April 13, 2025 Palm Sunday Psalm 118: 1-2, 19-29 Luke 19: 28-41 Not What Was Expected Elk Grove Presbyterian Church Dexter McNamara
What I’m going to read in a couple of minutes is Luke’s account of Jesus’ ride into Jerusalem. But before I read our text, I have little Bible memory quiz for you.
Here we go.
First: What is the subtitle given to this story? Triumphal Entry…that’s what it’s called in all four Gospels in both the NIV and NRSV translations…perhaps other terms in other versions.
Second: What happened on that Triumphal Entry? What went on? Each person, please just mention one thing that happened.
—
Alright…good.
Now, as I read Luke’s account, I want you to make a mental note of anything that surprises you, or maybe didn’t know that was there, or that is different than those things we talked about, or what you see as missing, or that you have a question about. Okay? Then we’ll share about those things that stuck out to you about Luke’s account.
Okay, here we go: Luke 19: 28-41
This is the Word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
So…what caught your attention in this reading?
—
Good…thank you!
Okay.
Now, I want us to consider several things:
1. EXPECTATIONS or ANTICIPATIONS about Jesus
2. Where those EXPECTATIONS or ANTICIPATIONS come from
3. How those EXPECTATIONS or ANTICIPATIONS…
…compare to the message in the Gospels…
…and how they compare to real life in the world.
And I want us to consider those issues as they relate to the people around Jesus on that Palm Sunday, how they relate to what Luke wrote, and how they relate to us.
Sound like a lot? Not to worry! We’ll go through this fairly quickly.
Luke wrote that people shouted: “Blessed is THE KING who comes in the name of the Lord.” That spoke of the expectation, the anticipation, the hope, that this Jesus was to become the new king of Israel…throwing out the Romans, re-establishing the throne of David, bringing back power and honor to the Jewish people.
That’s what John the Baptist declared about that one who was coming after him, the one who was greater than he was. That’s what Peter expected and anticipated when he declared that Jesus was the Christ, the anointed one, the Messiah. That’s what James and John anticipated and expected when they rather shamelessly asked for special seats of power in Jesus’ administration. That’s what many in the growing crowds that were following him were expecting and anticipating and hoping for.
“Blessed is the KING who comes in the name of the Lord!”
Where did that idea come from?
Well, it came from the prophets of old who spoke that the Messiah, the Anointed One, who would appear. It came from the Psalms that spoke of redemption for Israel. It came from what was discussed and debated about in synagogues. It came from what all the sacrificial rituals were related to. A “Son of David” would fulfill that promise
And if that was the expectation and anticipation of many of Jesus’ followers, it was seen by the religious hierarchy as an error and a threat. An error because this Jesus character wasn’t behaving the way the Messiah was supposed to act: he was hanging out the riff-raff of Jewish society, he was violating so many Jewish laws – like not to work on the sabbath. And he was a threat not only because he was challenging their authority, but because he might so stir up the people toward rebellion against Roman rule, that Pilate might bring down the hammer of military power.
As for Pilate himself, he didn’t care much what those Jews squabbled about his Jesus. But he knew that if rebellion was in the air, he would have to squash it with whatever force was needed. That’s what had happened some years before when a man named Judas of Galilee had started a protest against paying taxes to Rome. Judas of Galilee had been eliminated by the Romans. That’s what had happened when a man named Theudas had gathered about 400 followers to lead a resistance movement against Roman rule. Theudas had been eliminated by the Romans.
Was Pilate concerned about this Messiah talk? Only if it required military intervention.
“Blessed is the KING who comes in the name of the Lord!”
But Jesus, as presented in the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament, was not to be that kind of king. Jesus would speak and act about the power of love, not political power. He would teach about compassion, not about simply following the rules. He would advocate for God’s inclusiveness, not religious or cultural correctness and exclusivity.
For all those people around Jesus on that Palm Sunday, he would not seek to be the kind of king many of them expected and anticipated and hoped for. He would not seek to be the kind of king the religious hierarchy saw as a threat. He would not seek to be the kind of king Pilate thought he might have to worry about.
So, what kind of king would Jesus be?
That’s what Luke would write about perhaps 40 or so years after that ride into Jerusalem. Luke had read Mark’s Gospel, he had read Matthew’s Gospel, he had read a number of other accounts about what Jesus had done and said. He knew about Jesus having been executed by the Romans and then made alive again by God’s power. Luke knew about the power given to Jesus’ followers by the Spirit that allowed them to boldly proclaim Jesus as Lord and perform miracles of healing through that power. And Luke knew that the initial followers’ anticipation that Jesus would come back within a very short time had not occurred as they had expected. And he knew that the church had faced severe persecution from without and troubles from within.
