2nd Sunday After Epiphany, Ordinary Time 1-18-15

Formerly called the Season of Epiphany, along with liturgical denominations that share the Revised Common Lectionary, we are entering the Season After Epiphany, that is, Ordinary Time.

Collect for the Day

Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ is the light of the world: Grant that your people, illumined by your Word and Sacraments, may shine with the radiance of Christ's glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Reflections: The collect introduces the themes of illumination and calling that are woven through the readings appointed for this Sunday. Christ, whom we know in the Word and the Sacraments is the Word and Sacraments. He is also the light who seeks to illuminate our hearts and shine forth through us into the world. He is our vocation.

First Lesson: 1 Samuel 3:1-10(11-20)

Now the boy Samuel was ministering to the LORD under Eli. The word of the LORD was rare in those days; visions were not widespread.
          At that time Eli, whose eyesight had begun to grow dim so that he could not see, was lying down in his room; the lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the temple of the LORD, where the ark of God was. Then the LORD called, "Samuel! Samuel!" and he said, "Here I am!" and ran to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you called me." But he said, "I did not call; lie down again." So he went and lay down. The LORD called again, "Samuel!" Samuel got up and went to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you called me." But he said, "I did not call, my son; lie down again." Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, and the word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him. The LORD called Samuel again, a third time. And he got up and went to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you called me." Then Eli perceived that the LORD was calling the boy. Therefore Eli said to Samuel, "Go, lie down; and if he calls you, you shall say, `Speak, LORD, for your servant is listening.'" So Samuel went and lay down in his place. Now the LORD came and stood there, calling as before, "Samuel! Samuel!" And Samuel said, "Speak, for your servant is listening."
          [Then the LORD said to Samuel, "See, I am about to do something in Israel that will make both ears of anyone who hears of it tingle. On that day I will fulfill against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house, from beginning to end. For I have told him that I am about to punish his house forever, for the iniquity that he knew, because his sons were blaspheming God, and he did not restrain them. Therefore I swear to the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli's house shall not be expiated by sacrifice or offering forever."
          Samuel lay there until morning; then he opened the doors of the house of the LORD. Samuel was afraid to tell the vision to Eli. But Eli called Samuel and said, "Samuel, my son." He said, "Here I am." Eli said, "What was it that he told you? Do not hide it from me. May God do so to you and more also, if you hide anything from me of all that he told you." So Samuel told him everything and hid nothing from him. Then he said, "It is the LORD; let him do what seems good to him."
          As Samuel grew up, the LORD was with him and let none of his words fall to the ground. And all Israel from Dan to Beer-sheba knew that Samuel was a trustworthy prophet of the LORD.]

Reflections: The story takes place in a time of disorder, when the people did not feel close to God, or felt that God was not paying attention. Sound familiar? We are told that the word of the Lord had become “rare.” Israel’s heart was not listening; it lacked vision. To a large extent, Eli was responsible. His lack of control over his sons almost serves as a metaphor for his effectiveness in the whole community.

           When we come to his reading, we tend to focus a lot on the call of the young prophet Samuel. But here I’d like to look at Eli. He is a man who has spent his life attempting to serve God, but life happens, and we can’t control everything. In his later years seems to have lost his sense of mission and given in to defeat. Nevertheless, the lamp of God in the temple where Eli bedded down has “not yet gone out.”
          True, Eli is at first slow to understand what is happening to Samuel, but he figures it out. The old priest shows that the grace of God is still at work in him when, instead of being overcome with jealousy that God chose to speak to a child, Eli counsels Samuel how to respond.
          More telling, perhaps, is the fact that Eli does not try to protect himself from what he must guess will be a painful truth. He does not retreat into denial, but insists that Samuel reveal everything to him.
          So when Samuel does tells Eli what God had said, the old man does not defend rail against God, protest the unfairness, or cast blame. Rather, he sees and accepts that God’s judgment is just. Here is a “failure,” a man who can claim no pride over his service, and at the same time shows us how to be a mature, listening soul. Though the world is collapsing around him, the light has not been quenched.

Psalm 139: 1-5,  12-17  Domine, probasti

LORD, you have searched me out and known me; *

you know my sitting down and my rising up; you discern my thoughts from afar.

You trace my journeys and my resting-places * and are acquainted with all my ways.
Indeed, there is not a word on my lips, * but you, O LORD, know it altogether.
You press upon me behind and before * and lay your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; * it is so high that I cannot attain to it. . . .
For you yourself created my inmost parts; * you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I will thank you because I am marvelously made; * your works are wonderful, and I know it well.
My body was not hidden from you, * while I was being made in secret
and woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes beheld my limbs, yet unfinished in the womb; all of them were written in your book; *

they were fashioned day by day, when as yet there was none of them.

How deep I find your thoughts, O God! * how great is the sum of them!
If I were to count them, they would be more in number than the sand; *
to count them all, my life span would need to be like yours.

Reflection: The ways of God are beyond our comprehension, but we are not a mystery to God. We are known—and have always been fully known—by God more intimately than we know ourselves.

          For me, at least, it is only because God already knows me and loves me that I can bring dare to look at myself without illusion. Not that it is really possible quite yet to see myself as I am (I probably couldn’t bear it except in small increments—like the slow unpeeling of an onion—tear by tear). And that itself is possible only because I trust God and know that God loves me, more than I do.

 Epistle: 1 Corinthians 6:12-20

"All things are lawful for me," but not all things are beneficial. "All things are lawful for me," but I will not be dominated by anything. "Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food," and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is meant not for fornication but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us by his power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Should I therefore take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! Do you not know that whoever is united to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For it is said, "The two shall be one flesh." But anyone united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Shun fornication! Every sin that a person commits is outside the body; but the fornicator sins against the body itself. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.

Reflections: St. Paul’s injunction against the exchange of sex for money, may not seem relevant to the majority of us. Bizzare as it sounds to us today, prostitution was not something indulged in by “those” people, but by people like “us,” average members of the Christian community. In his time, prostitution was common, legal, and often presided over by local religious leaders and institutions (except in Judaism or Christianity).

          There is so much to say about why prostitution is a sin, but what I want to look at is that it is just another way to package and commodify intimate human sharing. Not merely prostitution alone, but the casual treatment of sex today suggests that sex has become no more than a transaction. When we commodify it, we commodify people—including ourselves.
          It’s not merely prostitution—although Paul devotes his text to this alone—but the many ways that we intentionally or unintentionally treat others like objects that is at issue. The more attention we pay to “those” people, the less likely we are to notice and repent of our own sin.

 Gospel: John 1:43-51

The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, "Follow me." Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, "We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth." Nathanael said to him, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see." When Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him, he said of him, "Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!" Nathanael asked him, "Where did you get to know me?" Jesus answered, "I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you." Nathanael replied, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!" Jesus answered, "Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these." And he said to him, "Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man."

Reflections: What does Jesus mean when he says that Nathanael has no deceit? Nathanael is prejudiced against things associated with Nazareth. But there is also something that captured Jesus’ attention. Something about him speaks of an open heart. Could it be the fact that despite the attitude Nathanael professes, he nevertheless accepts the invitation to “come and see”?

          It takes little to impress him deeply. But even that experience, Jesus promises, is only a hint of what awaits. Awaits Nathanael. And awaits us.