C, Post-Pentecost 5, Proper 10 - Amos 7:7-17 "Dread"

Amos 7:7–17 (ESV) This is what the Lord God showed me: behold, the Lord was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand. And the Lord said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord said, “Behold, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel; I will never again pass by them; the high places of Isaac shall be made desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste, and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.” Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, “Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel. The land is not able to bear all his words. For thus Amos has said, “ ‘Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel must go into exile away from his land.’ ” And Amaziah said to Amos, “O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, and eat bread there, and prophesy there, but never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a temple of the kingdom.” Then Amos answered and said to Amaziah, “I was no prophet, nor a prophet’s son, but I was a herdsman and a dresser of sycamore figs. But the Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’ Now therefore hear the word of the Lord. “You say, ‘Do not prophesy against Israel, and do not preach against the house of Isaac.’ Therefore thus says the Lord: “ ‘Your wife shall be a prostitute in the city, and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword, and your land shall be divided up with a measuring line; you yourself shall die in an unclean land, and Israel shall surely go into exile away from its land.’ ”

Picture yourself in Amos’s sandals.  You’re a sheep farmer and an orchardist and God calls you from your land into a different land.  Then God places before you visions and asks, “What do you see?”  You report what you see, then God calls you to proclaim his Word to others without fear or favour!

What you’re called to say, has occurred through the disobedience of the people, the priests, and the king to whom you’ve been sent.  God calls you to tell them, “God has dropped a dividing line between himself and you.  No longer will God be found in your places of worship, and your holy sanctuaries will lay in waste!”

In Amos’s time, God dropped his plumb line, saying, “Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel must go into exile away from his land.” (Amos 7:11 ESV)

It was God’s “line in the sand” set to cause dread amongst those who heard its proclamation.  Like Amos, having seen God’s vision and then told to tell others what God says, would you obediently report what you’re called to say?  It is a dreadful message to tell!  Who would you dread more; God or those to whom God calls you to proclaim the prophecy?

But it doesn’t end there.  This farmer come prophet from Judah is confronted by the priest of Bethel, Amaziah, who’s reported your prophecy to the king of Israel, and then tells him to get out of Bethel, go home, and prophecy there.  Imagine if God commissioned you to tell the priest, “Your wife shall be a prostitute in the city, and your sons and your daughters shall fall by the sword, and your land shall be divided up with a measuring line; you yourself shall die in an unclean land, and Israel shall surely go into exile away from its land. ” (Amos 7:17 ESV)

Would you dread telling this to the priest, or more so would you dread God, if you didn’t do what you were told to teach?

Like fear, dread has a positive and negative sense.  Today it’s mainly used negatively.  Dread and fear in a positive sense can lead a person in awe of someone to do great things. Like Amos, the prophets, our Lord Jesus Christ, his apostles and martyrs!  Or negatively, dread and fear can be quite awful, inciting panic and terror in those who refuse being rescued, by the likes of the prophets or the apostles, therefore remaining condemned guilty before God.

Two avenues of dread stand before Amos. Dread in reporting God’s Word to God’s people and how they would react to him.  Or not reporting God’s Word to his people and dreading how God would react with him, if he didn’t report what he was called to see and say!

This was the third vision God showed Amos, after stern prophecies were spoken against God’s people and king in Israel.  But it wasn’t to be the last vision or prophecy. 

The first two visions were firstly, locusts devouring at the end of the growing season.  And then secondly, judgement by fire which was to consume everything in the land.  But both times Amos interceded, and God relented.

Twice Amos says “O Lord God, please forgive! How can Jacob stand? He is so small!” (Amos 7:2,5 ESV) And twice, “The Lord relented concerning this: saying, ‘It shall not be’, and ‘this also shall not be.’” (Amos 7:3,6 ESV)

God’s people tested God, and Amos was sent by God to reveal God’s action against his people acting disobediently, the priests of God acting defiantly, and God’s king acting contrarily against God as a rebellious authority.

The plumb line prophecy was the third vision Amos saw, but it was the first of three in which God did not relent.  The first two were set to cause a godly dread and fear to turn God’s people in repentance back to him.  Now the third, fourth, and fifth prophecies were announced through Amos to reveal God’s opposition and cause them dread as they remembered what they defiantly didn’t do.

