Daily Reading 10/13

Sheesh. It's been 3 weeks since my last post. Sorry for that! I'll try to be better about posting from now on...

Today's daily readings are, I will admit, a bit difficult individually and as a whole, but I'll try and make some sense out of what's being said (to me, at least, you could take something entirely different from these lessons!). The readings for today are: Jeremiah 36:27-37:2, 1 Corinthians 14:1-12, and Matthew 10:16-23. To summarize each passage quickly: Jeremiah deals with the king's refusal to listen to Jeremiah's prophecy about the Babylonians; Corinthians discusses speaking in tongues and prophesy; and Matthew has to do with Jesus speaking about the coming persecutions for those who follow him. Pretty heavy stuff, eh? But once I read each of these passages, the thing that came to me most strongly was the idea of speaking God's truth, and what that could mean.

In the case of Jeremiah, we have a prophesy that no one wants to hear. King Jehoiakim saw the first scroll from Jeremiah, which said the Babylonians were going to invade and conquer Jerusalem. So, Jehoiakim had it burnt. God wasn't so happy about this, and told Jeremiah to write it down again. God's response goes something like this (from The Message):

"And send this personal message to Jehoiakim king of Judah: 'God says, You had the gall to burn this scroll and then the nerve to say, "What kind of nonsense is this written here—that the king of Babylon will come and destroy this land and kill everything in it? Well, do you want to know what God says about Jehoiakim king of Judah? This: No descendant of his will ever rule from David's throne. His corpse will be thrown in the street and left unburied, exposed to the hot sun and the freezing night. I will punish him and his children and the officials in his government for their blatant sin. I'll let loose on them and everyone in Jerusalem the doomsday disaster of which I warned them but they spit at.'" (36:29-31)

This is a pretty heavy condemnation-Jehoiakim is basically being told that none of his descendents will sit on the throne-not to mention the fact that he won't be buried properly. What's absent from today's story is how Jeremiah felt about all of this. Imagine having to tell the king news like this--granted, Jeremiah wrote it on a scroll and sent it but still; I wouldn't want to email anyone telling them that God wasn't happy and that the land was about to fall to a foreign power. At other times, Jeremiah isn't really happy with his position as a prophet. In chapter 20 he expresses his dislike of the prophet position he holds:

You pushed me into this, God, and I let you do it.
You were too much for me.
And now I'm a public joke.
They all poke fun at me.
Every time I open my mouth
I'm shouting, "Murder!" or "Rape!"
And all I get for my God-warnings
are insults and contempt.
But if I say, "Forget it!
No more God-Messages from me!"
The words are fire in my belly,
a burning in my bones.
I'm worn out trying to hold it in.
I can't do it any longer!
Then I hear whispering behind my back:
"There goes old 'Danger-Everywhere.' Shut him up! Report him!"
Old friends watch, hoping I'll fall flat on my face:
"One misstep and we'll have him. We'll get rid of him for good!"
(20:7-10, The Message)

So that's one kind of speaking--speaking truth to power, as the saying goes. And in Jeremiah's case, power didn't want to hear the truth (and how often do we ourselves really want to hear the out and out truth? Probably less than we'd like to admit!)

In Corinthians we have more about prophesy. Paul is discussing the difference between speaking in tongues and between prophesying, and he has a definite preference for prophesy. The Message translates this differently from the NRSV; in The Message version you'll see tongues referred to as a kind of individual prayer-language (but just so you know, there are Christian traditions where speaking in tongues is part of the worship life of the community. About tongues versus prophesy, Paul writes:

"The one who prays using a private "prayer language" certainly gets a lot out of it, but proclaiming God's truth to the church in its common language brings the whole church into growth and strength. I want all of you to develop intimacies with God in prayer, but please don't stop with that. Go on and proclaim his clear truth to others. It's more important that everyone have access to the knowledge and love of God in language everyone understands than that you go off and cultivate God's presence in a mysterious prayer language—unless, of course, there is someone who can interpret what you are saying for the benefit of all." (14:4-5, The Message).

In other words, what Paul's trying to tell us is that we need to go out and speak the truth to all people in words they'll understand. This will build up the Church-the difficulty is (and I'm not sure Paul points this out) finding words that people will understand. Can you think of a way to explain Jesus and everything he means in words that people will really get? That's a challenge we all face, I think, especially in a world of scientific skepticism (and I'm not bashing science here, I'm just saying we're taught to be skeptical and look for proof and things like that). How do you explain to someone that God became human and lived and died and rose from the dead and that death doesn't have a hold on us anymore? I'd be interested in your take on this. How do we spread the message in ways that people will know what we're talking about but ways that stay true to what we believe?

Jesus warns us about what might happen when we preach the Good News. The situation was different in Jesus's time-the Romans were occupying the land and to preach as Jesus did was eventually seen as politically dangerous-just look at Jesus's crucifixion for an example! They were concerned that he was called "The King of the Jews" for a reason-it made the occupying power nervous. Anyway, back to the passage. In Matthew's text, Jesus warns people about what will happen when they preach the Kingdom message. Jesus says:

"Don't be naive. Some people will impugn your motives, others will smear your reputation—just because you believe in me. Don't be upset when they haul you before the civil authorities. Without knowing it, they've done you—and me—a favor, given you a platform for preaching the kingdom news! And don't worry about what you'll say or how you'll say it. The right words will be there; the Spirit of your Father will supply the words. " (14:17-20, The Message)

I'm not sure many of us would be hauled in front of a judge for talking about Jesus with someone. There are cases where this could happen-when you preach the Good News through some sort of nonviolent civil disobedience, for example (take a look at the Civil Rights movement for a good example of this!). It's not easy speaking truth to power, but Jesus gives us encouragement-the words will come. God said the same thing to Moses. Don't worry that you can't speak that well-I'll give you the words.

How do you speak the truth of God's message? Do you feel like Jeremiah? Do you have a language for talking about Jesus?