The Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost - October 13

Healed, Cleansed and Whole
Luke 17:11-19

I should begin by saying I am not a Greek scholar. I took one year of Greek in seminary, but it didn’t really stick. I retained just enough, though, to be able to use some resource books on Greek. I’m going to talk a little bit about some of the words in today’s Gospel, which was originally written in Greek.

It’s the story of the ten lepers. Jesus is entering a town and on the outskirts of the town ten lepers cry out to him for compassion. He responds compassionately, telling them to go show themselves to the priests. As they obey, they are cured. One of the ten, a Samaritan, returns to Jesus giving thanks and praising God.

Three different Greek words describe what happened to the lepers. In our translation those words occur as “made clean,” “healed,” and the leper who returns to give thanks is “made well.”

As they obediently responded to Jesus’ instructions, all ten lepers were “healed.” The word is used in a medical sense. Certainly in Jesus’ day disease and healing and medicine were understood very differently than they are today. Nonetheless, this word indicates relief from the symptoms of a disease.

Because that disease was leprosy, to be healed also meant to be made clean. Interestingly, the Greek word translated “made clean” is the root of our words cathartic or catharsis, but in this context it refers specifically to ritual or cultic cleansing.

As you may know, in Jesus’ day to have leprosy meant you were labeled as “unclean” by the religious laws and authorities. Mistakenly, people at that time thought of leprosy as highly contagious. Lepers were forced to stay away from others and if anyone approached them, they were required to call out “unclean, unclean.” This meant, of course, that they were excluded from general society, excluded even from the lives of their families, and excluded from the meaning and comfort of all corporate worship. Excluded from family, societal and religious life.

To be made clean was to have a life lived with the company of others restored.

All ten lepers were healed and cleansed. One, seeing that he had been healed and cleansed, stopped, and returned to Jesus, doing two things. He offered himself, prostrating himself in thanksgiving and he gave praise to God. Praise and thanksgiving. Our words doxology and eucharist. Giving voice to praise and offering oneself in thanksgiving.

And the leper who spoke his praise and offered thanksgiving was made “well.” The Greek word translated “well” in this passage is a word that is sometimes translated “saved” or “made whole.” In the Gospels it is most frequently used to describe a result of Jesus’ healings and it clearly means more than a medical cure… it means wholeness of person. Being found or put right. Sometimes it refers to what will happen in the Kingdom of God. But most of the time, it refers to something that happens in the present tense to those who are healed by Jesus.

For me wholeness seems to be maybe the best translation.

As I was reading about this passage I came across a wonderful definition of wholeness. A little different from what I might have said before. In this definition wholeness is not so much a matter of restoration or repair or even healing. It is a state of being where everything unholy is pushed out. A state of total holiness. All else is shut out of our person except the holy context. We are at one with God and one another, in a sublime moment of grace. I can almost visualize it physically. Holiness within us expanding until we are wholly holy.

By God’s grace, this transformation to wholeness to holiness happens when we are actively engaged in singing praise to God and in offering ourselves to God in thanksgiving. These are the transformative acts that bring about wholeness. When we give ourselves to praise of God and thanksgiving for God’s grace and blessing and presence with us in Christ we become holy and whole.

And we have cause and opportunity to praise God and offer ourselves in thanksgiving. It is right to give God thanks and praise. Always and Everywhere. No matter what is going on in our lives or in the world around us. Sing praise. If you need words, whether you sing them or say them, check out the praise section of the Hymnal. And come to the Eucharist, offering ourselves, our souls and bodies, all that we are in this action of thanksgiving for Christ’s living presence with us.

The leper who gave voice to praise of God and offered himself in thanksgiving was made whole.

As we praise God and offer ourselves in thanksgiving, by God’s grace we, too, will be made whole.

The Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost - October 6

You Can Do a Lot with a Little Faith
Luke 17:5-10

What would you do if you had more faith? If all of a sudden you were given a lot more faith, what would you do?

I imagine all of us have at least fleetingly considered the “if you won the lottery” question. (Do remember that the church has consistently opposed gambling as a means of church or government fund raising…) If all of a sudden I came into a heap of money, what would I do with it?

So what would you do with more faith if you had it? What would you do?

