The parable of the talents...

Scripture: Judges 4:1-7; Psalm 123; 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11; Matthew 25:14-30

This week the gospel lesson is the parable of the talents. We have studied God and man's justice and judgment, humility and weakness and power, abundance and scarcity, and what it takes to enter, be and act in the kingdom of God. Last week we studied the parable of the wise and foolish virgins, of being prepared and to act, of being alert so as not to miss the opportunity to see and do God's will. Last week the wise virgins would not share their oil with the foolish virgins - the foolish presumed the generosity of others. In the parable of the talents what do learn about generosity? Of giving of talents? What does the parable teach us about being in and participating in the kingdom of God? See John Donahue's "The Parousia is not for Wimps."

In "There's Two Sides to Every Story, the Rev. Linda Pepe tells us "a common thread that runs through both of these interpretations.  And that is, the perceptions of how each of the servants perceived the master determined his course of action. What do you get out the parable? How did the servants perceive the master? What did they do? How did the master perceive the servants? How does God perceive us, and others who are different than us?

"Getting Real" in Today's "Me, Me, Me" centered world

Scripture: Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25 and Psalm 78:1-7 or Wisdom of Solomon 6:12-16 (Track 2: Amos 5:18-24 and Wisdom of Solomon 6:17-20 or Psalm 70); 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; Matthew 25:1-13

We have finished the vineyard parables, have considered the great commandment of loving God with all our heart, mind and soul, and also loving our neighbors as ourselves. Last week Jesus told us to "get real", and showed us how to practice what we preach.

This week we learn more about how to "get real," by giving up "false idols" in the Joshua scripture, and being attentive, "be awake" so we don't miss the kingdom, when the bridegroom comes. We must keep our lamps filled with oil and keep our wicks trimmed. We don't want to miss out on the real deal.

What must we do to "get real," and not miss out on the kingdom, and working in the vineyard? In "Be Prepared," D. Brent Laytham and Michelle Clifton-Soderstrom tell us "It's easy to read the parable of the ten virgins as a tribute to two core American values:  Individualism and meritocracy. Individualism and meritocracy. Individualism imagines the kingdom of heaven like this: "I got mine," the five wise virgins say to the foolish ones, "so you get your own." That sounds like our culture, which encourages us to "look out for number one." Hearing the parable this way affirms a selfish individualism, rather than the mind of Christ—who came to seek the lost, to serve the neighbor, to lay down his life for his friends. Meritocracy imagines the kingdom of heaven like this: "Everybody finally gets what they deserve. The wise virgins looked out for number one and earned their delight by being prepared. The foolish virgins, who played when they should have been working, deserved their despair." That sounds like our culture's approbation of ingenuity and effort, but it doesn't sound like the kingdom of God. The password for entrance into the kingdom has never been "try harder," and the kingdom's economy has never been one of scarcity ("If I share with you, I won't have enough"). Instead, the kingdom of heaven is about an abundance, given to all.

So how might we read the parable as Christians called to serve, love and give?

Walter Brueggemann ties the gospel passage into the Joshua passage in his homily "The Liturgy of Abundance, The Myth of Scarcity" Consider this description of the kingdom of our Lord :" The forgiveness of debts is the hardest thing to do--harder even than raising the dead to life. Jesus left ordinary people dazzled, amazed, and grateful; he left powerful people angry and upset, because very time he performed a wonder, they lost a little of their clout. The wonders of the new age of the coming of God's kingdom may scandalize and upset us. They dazzle us, but they also make us nervous. The people of God need pastoral help in processing this ambivalent sense of both deeply yearning for God's new creation and deeply fearing it.The feeding of the multitudes, recorded in Mark's Gospel, is an example of the new world coming into being through God. When the disciples, charged with feeding the hungry crowd, found a child with five loaves and two fishes, Jesus took, blessed ,broke and gave the bread. These are the four decisive verbs of our sacramental existence. Jesus conducted a Eucharist, a gratitude. He demonstrated that the world is filled with abundance and freighted with generosity. If bread is broken and shared, there is enough for all. Jesus is engaged in the sacramental, subversive reordering of public reality."

 The lame walk, the blind see, the deaf hear, the sick are healed, debts are forgiven and prisoners are set free. And death is not the end of the story. Thanks be to God.

