🐮 Epiphany 6
Readings: Jeremiah 17:5-10; Psalm 1; 1 Corinthians 15:12-20; Luke 6:17-26.
From the TRNG Room:
Reflection
Good morning and welcome to the sixth Sunday after Epiphany. This is Brother Logan Isaac broadcasting from Albany, Oregon. Our readings today come to us from Jeremiah 17, the first psalm, 1 Corinthians 15 and Luke 6. And there's a little bit of something and everything on Jeremiah. I can't help but notice and point out that the, it's about.
It's this agrarian and arborealist kind of imagery, the tree planted by the water that doesn't worry. Um, whose leaves stay green and it's not anxious when there's no drought or when there is a drought. Um, and I think it's important to point out Judges 9, the oldest, or the first parable in the canonical.
Um, Judges 9, uh, has to do with the, the first king of Israel, Abimelech, whose name means father of kings. And Abimelech was one of Gideon's sons, one of Gideon's 77 sons, apparently. And Gideon, um, is meek and unsure of himself, then he kind of regains his confidence and he wins this battle he's supposed to have, and he goes a little bit too far in having his, one of his sons, uh, supposed to, was supposed to kill these four kings, and he realizes that he kind of messed up and he seems to learn from it.
The people invite him to be king over all Israel. He says, no, I will not rule over you. Only the Lord will rule over you. And his, one of his sons, Abimelech, it's probably all mythical, 77 sons is just a term for exaggeration. He had a lot of sons, which means he was obeying the Lord and being fruitful and multiplying.
Um, and he was clearly good at it. And Abimelech wants to be king. And Jotham, another one of Gideon's sons, escapes the wrath of Abimelech and he has this parable of the trees holding sway over one another, kind of a foreshadowing of 1 Samuel 8 when the people Israel demand that they be like all the other nations, that what makes them distinct from everybody else should be, you know, done away with and we're just going to melt into this big melting pot.
Um, And Jeremiah, as a prophet of Israel much later, he, he certainly must have, you know, picked up what Jotham was putting down because this imagery of the trees is important to, um, Jeremiah, who's, you know, uh, closer to being a historical figure than Jotham and Abimelech, but, um, who, you know, remembers the central symbolism of the Hebraic imagination.
Um, And Psalm 1, I just, I think it's a great first psalm, and I think it's the entire psalm, just six verses, and there's a, a thread outside of the Pauline reading in 1 Corinthians, um, of the wicked and the righteous kind of next to each other. Um, Psalm 1 talks. about those who do right and do correctly by the Lord, and those who do wrongly and falsely by the Lord and, and what to expect.
And I say that because in the Luke reading, we have Luke's version of the Beatitudes and the Beatitudes, uh, which gets his name from, you know, uh, blessed are those, beati, this Latin word, um, And in Luke, there are four Beatitudes. If you're hungry, if people hate you, um, Let me make sure. I thought there were, yeah, you who are poor, which is distinct from Matthew.
So Matthew and Luke are very similar, and there's some debate as to which came first. My money is on Luke, and Matthew is a, a very quick, Not rebuttal, but like, uh, an addendum because first we have Paul's writings who's like, look, the law is important, but don't get lost in the law. If you're not Jewish, if you're not an Israelite, whatever, the Christ, Clearly breaks open, um, the kingdom of Yahweh for everyone.
And then we have Mark, who's written in a time of great upheaval when the temple is being destroyed. And we're not sure exactly if Mark knows that the temple is going to be destroyed or not. Um, but he's in the midst of this, you know, huge war between the Romans and the Jews. Then somewhere shortly after the destruction of the temple, Matthew and Luke write.
And Luke, I think, is first because Luke is very pragmatic. Luke, and one of the ways we see that is here in the Beatitudes, Luke says, Blessed are you who are poor. Pretty straightforward, right? Matthew says, Blessed are you who are poor in spirit. And, Matthew is more of an institutional apologist. He doesn't want people, or that community that produced Matthew, doesn't want people leaving the church.
The Israelite faith and tradition he wants that community wants to strengthen the bonds between the Messiah and the tradition that produced him. You know, Israelite religion. Um, Luke is obviously a Gentile, an educated Gentile who loves what Paul did, probably traveled with Paul, and Luke is just, he's more of a pragmatist.