God showed Amos the fourth vision, and then God says, “‘Amos, what do you see?’ And Amos said, ‘A basket of summer fruit.’ Then the Lord said to him, ‘The end has come upon my people Israel; I will never again pass by them. The songs of the temple shall become wailings in that day,’ declares the Lord God. ‘So many dead bodies!’ ‘They are thrown everywhere!’ ‘Silence!’” (Amos 8:2–3 ESV)

God promises to no longer forgive his people, he will not pass by or over them in judgement. No longer heeding his Word, God would withdraw from the orchard and no longer grace them with his presence.  God’s own people will be separated from him, left to themselves as dead rotten fruit.  There is unanswerable silence, in God’s deadly absence. 

God reveals continuing dread in what they’ve sought for themselves, saying, “‘Behold, the days are coming,’ declares the Lord God, ‘when I will send a famine on the land— not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.’” (Amos 8:11 ESV)

To this the Psalmist adds, “I said, ‘You are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, like men you shall die, and fall like any prince.’ Arise, O God, judge the earth; for you shall inherit all the nations!” (Psalm 82:6–8 ESV)

God inherits the nations through death.  In fear and dread people return in repentance to God, through the daily death of self and its pride, or they await dreadful expectations in a death without the Word of the Lord to save them.

This is played out in the fifth vision of Amos where he sees God standing beside the altar saying, “Strike the capitals until the thresholds shake, and shatter them on the heads of all the people; and those who are left of them I will kill with the sword; not one of them shall flee away; not one of them shall escape.  All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, who say, ‘Disaster shall not overtake or meet us.’” (Amos 9:1,10 ESV)

God did not put the plumb line amongst his enemy.  No!  These were his own chosen people, descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  Amos was called by God, to leave his farm in Judah, to followed God north into Israel, to see the visions of God, and to tell them to the people of God.  Did he dread doing this?  To this Amos testifies, “For the Lord God does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets. The lion has roared; who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken; who can but prophesy?” (Amos 3:7–8 ESV)

God had sent a shepherd, to shepherd Israel, to warn them by sending famine in one place and not another.  Yet, over and over again, God’s people did not dread God’s judgement, causing him to declare, over and over again, “yet you did not return to me.” (Amos 4:6,8,9,10,11 ESV) “Therefore thus I will do to you, O Israel; because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel!” (Amos 4:12 ESV)

God prophecies through Amos, pointing forward to Jesus Christ as the resurrection of David’s rule that’s fallen, saying, “In that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen and repair its breaches, and raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old. I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them… I will plant them on their land, and they shall never again be uprooted out of the land that I have given them,” says the Lord your God.”  (Amos 9:11,14a,15 ESV)

In our church and society today, many believe, “disaster will not overtake or meet us.”  The use of fear and dread are looked down upon as “not loving our neighbour”.  Yet God is still showing his faithful plumb line, a line in the sand in his Son Jesus Christ.  The Holy Spirit continues to open God’s Word to us; in the hope we receive Christ from our neighbours and share Christ with our neighbours.

When the silence of death comes, God will inherit the earth.  When we silence God’s Word of warning and believe “disaster will not overtake or meet us”, we should expect to dread, a death in the domain of darkness and the silencing of our sin.  Yet when we turn and trust in God, who will judge all things, then fear and dread leads us to the cross, to cover our sins with Jesus atoning blood for forgiveness, eternal light and life.  

Killing the prophets, re-crucifying Christ, not allowing the Holy Spirit to make us righteous in God’s Word, is still a current warning to all humanity, including you, regardless of how unpopular it is.  The writer of Hebrews reminds God’s people in Christ of his plumb line, “For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?” (Hebrews 10:26, 29 ESV)

The saints of God are still being physically and spiritually martyred for their faithfulness.  Where we are shown to be the killers of God, God’s Word and his people, may the dread of this, lead you and me to repentance from the domain of darkness.   So, having been transferred into the kingdom of God’s eternal light, we live in the assurance of God’s forgiveness of our sins. Amen.

