Year A

Jan 13 2025

Scripture Study for

Israelite kings were to act as God’s representatives, ensuring justice by ruling wisely and fairly; they often failed in this regard. In Isaiah’s vision, God raises up an ideal Davidic king who will perfectly reflect the rule of the God he represents. Endowed with divine gifts, the king will bring down the “ruthless” and the “wicked” through right judgment (“the rod of his mouth”). Further, he will usher in an era in which all creaturely violence will end. “Natural enemies” will belong to the “peaceable kingdom” brought about by the royal icon of God. Such will be the magnificence and beneficence of the kingdom that other nations will be drawn to it.

Paul reminds his Roman readers that the story of Israel, in which the promises to the ancestors were fulfilled first in ancient times and then more completely in Christ, gives evidence of God’s trustworthiness. One aspect of those promises was that all the families of the earth would find blessing through Abraham’s descendants (Genesis 12:3). Thus, the fulfillment of those promises also included the extension of God’s mercy not just to Israel but ultimately, in Jesus Christ, to all the nations. God wishes to gather all peoples together in Christ—a divine intention that encourages the Romans to seek unity among themselves.

John the Baptist’s message of repentance (metanoia, change of mind and direction) draws large crowds, who are preparing for the coming of God’s kingdom. This kingdom is understood eschatologically, as a time of consummation and judgment. Foreshadowing what is to come, John has harsh words for the religious leaders, who do not possess a repentant disposition. Anticipating a claim that they have no need of repentance to prepare themselves, John assures them that God is sending One who will see, not one’s birth status, but one’s heart, and will judge accordingly, baptizing in fire and the Holy Spirit, which is to say, with the power and wisdom of God. John’s message highlights that this is a moment of decision for everyone.

Jan 13 2025

Visions and Prophecies

Last year I went to a Christmas concert to help get myself into the Christmas spirit. The concert was moving along at a comfortable and comforting pace, enjoy able but nothing out of the ordinary, when suddenly the choir came out and sang a piece that moved me to tears. I searched the program and found its name and composer: The Dream Isaiah Saw by Glenn Rudolph. I went home and found it online, a youth choir performing it.

Its refrain brought together the passage of Isaiah we heard today and the event that we will celebrate in a few weeks. It does this very simply with several variations for the final line: “Little child whose bed is straw, take new lodgings in my heart, Bring the dream Isaiah saw: a) life redeemed from fang and claw; b) justice purifying law; c) knowledge, wisdom, worship, awe.”

Advent is a season that sets before us visionaries and prophets like Isaiah, the missionary Paul, and the herald John. Each offers us a vision of things coming together. For Isaiah, it is all creation—animal and human; for Paul, it is Jews and Gentiles; for John, it is the One who is coming to gather the wheat into his barn, God’s harvest, those baptized in the Spirit.

We are brought together each Sunday to think, live, and sing in harmony to the gracious God who has come to us in Jesus Christ, the One who came filled with the spirit of the Lord, to draw us more deeply into the life so generously offered by God.

Consider/Discuss

Does the dream of Isaiah with its pairing of opposites offer hope in our own day, when there is so much division in the world, in government, and even in the Church?
What would arouse John the Baptist’s wrath today? What in our lives can be considered as worthy wheat and as chaff to be swept up and tossed into the fire?

Responding to the Word

We pray this season that we may come to “think in harmony with one another, in keeping with Christ Jesus, that with one accord [we] may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 15:5–6).

Jan 12 2025

Transformed by Glory

On this the last Sunday of the liturgical year, many tongues will sing, “Christ Jesus Victor, Christ Jesus Ruler, Christ Jesus Lord and Redeemer.” For the Son of Man is coming in his glory and all his angels will be with him. He will sit on his glorious throne, and all peoples will come before him. Let the trumpets sound!

On this day, we do not look at the little ways in which the Holy Spirit speaks—through the smell of popcorn, the labor of climbing a mountain, or the planting of onions. This feast lifts us to the majestic, toward the awesomeness of God. All those who await us in heaven have vibrated with this glory. They have seen Christ the King.

Have you gotten a taste of that glory—in a dream? On the edge of a song? In the radiance of a sunset? In the joy of a meal? We don’t believe based on nothing. God has spoken. God has spoken to us.

The One we celebrate was so tiny at the beginning of this adventure. Today, he is grand as Christ the King. It is as though the coo of a newborn baby has swelled into the Hallelujah Chorus; the silence of a grain of sand has become the roar of the Pacific Ocean; the whisper of a gentle breeze has become the rumble of an earthquake. Rejoice!

In gathering the nations, the King wants our wholehearted “yes!” Have we been so completely changed into the person of Christ that we act as he acts, forgive as he forgives, and reach out as he reaches out? Have we given a cup of water to a little one? Have we fed the hungry? These actions are not just a garment thrown over our grubbiness. The trumpet blasts to transform our whole being.

