Devotions for the Fifth Week after Pentecost

Monday of Pentecost 5 – Prayer of the Week

Lord Jesus Christ, in Your deep compassion You rescue us from whatever may hurt us. Teach us to love You above all things and to love our neighbors as ourselves; for You live and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Sometime in the middle of the 4th century AD, when Roman power still dominated the whole of the Mediterranean basin, a young man and his friends in north Africa set upon some petty vandalism and theft. They jumped a wall and stole pears from a man’s tree. They were teenagers. This is a story which has been repeated countless times, perhaps even taking its own version in your own life.

We know about this because one of those youths grew up to become a bishop and author by the name of Augustine. He invented the whole genre of literature which we call autobiography in order to tell us that story and much more in his little book entitled “Confessions.” He wondered why he and his friends had done this. They were not hungry. They did not need the pears. They did not sell them. They ended up throwing them away. Augustine wondered why he had done that? Why does a person do the wrong thing?

We note in this prayer that God rescues us from all that would hurt us. The greatest danger to us is ourselves. In a world which often makes a hero of the person who authentically expresses their true self, the Christian cannot but consider that we have been warped and twisted by sin. To express our true self with great authenticity may simply be to express something very broken and awful.

Augustine examined his inner self but used that as an avenue to explore the transcendent God who had made him. We pray that God teach us to love Him above all things and our neighbor as ourselves. Augustine also made that little dictum commonplace in another book he wrote. (He wrote a great deal!) We hear a call from God not to be authentically our sinful selves, but to be remade into the true humanity which God created, a humanity which is focused on God as the source and substance of our lives, and which lives in loving community with all whom God has made. We turn not inward but upward and then outward.

Tuesday of Pentecost 5 – Leviticus 18:1-5, 19:9-18

1 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, I am the LORD your God. 3 You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt, where you lived, and you shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, to which I am bringing you. You shall not walk in their statutes. 4 You shall follow my rules and keep my statutes and walk in them. I am the LORD your God. 5 You shall therefore keep my statutes and my rules; if a person does them, he shall live by them: I am the LORD…

9 “When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, neither shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. 10 And you shall not strip your vineyard bare, neither shall you gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner: I am the LORD your God.

11 “You shall not steal; you shall not deal falsely; you shall not lie to one another. 12 You shall not swear by my name falsely, and so profane the name of your God: I am the LORD.

13 “You shall not oppress your neighbor or rob him. The wages of a hired worker shall not remain with you all night until the morning. 14 You shall not curse the deaf or put a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear your God: I am the LORD.

15 “You shall do no injustice in court. You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor. 16 You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not stand up against the life of your neighbor: I am the LORD.

17 “You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him. 18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.

When I was assigned my first parish I was sent to a small congregation in Utah. It was a small place, but it had some big people in it. An affluent community, it drew from a mainly white-collar strata of society: engineers, pilots, managers, scientists, etc. I remember one particularly impressive fellow who had a very stressful job. Or at least it seemed stressful to me. I was young and green behind the ears in this regard. He negotiated the contracts for the publicly owned hydroelectric dams in the intermountain region. He was a civil servant in the Energy Department of the federal government.

He seemed to be able to stand his ground very well and yet always was willing to talk to someone and reason with them, looking for a solution to the problem. He made a very good negotiator on your behalf. Sometimes people would say or do strange things, but it never stopped the conversation. Does that seem particularly timely and counter-cultural to you too? I think our world needs to hear verse 17 of this reading and we all need to work at putting this into practice. The rhetoric of our age seems to be veering into the irrational on both ends of the many spectrums in which discourse and live.

In fact, this whole passage merits our attention. Injustice in courts, partiality to either the poor or the great is a problem. Robbery and oppression, failure to pay workers and the treatment of the handicapped all benefit from these words of Moses from long ago. But let us reason with one another when we disagree. Let us solve the problems instead of simply stating them or more likely simply seeing them in another person. He is the LORD. He calls us to this.

Wednesday of Pentecost 5 – Psalm 41

1 Blessed is the one who considers the poor!

In the day of trouble the LORD delivers him;

2 the LORD protects him and keeps him alive;

he is called blessed in the land;

you do not give him up to the will of his enemies.

3 The LORD sustains him on his sickbed;

in his illness you restore him to full health.

4 As for me, I said, “O LORD, be gracious to me;

heal me, for I have sinned against you!”

5 My enemies say of me in malice,

“When will he die, and his name perish?”

6 And when one comes to see me, he utters empty words,

while his heart gathers iniquity;

when he goes out, he tells it abroad.

7 All who hate me whisper together about me;

they imagine the worst for me.

8 They say, “A deadly thing is poured out on him;

he will not rise again from where he lies.”

9 Even my close friend in whom I trusted,

who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me.

10 But you, O LORD, be gracious to me,

and raise me up, that I may repay them!

11 By this I know that you delight in me:

my enemy will not shout in triumph over me.

12 But you have upheld me because of my integrity,

and set me in your presence forever.

13 Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel,

from everlasting to everlasting!

Amen and Amen.

Some time ago, driving home from a wedding with my wife and two children, I started not feeling very well. By the time our six-hour drive was over, I was truly not feeling well. My wife handed me one of the “at home” COVID tests. I was positive. She banished me to the bedroom, but to no avail. Our lengthy time together in the car meant we all came down with it. It was miserable. I have been sick like that before, but not often. After three days of wild fever dreams and serious headaches, I started to feel better. Within a week I was close to symptom free, but still have a bit of fatigue. At least I tell myself that, perhaps I am just getting old.