The disciples ask Jesus to increase their faith. It’s hard to know exactly what prompted their request. In this portion of Luke’s Gospel, Jesus has most recently been talking about forgiveness and the need to forgive the sins of a fellow disciple over and over again. Maybe the disciples just felt overwhelmed with the whole discipleship thing…

Regardless of the disciples’ motivation, most of us would probably join in their request. Increase our faith. Although I expect most of us would voice that request for more faith in the hope that it would bolster our belief. If I had more faith my belief or my trust in God would be more secure.

But faith is more than a body of belief; it is a verb. It is what we do. It is how we live our lives as disciples of Christ. Faith is what we do. At the very least asking the question: what would you do if you had more faith? reminds us that faith is about what we do.

 Jesus tells the disciples they really don’t need any more faith to do what disciples do.

He seems to say two related, but slightly different things. (1) You can do a lot with a little faith. And (2) the little things you do faithfully count for a lot.

It only takes faith the size of a mustard seed, the size of a pin head, to move mountains or mulberry trees. You can do a lot with a little faith. And by faithfully doing the little things of daily life, serving God and others obediently within the context of your daily life… by doing these little things, you are doing what disciples do, and that counts for a lot.

 As one commentator (David Lose) says, “Faith, in other words, is doing what needs to be done right in front of you and this, Jesus says, the disciples can already do. Folks who feel daunted by discipleship need to hear that sometimes faith can be pretty ordinary…. it really doesn’t take all that much faith to be, well, faithful.”

The little things of daily life, done faithfully, count for a lot.

• doing our work (The tasks or vocation of life. Doing them is good stewardship, and often the means of caring for others. That counts a lot.) 
• caring for those in need (Those near to us and more remote. That counts for a lot.) 
• protecting the vulnerable (Protecting those who are bullied or marginalized in any way. That’s the work of a disciple, and it counts for a lot.) 
• reaching out to the lonely 
• befriending the friendless (Doing those things counts for a lot.) 
• keeping the world going (Whatever that means in your life. Keeping God’s world going. That counts for a lot.) 
• contributing to the common good. 

 The little acts of daily living. Acts that any person can choose to do just by deciding to do them. But choosing to do them “faithfully” as a disciple makes a difference, I think. We “partner” ourselves with God in doing God’s work in the world. And that makes a difference at least for us. Then what we do is a part of God’s generosity, God’s love. And we have the resources and reserves of God to draw upon. And, for what it’s worth, when we do these little things faithfully, we’ll find that other aspects of faith—our belief and sense of relationship with God—will grow and increase.

 Like the disciples, we have the faith that we need to do what disciples do. With a little faith you can do a lot. And the little things of life, done faithfully, count for a lot when done as disciples of Christ.

The Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost - September 22

God Commends Jerks (and other deeper moral quandaries)
Luke 16:1-13 

Over the last few days I have read multiple commentaries and online sermon resources pertaining to today’s Gospel. Everyone of them agrees. This is the worst of all of Jesus’ parables. And probably the most difficult to preach on.

It is often called the parable of the dishonest steward. Although in the translation we heard, he is called a manager rather than a steward. Some people, trying to put a more positive spin on it, call it the parable of the shrewd or clever steward.

Writing about this parable in his Interpretation commentary on Luke Fred Craddock writes: “Many Christians have been offended by this parable… some find it a bit disturbing that Jesus would find anything commendable in a person who has acted dishonestly. Why that should prove offensive is not fully clear, for everyone is a mixed bag of the commendable and the less commendable.” He’s right, of course, all of us are a mixture of the commendable and the less commendable.

But I sympathize with the people who are offended by this parable, even if “offended” is a pretty strong word. I think I probably find it easier to believe that God will forgive a profound sinner, an adulterer or the proverbial axe murderer… I find it easier to swallow that God would forgive a profound sinner than that God would commend a dishonest, self-serving jerk.

Which got me thinking about jerks.

 One on-line comment directed me to a book on the Parables of Grace by Robert Farrar Capon. He was a pretty well-known Episcopal priest and author. His was a name I grew up with because my mother had his book, “The Supper of the Lamb.” It’s an interwoven series of theological musings and recipes. I still turn to it for my Cuban bread recipe. He died September 5. So I’ve recently been reading glowing tributes. But he was a jerk. At least the one time I met him.

