Lectionary Ruminations for Sunday, October 14, 2012, the Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

Posted each Thursday, Lectionary Ruminations focuses on the Scripture Readings, taken from the New Revised Standard Version, for the following Sunday per the Revised Common Lectionary. Comments and questions are intended to encourage reflection for readers preparing to teach, preach, or hear the Word. Reader comments are invited and encouraged. All lectionary links are to the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible via the PC(USA) Devotions and Readings website, but if you prefer another translation, feel free to use that instead. (Other references may be linked to the NRSV via the oremus Bible Browser.)  Lectionary Ruminations is also cross-posted on my personal blog, Summit to Shore. 

Job 23:1-9, 16-17

23:1 Whom is Job answering?

23:2 What is Job’s complaint?  What is a “bitter” complaint?  Whose hand is heavy?

23:3 Whom does Job not know where to find?

23:4 Job is sounding like a trial attorney.

23:6 Why does Job think he would not be contended with?

23:8 Has Job really gone in all directions?  Like the Khan character in The Wrath of Khan, Job is a two dimensional thinker.  In a Copernican universe, three dimensions might be enough, but in a post-Einstein universe, we must posit at least four dimensions.  Where do we look for God in a four or more dimensional world?

23:9 Is Job’s terror anything like Rudolph Otto’s Mysterium Tremendum?

23:16 Does Job’s “if only” indicate the futility of trying to hide from God?

Psalm 22:1-15

22:1 Where have we heard this before, every one to three years?

22:2 How many times have you felt this way?

22:3 I think this “yet” is a one word statement of faith.

22:6 But I am not like my ancestors?

22:9 God takes us from the womb?

22:10 This reads as if life begins at birth, not conception.

22:12 What is a bull of Bashan?

22:14 Mixed metaphors/images?

22: 15 Give this Psalmist a drink of cool, refreshing water of life.

Hebrews 4:12-16

4:12 How can a word, any word, be living and active?  What does it mean to separate soul from spirit?

4:13 Were Adam and Eve still naked even after they attempted to cover themselves?

4:14 What is a high priest?  What is a great high priest? Why the plural “heavens”?  How many heavens are there? What confession?

4:15 Are there high priests who are unable to sympathize with our weaknesses?  Is there a difference between being tested and being tempted?

4:16 In the context of this verse, how do you define “boldness”?

Mark 10:17-31

10:17 Who was setting out, where was he setting out from, and where was he heading to? Is there any significance to the many using the word “inherit”?  What words, other than “inherit”, do we usually hear associated with “eternal life”?

10:18 What has the Church and Christian community not learned from this verse?

10:19 Why does Jesus refer only to the second tablet of the law rather than both tablets?

10:20 This man is a saint!

10:21 The conundrum: give away your riches and you will have what you lack.

10:22 Was he grieving because he gave up eternal life for riches, or because he gave up riches for eternal life?

10:23 Do you hear this, 1%?

10:24 The kingdom of heaven must be like flying with all one’s possessions in a carry on.

10:25 It is easier to drive a car through the Queens Blvd. overpass on the Jackie Robinson Pkwy than it is for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.

10:26  Is the answer not obvious?  The poor can be saved.

10:27 So even God can enable a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God?

10:28  Peter, also known as “open mouth, insert foot”.

10:29 What relative is not mentioned?

10:30 I can do without the persecution part.

10:31 The classical Christian inversion.

ADDENDUM

In addition to serving as the half time Pastor of North Church Queens and writing Lectionary Ruminations, I also tutor part time.  If you or someone you know needs a tutor, or if you would like to be a tutor, check out my WyzAnt  page and follow the appropriate links.

Lectionary Ruminations for Sunday, October 7, 2012, the Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

Posted each Thursday, Lectionary Ruminations focuses on the Scripture Readings, taken from the New Revised Standard Version, for the following Sunday per the Revised Common Lectionary. Comments and questions are intended to encourage reflection for readers preparing to teach, preach, or hear the Word. Reader comments are invited and encouraged. All lectionary links are to the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible via the PC(USA) Devotions and Readings website, but if you prefer another translation, feel free to use that instead. (Other references may be linked to the NRSV via the oremus Bible Browser.)  Lectionary Ruminations is also cross-posted on my personal blog, Summit to Shore. 