Consider/Discuss

Teresa of Ávila called her beloved in prayer “Your Majesty.” Try using that invocation as you enter into a moment of silence and contemplate the grandeur of God. Have you seen God’s glory? Tasted it? Heard it? Felt it? Share the story of that glory with a fellow traveler on the pilgrim road.
As we ponder the sovereignty of Christ, it is an act of our will to obey and follow, to serve as he serves, to love as he loves, and to give as he gives. What one grace can I ask for today to solidify my will to serve my King?

Living and Praying with the Word

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, thank you that we are not alone. Thank you for the fellow pilgrims who have walked with us this year. Thank you that we walk with the saints on earth and the hosts of heaven. Secure in that solidarity, we turn ourselves toward the light of the new liturgical year. We do not know what lies ahead. We do not know what will be. But we do know that the alleluias of the heavens will hold us, for with them, we too will to glorify you with our lives.

Jan 12 2025

Scripture Study for

The reading from Ezekiel comes from a passage that focuses on the failure of Israel’s leaders, who have not shown solicitude for the socially and spiritually vulnerable but instead have been negligent or even taken advantage of God’s flock for their own gain. Now, God says, I will do myself what you did not do. In God’s care, the neglected, abused, or those who were allowed to “go astray” will be cared for properly; “the sleek and the strong” who took advantage of them will receive their judgment. Yet even among the flock will be found the faithless, whom God will seek out. But some of them will resist, proving themselves not part of God’s flock, but goats and rams.

At least some of the Corinthian Christians denied the resurrection of the dead, yet had apparently accepted Paul’s teaching on Christ’s role in God’s redemption. Paul points out that if there is no resurrection, and Christ was not raised from the dead, the gospel message is meaningless and false because they are still in their sins and have no hope beyond this life. The gospel is that Christ was raised from the dead, and because of this the baptized have received life in and through him and will be resurrected too at his second coming. Christ alone will be sovereign, the only authority, and all powers will be subject to him, including and especially the power of death.

The final judgment scene must be understood against the background of Jesus’ consistent teaching, found throughout Matthew’s Gospel, on the great difficulty of entering “the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” One must completely reform one’s life, starting at the level of thought, attitude, and interpretation of reality. Thus the sheep have not made their way easily into the kingdom simply by a few “works of mercy.” Their actions represent a fundamental disposition toward God that is manifested in their actions on behalf of others. These are the members of the flock who denied themselves, took up their crosses, and thus became followers of Christ. The goats represent those who never did deny themselves or take up their crosses, and thus never really lived for anyone but themselves.

Jan 12 2025

Return on Investment

Another test! This time, it looks like the final in the evangelist Matthew’s finance class. Is there an eternal spreadsheet in heaven? Do the angels daily tabulate how much God has invested in us and how much we give back? When we get to the pearly gates, will St. Peter be holding out our heavenly balance sheet?

In today’s parable, “talents” were worth a thousand dollars each. In ancient times, the master who gave five talents, or five thousand dollars, invested a lot of money. Even one thousand dollars would have been a generous risk. Did he find the return on investment (ROI) worth it?

A mom gets up at 2:46 a.m. to tend to a vomiting four-year-old. A programmer sips his fourth cup of coffee to get the energy to put the final edits on a project. A coach invests long hours to improve her shooting forward’s free throws. Is the ROI worth it?

What are we to make of this parable? Is Jesus urging us toward a responsible lifestyle in which we carefully use (and not bury in the ground) the talents we have been given to build a better world? Is he telling us to dutifully invest the goods of faith toward lifting the lost? Yes and yes.

But even more than that, Christian life is not a bargaining “You gave me this, God, so I’ll give you that.” The mom may (or may not) make a return on the time she gives to her child in the middle of the night. She loves anyway. The Creator of the world will never make a balanced return on us. God loves anyway. God takes a risk on us. The Giver of gifts asks us to invest our lives in the boldest of schemes: follow Jesus wherever and however he leads. That is a grand venture. The ROI is out of this world.

Consider/Discuss

Have you ever cried out in frustration, “God, you owe me!” or “I deserve more!” How does the bargaining of a “balance-sheet Christianity” disparage the generosity of the risk-taking God? Are we willing to invest our lives and take a risk on the divine giver?
In abuse situations, children hide. When a boss’s temper is erratic, employees pull inward. If you had a hard taskmaster, would you feel like hiding your talents in the ground? What would help you to be willing to step out and take a risk?

Living and Praying with the Word

God of love, there is no way that I can give you back as much as I have been given. Do not let me see myself as a number on a heavenly balance sheet. Whatever you call me to do, help me to spend my life with love and generosity. I believe that this life is worth my best effort. Refresh my energy, for sometimes I feel it wearing out. You did not count the cost. Help me to do the same. For you, eternal God, have not just promised a “reward.” You have promised me yourself as my future.