If one expects God (YHWH, in Malachi) or Jesus to return and set matters right, how does one think and behave? If such a person is wise and pious, one will revere God and treat people with respect. One will continue to fulfill one’s duty before God. One will be heavenly-minded and of earthly good.
The Incarnation is not merely about the life of the Second Person of the Trinity in the flesh as Jesus of Nazareth, as well as the lives Jesus touched, directly and indirectly. No, the Incarnation pertains to many theologians have pondered for nearly two thousand years. I make no pretense of being an intellectual peer of St. Irenaeus of Lyons (circa 130-circa 202), author of The Scandal of the Incarnation. I do, however, tell you, O reader, that the Incarnation is also about my life and your life. Is Christ evident in us? Do we draw people to Jesus and make disciples, or do we drive people away from our Lord and Savior?
I can speak and write only for myself, so I do. I have a mixed record. I continue to strive to improve, by grace, however.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
MARCH 9, 2020 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF HARRIET TUBMAN, U.S. ABOLITIONIST
THE FEAST OF EMANUEL CRONENWETT, U.S. LUTHERAN MINISTER, HYMN WRITER, AND HYMN TRANSLATOR
THE FEAST OF SAINT FRANCES OF ROME, FOUNDRESS OF THE COLLATINES
THE FEAST OF JOHANN PACHELBEL, GERMAN LUTHERAN ORGANIST AND COMPOSER
THE FEAST OF SAINT SOPHRONIUS OF JERUSALEM, ROMAN CATHOLIC PATRIARCH
Sovereignty over the world has passed to our Lord and his Christ, and he shall reign for ever.
–Verse 15b, The Revised English Bible (1989)
Nevertheless, we must wait until Chapter 21 for that sovereignty to become apparent.
The sovereignty of God is indeed a challenging concept. In the Gospels the Kingdom of God is already partially present. The Roman Empire and its agents, one of whom goes on to order the execution of St. John the Baptist, born in Luke 1, is fully present.
Truly bad people who wield authority always seem to present somewhere. Nebuchadnezzar II, hardly a nice man, is a figure of ridicule in the Book of Daniel. He is fickle and seems unaware of the extent of his authority at times. He is willing to send people to die for refusing to serve the gods, so how nice can he be? He, as monarch, can change the law, too. Later in the Book of Daniel (Chapter 4) he goes insane. Also troubled and in one of the readings (sort of) is King Saul, a disturbed and mentally unwell man. The not attached to Psalm 57 contextualizes the text in 1 Samuel 22-24 and 26, with David leading a group of outlaws while on the run from Saul. In the story David saves the life of the man trying to kill him. (Aside: Chapters 24 and 26 seem to be variations on the same story. The Sources Hypothesis explains the duplication of material.)
One might detect a certain thread common to three of the readings: The lives of the faithful are at risk. That theme is implicit in Luke 1. God will not always deliver the faithful, hence the martyrs in Revelation 14. The sovereignty of God will not always be obvious. But we who claim to follow Christ can do so, by grace, and proclaim God among the peoples in a variety of circumstances.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
APRIL 29, 2017 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF SAINTS BOSA OF YORK, JOHN OF BEVERLEY, WILFRID THE YOUNGER, AND ACCA OF HEXHAM, ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOPS
THE FEAST OF SAINT CATHERINE OF SIENA, ROMAN CATHOLIC NUN
THE FEAST OF TIMOTHY REES, ANGLICAN BISHOP OF LLANDAFF
In most of the readings for this day we read of grumbling against God and/or Moses despite God’s proven track record, frequently in the presence of those who go on to grumble. Miriam and Aaron question the authority of Moses in Numbers 12. Miriam becomes ritually unclean because of this (Do not question Moses!), but her brother intercedes for her. People witness then seem to forget God’s mighty acts in Psalms 95 and 106, as well as in Hebrews 3. And, in Numbers 20, Moses disobeys instructions from God. He is supposed to speak to a rock to make water come out of it, but he strikes it instead.
By word and act Moses is thus appropriating to himself an act of God. In doing this he is undoing the message that God and Moses himself have been conveying to the to the people up to this point. The people have continuously directed their attention to Moses instead of to God….Until this episode Moses has repeatedly told the people, “It is not from my own heart,” and “You are congregating against YHWH,” but now his words and actions confirm the people’s own perception.
