my notes unedited from the festival of homiletics. as we explore the episodic nature of matthew by thomas long
- tells the story of a roadside shrine to a young person on his daily commute. he stops occasionaly to observe. as i stand and look at the shrine
- two things happen to me. i try to connect the dots... what kind of life could hold all these things together (speaking of the odds and ends relics a part of the shrine)? what is coherence here? even though this boy was only 19 years old it is hard to make coherence of this. what is happening to me is exactly what it means to be a human being. to take the disparate shards of our life and create an identity.
- father with alzhiemers, the great tragedy is not the normal loss of memory, but the loss of narrative memory... corsicov syndrome. he created his own narratives. but in worship he took on the narrative he was given in the eucharist.
- part of the responsibility of preaching is to give a confused culture a narrative that can begin to be absorbed.
- pastoral counselors used to assume that when people out there said, i know what i am supposed to do but i can't do it. and in this place we are fine and without judgement. and that was fine as long as the moral fray was clear. it is no longer clear.
- dykstra, jesus says "do this in remembrance of me" to remember the narrative.
- help people who have lost consciousness of their story themselves to help recover that. the book of matthew is written precisely to a community that has lost it's narrative. understand we are talking about a small fragile jewish community trying to shape it's roots with their experience with jesus.
- it puts us in conflict with the narratives of culture.
- in a funeral there are two preachers. us & "D" death. and death is a powerful story. it is our duty and delight to preach an alternative narrative. stories in conflict.
- the temptation story of jesus is not the typical temptation story. the temptation story in the gospels is a proposal of the tempter to alternative narratives.
- in the desert. "command these stones to turn to bread" then jesus said "it is written...." "if you are the son of God then cast yourself down" then jesus said "it is written.." reciting old creeds from deuteronomy. the tempter is proposing different identities to live by than the one given by God.
- a quote about desmond tutu "you would think he is old enough that he would hate by now".. but desmond knows the gospel.
- if jesus came down in matthew 4 he'd have a marketing plan.
- wheat and the weeds parable..
- if we lift this up out of the matthew context it becomes a demonic content. moral quietism. put it into matthew context it becomes a parable in pastoral conversation. there is good and evil thriving together "god did you cause this."
- a news paper headline "bush vows to rid world of evildoers" it's humorous but dangerous. matthew knows that our mission field is a permanently ambiguous moral landscape. will this change? no. there is a day that these things will burn with righteousness.
- barth, "do not fear the wrath of God, fear the love of God."
- when you know the future it dethrowns the powers in the present.
- on sunday we need to recognize that the biblical story collides with another story that is out there.
- "i am a series of episodes"
- matthew gives some claims to the episodic nature of our culture, starting with the geneology. you could not have a more chancy look. the history of God's people is a combination of God's random order of chance...
- we are random in the shaping of God's hand in our problems. even Jesus's life grows out of the messiness of the geneology of God. it is the mixed church that we experience the redemptive nature of the church..
- compelling story of ash wednesday with homeless and legislators. the poor and the powerful. his church had encouraged a homeless person who had been attending to come to their ash wednesday service "i'll be cool, and we will have a lunch afterwards." as the word spread through the street community the chapel began to become packed with over 100 homeless. while across the street, at the legislative plaza, one statesman said to his cohorts "i'm going to ash wednesday service, would you like to come with me?" soon 40 statespeople showed up at the church. the way this church imposes ashes is by having a lay person, who just had ashes put on them, turn and impose ashes on you after.
- neo-nosticism in today: matthew does not dismiss. they are learning together. in mark they never learn, they are always out to lunch (haha). they are the same disciples, but they can grow and learn. it is seeing rightly the message...
- our story goes this way. "blessed are the poor in spirit, theirs is the kingdom of heaven. blessed are those that mourn, they will be comforted...."
- good stories to tell a confused culture.