Let us pray! Thanks be to God, who still sends out disciples and saints to share God’s Word with their neighbours.  Thank you for pastors who put aside the dread of proclaiming the truth of your Word, so we, your disciples, can be taught and encouraged to proclaim your message of life without fear or favour, without dread or distraction.  Thank you that the death of Jesus Christ saves from the greater dread and fear of eternal death. Amen. 

C, Post-Pentecost 4, Proper 9 - 2 Kings 5:1-14 "The Problem of Being Parochial"

So [Naaman] went down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the word of the man of God, and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.  (2 Kings 5: 14 ESV)

There’s not a better feeling being clean after one has endured in the stench of a filthy body for some time.  Even better is the peace and tranquillity of health after the churning and trauma of illness.  Picture Naaman standing clean in health after he had suffered at the hand of skin disease.  No more sores, no more oozing, no more itching and stinging, the smell of failing flesh is gone, and so too is the social stigma of being a carrier of leprosy.

But there’s a stigma that’s even worse than the physical ailment seen by all; it’s one not seen by the naked eye of humanity.  Yet it’s more debilitating, and every one of us are long sufferers and loathers of this stigma we bear in the being of our flesh every day.  This is the oozing, rancid, reality of sin.  Like Naaman all of us have a deep-down desperate desire to be rid of the sickly stench of our sinfulness.

However, it’s surprising Naaman even had the opportunity to be cleansed, let alone the cleansing once he was given the advice which would free him from the foulness of his flesh.  We hear…

…Naaman came with his horses and chariots and stood at the door of Elisha’s house.  And Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean.”  But Naaman was angry and went away, saying, “Behold, I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call upon the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper.  Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?” So he turned and went away in a rage.  (2 Kings 5:9-12)

Now it’s easy for us to understand Naaman’s anger.  Why?  Because each of us bear the same pride as that of Naaman.  This pride manifests itself in his parochial attitude; the same parochial short sightedness as all of us bear.

A little test will demonstrate our bias.  Are you a cat person or a dog person?  What about Ford or Holden?   After all we all know Fords are “Found On Rubbish Dumps”, and Holdens are Holes, Oil Leaks, Dents & Engine Noise.  Perhaps you’re a lover of the green John Deere over the mighty Red of the Case or blue of the New Holland.  How about your political alliance; that always causes the hackles to flair!  And when it comes to the footy, surely we all stand as one!  Dare I even mention the other code and how they hold and kick a football! 

The point of this little, perhaps humorous, exercise demonstrates how our pride leads us away from listening, into opinions which are more or less built on emotive judgments.  It’s more than coincidence when a “one eyed supporter” evokes a war of words, always with another who’s just as opinionated it seems!  Pride always rubs pride up the wrong way!

Naaman expected big things from Elisha.  And Elisha surely delivered, but not as the military man had expected.  No pomp and ceremony, not even a face-to-face meeting, and washing in the waters of the Jordan, that’s just laughable; ludicrous!  Like Naaman, being parochial causes us problems.

But how did Naaman come to the point where he was commanded to wash in the Jordan seven times?  These are a string of events that break the parochial single mindedness of the most powerful people, and they all start with the capture of a little child.  In the scheme of earthly things, this young girl is a nobody; she amounts to nothing in the big picture of Syro-Israeli relations.  We can be quite confident there wasn’t talk of her capture in the halls of power at Damascus or Samaria.

Yet this is from whom the whole even unfolds!  A captured child of Israel speaks to her mistress, the wife of Naaman, about what Elisha, the prophet in Israel would do.  This little child speaks and cuts through layers of protocol and parochial etiquette.  She could be mistaken as obnoxious for speaking out of turn; after all she is a slave.  But against pride and protocol the wife listens to her, then Naaman listens to his wife, and then the king in Damascus listens to his leprous military leader, and sends word to his enemy, the king of Israel.

