Working Preacher – Sunday, 24 November
2013
Lectionary Scriptures:
Jeremiah 29: Plans to Give You the Future You Hope For 1-2 This is the letter that
the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to what was left of the elders among
the exiles, to the priests and prophets and all the exiles whom Nebuchadnezzar
had taken to Babylon from Jerusalem, including King Jehoiachin, the queen
mother, the government leaders, and all the skilled laborers and craftsmen.
4 This is the Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies,
Israel’s God, to all the exiles I’ve taken from Jerusalem to Babylon:
5 “Build houses and make yourselves at
home.
“Put in gardens and eat what grows in
that country.
6 “Marry and have children. Encourage
your children to marry and have children so that you’ll thrive in that country
and not waste away.
7 “Make yourselves at home there and work
for the country’s welfare.
“Pray for Babylon’s well-being. If things
go well for Babylon, things will go well for you.”
8-9 Yes. Believe it or not, this is the
Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, Israel’s God: “Don’t let all those
so-called preachers and know-it-alls who are all over the place there take you
in with their lies. Don’t pay any attention to the fantasies they keep coming
up with to please you. They’re a bunch of liars preaching lies—and claiming I
sent them! I never sent them, believe me.” God’s Decree!
10-11 This is God’s Word on the subject:
“As soon as Babylon’s seventy years are up and not a day before, I’ll show up
and take care of you as I promised and bring you back home. I know what I’m
doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you,
plans to give you the future you hope for.
12 “When you call on me, when you come
and pray to me, I’ll listen.
13-14 “When you come looking for me,
you’ll find me.
“Yes, when you get serious about finding
me and want it more than anything else, I’ll make sure you won’t be
disappointed.” God’s Decree.
“I’ll turn things around for you. I’ll
bring you back from all the countries into which I drove you”—God’s
Decree—“bring you home to the place from which I sent you off into exile. You
can count on it.(The Message)
Gospel: John 14: 25-27 “I’m telling you these things while I’m still living with you.
The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make
everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you.
I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace. I don’t
leave you the way you’re used to being left—feeling abandoned, bereft. So don’t
be upset. Don’t be distraught.)The Message)
Commentary on Jeremiah 29:1, 4-14 by Corrine
Carvalho
Home. It is a word that evokes strong
emotions, an idealized place even in the face of harsh reality.
We yearn to feel “home,” a place full of
love, security, comfort. Sometimes “home” is found in a domicile, sometimes in
a familiar landscape, sometimes even in another person. Church can feel like home.
This chapter in Jeremiah focuses on the
yearning for a home that is far off, a loss of home that has shaken the very
identity of the ancient Israelites. The passage offers cool comfort in its
prediction that this loss will last a very long time.
The book of Jeremiah reflects the events
surrounding the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians in 587 BCE. With this
devastation, two diaspora groups were formed: the elite who were exiled to
Babylon, and the poorer people who became refugees in places like Egypt. This
passage is ostensibly addressed to the first group, those who suffered violent
forced migration, and who had become cheap labor for their overlords. But much
of what it says could apply to both diaspora groups.
Biblical texts suggest that the
generation who suffered this defeat expected the exile to last only a short
time. Both Ezekiel and Jeremiah state that the exile was punishment for the
sins of that particular generation, setting up the expectation that the exile
would last, at most, the length of one generation, or approximately twenty
years.
As those who had been adults when the
city fell began to die out, the people worried about the significance of the
exile lasting so long. There was now a whole new generation of adults who had
either been children when Jerusalem fell or who had been born in exile, never
knowing the grandeur of their “home.”
Recently, biblical scholars have been at
refugee populations in the contemporary world in order to understand the
challenges facing multiple generations of refugees. These studies show that,
while the first generation always feels like an outsider in their new “home,”
subsequent generations begin to assimilate, creating a kind of hybrid identity.
The 1.5 generation, those who had been
children when migrating, reinterpret their own traditions in light of their new
home. Second generation refugees, while maintaining some traditions from their
family’s originating home, begin to lose markers of identity such as language,
dress, and music.
Assimilation and hybridity cause tension
among the refugee community, as the older generation, in particular, worry
about later generations losing their sense of identity. “Home” becomes
displaced. What is “home” to a second or third generation refugee?
This text in Jeremiah reveals this
anxiety. It both redefines “home” as the new place of residence, while also
maintaining a notion of the “true home” back in Judea. In this oracle, God
tells the exiles that they should settle and make new homes, even if they are
temporary, in their place of exile.
The oracle states that the exile will
last seventy years, or 3.5 generations. This means that when Jerusalem is
finally rebuilt and they can return home, it will be the great-grandchildren of
the original exiles, along with their children, who will return. Who would they
be at that point? How would they dress? What songs would they sing?
In the ancient world, cultural markers
like music, art, and even the names given to children had religious significance.
Most of the music that is preserved in the Bible, in the Psalms, was liturgical
music, which formed an integral part of the rituals. While the archaeological
record shows that later generations of exiles kept names that attested to their
worship of Yahweh, literary texts suggest something different. Esther and
Mordechai, in the book of Esther, are named after the Babylonian gods Ishtar
and Marduk. This oracle in Jeremiah asks, at what point does assimilation
become obliteration of the Jews’ identity? And what parts of their culture are
adaptable without threatening their identity as covenant partners with God?
The oracle maintains that it is not a
betrayal of God to fully assimilate into the “home” life of Babylon. Here
“home” is defined as land and family. They should own land, plant gardens,
arrange for marriages (and note that it does not limit whom their children
could marry). They should even work for the welfare of their host country. God
tells them to become model Babylonians.
