PROPER 12, YEAR A

July 26, 2020

St. Andrew’s by-the-Sea, Little Compton, RI

Genesis 29:15-28

Psalm 105:1-11, 45b

Romans 8:26-39

Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

As today is my final Sunday with you this summer, I want to take the opportunity to say how much I’ve enjoyed our worship together. Officiating virtually by Zoom has been a new experience for me; and while it’s not the same as being there in person, it’s certainly the next best thing—a great way to stay connected in a time of physical separation and relative isolation. I know you’re looking forward to having Lynn back with you next Sunday; in the meantime we keep her continued recovery and progress in our prayers.

Today is also my first time of having the occasion to preach on this Sunday’s reading from Genesis on Jacob and Laban. In my previous parishes, we used a slightly different form of the Sunday lectionary in which I don’t recall this story ever coming up. And it’s a good thing to reflect on passages of Scripture that one may have read many times but never had the occasion to explore in depth.

To be honest, however, my first reaction to this reading was to wonder what I could possibly find that would be edifying for us. Some aspects of the story are charming, such as Jacob’s deep love for Rachel. Other aspects are entertaining and amusing, such as Laban’s duping Jacob into marrying his older daughter Leah so that he has to work another seven years to marry his true love Rachel. This part of Genesis seems to be full of stories of tricksters pulling one over on each other! And, from the perspective of contemporary sensibilities, the context of the story is frankly appalling, with a patriarchal society treating women as property to be exchanged between fathers and husbands, not to mention polygamy.

But for the preacher, the question of overarching importance must always be: Where is God in this story? What was God doing here? As I puzzled over this question, I must confess that I was initially stumped. But then it hit me! Even through the dubious means of Laban’s deception, God was fulfilling his promise to Jacob—namely, that his descendants would multiply and spread abroad to fill the earth and become a blessing to all its families.

As we read on in the subsequent chapters of Genesis, we discover that between Leah and Rachel, and their two maidservants Bilhah and Zilpah, Jacob becomes the father of twelve sons—the ancestors of the Twelve Tribes of Israel—who are absolutely critical to God’s plan not just for the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but indeed for the salvation of the entire world. I could be wrong, but I think we’re meant to understand that none of this would ever have happened if Jacob had simply married Rachel at the outset, as was his wish. For, as it turned out, Rachel ended up bearing only two of Jacob’s twelve sons. (Of the other ten, Leah bore six, and Bilhah and Zilpah each bore two.)

So, even though Jacob didn’t realize it at the time, God was already at work, turning Laban’s deceit and exploitation to his own purposes, to bring about the fulfillment of his promises. As the psalmist sings in celebration: “God has always been mindful of his covenant, the promise he made for a thousand generations: the covenant he made with Abraham, the oath that he swore to Isaac; which he established as a statue for Jacob, an everlasting covenant for Israel …”

Read this way, the story illustrates the principle that Saint Paul enunciates in this morning’s reading from the Epistle to the Romans: “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”

A similar theme stands out in the series of somewhat mysterious and enigmatic parables told by our Lord in today’s Gospel reading from Matthew. The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed … yeast … treasure hidden in a field … a pearl of great value. One common feature in these images is great things arising from small beginnings that are either hidden, imperceptible, or easy to overlook. Another is that God’s kingdom is of such enormous importance as to be worth the sacrifice of all else. One sells everything one has to buy the field containing that treasure, or to obtain that pearl in the marketplace …

Taken together, then, one question that today’s readings invite us to consider is this: As we look back on our own lives in this world so far, are we able to identify situations or events in which God was present and working to fulfill his purposes for us in ways that we didn’t recognize or understand at the time, but which may have become clearer after the fact—perhaps years or even decades later? We might take some time this coming week to reflect on that question, and then thank God for his loving presence and involvement in our lives, and rededicate ourselves to his service in gratitude for all his blessings.

The Collect of the Day wonderfully sums up these themes and perhaps also furnishes a useful pattern for our own daily prayers: “O God, the protector of all who trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy: Increase and multiply upon us your mercy; that with you as our ruler and guide, we may so pass through things temporal, that we lose not the things eternal …”

Notice how that Collect ties in with today’s readings. God was indeed Jacob’s protector, ruler, and guide, increasing and multiplying his mercy upon him. And in the Epistle, Saint Paul promises that in Christ we will indeed not lose the things eternal: “Who,” Paul asks, “will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. Or I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, or rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

These words furnished a powerful reassurance to the first-century Christians in Rome who were vulnerable to persecution and death for their faith. For us, they offer the similar reassurance that God is for us, working in often hidden ways to bring us through the midst of present troubles to the glorious fulfillment of his purposes not only for us but for all creation. So, by God’s grace, we gain the courage to follow and serve Christ in this world, confident that as our protector, ruler, and guide, he will bring us through things temporal so that we lose not the things eternal.