And it gets a hostile parochial reception from the Israelite king.  As it would from any of us!  After all this is the enemy king, requesting for his unclean military commander, one who has been very successful in leading battle against Israel, to be healed of an incurable disease.  What would the Israelite king have thought, when confronted with a leprous, Gentile, warlord, breaking all the boundaries of parochial protocol?  Surely, he’s picking a fight with this request!

“Am I God, to kill and to make alive, that this man sends word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? Only consider, and see how he is seeking a quarrel with me.” (2 Kings 5: 7)  Is the king’s conclusion!  The irony in his words names God yet exposes his lack of trust in God but rather trust in his own parochial godliness.

How often do we listen to the parochial god within rather than trust the eternal Father in heaven whose desire it is to free us from the longsuffering stigma of sin which kills and causes our narrow-mindedness?  How quick do we depart from the word of God and trusting in our own limited understanding lose sight of the cross?  And when the going gets tough, how habitually do we fall into the mindset that the tough must get going rather than allowing the Holy Spirit access into our being so we can pray and ponder God’s word, therefore glorifying all that has been done for us?

Like Naaman we get angry; like the king we tear at ourselves fearing the worst and unlike the little Israelite slave girl we hang onto our parochial ways to the detriment of grace, mercy and peace.

 After he is encouraged to listen to the command, I imagine Naaman went down into the Jordan, just to prove a point.  “I’ll show them all how ridiculous is bathing in the Jordan!”  Defiantly he doesn’t even wash, but just dips in the river seven times and is healed.  Now Naaman, the mighty military man from Syria is released from his scourge and like the little slave girl through whom God began the whole process now too carries the same innocent clean smoothness of her flesh and faith.

Surely the events recounting Naaman’s healing are a reminder to us Gentiles to return to Word of God.  To repent and daily trust in the actions of God in his Word, and what he has done for you having been baptised into Jesus’ death and resurrection.  Having had the old parochial sinful self, buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. (Col 2:12)

Let the Holy Spirit continue leading you from the stigma of all your sin, into the promised peace and holiness of your heavenly home, together with God the Father and Jesus Christ his Son, your Lord and Saviour.  Amen.

C, Post-Pentecost 3, Proper 8 - Galatians 5:1,13-25 "The Divine Dance"

The Apostle Paul writes to the Galatians because they’re in the process of turning their backs on the freedom they have won in Jesus Christ. 

He gets straight to the point in chapter one, saying, “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.” (Galatians 1:6–9 ESV)

The issue is a group was seeking to reintroduced circumcision as an addition for salvation, and the Galatians were welcoming it.  Circumcision is nothing in itself, but the requirement to be circumcised is righteousness through works, that destroys all the works of God that brings a person to baptism and keeps one in their baptism. 

Saint Paul uses strong language since any works that one adds to God’s works, makes you, me, and the Galatians liable of sinning against the Holy Spirit.   When you and I use freedom to sin against God, you and I are addressed as ill witted Galatians, as Paul brings shame on them, saying, “O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith.”  (Galatians 3:1–5 ESV)

The Galatians were on the brink of piling contempt on the work of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit through their actions of freedom.  To those who were forcing the Galatians back to circumcision, Paul says, “I wish those who unsettle you would emasculate themselves!”  (Galatians 5:12 ESV) In other words, rather than forcing others into works of circumcision, he would rather those who demanded this would amputate everything off themselves, so there was no possibility of circumcision.

However, rather than circumcision or emasculation, that “cuts off”, Paul points out that all have, “put on” Jesus Christ in baptism — both Jew and Gentile, slave or free, man and woman.  All now share in the same discipleship!  Anything one thinks they need to add to this, to be effective, undermines the work of the Holy Spirit and submits one to a yoke of slavery once again.  Anyone who requires someone else to do these additional  works, be it circumcision or any other work, works contrary to Jesus Christ, with a “different or distorted gospel”.   When one seeks or orders this for effective discipleship, Paul says, “Let them be accursed”!  

Emasculation and being accursed are strong words that hopefully move you to consider how you function as a Christian and as Christians.  Or, better said, how you allow the Holy Spirit to give you life!    Paul says to you, “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.” (Galatians 5:13 ESV)

Today “love” can be a slippery word.  Love is love, the worldly banners proclaim, but the hidden truth, of the world, is all love is not the love the Holy Spirit works in and through us!  Three types of love can be noted here, but there is only one love to which Paul points.