The first parish I served in Houston was part of a group of parish who brought in relatively high profile speakers each year for their Lenten programs. The speakers would give presentations at each parish in turn. As a junior member of the clergy staff, it often fell to me to provide taxi service, driving the speaker from one parish to another. The minute Capon got in my car, without asking, he lit up. He started smoking! And then his presentation to our family-oriented Lenten supper was full of gratuitous profanity—the only purpose apparently to make him appear hip. He was a self-centered jerk. But I trust he feasts now in the presence of God at the heavenly banquet.

God most likely does commend jerks. Which is a good thing for all of us. God commends jerks. Not because even most jerks also have some good or commendable qualities. And I don’t think God only commends jerks when they do commendable things, even though that seems to be the implication of today’s parable. God commends jerks because God loves them.

My personal problem with this parable is a little different. I can get past God commending a dishonest jerk. I get stuck somewhere else.

Many commentators writing about this parable note what it was the steward actually did: He forgave others’ debts. (Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.) And he built relationships. These are what we call kingdom work. He is doing the work of God’s kingdom. But his means and his motives stunk. His means were dishonest and his motives self-serving.

So is Jesus saying: The end justifies the means??? Is Jesus saying: As long as you’re doing kingdom work it doesn’t matter how or why you are doing it? That’s not the moral world I want to live in. That’s not the moral landscape I personally accept… one where the end, even if the end is kingdom work, always justifies the means.

Parables are meant to stir us up, to unsettle us and help us see things in a new way. They are meant to provoke us to explore our perceptions. So this is where I end up with this parable this year:

1) God probably does commend jerks.

 2) I cannot automatically assume that my own “moral landscape” is the same as God’s. What I think of as good ethical behavior may not be the same as God’s perspective. I can’t presume to project my morals or ethics onto God, no matter how “good” I think they may be. It is hard for me to accept, as this parable seems to teach, that the ends justify the means. But I have to accept my personal confusion and discomfort that this parable provokes in me. And that confusion and discomfort challenges me to consider that my moral landscape and God’s may not be the same.

The Sixth Sunday after Pentecost - June 30

For Freedom, Christ Has Set Us Free

Galatians 5:1, 13-25 
Luke 9:51-62 

Now that we are in the long summer season of green ordinary time, the propers for each Sunday are actually keyed to the regular calendar, rather than the church calendar. So regardless of which Sunday after Pentecost it may be, the Scripture readings and collect we are using today are those appointed for the Sunday closest to June 29. Which is to say that every third year, when we are in lectionary year C, we get Paul’s proclamation about freedom on the Sunday before July fourth. It is interesting to explore Paul’s words within the context of this time when we celebrate our freedom as citizens of this nation.

 This nation’s freedom was born, of course, through the American Revolution. At that time the people living in this land were eager to gain freedom from British rule. Freedom from the oppression of their foreign overlord. Freedom from. Freedom in this sense is an escape from something binding or oppressive. But others have pointed out that true freedom is more than just freedom from. Its purpose is more than just escape. Its purpose is to create opportunity for a new future. Freedom for. Freedom for growth. Freedom for self-determination. The early leaders of our country understood this two-stage quality of freedom. The Declaration of Independence talks a lot about freedom from. Freedom from British domination and rule. But think about, would you really want to live in a country where the Declaration of Independence was the only statement of identity and purpose? Where all we are as a people is “not British?” That is an adolescent or immature sort of freedom. One which seeks to be free of all control, but lacks any sort of purpose.

But the Constitution takes the next step, into a more mature freedom. Freedom for. “We the people of the United States of American, in order to form a more perfect union…”

Freedom. Not just freedom from bondage, although that is certainly a good thing and an essential first step. But also freedom for. Freedom for a future with the opportunity to become something more. For freedom, Christ has set us free. Paul makes it clear that our freedom as Christians is not just an adolescent freedom from the requirements of the law so that we may pursue all sorts of self-indulgence. It is a freedom for the purpose of building up the Body of Christ.

