C240 Pentecost 14

[00:00:05] Speaker A: You're listening to by the well, a lectionary based podcast for preachers recorded on the land of the Wurundjeri people. [00:00:17] Speaker B: This episode is preparing for September 14th. We're in ESC and we're preparing for Pentecost 14. I'm Adrian Jackson and I'm joined today by Sandy Brodine. Thanks for joining us this morning. We're going to be looking at this Morning Today, whatever time you're listening to this. It's not even morning as we're recording this. Don't know what's going on with my brain. We're going to be looking at three readings. We've got Jeremiah 4 with some ranges there, 11 to 12 and 22 to 28, Psalm 14 and Luke 15, 1:10. There is also a first Timothy reading this Sunday, but we're not going to be looking at that now. Sandy, just straight off the bat, this set of readings together. [00:01:04] Speaker C: Well, I, we had a conversation beforehand, as all good presenters do, and what I found interesting was that you and I, I'm going to say, disagreed. That's not what I mean. We had a difference of approach in terms of which one we wanted to start with and I think, and I thought that was an interesting place to start. So I, I was kind of captivated by the worldview of Jeremiah and, and the Psalm and God lamenting about the nature of humans and, and human communities and how they behave and wondered whether the Luke reading was somehow, if I say antidote, that's too strong but that it somehow spoke into the situation of human beings. And you had a different approach. [00:01:54] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:01:54] Speaker B: So I like, I almost always did just put all the readings back to back either put. I think I pulled it up on the Vanderbilt website and read through and when I read the Jeremiah I'm like, gee, that's a harsh text. Then I read the Psalm and went that's also a harsh text than even the first Timothy. And that's a harsh text. And then got to the Luke and I'm Luke and I'm like, oh, this is a lot nicer. And it wasn't until I was actually digging into the commentaries about Luke and started to think about what it was saying, I kind of saw why those other texts were there. [00:02:33] Speaker C: So it's interesting, isn't it? How do we even read or sit with really difficult, painful texts? What do we do with them? Because we don't like that stuff very much. And yet you don't have to spend very long looking at the way the world is and particular particularly war torn parts of our world for these texts to feel very relevant to our current situation. [00:02:58] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:02:58] Speaker B: And this. You're absolutely right. There are relevance in these texts. And to be clear, I'm not suggesting that we should kind of suppress the Old Testament or hide away from these difficult texts. It was just like thinking about it in the. Kind of like, would I preach from this text? On its own, it's like, where's the message of hope? Where's the message of gospel? Particularly in the Jeremiah 1, where it's like, we're going to make this land a dust plain. [00:03:29] Speaker C: Yeah, well, that's right. And so. So these are the decisions that, that preachers make every week when they look at the texts. They. They have to. Well, are they going to use one or two of them? How are they going to use them? And do they go together or are they just random texts that really don't go together at all? [00:03:49] Speaker B: And it's even in the. Your liturgy, if you read both the text, but you just ignore the problem. 1. I know I would sit in the congregation and hear that that text read and just kind of go, oh, this is dark morning. What's gonna happen? And then to have it not mentioned in the sermon, I'd be like, so are we just kind of just looking the other way? [00:04:11] Speaker C: I'd almost say you can't mention Jeremiah or the psalm without using them or without referring to them and doing something with them. [00:04:19] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:04:20] Speaker B: So I think this is a kind of question of like, it's like, do you. Do you put this problem in your liturgy to the people? So do you start out by having that Luke reading first or the Jeremiah rating first? Like, do you actually set them up to ask this question themselves? [00:04:45] Speaker C: So what are we going to do, Adrian? Which one are we starting with? [00:04:48] Speaker B: Well, I vote Luke. What do you vote? [00:04:51] Speaker C: I vote Jeremiah. Okay, we'll go. [00:04:53] Speaker B: I'm actually, because my, my scholar hat putting on good biblical scholarship. Let's read the text for how it should be heard by its first readers. So let's start with Jeremiah. Let's not try to, like, I think for preaching purposes, when it should absolutely have a look at the. How Luke can help us read in Jeremiah. [00:05:21] Speaker C: Well, Jeremiah it is, then. Let's go. [00:05:23] Speaker B: Okay, so Jeremiah, we have a oracle that is possibly how I sometimes do feel about the church for