And after carefully pondering all that — all the teaching and all the miracles, all that was so positive and all that was so painful — Luke would ultimately boldly declare in the Gospel he wrote that Jesus Christ is Lord.
How about us on this Palm Sunday, 2025? What do we finally do with all the different messages we have heard and all the different images we’ve seen about who this Jesus is? We’ve heard about Beatific words he spoke from a gentle hillside, and the final, difficult words he spoke from a brutal cross. We’ve learned about how he lovingly embraced children, and how he angrily overturned the tables of the money changers that he threw out of the temple. We’ve seen images of him as a rather small, dark-skinned, dark-haired, dark-eyed Palestinian Jew of the first century, and we’ve seen images of him as a rather athletic, light-skinned, blue eyed, almost blond European type… a guy who would have fit right in with other blue-eyed, blond-haired athletes at UCLA.
He’s been appropriated by narrow-minded, only-we-know Christians who declare that he is solely about personal salvation, about just the individual’s soul. And he’s been appropriated by narrow-minded, only-we-know Christians who declare that he is solely about righting social injustice, about changing the corrupt system.
So, to what kind of king will we declare our loyalty on this Palm Sunday? Perhaps best to recall the words God spoke to Moses from that burning bush when Moses asked by what name that God should be called. From that bush came the term translated as “I am who I am,” also translated as “I will be who I will be.”
On this Palm Sunday, whatever expectations or anticipations we have had about Jesus and God, with the help of the Spirit may we also ultimately be willing to declare that we will commit ourselves to follow the Christ who “Is who He Is” and “Will be who He Will be.”
To God be the Glory.
Thanks be to God.
Amen!
April 6, 2025 Fifth Sunday in Lent Communion Psalm 126 John 12: 1-11 Private Blessings, Public Expectations Elk Grove Presbyterian Church Dexter McNamara
INTRO TO GOSPEL READING
Today, I want to do something similar to what we did last week: I’m going to read our text in John and then open the floor to what jumped out to you or to a key thought or idea or question that caught your attention. And if you read my not-finished version of this sermon that I mistakenly sent out yesterday instead of the bulletin, don’t steal any of my comments, please.
So: John 12: 1-11
Open mic time. Comments included:
–Judas as a thief, not just the betrayer
–Religious leaders want to kill Lazarus as well as Jesus
Good comments. Thank you.
Let me mention several basic ideas or themes that came to me about this passage and how those might relate to our own times and our own lives.
First, the words Place, People, and Purpose as related to that dinner.
The Place was in the home of Martha, Mary, and Lazarus in the town of Bethany. Luke had told of an earlier dinner at their house when Martha had been busy preparing and serving the meal while Mary sat listening to Jesus, which had not pleased Martha. But that’s a story for another time.
The town of Bethany was not far from Jerusalem. The name Bethany means “House of Figs,” figs symbolizing security and well-being. It had been near Bethany that Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead. Again, another story.
So, this dinner happened in a welcoming setting in a pleasant town that had significant meaning to Jesus and his followers, and was also on the way to Jerusalem and the cross.
The Place in this story was important.
Place can be important for us, of course. A warm and welcoming setting can create a sense of comfort, a place where we can feel relaxed. I think that’s what we felt at our potluck yesterday. This is a comfortable space, and people coming here for other meetings often comment at how comfortable they feel coming here. Many of you were involved in renovating is space, and Joann and Jim do such a great job helping make this a welcoming place.
Place is important. And I’m sure each of us could recount how place or places have been important in our own lives. I’ve mentioned how important Yosemite has been in my life. That home in Bethany was an important part of this story.
Then the People.
The people at that dinner were those three siblings, Jesus, his 12 Apostles, and perhaps others. Martha, Mary, and Lazarus were special friends of Jesus. His Apostles were an interesting mix, to say the least, as Judas makes clear. But this dinner gathering was of people closely connected to Jesus and his ministry, by and large a compatible group.
That was different from the other people who showed up later to get a look at Lazarus. And certainly different from the religious leaders who wanted to kill not only Jesus, but Lazarus, as well, because Jesus and Lazarus were threats to those leaders.
Place…People…and then the Purpose of that dinner, which was, as John wrote, to honor Jesus.
Why? Not only because those people appreciated how special Jesus was, but also because they knew dramatic, perhaps tragic things lay ahead for Jesus. Remember that somewhat earlier Jesus had left Jerusalem to get away from the religious leaders when they had tried to stone him to death. When he subsequently heard that Lazarus had died and he decided go back close to Jerusalem and that threat, good old Thomas had said: “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
That dinner in Bethany was not just a nice stop along the way, but an opportunity for his closest followers to show their great love and appreciation to him for the vision and hope he had brought to them.
