Sunday August 15 Pentecost 12
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Psalm 145
Praise to God because God cares for the oppressed and feeds all creation—God is praised everywhere.
2 Samuel 17: 1-23 What’s Samuel about?
Ahithophel, David’s former advisor, wisely advises Absalom to mount a sneak night attack on David, but David’s foreign spy Hushai, who had been ordered by David to remain in Jerusalem, falsely advises Absalom to organize a nation-wide war on David. God causes Absalom to choose the spy’s advice. Other spies, protected by a common woman, alert David to Absalom’s decision. Ahithophel, realising that he has been rejected by Absolom, and by God for betraying God’s king, hangs himself. The chaos in the royal house continues to deepen.
In the stories of how God ensured that Joseph rose to power in Egypt, God never directly appeared but influenced events through people’s actions. In the same way God is ensuring that consequences will be visited on Absalom for having plotted against the king God had anointed even though God never directly appears. This is a sophisticated understanding, from the ancient world, of how God works. It likely arose from the experience that Cyrus, who freed the Jews when he conquered Babylon, had likely never heard of the Jewish God.
John 5: 30-47 What’s John about?
John, the gospel writer, wants to be clear that Jesus is the way in which we see God. In this passage Jesus is using legal arguments, which would have carried weight in those days, to demonstrate that he really is the image of God. He defends himself from the accusation that he is biased toward himself by claiming multiple witnesses who affirm he is the image of God. These witnesses include John the Baptist, Moses, and the Hebrew scriptures. But the most important witness is God. Jesus says that those who don’t think he is the image of God doubt him because they haven’t experienced God.
The message to us is not to worry about the intricacy of these convoluted arguments which were likely developed by John, but to ask ourselves if Jesus’ death and resurrection is indeed the character of God, and therefore our character. If we engage in God’s activity of laying down our lives for justice, then we have already entered into the glory of Christ’s resurrection.
This week’s collect:
Almighty God,
you have broken the tyranny of sin
and sent into our hearts the Spirit of your Son.
Give us grace to dedicate our freedom to your service,
that all people may know the glorious liberty
of the children of God;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen.
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