Who Gets What? A Sermon based on Matthew 22. 15-22.
                                Preached on October 22, 2023 at Covenant Presbyterian Church, Scranton, PA

    Words.
    Words carefully chosen.
    Words skillfully crafted for a purpose.
    Words prefaced by sly words meant to flatter, disarm, and disguise the purpose of the skillfully crafted, carefully chosen words.
    Words, spoken with malicious intent, words not in the least believed at all by those who spoke them, words which conveyed “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” so help them God.

        “Teacher, we know that you are sincere,
          and teach the way of God in accordance with truth,
          and show deference to know one;
          for you do not regard people with partiality.”

            Truer words have never been spoken, as the saying goes!  Though they did not believe any of those words, they hit the nail on the head, captured the essence of Jesus in a nutshell; distilled in four short phrases all that was so compelling about the words of this un-credentialed rabbi from Galilee.  And though they didn’t know it, those very words comprised the problem they had with Jesus. They could use them in the opening argument when they presented their case against Jesus few nights later.

            He was sincere in what he thought and spoke. People noticed and remarked how his teaching was offered without constant quoting of others. That called the words and actions of other teachers into question.  Even so, he taught the way of God in accordance with the truth, and in doing so had, on occasion, pointed out that the Pharisees and the Scribes were selective in choosing which ways of God they would enforce and which they could ignore.

            If that weren’t enough to get him into hot water with the establishment, the third line of bogus praise was what really caused discontent among the religious leaders: he showed deference to no one. He wasn’t awed by the pedigrees of priests descended from priests.  He wasn’t intimidated by the diplomas on the wall of the Pharisee’s offices. He didn’t take a back seat to those who had earned the three doctor’s stripes on their sleeves.

            To top it all off, he did not regard people with partiality.  He wasn’t careful about the company he kept. He was known to travel with people of questionable reputations.  He sat at table with sinners and tax collectors, one of the latter was even numbered among his inner circle. The great physician didn’t spend his time doing wellness checks for the healthy, he made house calls and touched those who needed to be healed.

            So if you wonder why Jesus was on to their tricks, it is just this simple: their flood of flattery leading to their trick question was a thinly veiled rough draft of the indictment they were secretly preparing for his one and only appearance at night court.  That, and the make-up of the strange coalition that showed up in the temple of all places to try and trick him into saying something he would regret.

            As one commentator put it:  “Politically, about the only thing Pharisees and Herodians have in common is that they don’t like Jesus.  So they hold their noses, put aside their many differences for a moment, and come together to pose a question that they hope will put Jesus between a rock and a hard place.”[i]

            This is truly one of those moments when “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”  To get a handle on the absurdity of these questioners standing as one to discredit the one questioned, picture the Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan and the President of the NAACP stepping up to the microphone together at a town hall meeting to ask a candidate about racial profiling by law enforcement.  “For the record, is it lawful to pull over an individual for driving while black?” No matter what the candidate says, the constituents of one or the other of the persons posing the question will be dissatisfied.

            On a less serious note, to get a handle on how difficult a question Jesus was being asked,  imagine two people dressed in the garb of their favorite sports teams putting a question to a candidate for governor: “Tell us, dear candidate, which team truly represents the people of our fair commonwealth: the Phillies or the Pirates?  The Steelers or the Eagles? And don’t tell me you grew up in New York, or we’ll ask about the Yankees and the Mets!  (We won’t bother about the Giants and the Jets because they both share a stadium in New Jersey!)

            So here come two representatives of opposing views on the payment of taxes to Rome.  They slither up together to ask Jesus a question about those taxes: “Tell us, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?”

            Lutheran Scholar, David Lose provides some background on the question and why it was such a hoot that Herodians and Pharisees would have cooked it up together:

            “Jews in first century paid numerous taxes, temple taxes; land taxes, customs taxes just to name three. The tax in question was a particular—and particularly onerous—one. It was the imperial tax paid as a tribute to Rome to support the Roman occupation of Israel.  That is right: first century Jews were required to pay their oppressors a denarius a year to support their own oppression!”[ii]

            The Herodians and the Pharisees had diametrically opposed views about the payment of this tax.  A preaching professor from Colgate Rochester Divinity School introduces us to the two sides posing the seemingly unanswerable question. “As their name suggests, the Herodians were allied with Herod Antipas, who had been named king of the Jews by Rome.  Not surprisingly, they supported paying the tax to Caesar.  The Pharisees, who were committed to every detail of the Jewish Law, opposed paying the tax to Caesar. Their opposition was less based on the fact of the oppression and more on the special coin that had to be used to pay this particular tax.”[iii] 

            That coin, pictured on our bulletin cover this morning, played a pivotal role in the marvelous answer Jesus gave to their Machiavellian question.  Jesus begins his answer by putting them on notice.  He knows that they are up to no good.  He calls them hypocrites, and then he proves his point by asking them to produce the coin used to pay Caesar for the privilege of being under the thumb of theEmperor’s forces.

            We’ll flip that coin in a moment, but before we do let’s listen to David Hare provide insight as to why there is no simple “yes” or “no” answer to the question.  He writes: “It should be noted that the question, while profoundly political, is phrased in religious terms: ‘Is it permitted…’  The question,” he notes, “can be paraphrased: ‘Does it accord with Torah (the law) to pay taxes to Caesar or not?’ One facet of the legal question involves God’s ownership of the land of Israel: ‘The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine,’”[iv] (God declared way back in the Book of Leviticus!) That makes Caesar a trespasser, which leads Professor Hare to ferret out what is beneath the question from the standpoint of the Pharisees: “Since Caesar is a usurper is it not an act of disobedience to God to pay a tax to this pagan ruler?”[v]

            The dilemma Jesus faced was this:  If he said that Jewish law prohibited paying taxes to Caesar, all his opponents would have to do is drop a dime, call the Hot Line and report Jesus as a dangerous man riling up the people against the Romans. If he said that it that paying the tax was permitted, he would risk losing the support of the crowds, for whom the tax was, in Professor Hare’s words: “not only an economic burden but  also a hated symbol of lost freedom.”[vi]

            Now we’re ready for the coin toss.  At Jesus’ request, one of them produces the silver coin that represented an average day’s wage for a laborer.  Just by carrying the coin, and pulling it out in the temple precincts the hypocrites are exposed.  Their duplicity is all the more on display when Jesus asks about the picture and the words printed on the silver coin: “Whose head is this, and whose title?”