One way to look at today’s Gospel passage is within the context of freedom. This is one of those so-called “difficult sayings” of Jesus. Jesus’ words appear harsh. To people who want to follow him he says, “No, you cannot say goodbye to your family; no, you cannot bury your father no, you cannot first bring in the crops.” I am on my way, Jesus says, follow me. Come or stay. You can’t do both. It would not hurt us to consider these words, harsh as they are, at face value in our own lives. They are a call to place our commitment to follow Christ as the highest priority in our lives. Something none of us does.

Yet we can also consider Jesus’ words in another light. And from this perspective they are not just insensitive, autocratic commands, they are teachings… teachings about freedom. Jesus is teaching his followers that they are free. Free to follow him. Free to become Christians. Free from the bondage of family and social expectations. In Jesus’ day the family was the core unit of the social structure. Personal and social identity and authority and opportunity (or lack of opportunity) were inextricably bound up with family. The rules and expectations were clear, strict, and very limiting.

In one sense Jesus says to his followers, “If you wish to be my followers you must break these rules.” That’s the harsh reading of his words. But in another sense, Jesus says, “As my followers, you are free to break these rules.” Liberating words. And, Jesus says, you will not loose your identity or worth or status, because your true worth and identity are not granted by society, they are given as a gift by God. You are free to become more than a child of your culture, you are free to become a child of God. You are free to become more than so-and-so’s third son. You are free to become a Christian.

That was a mind-blowing message at the time. That they were free to leave behind the limited and limiting expectations others had of them. Free to become what God created them to be.

It’s a lesson Jesus teaches, at least implicitly, throughout this Gospel passage. When Jesus passes through Samaria, he is shunned… for whatever reason. James and John, who see themselves as Jesus’ right hand men, seek retribution. “Jesus, let us rain down fire upon those Samaritans!” Retribution was the cultural expectation, the law of the land. But Jesus points out that they are free—free from that social obligation. Just think you much our world today would be improved if people knew they were free from the culturally imposed expectation of retribution or retaliation. I think of the conflicts in the Middle East and northern Ireland to the gang warfare among youth on the streets of Chicago to the demand for retaliation in professional sports… baseball, football, hockey. If only people knew they were free from the need to retaliate. As Christians, we are free. As citizens of the kingdom of heaven we are governed by laws of mercy, love and forgiveness. Free to act, not as society expects us to, but as God desires us to. Free to forgive rather than retaliate.

Freedom from the bondage of social rules and expectations. Freedom also perhaps from our self-imposed bondage to material needs. Luke tells us that Jesus is on the road “to Jerusalem.” To walk that path meant giving up “a place to lay his head.” Giving up the basic shelter that even the foxes and birds would have. But was it for Jesus a giving up, or a freedom from, the need for creature comforts? Putting aside, perhaps, the basic need for shelter, think about how we are enslaved by our material needs. I have read that those nuns and monks who live the simplest, most ascetic of lives may begin that way of life with a great sense of struggle and deprivation. But for many of them, at least, it becomes a life of immense freedom, freedom from dependence upon creature comforts. It becomes a life grounded in the awareness that all of our true, deepest needs are richly fulfilled by God. What freedom!

For freedom Christ has set us free. Us. We, too, have been set free. Free from what binds us. Free for a life as Christians, beloved children of God.

 For example: We are free to put aside society’s expectation that our schedules be filled with “meaningful” activities. We are free from the social assumption that our fulfillment as human beings is measured by the fullness of our calendars. Many of the things we do bring enrichment and pleasure, but we need not be enslaved by our calendars because our human fulfillment does not come through out participation in any of these activities, it comes from our membership in the Body of Christ.

We are free to put aside the drive for material stuff as our main goal in life. Not everyone is called to live monastic lives of ascetic poverty, but we are free to put aside material ambition because our treasure lies in the Kingdom of God.

We are free to work for justice and dignity among all people even when that work may be culturally unpopular. We are free to work for the oppressed and marginalized even when that work is derided by our peers. We are free because our status, our citizenship is secure in God’s kingdom. No one can tarnish or diminish our status before God. We are free to live as Christians in the world.

For freedom, Christ as set us free.

The bondage of culture or the freedom to live as Christians. We are free to choose.

