Do Justice, Walk Humbly
2 February 2020 – Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany
Matthew 5:1-12
The location of the sermon “on a mountain” in contrast to Luke’s location of the sermon “on the plain” makes it clear that when Jesus teaches and heals the crowds from the mountain he is revealing himself as Israel’s Messiah, the Son of God, the one who speaks and acts in the name of God. In the location of the sermon, therefore, the author signals Jesus’ identity as the expected king of Israel who has come to inaugurate the reign of God promised of old and expected by God’s faithful people.
The beatitudes (vv 3–11) describe God’s reign. In short and precise terminology, they describe the citizens of the new kingdom. Compared to worldly standards and expectations, the redeemed people are a contrasting community to the world community. In the first four beatitudes, we hear of a people who live expectantly trusting in God, their anchor and source of hope. The next four portray a people whose lives are directed in the difficult present and who manifest an alternate attitude. They live out of the change in their hearts and motivated by the redemption they have experienced. “Blessed” is the term that well describes them. It is an eschatological term, portraying current existence in the light of future expectations. –– Blair Gilmer Meeks
Micah 6:1-8
This is a divine controversy passage, in which God brings Israel to court before the mountains and the earth’s foundations as jurors (vv 1–2). In the testimony for the prosecution, God rehearses the seminal portion of the story of salvation (vv 3–5). The passage continues with Israel’s defense of presumed faithfulness by engaging in lavish worship practices (vv 6–7) which even extend to offers of sacrificing children. But the Lord’s response through the prophet’s voice (v 8) is the clarion call to do what God really expects and desires.
The threefold infinitives “to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God” are the expected activities of the citizens of God’s kingdom.
Not only is this passage important as the key to Micah’s entire message, but it contains the whole theology of God’s grace, of sin and of righteousness. –– Blair Gilmer Meeks
1 Corinthians 1:18-31
Paul attacks the divisions in the Corinthian congregation by explaining the difference between human and divine wisdom. The failure to give up human wisdom (the attempt to know God by human insight and effort) was the cause of the party spirit in the Corinthian congregation.
By contrast. . . divine wisdom is wisdom found in the gospel. God saw fit to communicate it through the lips of the lowly and unlearned.
Paul . . . is defending preaching to those who were schooled in erudition and who expected to hear this new message in classical intellectual formulation and content. Paul argues forcefully that the word of the cross is a foolish message to those who will neither listen to nor accept it, but a powerful communication of God’s power to redeem people . . . who are open to hearing and believing it. –– Blair Gilmer Meeks
Blair Gilmer Meeks, was at the time of this writing, a pastoral minister, writer of worship-related resources, and leader of workshops on worship living in Brentwood, Tennessee. Among her four books is Standing in the Circle of Grief: Prayers and Liturgies for Death and Dying (Nashville: Abingdon, 2002).
Homily Service 38, no. 2 (2005): 43-50.