            They answer: “the Emperor’s”

            Heads: The likeness on the coin was the emperor on the throne back in Rome. Tails: Words to identify the picture on the other side. In this case it read: “Tiberius Caesar, Son of the Divine Augustus, Pontifex Maximus.” One, two, skip to my Lou…you’ve broken two of the ten commandments, the first two, the one that speaks of having no other gods before Israel’s God, and the other that prohibits graven images. Those who attempted to ensnare Jesus in their trap find themselves entrapped.

            Meanwhile, Jesus goes free.  He speaks and they are stunned: “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” I’m with Professor Hare, who suggests that Jesus might have heightened the impact of the answer by pausing for effect between the two halves of his answer.

            “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s…” See the Herodians about to break into a happy dance and cheer, as it appears he has validated their collaboration with the enemy.  Witness the ear to ear gotcha grins on the faces of the Pharisees as they calculate how far Jesus will drop in the polls, thereby eroding his popularity with the people. But wait, there’s more!  Having baited the hook for those who tried to reel him in, Jesus adds the second half of his answer:

            “…and to God the things that are God’s.”

            Gotcha!  Betcha thought you had me!

            As we’ll say in today’s affirmation of faith using the words of the Psalmist, it is pretty clear what the Scripture’s include in the list of “the things that are God’s!

“The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it,

the world, and those who live in it!”  (Psalm 24.1)

Doesn’t leave much out; doesn’t leave much doubt; Caesar can have his silver coins.  Truth be told, they’re God’s too, but we won’t sweat the small stuff, because all stuff from the contents of your kitchen junk drawer to the stocks and bonds in your portfolio to the gifts and talents that make you a unique child of God in your own right, belong to God.  It is the same truth Paul the apostle wrote of in the letter to the Romans, which are often read beside an open grave:

“If we live, we live unto the Lord;

And if we die, we die unto the Lord.

Whether we live therefore or die,

We are the Lord’s”[vii]

            The words of Jesus to those who attempted to catch him in their political/theological trap have been interpreted by some to bolster the argument for the separation of church and state.  That is not what is going on in this passage.  Douglas Hare explains why not:

            “Although there is strict parallelism between the two halves, (of the answer Jesus gave) they are by no means of equal significance, because Caesar’s role is so vastly inferior to God’s.  That is, Jesus is not saying, “There is a secular realm and there is a religious realm, and equal respect must be paid to each.” The second half (of Jesus’s answer) practically annuls the first by preempting it. In Jewish religious thought, foreign kings had power over Israel only by permission from God. Tax may be paid to Caesar because it is God’s will that Caesar rules. When God chooses to liberate his people, Caesar’s power will avail him nothing.” [viii]

            What the words of Jesus are not saying may leave us scratching our heads. They take time to sink in. The impact of what he was saying on the way we live our lives is much clearer.  As Professor Susan Eastman informs us: “Some early interpreters looked to the image of the coin, and answered that coins—bearing Caesar’s image--belongs to Caesar; and human beings—bearing God’s image—belong to God.”[ix]

            Presbyterian Pastor Richard Spalding picks the coin up off the turf after the toss and announces what it means for the game of life:

            Jesus “is not sketching parallel responsibilities, but a radical antithesis. Caesar can stamp his picture and pedigree far and wide, but he cannot come near the true commerce that animates us.  So Caesar will get many or most of the coins—and be flattered by how well his likeness is rendered in the medium of cold, hard cash; but the coin of the realm of our flesh and blood is the image of  God. What is rendered to God is whatever bears the divine image.  Every life is marked with that inscription, an icon of the One who is its source and destination.”[x]

            That One who is both the giver of our lives and “our hearts true home when all our years have sped,”[xi] The  God to whom we give what belongs to God,” as Spalding points out, “is the God described by the prophet Isaiah in the midst of the looming shadow of an earlier empire, for a people just as much at a loss to grasp the full magnitude of God’s care:

“Can a woman forget her nursing child?...

Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.

See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands.”[xii]

            When Jesus directs that we “give God the things that are God’s” it is a transaction that is based in relationship, a relationship grounded in love, a relationship in which the One in whose image we are made has promised guidance to make our way through the wilderness.  For the Israelites out there in the desert it was a cloud by day and a pillarof fire by night.  For followers of Jesus today, it is the gift of the Holy Spirit, providing the power and the direction “if thou but trust in God to guide thee.”[xiii]

            Discerning that guidance and allowing the Spirit’s power to move us along is not always easy.  Spalding elaborates on that as well:                                                                                                                          “All of us have fine lines to walk in negotiating the various kinds of commerce that fill our days. Most of us are collaborators some of the time, subversives some of the time. There is comfort, perhaps, in Jesus’ refusal to make the conundrum of daily rendering into an easy question. The answers are simple only for those who regard Caesar as God, or as the devil.  Meanwhile, we bear God’s image—as the palm of God’s hand bears ours.”[xiv]

          Words.
          Words carefully chosen.
          Words skillfully crafted for a purpose.

            Words carefully chosen and skillfully crafted by the One who backed them up with forgiveness. Words visible in a life given in love for others so we might know who we are, to whom we belong, and the purpose of our lives, to “give to God the things that are God’s.”

