This story has now been included in a collection, A Living Psalter: Creative Reflections on the Psalms, edited by Geoffrey D. Lentz.

But are we abandoned, and what would it mean?

Perhaps, as later Jewish mysticism suggests, God must withdraw for creation to burst forth in creativity and freedom.

Read the rest . . .

Now sometimes I see good reason for taking part of a Psalm, because one does need to keep the readings reasonable in length. As it is, many congregations only use a few lines from the Psalm.

But in this case, one could divide the Psalm into three sections, with the first being 1-6, expressing the greatness of God, the second 7-12 talking about living under God’s judgment or anger, and 13-17 being a prayer for God’s favor. Now if you leave out the center part of the Psalm, one misses the sense of the prayer.

In this case I suspect a desire of certain liturgists to avoid reading the really unpleasant verses, such as speaking of God putting our sins directly in front of him. Not comfortable reading, that!

In any case, I think this Psalm, as most Psalms, should be studied more as a whole, rather than chopped up. As worshipers, we should be more patient with hearing the reading of the Word.

I am not currently preaching anywhere, but I do use the lectionary in my devotional study and frequently use it in teaching. When I am invited to preach I normally preach from the lectionary texts. Because of the extra year I’m going to compare three sets of texts: 1) The RCL texts for the coming week, 2) The texts from the same year/gospel from the proposed four year lectionary, and 3) the texts we would use if this was the year for the gospel of John.

For this coming Sunday, August 21, that would be Proper 16A, Week 16A to match, and 16D for John.

Here are the texts:

If we were in Year A of the four year series we would have our choice between the rather risque story in Genesis 38 (Judah and Tamar) and the lofty language of Isaiah 40. In the epistle, 1 Corinthians 6:12-20 has a remarkably similar (though of course not identical) message to Romans 12:1-8. Obviously that’s not the issue, but I found it interesting! The gospel contains a collection.

If we were in Year D, we’d have the story of the exit from the ark after the flood, material on the Davidic covenant and God’s faithfulness from Psalm 132, the letter to the church in Laodicea, and a passage from John about whose children Jesus’ opponents really are.

I find it about equally difficult to create a good overarching theme for these passages and for those in the RCL. Sometimes there’s an intentional theme, and sometimes there’s not, but that’s nothing new.

I like the inclusion of passages that are not part of the normal lectionary readings. I wonder how many churches would actually read Genesis 38. I can’t recall anyone actually preaching from it!

In any case, I enjoyed the comparison. I hope to write a bit more on these passages as the week goes on, but it’s a busy week, and I may not get around to it. I will certainly compare a few more weeks of passages to help you get a flavor for this idea.

• Wright and Piper on 2 Corinthians 5:21
• English and Greek Ambiguity – 2 Corinthians 5:21
• Becoming Righteous and Becoming Rich
• Righteousness of God Redux

The way you understand the phrase “righteousness of God” will color much of the rest of your understanding of Paul, I think.

It’s not hard to find a theme in this week’s lectionary texts, nor to imagine why those are the texts for today. I think the Romans passage ties the theme together nicely, and if I were to teach this myself, I’d probably start from that point.

Paul tells us that one sin made everyone into sinners, and thus one obedient man, or one act of obedience (carried throughout his life) could make us right with God again. Our texts simply point to the pieces of the puzzle. In Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7, we have the original temptation and fall. Here the first couple are placed in the Garden of Eden, but directed away from the tree. Yet they eat in any case.

In Matthew 4:1-11, we have the opposite effect. Note that in Matthew 4:1, it is the Spirit that leads Jesus into the desert to be tempted. Even more so than Adam and Eve were directed away, Jesus was directed into the test so that he could pass and show that he would reject divinity, improperly offered.  Adam and Eve were human and wanted to be gods. Jesus was God and accepted humanity (Phil. 2:5-11).

The final element of this puzzle is Psalm 32 which, in my view, connects us to the other two. It describes guilt, repentance and forgiveness. It is repentance, a turning to God and away from evil, that allows us to be incorporated into the family that Christ represented in his act(s) of obedience. Lent is not just about the fall and redemption. It is about us becoming part of that new family of faith, incorporated into God’s family, established by the obedience of Jesus Christ.

This passage interested me because of the reference to revealing God’s wisdom to the authorities in the heavenly realm through the church (Eph. 3:10).  The reason for this interest is the “great controversy” theme that I grew up with as a Seventh-day Adventist. The foundation for this is Ellen G. White’s book The Great Controversy, and it has been taken up by a number of Adventist authors.

One of these was my professor Dr. Malcolm Maxwell, and another is Dr. Alden Thompson, author of Who’s Afraid of the Old Testament God?, which is published by my company.

This great controversy theme essentially sees the world as a theater with heavenly beings watching the way good and evil plays out. Amongst the texts on which this is based are Job 1 & 2, which has God demonstrating his righteousness to the waiting heavenly court, and of course this passage, in which the church shows the heavenly powers God’s wisdom.

It is one explanation for the reason that sin has to run such a long course. Why doesn’t God step in if he can and if he cares? There are many, many explanations for this, but this explanation suggests that if God wants to deal with sin permanently, the entire universe must see just how evil sin is on its own, and also see how good God is in redeeming fallen creation.

Alternatively one can connect this with ancient cosmology. To quote the just released Ephesians: A Participatory Study Guide (also by my company):

However, we should remember that according to the ancient world view what happens on earth mirrors what is also happening in heaven (Matt. 6:1 0). Therefore, even as the church delivers this message ? concerning the mystery of God ? on earth, the church is also delivering the message that God is sovereign over all things to the rulers and authorities in the heavens. This message is rooted in the belief of the church that in the resurrection of Christ, these powers that be, which seek to block the purposes of God, have been defeated (40).

Come to think of it, the two aren’t really in opposition, though they look at the issue from different angles.

I wonder how many pastors will have the guts (or lack of good judgment) to preach on the authorities in heavenly places?