Sixth Sunday after Epiphany
Jeremiah 17:5-10
Psalm 1
1 Corinthians 15:12-20
Luke 6:17-26
Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
grace and peace to you from our source and strength. Amen
I grew up around trees.
Hiking through the forests in the Pacific Northwest
you find all kinds of evergreen trees
which grow to great heights.
To the casual observer they look much the same
but when a storm blows in off the Pacific Ocean
the differences start to show.
The Douglas Fir trees (the Oregon state tree)
whose roots are sent deep into the ground
sway in the wind and rain
but do not fall down,
but the Pine trees
whose roots go out rather than down
are susceptible to toppling over
as the rain soaked ground loosens its grip on the roots,
and when a big gust of wind hits just right
down goes the tree,
it doesn’t break,
it just falls over
roots and all.
Of course, in drier climates
Pine trees are at an advantage,
their shallow roots are ready to soak up as much rare moisture as possible.
The roots of trees are needed for both strength and sustenance,
where trees place their roots matters.
This is the theme that runs throughout our readings for today,
like trees
where the faithful place their roots,
where they draw sustenance,
where they anchor themselves,
matters
especially when the rain dries up
and the winds begin to blow
a much more likely hazard in the arid Middle East
For both Jeremiah and the psalmist
those who place their trust in God
are like trees who are planted beside a stream,
who sink their roots into a constant source of water
- these trees don’t worry when drought comes
While those who whose hearts turn away from the Lord
will be like a shrub drying out in the desert,
or like chaff that blows away in the wind.
Where we place our trust matters.
Jeremiah in the manner of prophets
is quite blunt about it,
“cursed are those who trust in mere mortals…
blessed are those who trust in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.”
and Jeremiah is not speaking theoretically,
rather Jeremiah has been tasked with proclaiming to the people
the real life consequences of their actions,
that because they have placed their trust in worldly power and wealth,
even in their religious heritage
rather than God,
they will be overwhelmed by invading Babylonian armies
who will sweep away this power, and wealth,
and even national identity and sovereignty
as commentator Julia M O’Brien remarks “The plant metaphors used in this poem clearly convey the book’s bold (even scandalous) claim about the relative non-importance of human institutions. Strong armies, secure borders, national independence, sustainable religious bodies—Jeremiah challenges them all as ultimate goals. Such standards by which humans judge success are as shallow as the roots of a shrub.” (https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/sixth-sunday-after-epiphany-3/commentary-on-jeremiah-175-10-3)
Of course as harsh as prophets can be
they always include a word of hope as well.
In Jeremiah’s case
the hope comes for those who place their trust in God,
they will flourish
even in exile,
in fact Jeremiah suggests
that with what is to come
that is the only way to flourish,
later in chapter 29
Jeremiah instructs the exiles to live fully in exile,
to build houses and plant gardens,
to get married and have children,
even to seek the welfare of the foreign land where they are living
even as they remain faithful to God.
This is the context for Jeremiah 2’For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.
By worldly standards it would seem that there is no hope,
but for those rooted in God
there is life right now
and life in the future.
Jesus picks up on this motif
of reversed blessings and curses
in his sermon on the plain.
This is Luke’s version of the sermon on the Mount,
but where Matthew,
painting Jesus as the new Moses
places him on a mountain,
Luke who has Mary sing
of God bringing down the powerful and lifting up the lowly
at Elizabeth’s blessing of her pregnancy,
has Jesus come down to a level place
to teach the crowds that surround him,
and at the same altitude as the multitudes that jostle and push
to receive the power that comes out from him
healing all of them
Jesus teaches his disciples about the kingdom of God
that has come near in him,
that has already started but not yet fulfilled,
in the kingdom of God,
where the haughty are brought down
and the lowly lifted up,
where the Son of God stands on the same ground as everyone else,
blessed are those who by worldly standards
seem far removed from God,
the poor, the hungry, the mourning
those persecuted for the sake of the gospel,
and woe to those who by worldly standards are doing well
who might even interpret their status as being blessed,
woe to the rich, the full, the laughing,
those who are spoken well of.
Now it is important to note
that Jesus’ blessings and woes are descriptive
rather than prescriptive,
he is not saying that if we want to be blessed
we need to go be poor and hungry and mourn
and seek to be persecuted,
rather Jesus,
speaking to those who are suffering in real material ways
at the hands of those who are prospering in real material ways,
describes the way that in the kingdom of God
the needs of all will be met by God
and in real material ways,
that no longer will others have the power to reject or deny them,
God is the most powerful and God cares for God’s own.
This is good news,
and no one is outside of the care of God creator of all things.
The woes then act more like warnings,
warnings to those that may have placed their trust
in something other than God
wealth, a full stomach, the good words of other humans
these will dry up and go away,
and if they are where you have placed your trust,
if they are what you have sunk your roots into,
well, woe is you
for you shall be like a shrub in the desert when the drought comes.
Where we place our roots matters,
especially when the winds start to whip up.
If we place our trust in human markers of strength and security,
if we define ourselves based on what we have
rather than whose we are,
then when those impermanent things fall away
so will we.
But if we delight in the teaching of the Lord,
If we sink our roots into God the constant source of life
if we place our trust in God whose blessings run deeper than the surface,
God promises that there will be full life
even in the midst of worldly turmoil,
that worldly power will not have the last say,
but God will
because God is the source and strength of all life. Amen
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