This is where the theme of TIME comes in. That dinner took place in very stressful and scary times. They all knew of the threat facing Jesus. They may have heard of the threat to Lazarus. And, as Thomas understood, all of them associated with Jesus might also be in danger.
So, in light of the potential danger they all faced, perhaps the purpose of that dinner was also a kind of resistance in the face of the threat posed by the religious leaders and the military might of Rome. It was dangerous to side with this one the establishment was out to get. But they held that dinner party, anyway.
Resistance is always dangerous, of course, whatever form resistance may take and at whatever level– national, local, or personal. It can be difficult to know how to respond to people who strongly express racist or anti-Semitic comments, hard to know how to stand for love and truth and hope and justice when confronted with hatred and lies and the threat of violence.
I have never found that easy to do. In challenging, difficult times, I know I’ve stayed silent far too often.
That dinner took place during difficult times. Jesus knew what lay ahead. The next day he would ride into Jerusalem on what is rather ironically called his Triumphant Entrance, an entrance that would lead to the cross.
The final theme I want to mention is what I’ll call the interplay between the spiritual and the physical, between the theological and the human.
The Gospel of John is the most theological of the Gospels. It starts with that glorious Prolog: “In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.” There are such flights of theological thinking throughout his Gospel, often very difficult to follow. But there’s also a very human, physical side to John, as when he wrote in the Prolog: “The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us for a while.” There’s the very heavenly, and the very earthly.
We can see that in what Mary did at that dinner: she performed an act of deep devotion and worship by spreading that very expensive ointment of Jesus’ feet and wiping them with her hair — a profound spirituality expressed in a very physical and sensuous act, which filled the whole house with a beautiful fragrance. Perhaps she sensed that death would soon claim him, so she anointed him in preparation for that death.
But that act elicited a biting criticism from Judas. Was he really concerned about the poor or, as John stated, just wanting to get his hands on a potential financial windfall? Or maybe something else was going on with him. Could it be that such a prodigal outward show of love and devotion may have created such a sense of discomfort and embarrassment not only in Judas, but others, as well, that he needed to change the subject, to say something about…oh…true discipleship. Mary’s very emotional show of affection and devotion may have been very hard for Judas to take.
Maybe most of us can identify with being uneasy with strong showings of emotions. And, of course, we Presbyterians are known for being rather emotionally reticent, shall we say. But being emotionally reticent is okay, that may be how we were built. But, as disciples of Christ, it’s not okay to be reticent in sharing God’s love.
And that may be the key message for us is in Jesus’ reply to Judas: “Let her be. Let her do what she can do now.” That’s what the Gospel calls to each of us: To do what we can in our place and time, whatever public that may be. We are to show our devotion to Christ by loving and caring for others, in whatever ways each of us is capable of doing that. And each one of us has unique talents and gifts, and it is through you and me that God can touch others with love and peace and hope. It is through you and me, empowered by the Holy Spirit, that God’s will can be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Thanks be to God. Amen
March 30, 2025 4th Sunday of Lent Psalm 32: 1-5, 11 Luke 15: 1-3, 11-32 Coming to Our Senses Elk Grove Presbyterian Church Dexter McNamara
I want to start this sermon as a class seminar. So put on your thinking caps as we will do some give and take about what was the longest of all Jesus’ parables, which is also probably the most sliced & diced & written about of his parables, as well as being one of the most often depicted in religious art…paintings, stained glass, pottery& ceramics.
This is a very familiar parable. And as one commentator said: “One of the main struggles in reading this parable is that once we hear the words ‘A man had two sons,’ we quit listening, even as preachers. The challenge of this parable is to keep listening, to listen to it again, and to be open to the possibility it may say something new to us, however many times we may have read or heard about it.”
OK, class — several questions. One word responses are fine, no response more than 38 second, please.
First: What is the sub-title by which this parable is probably best known? “The parable of……(the prodigal son).
Second: What are some other sub-titles given to this parable? Lost son… NIV. Prodigal and his brother…NRSV. Others include Two Sons, Loving Father. German theologian Helmut Thielicke called it “The Waiting Father.”
Third: What are some of the key points often made about this parable? Derelict son, forgiving father, angry older brother, repentance.
Fourth: What does the term “prodigal son” imply about that son? Irresponsible, sinful, ungrateful.
Final question: What does the word “prodigal” mean? I needed to look that up: “wastefully extravagant”, “spending money or resources freely and recklessly”, “giving on a lavish scale.” Basically…beyond the norm or accepted or usual. One example was that was given: “a dessert with a prodigal amount of whipped cream.”
Well done. Class not dismissed.
Let’s remember the context in which Jesus tells this parable. He had been teaching and healing, healings often happening on the Sabbath. He had been relating to “religiously impure” Jews, and also to Gentiles. That’s the context for this parable.
