Devotion for the Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost, Year B (ILCW Lectionary)

Above:  Christ with the Children, by Carl Heinrich Bloch

Image in the Public Domain

Resentment and Righteousness

SEPTEMBER 22, 2024

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According to the Inter-Lutheran Commission on Worship (ILCW) Lectionary (1973), as contained in the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978) and Lutheran Worship (1982)

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Jeremiah 11:18-20

Psalm 54:1-4, 6-7a (LBW) or Psalm 119:25-32 (LW)

James 3:16-4:6

Mark 9:30-37

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Lord God, you call us to work in your vineyard

and leave no one standing idle. 

Set us to our tasks in the work of your kingdom,

and help us to order our lives by your wisdom;

through your Son, Jesus Christ.  Amen.

—Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), 28

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Keep, we pray you, O Lord, your Church with your perpetual mercy;

and because without you we cannot but fall,

keep us ever by your help from all things hurtful

and lead us to all things profitable for our salvation;

for you live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and forever.  Amen.

—Lutheran Worship (1982), 81-82

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Jealousy, disharmony, and resentment come to us in this week’s readings.

1. The lessons from the Hebrew Bible flow from the context of persecution for faithfulness.  In Jeremiah 11:18-20 and Psalm 54, the context is mortal threat.
2. James 3:16-4:6 tells us that peace is a fruit of righteousness–right relationship with God, self, others, and all of creation.  As my father taught me, troubled people cause trouble.  So, peace is not more commonplace than it is, unfortunately.
3. Oblivious disciples, jockeying for position relative to Jesus, received a profoundly counter-cultural lesson in a society that did not value children as people:  Those who welcome a child in the name of Jesus welcome Jesus and God.
4. Those same disciples also learned that they lacked a monopoly on exorcisms, whatever the causation of “possession,” in Hellenistic terms, may be in modern medical and psychiatric diagnoses.  (I, having been in a long-term relationship with a woman who had schizophrenia and manic depression, understand, that in antiquity, she would have been “possessed.”  I also accept that possession is real in many cases.  The Roman Catholic Church, before authorizing an exorcism, wisely checks medical and psychiatric diagnoses first.)  Anyone not opposed to Jesus was on his side.

“Righteousness” is a common word.  But how do we use it?  Given that I have already defined it in this post, I choose not to define it again in this paragraph.  And, to repeat myself for the zillionth time, righteousness and justice are interchangeable in the Bible.  Why not?  That makes sense.  As the Epistle of James–especially–keeps reminding us, how we treat others is a matter of great concern to God.  Therefore, we need to shape up morally, in community.  We–both collectively and individually–ought never to trample the rights of people, especially in the name of God and morality.  Yes, morally gray areas exist in real life.  Life becomes complicated much of the time.  But we can do our best, with the help of God, in these circumstances.  If making the least bad decision is the best possible outcome, so be it.  If an unambiguously good result is possible, wonderful.

The actions to which the ethos of shaping up morally in community lead us will vary according to circumstances.  We mere mortals live in circumstances, not abstractions.  Yet, to focus on one timeless principle, I ask you, O reader:  In whom do you struggle to recognize the image of God?  In which type of person do you not see the image of God, at least not easily?  And how is God calling you to think of such people and to behave toward them differently?

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

APRIL 21, 2023 COMMON ERA

THE THIRTEENTH DAY OF EASTER

THE FEAST OF SAINT ROMAN ADAME ROSALES, MEXICAN ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST AND MARTYR, 1927

THE FEAST OF SAINT CONRAD OF PARZHAM, CAPUCHIN FRIAR

THE FEAST OF DAVID BRAINERD, AMERICAN CONGREGATIONALIST THEN PRESBYTERIAN MISSIONARY AND MINISTER

THE FEAST OF GEORGE B. CAIRD, ENGLISH CONGREGATIONALIST THEN UNITED REFORMED MINISTER, BIBLICAL SCHOLAR, AND HYMN WRITER AND TRANSLATOR

THE FEAST OF GEORGIA HARKNESS, U.S. METHODIST MINISTER, THEOLOGIAN, ETHICIST, AND HYMN WRITER

THE FEAST OF SAINT SIMEON BARSABAE, BISHOP; AND HIS COMPANIONS, MARTYRS, 341

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Link to the corresponding post at BLOGA THEOLOGICA

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