“Love so amazing, so divine,

Demands my soul, my life, my all.”[xv]

Amen!

[i] Lance Pape, “Commentary on Matthew 22. 15-22, 20th Sunday after Pentecost, Year A, workingpreacher.com, 2014
[ii] David J. Lose, Feasting on the Gospels, Matthew, Vol. 2, Chapters 14-28, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2013), p. 189
[iii] Marvin A. McMickle, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 4, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), p. 189, 191
[iv] David R.A. Hare, Matthew – Interpretation – A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, (Louisville, John Knox Press, 1993), p. 253
[v] ibid.
[vi] ibid
[vii] Romans 14.8
[viii] ibid., Hare, p. 254
[ix] Susan Grove Eastman, , Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 4, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), p. 193
[x]Richard E. Spalding, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 4, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), p. 190
[xi] Hugh Thomson Kerr, God of Our Life, The Presbyterian Hymnal, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1990), Hymn #275
[xii] Isaiah 49. 15-16
[xiii] Georg Neumark, If Thou But Trust in God to Guide Thee, The Presbyterian Hymnal, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1990), Hymn #282
[xiv] ibid., Spalding, p. 192

[xv] Isaac Watts, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross, The Presbyterian Hymnal, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1990), Hymn #100, 101

 When God is Too Good - A Sermon based on Jonah 3.10-4.11 and Matthew 20. 1-16.      preached at First Presbyterian Church, Clark Summit, PA on Sunday, September 24, 2023

       During a TED Radio Hour talk, Dr. Frans de Waal, a psychologist and primatologist showed clips of several experiments demonstrating that animals are capable of empathy, cooperation, and fairness. In one, a pair of monkeys sat in side-by-side cages. Their task was to hand a scientist a rock in order to receive a treat. Monkey #1 hands over its rock and receives a cucumber.  Monkey #2 gives its rock and receives a much preferred grape.  Anticipating a better treat, monkey #1 hands over another rock but receives another cucumber. It promptly throws it out of the cage and violently shakes the door in protest. It was grumbling for a grape![i]  Whether we’re talking about being handed one denarii after working all day in a vineyard, or receiving a cucumber in exchange for a rock, fairness is a big deal!

            That slighted monkey and the workers at the back of the line in the parable have some-thing in common with the older brother in the Parable of the Prodigal Son. They share outrage at what they perceive to be unfairness, a condition that leads to resentment.

            Noting “how easily we can relate to the grumbling of the laborers who assumed…they would be paid more,” one observer points out that “such dangerous assumptions can pop up in our closest relationships, our work settings, our congregations, and our national thinking.”[ii] “There is a saying,” she adds, ‘Assumptions are planned resentments,’ warning, “Whenever we assume anything, we set ourselves up for possible disappointment or even worse, we set the other person up as the object of object of our disappointment, anger or resentment.”[iii]

            The assumption of the grumbling laborers is made possible by the added unfairness of making those who worked the longest wait the longest to receive their wages. The scene calls to mind not only the assumptions we make based on seniority, but also our inability to appreciate the blessings that have come our way.

            In our Call to Worship today we have already spoken words that pop up in scripture no less than ten times.  Most of the time, they let us know God will not be as hard on us as we deserve.  One version of this phrase appears in the Book of Joel.  Surprisingly, Joel’s creedal words show up in the Book of Jonah on the lips of the king of Nineveh when he responds to the reluctant prophet’s call for repentance. Quoting Joel, the king decreed:

Return to the Lord, your God,

for he is gracious and merciful,

slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love,

and relents from punishing.

Who knows whether he will not turn and relent

and leave a blessing behind him?”[iv]

            Psalm 100 paints the picture of our gracious and merciful God using some other words that are familiar:

“The Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever,

and his faithfulness to all generations.”[v]

            That was the problem as far as Jonah was concerned: God is good and gracious and merciful. That too, was the rub that chafed at the workers in the vineyard who had been at it since sun up when at sundown the last were paid first and treated as equals.

            It is one thing for God to be gracious and merciful to me.  It is another if God is merciful and gracious to somebody else. When I have given God a reason to be angry, that slowness is greatly appre-ciated; when someone else does something worthy of divine wrath the delay is unbearable. When I am the undeserved beneficiary of God’s steadfast, covenantal love, it is cause for celebration.  When some-one else is the recipient of amazing grace, the sound is not always so sweet!

            Just ask the laborers in the vineyard…or Jonah. But here is the kicker: both the full day laborers, and Jonah himself, in their indignation over God’s goodness, fail to recognize, appreciate, or express gratitude for having been recipients of the same benevolence they grouse about.  All of the laborers, from the first to the last, had received the means to purchase their “daily bread.”  Jonah had been saved from drowning. He was heard when he uttered a cry for help, and given a second chance to do what God called him to do.

           How very human of them not to notice!
           How very gracious of God to persist in loving them anyway!
           How very challenging to us as we continue to learn to recognize, celebrate, and share the blessings bestowed on us and others by the One who is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.

            From beginning to end, the story of Jonah is told with wit and humor. The cast of char-acters defy stereotypes: There’s a prophet who says “hell no, I won’t go.”  There are seasoned, salty sailors, who hit their knees to pray in the face of a storm while the man of God sleeps below deck. The residents of a foreign city listen to the half-hearted proclamation of an alien who shows up in their streets pro-claiming impending doom. There’s a king who takes note of what his people are doing and follows their lead and then leads their following by humbling himself before the Lord. There are even creatures put to work by God: a fish that swallows and spits-up on command; a plant that sprouts up overnight; a worm whose hunger contributes to the lesson God is trying to teach.

            Last, but not least, we are drawn into the picture as those who are asked along with Jonah the questions God put to him.  “Is it right for you to be angry?” and “Should I not be concerned about Nineveh?”