While the oracle states that they will do
this for seventy years, the number seventy can simply mean a very long time. If
forty years in the wilderness was long, this is more than one and a half times
as long. They are in this for the long haul. There is no imminent return
offered here, no savior on the horizon.
The oracle ends with a vague promise of
return. This return is linked to their maintaining one element of their
original identity: faith in Yahweh. The oracle states that their exile is part
of God’s plan; in other words, they are not exiled from God. It also states
that when they pray to God, then God will respond by restoring them to their
home. But the oracle raises the question, what will home look like when they
return?
Given the transformation that the end of
the oracle envisions, I would maintain that what is promised is that perfect
“home” that we all yearn for. It is that place, that status, where we no longer
feel like we are an outsider. It is a place of safety because someone good is
in charge. In Jeremiah, it is deliberately ambiguous inviting each of us to
think about how we are all refugees in this land, waiting for the promise of
our ideal home.
PRAYER OF THE DAY:
God of hope,
How often have we found ourselves in
exile, separated from our awareness of your presence! Restore us, and let us find
you when we seek you. Amen.
HYMNS:
“Evening and morning” by Paul Gerhardt
1. Evening and morning,
Sunset and dawning,
Wealth, peace and gladness,
Comfort in sadness:
These are Thy works; all the glory be
Thine!
Times without number,
Awake or in slumber,
Thine eye observes us,
From danger preserves us,
Causing Thy mercy upon us to shine.
2. Father, O hear me,
Pardon and spare me;
Calm all my terrors,
Blot out my errors,
That by Thine eyes they may no more be
scanned.
Order my goings,
Direct all my doings;
As it may please Thee,
Retain or release me;
All I commit to Thy fatherly hand.
3 & 4 [protected by copyright]
---
“Praise, my soul, the king of heaven” by
Paul F. Lyte
1. Praise,
my soul, the King of heaven,
to
the throne thy tribute bring;
ransomed,
healed, restored, forgiven,
evermore
God's praises sing.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
Praise
the everlasting King.
2. Praise
the Lord for grace and favor
to
all people in distress;
praise
God, still the same as ever,
slow
to chide, and swift to bless.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
Glorious
now God's faithfulness.
3. Fatherlike,
God tends and spares us;
well
our feeble frame God knows;
motherlike,
God gently bears us,
rescues
us from all our foes.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
Widely
yet God's mercy flows.
4. Angels
in the heights, adoring,
you
behold God face to face;
saints
triumphant, now adoring,
gathered
in from every race.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
Praise
with us the God of grace.
---
CHORAL
“A sound of angels” by Christopher Tye
A sound of angels from afar
Fills all the quiet air,
And Ah! how full of gladness are
The tidings that they bear.
The shepherds run to Bethlem town
To see a wondrous sight.
The Lord of Lords to earth come down
Is born for men tonight,
Yeah, Christ is born, our heav’nly king,
Salvation now is nigh,
So all mankind with angels sing
Glory to God on high.
---
“Adoramus te Christe” by Giovanni Palestrina
Refrain:
Adoramus te Christe, adoramus te Christe,
adoramus te Christe, adoramus Christe.
1. Adoramus te Christe,
et benedicimus tibi.
Refrain:
Adoramus te Christe, adoramus te Christe,
adoramus te Christe, adoramus Christe.
2. Quia per sanctam Crucem tuam
redemisti numdum.
Refrain:
Adoramus te Christe, adoramus te Christe,
adoramus te Christe, adoramus Christe.
---
John Wesley’s Notes-Commentary for:
Jeremiah 29:1,4-14
XXIX Jeremiah's letter to the captives in
Babylon, to be quiet there, ver. 1-7. Not to believe false prophets; nor expect
to return 'till after fifty years, ver. 8-14. The destruction of those who
remained in Judah for their disobedience, ver. 15-19. The fearful end of two lying
prophets, ver. 20-23. Shemaiah's letter against Jeremiah, ver. 24-29. Who reads
his doom, ver. 30-32.
Verse 1. Captives - There were two
carryings into Babylon, the latter about eleven or twelve years after the
former, the first was in the time of Jehoiakim, When the princes, and all the
mighty men of valour, even ten thousand captives, and all the craftsmen and
smiths were carried away.
Verse 10. After - From this text it
appears that the seventy years captivity, were to be accounted from the first carrying
into captivity in the time of Jehoiakim, so that eleven years of it were
elapsed, before Zedekiah was carried away.
Verse 11. To give - This deliverance will
not depend upon your merits, but upon my own mercy, and kind thoughts and
purposes I have for the seed of Abraham my servant, and I am resolved in my own
thoughts what to do, I intend not the blotting out of the name of Israel from
the earth, but to give such an end to their trouble as themselves expect and
desire.
Gospel: John 14:27
Verse 27. Peace I leave with you - Peace
in general; peace with God and with your own consciences. My peace - In
particular; that peace which I enjoy, and which I create, I give - At this
instant. Not as the world giveth - Unsatisfying unsettled, transient; but
filling the soul with constant, even tranquillity. Lord, evermore give us this
peace! How serenely may we pass through the most turbulent scenes of life, when
all is quiet and harmonious within! Thou hast made peace through the blood of
thy cross. May we give all diligence to preserve the inestimable gift
inviolate, till it issue in everlasting peace!
-------
No comments:
Post a Comment