David seems to have written these words in a time of sickness. In verse three he confidently asserts that God sustains the blessed man on his sickbed. Was David speaking in the past or the future tense at that point? Was he anticipating God’s deliverance or reflecting upon it? I don’t think I could have written much poetry when I was feverishly sick. Or if I did, I think it might have been even more unintelligible than my usual attempts at poetry.

But David’s problems go even deeper. Apparently, when King David fell ill his political enemies started to circle like buzzards. Even a friend, one who ate his bread, lifted the heel against him. They gloated that an evil thing had befallen him; he would not rise. They gathered together and imagined the worst for him. Have you read the breathless reports of Putin’s illnesses? I have heard one fellow suggest that he has already died and what we see on TV is a body double. The real Putin is in a freezer somewhere. I cannot say whether the reports have merit, but the eager expectation of his demise expressed by some is what I think David was hearing about himself.

David through all of this confesses his confidence in God. The enemy will not shout in triumph over him. But read those last verses of this psalm carefully. David expects that God will set him in God’s presence “forever.” God is blessed from “everlasting to everlasting.” David was aware of his own mortality. He knew that recovery from this sickness and deliverance from this political threat was not eternal life. That was a gift which God had given him and no sickness, no enemy, not even death could take it away. God gave you that same gift on the day of your Baptism.

Thursday of Pentecost 5 – Colossians 1:1-14

1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

2 To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father.

3 We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, 4 since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, 5 because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, 6 which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, 7 just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf 8 and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.

9 And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, 10 so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. 11 May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. 13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Oscar Wilde had a rapier wit. He once said that “Some people make others happy wherever they go, others whenever they go.” We can smile reading that. It is true and the turn of the phrase makes it so much better. But we expect someone like Wilde to say such things. Did the authors of the Bible ever cast any shade?

This passage may be one of the best candidates for a bit of biblical sarcasm. From the reading the book of Colossians, it appears that this congregation was divided. Some folks thought of themselves as intellectually and spiritually superior to their fellow congregants, probably illiterate slaves and others who had not gone to school. Paul is distressed by this, so he uses this opening paragraph of the letter to take the arrogant members of the congregation down a notch. In the first paragraph he thanks God for their faith in Jesus and their love for one another. Faith and love are not intellectual virtues. Any slave can love, and I have known developmentally disabled people who had tremendous faith.

Then, Paul starts to pray for the Colossians. He prays that God gives them some knowledge, wisdom, strength, and understanding. Ouch! These people thought that they were smarter and better than the lowly slaves, but Paul thanks God for the love and faith which the slaves have aplenty and prays that they all will get some of the very knowledge, wisdom, and understanding which they prided themselves on. I wonder how this paragraph went over the first time it was read at Colossae. How would it go over at your congregation if it was directed at you?

We often fall into the very sin which Paul exposes here. In I Corinthians 13, Paul says that the greatest of God’s gifts is love. A child can love. The barista who makes your coffee or the checker at the grocery store might see their service as a form of love. The lowliest among us can love and sometimes love much better than those who have the most education. I am not opposed to education. I used to be a professor after all. But I have been regularly humbled by the love demonstrated by the children and the simple. Pray with Paul a prayer of thanksgiving for the love and faith which God has poured into your heart and let them both guide and shape your knowledge, wisdom, and understanding.

Friday of Pentecost 5 – Luke 10:25-37

25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”

29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 34 He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ 36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” 37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”

Robert Capon, one of my favorite interpreters of the Parables of Jesus, wrote about this parable that he thinks it is misnamed. It should be the Parable of the “Man Who Fell Among Thieves.” He admitted that his campaign to have the parable officially renamed had met with stiff resistance from the American Medical Association who were afraid of the implications of renaming all the Good Samaritan Hospitals, “Man Who Fell Among Thieves Hospital.” Apparently, doctors were not pleased with this suggestion.

The man who approaches Jesus is very confused about a number of things. First, he wants to know what he has to do to become an heir of heaven. Inheritances are not things you get because you did something. Inheritances come you because you are who you are. Second, after Jesus tells him essentially to be perfect, he seems to think he can do this if the bars are not set too high. That is what is behind his second question about the identity of the neighbor. But Jesus is still working on the first problem when he answers the question – the man’s mistaken idea that somehow heaven is earned, and he can do it if he tries hard enough and the neighbors are defined the proper way.

Jesus blows up his world and his self-made righteousness with this parable. Neighbors are not defined by race, religion, or any of our usual criteria, but by proximity to need and the help they offer in that need. The Levite and Priest who primly walked by lest they render themselves unclean and hence unfit for service in the temple by touching a potentially dead man were not neighborly, despite their Jewishness. It was the hated Samaritan who was the neighbor.

Jesus must have had a bit of a twinkle in His eye when finished this parable and told the man to go and do likewise. He knew that the man would fail to earn heaven that way, but he had just raised the bar so high that soon he would be back, looking for a gift from God instead of a reward. From the first words of this conversation Jesus wanted to give him that gift which cannot be earned. We often hear this parable as an exhortation to be a good person. That is never a bad exhortation to hear but have a care. Jesus is not telling this man how to earn eternal life. He is crushing the very idea that eternal life can be earned. When he turns to you and also says, “Go and do likewise,” he leads you to that same conclusion.