Devotion for February 24 in Epiphany/Ordinary Time (LCMS Daily Lectionary)

Above:  Statue of Reconciliation, Coventry Cathedral, England

Image Source = Rebecca Kennison

Job and John, Part XVI:  Alienation and Reconciliation

FEBRUARY 24, 2020

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Blessed Lord, who caused all holy scriptures to be written for our learning:

Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them,

that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life,

which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ;

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

–The Book of Common Prayer (1979), page 236

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The Assigned Readings:

Job 19:1-12, 21-27

Psalm 110 (Morning)

Psalms 66 and 23 (Evening)

John 8:1-20

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The story of the woman accused of adultery and her near-stoning is one of those pieces of the oral tradition which fits better in some ways in the Synoptic Gospels, where it is not.  Scholars recognize this fact.  Yet I propose that its placement here in John is appropriate theologically.  I cannot attest to the veracity of the chronology.  For that matter, chronology is a matter on which the canonical Gospels disagree.  That fact, however, seems not to have troubled those early Church leaders who approved of the New Testament canon.  And it does not trouble me.  The Gospels are more theological than historical anyway.  And doubts regarding the chronology are irrelevant to my purpose today, for I take the text on its own terms.

As I reread parts of John 7 and 8, I noticed something striking:  Jesus saves the woman’s life at a time when people are plotting to kill him.  That is why the placement of this incident at this juncture in the Johannine Gospel works so well.  As to the woman’s story, I ask one two questions:

1. Where was the man?
2. And why did not her accusers care about that detail?

By law he should have faced the same penalty as she would have.  And, given the circumstances, so should have her accusers.  They let the man get away so that they could entrap Jesus.  They did nothing to prevent the act of adultery?  Thus they were complicit  in the offense.  Perhaps Jesus reminded them of this via whatever he wrote on the ground.  And, by the way, the accusers were creepy peeping toms.

I note another fascinating feature of the Johannine material.  There is a contrast between Jesus, the source of living water (7:38) and the light of the world (8:12) on one hand and such bloodlust on the other hand.  His enemies plotted not only to kill him but others–the woman in this account and Lazarus shortly later in the Gospel.  Indeed they lived in darkness–and, to sound like the Gospel of Thomas–they were that darkness.

The thread linking the readings from the Gospel of John and the Book of Job is alienation.  Job was alienated from his friends, his family members, his life, and his God.  Jesus was alienated (not by his choice) from many leaders of his own tradition.  Reconciliation is a mutual state; if only one party is willing but the other is not, there is no reconciliation.  Thus one party can create alienation.  And few activities create this reality more than plotting to deprive someone of his life.  May we be willing to reconcile–to restore wholeness with the other, to restore wholeness where dissonance has arisen.  Dissonance might remain, but may we not be the source of it.

Until the next segment of our journey….

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

APRIL 26, 2012 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINTS REMACLUS OF MAASTRICHT, THEODORE OF MAASTRICHT, LAMBERT OF MAASTRICHT, HUBERT OF MAASTRICHT AND LIEGE, AND FLORIBERT OF LIEGE, ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOPS; LANDRADA OF MUNSTERBILSEN, ROMAN CATHOLIC ABBESS; AND OTGER OF UTRECHT, PLECHELM OF GUELDERLAND, AND WIRO, ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONARIES

THE FEAST OF CHRISTINA ROSSETTI, POET

THE FEAST OF SAINT PASCHASIUS RADBERTUS, ROMAN CATHOLIC ABBOT

THE FEAST OF ROBERT HUNT, FIRST ANGLICAN CHAPLAIN AT JAMESTOWN, VIRGINIA

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http://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2012/11/06/job-and-john-part-xvi-alienation-and-reconciliation/

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