This 15th chapter opens by saying that “tax collectors and sinners were all gathered around to hear him.” Then says: “But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.’” Those “religious” ones saw Jesus as not abiding by the rules and regulations, not abiding by the acceptable norms. Jesus was being rather “prodigal” in his care for God’s people.
Our reading goes on: “Then Jesus told them this parable (actually, “these parables”): the parable of the lost sheep, another of his most beloved parables; then the parable of the lost coin. Both those concluded with great celebrations when what was lost was found. And that, of course, becomes the final point of this parable of the prodigal son — that the one who was lost was now found.
Jesus was not against Jewish laws and not against social norms as such. He was against those being used to separate and divide people into different categories and castes: clean and unclean, acceptable and unacceptable, holy and unholy, part of family or alien.
Obviously, there is lots to consider in this parable. But I just want to focus on two phrases.
The first is about the son: “when he came to his senses…” In essence: “Woe. What am I doing here?” So, he decided to go back home. He rehearsed what he’d say to his father, a nice sounding speech. Was he truly repentant, or just hoping it would sound good to his father? We don’t know.
What does it mean for us to come to our senses, given the complexity of our own personal lives and the pressures we can feel from so many different sources — expectations of others, social norms, religious messages about what’s right and what’s wrong, political loyalties. We all have a mixture of motives and emotions, don’t we? And even our best intentions can come with deeper needs that we may not even be aware of.
The Gospel doesn’t say God is going to help us gain perfect understanding about ourselves and perfectly pure hearts. The Gospel does say God’s Spirit can help us become more honest with ourselves, more aware our needs and motives, more conscious of and concerned about what’s going on around us, more ready to struggle with tough questions rather than to simply accept easy answers.
Whatever that son’s mixed motives were after he came to his senses, whatever our mixed motives are when we come to our senses in different ways and at different times, the important thing for that son was to head for home, just like the important thing for us is to head for God’s love and God’s truth.
Phrase #1 was about the son…and us.
Phrase # 2 was about the father…and us.
The story says that when the father saw his son, he defied the social norm of being dignified, of waiting for that son to get to him, or perhaps to slowly walk towards him. Instead ran out to meet him, threw his arms around him, didn’t even wait for the son to complete his well rehearsed speech. That father did something prodigal when he saw that son.
That’s what the Gospel says God does with us: ready to greet us with open arms long before we have fully sorted out our needs and motives, long before we fully know what repentance means. We might say that God is prodigal with God’s grace.
And once we experience that Amazing Grace, that’s how we are to seek to relate to others, whoever they may be, whatever their relationship to God may be.
In his work with hardened gang members in Los Angeles, Father Gregory Boyle says he has learned “The power of EXTRAVAGANT TENDERNESS” (a subtitle to one of his books), the power of a prodigal loving and accepting of those gang members who, as they were willing, became open to being loved by other people and became open to the mystery of God’s love.
Prof. Arlen Hultgren comments about this parable: “Jesus came preaching the kingdom of God. His message was about a God whose love surpasses all typical expressions known to humanity. That love is celebrated by those who apprehend it in the gospel of Jesus, as illustrated in the scene of celebration after the homecoming of the younger son. There really is no point in going beyond the story as given to wonder whether the father finally prevailed upon the elder brother to join the party (or what would happen to the relationship between those brothers). The parable is open ended, and it is best not to try to rescue it to fulfill our own wishes for resolution.”
Like that parable, our lives are also open ended, wherever we are on our journey. And God is with us on that journey as we seek to “come to our senses” each day, as we seek share grace and truth and hope each day.
That’s the hope and the challenge of the Gospel.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
March 23, 2025 3rd Sunday of Lent
Psalm 63: 1-8
Luke 13: 1-9
God’s Foolish Patience
Elk Grove Presbyterian Church
Dexter McNamara
Three things about this sermon:
- It may be a little shorter than most. No promises, of course…but…
- Right off I’ll state the main message I see in this reading in Luke and the main thing I hope you will take away from this sermon. Those are summarized in the sermon title: –“God’s Foolish Patience.” By which I mean God keeps on loving us, keeps on knocking on the doors of our hearts, keeps on calling us back…even as we may resist that love, ignore that knocking, and be deaf to that call.
- I hope you’ll stay for the Sermon Shoot Around after the service (and after
a time for goodies, of course) to talk about the text & sermon, ask questions…whatever else.
Okay? Okay.
Two disasters and an unfruitful fig tree. I find this to be one of the more interesting and challenging lectionary Gospel texts…interesting because of the text itself and challenging because of how relevant it is to our times. And as I thought about this text, a rather straightforward perspective about this scripture and about our faith journeys formed in my mind:
“Be uncertain about your certainties.”
Or, said another way:
“Be willing to question those things you think you already know for sure.”