The first two are passions of the flesh.  This is desire from within that is either vulgar evil desires, or seemingly good righteous desires that sees one climb up to God to do the greater good. 

Vulgar evil desires or passions are self-explanatory.  You and I know exactly what they are when one lusts after, or hates, another person in their heart.  But good righteous desires are a little more difficult for us to discern.  These desires subtly deceive the faithful because they seem godly!  But in fact, they’re the same fleshy desires that deliver us ultimately into death. 

Firstly, and foremostly, these good desires were the works of circumcision amongst the Galatians.  But the works can be any works of righteousness that dilute and desecrate the holy work of God the Father, in his Son, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. 

The problem of climbing up to do the work of greater good, assumes we can climb up to God in the first place.  Even in our minds, if we believe we have ascended to the heights of God, we want to be like God.  Then, like the circumcision party or any other pietistic or self-righteous group, our own law is proclaimed for others to follow.

In the second place, the problem of climbing up to do the work of greater good shows contempt for God’s will, his Word of law and gospel, and for God himself, who always comes down, to create and recreate.  We heard on Pentecost Sunday at Babel when the world worked as one to build themselves up to God, God still had to come down.  And once there, he destroyed their collective good, which in reality was not good at all. 

Similarly, any greater good worked in God’s church needs to be enacted by the Holy Spirit, lest it’s only an act of self-righteousness against God’s righteousness.  A work of Divine love always begins with God, and ends with God, and it works in us to work for God.  Any other work just does not work.

When we realise our passions and desires don’t work, the work of God has begun to bring Jew and gentile, slave and free, man and woman, into step with the Holy Spirit.  This is the Holy Spirit, two step, of law and gospel!  This is the place where the Holy Spirit begins to teach you and me how to be one church, in a beautiful dance with our Saviour, Jesus Christ.  The Holy Spirit perfectly aligns us, the body of Christ, and individual members of it, with the Head, our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ came down to us and allowed the Holy Spirit to choreograph him in his life and ministry.  This is the love of God to which Paul and the Apostles point us in God’s Word.  Now, Jesus and our Father send the Holy Spirit to choreograph us, with the Word, to dance with Jesus in a Divine Dance. 

With this picture we can see how Paul calls us to allow the Spirit to direct us into the fluidity of Christ’s love with him in this Divine Duet.  This is not a dance like a disco, where individuals decide to do “whatever they like”, chaotically bouncing up and immediately falling right back down, crashing into each other, like out-of-control human pogo sticks!

Paul says, “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.”  (Galatians 5:16–18 ESV)

And so, Paul gives us the first of two lists in which we are called to see ourselves in the reflection of God’s Word.  In showing you the law in the first list, you see the fickle fleshy reality of your dance moves, so the Holy Spirit can move you and lead you, from the disjointed desire for a disco disaster, into the dance that bears all the holy fruit in the second list.

In our dance with Jesus Paul tells us exactly what the work of the Holy Spirit is.  “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” (Galatians 5:24 ESV)

Therefore, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.” (Galatians 5: 25 ESV) Let us let the Holy Spirit keep on crucifying the flesh with its passions and desires. Amen.

Extras for Contemplation

Let’s now look at the lists to hear how the Holy Spirit works to keep us with in step with him, Jesus Christ, and our Father in heaven.

Unhelpful fleshy desired dance moves Paul warns won’t work to inherit the kingdom of God. (Galatians 5:19–21 ESV)

Sexual immorality – the Greek word used here is from where we get the word pornography and includes all sexual vulgar activities in heart or deed outside what God orders in creation.

Impurity – is to not be cleansed, pruned, purged, or expiated by the work of Jesus Christ on the cross.

Sensuality – is to be incontinent or filthy in the sense of lacking self-restraint of emotional actions.

Idolatry – is worship of created images.  An idol is anything that breaks the First Commandment, created physically, spiritually, or mentally.