            Add the two questions Jesus poses on the lips of the vineyard owner in the parable: “Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me?  Or are you envious because I am generous?”[vi]

            Put all those questions together and a larger question looms: “Are we, or are we not, willing to let God be God?” The Book of Jonah ends without the final question being answered by the sad, sun-burned servant of God.  The parable of the workers also leaves the questions about letting God do God as God pleases, unanswered.

            Most people are familiar with the first part of the Jonah story which we didn’t read today. Here is how Frederick Buechner summarized it:

            “Within a few minutes of swallowing the prophet Jo-nah, the whale suffered a severe attack of acid indigestion and it’s not hard to see why.  Jonah had a disposition that was enough to curdle milk.”

            Buechner continues: “When God ordered him to go to Nineveh and tell them there to shape up and get saved, the expression on Jonah’s face was that of a man who had just gotten a whiff of septic-tank trouble.  In the first place, the Ninevites were foreigners…  In the second place… nothing would have pleased him more than to see them get what they had coming to them.”[vii]

            You know the next part. Instead of heading to Nineveh, Jonah books passage on the Medi-terranean Cruise Line, and while the others waved good-bye from the rail, he went down below deck and took a nap.  Soon a storm sent by God descends. It’s a category seven storm. Normally brave sailors cry out to the various gods they worship.  The captain, having done a headcount realizes that Jonah is missing. He goes below, finds him sleeping and urges him to get upstairs and send an S-O-S to God.

            The sailors resort to superstition casting lots to reveal which of them is responsible for the weather’s fury.  Jonah is singled out.  After he explains who he is, where he is supposed to be and what he was told to do, the others are really scared. But when he suggests throwing him over-board, they refuse because they, more than he, now fear the God who “made the sea and the dry land.”  

            Despite their reluctance and their double efforts to row the boat ashore where they hoped to sing “alleluia!”—the storm grew worse.  Finally, after praying, asking Jonah’s God not to hold his impend-ing death against them, they toss him over the rail. The storm ceased. The sailors took notice, offered a sacrifice to Jonah’s God. Even when he wasn’t trying to, Jonah was re-sponsible for turning hearts to God.

            Meanwhile, Jonah, “sinking deep in sin far from the peaceful shore,”[viii] gets swallowed by a large fish, who put up with its pesky passenger for three days before spewing him onto the beach. In belly of the beast, Jonah, had plenty of time to reconsider how he might respond, should God be foolish enough to ask again that he go to Nineveh and urge them to turn from their evil ways.

            Jonah is given a second chance. This time he heads in the right direction.  Nineveh is a big city, three days walk across.  Jonah slowly goes a third of the way, and makes one unenthusiastic declaration: “Forty days more, and Nineveh will be over-thrown.”

            The people of Nineveh heard what he had to say.  They took him seriously. They proclaimed a fast, and everyone, the movers and shakers and the everyday people, put on garments of mourning.

            James Limburg spotlights how remarkable this grass roots groundswell of repentance was. Not only did they believe God, announce a fast, and humble themselves before God, they “did something to clean up the terrorism and violence in their city.  This was not the action of just a few, but involved everyone, including the animals!”[ix] Noting how the king follows the lead of his people, he said:        “The king’s behavior is exemplary. He humbles himself by divesting himself of his symbols of author-ity… and by putting on sackcloth and sitting in ashes. He calls for an all-inclusive fast extending even to the animals and admonishes all to turn from their evil and violent ways.”[x]

            Limburg goes on to describe how “the king realizes that conducting a fast does not guarantee that the Lord will act favorably.”[xi] All he can do is rely on a quote from the prophet, Joel, and ask, “Who knows?” hoping God will relent and change his mind. (3.9)  “…The king did not pre-sume to control God.  His is no mechanistic religion, expecting that repentance automatically guarantees rescue.  The king is humble before God and concerned for his people.”[xii]

That leads me to add this: Like the captain of the ship earlier, Nineveh’s king shows himself to be a worthy shepherd of the flock entrusted to his care. Wouldn’t it be nice if leaders in our time did the same!

            Seeing the Ninevites respond in appropriate ways pleased God. Jonah, however, was ticked off. He let loose a barrage aimed directly at God, explaining why he took that boat ride the first time he was sent to Nineveh.  Three nights in the belly of the fish may have convinced Jonah to do as he was told, but that did not mean he agreed with the mission.

            In one of the greatest “I told you so” tirades of all time, Jonah fires off a Tweet to God: “Is not this what I said while I was still in my own country?  That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing. And now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.” (4.2-5)

            God sends a short and sweet response containing a simple question for Jonah to contem-plate: “Is it right for you to be angry?”

            After all, Jonah was the beneficiary of God’s grace and mercy. One of the very human things about Jonah is the way his stubborn insistence that the Ninevites get what was coming to them blinds him to the ways God had not punished him for his failure to do what God asked.

            Todd Hobbie counts up all that Jonah seems to have missed.  He writes: “It never seemed to cross Jonah’s mind that, though he had directly disobeyed God’s command, God had pursued him with persistent love.  At least the Ninevites had ignorance of God as an excuse. Unlike Jonah, they repented, as soon as the message he brought from God was clear.

            “It never seemed to cross Jonah’s mind that if God were unforgiving, God would have let him drown in the storm.  It never seemed to cross his mind that the pagans on the ship, in their attempts to save him from harm at all costs, were much more like God than he was.”

