People, including me, often say they would love to have been with Jesus and learned from Him while He was on Earth, to walk and talk with Him and to ask questions.  I’m not sure any of the people who asked Jesus questions ever got an answer they could feel good about.  Not even the disciples and especially not the lawyer who is questioning Jesus in today’s text.

Our text, Luke 10:25-37, features the last parable in our three session series on parables of forgiveness and love; the Parable of the Good Samaritan.

There really is no immediate context for the parable.  It sits, a seeming non-sequitur, sandwiched between Jesus’ sending out the 72 and the scene at Martha and Mary’s house where Martha complains about working while Mary sits.  Its only setting is “On one occasion” suggesting it is not related to any event in the text around it.

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Have you been in a position where you just couldn’t catch a break?  You were damned if you did and damned if you didn’t?  Jesus spent His whole life like that.  The religious establishment had condemned John the Baptist and said he was crazy for the lifestyle he lived (locusts, honey, camelhair, etc.).  Then Jesus came and did not eschew comforts and hung out with people they didn’t like and they railed against Him as a libertine. 

In Luke 7:33, just before our focal passage, Jesus says,

For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’

So, having been called a drunkard, glutton and friend of tax collectors (that was really the worst) by the religious establishment, He accepts an invitation to dine from one of those worthies.  One might logically expect that, having now agreed to dine with the “right” crowd, he would be invited with open arms.

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Happy New Year.  After your discussion leaders compared notes, we decided you are stuck with me until January 29 when competent and intelligent leadership will return.  My sincere apologies.  And since I am much in need of your forgiveness for my horrible grammar, convoluted thought process, possible heresy and myriad other offenses I thought I’d start our year looking together at a trio of parables on love and forgiveness.

I believe these are two of the distinctives of Christianity, in no other religion are love and forgiveness the goal.  Islam tells you its goal in its name, the word in Arabic means submission or obedience.  If Buddhism or Hinduism speak of love it is not in terms of a God who loves us and seeks us because of His (or perhaps her) love.  No, Christianity is unique in propounding a God who cares for us, loves us and forgives us.

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At last we come to the most popular (at least in the present day United States) account of Jesus’ birth. This is perhaps because it is more accessible to us as Westerners because of its fully chronological style and reason for existing.

Just like the other authors Luke tells us upfront why he is writing his account.  In 1:3-4 he says “…I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.”

Several questions pop immediately to the fore; were the other accounts disorderly and who the heck is Thophilus?  Both of those questions go to the heart of the really big question which is: Why was Luke writing?  And the answer here is, we’re not really sure.

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Matthew was apparently a pretty straight forward kind of guy, not the sort to beat around the bush or hide things in elegant language.  He tells us upfront, in the first sentence of his Gospel what he is trying to accomplish by writing.  He says,”This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham…”, and then begins the begats.

What, that wasn’t all that clear?  Sure it was.  Matthew is telling us that he intends to present Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, the fulfillment of prophecy, as the Priest/King of Israel. And to do so he starts, not as John did at the very beginning of the world, but at the very beginning of the Jewish people, with Abraham.

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We have talked before about the central mystery of Christianity, of its inherent paradox, that things are backwards from what we think they are, or that two things that can’t be the same, are.  He who would lose his life must find it.  The first shall be last.  Life from death.  Weakness is strength.  What is meant for evil is good.  Victory from suffering.  We find these kinds of themes throughout scripture.

Nowhere, however is the paradox more pointed than when we focus on the person of Jesus.  During these next three weeks of Advent we will be taking a personal look at him in the three Gospel accounts of His coming.  Mark picks up Jesus at his baptism, so we won’t be looking at Mark.  Matthew starts with Jesus’ family tree, tells how Jesus was conceived, something of his family politics and gives some interesting events that occurred when he was a very small child, but skips all the details of the birth.  Luke gives us all the details, not only of Jesus’ birth, but of John the Baptist’s as well and fixes Jesus’ place in the historical record.

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How does one get a Thanksgiving study out of Ecclesiastes?  I’m not sure I really know, but I feel compelled to try.  This could be fun.

We’ll be looking at Ecclesiastes Chapters 10-12.  Chapters 10 and 11 are chock full of more Proverbs.  Remember that we looked at 12:9 earlier where it says, “He [Qoheleth] pondered and searched out and set in order many proverbs.”  This “set in order” might mean he arranged them in a particular order so as to convey a particular meaning.  Or it may mean that he set them right or corrected them.  Or both. In any event it is clear that Qoheleth edited the Proverbs to reflect his message. 

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I’m looking for a twist here, a hook, something I can hang a lesson and I just cant find it.  He starts off chapter 8 with a question “Who is like the wise?”  by implication no one. He ends chapter 8 with “Even if the wise claim they know, they cannot really comprehend it.”

In between he makes several comments:

• Obey the king if you took an oath.
• There is always a proper procedure
• Nobody can foretell the future
• You can’t get away from wickedness once you start
• People often lord it over others to their own hurt.
• Delayed punishment encourages crime.
• Bad stuff happens to good people and vice versa
• Thee is nothing better than to eat, drink and be glad.

This sounds like a repeat of things he has said before, and they are.  We can talk about the individual proverbs, but what it the point of all the repetition?  That’s what I’m really interested in.  What is he telling us beyond the parables?  Is the repetition an indication that Qoheleth is beyond intellectual skepticism and into full blown nihilism? Is he using repetition as a literary tool to artistically illustrate the meaninglessness and repetitive nature of life “under the sun”?  I don’t know, but I feel certain there is more hear than I am seeing.

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Ecclesiastes 7 begins a group of collected proverbs.  We know Qoheleth was their collector and arranger because of 12:9, “He (Qoheleth) pondered and searched out and set in order many proverbs”.  In that sense he was an editor and redactor, but in 12:10 he “searched to find just the right words, and what he wrote was upright and true.”  So he didn’t just take any old proverbs, he looked for those that were true.  By implication he also arranged them to forward his themes for the book.

7:1-6  A good name is better than perfume, morning better than feasting, frustration better than laughter, house of morning better than house of pleasure, rebuke of wise better than song of fools.  Do you see a theme running through this?  Isn’t it the same sort of theme that runs through the first shall be last, lose your life to find it, etc.?  These thoughts are contrary to what we usually are told by society.  Some of these are plays on words, for example shem is name in Hebrew while shemen is perfume.

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To whom have you made promises and what are some of the more important promises of your life?  Perhaps your marriage vows, or promises to your children, yourself or to God.  How did you enter those promises?  Were they done in the heat of the moment or after careful reflection?  How do you enter business relationships?  Do you read and study the contract?  Do you get to complain, after having signed the contract, about its terms?

Qoheleth has taken great care in the preceding chapters to establish his credentials as one keenly knowledgeable of the human condition.  Now he gives us some advice on how to deal with the most important relationship we will ever have, our relationship with God.

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