my people. They are stupid children. No, actually, did I just say that? I'm recording. But yes, there is a little bit of. Actually quite a lot of judgment against. [00:05:49] Speaker C: So we've got. We've got that. I Mean if you, if you. We've got this strange cut up passage, haven't we? We've got 11 and 12 and then you've got all this poetic bit and we lose the first 10 verses of the poetic bit and then we come in at 22. [00:06:06] Speaker B: Yeah. And those, those verses in between actually, if you read them together, are really nice poetry. They are like one of the commentators goes, the beauty of the poetry almost makes like accentuates the horror of the text. [00:06:24] Speaker C: Yeah. So. So the introductory bit about the wind blowing through in the desert towards the daughter of my people. And, and, and it's, it's kind of this agricultural thing. So it's not a wind that's a, a light blowing wind that you might, might be helpful if you were trying to, you know, deal with your grain and, and blow off the chaff so that you just had the, had the grain sitting there. It's a really strong wind. It's a kind of wind that is destructive. So it would blow the wind and. Sorry, blow the wind. It would blow the chaff and it would blow the seeds and it would blow everything away. [00:07:02] Speaker B: We're talking about a dust storm here or something like that. Your whole town and crops is going to be covered in red dirt if you're out in broken hell. [00:07:12] Speaker C: Yeah, that's right. So this is, this is, you know, things are not good in the, in the land of, in the land of Israel. And then as you just said, then we've got that first bit, verse 22, which is kind of a lament. And then we go into this almost another voice of a different, a different, a different kind of piece of poetry almost. [00:07:34] Speaker B: Yeah. Now this bit of poetry here is an echo of something else we've heard. Right. So we have the earth, the heavens, light earth and void, heavens and light, mountains quaking hill, birds of the air. This is creation. This is creation being retold. [00:07:55] Speaker C: So if this was in the middle of the seasons of creation, you might want to talk, there'd be plenty you could talk about from this. [00:08:02] Speaker B: Yeah. And there's this question here of is this an image of what the earth without the creator in it looks like. [00:08:11] Speaker C: Or is it what happens to the creation when the created I us do bad things to the creation? [00:08:19] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:08:19] Speaker B: And so there is a little bit of an opportunity here to talk about ecological justice where creation abuses the creation and what a kind of apocalyptic future looks like wherein people turn away from the good and the beauty of creation and let it kind of climate change. [00:08:44] Speaker C: Here and it's, it's A land that is no longer fruitful. You know, it's a land that. That once bore fruit and was able to sustain life and is now desert in that. In that sense of nothing left. Desert. I know certainly in Australia and probably also in the Holy Land, a lot of desert is a thriving place. But that's not really what this means. [00:09:09] Speaker B: Yeah, well, this is. This is talking about a weather or climate event that has changed the state of the place. It's not like. [00:09:21] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:09:22] Speaker C: So this is, as you said, a bleak text that makes you wonder about the nature of humanity and the nature of God. [00:09:31] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah. [00:09:33] Speaker B: And it's a God who is very determined to make this kind of dark turn happen. But I have spoken, I have purposed, I have relented, and I will not turn back. [00:09:47] Speaker C: But it's also a God who is lamenting why this has happened. It's about God's foolish people, stupid children. And that's all of us, not just children. Children who are skilled in doing evil and do not know how to do good. It's. It's clear that this is happening not because God's just a capricious God who, you know, decides to do something for the sake of it. This is. This is as a result of the behavior of the created, as in the people. [00:10:17] Speaker B: Yeah. And one of the reasons why I wanted to start with Luke first is I think this actually kind of helps us think about a larger creation. This is about the whole world, because if we focus too tightly on that Luke text, it's about the One. [00:10:35] Speaker C: Okay. [00:10:36] Speaker B: And so this is a good kind of. In my view of that Luca and text that kind of can sometimes be read as a bit of saterial. It was about House reaching out, evangelizing to the One. [00:10:49] Speaker C: Oh, yes. How one person can be saved. [00:10:51] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:10:52] Speaker C: Okay. [00:10:53] Speaker B: But this also is a kind of. What about the kind of 99 that is kind of still there? Like, is this a bit more about the wholeness and the recovery of the