Lectionary Notebook Luke 19:1-10

Thoughts on the Gospel Reading
Thirty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time C
Luke 19:1-10 (see TEXT below)



We are sometimes offered the quaintly presented account of Zacchaeus, the “wee little man” coming to Jesus, but we would do well to remember that what is as stake here is more than a happy story we sing to Sunday's children, as important as this is.  No, what is at stake is the picture of a person burdened down by personal sin and guilt, which opens to us perhaps the purest post-modern question of all, at least the major one of the TEXT: Where might today's sinner go to find relief from the burden of sin?

As we attempt to think this through I have the sense that it is not a problem of the same magnitude and degree of concern that it once was to this old world. In short, do post-modern people really seem to need a place to go for sin relief? Is sin real anymore and an actual burden to anyone? Notice, I am not asking if they (or we) are sinners, that answer seems self-evident. No, I am asking if they would see themselves as sinners in need, as the man in the sycamore tree saw himself. Here the answer is self-evident as well.

Said another way, to us religious types, and those of us who sometimes think about GOD, the problem of sin still registers on the radar of the heart, but I suspect that for the average person of the West, a burden about sin ranks as a fairly low level of concern. Now, we have scandal. In fact, as a voyeuristic culture -- we are mostly watchers -- we love to see the the dirt brought out in the open, but as to any sense of shame, well that seems to have gone out with high-collars and neckties.

Much has been lost here.

I now think I can hear the howls of the enlightened, but I say this even while understanding the damage done to the psyche of we moderns by vicious religious judgmentalism, a fact of reality and not myth, which I have consistently stood against for most if not all of my ministry (now over 34 years). But is it not also true that post-moderns are mostly immune to such damage, having seen through the parental and institutional guilt-trips, and having finally rejected them outright?

In the defense of the more religiously minded, we have come to see that there is a difference between true, moral guilt and guilt feelings. Guilt feelings are mostly trumped up charges against ourselves that feed false views of self, while true, moral guilt comes from deeds actually done. Thought about in a different way, true moral guilt is based in reality and conscience -- “I did this,” while guilt feelings are based upon false cognitive scripts that run in loops inside ourselves - “I'm a bad person.”

For post-moderns the struggle here comes at the point of conscience which is informed not by the Almighty, but instead by the latest rock star or movie heroine, so that what it means to be a person in the West has fundamentally changed and shifted off its historic base.

For some this is a cause for a joyful liberation -- the wicked moralists have lost their grip. You will forgive me if I do not share the joy. What is lost is personal responsibility and eventually the soundness of the soul. But notice what is also lost is the existential need for the Gospel -- the death, burial and resurrection work of Jesus -- to be applied to a life. Where’s the desperation, after all, for the sacrificial death of a Savior applied to someone's sinful heart if one no longer believes in sin?

True, there are some, even some post-moderns, who have wonderfully had the Gospel applied and discovered forgiveness, but the vast majority of thirty-somethings have left this version of world far behind. And let me say, if one does not see this as a problem then I doubt one is much in touch with those that people the culture today, or one has not much tried to apply the Gospel to the culture in a way that can be heard.

What then will be the basic appeal of the Gospel if we cannot offer forgiveness for sin? I do not have the answer, but I have a possible direction. Zacchaeus is offered forgiveness, yes, but he is also offered a new life and a new way to live. He is offered a life built for others which looks beyond the self. This is an appeal that many post-moderns can find truthful because they clearly see how the modern world has been lived for nothing but the individual self, and in this they find the ruination of the planet.

For example, many post-moderns have seen their parents split for reasons of self-fulfillment, leaving them and their siblings in the lurch of emotional poverty. And many of them have followed suit, but rather than seeing this as just the way things are, many are searching for a new way to live. Instinctively, they know that being a Western Christian does not offer this to them, but what they may not know -- because they have only heard a caricature of the Gospel -- is following the ways of Jesus ultimately leads them to a new place, to being part of a new people, to the life of wholeness.

For this newness to occur, the mystery of GOD must somehow be rediscovered, the GOD beyond the formulas and proofs. The GOD, who in fact, comes to your house, eats a meal with you and loves you just as you are -- sin and all -- and then demands you make new choices.




Luke 19:1-10
At that time, Jesus came to Jericho and intended to pass through the town. 
Now a man there named Zacchaeus,
who was a chief tax collector and also a wealthy man,
was seeking to see who Jesus was;
but he could not see him because of the crowd,
for he was short in stature. 
So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus,
who was about to pass that way.
When he reached the place, Jesus looked up and said,
"Zacchaeus, come down quickly,
for today I must stay at your house." 
And he came down quickly and received him with joy. 
When they all saw this, they began to grumble, saying,
"He has gone to stay at the house of a sinner." 
But Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord,
"Behold, half of my possessions, Lord, I shall give to the poor,
and if I have extorted anything from anyone
I shall repay it four times over."
And Jesus said to him,
"Today salvation has come to this house
because this man too is a descendant of Abraham. 
For the Son of Man has come to seek
and to save what was lost."

