John Shearman's
 Liberal Lectionary Analysis

Rev. John Shearman

 INTRODUCTION TO THE SCRIPTURE

[A more complete analysis follows this brief summary for church bulletins.]

ISAIAH 49:8-16a This passage is just a brief excerpt from one of the so-called Servant Songs contained in Isaiah 49:1-26 from the Unknown Prophet of the Babylonian Exile (aka Second Isaiah. The depth of feeling in this poetry is unsurpassed in most of the Old Testament. Speaking for God, the prophet envisions the exiles returning to and restoring their homeland. Heaven and earth are called to rejoice that God has had compassion of God’s people despite their apostasy because God loves them as a mother loves her suckling child.

PSALM 131 This psalm seems almost too brief to have any significance, yet it was included in a collection of psalms (Pss. 120-134) for pilgrims approaching Jerusalem and its temple at one of the great festivals. It expresses a humility and quietness of mind that places complete trust in God. The imagery of a weaned child (vs. 2) seems almost out of place, because no weaned child would necessarily be tranquil. The error is on our understanding of the Hebrew context. The figure is that of a child which after being suckled is now quiet and composed.

I CORINTHIANS 4:1-5 Paul has been driven to protest the authenticity of his apostleship because of divisions within the Corinthian community. There appear to have been parties loyal to different apostles - Apollos, Cephas, Paul (1 Cor. 1:10-17). Here he tries to establish the fundamental truth that all are servants of the Messiah/Christ who has been revealed to them as the one Lord of all. Being of one fellowship and not lacking in spiritual gifts, all will be found blameless when Christ returns.

MATTHEW 6:24-34 This well-known passage from the Sermon on the Mount declared the secret to God's ample provision for human need: trust and obedience to God's righteous rule. Our grateful response to God's plentiful grace, not anxious materialism and manipulation of economic and financial systems, will bring about the universal prosperity God wants all of us to enjoy.

ISAIAH 49:8-16a The depth of feeling in this poetry is unsurpassed in most of the Old Testament. Speaking for God, the prophet envisions the exiles returning to and restoring their homeland. Heaven and earth are called to rejoice that God has had compassion of God’s people despite their apostasy because God loves them as a mother loves her suckling child.

This passage is just a brief excerpt from one of the so-called Servant Songs contained in Isaiah 49:1-26 from the Unknown Prophet of the Babylonian Exile (aka Second Isaiah. Exegesis of the complete poem informs us that the excerpt consists of the fifth to seventh strophes of twelve. Vs. 13 is a hymn of thanksgiving inserted between the sixth and seventh strophes. The hymn calls on all nature to celebrate the way Yahweh has comforted Israel.

The theme of the poem is Yahweh’s redemptive action toward the exiles in Babylon. Yahweh has not forgotten them because they are the people of the covenant with a long history of an intimate relationship with their God. They will experience a new exodus in returning to their homeland under Yahweh’s provident protection.

In two striking images the final strophe of the passage reassures the exiles that Yahweh has not forgotten them as they feared. As a mother cannot forget her suckling infant and as writing imprinted on a hand as an aide memoire, Yahweh reminds them of how he intends to re-establish them behind the walls of Jerusalem.

PSALM 131 This psalm seems almost too brief to have any significance, yet it was included in a collection of psalms (Pss. 120-134) for pilgrims approaching Jerusalem and its temple at one of the great festivals. It expresses a humility and quietness of mind that places complete trust in God.

That was not the psalmists original state of mind. Once he had much wealth and pleasure in his material possessions. His mind was set on earthly things which did not satisfy his soul. Now all this has changed as he has found rest in a deeper trust in Yahweh’s providential grace. Perhaps his wealth has been sorely diminished and he is both old and much poorer than he has ever been.

The imagery of a weaned child (vs. 2) recalls the similar image in Isaiah 49:15 above. The NRSV and the KJV give the impression that the child has already been weaned. To our modern sensibilities, it seems almost out of place, because no weaned child would necessarily be tranquil. The RSV and the NIV, however, reflect a more accurate context if not an exact translation. The figure is that of a child which after being suckled is now quiet and composed.

The psalmist or a later redactor may have added a brief, final prayer calling Israel to place their hope in Yahweh, thus shifting the focus from a personal to a congregational setting.

I CORINTHIANS 4:1-5 Much has been written about Paul’s conflict with the Corinthians Christian community. There appear to have been parties loyal to different apostles - Apollos, Cephas, Paul (1 Cor. 1:10-17). Paul has been driven to protest the authenticity of his own apostleship because of these divisions. This controversy became the whole emphasis of the first three chapters of this letter. Finally, in a move to resolve the situation, he takes a different tack. He tries to establish the fundamental truth that all are servants of Christ who has been revealed to them as the one Lord of all. Being of one fellowship and not lacking in spiritual gifts, all will be found blameless when Christ returns.