Now, some interesting things about our text.
First:
It was only Luke who included this story about the Galileans’ blood and the Siloam tower and it was only Luke who included this parable about that unfruitful fig tree. Scholars remind us that though much of what we find in Matthew and Luke is almost exactly the same as what we find in Mark, there are also almost exact same things we find in Matthew and Luke that we do not find in Mark, and then there are some things we find only in Matthew and some things we find only in Luke.
Which means what? Different sources, different perspectives and, therefore, sometimes apparent contradictions.
And some people may understandably say that because of those differences and contradictions in the Gospels, they can’t really believe since the Gospels are rather unreliable sources of information.
But what I believe those differences and sometimes confusing stuff really means is that in the creation of those Gospels, God was working through very human channels, people writing from their own backgrounds and experiences and relationships and memories, but all pointing at a loving God who is present in the middle of life.
And I find that to be very good news, because I believe it means that God can continue to work through very human channels…like you and me, with all our different backgrounds and experiences and relationships and memories, with all our strengths and weaknesses, successes and failures, moments of great faith and moments of deep doubt, moments of amazing joy and moments of almost unbearable pain and loss and grief.
The basic message of the Gospel is that we can trust God to be present with us now, just like God was present 2000 years ago.
Second…about the killing of those Galileans.
We don’t know anything more about that. There are no known Roman or other records about it.
We do know that Galilee was a center of civil unrest about Roman rule. And we know that Pilate could be a brutal suppressor of any threats to Roman rule. So, this may refer to his action against Galileans who were stirring up trouble in Jerusalem during a Jewish sacrificial rite. And we know that several years later Pilate would be removed from his rule in Palestine and sent back to Rome after the merciless killing in Samaria of participants in an uprising against Roman rule. But the question remains: why were those Galileans killed?
Similarly, no other information about the tower that collapsed and killed people, though, apparently, many people knew about it. Again, why were they killed?
In both those cases the real issue Jesus seemed to address was whether those deaths were due to some sin those people had done, some failure for which God was punishing them. That may have been the prevalent thinking among the people. To that kind of thinking, Jesus emphatically said “NO.” Bad things do happen to good people…that’s a reality of life…but not because God is punishing them or trying to teach them a lesson.
And being faithful disciples of Christ doesn’t mean God will protect people from all danger, though we heard a lot of that foolishness during Covid, and a lot of faithful unvaccinated people died.
And God must have sadly thought: “What were they thinking? I gave them brains. I expected them to use their brains.”
Jesus wanted to dissuade those people from the idea of a “transactional god,” a tit-for-tat god who says “treat me right and I’ll treat you right, but treat me wrong and I’ll treat you wrong.” Too much of that in our world right now. Too often, too much of that in our own hearts and actions. Jesus was saying that God is a god of grace and compassion, not a god of retribution. Lord, help our thoughts to become more like your thoughts, our ways to become more like your ways.
Third: that parable about the fig tree.
The owner was upset because it wasn’t bearing any fruit…for three years in a row after planting it.
However, thanks to Wikipedia, I learned that if you plant a fig tree, it’s going to be 3-5 years before it begins bearing fruit. Was that the problem with that fig tree, that it was just doing what fig trees need to do, but the owner didn’t know that? His problem may have been that he was sure he knew all about fig trees. But, as Mark Twain said: “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure, that just ain’t so.” That gardener knew better. The gardener said, “Let’s be patient.”
We’ve probably all been sure of things about God that “just ain’t so.” Thankfully, God is patient with us, like that gardener was with that fig tree. That’s why we need to remain open to whatever new things God’s Spirit wants us to learn, whatever new ways God’s Spirit wants us love — to love other children of God, to love and care for God’s creation.
I like how Prof. Matt Skinner pulls together the pieces of today’s text on this third Sunday of Lent: “Jesus’ words about judgment and repentance are scary, yet they depict human life as a gift, albeit a fragile one. Vulnerable creatures that we are, we can presume little and do little to preserve ourselves. Too many Lenten observances assume that taking our humanity seriously requires morose expressions of piety. But the Christian outlook on repentance arcs toward joy. And it finds grace experienced within the awful precariousness and strange beauty of our fleeting existence.”
Quite a thought, isn’t it: “grace experienced within the awful precariousness and strange beauty of our fleeting existence.”
And it is in “our fleeting existence” that, as Skinner says, “God transforms us through grace, a grace that calls us to be generous toward those still trapped under the weight of poverty, want, and devastation of all kinds.”
