Luke 13:10-17I'd hate for there to be no post for two weeks - we might want to look back on some of this in sermon prep in the future...
Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. 11 And just then there appeared a women with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, "Woman, you are set free from your aliment." 13 When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14 But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the Sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, "There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the Sabbath day." 15 But the Lord answered him and said, "You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16 And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the Sabbath day?" 17 When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.
Here's a little bit for yesterday...
Mary Hinkle Shore, in her blog, quotes from Sharon Ringe -(whoever she might be) that the core question of this story “is not whether to keep the sabbath, but how to keep it.”
That is an interesting way to go, but I like Loader’s suggestion that the synagogue leader and Jesus have two quite different ways of viewing God. Perhaps the deeper question is “what sort of God do we serve?”
Loader:
The theology which informs Jesus’ attitude appears to be diametrically opposed to the theology reflected in the leader of the synagogue. Both would affirm that we must love God with the whole heart and soul and strength and that this needs to show itself in action. For the leader this meant: keeping the commandments...
. . . What is God really like? What if God’s chief concern is not to be obeyed, but something else? What if God’s chief focus is love and care for people and for the creation? Then the focus moves from God’s commands to God’s people and world. It is as though God is telling us to get our priorities right. Commandments, rules, guidelines, traditions, laws, scriptures are also subordinate to that purpose: love. God’s focus is not self-aggrandisement as it is with so many who have power and wealth and want to keep it, but generosity and giving, restoration and healing, encouraging and renewing. When any of these means (commandments, laws, scriptures) cease to be seen in that light, they become ends and we find people in absurd conflicts about whether they help someone in need or obey God. When those become alternatives, something has gone terribly wrong, IF you believe God’s chief concern is caring concern for people.
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Willimon has an interesting sermon on this text, looking at how God names us - and it concludes with this illustration, a pretty good one he stole from Craddock. . .
You also are a daughter or son of Abraham. Your name, whatever else we may call you, is “Christian.” Stand up straight, act like it, go in peace.
Fred Craddock tells of meeting a man one day in a restaurant.
“You a preacher?” the man asked.
Somewhat embarrassed, Fred said, “Yes.”
The man pulled a chair up to Fred’s table. “Preacher, I’ll tell you a story. There was once a little boy who grew up said. Life was tough because my mama had me but she had never been married. Do you know how a small Tennessee town treats people like that? Do you know the words they use to name kids that don’t have no father?
“Well, we never went to church, nobody asked us. But for some reason or other, we went to church one night when they was having a revival. They had a big, tall preacher, visiting to do to the revival and he was all dressed in black. He had a thunderous voice that shook the little church.
“We sat toward the back, Mama and me. Well, that preacher got to preaching, about what I don’t know, stalking up and down the aisle of that little church preaching. It was something.
“After the service, we were slipping out the back door when I felt that big preacher’s hand on my shoulder. I was scared. He looked way down at me, looked me in the eye and says, ‘Boy, who’s your Daddy?’
“I didn’t have no Daddy. That’s what I told him in trembling voice, ‘I ain’t got no Daddy.’
“‘O yes you do,’ boomed that big preacher, ‘you’re a child of the Kingdom, you have been bought with a price, you are a child of the King!’
“I was never the same after that. Preacher, for God’s sake, preach that.”
The man pulled his chair away from the table. He extended his hand and introduced himself. Craddock said the name rang a bell. He was the legendary former governor of the state of Tennessee.
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