Sorcery – this is a Greek word from where we get the word pharmacy, and means magic and crafts, including but not limited to, means of medication.  The spells and potions of occultic activity.

Enmity – Hostility, hatred, being contrary or an adversary.

Strife – quarrelling, disputing, wrangling.  

Jealousy – indignation, being offended, to covert.

Fits of Anger – heated impassioned outbursts

Rivalries – Factions that stimulate undermining behaviour.

Dissensions – Disunion that causes two positions or standings.

Divisions – this is often confused with division between people but comes from the Greek word from where we get the English word heresy.  So, it is division or sect against God and his Word.

Envy (and Murder) – Ill will, character assassination, to spoil, to shrivel, to wither, to ruin, (therefore some manuscripts add murder).

Drunkenness – intoxication of various substances.

Orgies, and things like these – Revelry or rioting in various manners, from the Greek to lie outstretched for self-indulgent pleasures of the senses.

Helpful Holy Spirit worked fruit. (Galatians 5:22–23 ESV) The things the Holy Spirit wills to work within those who allow him.

Love – Greek here is agape, love of God that comes down.  Charity, benevolence, compassion, generosity.

Joy – a common delight or cheerfulness.  Greater than happiness.  Where one can be happy in themselves, joy involves more than just an individual.

Peace – from the Greek word “to join”, so rest, quietness, prosperity in the spiritual sense, but comes from being joined to that which gives the qualities of peace.

Patience – long tempered, as in holding one’s heated breath to cool.

Kindness – being useful, employable, easy, to furnish what is needed, to act towards one in a given manner.

Goodness – in all senses, benefit, goods (as in things), wellness, good.

Faithfulness – conviction, belief, reliance upon Christ, unhidden truthfulness, fidelity.

Gentleness – humility, to be mild.

Self-control – power over the self’s desires, and passions.

The Spirit doesn’t demand perfect footwork; He perfects as one yields their steps to Him. Learn trust in the trust-worthy Choreographer.

How does this Spirit-led dance shape the way we receive God and give thanks in the Divine Service?

In what ways did the early church’s gatherings reflect Paul’s call to freedom?

We thank God for Paul and the other Apostle’s determination to put glory in themselves aside so the Holy Spirit could use them in his instruction of the Church’s Divine Dance with Jesus Christ our Saviour.

C, Post-Pentecost 2, Proper 7 - Luke 8:38–39 "Making a Gentile Gentle"

Luke 8:38–39 (ESV) “The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him.”

The encounter between Jesus and Legion, the man possessed by a legion of demons, is a strange event in the ears of twenty-first century hearers. Who is this man confronted by Jesus on the gentile side of Lake Galilee?

He is a man portrayed as one in the depths of depravity.  The unclean of all unclean gentiles, living in the spiritual and physical uncleanness of death.  In his unclean state, he sees no need for the bondage of clothing, and when he is bound with chains and shackles for his own good and for the protection of those around him, his demonic possession is so powerful, he breaks free and withdraws to the wilderness, to the known dwelling of demons, in the desert.

Where no one else could bind this legion of demons within the man, Jesus is the only one to bind the sin and free the sinner.  At the sight of this gentile made gentle and clothed sitting at Jesus’ feet, fear strikes the hearts of the other Gerasene gentiles, and they ask Jesus to leave.  It seems the devil they know is better than the unexpected salvation they don’t! 

This is not the only extreme picture God’s word gives us today.  In the Old Testament, King Ahab and Jezebel, are arguably the most abhorrent people from amongst God’s chosen people.  So much so God uses Jezebel’s name in Jesus’ warning to the church in Thyatira, in Revelation, as a vengeful person or personification of those who lead others into immorality and idolatry against God.

Jezebel and King Ahab seek to kill Elijah, after he slaughters Baal prophets on Mount Carmel.  As Elijah is pursued, he is broken and desires death from God, rather than from the vengeful two.  From Mount Carmel he flees and is sent forty days to another, the mountain of God.  To where Moses first, saw the burning bush, and from where he received God’s word of Law, the Ten Commandments.  From here, Elijah is sent back to anoint Hazael, a gentile king in Syria, and Elisha, a prophet, to continue in his position.