The Fifth Sunday after Pentecost - June 23

One in Christ
Galatians 3:23-29

The epistle readings for the last few weeks have come from Paul’s letter to the Galatians. A significant focus in Galatians, certainly in a big chunk of chapter 3, is all about identity. Who are the people of God? And what makes someone God’s own? What constitutes identity as God’s people?

 Inevitably for Paul with his history and in his day this meant an exploration of the law, torah.

One commentator on this passage writes: “The torah has been Israel’s pride and joy; the psalmists of old sang its glories. Particularly since the reestablishment of religious life by Ezra after the exile, the torah has been Judaism’s distinguishing symbol. It was read in synagogues not only in Palestine but throughout the dispersion. Though the temple was sacked and the land snatched away, Jewish existence could continue because the torah was present. It made Israel to be Israel” (Charles B. Cousar, Interpretation).

The first few verses of the portion of Galatians we heard today are part of Paul’s discussion of torah. Paul wonders: In light of Christ’s coming, what was the purpose of the law in God’s overall plan for human kind? To discuss that in depth is a sermon for another day, but in brief, at least in these verses, Paul sees the law as a caretaker. “The law was our disciplinarian until Christ came.” The word translated disciplinarian could also be translated custodian or nanny/tutor. Torah was like someone who has benevolent custody of a child and guides and teaches, looking forward to some later fulfillment or maturity.

What is the ongoing role of torah for Christians? That is definitely a sermon for another day. (In today’s passage Paul seems to suggest that we no longer need any disciplinarian or custodian, but elsewhere in Paul and Jesus’ words in the Gospels still place high value on the law.)

But Paul’s discussion of the law is all background for his focus on identity. If torah was the symbol of what made Israel Israel… If torah is what made Israel the people of God…

Then what does it mean to be a person of God now that Christ has come?

Paul says that the identifying characteristic is now being “in Christ.” And it is God’s gift of faith that enables us to be “in Christ.” Faith in this context is not so much a conviction or affirmation of belief (that Jesus is the Son of God or your personal Lord and Savior). It brings the ability to recognize that God is offering you the opportunity to be his own. Think of Paul’s own conversation. It was the mind-blowing recognition that Jesus was talking to him, cared about him. It’s coming to awareness that through Christ, as Paul says in Romans, we are offered the identity of God’s children, adopted as sons and daughters of God. Being “in Christ” is nothing more and nothing less than knowing we are God’s own. To use another wonderful phrase of Paul’s: that we are “clothed in Christ.”

To offer a somewhat ludicrous example. I’m aware that right now there are people who are sleeping in Blackhawks jerseys—their identity as Blackhawk fans is that important. Or I guess you call them “sweaters” if you’re into hockey. But a lot of folks are wearing that identity a lot of the time. To be clothed in Christ is to wear a jersey every minute of the day and night that says, “I am God’s beloved child.”

Putting on that jersey identifies us as God’s own. Then, baptism is the symbol, the seal.

In the last few verses of today’s reading Paul gets to the excited culmination of his discussion.

We’re going to do a little exercise. We all identify ourselves in many ways. As members of a particular family, or by the job we do, or by some passion or interest of ours. So here are some examples of how those of us here might identify ourselves.

Raise your hands. How many here are male? Female? We could count and get the exact percentages of what portion is male and what portion is female.

How many live in Flossmoor? So all the rest of you live somewhere else…. How many live in Homewood? And how many in other communities with other names?

How many of you grew up with a brother? OK, the rest of you just cannot imagine what that experience is like.  Your lives were different.

How many were born in Illinois? In Maine, where I used to live, they have an interesting phrase. You are either from Maine or you are “from away.” There’s Maine. And there’s away. And you’re one or the other. And two feet into New Hampshire is “away.”

In another setting if we had more time and opportunity for conversation, I might ask about other ways of identifying ourselves.

Who voted Democratic in the last presidential election?
What is your racial identity?
Your sexual orientation?

Within this parish community we have individuals with differing identities on all of these issues.

So one more question. Raise your hands. How many of you are baptized in Christ?

Look around you. That is Paul’s point. That is Paul’s point.

There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.

All of these different identities were important in Paul’s day. Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female. They had huge implications within the society of his day. As, to a large degree, they do today. As the identities I named have significant implications in today’s society.

There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.