Job 1:1, 2:1-10

1:1 Is this similar to “once upon a time”?  What do you know about the land of Uz?  What does it mean that he “feared God”?

2:1 How many heavenly beings are there?  What is the meaning of the name “Satan”?

2:2 Would not an omniscient God not have to ask this question?  Do I hear an echo of Genesis chapter 3 verse 9?  Did Satan prefer the earth to heaven?

2:3 Why did the LORD bring up the topic of Job?  Since Satan had just been on the earth, is this a put down of Satan, God saying to Satan “Job is better than you”?\

2:4 What is the meaning of “skin for skin”?

2:5 What does it mean to  touch bone and flesh?

2:6 Is this going to be a test of Job’s integrity or Satan’s power?  Is God testing, even tempting, Satan?

2:7 Is there a double meaning at work here?

2:8 Some days, we anyone of us may feel like Job.

2:9 Why do Republicans not accuse Job’s wife of constituting the first death panel?

2:10 Job is, above all, a man of clear logic.  Job may not have sinned with his lips, but what about with his heart or mind?

Psalm 26:1-12

26:1 Yep, this sounds like something Job would have said.

26:2 What about lead me not into temptation?

26:4 If I did this, how could I stay in the church?

26:6 This Psalmist is beginning to sound self-righteous.

26:7 What are God’s wondrous deeds?

26:8 Can we truly say this when God is omnipresent?  This seems to reflect worship of a domesticated God confined to the Temple rather than a wild and primitive wandering God sometimes abiding in a tent, a cloud, and a column of fire.

26:11 Is the Psalmist pleading his case before God’s bench?

26:12 What is “the great congregation”.

Hebrews 1:1-4, 2:5-12

1:1 “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...."   Sorry, wrong story.  What were the many and various ways God spoke by the prophets?

1:2 What does the author mean by “last days”?  Why the plural “worlds”?

1:3 What is the difference between a reflection and an imprint?  What is his powerful word?  Does “purification for sins” presume any particular understanding of the atonement?

1:4 What name did he inherit and from whom did he inherit it?

2:5 What is the coming world?

2:6 What is the source of this saying?

2:9 Is death suffering, of did Jesus suffer in a way that no human has suffered and died?

2:10 Who are God’s many children?  What is perfection?

2:12 Where in the Gospels does Jesus say this?

Mark 10:2-16

10:2 How many Pharisees, two, twenty, two hundred?  Were the Pharisees seeking to “test” Jesus as God tested Job and the Psalmist?  What could Jesus know about a man having a wife?

10:3 What did Moses, or what did God command you?

10:4 So much for family values.

10:5-9 This seems to answer a question about divorce, or rather the afterlife, not marriage, let alone same sex marriage.  Speaking of same sex marriage, check out this Stand For Love link: http://www.mlp.org/2012/10/03/stand-for-love/

10:10 In whose house?  Where the disciples also seeking to test Jesus?

10:11-13 How have Biblical literalists arguing against same sex marriage seem to ignore the fact that Jesus said nothing about same sex marriage but said this about heterosexual marriage and divorce?

10:13 Ouch.  This sounds ugly in light of recent sexual abuse of young boys by priests and football coaches.  I would prefer “laying on of hands”  rather than “touch”.

10:14 How can the kingdom og God belong to little children.  Can we grow to big or too old for God’s kingdom?

10:15 I think a whole sermon could be preached based on this single verse.

10:16 Who do we bless and how do we bless them?

ADDENDUM

In addition to serving as the half time Pastor of North Church Queens and writing Lectionary Ruminations, I also tutor part time.  If you or someone you know needs a tutor, or if you would like to be a tutor, check out my WyzAnt page and follow the appropriate links.

Lectionary Ruminations for Sunday, September 30, 2012, the Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

Posted each Thursday, Lectionary Ruminations focuses on the Scripture Readings, taken from the New Revised Standard Version, for the following Sunday per the Revised Common Lectionary. Comments and questions are intended to encourage reflection for readers preparing to teach, preach, or hear the Word. Reader comments are invited and encouraged. All lectionary links are to the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible via the PC(USA) Devotions and Readings website, but if you prefer another translation, feel free to use that instead. (Other references may be linked to the NRSV via the oremus Bible Browser.)  Lectionary Ruminations is also cross-posted on my personal blog, Summit to Shore. http://summittoshore.blogspot.com/

First Reading - Esther 7:1-6, 9-10, 9:20-22

v. 1 Who is the king and what is he king of?  What is the relationship between Haman and Esther?

v. 2 On the second day of what?

v. 3 Who are Esther’s people and why does she ask for her life and the life of her people?

v. 5 How could the king not know about this?

v. 9 Does it matter that Harbona was a eunuch?  How could Harbona know what was going on when the King did not know?

v. 10 The height of irony.

v. 20 Why did Mordecai record these things?  Why did he send letters?  I think it would be a find of great historical significance if one of these letters were ever discovered.

v. 21-22 The feast on these days commemorating all these events is called what?