These events all seem foreign to us.  Burning bushes, naked demon possessed tomb dwellers, and a prophet pursued by a rogue king and his evil queen seeking revenge.

From these two readings in God’s word, we’re called to hear that regardless of being an Israelite or gentile, God calls all people, and he does not let the demonic or death defeat him.  But that he seeks to defeat death and depravity in both his chosen ones, and those whom he calls to testify of his works.

These biblical accounts are extreme events.  How are we to picture ourselves in them? 

First, despite these biblical accounts reporting the greatest of abominations, we do well to see ourselves included in them!  We’re to view them as accounts that include everyone, leaving no one unaccountable.   Second, we do even better to see ourselves as the characters in these real stories, so we know what is really in store for us, in relation to how we respond to God’s actions.

We have opportunity to search ourselves to see if we’re a Jezebel or an Ahab type of character, unrepentant and unforgiving, on one hand!   Or, whether we’re like Legion.  Whether we receive and proclaim God or reject him and act with rebellion and revenge!

When the locals saw what happened to demons, to the pigs, and to the man from whom the demons departed, they were seized with great fear!  The people were more fearful that the demon possessed man was now not possessed.  If this Jesus is so powerful he can cast out demons from him who is the epitome of demon possession, how powerful is he to cleanse me of my seemingly well behaved publicly pleasing happy demons and my supposedly inoffensive idols?   

Or on hearing what happened to Ahab and Jezebel, we’re not called to think, that won’t happen to me because I’m not like them!  Rather, if God can do that to his chosen people, what can happen to me when I conduct my life without repentance and forgiveness, and in its place work with revenge and murderous thoughts!

The reality is we’re not all that different to Legion, whom Jesus delivered from death and destruction from within himself.  And furthermore, it takes very little for us to return to the ways of Jezebel and Ahab, when we take the kingship of Christ, implanted in us for granted.

In our baptism all have been made disciples of Jesus Christ.  All who remain in Jesus and his word are offspring of Abraham, bearing the faith that makes us righteous, just as Abraham was deemed to be righteous by trusting, not in himself, but God.  We are gentiles joined as one as God’s people, having been grafted into God through his Son Jesus Christ.  Just as Legion was made a gentle gentile we too have been made gentle gentiles in our baptism into Christ.  We are made disciples, disciplined in repentance and forgiveness, by Jesus Christ, the Light of the Nations, the gentiles.

In baptism we are God’s children.  In Galatians, Saint Paul says, “For as many of you as were baptised into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”  (Galatians 3:27–28 ESV)  

Baptism has cleansed and saved you, remaining in that baptism continues to cleanse and save you, in baptism all baptised people have been given the gifts like Legion, to “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” (Luke 8:39a ESV)

Jesus did not allow Legion to come in the boat with him and the disciples he was to send out as apostles.  Instead, he commissioned him to declare in faith what God did for him.  And he did, “And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him.” (Luke 8:39b ESV)

The one who formerly bore the demons and declared, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me.” (Luke 8:28 ESV) Now goes and declares Jesus, as the Son of God, who saved him from depravity.

This is how God the Holy Spirit wants you to see yourself in his word, being cleansed and being forgiven.  Indeed, Paul wants you to see as he saw himself grafted into Jesus Christ, who though he was a Jew was in danger of being pruned from the Holy Vine of God.  Just as God told Elijah that there was a remnant in Israel, there is also a remnant of his people in Christendom, chosen by grace.

You have been chosen by grace in your baptism; this is a baptism where the Holy Spirit gives faith.  God’s Spirit leads us away from faith in the self, like the faith of Jezebel and Ahab, which saw them separated from God.  Therefore, they died in the most debased way possible. 

As Paul warns, “They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off.” (Romans 11:20–22 ESV)

In faith, through repentance and the forgiveness of sins, you stand grafted into Christ as one legion of sinner-saints.  In the kindness of God, the Holy Spirit motivates you to tell others of the mighty works of God in Jesus Christ our Lord who has delivered you from the depravity of eternal death and clothed you in his righteousness. Amen.