Third Pass at the November 4 Bible Lessons

[To learn what these "passes" are about and to read the first one, go here. To see the second pass, look here.]

The Gospel Lesson: Luke 6:20-31
General Comments:
1. Of all the Gospels, Luke is the one that most underscores the topsy-turvy, countercultural realities of the Kingdom of God. We see this early on, for example, in the Magnificat, the song of Mary, spoken after the angel tells her that she will give birth to the long-awaited King and Savior. In the Gospel lesson for November 4, Jesus tells us that the "blessed" include the poor, the hungry, the sorrowful, and those hated and rejected "because of the Son of Man." (Jesus characteristically refers to Himself as "the Son of Man.") Only those living under the reign of God would dare to see these conditions as signs of God's favor or blessing.

2. As Lutheran pastor Brian Stoffregen points out, Jesus uses the word makarios, blessed, in a completely different--and subversive--way than it had been used previously. Stoffregen traces the history of the term in the Greek language:

The Greek word for "blessed" used in our text is _makarios_. In
ancient Greek times, that word referred to the gods. They had achieved
a state of happiness and contentment in life that was beyond all
cares, labors, and even death. To be blessed, you had to be a god,
living in some other world.

That word took on a second meaning. It referred to the "dead". The
blessed ones were humans, who, through death, had reached the other
world of the gods. They were now beyond the cares of earthly life. To
be blessed, you had to be dead.

Finally, in Greek usage, the word came to refer to the elite, the
upper crust of society, the wealthy people. It referred to people
whose riches and power put them above the normal cares and worries of
the lesser folk -- the peons, who constantly struggle and worry and
labor in life. To be blessed, you had to be very rich and powerful.

When this word was used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament,
it took on another meaning: It referred to the results of right living
or righteousness. If you lived right, you were blessed. Being blessed
meant you received earthly, material things: a good wife, many
children, abundant crops, riches, honor, wisdom, beauty, good health,
etc. A blessed person had more things and better things than an
ordinary person. To be blessed, you had to have big and beautiful
things.

In all of these meanings, the "blessed" ones existed on a higher plane
than the rest of the people. They were gods. They were humans who had
gone to that other world of the gods. They were the wealthy, upper
crust. They were those with many possessions.

Jesus uses this word in a totally different way. It is not the elite
who are blessed. It is not the rich and powerful who are blessed. It
is not the high and mighty who are blessed. It is not the people
living in huge mansions or expensive penthouses who are blessed.
Rather, Jesus pronounces God's blessings on the lowly: the poor, the
hungry, the crying, and the hated. Throughout the history of this
word, it had always been the other people who were considered blessed:
the rich, the filled up, the laughing. Jesus turns it all upside-down.
The elite in God's kingdom, the blessed ones in God's kingdom, are
those who are at the bottom of the heap of humanity.

3. As I often point out in these passes, context effects content. Within the context of Luke's Gospel, this lesson comes immediately after Jesus calls the Twelve--the apostles, for their special function in His fledgling Church. It's important to realize that, as Luke tells it, "apostles" (the word means "sent ones") are disciples are with a particular function. They're called to lead the Church and to direct its efforts at fulfilling Christ's mission for the Church.

4. In this lesson, Jesus seems to be addressing three audiences: the apostles, the disciples, and the "multitudes," the crowd. The crowd is composed of people who haven't yet begun to follow Jesus. While followers of Jesus are committed to growing up in their faith, the message of the Gospel is the same for everyone.

5. This passage has a lot in common with the Sermon on the Mount. Some insist that this is an entirely different "sermon." (Luke never uses that term to describe it, by the way.) Others that this is essentially the same bit of teaching from Jesus, only seen through the prism of Luke.

Who knows? But the Church, inspired by the Holy Spirit, sees the Word of God in both sermons from Matthew and Luke. I think that as we read both passages, we too experience them as the world-changing, subversive Word of God.

Comparing the two of them:

• The Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, occurs, obviously, on an elevated place. The audience is made up of the Twelve, the group Matthew means when he speaks of "the disciples." In Matthew, Jesus and the Twelve retire from the crowds.
  
• Guess where the Sermon on the Plain, of which our lesson in Luke is a part, happens? As Eliza Doolittle would say, "On the plain." The audience, as noted above, is composed not just of the Twelve (the apostles), but also other disciples and an interested multitude.
• In the Sermon on the Mount, the "poor" who are called blessed are those who are "poor in spirit." In our lesson from Luke, the desperately poor are described as blessed. Why? Probably because they're empty enough of the pretense of self-sufficiency to know that they need God. The rich and that includes most, if not all, who may have the access to technology to read this blog, have just enough of the stuff of this world to think that they don't need God. (See here.)

6. Methodist scholar Fred Craddock writes:

[The Luke passage] is clearly addressing the poor and the despised of the earth in the literal sense of those words, not the "poor in spirit" or "those who hunger and thirst for righteousness," as in Matthew (Matt. 5:3, 6)...

7. The beatitudes of this lesson are followed by what I would call an explanation or expansion of what Jesus shares in 6:20-26. I like what Stoffregen writes:

With the blessings and woes [in vv.20-26], Jesus announces the reversal of fortunes that God is going to bring about. With these verses [vv.27-31], Jesus announces a reversal that is to be part of the lives of those who are listening to him.

If I get the chance, tomorrow or soon, I'll present verse-by-verse reflections on this lesson, the text on which I'll be basing my sermon at Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan on November 1.