Charades and Reality, Hypocrisy and Humility

Scripture: RCL) Joshua 3:7-17 and Psalm 107:1-7, 33-37 (Track 2: Micah 3:5-12 and Psalm 43); 1 Thessalonians 2:9-13; Matthew 23:1-12

Last week we discussed Jesus answering the Pharisees question about the "greatest commandment," and what he meant by loving God with all our hearts, minds and souls in connection with what the "messiah, Χριστός - Christ, means. We are able to do so with Christ present with us in our hearts, minds and souls - in everything we are and do. In doing so, we lose ourselves to God's will and service to God and our neighbors. A humbling but wholly fulfilling experience. As we say in our baptismal service - with God's help. We celebrate the presence of Christ in the sacrament of his body and blood when we celebrate, with thanksgiving, the Eucharist each week.

Speaking of the Pharisees, this week Jesus tells us "...do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practice what they teach. They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them." 

We learn more about humility, and hypocrisy, about "playing rhythm guitar" to Jesus, as The Rev. Roy T. Bird puts it. in "Charades and Reality" We will consider what it means to "practice what we preach," and why we sometimes say, or act out "do as I say, not what I do." How can we be helped when we fall short? What is it to live an "authentic" life? How can we live "authentic" lives. Check out Steve Godfrey's  "Authentic Leadership" in his Blog The Church in the World. What does Jesus tells us about our burdens?

On "ALL" this hangs the law and the prophets...

Scripture: Deuteronomy 34:1-12, Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17; or Leviticus 19:1-2, 15-18, Psalm 1; 1 Thessalonians 2:1-8; Matthew 22:34-46

 

This week Jesus answers the Pharisees' question about the greatest commandment. Jewish scholars had surveyed the Torah, counted carefully and discovered 613 commandments. Applying all 613 at once was virtually impossible, even if they could he remembered. If one were to hang all of these laws on one nail, what nail would it be? Jesus uses two nails: love of God and love of neighbor.

 

D. Brent Laytham and MIchelle Clifton-Soderstrom tell us in their article "Christ Jesus it is He" in Blogging toward Sunday, that Jesus didn't stop there - he pushed it to a different level. He asked what they thought about the Messiah, and the asks "whose son is he? Why do you think he did this? What did he mean? How does this relate to what Jesus refers to as the greatest commandments? He says that on these two commandments hangs all the law and prophets.

 

The Rev. Sister Judith Schenke has a great homily on what "All" means, as well as "heart," "mind" and "soul." Most importantly, she discusses why Jesus asks about what the Messiah is. She says the significance of Jesus' choice of the word "hang," and his self-sacrificial love embodies God's loving forgiveness and redemption of us when we fail, when we fall. She says "the word “hang” is the same one used for “Jesus, whom you slew and hanged upon the cross.” That shifts the entire meaning of the Great Commandment, doesn’t it? To love the Lord with all our hearts and souls and minds, and to love our neighbor as ourselves is a crucifixion. It means to die to ourselves. No wonder there are so few volunteers. To love with that little word “all” costs everything. Everything. It is the Great Kenosis: a total emptying. [cf. Philippians 2: 7 "but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men"]  God asks no less. God asks everything. God asks all. Do we dare? Can you believe there is a resurrection in our own life on the other side of that void of death, that emptying, giving, surrendering love?"

All. Only “All.”

"Give to Caesar that which is Caesar's, and to God that which is God's."

Scripture: (RCL) Exodus 33:12-23 and Psalm 99 (Track 2: Isaiah 45:1-7 and Psalm 96:1-9, 10-13); 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10; Matthew 22:15-22

We have studied the parables of the vineyard owner, workers and tenants, and those invited to the feast of the king, including the one last week who didn't come with a robe - all stories about the nearness of God, being in the kingdom, and of judgment - God's judgment and our choices. At this point in his mission, the week before the cross, Jesus is challenging us to fish or cut bait. Now is the time for God's presence, and entrance into the kingdom. The table is set, and prefigures, like Psalm 23, the great heavenly feast at the wedding of the Lamb, to his bride, the church. We concluded last week with reference to the wedding garment - one of shining linen, made of the good deeds of God's saints - those who choose to accept God's continual calling and reaching out to and for us, and who put on the baptismal robe, dying to old lives of what we discussed last week - vanity, self- righteousness and possessiveness - and, with God's help, taking up a new life where we give our selves in service to God's call, and others. Grace, not cheap, but costly.

This week I include a charming story of a young woman who becomes a teacher for a year in Mexico, in “The Wedding Dress “ by Mary Sue Dehmlow Dreier from the book The Home Stretch - Matthew's Vision Of Servanthood In The End-Time as she ponders the meaning of a favorite hymn and Jesus' answer to the trickery of the Herodians and Pharisees "Give to Caesar that which is Caesar's, and to God that which is God's." She tells us "We cannot really give to God what is already God's. But we can release ourselves and our possessions to God's purposes. It's a matter of the heart."