            Finally, Hobbie concludes: “It never seemed to cross Jonah’s mind that even the fish was more obedient to God than he was. At least the fish, when commanded by God to vomit up Jonah, did what it was told.”[xiii]

            “Is it right for you to be angry?” God asked Jonah. The prophet persisted in thinking he was right.  Phyllis Trible notes that “The divine questions put to Jonah asks about the value or benefit of anger…The text does not engage in ‘should’ talk. Jonah is not told that he should be or should not be angry. Instead, he is invited to reflect on the meaning or value of anger.”[xiv]

            Tribble adds: “A reader may hear in the divine questions the implied answer that anger is not good for Jonah, but the answer does not forbid Jonah to be angry. The responsibility for the emotion and its consequences resides with Jonah. When he defiantly holds fast to anger, insisting it is good for him ‘unto death,’ he mouths profound truth. Anger leads to destruction. If it is repressed or suppressed, it ‘burns’ the one who contains it; if it is expressed, it ‘burns those to whom it is directed.  Although anger is an inevitable part of the human condition, the divine questioning offers the opportunity to work it through and to work through it.”[xv]

            The final scene of the Book of Jonah lifts up that opportunity for Jonah to do that work. Like a petulant child he stormed off when God asked about his anger. With the sudden appearance of a Castor Oil plant to offer him shade which pleases him no end…and the plant’s just as sudden demise thanks to a very hungry worm, God reveals the volatility of both joy and anger.  God used what Jonah feels to help him understand what God felt about the people of Nineveh and all their animals.

            Whether Jonah got it or not is never revealed. Whether we get it or not is what matters.  When God appears to be too good, forgiving those we deem unforgiveable or disbursing blessings to those we don’t think have earned them, we have the same choice: fan the flames of our anger, or celebrate God’s grace and mercy to us and to all.

[i] www.npr.org/2014/08/15/338936897/do-animals-have-morals
[ii] Charlotte Dudley Cleghorn, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 4, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), p. 94
[iii] ibid.
[iv] Joel 2. 13
[v] Psalm 100. 5
[vi] Mt. 20. 15-16
[vii] Frederick Buechner, Beyond Words, Daily Readings in the ABC’s of Faith, (New York, HarperOne, 2004) p. 196-7
[viii] James Rowe, Howard E. Smith, Hymn: “Love Lifted Me,” verse 1
[ix] James Limburg, Hosea-Micah – Interpretation – A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, (Atlanta, GA: John Knox Press, 1988), p. 151
[x] ibid., p. 150
[xi] ibid.
[xii] ibid., p. 151-2
[xiii] Todd M. Hobbie,. Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 4, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), p 76
[xiv] Phyllis Trible, The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. VII, (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1996), p. 524
[xv] ibid.

 

A Chain of Caring Hands      a Sermon based on Exodus 2. 1-10 and 2 Timothy 1.3-7, preached on Mother’s Day, May 14, 2023 at Covenant Presbyterian Church, Scranton, PA

            Standing shoulder to shoulder, volunteers pass sandbags hand to hand, linking the point where a pile of sand is shoveled into the bags, to the make-shift dike protecting property from a river on the rise.

            Lined up from the designated storage area to tables arrayed in a church hall, bags and boxes and precious treasures are passed person to person in preparation for the annual flea market or rummage sale.

            On the 4H fairgrounds at a horse show, a baby boy born in January is sung to by this one, rocked to sleep by that one, fed and changed by the other one, so his mother’s hands and heart are free to prepare their children to enter the show ring.

            Each story involves a chain of caring hands, each set attached to a heart that cares and a head filled with the knowledge that we do much better together than we do alone. Many hands do make the work light. And each one’s touch adds something to the process: the suggestion that improves efficiency, the humor that diffuses tension, the fresh infusion of patience when every-one else has had enough.

            On a sticky May night a couple of decades ago, two dozen of us crowded into the vacant Methodist parsonage in Pittston.  It was almost a week after the Postal Workers Food Drive, and the donations delivered for Meals on Wheels which operated out of the church kitchen next door filled the first floor.  We were knee-deep in plastic bags of food.  There was little room to move about. People were getting frustrated and frazzled by the chaos.  Then one spoke up to suggest a way to impose some order. A system was outlined. Before long we were transformed into specialists with manageable tasks: un-packers and passers, stackers and packers, box-builders, barrel haulers, and bag folders.

It didn’t take long for the place to be filled with the sound of rustling bags and stacking cans amid the constant chatter and laughter of people having a good time doing a good thing together.  And through it all, there was to my recollection, no mention of God.

            Yet all the while the work of God was being done. Most notably the work enabled the staff and volunteers of Meals on Wheels to provide the kind of caring Jesus spoke about in Matthew 25 when he talked of people caring for him when he was hungry or lonely.  Beyond that, in the side conversations taking place, there were hearts unburdened, there was helpful information shared, there were expres-sions of support and solidarity exchanged. And since there were children and adolescents among us, an example was set which demonstrated that faith involves more than giving thanks for being forgiven and saying what we believe. We are, as a friend reminds us, “saved for service.” And the enjoyment experienced as the jokes and jibes fly across the room make it clear that serving is not a joyless grind.

            If you read the Book of Exodus, you are seventeen verses into the first chapter before God is mentioned. You’ll have to wait until the last word of the twenty-third verse of the second chapter before God is mentioned again.  But that doesn’t mean God is absent from the stories contained in between. It turns out that God was at work the way God often works: in quiet ways through people going about the business of living their lives.  Even in the middle of difficult times and horrendous circumstances, God is discovered in the lives of faithful people doing what they can where they are to live up to the purpose for which they were created.

            Though Exodus begins without a mention of God, we are only seven verses in when it becomes clear that the promises made to Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Rachel and Leah, have come true. Years have passed, Joseph and his eleven brothers have all long since passed from the scene, but the fulfilled promise is declared in one verse: “But the Israelites were fruitful and prolific; they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong, so that the land was filled with them.” (1:7) Unlike the politicians of every age, God does not require plaques on every building or bridge to trumpet accomplishment. God relies instead on the stories of faithful people.

