Lectionary Ruminations 2.0 for Sunday, February 23, 2014, the Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A)

Lectionary Ruminations 2.0 is a revised continuation of Lectionary Ruminations.  Focusing on The Revised Common Lectionary Readings for the upcoming Sunday from New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible, Lectionary Ruminations 2.0 draws on nearly thirty years of pastoral experience.  Believing that the questions we ask are often more important than any answers we find, without overreliance on commentaries I intend with comments and questions to encourage reflection and rumination for readers preparing to teach, preach, or hear the Word. Reader comments are invited and encouraged.  All lectionary links are to the via the PC(USA) Devotions and Readings website.

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First Reading - Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18

19:1 Did The LORD speak in Hebrew?

19:2 Why should the people of Israel (and us by extension) be holy?  What is the difference between shall and should?

19:9-10 What do you know about gleaning?  In addition to this being a form of social welfare, it probably also is good ecology.  How has industrialized farming done away with such practices? What does this say to the 1% and the 99%?

19:11-12 So, contrary to last week’s Gospel Reading, it is ok to swear by the name of God as long as one swears truthfully?

19:13 Let’s put these word on display on Wall Street and in the lobby of America’s mortgage lenders. Is it permissible to defraud someone who is not a neighbor?  Who is a neighbor?

19:14  Praise God for the ADA.  I sometimes wonder what was going through the minds of people who designed and built church buildings before ADA.  I fear we are now paying the price for their lackof awareness and foresight.

19:15 As the economic disparity in America approaches levels that have not been seen since just before the Great Depression, this verse becomes ever more poignant.  In other words, justice is economically blind?

19:16 Good for kin and neighbor, but what about the stranger?

19:18 The first part of his verse points toward the Gospel reading.  The second part of this verse informs Jesus’ answer to the questions “Which is the greatest commandment?”

19:8, 10, 12, 14, 15, 17 Is the repetition of “I am the LORD” merely a literary device or does it suggest that these verse may have been used liturgically in a responsive fashion?  Might the repetition of “I am the LORD” also serve a theological function?

19:1, 9-17 How shall we read these verses in light of the Ten Commandments?

Psalm - Psalm 119:33-40

119:33-40 Do not forget that this is the second week in a row the Psalm has been an excerpt from Psalm 119, an acrostic. What synonyms for “statutes” are used in these verses?

119:33 How does the LORD teach?  Note that “way” is singular.

119:34 Does understanding precede the keeping of God’s law?

119:35 Note that “path”, as “”way” in verse 33, is singular.

119:36-37 What is God’s responsibility and what is our responsibility for turning our heart and eyes?

119:38 What is The LORDS “promise”?  What does it mean to “fear” God?  You may want to revisit Aldous Huxley’s “mysterium tremendum” as described in his The Doors of Perception and Rudolph Otto’s “mystery” or “numinous” as explored in his The Idea of the Holy: An Inquiry into the Non-rational Factor in the Idea of the Divine and its Relation to the Rational. 

119:39 What disgrace does the Psalmist dread?

119:40 Hey, God, look at me?  I might not have kept all your decrees, but I wanted to.  Give me life just for trying.

Second Reading - 1 Corinthians 3:10-11, 16-23

3:10 How much of God’s grace has been given to Paul?  How much has been given to you? Is Paul bragging when he calls himself “a master builder”. If Paul laid the foundation, who is now building on that foundation?  How many ways are there to build on an already established foundation?

3:16 What is the foundation of “God’s Temple”?  Did God’s Spirit dwell in the Jerusalem temple before it was destroyed?

3:17 Is Paul talking about self-destruction, or destroying the temple of another? How shall we read this in light of the Roman destruction of the Jerusalem temple?

3:18 Paul again writes about being “wise” and becoming “fools”,  but become fools in order to become wise.  What is Paul doing with these word games and twists of logic?  Are there two types of wisdom?

3:19 Where is this written, Job 5:13 perhaps?  If so, I find it ironic that the Book of Job is traditionally classified as “Wisdom Literature”.

3:20 Where is this written, Psalm 94:11 perhaps?

3:21 All things are yours?  What is Paul talking about?

3:22-23 So, in the end, all things are God’s?

Gospel - Matthew 5:38-48

5:38 How many times have we not only heard this said, but cited out of context, and used to argue the opposite point for which it was intended?

5:39 It sounds as though Jesus is asserting his own authority over the law.  What do you know about “turning cheeks”?  The Just War theory has overturned any sense of not resisting evildoers.

5:40 Did Jesus live in a litigious society?  What point is he making?

5:41 Who might force you to go a mile and why?

5:42 Give?  How much?  Loan?  With our without interest?

5:43 I have not heard this one very often, if at all.

5:44 I actually find it easier to pray for those who persecute me than to love my enemies.

5:45 True is true, but so what?

5:46 Does Jesus mean to suggest that the only reason to love is to be rewarded?

5:47 What does it mean to “greet”?

5:48 Is human perfection really an attainable goal?