whole of creation? [00:11:05] Speaker C: Let's not go there yet. Let's look at Psalm 14. [00:11:13] Speaker A: If you'd like to know more about by the well or any of our Hosts, please visit bythewell.com au. [00:11:24] Speaker B: Speaking of fools saying in their hearts there is no God. Sandy, we're in Psalm 14. [00:11:30] Speaker C: Thank you. I'm. I hope you're not suggesting that I am one of those fools. Isn't it interesting that the Lord looks down and is finding those people painful and difficult? That there are people on the earth who don't understand God? We don't often think about it in those terms, do we, how it might affect God when people not just don't know that God exists, but behave as though God doesn't exist and behave as though they don't need to turn back to God and seek God's favor. You know, they do evil deeds and don't even notice that they're doing them or don't even care that they're doing them. Again, I can think of lots of examples of things that are going on in the world around us all the time politically in war torn countries around the globe. That would seem to be evidence of these people who eat up, eat up the bread and eat up everybody's bread. Not just eating up their own bread. Eat up everybody's bread and then don't call on the Lord. [00:12:34] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:12:34] Speaker B: And it's, it is one of those texts where it's actually like in. You read it at first and you go, there's a lot of despair here, whatever. Be also gleaning there a whole bunch of like, kind of what does good look like in. In as a kind of like what's not being found? And it's this kind of God's company with the righteous and the confound like you would confound the plans. But God is on the side of the poor. [00:13:01] Speaker C: Well, it's justice too. Justice is about taking care of the needs of the poor, making sure they're looked after, making sure that there is enough bread for everybody. If there's a certain amount of bread, you share it amongst all of the people. For example. Oh, that the deliverance for Israel would come from Zion. God, God has this loving relationship with God's people and, and is hoping and despairing that God's that. That the deliverance will not come from God's own people. [00:13:33] Speaker B: Yeah. And there is a message of hope when Lord restores the fortunes of God's people. [00:13:40] Speaker C: So even, even though those people are so evil and so bad and so much wrongdoers, they're not. [00:13:54] Speaker B: They can be restored. [00:13:55] Speaker C: They can be restored. Even, even, even the most evil, even the most far away from God can be restored. [00:14:13] Speaker B: So we're in the parables of the lost in Luke, Luke chapter 15. [00:14:16] Speaker C: We are. [00:14:17] Speaker B: And everybody knows the third parable in. [00:14:20] Speaker C: This set there is, there's the parable of the prodigal son. That's the third one or the lost son. [00:14:27] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:14:27] Speaker C: But the other two are equally important and equally worth speaking. Spending time on the parable, Parable of the lost sheep and the parable of the lost Coin. [00:14:39] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:14:39] Speaker B: And the chapter starts with an important setting. Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. This kind of gets a little bit lost in the translation, as if that's kind of like this is an in situ event that Jesus is out there and all of a sudden a bunch of tax collectors and senate, he's eating with them. Yeah, this is, this is trans. Like this is, indicates that Jesus is regularly doing this. [00:15:06] Speaker C: He's welcoming them in, which makes him the host and he's eating with him. So, so the other example of this, famously in Luke's Gospel is our friend Zacchaeus up the tree who says to Jesus, hey, come to my house today. And Jesus goes and becomes the guest. And we know famously that Zacchaeus's life is turned around by his experience of Jesus, but in this one, Jesus is there doing the welcoming in of the sinners. What I really liked about, particularly about Bill Loder's commentary this week is that Bill gives you this fantastic couple of paragraphs of what this kind of banquet scene would be like, what it means to invite people and how, how extravagant and expensive that is in this time period, how it's done. It's kind of, in some events it's kind of drinking and you know, ravelry and it involves prostitutes and you know, too much alcohol and bad behavior in sometimes it's symposiums and hearing from good moral speakers. So the kind of eating banquet event has different flavors, but it seems to be suggesting that Jesus is doing this in the kind of way that the Pharisees and the scribes see good reason to get very, very grumpy at Jesus. [00:16:27] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:16:28] Speaker B: And like I read this and just these two verses on their own at the start of the passage, I go, so if we're a church