PROPER 11, YEAR A

July 19, 2020

St. Andrew’s-by-the-Sea, Little Compton, RI

Genesis 28:10-19a

Psalm 139:1-11, 22-23

Romans 8:12-25

Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

A theme running through today’s readings is the vast gulf separating human perception from divine knowledge. In his omniscience—that is, his all-knowingness—God sees everything, including all that remains hidden from within the limitations of our finite human perspective. As the psalmist says, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain to it.”

But then, occasionally, and in accordance with God’s own saving purposes, we’re granted glimpses of divine truth—not by means of any innate human cleverness of our own, but rather by means of God’s revelation to us. Today’s readings afford multiple instances of this wonderful process of God’s Word illuminating our minds with the brightness of divine wisdom.

In the reading from Genesis, Jacob is fleeing from his elder twin brother Esau. We may recall in last Sunday’s reading how Jacob extorted Esau’s rights to his inheritance in return for a bowl of lentil stew. In the intervening chapters, moreover, Jacob has impersonated Esau and stolen his blessing from their dying father Isaac. Understandably enraged, Esau wants to kill Jacob, who in turn escapes to take refuge with his uncle Laban in a place called Haran.

On the first night of his journey, sleeping out under the stars with a stone for his pillow, Jacob dreams of a ladder set up between earth and heaven, on which the angels of God are ascending and descending. Then the Lord draws alongside Jacob and speaks to him, making a series of amazing promises: he and his descendants will inherit the land on which he lies; his offspring will spread abroad in all directions as numerous as the dust of the earth, and they will become a blessing to all the families in the world. The Lord will be with Jacob wherever he goes, and will ultimately bring him back to this land from which he’s now fleeing in fear for his life.

The transformation is almost total. Jacob went to sleep a fugitive and refugee; he wakes up the inheritor of God’s promises to his fathers Abraham and Isaac. Such was the gap between human perception and divine wisdom that Jacob exclaims in wonder, “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it! … How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”

A similar gulf between human perception and divine wisdom is evident in the Gospel parable of the wheat and the weeds. When an enemy sows noxious weeds in a farmer’s wheatfield, the servants offer to go and pull up the weeds. But the householder says, “No, for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat as well.” Let both grow together until the harvest. Only after they’ve both been cut and reaped in the harvest can they be safely sorted and separated.

Saint Augustine of Hippo gave the classical interpretation of this parable around the turn of the fifth century when he likened the Church in this world to a mixed field of wheat and weeds growing together. Against rigorists and purists who wanted to excommunicate evil-doers from the Church’s fellowship for life, Augustine said no, the Church is as much a hospital for sinners as a showcase for saints. Moreover, we’re unlikely to know with any certainty who are which before the Last Judgment. Many who appeared in this life to be the worst sinners could then turn out to have been the greatest saints, and vice versa.

The contrast for Augustine, then, was between the sorry state of the Church in this world and the final revelation of its goodness, truth, and beauty in the next, when “the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” In the meantime, God alone knows the inmost secrets of each person’s heart. In the words of the psalmist: “Lord you have searched me out and known me … you discern my thoughts from afar.”

Again, Saint Paul draws a contrast between present appearances and future reality in the Epistle reading from Romans: “I consider,” he writes, “that the sufferings of the present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.” A bit further on, Paul describes a creation in bondage to decay groaning as if in labor, and not only creation but we ourselves, groaning inwardly, as we wait for redemption.

The problem is that from our finite human perspective we’re apt to focus our attention more on our present bondage and groaning than on the glory waiting to be revealed. So Paul exhorts us to wait patiently in hope: “Now hope that is seen is not hope … But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”

Taken together, these Scripture readings invite us to renew our trust in the God who sees infinitely more than we do. In the midst of a global pandemic, a faltering economy, and an ideologically polarized body politic, the temptation is to give in to despair. In the past weeks, I’ve occasionally found myself wondering: How are we ever going to get through all this?

At such moments, however, we need to remind ourselves that God desires only our good, and is working through our present troubles to bring us to a future beyond anything that we can presently imagine or visualize. Even when God seems absent or hidden, he’s always in our midst, bringing good out of evil, hope out of despair. So at length we shall be able to say along with Jacob, “Surely the Lord was in this place—and we did not know it!”

This hope, I hasten to add, presupposes no merit or worthiness of our own. Notice that in the Genesis reading, Jacob has done nothing to earn or deserve the promises that God makes to him. On the contrary, he’s a despicable character, a scoundrel (albeit maybe a likable scoundrel). But God favors him and blesses him anyway—as a sheer gift of unmerited grace and divine mercy. And if God did so for Jacob, he can certainly do so for each of us, without exception.

So, the foundation of our hope is the worthiness of Christ, in whom, as Saint Paul says in today’s Epistle, we’ve received the Spirit of adoption as God’s children. “When we cry ‘Abba, Father!’ it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ—if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.”

In the days of the coming week, we might spend some time reflecting on our Christian hope and renewing our trust in God’s promises—especially in view of the vast gulf between the divine omniscience and our limited human vision. For the good news is that God sees, clearly and eternally, even what at present we cannot.

