
wonder what kind of man reaps what he does not sow and gathers what he does
scatter? What kind of man takes things that belongs to another? And it came to
me; he is a criminal. He heads up a criminal enterprise and he has to get out
of town for a little while because the heat is building up. He is a gangster,
and I noticed the financial advice the gangster gives the third slave about
investing the one talent with money lenders to get interest. Jewish law forbade the charging of interest;
the Hebrew word for interest comes from their word “to bite”, and therefore the
advice was to invest it with a criminal loan shark and take advantage of
someone who is down on his luck. The story does not say how the first two
doubled their money, but it makes sense that, since they worked for a criminal,
they probably engaged in their own criminal enterprise. I started to see the
story as a gangster story of an organization like the Yakuza or Mafia. I don’t
think Jesus is telling a story about God as much as he is talking about the “Godfathers”
of our cultures. I can visualize the three coming to the Godfather after he got
out of jail to pick up the reins again of this criminal enterprise and kissing
the boss’ ring and saying something like: “Hey Boss, I took your five talents…”
(now a Talent is roughly equivalent to
71 pounds of silver, or the wages of a
skilled worker for nine years and so five Talents would equate to wages for 45
years – imagine, therefore, every penny you ever made in your working life) “… I
took your five Talents and bought a supply of heroin and doubled your money.
How about them smackers?” The Boss would say, “Oh Charlie, Charlie, you are a
good gang member. Let me give you a bigger territory.” He also rewards the second,
who invested in a chain of brothels, but he changes his tune with the last
slave and orders cement shoes for this one who wasn’t harsh enough, and that
slave of the one talent “sleeps with the fishes.”
If we take this story to be literally about God,
then God is a monster, and we who are faithful can become monsters in that
divine pattern. We have seen throughout history how people have taken the God
of love and used that God as a foil, a God-father, for all sorts of monstrous
activities. Last week we celebrated Veterans Day on the anniversary of the end
of that horrible conflict which started 100 years ago in 1914. It was that War
that galvanized theologian Karl Barth as many of his teachers in Seminary
signed on to support German War aims in World War I, and Barth reexamined how
culture used religion for its own purposes. It was that War where Russian
Orthodox Priests and Bishops joined with the leaders of English and French
churches to support the slaughter that would last for four bloody years and whose
main purpose was national pride as both sides saw the war as supporting their
culture. The total number of military
and civilian casualties in World War I
was over 37 million, over 16 million deaths and 20 million wounded. One third
of the deaths were from disease and malnutrition made worse by the war. We were
slow to learn, for the end of World War I carried the seeds of World War II
where estimates of the dead numbered from 60 to 85 million. War is not a
political issue; it is, at its core, a spiritual issue. Barth wrote: "To
clasp the hands in prayer is the beginning of an uprising against the disorder
of the world."
I think the question that Jesus posed to his
listeners is “What kind of “Boss” of our life do we follow?” If the “Boss” of our life is a harsh boss who
takes what belongs to others to enrich himself, then we will pattern our lives
after that “Boss”, and the final question, the bottom line will be “Did you
take more from others than you were given by me?” However, if our Boss is about the business of
love, then the important question at the end of our time of serving our boss
will be “Did you give more to others than you received from me?”
I think that both the lessons are about how God is speaking
all the time, speaking about who God is and inviting us to follow God to help
lift people out of oppression. I think the first lesson for today is that God
uses all sorts and conditions of people, even you and me. So are you and I listening to God and
responding to what God invites us to do? I think the second lesson asks us to
ask ourselves who is this God in whose image we are made and how are we “good
and faithful servants” of that God?
Parker Palmer wrote a version of the Lord’s Prayer:
Heavenly Father, heavenly
Mother,
Holy and blessed is your true name.
We pray for your reign of peace to come,
We pray that your good will be done,
Let heaven and earth become one.
Give us this day the bread we need,
Give it to those who have none.
Let forgiveness flow like a river between us,
From each one to each one.
Lead us to holy innocence
Beyond the evil of our days —
Come swiftly Mother, Father, come.
For yours is the power and the glory and the mercy:
Forever your name is All in One.
Holy and blessed is your true name.
We pray for your reign of peace to come,
We pray that your good will be done,
Let heaven and earth become one.
Give us this day the bread we need,
Give it to those who have none.
Let forgiveness flow like a river between us,
From each one to each one.
Lead us to holy innocence
Beyond the evil of our days —
Come swiftly Mother, Father, come.
For yours is the power and the glory and the mercy:
Forever your name is All in One.
This a Haiku I wrote to
help me go deeper in meditation than what I wrote
The
Summons
Coming
to Palm shade
Hearing
sighs and murmuring
God’s
breath spirit call.
