Jesus calls us to resurrection life: 19th after pentecost a

The first reading is Philippians 4:1-9.

El santo evangelio según San Mateo (22:1-14)

Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying:

      ²“The kingdom of heaven has been likened to a man, a king,

            who gave a wedding banquet for his son.

            ³He sent his slaves to call those who had been called

                  to the wedding banquet,

                  but they would not come.

            ⁴Again he sent other slaves, saying,

                  ‘Tell those who have been called:

                        Look, I have prepared my dinner,

                              my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered,

                              and everything is ready;

                                    come to the wedding banquet.’

                  ⁵But they made light of it and went away,

                        one to his farm,

                        another to his business,

                        ⁶while the rest seized his slaves,

                        mistreated them,

                        and killed them.

            ⁷The king was enraged.

                  He sent his troops,

                        destroyed those murderers,

                              and burned their city.

            ⁸Then he said to his slaves,

                  ‘The wedding is ready,

                        but those called were not worthy.

                              ⁹Go therefore into the main streets,

                              and call everyone you find to the wedding banquet.’

                  ¹⁰Those slaves went out into the streets

                  and gathered all whom they found,

                        evil as well as good;

                              so the wedding hall was filled with guests.

¹¹“But when the king came in to see the guests,

      he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe,

      ¹²and he said to him,

            ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?’

      And he was speechless.

      ¹³Then the king said to the attendants,

            ‘Bind him hand and foot,

            and throw him into the outer darkness,

                  where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’

                        ¹⁴For many are called, but few are chosen.”

El evangelio del Señor.

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“Rejoice in the Lord always.”

No matter what.

That is a tall order coming from Paul to the church in Philippi.  And much like our gospel reading today, this passage has frequently been interpreted, without sufficient context, in ways that are harmful. 

The number of people with mental illness, especially depression, who have been told “⁴Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” when their chemical, emotional, and mental contexts make their situation way more complicated than that easy exhortation is, perhaps, only rivaled by the number of people who have been told that today’s parable—or riddle—from Jesus means that God enacts harm and even kills some people or casually sends others to hell.

Neither of these interpretations are Gospel, or Good News, for God’s people.  They also don’t take into account the full context.  Take Paul, for example.  He’s neither telling depressed people to just try to be happier, nor is he prescribing the life of faith to be one of ignoring any suffering or injustice in the world.  God still calls us to weep with those who weep.  Instead, Paul speaks out of his own context, of suffering and faith, because Paul is writing to the church of Philippi from jail.  He has been imprisoned for his commitment to the Gospel in the face of an Empire that wants to keep a tight hold on its power.

So when Paul encourages us, with the church of Philippi, to “⁴Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice,” it’s not about ignoring reality or “fake it ‘til ya make it.” It’s the same commitment that landed him in jail in the first place.  God is bigger than the persecution of the Roman Empire and even the death that Paul will face.

So, in the face of injustice and even death, Paul exhorts followers of Christ to … continue following Christ, saying, “⁸Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence        and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. ⁹Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.”

Last week, Jesus told the religious authorities a riddle and they responded to it with a call for vengeance.            Wrong answer.            They didn’t get Jesus.  The religious authorities are operating from an understanding of God that is rooted in the way the world works, so Jesus brings them back to the cornerstone, saying, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes.” (Matthew 21:42)  The religious authorities’ understanding of God as a God of vengeance will be upended.  The ones rejected—the Crucified One—will become a resurrected people—and the Resurrected One.

This is the God who is Good News and to whom Paul is so committed that he will exhort us all to “⁴Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.”

Jesus furthers his point to the religious authorities with today’s parable.  While many try to allegorize today’s riddle and make God, or Jesus, the king, there’s more to the text—much more.

In the original Greek, it’s not that the kingdom of heaven is like a king, but instead it’s that “The kingdom of heaven has been likened to a man, a king.”  Jesus is calling out the religious authorities on their vengeful theology.

There are some who say God’s reign is like a powerful political leader—the powerfullest—throwing a big party.  This political leader invites all the most “important” people, but when the slaves go out to gather these important political and cultural people—the ones with influence and definitely money, these ones who have been invited decide they don’t want to come.  They snub the political leader—in a culture so heavily steeped in honor and shame, they shame this political ruler, diminishing his power and calling his authority into question.  After all, this was never just a wedding feast; it was always also a political gathering.