in the likeness of Christ, are we hanging out with the types of people that the law abiding citizens would be a bit like, what are they doing hanging out with those lot? [00:16:48] Speaker C: And if we're not, we probably should be. Exactly, exactly. But I think, I think the other thing Bill Lotus says, which I really liked, is there's those two little verses in there, verse 7 and verse 10 where it's like Luke's telling us how we should read the parable and he and, and Bill Lotus is actually just ignore that and read the parables in their own terms, which, you know, as a godly play practitioner, I really like the idea that you would just let the parable open you up and make. And invite you into a wandering situation where you think about what the parable is trying to tell you, and then. And then I think you then find out. It's about two things. It's about losing something which has great value. So even though it's only one of the hundred sheep, that is a very valuable object for a farmer. It's something that the farmer does not want to lose. And for the poor woman who has 10 silver coins, that one coin is incredibly valuable and important. So the thing that you want to lose really matters. That's one thing. And then I think the other really important thing is that the response to that is a loving response, which is quite the flip of what the Pharisees are wanting to say. This is about kind of the law and sitting with the right kind of people. And. And for the. For the. For Jesus. It's a very different response. [00:18:20] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:18:20] Speaker B: And I think there's a lot of this in. So when I. When I do my kind of exegetical work, I've got this exegetical guide. Ask a lot of, like, kind of points out, what are the disagreements between the commentaries? What are the questions? These two texts leave a lot that the commentators just. I tried to answer, like, what happens to the 99 sheep? What happens? Why. Why is he putting the sheep over his shoulder? Why is she using a lamp to find the coin? Why is she using a broom? And there are like multiple answers to all of these. And in one school of thought, that can kind of give you a little bit of anxiety as the text doesn't give us enough detail to know what on earth's going on. We're too far detached from the context of the text. Are we going to miss them? Right. But I would encourage just picking up on your comment about God. But there is a lot of room in these texts for imagination, wondering. And I think this is also a text is really good to kind of get people into the idea of, like, that kind of retelling the story. Invite the kids to kind of imagine, like, what this might look like today. Rewrite the story, rewrite it for finding their lost toy or rewriting for landing the lost puppy. [00:19:44] Speaker C: So this can be done not only with children, but in an intergenerational setting, with people of all ages imagining how they might retell this story and how it might be for them, which is a great creative way to deal with it in a congregational setting. [00:19:58] Speaker D: Yep. [00:19:59] Speaker B: I still do want to throw, as much as I do encourage a little bit of creativity. Exegetical points here. Don't read anything into 99 being left in the wilderness. No one. The wilderness probably is more referring to untilled soil. Not. It's not a forest. It's not lost in the lost somewhere. This is where the sheep should be. Yeah. The parable doesn't go to the effort of saying, oh, and left it in the company of his fellow shepherds or anything like that. Just because that's not there doesn't mean he's abandoned or he or she, the shepherd has abandoned the 99 sheep. So don't go preaching about the 99. It's possibly reading the parable a bit wrong. [00:20:51] Speaker C: So can I go back to your very first question, which was the question of salvation and that reading these is about, you know, the one person as opposed to the community. Where can you want to say more about that? [00:21:05] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:21:05] Speaker B: So a lot of, lot of kind of preaching or even evangelical proclamation has been around. Okay. We've got to kind of got like, we've got the righteous in the church. Let's go out and save the one. [00:21:19] Speaker C: Yep. [00:21:20] Speaker B: And it turns into Sandy, do you know Jesus? [00:21:25] Speaker C: Yes, exactly. [00:21:28] Speaker B: And I'm not drawing all of the baby out with the bathwater here. To be clear. Like, personal proclamation of the gospel is a good and wholesome thing. [00:21:39] Speaker C: So the other thing too is that it, the love trumps the savability. So it's not about. It's not saying they're not good enough to be saved or they're not that, you know, his coins, the lesser of the coins, or it's the one that was stupid enough to run away. [00:22:00] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:22:00] Speaker B: There is nothing, no moral judgment on the last coin here, which says something. [00:22:04] Speaker