Category Archive

SECOND SUNDAY OF ADVENT FIRST READING Isaiah 11:1-10 In this beautiful poem, “First Isaiah” speaks about a king in the line of David, the “stem of Jesse” (David’s father) who will restore the world to its original peace. The images of the animals at peace with one another and their child master are unforgettable. The kings of Israel were thought to be descendants from David. When they came to the throne, they were traditionally welcomed as messiahs. Our reading may have been written to celebrate the anointing of Hezekiah as king, but Christians see it as a prophecy of Christ …

FIRST SUNDAY OF ADVENT FIRST READING Isaiah 2:1-5 The meaning of this beautiful poetic prophecy of a world at peace under God needs no comment from me. But there is a textual puzzle. The verses that constitute our lesson appear almost word for word in the prophet Micah (4:1-4). Micah was a younger contemporary of First Isaiah, and they may have known each other. One of them may have borrowed from the other, but in neither prophet do the words fit well with what is said before and after. Some scholars think it was a poem known to the two …

PROPER 29 November 20-26   FIRST READING Jeremiah 23:1-6 The prophet disclaims false or delinquent priests and prophets.  In time, he says, God will send a descendant of David who will rule wisely and bring justice.  A historian probably would say Jeremiah is predicting the rise of a worldly king.  But Christians treasure this passage, for to them, he prophecies the coming of Christ.     NO ALTERNATIVE     SECOND READING Colossians 1:11-20 In this passage, Paul reaches high for an understanding of Christ.  The Christ he envisions uses his glory and power to “rescue” us from evil, but …

PROPER 28 November 13-19   FIRST READING Isaiah 65:17-25 The Lord has just told the people that those who have been faithful to him shall be happy, those who have not shall suffer.  Here he speaks of the new world he is preparing for the faithful.  He is not creating a new physical world, but transforming the old.  The disasters caused by an occupying army will be reversed.  The disasters of infant illness and the weaknesses of old age will be reversed.  Especially interesting to me is the line about God’s hearing and answering their prayers before they are spoken.  …

PROPER 27  November 6-12   FIRST READING Haggai 1:15b – 2:9 Emperor Cyrus of Persian freed the Jews enslaved at Babylon and Chaldea in 538 BCE and permitted them to return to their home.  They found their lands in ruins.  Jerusalem and the Temple were rubble.  They decided not to try to revive the old duel kingdoms of Israel and Judah; instead they formed a new nation called Judea.  There was conflict between the rabbis and synagogues who held to a new word-oriented worship, and the conservatives who held to the cult sacrifices.  Though the conservatives wanted to rebuilt the …

PROPER 26 October 30 – November 5   FIRST READING Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4 Habakkuk is a mysterious figure.  Nothing is known of him except his prophetic poem in the Bible.  Our reading is a small part of a set of questions Habakkuk puts to God and God’s response.  Habakkuk is audacious in questioning God about the injustice he sees everywhere and about the immediate enemy, the Chaldeans, a fierce tribal people who are helping the Babylonians in the sack of Israel.  God’s answer is to wait: justice will eventually be done; just wait.  Such waiting can only be accomplished by …

PROPER 25 October 23-29   FIRST READING Joel 2:23-32 Joel was probably reared in Judah, but moved to Jerusalem, where he may have been a Temple priest, probably in the second half of the fourth century BCE.  Judea, the Jewish state formed by those who returned from the Exile, had in recent years experienced both a draught and a devastation by locusts, which God tells them he has sent to punish them.  But now he is sending abundant rain and withdrawing the locusts.  The people will prosper, and God will “pour out” his spirit upon them.  (Being myself an old …

PROPER 24 October 16-22   FIRST READING Jeremiah 31:27-34 I find this passage of such critical importance to my religion that I keep a permanent bookmark here in my Bible.  At the return of the Jews from Babylonian slavery, Jeremiah announces an individualism that would have been inconceivable to earlier generations.  No longer will children be made to suffer for the sins of their fathers and grandfathers, “but all shall die for their own sins” (31:30).  God transforms the very nature of covenants, for he establishes a new covenant with every individual, one that frees her/him from dependence upon priests …

PROPER 23 October 9-15   FIRST READING Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7 This letter of Jeremiah to the exiled Jews in Babylon comes as a great surprise.  God wants them to settle in, he reports, to build houses, have kids, and pray for Babylon.  In short, become something like citizens.  The letter throws light upon the conditions of the Babylonian captivity.  It was already obvious that the Jews had been ghettoized.  Now we see that within their ghettos they had great freedom.  Now we can better understand the enormous religious advancement that took place in captivity.  The captive people created the first …

PROPER 22 October 2-8   FIRST READING Lamentations 1:1-6 Our reading is from a collection of laments for the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians and their allies the Chaldeans.  For centuries it was believed that Jeremiah was the author, but modern Biblical scholarship (which began with Erasmus in the 15th century) has decided otherwise.  No author has been identified, and it is generally believed that there were more than one. As you listen, bear in mind that lamentations are prayers. Prayers of lament ask nothing of God except to listen.  Neither do they accuse God as the author of …