The Name of God

 Scripture: Exodus 3:1-15 and Psalm 105:1-6, 23-26, 45b  • Jeremiah 15:15-21 and Psalm 26:1-8  • Romans 12:9-21  • Matthew 16:21-28

Naming is important to us.  In the Jewish tradition, baby boys are named at a brit milah on the eighth day after their birth. Girls are named within the first two weeks. Common Ashkenazi custom maintains that girls should be named when the father is called up to the Torah on a Torah reading day closest or close to when the girl is born, although practice often has baby girls named at the Torah reading on the first Shabbat following birth. A resurgence in recent generations of the less popular simchat bat ceremony for naming baby girls has recently taken hold in many modern Orthodox Ashkenazi communities. In our tradition, the name of the child is announced at baptism when we joyfully welcome and receive the child as we renew our baptismal covenant. God charged Adam with naming the animals.

This week we are given the name of God. Last week Peter was blessed and given the keys of the kingdom when he confessed that Jesus was the Christ, the Messiah. In Exodus, when Moses asks the name of the God who will deliver his people, he is given the answer "I am Who I am, and I shall be Who I shall be."John's gospel contains several "I am" sayings of Jesus. This week Peter is rebuked by Jesus when he seeks to deter Jesus from his mission, as he looks on the Lord from a human perspective, as opposed to the divine perspective of the redemption and deliverance through a suffering God, who lives and dies with us, and is raised to new and everlasting life. Consider Susan Butterworth's "A Paradox of Faith ."

This week's epistle from Paul to the Romans is one of my favorites. It teaches us about vengeance. Consider The Rev. Dr. Peter Marty's "Trusting God to Settle Scores." 

We also read about Moses and the burning bush. How did Moses overcome his excuses to become the leader of the Hebrews out of bondage in Egypt? Read The Rev. Amy Richter's "Unquenchable Love."

When Jesus rebukes Peter for Peter's comments when Jesus says that Jesus must suffer death and humiliation, after praising Peter for confessing Jesus as the Messiah, Debie Thomas, in "Losing and Saving," offers thoughts on what Jesus means about suffering and loss, especially relevant in our culture today.

In "Loving Your Life," Bernie Pearson's compares life, and death, and how we go about living from human and divine perspectives. 

Identify crisis

 Scripture: Exodus 1:8-2:10 and Psalm 124  • Isaiah 51:1-6 and Psalm 138  • Romans 12:1-8  • Matthew 16:13-20

The noun "crisis" is derived from the Greek  verb κρίνω krinō, which means 'distinguish, choose, decide.

In "But What Do You Think," Debie Thomas' essay on this Sunday's gospel lesson, when Peter confesses "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God," in response to Jesus' questioIn "Who do you say I am?", Thomas invites us to journey into the question. To do as Jesus did when he asked that question, preceded by his question, "Who do people say I am?" What did Jesus do? He listened. He patiently awaited the answers of his disciples. He neither praised, nor condemned. But then he pressed further. Why? It means nothing without personal investment, commitment - in to all that is the Christ.

Why does Jesus ask the question? For us to be come whole, to be totally invested and encompassed in the totality of God's grace. See The Rev. Anna Tew's "Totality." All of our Scripture readings today resound in the totality of God's grace. Read Marcea Paul's "Questions That Lead to Action ."

Boundaries. Could you use some good news?

 Scripture: Genesis 45:1-15 and Psalm 133  • Isaiah 56:1, 6-8 and Psalm 67  • Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32  • Matthew 15: (10-20), 21-28

This week we have what I call the stretcher. Jesus has crossed over into Gentile country where Jews and Gentiles do not mix. From afar there is the sound of the Syro-Phoenician woman crying out to the "Son of David" for mercy on her, pleading for the healing of her daughter. Why does she cry out for mercy on her, not her daughter? She knows the boundaries between Jews and their age old enemies, the Canaanites. And she is pressing the boundaries, praying that the Lord of life will cross them and heal her daughter. This is  not just a stretching moment for Jesus. It is a teaching moment for his disciples, and us, who seek to put her away, cast her aside. Read the Rev. Cannon Joseph Pagano's "Borderlands,".

You've undoubtedly seen many memes about what could possibly happen next in 2020. Remember the murder hornet news? I like the meme "The murder hornets. Did we skip the murder hornets? I think we skipped the murder hornets." There is so much bad news, many of us have turned to doomscrolling from one bad news item to another, wondering what could possibly go wrong next. Remember Murphy's Law. "If anything can go wrong, it will go wrong." 

Well, it seems we all could use some good news. And Debie Thomas's article, "Is It Good News Yet?" really strikes a chord with me, as Jesus experienced an eye opening watershed moment in his ministry as the Syro-Phoenician woman told him "Even dogs  eat crumbs that fall from their master's table." As Barbara Taylor Brown said,"You can slmost hear the huge wheel of history turning as Jesus comes to a new understanding of who he is and what he has been called to do." And, as Debi Thomas says, the same Lord who eats with sinners,  prostitutes,  tax collectors,  and touches and heals lepers,  sees his mission as offering God's Good News of welcome, healing, reconciliation, and forgiveness to everyone. All are welcome at the Table of the Lord of life,  of love,  of mercy, and forgiveness. Thanks be to God.

Just when we think we've got it

Scripture: Genesis 29:15-28  and  Psalm 105:1-11, 45b or Psalm 128  • 1 Kings 3:5-12  and  Psalm 119:129-136  •  Romans 8:26-39  •  Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

This week our Scripture ranges from Joseph's brothers selling him into slavery after deciding not to kill him, an exhausted, despairing and depressed Elijah needing desperately to hear from God as Jezebel seeks to have him killed, to Peter and the disciples cowering in a storm tossed sea when they see what?