Psalm - Psalm 124:1-8

v. 1 Must the LORD be on any one’s side?

v. 1-2 This sounds like a responsive call and response.

v. 3-5 Thus, the victory belongs to the LORD.

v. 8 This is not the confession of a national security state.

Second Reading - James 5:13-20

v. 13 is this an admonition or a restriction?  Shall the suffering only pray?  How many congregations on Sunday morning really sound cheerful?

v. 14 How many PC(USA) Teaching and Rulings Elders do you know who will anoint with oil?

v. 15 Is this a reference to faith healing?  What is the relation, if any, between faith and healing?

v. 16 How is the prayer of the righteous powerful and effective?  What about the prayer of the unrighteous?

v. 17 How do we wander from the truth?

Gospel - Mark 9:38-50

v. 38 What do you think of the situation John describes?  What is your take on “demons”?

v. 39 What do you think of Jesus’ advice?

v. 40 Is the enemy of my enemy my friend?

v. 41 What reward?

v. 42  What is a stumbling block?  Of the sixteen occurrences of “stumbling block” in the NRSV, consider especially 1 Cor. 1:23.  Who are “these little ones”?

vs. 43-47 How do children and others who understand Scripture literally understand these verses?

v. 48 Why do many of our contemporary images of hell include flames but not worms?

v. 49 What does it mean to be salted with fire?

v. 50 How does this verse follow from the verse that precedes it.

ADDENDUM

In addition to serving as the half time Pastor of North Church Queens and writing Lectionary Ruminations, I also tutor part time.  If you or someone you know needs a tutor, or if you would like to be a tutor, check out my WyzAnt page and follow the appropriate links.

Lectionary Ruminations for Sunday, September 23, 2012, the Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

Posted each Thursday, Lectionary Ruminations focuses on the Scripture Readings, taken from the New Revised Standard Version, for the following Sunday per the Revised Common Lectionary. Comments and questions are intended to encourage reflection for readers preparing to teach, preach, or hear the Word. Reader comments are invited and encouraged. All lectionary links are to the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible via the PC(USA) Devotions and Readings website, but if you prefer another translation, feel free to use that instead. (Other references may be linked to the NRSV via the oremus Bible Browser.)  Lectionary Ruminations is also cross-posted on my personal blog, Summit to Shore. 

First Reading - Proverbs 31:10-31

v. 10-31 Is this an example of a sexist Lectionary, not necessarily because the reading itself is sexist, but because there is no “capable husband” text to balance it?   If Jesus had a wife, would she have been the sort of wife described in this Reading?

v. 10 On the other hand, comparing a woman to a physical item could be seen as sexist, suggesting that a capable wife is a possession, mere “arm candy”, like a “trophy wife”.

v. 18 Is there a double meaning here?

v. 26 At least this verse does not seem sexist.

v. 28 How would a wife who is childless, perhaps not by choice, hear this verse?

Psalm - Psalm 1

v. 1 Where do scoffers sit?

v. 2 What does it mean to meditate on God’s law?

v. 3 To borrow a phrase going around facebook, following the law of the LORD bears fruits, not nuts.

v. 4 What process is being alluded to here?

v. 6 Is thee a difference between the LORD watching over the way of the righteous and watching over the righteous?  Note that it is not the wicked who perish but the way of the wicked.

