First Reading
Joel 2:23–32 (track one)
“Be glad, O children of Zion,
and rejoice in the LORD your God,
for he has given the early rain for your vindication;
he has poured down for you abundant rain,
the early and the latter rain, as before.
“The threshing floors shall be full of grain;
the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.
I will restore to you the years
that the swarming locust has eaten,
the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter,
my great army, which I sent among you.
“You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied,
and praise the name of the LORD your God,
who has dealt wondrously with you.
And my people shall never again be put to shame.
You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel,
and that I am the LORD your God and there is none else.
And my people shall never again be put to shame.
“And it shall come to pass afterward,
that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh;
your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
your old men shall dream dreams,
and your young men shall see visions.
Even on the male and female servants
in those days I will pour out my Spirit.
“And I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes. And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved. For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the LORD has said, and among the survivors shall be those whom the LORD calls. (ESV)
Sirach 35:12-17 (track two)
12 Give to the Most High as he has given to you,
generously, according to your means.
13 For he is a God who always repays
and will give back to you sevenfold.
14 But offer no bribes; these he does not accept!
15 Do not trust in sacrifice of the fruits of extortion,
For he is a God of justice,
who shows no partiality.
16 He shows no partiality to the weak
but hears the grievance of the oppressed.
17 He does not forsake the cry of the orphan,
nor the widow when she pours out her complaint.
Or,
Jeremiah 14:7-10,19-22 (omitted verses in italics)
“Though our iniquities testify against us,
act, O LORD, for your name’s sake;
for our backslidings are many;
we have sinned against you.
O you hope of Israel,
its savior in time of trouble,
why should you be like a stranger in the land,
like a traveler who turns aside to tarry for a night?
Why should you be like a man confused,
like a mighty warrior who cannot save?
Yet you, O LORD, are in the midst of us,
and we are called by your name;
do not leave us.”
Thus says the LORD concerning this people:
“They have loved to wander thus;
they have not restrained their feet;
therefore the LORD does not accept them;
now he will remember their iniquity
and punish their sins.”
The LORD said to me: “Do not pray for the welfare of this people. Though they fast, I will not hear their cry, and though they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence.”
Then I said: “Ah, Lord GOD, behold, the prophets say to them, ‘You shall not see the sword, nor shall you have famine, but I will give you assured peace in this place.’” And the LORD said to me: “The prophets are prophesying lies in my name. I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds. Therefore thus says the LORD concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name although I did not send them, and who say, ‘Sword and famine shall not come upon this land’: By sword and famine those prophets shall be consumed. And the people to whom they prophesy shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem, victims of famine and sword, with none to bury them—them, their wives, their sons, and their daughters. For I will pour out their evil upon them.
“You shall say to them this word:
‘Let my eyes run down with tears night and day,
and let them not cease,
for the virgin daughter of my people is shattered with a great wound,
with a very grievous blow.
If I go out into the field,
behold, those pierced by the sword!
And if I enter the city,
behold, the diseases of famine!
For both prophet and priest ply their trade through the land
and have no knowledge.’”
Have you utterly rejected Judah?
Does your soul loathe Zion?
Why have you struck us down
so that there is no healing for us?
We looked for peace, but no good came;
for a time of healing, but behold, terror.
We acknowledge our wickedness, O LORD,
and the iniquity of our fathers,
for we have sinned against you.
Do not spurn us, for your name’s sake;
do not dishonor your glorious throne;
remember and do not break your covenant with us.
Are there any among the false gods of the nations that can bring rain?
Or can the heavens give showers?
Are you not he, O LORD our God?
We set our hope on you,
for you do all these things. (ESV)
Second Reading
2 Timothy 4:6–8, 16-18 (0mitted verses in italics)
For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.
Do your best to come to me soon. For Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. Luke alone is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is very useful to me for ministry. Tychicus I have sent to Ephesus. When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, also the books, and above all the parchments. Alexander the coppersmith did me great harm; the Lord will repay him according to his deeds. Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposed our message.
At my first defense no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me. May it not be charged against them! But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. So I was rescued from the lion’s mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. (ESV)
Gospel Text
Luke 18:9–14
He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” (ESV)
Comments and Questions for Discussion
First Reading
Joel text (track one)
There are several rabbit trails I could go down in talking about this passage from Joel. We’ll see how well I can focus on just one or two!
The first is one that’s easy to overlook, but one that is particularly important to me personally. The date and time of Joel’s prophecy can’t be well established, but he prophesies in the midst of terrible devastation caused by an invasion of locusts that have destroyed the agriculture and economy of the Southern Kingdom. He has equated that destruction with the Judgment of God on a sinful people. He is never clear about the nature of the sin, only that it calls for genuine repentance. (Rend your hearts and not your garments.)
As we begin this week’s reading though, Joel’s theme shifts from judgment to restoration. All that has been taken away will be returned. The threshing floors will be full with grain, the vats of oil will be full.