Although I delighted in the story of Jesus walking on water as a child, and Peter trying to step out of the boat to go to Jesus, I confess, as I grew older, I had my doubts about the literal account. I believe he was both human and divine, and in his real presence, then and today.  I study Greek, and look at the story from the perspective of Jesus' words, "Take heart!" "Have courage!" θαρσεῖτε in Greek. He is the One who reaches out to lift us up, with grace, forgiveness - whatever we need to get through stormy seas.

Professor Alyce MacKenzie gives us so much more about this passage in "Walking Toward Us ," on our gospel account from Matthew. It is on three web-linked pages, not very long, and is worth reading. As she says, Jesus is "...someone who never stands on the shore watching us suffer, but is always walking toward us on the sea, stretching out a hand to us—with forgiveness, with love. Reaching out a hand to us that is both very human, and the very hand of God."

In "Out on the Water ," Debie Thomas examines issues of fear, where fear takes us, and trust in the One who always moves toward us, regardless of our fear or circumstances, to give us what we need in the storms of life, reaching out for us, saying "Take courage. It is I. Don't be afraid."  

Peter, the boldest, most confident, and sometimes rash stepped out on the sea toward Jesus, and then as doubt set in, he called out for Jesus to save him.  Jesus's reply to Peter and to his other disciples in the storm was "O you of little faith, why did you doubt?" The word Jesus used for doubt comes from the root word διστάζω, which means "to stand in two ways" - an uncertainty which way to take. In her "Reflection ," Rev. Cheryl Lindsay reminds us that it's not just in the valleys of life that we have our doubts, or lose faith, sometimes it is on the mountaintop, or when we have a feeling of confidence and certainty, that we stumble or hesitate about which way to go. Jesus did not chastise Peter, but came near, and lifted him up. It is sometimes in doubt and uncertainty that we experience the Lord of life. And even just when we think we've got it. 

Wrestling with God

 Scripture: Genesis 32:22-31 and Psalm 17:1-7, 15  • Isaiah 55:1-5 and Psalm 145:8-9, 14-21  • Romans 9:1-5  • Matthew 14:13-21

This week's Old Testament reading is the nocturnal wrestling match between Jacob and what some commentators say is God, others an angel, and a few, a demon.  In The Limp and the Blessing, Debie Thomas tells us why struggling with God matters. What are your thoughts about "struggle," with your faith, fears, doubts, failures - you name it. Especially with struggle, in our journey with Jacob, we see the amazing and wonderful persistence of blessing, even if we end up with a limp. 

There is an ancient Greek proverb: Καλεπα τά καλα: "Beautiful things are difficult," translated in a practical sense: "naught (nothing) without labor." How does this relate to our reading from Genesis?

And then there is the gospel account of a tired Jesus, wanting to get away from it all, but moved with compassion for them he healed them, and with their own 5 loaves and fishes, tells  his disciples to feed them - those hungry for bread, for love, for mercy, for answers, for forgiveness, and hope. Hungry for life, and the abundance of life which God offers. "You feed them." Therein lies the miracle, The Rev. Jason Cox tells us in "Which Party?." 

In Jesus, and each other, we can see the face of God. If only we care to look. 

Nothing can separate us from the love of God

 Scripture: Genesis 29:15-28 and Psalm 105:1-11, 45b or Psalm 128  • 1 Kings 3:5-12 and Psalm 119:129- 136 •   Romans 8:26-39  • Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

I really like the articles for this week's lesson. As Jesus gives us the parable of the mustard seed, the yeast, the pearl, and the basket of fish, we are shown that we can live with a sense of wonder and surprise, and, as we experience in the beautiful sacrament of baptism, we learn that we belong to God. See "Wow! Would You Look at This?" by Peter Woods, and "You Belong to God," by Daniel P. Clendenin.  Michael Fitzpatrick says he sometimes fears that we have forgotten how our faith is supposed to be Good News, not just for us, but everyone. Read his "The Good News is that God Is For Us," Read also Danae Ashley's "Finding Value in What Others Overlook. "

Living in the kingdom. Even when things happen which we don't understand, or we can't make everything right, Paul tells us in his letter to the Romans, chapter 8, that the Spirit intercedes for us in sighs "too deep for words," and that nothing, not even death, can separate us from the love of God. So, let's open our eyes in wonder, to make way for the surprises God has in store for us. And let us respond in gratitude, and giving.

Jacob's ladder and gardening among wheat and weeds

 Scripture:Genesis 28:10-19a and Psalm 139:1-12, 23-24  • Wisdom of Solomon 12:13, 16-19 or Isaiah 44:6-8 and Psalm 86:11-17  • Romans 8:12-25  • Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

This week our Scripture takes us from Jacob's ladder, to a stone, to gatdening the wheat among tared. This week we study Jesus' second parable of sowing seeds. Again the sower broadcasts the good seed, and this time the wheat and weeds grow up together. Should we weed the field so the good plants can grow? They become entangled. Is this about judging others? What can we learn about judging others? Is this about the good and bad in all of us? 

For the significance of the biblical account of Jacob's ladder and a stone or rock read Susan Butterworth's: "Stone, Wheat, and Weeds,"and Whitney Rice's "A Rock, A Ladder, A Promise ."

Life is not all black and white, as we all know. There is something greater than ourselves and it takes time, patience, and faith to look for the light in times of darkness, and the sun in times of rain. As Jesus said, it rains on both tge good and the bad together. So it is with wheat and tares. Read Debie Thomas' "Let Them Grow Together." All creation experiences growing pains. Read "Inheritance," by The Rev. Kellan Day. May we discern and grow through the lens of Christ.