Last Sunday (Pentecost 13, Year A, September 7, 2014)
September 14 – 10:00am, Godly Play begins
September 14 – 11:00am, Holy Eucharist, Rite II, Pentecost 14
September 16 – 7pm, LYRA concert at St. Peter’s
This Sunday at St. Peter’s – Servers, Readings
Coming this Tuesday!
Several articles:
1. Introduction, part 1
2. Introduction, part 2
3. Their program
4. The musicians who will be here
5. Musical selections
Lectionary, Pentecost 14, September 14, 2014
I.Theme – Forgiveness, the basis for reconciliation.
"The Unforgiving Servant – 1973. Jesus MAFA. JESUS MAFA is a response to the New Testament readings from the Lectionary by a Christian community in Cameroon, Africa. Each of the readings were selected and adapted to dramatic interpretation by the community members.
The lectionary readings are here or individually:
Old Testament – Genesis 50:15-21
Psalm – Psalm 103:(1-7), 8-13 Page 733, BCP
Epistle –Romans 14:1-12
Gospel – Matthew 18:21-35
There are two interwoven themes this week:
•The power and importance of story and the role of story in developing identity.
•The recurring Biblical theme of forgiveness and the related theme of resisting our tendency to judgment.
Both themes have intertwined in and through them God’s presence, always available and always working in and through the life of an individual and the life of a group of people.
The other connecting thread is that of healing or becoming whole as Christians. This way of looking at healing embraces both our formation as Christians, the building up of our identity in faith; and challenges us to allow ourselves to be reformed through forgiveness.
Genesis looks at forgiveness from the victim. The Gospel looking at forgiveness in terms of grace.
The story of Joseph in Genesis 50: 15-21 describes a very human situation with which most of us can identify. It deals with guilt of Joseph’s brothers in their treatment of him, selling him into slavery. Joseph father may have prevented Joseph from getting even. But now the father was dead That thought of getting even consumed them, even more than the loss of their father. They tell Joseph that Jacob’s dying wish was that he forgive them. We do not know if that is true. At least, it shows how desperate they were to use every device they knew to persuade Joseph to forgive.
The family that has known disruption, favoritism, hostility, and deceit all through the book of Genesis may finally get its act together. There is hope for reconciliation after this forgiveness. One marvels at the graciousness of Joseph who is actually able to forgive after all of this.
As a response to the first lesson from Genesis 50, these verses from Psalm 103 could provide hymn texts for Joseph and for Joseph’s brothers. Verses 1-7 would be the song of pious Joseph who suffered deep wrong at the hands of his envious brothers and had ample reason to question God’s sovereignty.
Instead, the singer remembers "all God’s benefits": forgiveness of sin (pride for Joseph), deliverance from the grave (the pit and then slavery); crowing with mercy (not to mention the literal "crown" of Pharaoh); and vindication — to the point that Joseph can find God’s hand at work in the evil deeds of his brothers.
Verses 8-13 would be the song of Joseph’s thankful brothers when they hear Joseph’s words of pardon. Joseph’s forgiveness bears witness to the God who is full of compassion and slow to anger and who does not deal with us according to our sins or repay us according to our iniquities. And as Joseph draws his father and brothers west toward Egypt, the memory of their sins is blown as far to the east as can be imagined.
Romans gives some practical examples of forgiveness of others and ourselves. Here it is more of a group conflict. Differences in lifestyle, however, were the attitudes that were dividing the church. Paul’s commands toward both groups make it pretty clear that the "strong" were despising the "weak," while the "weak" were judging or condemning the "strong. God judges; we shouldn’t. Each Christian is answerable to “the Lord” and should not be criticized.
Paul’s goal for the church is presented in his benediction in Romans 15:5-6, that instead of using our words to despise or judge others in our fellowship, we glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ "with one voice!"
The Matthew story is all about forgiveness from the perspective of those who give it. Jesus sets before us an ideal, namely that we be forgiving as God is forgiving. Yet, at the same time we are reminded that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven is not the good person who is good at forgiving, but the sinner whose sin is forgiven.
This is the story of the unmerciful servant. The king forgives a servant who owes him more than could be repaid in a lifetime. However, in turn the servant fails to forgive other who owes much less to the servant. He fails to imitate the forgiveness of the king. When the king hears about this, he retracts his forgiveness and has the first slave tortured – probably for ever.
Two key thoughts:
1. Forgiveness in this parable is both an extravagant and a precious thing.
2. Forgiveness in the Gospel of Matthew is not only relational it is reciprocal and reliant. When teaching his disciples to pray Jesus would have us say, "Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors" (Matthew 6:12). It is a change in attitude. Members of the community must treat one another as God has treated each of them. However, it does not mean that the sin involved is forgotten or overlooked.
Read more about the Lectionary…
Forgiveness at the Time of Jesus
"and be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you." – Ephesians 4:32.