All of you are one in Christ Jesus!

Among those many ways each of us identifies herself or himself, although we may cherish our Christian identities, our identities as God’s beloved, I think we often put that identity as Gods own pretty low on the list of ways we identify ourselves. For Paul it was at the very top. Being “in Christ” was the pinnacle, the overarching, all consuming identity that dominated all others. And being “in Christ” is an identity that unites, rather than separates. For Paul, being “in Christ” was his most important identity.

What if it were for us? What if we wore our “Beloved Child of God jersey” on top of all our others? All of the time. Just think of the implications that would have.

The Fourth Sunday after Pentecost - June 16

God's Extravagance
Luke 7:36 – 8:3

How do you feel about extravagance? What is your gut reaction to extravagance? (This is another one of those Episcopal sermons.) So how do you feel about real extravagance? Either being extravagant yourself or receiving extravagance from others?

Maybe you are someone who relishes over-the-top experiences… Who likes living to the fullest in every moment. Extravagance means freedom, lack of regulation. Or maybe for you extravagance is purely negative, always irresponsible. Maybe you have mixed, complicated feelings when you think about being involved with extravagance.

For me the overriding feeling is discomfort. Discomfort at having extravagance bestowed upon me. And discomfort at the idea of being extravagant.

I read several commentaries on today’s Gospel and in both the woman who interacts with Jesus in this story was described as showing lavish or extravagant hospitality.

She bathes Jesus’ feet. She kisses him. She anoints him. These are all potentially reasonable acts of hospitality, of kindness shown to a guest. But she performs them extravagantly. Instead of having a servant wash his feet with water and a basin, she bathes his feet with her tears. She kisses his feet. And anoints him with costly perfume.

I looked up extravagant. It means: Lacking restraint. Exceeding what is reasonable.

That certainly fits the woman’s actions.

So how do you feel about extravagance?

Jesus’ comments draw a contrast between the unnamed woman and the Pharisee Simon. And Jesus clearly identifies the woman and her extravagance as the positive figure.

We don’t know much about the Pharisee except his name. He was probably a leader in the town. A man of some means. But certainly not extravagant in his hospitality.

And Jesus implies that Simon does not know forgiveness, does not know himself to be forgiven.

And here’s the heart of the message: Forgiveness is always extravagant. Forgiving someone who has wronged or hurt you is always extravagant. It is not reasonable.

Although we may try and persuade ourselves that forgiveness is a reasonable process. Maybe Simon did. We can imagine that he didn’t consider himself a sinner in need of extravagant forgiveness. He saw himself as a good person who occasionally slipped up on a few details following the law. And when he did he chose to perform the appropriate rituals of cleansing or restoration. And then he could be sure that he had put things right and his status as a good person was unthreatened.

But God’s forgiveness… God’s act of forgiving us… God’s yearning for reconciliation with us even though we sinners repeatedly and profoundly hurt God and shred our relationship with God. God’s eagerness to just put away our sins. That’s extravagant. Lacking restraint. Exceeding what is reasonable. What God does in forgiving us is extravagant.

Are you comfortable with God’s extravagance? The starting point is to acknowledge that we need extravagant forgiveness. That we are sinners through and through and only God’s extravagant forgiveness can reconcile us to God.

A lot of times it’s not easy. Simon didn’t get it.

We’d like this process of reconciliation to be more reasonable. Like Simon perhaps we think of ourselves as basically good people who make the odd mistake from time to time. And when we do, we take responsibility and we initiate a reasonable process of reconciliation… We make sure to come to church at least for a few weeks, say the general confession with extra sincerity, say a few “Hail Mary’s” if we were raised that way. And that’s it. Surely we don’t have to enter this world where extravagant forgiveness is needed or offered.

Except we are in that world. All of us need God’s extravagant forgiveness. And to be reconciled to God means to let ourselves be swept away by his extravagance. And we, in turn, respond with extravagant praise. Praising God not just circumspectly now and then, but without restraint. And we give of ourselves extravagantly. Not just reasonably what we can when we can, but extravagant self-offering.

This Gospel story is about extravagance. And it prods us to work at getting comfortable with extravagance. To participate in a world of extravagance. To welcome God’s extravagant forgiveness. To offer God extravagant gifts and praise.