Lectionary Notebook: Luke 18:9-14

Thoughts on the Gospel Reading
Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time C
Luke 18:9-14 (see TEXT below)

Who is justified before the LORD, and before the Almighty who stands vindicated? Apparently, one's resume of spiritual accomplishments do not carry the final call. Jesus' warning to us through the parable of the tax-collector and the pharisee reminds us that the final justification of the person before GOD may not be as simple as we assume.

 

[NOTE: I am closely following Andre Louf’s powerful little book, The Way Of Humility, for portions of this essay.]

THOUGHTS:

1. 

GOD'S View of the Heart is Not Our View of the Heart.  By outward appearances the pharisee has his act together, and it is important to note that the things he had accomplished are not insignificant! His achievements -- the tithe, the fast, the temple attendance -- denoted spiritual growth and discipline. The pharisee is a poster-child for a savory post-modern church member. Yet, with all his success, his heart is not pure, and the GOD who sees knows his secret, even if it is hidden from pharisee’s own heart.

By contrast, of course, the tax collector is by all accounts a living-color scoundrel. This comes to us by way of the social decree from his own time about those in his profession, and by his own self-confession -- "God, be merciful to me a sinner."

What is interesting is the realization that actually both men are sinners -- a surprise to the pharisee. What is also interesting (an understatement?) is that only the tax collector is justified before GOD -- again, a surprise to the pharisee and to Jesus’ original hearers as well. How is it that the one who stands far-off from GOD and speaks his prayer from an isolated and doubting heart gains a hearing and goes home vindicated, while the Torah-faithful religious man is found wanting? Had we never heard of this parable we would truly be astounded at this outcome, and, even now, after hearing it preached we often live the way of the pharisee anyway without knowing it. GOD's view and GOD’s ways are foreign to us. Or, as St. Bernard once remarked: "God prefers a repentant sinner to a self-righteous virgin."

2. 

What Makes One Acceptable Is The Question Of Humility. The tax collector is humble; the pharisee is not, this is the distinction that separates them before GOD. Humility, which means of humis or of the earth, in this context means that one has the ability to recognize the reality of sin that resides deeply within oneself. In contrast to the sinner-pharisee, the sinner tax collector has a severe sorrow for his sin. We see in his words a broken self-reliance and a steep loss of self-satisfaction that the sinner-pharisee does not share.

Interestingly, what is commended in the TEXT -- humility, brokenness, and a short-circuiting of self --  are the very things psychology tells us are needed for a healthy self concept. This offers us a difficult choice.

Said another way, to find humility we must pass through the crucible of humiliation. Humility is born out of true, actual sin and failure (even moral failure), and if you've sinned, then you will no doubt understand this statement.  It is succumbing to temptation, then, that moves us to the path of humility, and once it crashes onto us we are forever marked by its scares and sorrows. In contrast to popular thought about GOD, we find that the Almighty never once winked or ignored our sinful ways, but instead when honestly asked was ready to apply the balm of mercy found in the grace of the Christ, which finally brings us forgiveness and relief, but never amnesia.

3. 

The Pharisee Used the Wrong Metric. He measured himself against the waywardness of the world and the sinfulness of the tax collector, but this is not the true standard. No, the genuine standard of righteousness is the Almighty! "Be ye Holy as I Am Holy."

Psalm 15 is instructive here:
1  O Lord, who may abide in your tent? Who may dwell on your holy hill?  2  Those who walk blamelessly, and do what is right, and speak the truth from their heart;  3  who do not slander with their tongue, and do no evil to their friends, nor take up a reproach against their neighbors;  4  in whose eyes the wicked are despised, but who honor those who fear the Lord; who stand by their oath even to their hurt;  5  who do not lend money at interest, and do not take a bribe against the innocent. Those who do these things shall never be moved. (NRSV)

Clearly, the only response to this standard is the one given by Isaiah in his vision of the LORD: "Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!" (Is.6:5)

4.
 

Success in spirituality and religious practice is the greatest danger of all. This by all accounts is most counter-intuitive, but it stands as the greatest warning of all. Practicing good works opens to one the temptation of self-satisfaction, and once this viral thought has been introduced into the spirit one has opened the soul to the infection of pride that soon brings one down. Or, as St. Paul reminds us:"him who stands take heed lest he fall."

Church leaders are especially open to this tragedy. We who serve the body Christ by presiding over her worship, by preaching her sacred TEXTS  or by comforting her members are often seen as special and especially spiritual because of the work. This means we must constantly keep before our eyes our own brokenness and lostness, lest after we have preached to others we ourselves become castaways.  If, however, the sin of self has already penetrated the heart, and we have thus been confronted with the stench of pride, then the sting and the sorrow of sin will be found to be ever present to the heart, and will offer the conscience the constant reminder that we are, after all, only made of clay, which is but wet dirt, which is of the earth from whence we shall soon return.