At the time of Jesus, forgiveness was about restoring a right relationship. This means that both parties understood that there was in fact a proper and right way to be in relationship – and that this "rightness" was what God desired for them – neither of them had the authority or power to decide what was right – both of them were accountable to God to act as God desired them to act toward the other.
First-century Mediterranean peasants understood sin, that is, interpersonal transgressions, after the fashion of debts. When one of them broke the relationship they created a debt: they now owed the other a payment of some kind to make amends, to show remorse, to compensate for the damage done to the relationship.
But then as now, often the debt owed for breaking a relationship was beyond any possible material gift. Then, as now, the only solution, the only means to restore the relationship was for mercy to be shown; for the debt to be forgiven.
But notice. It is not the behavior that is forgiven. It is not even the other that is forgiven. It is the debt that is forgiven. And what forgiveness does is this: it transfers the obligation and responsibility to pay the debt to the obligations and responsibilities of the right relationship.
So how forgiving are you ? Take the Forgiveness quiz!
This quiz of 30 questions will lead to a chart that will display how forgiving you are. You rank each question from 0 to 5. Note the scale = "0" is "strongly disagree" to "5" "strongly agree". It does not keep your score!
"End of Construction. Thanks for your patience"
By Dan Clendenin
" If you visit the grave of Ruth Bell Graham in Charlotte, you’ll find a simple granite stone with an inscription that she herself requested: “End of construction. Thank you for your patience.”
“What a marvelous image for the Christian life," she said, "a work under construction until we go to be with God. That’s what I want as my epitaph.”
" As works under construction who need the patience of others to the very end, let us freely give and receive the extravagant forgiveness that Jesus commends"
In this article entitled "Accept One Another:The Parable of the Unmerciful Servant" which appeared on the site "Journey with Jesus", Daniel Clendenim provides the story of Ruth Bell Graham, the wife of Billy Graham who had an enormous capacity to forgiveness.. even for Jim Bakker of the PTL club. Remember Jim and Tammy Faye?
This is a film by Martin Doblmeier on forgiveness that won Best Documentary at Sun Valley Spiritual Film Festival in 2007 .The film combines medical studies of forgiveness as well as forgiveness in the spiritual realm.
You can see the entire 78 minute film here .
Additional resources:
An interview with the filmmaker
Understanding Forgiveness This section looks at forgiveness and justice, forgiveness and memory, forgiving yourself, forgiveness and faith. Check the left sidebar on this page
From the publication Visual Parables:
"Forgiveness is not just a spiritual or religious theme, either, the film asserts. In fact filmmaker Martin Doblmeir was inspired to make the film when in 2004 he attended a Templeton Foundation-sponsored conference in Georgia exploring the medical and health aspects of forgiveness. For the next two years he traveled the globe interviewing persons about their experiences, asking them about forgiveness as a means for dealing with their anger over great wrongs, and sorrow and grief. In one segment he brings together the spiritual and the scientific disciplines, disclosing how hundreds of experiments have been conducted on the medical aspects of forgiveness. In a brain scan the pleasure portions of the brain lights up when the person is thinking of revenge, and we see several subjects of another experiment in which their blood pressure rises when they recall a person who has wronged them, whereas those who forgive have a normal blood pressure when they recall a past wrong.
Book of Forgiving- Desmond Tutu
"Forgiving is so wonderfully hopeful. It refuses to give up on anyone. It provides the perpetrator, the sinner with yet another chance to make a new beginning. God never gives up on us." – Desmond Tutu, Washington National Cathedral, 2007
The Book of Forgiving written together by the Nobel Peace Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and his daughter Rev. Mpho Tutu, and published this year offers a personal testament and guide to the process of forgiveness based on a lifetime of experiences. We will be exploring this impressive volume this week in several segments. Several beginning statements:
"There is nothing that can’t be forgiven and there is no one undeserving of forgiveness."
"Forgiveness is the journey we take toward healing the broken parts."
"Forgiveness is the way we return what has been take from us and restore the love and kindness and trust that has been lost. With each act of forgiveness we move to wholeness – who we bring peace to ourselves and the world."
"Without forgiveness we remain tethered to the person who harmed. We are bound with chains of bitterness. Until forgive, person will hold keys to our happiness."
"Forgiveness is a gift to ourselves offers freedom from the past, from a perpetrator, from future victimization. Forgiveness as grace -It frees the person who forgives – untethered from the person did harm. You are free to move on in life, grow and no longer be a victim. It enables another person to get up, and get up with dignity tobegin anew."
"To not forgive leads to bitterness and hatred. Like self-hatred and self-contempt, hatred of other gnaws away at our vitals. Whether hatred is projected out or stuffed in, it is always corrosive to the human spirit."
Read more why we should forgive…
Book of Forgiving- What Forgiveness is not ?
Desmond Tutu’s – from the Book of Forgiving.
1 Forgiveness is not weakness
It is not being spindles, nor does it mean one doesn’t get angry
2. Forgiveness is not subversion of justice
People always live with consequences of their actions. It is only way out of trap that injury creates
3. Forgiveness is not forgetting. Not denying the harm or pretending it not happen or the injury not as bad as was. Forgiveness requires giving voice to violations and naming pains.