With the help of the Spirit, may we allow ourselves to be in the continual process of being transformed by God’s grace and becoming more generous towards those in need and more responsible stewards of God’s magnificent creation.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
16, 2025 2nd Sunday of Lent
Psalm 27: 1-6, 13-14
Luke: 13: 31-35
The Wrong Side of God’s Will
Elk Grove Presbyterian Church
Dexter McNamara
Conflict…Compassion…Acceptance…and Action
Those words came to me as I thought about this morning’s readings in Psalm 27
and Luke 13, as well as what we’re experiencing in our own country and in the world right now,
what we may experience in the church and our own lives, and how we are to live as followers of Christ.
The Gospel of Jesus Christ invites us to experience the wonder of God’s grace that assures us that way beyond whatever uncertainties and difficulties we encounter in life, God’s surrounding love is here with us, a love that allows us to take a deep breath of God’s healing Spirit any time we feel the constricting power of life’s challenges. The Gospel is Good News.
And the Gospel of Jesus Christ also invites us to be brutally honest about ourselves, about the church, about this world in which we live – a world filled with conflict, a world needing compassion and understanding, a world in which we need to be able to accept the reality of the world as it is, even as we are called to work to bring God’s kin-dom into this world.
Conflict…Compassion…Acceptance…Action
Conflict is immediately introduced in today’s reading in Luke: “Some Pharisees came to Jesus and said to him, ‘Leave this place and go somewhere else. Herod wants to kill you.’” Pharisees warning Jesus about Herod? Time out here. Aren’t Pharisees always bad guys? Mark tells us that some Pharisees got together with “the Herodians” – Herod’s toadies – to figure out how to kill Jesus. They are bad guys.
But maybe not all of them. Nicodemus, a leader in the Jewish community and a Pharisee, came to talk privately with Jesus and would later defend him at Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin. In the verses following today’s reading, Jesus went to the house of a Pharisee for a meal. So there were some Pharisees sympathetic to Jesus, and the book of Acts tells us that some Pharisees became followers of Christ.
So, those Pharisees who came to Jesus may have been genuinely concerned for his safety.
But there is another possibility. The Pharisees hated Herod, the Roman installed king of Galilee.
I’m going to take us on a little excursion to look at the backstory of why the Pharisees hated Herod.
This Herod was Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great, whom the Romans had named King of the Jews. But these Herods, though called Jewish Kings, were not ethnically pure Jews, because they were not descended through Jacob’s line. You remember that story. Way back when, Isaac, the son of Abraham, had twin sons, Esau & Jacob, Esau having been born first. But Jacob, at his mother’s urging, cheated his older brother out of their father Isaac’s blessing. That led to conflict between those brothers. Jacob got away from that conflict by heading for the land of Rebeka’s brother, Laban, and ended up marrying two of Laban’s daughters. There was some interesting conflict and deception involved with that. But, it was Jacob’s descendants who became the Jewish people, and it was through Jacob’s descendants that Jesus came. Got that so far?
The Herods were not descendants of Jacob’s line, but of Esau’s. Esau first married outside the family bloodline, two Hittite woman. That had displeased his parents, Isaac and Rebekah. To get back in their good graces, Esau later also married a woman descended from Abraham, a woman who was the daughter of Ishmael, that actual first-born son of Abraham.
Clear about all that? Me neither. But, listen, if you want to read about family intrigue and conflict and trickery, you’ll find lots of that in the book of Genesis and throughout the Old Testament.
Back to today’s reading. Suffice it to say that pure-blood Pharisees hated those half-breed Herods.
Maybe even hated Herod more than they hated Jesus, who was, after all, at least a “pure” Jew, even a descendant of that ultimate Jew, David.
You probably know the saying: “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Those Pharisees may have thought: “We consider Jesus an enemy. But we consider Herod an even bigger enemy. Therefore, if Herod is an enemy of Jesus, for now we’ll consider Jesus our friend.” Tangled relationships, right?
Maybe similar to what I might say if someone asked me who my two favorite college basketball teams are, and I said: “UCLA…and whoever is playing SC.”
So, whatever we make of the motives of those Pharisees who warned Jesus about Herod, we know that Jesus was often in conflict with Pharisees, who were actually very religious Jews. They were not part of the formal religious hierarchy of priests and scribes. They were not clergy, as it were, but strict, go-by-the Torah layman.
So, conflict #1 was what I’ll call conflict between “ordinary” Jews…Jesus and Pharisees
Conflict #2 was with Herod. That conflict was with the political and military establishment, Rome and Rome’s appointed underling, Herod. Both Herod and Rome were threatened by Jesus calling for a change from that current power structure to God’s kingdom of mercy and justice and compassion and community. That would have been a threat to Herod, so that’s why he might be seeking to kill Jesus, which would eventually happen, of course, at the order given by the Roman Pontius Pilate.