Second Reading - James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a

v. 13 Socrates, Plato and Aristotle might agree.

v. 14 what is the relation between wisdom and truth?

v. 15 There seems to be at least two types of wisdom, earthly and spiritual.

v. 18 In or out of context, this is one of my favorite verses and one we should all keep in mind.  Why does the United States have a Defense Department (formerly the Ward Department) but has never had a Peace Department.  We have Military Academies but no nationally funded Peace Academy.

v. 1 Is this a naïve understanding of conflict?  How much of our conflict is based on psychological projection?

v. 2 I can not disagree.

v. 3 This is sounding like an indictment of the consumerist economy and marketing that appeals to selfish emotions.  How would this verse play out on Mad Men?

v. 7 I can do without devil language.

v. 8 This makes sense to me and based on personal experience seems somewhat true.

Gospel - Mark 9:30-37

v. 30 Who are “they” and where was “there”?  Why did he not want anyone to know it?

v. 31 Do you think that when Jesus teaches his disciples he is teaching the church, and that when he speaks to the crowd, he is speaking to the wider culture?  Why is Jesus portrayed as using “Son of Man” imagery and no other imagery?

v. 32 How often to people in the pews or in the classroom not understand the preacher/teacher but are afraid to ask a question?

v. 32 What do you know about Capernaum?  Whose house might he have been in?  Disciple’s arguing?

v. 34 Is Jesus not the greatest?  Oh, right, he is the least!

v. 35 Why did Jesus sit them down?

v. 36 Where did the little child come from?

v. 37 So welcoming a little child and holding him or her in my arms is akin to welcoming Jesus and thus God?  I can live with that.

ADDENDUM

In addition to serving as the half time Pastor of North Church Queens and writing Lectionary Ruminations, I also tutor part time.  If you or someone you know needs a tutor, or if you would like to be a tutor, check out my WyzAnt page and follow the appropriate links.

Lectionary Ruminations for Sunday, September 16, 2012, the Twenty-Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

Posted each Thursday, Lectionary Ruminations focuses on the Scripture Readings, taken from the New Revised Standard Version, for the following Sunday per the Revised Common Lectionary. Comments and questions are intended to encourage reflection for readers preparing to teach, preach, or hear the Word. Reader comments are invited and encouraged. All lectionary links are to the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible via the PC(USA) Devotions and Readings website, but if you prefer another translation, feel free to use that instead. (Other references may be linked to the NRSV via the oremus Bible Browser.)  Lectionary Ruminations is also cross-posted on my personal blog,  http://summittoshore.blogspot.com/.

First Reading -Proverbs 1:20-33

v. 20 This passage seems to personify wisdom in the feminine, so why not use the original Greek “Sophia” rather than the English translation “Wisdom”?  This verse also seems to display the Hebraic poetic device of repetition.

v. 22 Does this verse contrast the simple with the wise?  Are the simple the same as scoffers and fools?

v. 23 Who is speaking?  Can all thoughts be expressed in words, or must some thoughts be expressed through non-lingual representative arts?  Does DaVinci’s Last Supper or Dali’s Last Supper say something about the Last Supper that words can not express?

v. 29 Is knowledge the same as the fear of the LORD?  Is knowledge the same as wisdom?

Psalm - Psalm 19:1-14

v. 1 The Astronomer’s Bible/Gospel!  What is a firmament?

v. 2. What is the relationship between speech and knowledge?

vs. 3-4 How does a voice go out through all the earth if it is not heard?

vs. 4b-6 How do you interpret and apply a passage that assumes a pre-Copernican three-tiered universe in a post-Copernican world?

v. 7 How did we transition from the heavens to the law?

v. 10 At the close of the market on Tuesday, gold was selling for $1,728.7/ounce.

v. 14 One of my personal pet peeves is that this verse should not be used as a public prayer by a preacher before the preaching of a sermon, ESPECIALLY after a Prayer of Illumination has already been prayed before the reading of Scripture.

Second Reading - James 3:1-12

v 1. Using PC(USA) nomenclature, is James referring to “Teaching” Elders in particular, Sunday School Teachers, or teachers of faith in general?

v. 2 How true!   Who, but Jesus, is perfect?

v. 3 What is the equivalent of a verbal bridle?

v. 4 Ahhhhhh, sometimes the will of the pilot is overcome by the wind, lack of piloting skill, poor equipment, etc.  I wish I could always guide my C&C 24 wherever I want it to go, but that is not always the case.

v. 5a The tongue not only boasts of great exploits but can take us places we never wished to go. 

v. 5b-6a I doubt the author had in minds the tongues of fire associated with Pentecost.

v. 6b But the same member that curses can also bless.  The same tongue that expounds hate can also verbalize love.

v. 7 I think this is not true.

v. 8 What do you think?

vs. 9-10 See my rumination for verse 6b.

v. 11 Not at the same time, but perhaps alternately.

v. 12 True, true, but what about reverse osmosis and distillation?

vs. 1-12 In the age of social media and the internet, is the tongue really the problem, or is it the mind that tells the tongue what to say and the fingers to type?

