The Destitute and the Successful are All Blest – 29 January 2023
Matthew 5:1–12
Matthew addressed his version of the sermon on the mount to Christians who were already suffering persecution from others in their Jewish community and from imperial authorities, as well as from divisions in the early church. There is no doubt that the beatitudes are a wonderful blessing to members of such a despised and controversial faith. Those who have no future to anticipate on earth are given a splendid future to come. Those who are overwhelmed by forces totally out of their control, who can do nothing but endure the agony, are given the assurance of a wondrous life by someone who can do something. The promises are radical in their largess. . .
On the other hand, those who have everything should realize that they are in the same boat as those who have nothing. Those who have a future have as little future as those who have none—they all shall die, after all. . .
We all stand on the brink of chaotic despair and meaninglessness. We stand empty-handed before the throne of the only one who can bless us with a future otherwise completely out of reach, the kingdom of heaven and earth. No offering, no sacrifice, no meritorious deed of ours, as Micah exclaims, is adequate to obtain such bliss; not even the supreme sacrifice of one’s first- born could begin to suffice. But we know that the one who has no need to sacrifice anything, in indescribable goodness and mercy, purity and love, did sacrifice Jesus, the first-born. . . the source of our life, our wisdom, our righteousness, our sanctification, our redemption. –– Blair Gilmer Meeks
1 Corinthians 1:18–31
Reflect on what Paul means by saying the cross reveals God’s power and why this concept would be counterintuitive to the people of Corinth. In what ways is God’s wisdom different from human wisdom? By what criteria, according to Paul, does God choose those who are called? –– Blair Gilmer Meeks
Micah 6:1–8
The people who gathered for Jesus’ most famous sermon had probably also been present at far less open gatherings, where self-styled prophets and messiahs had beaten the drum for open rebellion against Rome and the corruption of Jewish political and religious leaders. For such a crowd Jesus’ words could not have been heard as simply comforting. Not only were they difficult, but they must have seem politically reactionary, for Jesus praises the very qualities that were no doubt seen as weakness and a source of shame by the political messiahs.
. . . In the last verses proclaimed today, he does not call the people to get in line behind a new prophet but to identify with the biblical prophets. . . Do not blindly follow wide-eyed, golden-tongued visionaries. Find your own visions. In your own scripture-guided hearts.
When we are honest with ourselves, we are overwhelmed by the fact of our having forgotten what the Lord has meant for us. We have become so removed from what is central to our existence, the source of human value and meaning, that there seems to be nothing we can do. We think in vain of material expressions of our unworthiness (thousands of rams, ten thousand rivers of oil), forgetting that the real sacrifice, the one that costs us the most and the only one that transforms us, is a change of heart: “act justly, love loyalty, walk wisely.” –– 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.