We move on to conflict #3…with the religious establishment centered around the Temple in Jerusalem, an establishment, as Jesus noted in our text, that had always opposed and often killed God’s prophets, who had consistently called for justice and mercy and humility, rather than just the performance of sacrificial rituals and rites, along with denouncing all the financial shenanigans that went with that system. This conflict is captured in the simple words of Jesus’ lament: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem.”
Three areas of conflict for Jesus 2,000 years ago: with other religious people, with the ruling governmental structure of society…Herod & Rome, and with the religious hierarchy. All those I characterize as being on “The Wrong Side of God’s Will.”
Why did I decide to go into that rather lengthy look backwards? Because those conflicts were very much like our conflicts in 2025.
Today, we certainly know of conflicts and disputes and divisions between people within the Christian family, to say nothing of the animosity and hatred and sometimes violence that exists between people of different religious traditions.
Today, we certainly know that governmental structures and powers can be much more concerned with maintaining their structures and powers than seeking the well-being of their citizens.
Today, we certainly know that religious hierarchies and denominations can get so wrapped up in maintaining their doctrines and authority and survival that care for people and stewardship of God’s creation can get ignored.
I think conflict is a reality for us in our times, as it was for Jesus in his time. The Gospel calls us to be aware of and concerned about those conflicts.
But our reading also included Jesus’ words of compassion about God’s longing to make things right:
“how often I have longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings.” Even as the Gospel calls us to be honest about the conflicts we may face, the Gospel also calls us to a similar level of compassion – to long for people and institutions to open themselves to God’s redeeming and transforming grace. Lord, help us to have compassion.
Then there needs to be acceptance, the recognition that what is, is…that people and institutions are very likely not to change, not to give up their old, destructive ways. We don’t have to like that, but we do need to recognize and accept that as reality.
Which might finally lead us where?
A grudging acceptance might lead to despair and anger.
But that’s not the way of the Gospel. The Gospel also calls us to continue to hope and trust in God, and, with the help of the Spirit, to continue to act and serve. And I think we can only do that if we are willing to trust and hope. We’re not called to be naive. We are called to have faith that God can work in ways we may never understand. And we are called to love and support and care for each other in the church, and share love and hope with a needy world.
Thanks be to God.
March 9, 2025 1st Sunday of Lent
Psalm 91: 1-2, 9-16
Luke 4: 1-14
Sticking to Our Values
Elk Grove Presbyterian Church
Dexter McNamara
Two spiritual highs followed by two spiritual challenges – that’s what last week’s and this week’s readings in Luke gave us. Last Sunday was the conclusion of the season of Epiphany, with the account of the spiritual high of the transfiguration, followed by the challenge of a boy with epilepsy. Today is the first Sunday in the season of Lent, and this morning’s reading started immediately after the spiritual high of Jesus’ baptism, that included the voice saying “You are my son, whom I love. With you I am well pleased.” Luke then recounted Jesus going into the wilderness for those forty challenging days of fasting and temptations.
Here’s what Frederick Buechner wrote about Lent: “After being baptized by John in the river Jordan, Jesus went off into the wilderness where he spent forty days asking himself what it meant to be Jesus. During Lent, Christians are supposed to spend a similar period of time asking themselves what it means to be themselves.”
Asking ourselves what it means to be ourselves: to be fully human and to be faithful followers of Christ.
Those three temptations Jesus faced in the wilderness were issues he would face again and again during his ministry, just like there are challenges we face again and again in our faith journeys.
Three temptations: turning stone into bread, gaining earthly power, doing something spectacular.
I see three things we might consider about Jesus’ wilderness experience:
1. What was the significance of that experience for Jesus, for his disciples and Apostles who were with him, and for each one of us
2. Then let’s consider the source of those values: the source of Jesus’ values that he affirmed in that wilderness, and the source of our own values.
3. Finally, let’s consider where Matthew, Mark, and Luke got their information about what happened in that wilderness, and why that’s important.
First, the significance of those temptations: turn stone into bread, gain earthly power, do something spectacular. There are two ways to look at those temptations.
One is to see those as self-centered temptations: meet your own physical needs, gain personal power, do something that will amaze people about how amazing you are. Of course, in that wilderness, Jesus rejected those self-centered, something less than subtle temptations.
But, as some commentaries point out, there can be another way to look at those temptations: not about meeting self-centered needs or desires, but about doing something for the greater good of God’s kingdom and for all of God’s people.
While Luke’s account had the devil saying “Turn THIS STONE (singular) into bread,” Matthew’s account said “Turn THESE STONES (plural) into bread”…enough to meet the physical needs of all God’s people, perhaps the devil saying “Now, wouldn’t that be a truly godly thing to do?” A rather intriguing temptation.
Similarly, perhaps the devil was saying “I’m not suggesting you gain earthly power for your own sake, but to be able to institute that realm of God you want to see happen. Be effective, Jesus. For God’s sake, be efficient. Power would do that.”