Luke 18:9-14
9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt: 10 "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, "God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.' 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner!' 14 I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted." (NRSV)

Lectionary Notebook: Luke 18:1-8

Lectionary Notebook
Thoughts on the Gospel Reading
Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time C
Luke 18:1-8 (see TEXT below)


The Lectionary Gospel reading for this Sunday tells us that -- Jesus told his disciples a parable about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary -- a worthy endeavor for we post-moderns to learn as well.

According to the parable there was a judge in a certain town who neither feared God nor respected any human being. And, there was also a widow in that town [who] used to come to him and say, 'Render a just decision for me against my adversary.'

But, because of his wickedness, this judge was unwilling to help the widow. However, eventually he began to argue with himself, thinking: 'While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being, because this widow keeps bothering me I shall deliver a just decision for her lest she finally come and strike me.'"

The point of the parable is this: If a wicked judge, who acts only out of self-interest, is finally affected by the widow’s persistent petition, how much more will the GOD of the universe -- who is good, who is just, and who cares for all His creation -- do what is right?

Jesus says as much -- Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night?  Will he be slow to answer them?  I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily.

It seems this TEXT is offered to remind us that GOD is good and continues to always work on our behalf. OK, but, what then does the parable have to do with persistent prayer, which was the theme St. Luke tells us was the reason Jesus told the parable in the first place.

Several thoughts:

First: If Jesus desires his disciples to pray always without becoming weary, then we might begin by asking the natural question: What makes us weary in prayer? What circumstance causes us to give out and leave off our petitioning? We become weary in prayer either because we see no immediate results or because we fear GOD will not answer or will not answer in the way we desire.

Contrary to what some media ministers present, I would offer this important axiom: If immediate results are what we are after in prayer, we are in trouble. In my experience anyway, immediate prayer results are rare indeed. And, while it may be true that I do not have the eye of faith needed for such evidence, after over thirty years of pastoral ministry I confess I can count on one hand immediate prayer answers (this is only a slight exaggeration). What I have found is that the Almighty intervenes far less than I wish, and eventual interventions are overwhelmingly subtle, soft-spoken, and rarely immediate.

Perhaps this is your experience as well: You pray, asking GOD to act or do something, but it does not happen as you want or as you plan. Sometimes (often) nothing happens. You wait; you pray. Silence. Then, amazingly, sometime later (often, a long time later) there is actually an answer to the prayer, but not in the way you imagined, and you are so far removed from the point of asking (way back when) that when you finally come to the answer point you have actually forgotten your prayers! Amazingly, the answer goes unnoticed. “How fortunate I am!” you say, “how lucky!” “things just had a way of working themselves out.”

Really? Is that what happened?

Said another way, we can easily miss GOD’S movement in the world as a response to our prayer, never realizing that GOD was at work the entire time after our prayer (and no doubt even before we asked), only incognito, subtly quiet, but still powerfully providential.

Said still another way, one reason we are to steadily pray is so we will be able to connect the prayer to the answer when it comes! That is, we are dullards, all of us, and we easily forget those vital, but invisible connections between GOD and the world.

We can also become weary in prayer because we doubt that GOD will do what we desire, or because we doubt that GOD would do good for us. This speaks of our own feelings of unworthiness or our lack of conviction over GOD’S worthiness (read: ultimate goodness). Do we believe that GOD really loves us? I mean, we reason, how could GOD love one such as me, knowing my fallenness and brokenness as I do? Compounding this is the fact that many of us have been so deeply hurt and cut-down by life that we silently feel we are abandoned by GOD, which means we have little expectation in prayer. “Why pray,” we think, “What good would it do? We’re not of much use to GOD!” These common thoughts betray a hidden question as to GOD’S open-ended benevolence.

What we fail to remember on the one hand is the depth of GOD’s grace -- the power of divine forgiveness flowing toward us "anyhow" because its basis is in GOD and not our success or failure. And, on the other hand we fail to see that there is a goodness at the very heart of GOD -- a goodness which compels GOD’S constant movement toward us in acceptance in the Christ.

All of which opens the second question: What, then, makes us pray always? What factors keeps us within the protracted prayer struggle?

We keep faithful prayer either because the need in our life is so great or the burden we carry from the LORD demands constant vigilance. That is, the internal need is so great because we are in a sheer, bloody mess, or the calling from the LORD we carry is so serious that we cannot but carry-on in prayer. Said differently, we most often persist in prayer because we cannot help ourselves.

I have been in both places -- desperate and burdened, and I can tell you that the movement to prayer comes easy, in the sense that you do not have to be reminded to pray, but it also comes hard because the circumstances are often thick with pain and sorrow and a heaviness of spirit.