–Richard Elliott Friedman, Commentary on the Torah with a New English Translation and the Hebrew Text (2001), page 495
Moses was generally trustworthy in the sight of God, per the positive assessment of him in Hebrews 3. At Meribah he gave into human weakness. All of us have caved into our own weaknesses on multiple occasions, have we not? Have we not, for example, sought our own glory instead of that of God? Have we not yielded to the temptation to be spectacular, which Henri J. M. Nouwen identified in The Way of the Heart (1981) as one of Satan’s temptations of Jesus in Luke 4 and Matthew 4? If we have lived long enough, yes, we have.
And you, my child, will be called Prophet of the Most High,
for you will be the Lord’s forerunner to prepare his way
and lead his people to a knowledge of salvation
through the forgiveness of sins:
for in the tender compassion of our God
the dawn of heaven will break upon us,
to shine on those who live in darkness, under the shadow of death,
and to guide our feet in the way of peace.
–St. Zechariah in Luke 1:76-79, The Revised English Bible (1989)
St. John the Baptist grew up and became one who admitted the truth that he was not the Messiah (Luke 3:15-17 and Mark 1:7-8). He pointed to cousin Jesus instead (Matthew 3:13-14 and John 3:25-36).
The spiritual vocations of Christians vary in details, but the common threads run through those calls from God. We who call ourselves Christians have, for example, a responsibility to glorify God, not ourselves, and to point to Jesus. We also have an obligation to lead lives defined by gratitude to God, not rebellion against God. We can succeed, by grace.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
AUGUST 20, 2016 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF JOHN BAJUS, U.S. LUTHERAN MINISTER AND HYMN TRANSLATOR
Above: Mattie Ross on Blackie, Her Fine Horse, in True Grit (2010)
A Screen Capture via PowerDVD and a legal DVD
The Faithfulness and Generosity of God, Part I
DECEMBER 6, 7, and 8, 2018
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The Collect:
Stir up your power, Lord God, to prepare the way of your only Son.
By his coming give to all the world knowledge of your salvation;
through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns
with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
–Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), page 19
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The Assigned Readings:
Malachi 3:5-12 (Thursday)
Malachi 3:13-18 (Friday)
Malachi 3:19-24/4:1-6 (Saturday)
Luke 1:68-79 (All Days)
Philippians 1:12-18a (Thursday)
Philippians 1:18b-26 (Friday)
Luke 9:1-6 (Saturday)
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NOTE REGARDING VERSIFICATION:
Malachi 4:1-6 in Protestant Bibles = Malachi 3:19-24 in Jewish, Roman Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox Bibles.
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Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil. The author of all things watches over me, and I have a fine horse.
–Mattie Ross in True Grit (2010)
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A person who remembers the ending of that movie should understand that Mattie’s fine horse did not prevent her from losing part of one arm. One might also recognize the irony of the last sentence.
The author of all things watches over me
seems to indicate trust in God, but
I have a fine horse
constitutes a contradictory thought.
The instructions of Jesus to his twelve Apostles emphasize complete dependence on God, who provides via people much of the time. In Mark 6:8 each man may carry a staff, but Matthew 10:10 and Luke 9:3 forbid that item. The Apostles’ mission was an urgent one for which packing lightly and depending upon the hospitality of strangers were essential. Such light packing also emphasized solidarity with the poor, who were most likely to be the ones extending hospitality, given the fact that they lived on the edges of towns. The Apostles were to announce the Kingdom of God, not to press the issue where they were unwelcome.
The ethic of trusting God, especially during difficult times, exists in the readings from Malachi and Philippians. Locusts (in Malachi) and incarceration (in Philippians) were the background hardships. Yet trust in the generosity of God, the prophet wrote. St. Paul the Apostle noted that his period of incarceration (wherever and whenever it was; scholars debate that point) aided the spread the gospel of Jesus.
Zechariah prophesied that his son, St. John the Baptist, would be the forerunner of the Messiah. Both John and Jesus suffered and died at the hands of authorities, which we remember in their context. Officialdom was powerless to prevent the spread of the good news of Jesus in those cases and in the case of Paul. Mortal means can prove useful, but they pass away in time. The faithfulness and generosity of God, however, are everlasting. To live confidently in the latter is a wise course of action.