Like if you're poor, it means that. You have been putting up with so much. God sees in your heart and when you, when your body expires, you will have a reward in heaven. If you're poor, God looks upon you. You are blessed. Um, and he goes on. If you weep, you'll laugh. If you, if people hate you, you will be exalted by the Son of Man, et cetera, et cetera.
And then Luke follows immediately with these four woes, four beatitudes, four blessings, and four woes. And that one to one mirror image of the blessings. But the first one is, Woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your consolation. You've already got the thing that God would give you, so don't expect much more when you die.
And he goes on to say, You who are full, for you'll be hungry. Woe to you who are laughing, because you'll mourn and weep. And then finally, Woe if people speak well of you, because That's kind of how, um, they treated people that made them feel right, even though they were wrong, the false prophets. So Luke seems to be pragmatic.
He also claims to have a direct connection to Paul, who had been seen quite highly before he was converted to Christianity, as opposed to rabbinical Judaism, I suppose. Um, but it's just kind of plain. Like, if you're poor, then God will make you rich. And there's this, you know, the imagery of the scales of justice and how, you know, things will all be made right, you know, the mountains will be made low so that the valleys can be filled in, like, there's a finite system in mind, and if you've had what you otherwise could expect, In heaven, then you won't have it in heaven, and those who have not had it can expect it in heaven.
Uh, you know, the equilibrium, that's the word I'm looking for. Um, and so Luke has these two right next to each other. In Matthew, you have the beatitudes in like chapter 5. And then you have some more woes, so Matthew doesn't like, you know, Matthew isn't a total institutionalist. He does have The, the woes in Matthew, uh, 23, what is that?
17, 16 chapters later? I can't remember. I can't do math. Um, but Matthew seems to be walking in a finer line between the institutionalized Israelite religion, uh, i. e. the scribes and the Pharisees, and Luke seems to be kind of hands off. At least in terms of Israelite institutionalism. He's not a Jew. He's followed Paul who was a Jew of Jews and who told Gentiles like, Don't worry about being a Jew.
Worry about being a good person. Worry about loving God and letting that be enough. And so my money is on Luke having been written first and Matthew kind of a response to Luke for Jews, you know, insiders that wanted to, or want to own or, or, um, or claim to have a closer bond, connection, uh, whatever, as the source of the Messiah.
Um, but I bring all these things up because it was in the military that I learned. Um, you know, that there's good people and there's bad people, um, that not all of leaders are good, not all enemies are totally horrible, and that it's usually a mix, right? There's good and bad in all of us, and if you listen to the bad, you'll become bad.
You'll spoil, right? Like fruit on the, you know, that goes bad on the ground, and you'll eventually die, and you're, you're, stuff will be absorbed by others. Um, but there's those who will listen to the good, remember in, in the first Psalm. Um, and they will, they will not perish. There's something of them that will go on forever.
Um, because they haven't sought more than they need. And people have a way of remembering. people that are inspiring, people that are virtuous, people who, um, do not take any more power than they have been given. Um, and so to hold those two right next to each other, for me, I learned that at a young age, relatively young age, that don't think all one thing about somebody or an institution.
The military is not all bad or all evil. Good, it is what people make it. The people above you, the people around you, the people below you. Um, and so when you think that you're blessed or when you think you're in trouble, um, remember to, uh, my, one of my favorite proverbs was this Greek philosophical proverb, moderation in everything.
Don't think that you're all bad. Don't think that anybody else is all good. But take both right next to each other. Luke has the beatitudes, the blessings, right next to the woes. Um, so that, As a reminder that there's not a big gap or chasm between evil and good, but rather they're often woven amongst, uh, you know, woven together like a braid.
I'm sure you can pull them apart, but then you have something totally new. I'm starting to ramble, but I really appreciate Luke because Luke seems to be freer to say what What to me seems clearer, right? That some, you know, yeah, we can argue about who is poor in spirit, but we can look and kind of, kind of grasp whether someone's poor or not.
We can look and see someone who is hungry or who is not hungry. It's not always true. It's not, you know, it's supposed to be binary either or. That's why they're smashed together as opposed to several chapters apart.