PROPER 10, YEAR A

July 12, 2020

St. Andrew’s-by-the-Sea, Little Compton, RI

Genesis 25:19-34

Psalm 119:105-112

Romans 8:1-11

Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

In the past year or so, I’ve discovered that a good starting point for reflections on the readings appointed for any given Sunday is the Collect of the Day, which in Morning Prayer comes right after the Lord’s Prayer and the Suffrages—two pages on from where we are now.

So, let’s look at today’s Collect. “O Lord, mercifully receive the prayers of your people who call upon you …” That opening phrase describes all of us gathered virtually in this Zoom videoconference, and all Christians throughout the world, worshiping on the Lord’s Day. It immediately reminds us of who we are and what we’re about: God’s people, calling upon him, and asking him to receive our prayers.

The Collect continues: “Grant that we may know and understand what things we ought to do, and also may have grace and power faithfully to accomplish them …” Wow. Those words suggest what we need to be asking of God this time in our history—as individuals, as communities, as a nation, as a world—knowledge, understanding, grace, and power.

So, right off the bat, the Collect of the Day offers us substantial material for reflection and prayer. In the days of the coming week, we might periodically return to this question: In what areas of our lives do we need knowledge and understanding of what we ought to do, and grace and power to do it?

The opening verse of today’s Psalm, suggests a good place to begin seeking the answer to this question: “Your word is a lantern to my feet, and a light upon my path”—a wonderful image of God’s Word illuminating the right way before us even in the darkest night. So, we can look at today’s readings with this question in mind.

The story of Jacob and Esau in Genesis highlights the consequences of failing to do the things we ought to do. The point not to miss is that neither Jacob nor Esau are particularly admirable characters. Jacob extorts from Esau his inheritance in return for some bread and lentil stew. And Esau is foolish enough to agree to the deal. The failure on Esau’s part is a lapse in knowledge and understanding: going against his true interests, he yields his birthright in return for the momentary relief of his hunger. But the failure on Jacob’s part is a moral lapse: even though he knows and understands that what he’s doing is wrong, he does it anyway.

The challenges facing us in our country and the world today afford multiple instances of our need for knowledge and understanding of what we ought to do, and for the grace and power to do it. With respect to race relations, I believe that we’re entering a period of national conversation in which all voices must be heard and listened to, precisely so that we can gain the deeper knowledge and understanding necessary to achieve a more just and equitable society. In the matter of the COVID-19 pandemic, however, I suspect that the problem is more that while we largely do know what needs to be done, in too many places too many of us have been unwilling or unable to do it. My aim in saying this is not to be judgmental but simply to reiterate the point that our need is not only for the knowledge and understanding of what we ought to do, but also for the grace and power faithfully to accomplish it.

The good news in this picture comes, appropriately enough, in the Gospel reading: “And [Jesus] told them many things in parables, saying, ‘Listen! A sower went out to sow …’” In the interpretation that our Lord himself supplies, the seed represents the Good News of the Kingdom, and the different types of ground—the path where the birds eat up the seed, the rocky ground where the seed can’t gain deep roots, the thorns that choke, and the good soil where the seed flourishes—all represent different types of responses to God’s Word. But these allegorical features can all too easily distract us from the most remarkable character of all: namely the Sower himself. I think it’s fair to identify the Sower as a figure of God. And the sower’s wildly indiscriminate scattering of the seed is a vivid image of God’s extravagant generosity in distributing his gifts of knowledge, understanding, grace, and power to his people.

Despite the seemingly wasted effort of scattering seed in places where it cannot grow, enough still falls on good soil to yield a harvest of amazing abundance. And notice how the final verse of today’s Gospel ties in with the Collect of the Day: “But as for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.”

To play with this imagery just a little bit more, one remaining question is how we can know what kind of ground we’re supplying to receive God’s Word and God’s gifts in our own lives. How can we make ourselves into good soil that brings forth an abundant harvest of good works?

Well, it’s a trick question. The answer is that we cannot. Only God can do that. But God is the creator of both the seed and the soil. The good news, again, is that God can and will make us into such good soil, if only we ask him to do so, by the power of his Holy Spirit.

Here today’s Epistle from Romans comes to our aid. The distinction that Saint Paul makes between “Spirit” and “flesh” can be a bit misleading. It’s not a dualistic distinction between the spiritual and material realms, but rather between a life oriented towards God in the world, and a life oriented towards the world apart from God. What Paul calls life “in the flesh” is the attempt to live relying on our unaided human resources and abilities. And what he calls life “in the Spirit” is life lived relying on God to do in us what we could never do for ourselves.

So Paul writes, “you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you.” And then, for good measure, he adds this amazing promise: “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.”

In other words, all this imagery of Sower, seed, sowing, and harvest refer not only to this life but even more to the life of the world to come. Eternal life in Christ is the hope we proclaim and the gift we pray for. We ask God, then, to send his Holy Spirit to make us into fertile soil capable of hearing and receiving his Word, so that we in turn may bring forth an abundant harvest to the glory of his Name.