The political leader tries again, but the politicians and business owners, the celebrities and religious authorities, dismiss the slaves, or even kill them, taking away even more power from this ruler.

The king’s response?

Enraged, he throws a grown-up tantrum, as only one used to getting anything and everything he wants, can do.  The political leader kills those who refused to give in to his power—destroying entire cities in the process!  Cities filled with innocent people, completely unaware of the politics at play.

Then he tells his slaves—the ones with so little power that they really have no hope of doing anything but listening obediently.  He tells them that the ones who deemed him unworthy, rejecting his invitation, are the real “unworthy ones.”

It is reminiscent of childhood arguments where one kid calls the other a name, eliciting the well-known taunt, “I know you are, but what am I?”  But this king has all the power, so, to save face, calling the original guests unworthy, he “calls”—but what peasant could say no to a request from the king—you heard what he did to the powerful folks!—plus, there’s free food.  The political ruler calls everyone in town—“evil as well as good.”  The political leader gets his filled feast, the peasants get a bit of food, and maybe this won’t be a complete failure after all.

But when we think that it’s at last settled, this political leader notices the one person who has not completely followed his rule of law.  Tapping into the irony, the king calls this stranger “friend” and challenges his presence at the feast.  Then the political ruler throws him out and we are left to wonder about this outer darkness and the weeping and gnashing of teeth.

If “The kingdom of heaven has been likened to” this, I don’t want a part of their kingdom of heaven—and perhaps that’s Jesus’ point.  No one wins in this parable.  It is filled with violence and vengeance.  If God is the king, then God cannot be the source of all love, because love wouldn’t wipe out all of those towns or wield power in such harmful ways. 

And if Jesus can be found anywhere, it is in the man at the end, bound “hand and foot, and [thrown] into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

Jesus knows weeping and gnashing of teeth—it is the deep pits of suffering and imprisonment, it is the pit of depression, and it is from there that Paul writes.  It is from there that resurrection comes—true hope.  It is precisely because Jesus, our Cornerstone, knows pain, violence, oppression, and hell that our path of faith can challenge theologies of vengeance and can insist on rejoicing in the one who is more powerful than any fear or even death. 

It is not an ignorant rejoicing.  It is not a rejoicing that tries to “fix” those of us living with depression or mental illness.  It is a rejoicing that takes each moment as a moment, that lives out of the Love that grounds all life.  That is the God whom we follow in Christ Jesus.  That is the God to whom Paul is committed, even in prison.  That is the God who calls us to new life, to rejoice in a power greater than death.  To live into our resurrection life of hope.

Thanks be to God.

God's authority is given in baptism: 17th after pentecost a

A reading from Philippians (2:1-13).

¹If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, ²make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. ³Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. ⁴Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. ⁵Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,
 ⁶who, though he was in the form of God,
  did not regard equality with God
  as something to be exploited,
 ⁷but emptied himself,
  taking the form of a slave,
  being born in human likeness.
 And being found in human form,
  ⁸he humbled himself
  and became obedient to the point of death—
  even death on a cross.

 ⁹Therefore God also highly exalted him
  and gave him the name
  that is above every name,
 ¹⁰so that at the name of Jesus
  every knee should bend,
  in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
 ¹¹and every tongue should confess
  that Jesus Christ is Lord,
  to the glory of God the Father.

  ¹²Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; ¹³for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Word of God, Word of Life.

The other reading I reference is Matthew 21:23-32. 

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In the summer of 1523, with the debates and battles of the Reformation in full swing, the faculty of the University of Ingolstadt received a letter challenging their action in forcing a student to recant his support of the Reformation.

What is perhaps most stunning is that Argula von Grumbach, the author of the letter, was the only one speaking out against this injustice and as a woman whose husband was Catholic, the odds were stacked against her.  But von Grumbach had studied the bible and knew about the priesthood of all believers.   