            Speaking of politicians, a new administration had taken over in Egypt where the Hebrews continued to live in the land of Goshen. The new Pharaoh did not appreciate that the prosperity he inherited had its roots in the wise management of resources instituted by a former Hebrew slave named Joseph. His dream-inspired plan to prepare for and survive a multi-year famine imposed order on what could have been a chaotic experience for Egypt.

            Unfortunately, the new Pharaoh and his advisors viewed these numerous foreigners among them as a threat. To eliminate the menace, it was decided to enslave the Hebrews and work them to the point of exhaustion. With harsh taskmasters in charge, the children of Abraham were put to work as the new Pharaoh built a new capital with lots of impressive structures on which to place plaques to proclaim, “See how great I am.”

            Hard labor did not curb the growth of the Hebrews as a people. So, the king summoned the Hebrew women who served as midwives and instructed them to kill any boy born to their neighbors.  Those women, whose names were Shiprah and Puah answered to a higher power.  Their reverence for God and respect for life empowered them to engage in the first act of civil disobedience recorded in the Bible. They quietly ignored the Pharaoh’s edict. No sit-ins, no marches, no bull-horn shouted slogans in front of the palace. All they did was risk their lives by doing what they knew was right. In so doing, they became the first in the chain of caring hands that made it possible for God to act to remove from the Hebrews the yoke of Egyptian slavery.

            When the king discovered that the number of male Hebrews continued to increase, he instituted more drastic measures. A decree was issued. All Egyptians were to comply. Pharaoh commanded: “Every boy that is born to the Hebrews you shall throw into the Nile, but you shall let every girl live.” (1.22) But a chain of caring hands, some of them from his own household, once again thwarted the Pharaoh’s plan. Which brings where our reading began this morning.

            A Hebrew woman, a descendant of Jacob’s son, Levi, married and gave birth to a son. In words that echo the creation story in Genesis, we’re told she looked on the child God had created and saw that he was good. “A fine baby” is how our translation put it.  And like the Hebrew midwives before her, she ignored the Pharaoh’s command.  In another quiet act of civil disobedience, she hid the baby.

            Only this little Levite wouldn’t remain quiet. After three months the child was no longer easy to hide, but its mother had a plan. Creatively she set about doing exactly as the Pharaoh ordered. She constructed a basket, gave it a waterproof coating, placed the child in it, and cast her baby upon the waters. The boy born to the Hebrews was thrown into the Nile, though not with the results Pharaoh intended.  Don’t you love it? The child’s mother undermines Pharaoh’s order by obeying it with a minor modification.

            Now one of the peculiarities of translating Hebrew into English is that we miss the fact that the word for the basket is the same word used for Noah’s Ark. Once again the future of God’s promises floats protected on the waters. The instrument of Pharaoh’s version of the final solution becomes the incubator for God’s plan for liberation!  And, can you imagine the hope of the world resting on a baby placed in an unconventional cradle?  Hmmm!

            The child’s mother, whose name we learn later in the book is Jochebed, enlists another set of caring hands to help watch over the child moored in the marsh.  Her daughter, Miriam, stands guard from a safe distance. The family influences exerted upon us are not limited to our parents and grand-parents. Siblings play a part too.  When I lived across the street from an elementary school, I once spotted an older sister walking a little brother to the door. Being a little brother with a an older sister myself, I knew what was behind his contented smile as they walked hand in hand into the building.

            With Miriam peering through the bulrushes, Pharaoh’s daughter came down with her entourage for a bath and a stroll along the riverbank.  She sends one of her attendants to retrieve the basket she sees among the reeds. Discovering the little ark’s cargo crying,” she took pity on him. Pharoah’s daughter decides to ignore her father’s instructions. Miriam steps forward and offers to find a wet-nurse to care for the child. Next thing you know the child’s own mother is on Pharaoh’s payroll getting paid to feed her own child.

            The chain of caring hands linked to watch over this particular baby boy now extends from the midwives to his mother to his sister to the daughter of Pharaoh and her attendants.  Without an organizational meeting or a handbook to follow, each one becomes a part of the conspiracy to subvert the unjust policy of the Pharaoh. 

            What a wondrous thing it is to behold. The king of Egypt ends up footing the bill to feed and educate the child who will become the man who will one day deprive him of his slave labor. That’s the final irony. Without being mentioned by name, God sets things up so the king contributes to his own undoing. From his biological mother and sister, the child learns the history and traditions of the children of Abraham, who came to Egypt few in number but grew and prospered according to God’s promise. From his royal, Egyptian, adoptive mother and her aides, he learns the protocol and procedures of life in the courts of the king.

            To lead the Hebrew people after Pharaoh lets them go, all Moses lacks are the skills for survival in the desert. God fills in those blanks after Moses murders an Egyptian who was mistreating a Hebrew slave.  Moses goes on the lamb and lands on his feet by marrying the daughter of a desert shepherd. More caring hands in the chain teach him all he would need to know to fulfill the purpose for which he had been born.

            Faith and practice don’t just fall into our laps. We learn them from others.  It begins in the home and is supplemented by influences beyond.  Our scriptures both Old and New today celebrate the chain of caring hands involved in the process.  This being the day that it is, the passages have been chosen because the highlight the contributions of a variety of women. Though the culture focuses on Mother’s Day, some churches call it “The Festival of the Christian Home, in recognition that there are lots of people who contribute to who we become.

            Timothy’s mother and grandmother, and Moses’ mother and sister represent the biological connections. Pharaoh’s daughter stands in for the adoptive mom’s and step-mothers.  The midwives and the attendants of the Egyptian princess call to mind the teachers and coaches, Den mothers and the camp counselors who’ve had an impact on us.

