Epiphany 6 C + Christ is the Promise of More + 2.16.25 + ACL & MCL

 

Christ is the Promise of More
Epiphany 6C, 2025 (Luke 6, 1 Cor. 15, Jeremiah 17)

St Francis, Simi Valley and All Santos, Oxnard
The Revs. Alene and Melissa Campbell-Langdell

 

I love to watch detective shows on TV, but since they’re my way to relax, I prefer those mystery shows where after the obligatory murder that starts the mystery, the rest is mostly solved through astute following of clues and very little violence and bloodshed.  But, it seems there is always a moment even in the most puzzle oriented detective shows where the writers feel like the intensity needs to be amped up a bit.   At those moments, I find myself yelling at the screen, “Don’t go there by yourself without telling anyone.  That’s just stupid!  What are you thinking?” 

As I listened to the Working Preacher trying to parse out a better equivalent in English for Jesus’ word translated here as “Woe,” that image from detective shows kept coming to mind.  “Yikes, no, don’t go there!”  “Be careful if you’re rich,” “watch out if you feel full,” “oh no, you’re laughing now, but you can’t see what’s coming around the corner,” “if everyone’s praising you, this is not going to end well.” 

And yet, despite Jesus’ words here, very few of us would be willing to even consider joining those saints in history like St Francis who felt called to give up everything.  This way of thinking doesn’t make sense from our point of view.  Like the detective in the story who continues into the dark cave without considering who might be lurking nearby, we go blithely on trusting that wealth, power, and influence will make the world a better place.  But, if we consider ourselves followers of Christ, we must allow these words to shape our understanding of the world and our place in it. 

 

This change in perspective isn’t about poor people being good and rich people being bad.  We are all both. There will always be someone who has more wealth, power, or popularity than we do and there will always be those with less.  The mountains and the valleys have not yet been made level.  Both parts of this Gospel passage are addressed to us.  But, there’s a simple test if you want to know which side you fall on today.  The only other time the Greek word translated “consolation” is used in Luke is in this verse, “Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon; this man was righteous and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel” (Luke 2:25).  Simeon was looking for the Messiah who would usher in the kingdom of God.  The poor that Jesus describes are blessed because they are part of the kingdom of God.  They look to a future when everyone will be filled and laugh with joy.  By contrast, the rich in Jesus’ account are those who have already received all the consolation, all the salvation that they expected.  There is nothing more to look forward to other than hunger and mourning.  They are on top with nowhere to go but down.  If we want to know where we stand as individuals, as a church, or as a nation, in Jesus’ paradigm of poor and rich, all we need to do is ask ourselves, “Are we still waiting for the kingdom of God or secretly hoping it will never come?”

And yet, much like the detective blundering into danger, I find myself caught in between these two. I am caught in the lie that I am poor enough to be righteous in my cause and rich enough to bring about the change I long for.  It is in this space that Paul’s words to the Corinthians and Jeremiah’s words to the people of his day offer both hope and corrective.  For both Paul and Jeremiah, our hope comes from a willingness to accept the reality we have been given while trusting in God’s ability to bring life out of death.  For Paul, this starts with the fundamental need to see Jesus as God’s literal investment in the world.  Jesus’ death and resurrection is the down payment, the first fruit, of what God intends to do for all of us. 

Paul is convinced, as am I, that until we internalize the truth that in God’s kingdom resurrection always follows death, we will never have the courage to accept and live into Jesus’ upside-down way of seeing the world.  If you’re like me, that’s still a work in progress.  Most of the time, I do a much better job of assenting to resurrection in my mind than to living it out in my day-to-day life. 

 

This is where I find Jeremiah’s words helpful.  Jeremiah is really practical.  He is speaking to a people who are terrified of the Babylonian Empire who is at their doorstep threatening to swallow them up.  The common wisdom of the day is to make an alliance with Egypt and trust that Egypt will come to their aid and protect them from Babylon.  But Jeremiah is blunt.  Trusting in people or things to save you will turn you into a dried-up tumbleweed in the desert, blown about every direction, and never able to see the relief that God will bring.  A little farther on in the book, when the people have been taken into exile in Babylon, Jeremiah counsels them on God’s behalf, “Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce…seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare” (Jeremiah 29: 5-7). But even as we strive to care for the welfare of those who surround us, we can never put all our trust in human leaders and structures.

Instead, we must put our trust in God. In today’s passage we read, those who trust in the Lord (those for whom God is everything) will be like a tree planted by water “in the year of drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit” (Jeremiah17:7-8).  Bobby Morris writes, “Interestingly, the verb here, though of a different root than the one used in verse five, also means ‘depart’ or ‘turn away.’ Thus, the tree experiencing drought, but whose roots are near a stream, will not ‘turn away from making fruit’.”[1]

So how do we work to bear fruit in the ground in which we are planted, even when it seems to be rocky soil (to borrow from another parable) and how do we keep trusting in God when the ground underneath our feet feels uncertain? It makes me think of the Serenity Prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”  I might add: God, let me trust you with what I cannot change rather than trying to control it myself.  And then, grant me the courage to put down roots and be ready to nurture those around me—even if they’re Babylonians. 

 

 

It takes a kind of openness; a kind of self-emptying, to allow oneself to be both rooted in God and fruit bearing in troubling times. In her book, Clay in the Potter’s Hands, Diana Glyer describes the process of turning a lump of clay into something beautiful and useful. She says that it is kind of like our relationship with God. She writes, “In order to transform that clay into something I can use, I have to open a hole in the middle of it.  I rest my left hand lightly on the outside of the clay; I use my right hand to press into the top of the clay.  Pressing down and pulling out, I move the clay aside and open up an empty place.”[2]  Like that clay, we too can be reformed and reshaped.  We can open ourselves up to God’s grace.  We can learn to trust in the promise of the resurrection. We can take that moment of “woe” – the word of caution to those who possess much – and see it as a promise of God’s goodness and provision to all.  We can put down roots into our communities and refuse to turn away from giving our fruit to those in need.   If we do, we will find that space inside us expanding once again until we are both hungry for and filled by the only one who can truly satisfy.

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[1] Bobby Morris, “Commentary on Jeremiah 17:5-10,” WorkingPreacher.org (February 17, 2019), footnote 4.  Available online at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/sixth-sunday-after-epiphany-3/commentary-on-jeremiah-175-10

[2] Diana Pavlac Glyer, Clay in the Potter’s Hands, preview ed. (USA: Lindale & Associates, 2009), 47.