The woman in this story knew herself to be a sinner. She also knew herself to be extravagantly forgiven. And she responded with extravagant love, praise and self-giving. We should be more like her.

The Second Sunday after Pentecost (proper 4) - June 2

Infallible Providence
Collect, Proper 4

As I was spending time with today’s propers this week—the collect and lessons appointed for this Sunday—I never really got past the collect. It’s old, dating back from medieval Latin service books.

As we pray it in English, one phrase in particular struck me. “O God… put away from us, we entreat you, all hurtful things.”

Put away from us all hurtful things. And then it continues—give us those things that are profitable for us. Put away from us all hurtful things. When the collect was written, this undoubtedly referred to external things that could hurt us. We pray to be protected from hurt. But as I hear it I wonder if it couldn’t have a broader meaning as well.

Put away from us all things that are hurtful. Put away from us all things that have the power to hurt. Put away from us, protect us, from all those things outside ourselves that might hurt us. Accident or illness. Or the meanness and unkindness of other people who have the power to hurt us.

But also put away from us the things that we bear, that we cling to, that have the power to hurt others. Put away from us all of the weapons we carry that give us the power to hurt others. Scorn, indifference, words that degrade or wound.

And also put away from us the things we use to hurt ourselves. We have the power to hurt ourselves. As we nurture anger until it festers, or put ourselves down, or carelessly neglect the lives and bodies God has given us.

Put away from us all things that are full of hurt. All things that have the power to hurt.

It seems to me that’s almost the only prayer we need on a daily basis.

But it continues: Give us those things that are profitable for us. I don’t know what the original Latin is, but the word “profit” is so wrapped up with financial assets in our minds it may be hard to get passed it. But this is from God’s perspective. Looking at ourselves with God’s eyes, what sorts of things are profitable for us? What things enable us to live more fully into the people God hopes for us to be?

Blessings profit us. Anything that brings holiness into our lives. Gifts, recognized as God’s gifts, are profitable for us. And being a blessing to others profits us because it knits us more closely into God’s work and presence in our lives.

Faith is profitable for us. As we pray that God will give us profitable things, let us pray for a deepening and strengthening faith.

The capacity to love and show compassion profit us. Hope and perseverance are profitable.

And reconciliation is profitable. Whenever we experience or work for reconciliation, for the healing of estrangement, we profit greatly. Reconciliation with one another always brings with it reconciliation with God.

So in this collect we pray for discernment, for God’s help in identifying those things in our lives that have the power to hurt. And we pray for God’s help to put away those hurtful things. And we pray for God’s help in identifying those things that profit us as children of God and for God’s help that we may welcome and cherish these profitable gifts.

And we are able to pray for, to hope for, this discernment and help from God because we are surrounded by God’s providence.

And that’s what this collect is really about. It’s really about God’s providence. Providence is not a word we use so much these days in general conversation and I have to remind myself what it actually means. I tend to think of it as meaning God’s plan or purpose. But that’s not it. It means God’s care and protection. God’s loving care and protection.

God’s providence is right there in the first phrase of the collect. Collects typically start with an address to God, followed by some descriptive phrase highlighting a particular quality of God. This collect highlights God’s never-failing providence. Our God is a God of never-failing love and protection for us.

I gather that first phrase of the collect has undergone some variation in different English translations. In the first English Book of Common Prayer, Cranmer translated it as God’s providence that “cannot be deceived.” Nothing in the world can deceive or distort or diminish God’s providence. A more literal translation would be God’s providence that is “infallible.” Cannot fail. God’s loving care and protection of us cannot be diverted, or diminished or fail in any way.

Ultimately, nothing can deny or destroy the loving care of God for us. This collect teaches us to trust in that never-failing providence—even when circumstances around us may seem to our eyes hurtful or uncertain.

This collect teaches us that God’s providence is never-failing. And in praying this collect our trust in the presence of God’s never-failing providence is increased. Praying helps believing. Praying over and over again builds trust. Especially as we remember the countless Christians who have prayed this prayer—in various languages—for centuries and centuries. Listen to their voices, to their prayers. Their witness to God’s never-failing care and protection.

 O God, your never-failing providence sets in order all things…