This was not a note of appeasement. Rather, Paul called the Corinthians to a higher mandate. Harking back to a prophetic motif found in the Servant Songs of Second Isaiah, he likened the apostles to servants of Jesus Christ as Israel was Yahweh’s servant. He undoubtedly also knew the tradition that Jesus had used a similar image to characterize his ministry. With a nod to the Gentiles in the Corinthians community familiar with the mystery cults of the time, he included a reference to the apostles being "stewards of God’s mysteries."

Paul then placed much emphasis on the trust that ought to be placed in these servant-leaders. He was not asking to be judged for any success or failure on his part. Though he felt he had done nothing wrong, he didn’t try to excuse himself. He knew that it was Christ who was and always would be his judge. He was satisfied that judgment would come when Christ returned. Only then would each person be able to discern how gracious God would be in commending those who had remained faithful to the end.

Many wagging fingers have been shaken over congregations or within families about unseemly behaviour. Perhaps it is a failure to which we all ought to confess. Paul reminded the Corinthians that we all face the same challenges to be faithful in our witness as followers of Jesus Christ in whatever circumstances we may be called to live and serve.

MATTHEW 6:24-34 This well-known passage from the Sermon on the Mount declared the secret to God's ample provision for human need: trust and obedience to God's righteous rule. Our grateful response to God's plentiful grace, not anxious manipulation of economic and financial systems, will bring about the universal prosperity God wants all of us to enjoy.

The two parts of this passage from the Sermon on the Mount may have existed separately in the earliest oral tradition behind Matthew’s Gospel. Vs. 24 is much like a proverb that speaks an important truth in a minimum of words. Its last few words are a connective linking it to the longer segment of the passage elaborating the equally valid truth that one cannot put one’s trust in material things, but only in God and God’s loving and providential reign in our lives.

Would that these values could be translated into action by the economic and political decision makers of the global institutions we are in the process of creating. We tend to forget how much change has occurred in the past few decades. One recent estimate held that just a century ago the vast majority of the world's population had no more annual income than the poorest people of the world today. Was it Gandhi who said, "If everyone cares enough and everyone shares enough, there will always be enough"?

In 1971, just prior to the first oil crisis and as the computer revolution was just beginning , the noted economist, Robert Heilbronner, predicted that no one would ever again be as rich as North Americans had become and the global economy would never be as fully developed as it was at that time. How wrong he was! In1995, Heilbronner summarized 188 reports of economic development he had received from international observers on three continents in these words: "Their common insight is that the global free-market paradigm is neither viable ecologically in the long term, nor adequate, in the short term, to meet the basic needs of all peoples for human development. Those interviewed are not ideologues and have no ready-made alternative to offer, but they are searching for broader alternative approaches to development, ones that include a critical handling of cultural and spiritual values. ... They would agree with Mohamad Sahnoun: manifestations of cultural and religious values, like values found in the dominant economic paradigm, secularism, individualism, materialism, paternalism, and marketism can become modern 'golden calves.'"

We do need a new vision of how to work out on a global scale what this gospel reading anticipated. Theologian Gabriel Fackre called it "God's Vision" for the world. The Commission on Global Governance, in its 1995 report, Our Global Neighbourhood, affirmed the need for "neighbourhood ethics" and "neighbourhood values" as the cornerstone of future global governance. The report quoted Barbara Ward as suggesting that "people have to see with new eyes and understand with new minds before they can truly turn to new ways of living."

In 2000, Paul Martin, then Canada's minister of finance, made an earnest plea to the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to extend a moratorium on burdensome debt repayments that cause developing nations to restrict their spending on health and education, and so worsens the cycle of ever increasing poverty and disease. Commitments of this kind can only help those in greatest need in those parts of the world that made the developed countries wealthy in the colonial period of past centuries. This is carrying into the global economy the justice and righteousness of God which Jesus set before us in the gospel lesson for today.

Only now in 2008 are we beginning to see the high cost of neglecting these moral and spiritual values which should shape our global economic policies.

The cost of essential foodstuffs like wheat, rice and corn is almost beyond the reach of the poorest billion people in the world while Europeans and North Americans turn food grains into ethanol to propel our expensive motor vehicles.

In the midst of civil warfare in Darfur, Sudan, and Zimbabwe, millions are starving. Natural disasters in Burma and China, have brought death to uncounted thousands and caused millions more to live in dire need of food and shelter. Are these people not our neighbours too? Which God do we really worship?