“And about throwing yourself off from the top of the temple, I’m not suggesting you do that to build yourself up in the eyes of the people. How crass that would be. No, no, no. But, when those angels save you, as promised in the 91st Psalm, wouldn’t that make people believe in the power of a loving God? Hey, Jesus…I’m just here to help you quickly get done what God wants you to do.”
To those temptations, Jesus basically said: “No thanks. No shortcuts.”
But, just as Luke concluded this scene with the words “the devil left him until an opportune time,” those temptations would be dangled in front of Jesus throughout his ministry at “opportune times.”
And Jesus would continue to say “No shortcuts, no effective/efficient, quick ways to bring about redemption and transformation. Not a throne, but a cross and then an empty tomb.”
In one form or another, those were temptations his followers and Apostles would struggle with while Jesus was with them. Those Apostles would help feed more than 5,000 people with a couple of fish and a few loaves, but there was more to the God’s realm than just that. The Apostles would jockey for positions of power in the political kingdom they thought Jesus was going to bring about. Wrong idea about God’s kingdom. They and others would confuse Jesus’ compassionate healings with mere magical marvels.
Such temptations have continued for 2,000 years, of course, in many different forms: from conflicts within the early church about power and the importance of miracles, to Constantine raising Christianity into legitimacy and power and wealth, to the church creating her own place of political influence and power, down to modern examples of the church and Christians pursuing power and prestige and privilege and possessions, even if claiming to be faithful followers of Christ.
It’s easy to lose perspective. It’s easy to be seduced away from following in Jesus’ steps.
Lent is a time to take a good look at ourselves in the mirror and to consider our own values and commitments, and to think about how we respond to the temptations and challenges we encounter,
just as Jesus responded to those wilderness temptations by sticking to his values and commitments.
Values and commitments. Where did those come from for Jesus, and for you and me?
The Bible doesn’t tell us much about Jesus’ growing up, about what led him to his understanding of himself and the direction his ministry would take. Growing up with Mary and Joseph, he certainly heard them tell about the miracles surrounding his birth and early childhood. He had a pious and loving and strong mother. And he had an understanding, caring, and strong step-father, from whom he learned the patience-and-precision requiring skills of carpentry. He studied the Torah at the local synagogue, and participated in the interactive Jewish tradition of debate and questioning. He played and interacted with other boys and young men. Perhaps he long conversations with his much more spiritually and ascetically-oriented cousin John. He grew up within the political reality of Roman power, and saw the religious establishment’s acquiescence to that power
Through it all, he must have had a growing awareness of a holy and mysterious God. Through it all, he developed a set of values much more focused on the kindness and grace and compassion of God than on the need for sacrifice and the strict following of laws and rules. It was those values, that sense of what God was like and who he was in relationship to that God, that allowed him to stick to those values and commitments during that wilderness experience.
Lent is a good time for each of us to think back on and reflect about the various factors that went into the formation of our values and commitments: our parents, extended family, our social setting… what were the values we picked up from those influences; if we grew up connected to a church or religious group, did we hear about a God who loved and cared for all people or about a God who said “obey the rules…or else;” what did we learn in school…not just the subject matters, but about who matters and what justice means, about how to get along, and about being good neighbors and good citizens.
And, like Jesus, what have we done with that whole range of impacts and ideas and influences?
Have we been able to re-think and let go of negative values and prejudices? Have we allowed ourselves to be open to God’s Spirit calling us in new directions? It can be good to consider the sources of our values and commitments.
Final thought – a little question about the Bible: How did Luke know what happened in that wilderness? No one was there recording Jesus thoughts or his conversations with the devil.
Mark was the first Gospel written, based mostly on Peter’s preaching and teaching, and Mark simply said that Jesus spent forty days in the desert being tempted by the devil, that there were wild animals with him, and that angels attended him. Mark was the text both Matthew and Luke used in writing their Gospels. So, how did Matthew and Luke learn about the temptations? Most likely because they had an account that someone else had written about what Jesus must have shared with his Apostles about that experience, perhaps as they were sitting around a campfire. Why would he have done that? I think because Jesus wanted those Apostles to know about his own journey of faith, about the struggles and challenges he faced. That campfire conversation got passed on, someone wrote it down, that got passed on to Matthew and Luke, who included it their Gospels, and it has been passed on to us.
And why are those stories of the temptations important for us to hear? Because though we affirm that Jesus was fully God, we also affirm that Jesus was fully human. Which means that the hope and promise of the Gospel is that God can also become present in and through each one of us; that even with our own struggles and challenges, we can stick to our values of understanding and love and compassion and peace and justice, no matter what we may face.
And that is good and much needed news.
Thanks be to God. Amen