C: About the nature of God's love. God's love is so overpowering that even, no matter who you are, even if you're in that desert with Jeremiah and totally feeling forsaken, actually there is a possibility of turning around, turning back to God and coming back into that relationship that those Old Testament texts seem to desperately desire. It's what God's saying. God is lamenting and distressed that God has lost that relationship with humankind, God's creation. And I think what you get in this is when the coin reappears. Well, you know, the broom sweeps it out and finds it all. When the sheep is found and thrown over the shoulders of. Of Jesus, actually there's a moment where those things are back in relationship with God and that's what brings the joy and the. And the celebration. [00:22:56] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:22:57] Speaker B: And it's important when we kind of thinking about this kind of notion of repentance and those. That Jeremiah text that's not the entirety of the Jeremiah proclamation like we're reading a small passage here. There is always the opportunity for repentance. [00:23:16] Speaker C: That's right. And it's what. It's the thing that God is always calling God's people back to back into relationship, back into right relationship. Which means you care for the creation and you care for other people and you love your neighbor as yourself and you know, you celebrate when the one comes back. And all of those things, they're the things that happen when you're in right relationship with your neighbor and with God. [00:23:38] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:23:39] Speaker B: So, Sandy, where having thought through these texts and imagining you're going to be preaching this coming Sunday, you might be. I don't know. What would you want to preach on? [00:23:54] Speaker C: It's a hard question, I think. I think now that. I think you may have convinced me to focus more on the Luke text. But I do think that setting off of hearing God despairing about God's creation is something we. The lecture doesn't give us very often. It's actually in the Old Testament texts far more than we get it in the lectionary. And it's good for us to be aware, I think, of how God feels about us and how God is affected by the way we are. And that's an interesting thought. A bit like we were discussing last week. God actually responds to how humankind behaves. And we're getting, you know, God very angry and very sad at the way we are. And in the. In the Luke text, we're getting God rejoicing, Jesus rejoicing with excitement when the one comes back. I think there's something in that for all of human creation, but possibly also for the one, dare I say? [00:24:58] Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. And I think that you have reminded me here in the first Timothy text that we did not talk about. Is this just lovely line, this saying is true and worthy of full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of who I am the foremost. [00:25:15] Speaker C: That's right. He needs it the most. Although it's not written by Paul, but it's written in Paul's voice by someone who isn't Paul. But yes, he's been a pretty nasty character in the past and he knows that he needs God's forgiveness because he can't. He can't achieve that for himself. Yes, good point. [00:25:34] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:25:34] Speaker B: And for me, I think there's possibly one or two ways that I could imagine this being these texts being preached. If you're the type of congregation that is working really hard all the time on restorative justice, all of that kind of thing. Here's your invitation to take a Sunday to celebrate. Celebrate the wins, celebrate the new, the create new creation in your community. [00:26:01] Speaker C: Yep. [00:26:02] Speaker B: Throw a party. Get the kids to put up some decorations. Or if you get the adults to put up some decorations. You don't have to have kids in your congregation to have to be like little children. [00:26:13] Speaker C: Absolutely. [00:26:15] Speaker B: But if you are the kind of congregation that hasn't spent some time lately thinking about what the state of the. [00:26:24] Speaker C: Planet is, maybe you need to sit in that lament for a bit. And can I just say, just because you did mention 1 Timothy the very end, that verse 17 to the king of all the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God be glory, and forever and ever. That reminds me of a great hymn that you could decide you wanted to sing if you wanted to get a really good old favorite. [00:26:49] Speaker B: Yeah, I think I have the same hymn in my head immediately. [00:26:53] Speaker C: Excellent. Thank you very much for spending time with me today, sharing those readings. Adrian, that was great. [00:26:59] Speaker B: Great to be with you. Sandy. [00:27:03] Speaker A: By the well is brought to you by Pilgrim Theological College and the Uniting Church in Australia. It's produced by Adrian Jackson. Thanks for listening.