And here’s the phrase that I’d like you to notice. “I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten.” Even lost time will be restored. This phrase was really important to me during a difficult time in my life when I was being restored after going painfully off the rails. I had repented, I knew that I was forgiven. Unburdened, I felt a renewed sense of purpose and vision for my life, but I was plagued with regret. Regret for lost time and opportunity. When my spiritual director and I finally recognized this new attack from the accuser, she brought me to this page in the book of Joel, to this verse.
I will restore to you the years
that the swarming locust has eaten.
This is the promise God holds out to every penitent. Even the time that was lost will be restored to you. I don’t understand the whole of it, certainly not the how of it, but I know that in that moment I felt the weight of regret lift from my shoulders and I felt greater freedom to walk into the path that had been laid before me. Perhaps God granted more more productive years. Perhaps I’ve just been more fruitful in the years given to me because of the lost time. Maybe it’s something else entirely. But whatever the case, the time is not lost.
Okay. One other thing. I said I’d try to keep it to two.
This passage from Joel is probably the one that sounds most familiar to us because Peter quotes a part of it on the Day of Pentecost.
“And it shall come to pass afterward,
that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh;
your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
your old men shall dream dreams,
and your young men shall see visions.
Peter understood that day to have been a fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy. But a fair number of biblical commentators would quibble with Peter. (I know!)
Read in the context of the rest of that chapter of Joel, we can understand why, I suppose. Joel foresees this outpouring of the Spirit as an immediate precursor to the “great and awesome Day of the Lord.” And as this final day of judgment has not yet fallen upon us, the outpouring at Pentecost could only have been (as one commentator put it) a “foretaste” of the coming of the Spirit that Joel foresaw.
This confusion seems to me to be the result of our inveterate habit of trying to confine God to a timeline that makes sense to us. As I have come to understand it, all those future realities to which the commentators point, those things that haven’t happened yet, are already realities in the heart and mind of God. God doesn’t do timelines. For God all reality is Now. Those future realities have impact on us now, or can. Indeed, our task as messengers of the Gospel is to bring Kingdom reality to bear on the present as we experience it here. “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
It may seem like I’m the one doing the quibbling here, and perhaps I am, but I think this distinction is important. The coming of the Holy Spirit wasn’t just an appetizer to get us ready for the real thing on the Last Day. It is a manifestation of that reality in this moment that we’re able to comprehend. It’s like the way that some sci-fi writers try to talk about interstellar travel through the “folding” of space. Two impossibly distant points become adjacent, share reality through this folding. Well we, as we place our trust, our faith in the reality that seems future to us fold our timelines so that both present and future occupy the same moment, and miracles happen. The Spirit makes it possible to be understood even though we don’t know each others’ languages, people are healed, the oppressed are delivered, the dead are raised.
As an Episcopal priest I believe in that miracle of folding time every time I step to the altar to celebrate the Eucharist. We are instructed to do what we do at the altar “in remembrance of me.” This isn’t a mere recalling of some distant past event, but “anamnesis,” a “knowing again” that brings the past into the present, so that two moments touch. And it also pulls into the present moment the future reality of the feast of the Wedding of the Lamb. Past, future, present, all entangled with one another as time is bent into the Now of God.
So, perhaps Joel might not have anticipated that Pentecost would be a manifestation of the Last Day, but that doesn’t mean that it wasn’t.
Now that, my friends, is a real rabbit trail. I hope I haven’t completely lost you!
Sirach (Wisdom of Ben Sira) text (track two)
The book called by several names, but in our Lectionary called “Sirach” this week, comes to us from the early second century BCE. Scholars date it from about 190 to 180. It is said to have been written during the time of the Seleucid empire (Greek). Most students of this book see it as having been written by Ben Sira himself, who was well versed in the “wisdom” literature of his time. His book of maxims closely resembles Proverbs, and echoes the themes of that book.
In our reading for this week we see one of those themes presented, that is, God’s concern for the poor and powerless. What is less obvious here, because our reading ends where it does, is that this passage begins a transition from God’s concern for the oppressed individual to God’s care for the oppressed nation. There is a “hymn” in chapter 36 that calls on God to come to the aid of the people of Israel and wreak vengeance upon her enemies. It is so different in tone from the rest of the book that some commentators have suggested that it is a later interpolation, perhaps from the Maccabean period. But the latter verses of chapter 35 (which we will not read this week) actually make the transition to the hymn, so I’ll cite them here, just so you can see how chapter 36 fits.
18 Do not the tears that stream down her cheek
19 cry out against the one that causes them to fall?
20 Those who serve God to please him are accepted;
their petition reaches the clouds.
21 The prayer of the lowly pierces the clouds;
it does not rest till it reaches its goal;
Nor will it withdraw till the Most High responds,
22 judges justly and affirms the right.
God indeed will not delay,
and like a warrior, will not be still
Till he breaks the backs of the merciless
23 and wreaks vengeance upon the nations;
Till he destroys the scepter of the proud,
and cuts off the staff of the wicked;
24 Till he requites everyone according to their deeds,
and repays them according to their thoughts;
25 Till he defends the cause of his people,
and makes them glad by his salvation.
26 Welcome is his mercy in time of distress
as rain clouds in time of drought.