Of all the illusions to abandon, one of the most difficult to leave behind is the idea that one must be in control. The illusion of control might boost one’s self-esteem, but so what? Control remains an illusion. On the other hand, recognizing that God is in control is liberating. It frees one up to live as one ought to live–
in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ
–according to Philippians 1:27b (The New Revised Standard Version, 1989).
I know this struggle well. The idol of the illusion of control was precious to me. Then circumstances forced me to learn the reality of my powerlessness and to trust God, for I had no feasible alternative. Sometimes dire events prove to be necessary for spiritual awakening to occur.
God has given each of us important tasks to complete. May we lay aside all illusions and other incumbrances, pack lightly, and labor faithfully to the glory of God and for the benefit of those to whom God sends us and to those whom God sends to us. May we trust in the faithfulness and generosity of God, not in ourselves.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
AUGUST 11, 2015 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF SAINT GREGORY THAUMATURGUS, ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOP OF NEOCAESAREA; AND SAINT ALEXANDER OF COMANA “THE CHARCOAL BURNER,” ROMAN CATHOLIC MARTYR AND BISHOP OF COMANA, PONTUS
THE FEAST OF AUGUSTUS MONTAGUE TOPLADY, ANGLICAN PRIEST AND HYMN WRITER
THE FEAST OF SAINT CLARE OF ASSISI, FOUNDER OF THE POOR CLARES
THE FEAST OF MATTHIAS LOY, U.S. LUTHERAN MINISTER, EDUCATOR, HYMN WRITER, AND HYMN TRANSLATOR; AND CONRAD HERMANN LOUIS SCHUETTE, GERMAN-AMERICAN LUTHERAN MINISTER, EDUCATOR, HYMN WRITER, AND HYMN TRANSLATOR
One of the great virtues of High Churchmanship is having a well-developed sense of sacred time. So, for example, the church calendars, with their cycles, tell us of salvation history. We focus on one part of the narrative at a time. Much of Protestantism, formed in rebellion against Medieval Roman Catholic excesses and errors, has thrown the proverbial baby out with the equally proverbial bath water, rejecting or minimizing improperly the sacred power of rituals and holy days.
Consider, O reader, the case of Christmas–not in the present tense, but through the late 1800s. Puritans outlawed the celebration of Christmas when they governed England in the 1650s. Their jure divino theology told them that since there was no biblical sanction for keeping Christmas, they ought not to do it–nor should anyone else. On the other hand, the jure divino theology of other Calvinists allowed for keeping Christmas. Jure divino was–and is–a matter of interpretation. Lutherans, Anglicans, and Moravians kept Christmas. Many Methodists on the U.S. frontier tried yet found that drunken revelry disrupted services. Despite this Methodist pro-Christmas opinion, many members of the Free Methodist denomination persisted in anti-Christmas sentiment. The holiday was too Roman Catholic, they said and existed without
the authority of God’s word.
Thus, as the December 19, 1888 issue of Free Methodist concluded,
We attach no holy significance to the day.
–Quoted in Leigh Eric Schmidt, Consumer Rites: The Buying and Selling of American Holidays (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), page 180. (The previous quote also comes from that magazine, quoted in the same book.)
Many Baptists also rejected the religious celebration of Christmas. An 1875 issue of Baptist Teacher, a publication for Sunday School educators, contained the following editorial:
We believe in Christmas–not as a holy day but as a holiday and so we join with our juveniles with utmost heartiness of festal celebration….Stripped as it ought to be, of all pretensions of religious sanctity and simply regarded as a social and domestic institution–an occasion of housewarming, and heart-warming and innocent festivity–we welcome its coming with a hearty “All Hail.”
–Quoted in Schmidt, Consumer Rites, pages 179 and 180
Presbyterians, with their Puritan heritage, resisted celebrating Christmas for a long time. In fact, some very strict Presbyterians still refuse to keep Christmas, citing their interpretation of jure divino theology. (I have found some of their writings online.) That attitude was more commonplace in the 1800s. The Presbyterian Church in the United States, the old Southern Presbyterian Church, passed the following resolution at its 1899 General Assembly:
There is no warrant for the observance of Christmas and Easter as holy days, but rather contrary (see Galatians iv.9-11; Colossians ii.16-21), and such observance is contrary to the principles of the Reformed faith, conducive to will-worship, and not in harmony with the simplicity of the gospel in Jesus Christ.