Gospel - Mark 8:27-38

v. 27 Was Caesarea a village and Philippi a village?  Like Minneapolis / St. Paul?  Who do people in our culture say that Jesus is?

v. 29 This is the question Jesus asks each and every one of us.  Who do you say Jesus is?  Does your answer depend on who is asking the question?

v. 30 Why the order not to tell anyone about him?  What do you know about “the Messianic Secret”?

v. 31 John the Baptist,  Elijah, one of the prophets, one Messiah, the Son of Man?  So many identities, titles, and names!  Why did Jesus refer to himself as the Son of Man?

v. 32 Why did Peter rebuke Jesus?

v. 33 Why did Jesus call Peter “Satan”?

v. 34 What does it mean to take up one’s cross?  What is your cross?

v. 35 This reads like a conundrum.

v. 36 Does this matter at all to a generation that is embracing YOLO?

v. 38 How was Jesus’ generation adulterous and sinful?

ADDENDUM

In addition to serving as the half time Pastor of North Church Queens and writing Lectionary Ruminations, I also tutor part time.  If you or someone you know needs a tutor, or if you would like to be a tutor, check out my WyzAnt page and follow the appropriate links.

Lectionary Ruminations for Sunday, September 9, 2012, the Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

Posted each Thursday, Lectionary Ruminations focuses on the Scripture Readings, taken from the New Revised Standard Version, for the following Sunday per the Revised Common Lectionary. Comments and questions are intended to encourage reflection for readers preparing to teach, preach, or hear the Word. Reader comments are invited and encouraged. All lectionary links are to the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible via the PC(USA) Devotions and Readings website, but if you prefer another translation, feel free to use that instead. (Other references may be linked to the NRSV via the oremus Bible Browser.)  Lectionary Ruminations is also cross-posted on my personal blog, Summit to Shore. 

First Reading - Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9,22-23

v. 1 What is the history and meaning of your name?  What name is above every other name?  What is “favor”?

v. 2 Is this ALL they have in common?

v. 8 Let the politicians beware.

vs. 22-23 This reads like a passage for the 99%

Psalm - Psalm 125:1-5

v. 1 How do you define trust?

v. 2 What is it about being surrounded by mountains that is good news?

v. 3 What is a scepter and what does it symbolize?

vs. 3-4 Is there a theology of reward and punishment informing this Psalm?

Second Reading - James 2:1-10 (11-13)14-17

v. 1 What “acts of favoritism” are being referred to?

v. 2-4 Have you ever witnessed any such thing?

v. 5-7 Some more Scripture for the 99%.

v. 8 Why is this law referred to as “the royal law”?

v. 11 This verse seems to me to get it backwards.

v. 12 What is “law of liberty”?

v. 14 Can faith save YOU?

v. 17 Faith, without works, might be dead.  But what are works without faith?

Gospel - Mark 7:24-37

v. 24 From where?  What do you know about Tyre?  Why did Jesus not want anyone to know he was in the house?

v. 25 How do post-modern, scientifically informed people of faith handle passages, like this one, that speak of “unclean spirits”?

v. 26 What difference does it make that she was a Gentile?  Of Syrophoenician origin?

v. 27 How do you react to the fact that Jesus said this?

v. 29 Why was her response rewarded?

v. 30 How could Jesus heal someone without that person even being present for laying on of hands?

v. 31 What do you know of Sidon?

v. 32 What sort of impediment do you imagine?

v. 33 Why in private?  Why put fingers in ears and touch tongues instead of laying on hands?

v. 34 What language is “Ephphatha”?  Where else in Scripture do we hear a world like this?

v. 36 What do you know about “the Messianic secret”?

v. 37 When was the last time you, or members of the congregation you are associated with, were astounded?

ADDENDUM

In addition to serving as the half time Pastor of North Church Queens and writing Lectionary Ruminations, I also tutor part time.  If you or someone you know needs a tutor, or if you would like to be a tutor, check out my WyzAnt page and follow the appropriate links.