It might be helpful to remember Jesus’ prayer prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane:

“I am suffering with sorrow unto
death, can you not watch with me?”

“Father, if it is possible let this cup
pass from me; nevertheless not my
will but Yours be done.”

Which, finally, leads to the last question:  What makes one prayer not enough for GOD? Why do I need to ask for the same thing over and over? Must I talk GOD into what I want?

Simply put, the primary reason we pray is for us, not for GOD. Prayer is GOD’s greatest teaching tool for disciples because it causes us to actually, mystically, partner with the Almighty. Prayer brings us close to the Father of Lights, where we commune with the one in whom there is no shadow of turning, and where we, in time, are caused to walk close to the Holy.

Said another way, prayer mediates the presence of GOD to us in subtle and quiet ways, shaping our hearts and causing us, amazingly, and more often than not, to become the answer to our own prayers!

Luke 18:1-8
Jesus told his disciples a parable
about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary. 
He said, "There was a judge in a certain town
who neither feared God nor respected any human being. 
And a widow in that town used to come to him and say,
'Render a just decision for me against my adversary.'
For a long time the judge was unwilling, but eventually he thought,
'While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being, 
because this widow keeps bothering me
I shall deliver a just decision for her
lest she finally come and strike me.'" 
The Lord said, "Pay attention to what the dishonest judge says. 
Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones
who call out to him day and night? 
Will he be slow to answer them? 
I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily. 
But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?"
(NAB)

The Koinona Christ

Talking about the early church after the harvest on the Day of Pentecost, St. Luke writes:

 "They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs were being done by the apostles. All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds  to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home  and ate their food with glad and generous  hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved." (Acts 2:42-47 NRSV)

A rather beautiful summary of the practices of the early church. After baptism, the newly minted believes shared life together, shared blessings and needs, shared the table, prayers and the Apostle's teaching.

The theological word used to describe the foundation of the early church's actions is the Greek word, Koinonia (κοινωνία) -- the shared life. The word itself has a depth of meanings that ask us to think through the ideas surrounding a partnership, a united, joined-together, sharing community. In fact,  Koinonia takes us into the movement of an intimacy with each one who claims residence within the church, an intimacy that goes beyond friendship toward a familial type of sharing.

Said another way, one gets the idea that, in the ancient world anyway, the radical move of accepting the Gospel proclamation of the Christ caused one's allegiance and location of concern to shift to a total reorganization of one's life. New ways captured them now, new friends, new daily activities and a new autobiography was conceived -- "my life before Christians" and "my life now with other Christians. That is, back then to accept the Jesus-way was to change the course of your life forever. [Such seems far from the case today when we change world views as easily as we change toothpaste.]

But, of course, there is a deeper Koinonia at work here, a Koinonia that moves the intimacy between fellow Christian believers beyond the natural realm -- shared food and shared time and shared teaching -- to a shared life between the called out assembly and the living, risen Christ himself.

Perhaps the easiest way to enter into this idea is to think about the conversion of St. Paul.  When, as Saul the Rabbi, the persecutor of those on the Jesus-way, he is struck down by the powerful presence of the Christ, Saul asks, "Who are you, LORD?" A natural enough question. The answer he received, however, was shocking and provocative. Saul hears a disembodied voice,  saying, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting."

Well, on the face of it such a statement is nonsense. First, Saul was not persecuting Jesus of Nazareth, for he had already been killed -- a failed Messiah. But, what St. Luke wants us to understand (and what Saul soon discovers) is that the Messiah Jesus was not failed at all, that he is alive and well and at work in the world, which meant that Saul was actually opposing the work and word of GOD!

But there is more. How was Saul persecuting Jesus himself when he carried off believers to prison? You see, what Saul also learned that day is there is such and intimacy -- such a Koinonia --  between the risen Christ and His people that to touch the hair on the head of a person on the Jesus-way, is to actually touch the Christ. I suspect that this is the origin of St. Paul's small but pungent phrase, "in Christ." (e.g Gal. 2:20)

What follows then is the important question for us. Namely, just how we -- the discipleship community, the Body of Christ -- are to find this intimacy with the living, risen Christ at this late date? I think an excellent case can be made that we meet the Christ when we practice those things that make us an actual called-out assembly. That is, in the waters of baptism, in the meal of bread and wine, in the hearing and preaching of the word, in the prayers and the sharing that meets needs, we "behold the face of the Christ" (Gordon Lathrop).

Said another way, when the assembly actually assembles and attends to the expressions of  what makes us Christian, Christ is somehow, realized, present and mediated through such expressions. Which means the lack of church attendance, and the somewhat anemic presentation of those historic and canonical practices may be regarded as the greatest threat to the resilience of the church in the West.