            When a child is baptized in our tradition, we as a congregation promise to do all in our power to provide the environment and the teaching that will help each child grow up to declare him or herself a disciple of Jesus Christ. It doesn’t end with merely providing classrooms and curriculum and recruiting teachers.  And it doesn’t end with only those who have been baptized into our fellowship. In our homes, in our neighborhoods, and from the soccer field sidelines, we all have opportunities to model what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ. Every once in a while, we might even get the chance to explain why we do what we do.

            You may not be able to influence what your children or the neighbors kids learn in school, but you have some choice about what books you read them at night and what historical sites you visit on vacation.  You may not be able to control what goes on when they’re at the neighbor’s house, but you have a say in what games are installed on the screens, large and small, they play upon. You might not be able to choose what movies they see in someone else’s com-pany, but you have a choice about what you stream for your family movie night.

            Common courtesy, respect, time management, kind-ness and compassion are attributes and skills that need to be passed from generation to generation.  The rhythms of work and play, service and Sabbath, study, reflection and prayer are all learned behaviors. If no one models them for us, we are the poorer for it.

            Years ago, I received a message on the answering machine from a concerned parent. One of the Sunday School teachers had given her students some books with prayers for use in differ-ing circumstances at various times of the day.  The child handed the books to the parent.  The parent placed the books on top of a coat rack before Worship. A day of two later, the child went searching for the books and couldn’t find them.  She called the parent a work, asking, “Where are my books from Sunday School?”

            Thus the message on the machine: “Are my books still there…and if not, can you tell me the titles so I can get another set?”  Turns out the books were right where they had been left. In short order they made it into the mother’s hands and into the hands of the child. Another chain of caring hands. And a grateful parent expressed gratitude for others involved in teaching her child to pray.

            Take a moment or more today. Reflect on the human links in the chains of caring that have made a difference in your life.  Thank God for each one of them. Then take a few moments more and consider how active your hands are in the caring chains within your reach.  Then, resolve, with God’s help, to keep your hands busy!

           

 

                                         

Slowtu B. Leave and Bishop W.G. Mildew

First Presbyterian Church, Clarks Summit, PA is one of many congregations that observe Holy Humor Sunday the week after Easter.  What follows below is A Chancel Drama co-written and presented by Jim Thyren and Bill Carter.  It followed a scripture reading from the Gospel of John, Chapter 20, verses 19-24.

HOLY HALITOSIS!

Nate:    There are some conversations that didn’t get written in the Bible. And this might be one of them…between the disciples Nathanael and Thomas. 

Nate:    Thomas, where have you been? We’ve all been hanging out together.

Tom:    Nathanael, I didn’t think that was such a great idea. I mean, if Judas told the authorities where to find us, don’t you think he gave them this location too?  Rounding you all up would be like netting fish in a barrel. So I decided to make myself scarce until things calmed down as the Passover celebrations drew to their close. 

Nate:    “Well, turns out they didn’t come after us, but you did miss a very important visitor.”

Tom:    “And who might that be?

Nate:    “Jesus.”

Tom:    Who?

Nate:    Jesus

Tom:    Say that again!

Nate:    Jesus!

Tom:    No way!

Nate:    Yes, the Way himself! I am telling the Truth. Our Life depends on it.

Tom:    Okay, start from the beginning. Tell me everything that happened.

Nate:     Well, you know how he is. He just showed up. Didn’t knock on the door…or use it that                         matter.He was just suddenly standing there, and the first thing he said was: “Peace be with                     you…”

Tom:     Peace? You mean the whole Shalom Alechem thing? That was his favorite greeting. Most                     people say good morning, or hi, or yo. Always Jesus loved to say “peace be with you.”
     
Nate:     Still does, apparently. Just like that night when he washed our feet. Remember that?

Tom:      Of course I do.

Nate:      “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you…:

Tom:     Well, he didn’t leave us with a lot of peace that night. I still have nightmares of the whole                     evening: Judas selling him out, Peter swinging the sword, the soldiers arresting him, the trials,
             the crowds wanting Barabbas instead of the Lord – and then the way the whole thing ended.
            Too much for me to take. I can’t sleep.

Nate:      Tom, he’s back. 

Tom:      What do you mean he’s back?

Nate:      He’s alive. Breathing. Looking better than ever.

Tom:      Nate, he may have pegged you as a man without deceit,
               but that doesn’t mean you can’t be deceived.

Nate:      No, Tom, he’s here.

Tom:      Where?

Nate:     Well, here… I guess he’s wherever he wants to be.

Tom:      I find this impossible to believe. And I’ve about seen it all.

Nate:      He showed us the holes in his hands and his side.

Tom:      (pause). You’re kidding.

Nate:      His wounds…from the crucifixion.

Tom:      Ghosts don’t have wounds.

Nate:      He’s not a ghost. Just like that night he sauntered across the water and jumped into the boat.
               Scared the life out of us, remember?
               I’m talking about Jesus, the real Jesus. Same Jesus. Same wounds in his wrists, same wounds                   in his ankles, and that big gash in his side. Remember?  John and the women told us all about                that one.

Tom:     Well, so much of this week’s stories come to us second hand. I still don’t believe it.

Nate:    I understand. The rest of us are stunned, too. But it’s the same Jesus – alive! The wounds are                 the same that he endured last Friday. Inescapable! It took us a while to comprehend what we                 were seeing. Peter looked into his pomegranate juice, wondering if it was fermented. Andrew                 stammered, couldn’t find his words. James and John stood on each side of him to get a better                 look. Jesus laughed and said, “Stop staring.” The whole time, Mary Magdalene is over at the                 table, saying: “I told you so. I told you so.”

Tom:      She can be so annoying. And this all sounds so impossible.

Nate:      You know what they say: Nothing is impossible with God.

Tom:     Yeah, but God is so invisible. I just can’t grasp any of this. Weren’t you all afraid?

Nate:      Of course, we were. That’s why we were in that room. That’s why we locked the door.

Tom:      Wait – the door was locked? Are you sure you weren’t seeing a ghost?