4. Forgiveness not easy but is path to healing. Tell your story as long as needed, name your hurts until they no longer pierce your heart. Grant forgiveness when you are ready to let go of a past that cannot be changed. Reconcile or release the relationship as you choose
5. It does not mean reversing, not mean won’t happened again, is not means not to grieve. Healing means our dignity is restored and we are able to move forward in our lives.
Book of Forgiving- The Four Fold Path
Desmond Tutu’s – from the Book of Forgiving. Four Fold Path
• We always have a choice whether to walk the Revenge Cycle or the Forgiveness Cycle.
• In the Revenge Cycle, we reject our pain and suffering and believe that by hurting the person who hurt us our pain will go away.
• In the Forgiveness Cycle, we face our pain and suffering and move toward acceptance and healing by walking the Fourfold Path.
These are the steps of the Fourfold Path: (notes from the book follow the links)
4. Renewing or Releasing the Relationship.
Book of Forgiving – The Need for Forgiveness and how we forgive ourselves
Steps
1 Admit the wrong.
2 Witness the anguish and apologize
3 Ask for forgiveness.
4 Make amends or whatever restitution or reparation is called for or needed.
5 Honor your victim’s choice to renew or release the relationship.
We become imprisoned in the past when we do not forgive ourselves for past mistakes.
The reasons for forgiving ourselves are the same as for forgiving others. It is how we become free of the past. It is how we heal and grow. It is how we make meaning out of our suffering, restore our self-esteem, and tell a new story of who we are. If forgiving others leads to an external peace, forgiving ourselves leads to an internal peace
When we forgive someone, we let go of any demand that he or she should suffer as we have suffered. As we have shown, this cycle of retribution and revenge never offers the release from pain we seek. It only serves to compound the anguish. When we forgive ourselves, we also free ourselves from a cycle of punishment and retribution directed at ourselves
The Forgiveness Challenge
Desmond Tutu and his daughter are not just writing about forgiveness but trying to encourage us to act on it. This is the "Forgiveness Challenge" that they have created.
The sites includes resources, exercises for 15 minutes or less a day spread over 30 days. There is FAQ. "Sign up, and you’ll receive a daily inspirational email from the Archbishop and Mpho Tutu, with a link to join their online forgiveness community."
There is a study indicating the effectiveness of this approach as well as testimonials. "After completing the Challenge people showed a 14% increase in their likeliness to forgive, moving to the highest category, which means they are “usually forgiving of oneself, others and uncontrollable situations.”
"If You Don’t Forgive…"
To paraphrase a well-known saying from C.S. Lewis from Mere Christianity, everybody agrees in principle that forgiveness is a mostly lovely idea and this agreement continues right up until that moment when you have an actual person in front of you whom you must forgive—then suddenly caveats, nuances, and provisos start to fill the air. Lewis wrote that shortly after the completion of World War II and so used the prospect of forgiving the Nazis and the Italians as his key example of where one’s high-flying rhetoric about forgiveness sometimes smashes into the hard wall of bitter reality.
Everyone agrees that forgiveness is a lovely idea until . . . we actually have to figure out how to extend it to the unrepentant, the truly evil. For it is then that we realize that such forgiveness is going to cost us something, quite probably cost us a lot.
The truth of this phrase is in the following story from PreacherRhetorica.com entitled "If you don’t forgive". John Rogers, after years of working with the same company, goes out on his own creating his own business enterprise. He found lightning can strike twice in the same location.
Brad Hambrick comments on C. S. Lewis "When others see us execute forgiveness as a radically free gift, absorbing its cost in ourselves, they ask “How-why do you do that?” We can answer, “I couldn’t. The task is beyond my capacity. When I embraced the Gospel, God came into me and I gained His capacity to forgive. It still hurts, but it now hurts like the pain of childbirth, because I know it is a testimony to the new life in me.”
"This is why (not my best estimation) we can almost all unanimously agree that forgiveness is a lovely idea, and then defiantly resist it when our opportunities come to put it on display. We reveal the miracle and beauty of forgiveness even when we resist it and even when it is painful to give."
Forgiveness in Adult Ed, 2013- Another Approach
During 2013, Adult Education looked at forgiveness over 5 Sundays using the work of Father Frank Desiderio, a Catholic priest.
For the Christian, forgiveness is a non-negotiable. Jesus insisted on it “If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions” (Matthew 6:14-15). Jesus forgave unconditionally from the cross, “Father forgive them they know not what they do” (Luke 23:24). We are called to be like Christ and forgive generously and sincerely. The question is often how to forgive.
We have links to the notes from all 5 sessions:
Session 1 – The Spirituality of Forgiveness
Session 2 – Why we find it hard to forgive
Session 3 – Steps in Forgiveness
Session 4 – Empathy is the Key
Session 5 – Give forgiveness freely