This was very nearly an entry about prophecy, despite the fact that the reading from Genesis that we find in the lectionary for Sunday isn't really a prophetic story.
I could wax poetic about how the word "prophecy" has been misunderstood and how therefore its very meaning has changed over the years. But that will be a post for some other day.
No, the story of God and Abram forming their covenant with each other is more like the Council of Elrond than it is some obscure and obfuscated rhyming prediction of the future!
I don't know about you, but when I think of the Abrahamic covenant, what I tend to remember is God's promise: do these things and I will make of you a great nation.
Similarly, when I think of the Council of Elrond, what I remember is Aragorn standing up and saying, "If by my life or death I can protect you, I will. You have my sword." Followed by Legolas and Gimli. You can almost hear the sweeping music, can't you?
What you may not remember quite so clearly is the arguments concerning whether to use the One Ring or destroy it. And then the more bitter arguments concerning who should carry the Ring into Mordor.
And perhaps you forget the part that was actually most important--Samwise bursting out of hiding and demanding to go along. And the decision to include Merry and Pippin instead of more of Elrond's elves.
Because friendship and loyalty were deemed more important that strength.
And you know what? That's not a bad description of what's actually going on between God and Abram.
It is a matter of friendship and loyalty.
Instead of bearing a Ring of Power, Abram and his wife Sarai bear being uprooted and settled in a strange land. They bear circumcision--well, Abram and his male offspring do. They even bear having their names changed to Abraham and Sarah.
Instead of arguing about what to do with the One Ring, or who is to do it, 100-year-old Abraham literally falls on his face and laughs when God tells him that his 90-year-old wife is about to become pregnant after experiencing barrenness all her life.
But in the end, this agreement, these promises, this covenant between Abraham and God are most like the Fellowship of the Ring in these ways:
Sometimes the people of God are like Boromir, too weak to keep our promises and sorry for it.
Sometimes the people of God are like Frodo, brave and diligent, plodding along even when our strength is failing.
But God? God is like one Samwise Gamgee. A loyal friend who is determined to walk beside us, no matter what we say.
All the way to Mordor, if that's what it takes.
Be good to each other,
Rev. Josh
022415
The scripture lessons for March 1st—The Second Sunday in Lent Year B—are:
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16
When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him, "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless. And I will make my covenant between me and you, and will make you exceedingly numerous." Then Abram fell on his face; and God said to him,
"As for me, this is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you.
"I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you."
God said to Abraham, "As for Sarah your wife, you shall not call her Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her, and moreover I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall give rise to nations; kings of peoples shall come from her."
Psalm 22:23-31
You who fear God,
praise God!
All you offspring of Jacob,
glorify God;
stand in awe of God,
all you offspring of Israel!
For God did not despise or abhor
the affliction of the afflicted;
God did not hide God's face from me,
but heard when I cried to God.
From you comes my praise
in the great congregation;
my vows I will pay
before those who fear God.
The poor shall eat and be satisfied;
those who seek God shall praise God.
May your hearts live forever!
All the ends of the earth
shall remember and turn to God;
and all the families of the nations
shall worship before God.
For dominion belongs to God,
and God rules over the nations.
To God, indeed, shall all who sleep in the earth
bow down;
before God shall bow all
who go down to the dust,
and I shall live for God.
Posterity will serve God;
future generations will be told about God,
and proclaim God's deliverance
to a people yet unborn,
saying that God has done it.
Romans 4:13-25
For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.
For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations") — in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. Hoping against hope, he believed that he would become "the father of many nations," according to what was said, "So numerous shall your descendants be." He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was already as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. Therefore his faith "was reckoned to him as righteousness."
Now the words, "it was reckoned to him," were written not for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.
Mark 8:31-38
Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, "Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things."
He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels."
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