She knew that, as we hear in Philippians, Jesus’ authority comes from God, and she knew that she was entitled to share in that authority.  She embraced the spirit of the Reformation and used her authority and call as a baptized child of God to speak out against injustice.  Truly, we could say to her, “it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for God’s good pleasure.”  God was indeed working through her.

Looking back, it’s clear to us, but it can be harder to recognize God at work in the moment, to acknowledge that God is up to something in us.  That’s partly why we have extended processes for ordination in both the PCUSA and the ELCA.  Recognizing God’s call in us is important, and we also work together as communities of faith to recognize God’s call in each other.

Sometimes the call is to leadership in the community or congregation and sometimes it is to ordination, as was the case when you all recognized and affirmed gifts for ordained ministry in Leah and Carina.

In 1832 the New York Synod recognized that God was calling Jehu Jones to ordained ministry.  Born to enslaved parents who were freed when he was 12, Jones joined a Lutheran congregation in Charleston, South Carolina, which encouraged him to pursue ordained ministry in the North.  Jones became what we would call a mission developer in Philadelphia, founding multiple congregations throughout his ministry.

Jones knew with a greater depth than we could know what it means that Jesus “emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.”  Jones’ ministry was founded on the authority of God and even as he faced a lack of financial support for his ministries and mission as one aspect of racism in both the culture and the church, he persevered in what God was calling him to do.

The Lutheran Church recognized and affirmed God’s authority at work in Jehu Jones and called him into difficult ministry and Jones persevered through it all.

Then fast forward to 1990 when the predecessor organizations to Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries ordained first Jeff Johnson, Ruth Frost, and Phyllis Zillhart and then in the years leading up to the ELCA’s 2009 policy change they ordained another 15 people who had been banned from ordination in the ELCA due to sexual orientation and/or gender identity.  When these “extraordinary ordinations” took place, it was clear to those working toward policy change that eventually the ELCA would change its policy, and so people talked about borrowing their authority from the future.

They knew God was at work in them, and they knew that “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice," so, in the spirit of the Reformation, they did what was simultaneously controversial and faithful.  They “look[ed] to the interests of others” who would follow in their footsteps toward ordination.

Although this month we will celebrate the 500^th anniversary of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation, the Reformation didn’t happen in the 1500s and then stop.  It continues even today.  We continue to find new ways that the Holy Spirit is at work.

As in today’s gospel, we continue to hear people in positions of power question the authority of others to do the work of God, but Jesus still responds, pointing to the work of ordinary people like John the Baptist, Argula von Grumbach, Jehu Jones, Jeff Johnson, Ruth Frost, and Phyllis Zillhart, whose power and authority come by the Holy Spirit.

In Philippians, we hear the exhortation, “⁵Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, ⁶who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, ⁷but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.  And being found in human form, ⁸he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.

“⁹Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, ¹⁰so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, ¹¹and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Who else has heard this exhortation?  Who else proclaims this Good News?  Are there others today who humble themselves—perhaps in controversial ways—to look to others’ interests?

We don’t need to be powerful in this world to make a difference.  God empowers each of us.  Argula von Grumbach made a big difference without much power.  Jehu Jones’ persistence testified to God’s authority at work in him who was born into slavery.  Without those first 3 or 18 extraordinary ordinations, there wouldn’t be 274 publicly identified lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer members in Proclaim.

Jesus’ controversial claims, like the one in today’s gospel, are part of following Jesus.  They’re intended to make us and others think.  So as we wonder about Jesus’ controversies we can also wonder: when Colin Kaepernick takes a knee, who is it for?  When the president tweets, when a protest is held, when something happens that rubs us the wrong way or makes us feel defensive, what is the real issue and how does it impact the most vulnerable?

Protests and controversies aren’t intended to make us comfortable, but they make us wonder with the crowd around Jesus: whose authority is most important?  How is God at work?  What would Jesus have to say about helping hurricane recovery in Puerto Rico, about the importance of the lives of Black people who face racism daily, about the immigrants in our community who face discrimination, and about those who will be banned from this country by the newest travel ban?

Jesus preaches and teaches with divine authority and as we follow him, he calls us to “look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others,” to bend our knee at the name of Jesus and in service to others, because that is God’s call for us in baptism.

Thanks be to God.