Nate:      Listen, I saw him sneaking a piece of pita bread and dipping it in the hummus.

Tom:      This is inconceivable.

Nate:    Oh, I know. We were scared to death – of him, of his enemies, and then he has the audacity to                say Shalom Alechem – peace be with all you. And it was him. I’d recognize that Voice                            anywhere. Never thought I’d hear it again. And there he was. And suddenly the laughter started             bubbling up in our bellies. We were beside ourselves with joy. James and John were first. They                 started hootin’ and hollerin’ and stomping just like a thunderstorm. Mary Magdalene laughed so              hard she farted. Matthew said, “Shh! Somebody is going to hear us.” Jesus waved him off, not a              care in the world. Then he said a second time, “Shalom Alechem – peace be with all of you.”                 This time, it wasn’t a greeting. It was a gift.

Tom:    Well, good for you. I’m glad you had that…experience.
            But do you think I can make any sense of this?

Nate:    I tell you, Thomas, the room had changed. I don’t know how that happened. But the Word he                 spoke, it was like the first light of dawn, breaking through the gloom – yet inside that locked                 room. Peace, peace…in the middle of all that has happened. Later on, after he departed, Philip                 said, “It’s just as he promised, his peace is different than any peace the world can give. He’s                     alive, Thomas. Alive! That’s the truth of it. And that’s why the peace is so different, so real. It’s              peace that stays with us. I saw him, the peace is still with me.

Tom:    Well, good for you. It always came easier for you than for me. I tell you, unless I can poke my                 finger in his wounds and touch them myself, I’m not going to give into any of this. I need more              proof.

Nate:     But wait, there’s more!

Tom:     I think you’ve told me enough.

Nate:      Oh, wait ‘til you hear this. He lifted his hands and told us to get on with our work.

Tom:      What?!

Nat:      He said, “As the Father sent me, so I send all of you.”

Tom:     Where?

Nat:      What do you mean, ‘where’?

Tom:      Where is he sending us?

Nate:    Didn’t specify. Or rather, didn’t limit where we should go. But listen: how many times did he                 tell us and others that the Father had sent him?
 Tom:    Never kept track. Hundred times, maybe? It was a lot.

Nate:     “As the Father sent me, so I send you…”

Tom:      Well, that’s a bit troubling. Does he expect us to get arrested, beaten up, and crucified, just like                 him?

Nate:     Oh, Thomas, get your head out of the dirt. Have you remembered nothing? How he lifted the                 little boy in Cana from his death bed? How he asked us to feed that huge, hungry crowd? How                 he took on all the nonsense of those dim-headed religious leaders? How he lived with us,                         laughed with us, challenged us – and how he kept forgiving us, leading us into the truth and life             every step of the Way?

Tom:    I thought all of that got buried with him, that the whole movement was over.

Nate:     Not if he is alive again. He’s come to tell us to get on with his work. “As the Father sent me,”                 he said, “so I send all of you.”

Tom:    Well, good for all of you. I wasn’t there. Sorry I missed all of that.
            And I tell you, not only do I doubt he’s alive, I doubt any of us could do his work like he did it.

Nate:    Oh, Thomas. I’ll tell you one thing more. He showed up in a locked room, he wished us peace,                 he gave us peace, he showed us his wounds, and then – he took a big breath and puffed on us.

Tom:     He…what?

Nate:      He breathed on us…

Tom:      What did his breath smell like? Fish? Stale Passover wine? Like he hadn’t brushed his teeth in                three days? Holy Halitosis!

Nate:   Oh, Thomas, ever the skeptic. As he breathed, he said, “Receive the Holy Ruach – the breath,                the wind, the Spirit.” Right in our faces, a “breathe on me breath of God” moment. I was taken                back to the beginning, when the Father scooped up some mud, formed an earth creature, and                    breathed life into its nostrils, and said, “Let there be Adam.” And I remembered dem bones,                    dem bones, dem dry bones, when all of Israel’s hope had been slaughtered. And God asked                    Ezekiel, “Can these bones live again?” Then God blew the breath, the holy wind, and the ankle                bone connected to the shank bone, and the shank bone connected to the knee bone, and all those             bones started dancing. It was because of the breath, the Holy wind, the Spirit of the Living God.             It brings us alive – and Jesus breathed it on us.

Tom:    What is that breath like?

Nate:    It was earthy, pungent and fertile, kind of sweet and kind of strong. It smells like the scent of the              first daffodils on a morning in Spring, the smell of a charcoal fire on an Autumn evening. It is                 invigorating, bracing like a winter wind or the summer breeze that fills the sail and powers a                 boat across the water.

Tom:     Well, I don’t know. Sounds like you were in the right place at the right time, if, in fact, all of                 this is true.  But I wasn’t there. I can’t be sure.

Nate:     Oh, Thomas, sweet, thoughtful Thomas, I agree it was a “had to be there” moment. But I’ll tell               you this. Since Jesus is alive, since he can come and go where and how he wishes, there’s a                     very good chance he’s listening in on this conversation. He could show up at any moment, in                 any place, but he’s not going to sit around and wait to show us proof. He sends us to get on with              life – his life – and to share that life with everybody we meet, loving, forgiving, offering                         ourselves to the needs of the world. He breathes that life on us, into us, through us, in spite of                 us, ahead of us… He’s alive. He’s still breathing…

Tom:      I don’t know what to say…
              I guess I wish that I could feel some of that Spirit breath, too.

Nate:     Be careful what you wish for. In any case, it’s been a week since we saw him Why don’t you                  stop by for dinner tonight? You know the place. Knock three times. We’ll let you in, and we’ll               lock the door behind you.

Tom:      Can I bring anything?

Nate:      Just an open mind…and an available heart.
                                                                                                    Written by Bill Carter and Jim Thyren,                                                                                                                 April 2023