–Page 430 of the Journal of the General Assembly, 1899 (I copied the text of the resolution verbatim from an original copy of the Journal.)
I agree with Leigh Eric Schmidt:
It is not hard to see in this radical Protestant perspective a religious source for the very secularization of the holiday that would eventually be so widely decried. With the often jostling secularism of the Christmas bazaar, Protestant rigorists simply got what they had long wished for–Christmas as one more market day, a profane time or work and trade.
–Consumer Rites, page 180
I affirm the power of rituals and church calendars. And I have no fear of keeping a Roman Catholic holy day and season. Thus I keep Advent (December 1-24) and Christmas (December 25-January 5). I hold off on wishing people
Merry Christmas
often until close to Christmas Eve, for I value the time of preparation. And I have no hostility or mere opposition to wishing anyone
Happy Holidays,
due to the concentrated holiday season in December. This is about succinctness and respect in my mind; I am not a culture warrior.
Yet I cannot help but notice with dismay the increasingly early start of the end-of-year shopping season. More retailers will open earlier on Thanksgiving Day this year. Many stores display Christmas decorations before Halloween. These are examples of worshiping at the high altar of the Almighty Dollar.
I refuse to participate in this. In fact, I have completed my Christmas shopping–such as it was–mostly at thrift stores. One problem with materialism is that it ignores a basic fact: If I acquire an item, I must put it somewhere. But what if I enjoy open space?
I encourage a different approach to the end of the year: drop out quietly (or never opt in) and keep nearly four weeks of Advent and all twelve days of Christmas. I invite you, O reader, to observe these holy seasons and to discover riches and treasures better than anything on sale on Black Friday.
Pax vobiscum!
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
NOVEMBER 25, 2013 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF SQUANTO, COMPASSIONATE HUMAN BEING
THE FEAST OF JAMES OTIS SARGENT HUNTINGTON, FOUNDER OF THE ORDER OF THE HOLY CROSS
–Martin Luther; translated by William James Kirkpatrick
Yesterday I sang in my parish choir’s performance of the Christmas portion of Handel’s Messiah. We dropped “His yoke is easy and his burden is light,” culminating instead in the Hallelujah Chorus. The concert was glorious and spiritually edifying for many people.
There are still a few days of Advent left. So I encourage you, O reader, to observe them. Then, beginning sometime during the second half of December 24, begin to say
Merry Christmas!
and continue that practice through January 5, the twelfth and last day of Christmas. And I encourage you to remember that our Lord and Savior was born into a violent world, one in which men–some mentally disturbed, others just mean, and still others both mean and mentally disturbed–threatened and took the lives of innocents. Names, circumstances, empires, nation-states, and technology have changed, but the essential reality has remained constant, unfortunately.
The Hallelujah Chorus, quoting the Apocalypse of John, includes these words:
The kingdom of this world is become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ.
That is not true yet, obviously. But that fact does not relieve any of us of our responsibilities to respect the Image of God in others and to treat them accordingly. We must not try to evade the duty to be the face and appendages of Christ to those to whom God sends us and those whom God sends to us. We cannot save the world, but we can improve it. May we do so for the glory of God and the benefit of others.
May the peace of Christ, born as a vulnerable baby and executed as a criminal by a brutal imperial government, be with you now and always. In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. Amen.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
DECEMBER 17, 2012 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF MARIA STEWART, EDUCATOR
THE FEAST OF EGLANTYNE JEBB, FOUNDER OF SAVE THE CHILDREN
THE FEAST OF FRANK MASON NORTH, U.S. METHODIST MINISTER
The Law of Moses contains rituals and commandments. Many of these laws condemn the exploitation of others. To exploit someone economically and/or judicially was a form of idolatry. It still is.
One of the major themes in the Hebrew Bible is that such idolatry led to the destruction of kingdoms, followed by exiles. Yet mercy upon the remnant follows in judgment in the Hebrew Scriptures. The human-divine relationship (God acts lovingly-people reject God–God punishes people–God acts mercifully again) is a recurring cycle.
In Advent, of course, we look forward liturgically to a future season of both divine judgment and mercy (judgment on some as mercy on others) and backward liturgically to a time when God broke into history via the Incarnation. I, having read about what God has done, wonder what God will do next.