You can see that by verse 25, the one being defended is no longer an individual, but a people, and this sets the stage then for chapter 36. I won’t include all of that text here, but if you’d like to read it, HERE’S A LINK to Sirach, chapter 36.
Having said all that, I think the thing I take away from this text is that, especially in the centuries just before the time of Jesus, there was a strong link in the minds of the people of Judah between the plight of the poor and the plight of God’s oppressed people.
Or,
Jeremiah text
To me, the most interesting section of our reading from Jeremiah for this week is the part that was omitted, the parts in italics above. The verses that we will read on Sunday are familiar. Some of them very familiar, “Yet you, O LORD, are in the midst of us, and we are called by your name; do not leave us.” (Used in the evening office called Compline.) But the verses that we’ve skipped over add something to Jeremiah’s well-rehearsed litany of doom and gloom.
We know from most of the book that Jeremiah’s prophecies of impending destruction were not well received among the people or their rulers. What we may forget without the verses in italics is that he was competing with many other voices that were prophesying exactly the opposite. It wasn’t just that the people were stubborn in refusing to hear Jeremiah. They had other “prophets” to listen to who told them what they wanted to hear.
It is significant to me that Jeremiah was moved to include that conflict among the texts that he left us. It is one thing to prophesy to a “stiff necked people” who don’t want to hear you. It seems something quite different to find yourself opposed by others who claim to speak “peace” in the name of the Lord when there is no peace.
It also seems to me that this is quite the reverse of what those who follow Jesus are called to do in my own time. We are called to speak peace to a world that is too afraid to hear it, but worse, we speak peace in the name of Jesus while others, many others, speak something else altogether. I think we can be forgiven for echoing some of Jeremiah’s complaints to God about his calling!
Second Reading
As I read these concluding words to Paul’s letter to Timothy, I hear the pain at his desertion and betrayal, and the faith that makes it all bearable. We can hear him almost reassuring himself that he has done all that was asked of him, and that his devotion has not gone unnoticed.
But I think that “crown of righteousness” that is laid up for him has been twisted into something Paul wouldn’t have recognized. I remember as a college student I was occasionally asked to come and sing at revivals at Baptist churches around Greenville. After one such meeting I was being driven home by a nice older member of that church. On the way she said to me, “Well, you certainly earned yourself another jewel for your crown!” I must have looked as confused as I felt because she went on. “You know, the crown of righteousness you’ll get in heaven! Tonight you added another gemstone to it!” Oh, that.
Paul does not mean that we’re all going to be wearing crowns in heaven. The only “crown” that he looks forward to is the declaration of his righteousness. The righteousness that is his by faith, because he has “loved His appearing.” And I love that the word that is translated appearing in our reading today is “epiphaneia.” Epiphany. The showing forth of Christ’s identity and glory and majesty. And the readings of that season often include His revelation to and through Gentiles. Leads me to wonder if there’s a link between this verse from the Apostle to the Gentiles and the naming of that liturgical season.
Gospel Text
“For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
That teaching echoes throughout the New Testament. Over and over again we find it, and Jesus gives us a parable here to illustrate it. But He doesn’t intend that we should all go about our days beating our breasts and refusing to raise our eyes to heaven. This parable and this teaching have been misunderstood in that way in too many corners of Christianity. Either unfortunate believers have been encouraged to repeatedly castigate themselves for sin they might not even be able to name, or some seem to have come to see no purpose in trying to behave righteously, leading Paul to need to say, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means!” (Romans 6:1-2a, ESV)
It’s really just a matter of how we position ourselves before God. Do we stand on our doings, our works? Or on His mercy, His righteousness? There can still be joy in the heart of the ones who place their trust in His mercy. This isn’t about breast beating, it’s about knowing where your righteousness comes from. The people who know how they stand before God and the Pharisee might look a lot alike actually, in worship. Both are smiling, both are generous. But if you sneak close enough, you can hear the difference in the prayers they mutter. There is “Thank you God for not making me like them!” and then there is “Thank you God for enabling me to do what I couldn’t have done on my own!”
You see, the things they do out in the world, they look a lot alike. But there is greater joy in resting in the mercy of God, acting out of mercy received, than there is in taking satisfaction in what is done in order to be judged righteous. It is my experience that those who do good in order to be found “good” eventually burn out. The pleasure in their good-doing isn’t enough to sustain them through the inevitable disappointments and betrayals. And they will come. Those to whom we intend to do good will often fail to appreciate us or what we do. But the one who does what she does out of love for the Mercy in which she is held, this one finds no insult in that disappointment, only sorrow for the other. One who knows she’s held in Mercy knows the same concerning the other to whom she ministers. And she knows the pleasure of the Father in whose name she ministers when she acts out of His bounty and not her own.
There is joy and empowerment to be had in seeking to live out of the abundance of mercy that is ours, and this joy and empowerment is what makes true obedience possible. Jesus used a parable. It’s never wise to try to make something too literal out of a parable. We aren’t intended to go about pounding our chests in misery. We are, however, intended to live in the joy that comes with being justified by mercy, not by our works.