What does Jesus mean by that? Is he speaking of a dichotomy of matters of church and state, matters religious and secular, or obedience to secular authority? What belongs to "Caesar? To us? To God? What are we to do with what we have?  What does this have to do with the kingdom of God, and the "wedding feast?" As John Donahue says in his exegesis "Tax Time in Autumn," "Paul summons his community at Thessalonica to persevere and grow in 'the work of faith, the labor of love and endurance in hope.' What better way is there to repay to God what is truly God’s?"

"Are you Ready for the Feast?"

Scripture: Isaiah 25:1-9; Psalm 23; Philippians 4:1-9; Matthew 22:1-14

Jesus is headed toward the cross. He has made his triumphant entrance into Jerusalem, and Matthew's gospel contrasts that with the rejection the king who invites guests, and invites them again, experiences when the guests do not come, and, as we study this week's parable, when one comes not dressed for the occasion.

 

As our homilists, The Rev. Frank Logue, and  Samuel Zumwalt in "Ready for the Feast," point out, some Christians and "Christian" leaders through the centuries have used this to justify ant-semitism, or a more subtle exclusionism. What do you think the point of the parable is when the king has the guest bound and removed from the feast? How does this fit the image of a merciful God? We have discussed God's judgment, and our judgment, and themes of justice, mercy, righteousness, grace and forgiveness as well as repentance this year.  How does this week's parable relate to those themes? What do you think the robe stands for? Can you think of other passages where clothing is used as a metaphor or serves to make a point?

 

Last week Fr. Gil told us to be doers of the word, not hearers only, considering James telling us  that faith without works is dead. Does that relate to this week's parable? What about Peter's denial of Jesus? Comparing Peter's denial with this parable, what does Jesus tell us about being received into the kingdom - and at the Table and feast of heaven?

 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer contrasts "cheap grace" and "costly grace".  "Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves ..the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance ..grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate. ..Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock.  Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ.  It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life."  God invites each of us to his banquet that we may share in his joy.  Are you ready to feast at the Lord's banquet table?

 

Conclude this lesson with a reading of Psalm 23.

 

I look forward to our discussion this week.

 

"Alleluia! The reign of the Lord our God the Almighty has begun; let us be glad and joyful and give praise to God, because this is the time for the marriage of the Lamb. His bride is ready, and she has been able to dress herself in dazzling white linen, because her linen is made of the good deeds of the saints."

Revelation 19:7-8

“The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes.”

Scripture: Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20 and Psalm 19 (Track 2: Isaiah 5:1-7 and Psalm 80:7-14); Philippians 3:4b-14; Matthew 21:33-46

We continue with Jesus' parables in the vineyard. But first, this week, we have the Ten Commandments, the story of God's vineyard in Isaiah, and Paul's personal testimony and pressing on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.

God gives us the law to help us get it together. He sends us the prophets, and when we still don't get it, he sends his Son, and what do we do to him? What do the tenants of the vineyard deserve under the law? What does God do in this parable told by Jesus? What does Jesus mean when he immediately says after the tenants have killed the son of the vineyard owner that the stone which the builders have rejected becomes the cornerstone, and will crush anyone it falls on? What does he mean that the kingdom of God will be taken away and given to those who produce fruits of the kingdom? What are the fruits of the kingdom?

I include sermons and exegesis by our own Fr. Rodge Wood, The Rev. Charles Hoffacker and John Donahue of the Society of Jesuits. What does Fr. Rodge say is the cornerstone on which the kingdom is built? See his story, when he was a prison chaplain, about the murderer and family of the victims. Hoffacker asks how can we put into practice the lessons learned from the rejection of the stone which becomes the cornerstone. Consider his examples of the Danish king and people's resistance to the Nazis, the stand against Marcos in the Philippines - young and old bound together to oppose the dictator, and Mandela in South Africa. How can we, in our everyday lives have the liberating power and authority (εξουσια) of Christ - the rejected stone, become the cornerstone - in our lives,  and bring it to the lives of others - even our enemies - producing fruits of the kingdom?

I look forward to seeing you Sunday. Give thanks for the wedding of Alan and Jan's daughter, Natalie, and her fiancé, Van, this Saturday. May God's joy, peace and radiant love be with them and us, now, and forevermore.