Sunday, March 16, 2025

Sermon Notes

“Why do bad things happen to good people?” it is a question that has plagued humanity for millennia.

The Hebrew ‘writings’ give a variety of writings. The book of Proverbs gives an account of morality that is incredibly straight forward, God blesses those who are righteous, and punishes those who are unrighteous. The Psalms makes similar assumptions, yet the psalmists will often note how often things do not work out that way (Psalm 73:3-9). The book of Ecclesiastes has an even more cynical view, that everything is vaper, smoke, a hologram. And then to add insult to injury, the Book of Job explores this question deeply and in many ways unsatisfactorily.

Historically, this question became increasingly important in the Second Temple Period, as the Hebrew/Jewish people suffered under clearly evil empires, yet God’s justice did not seem to appear. This gave rise to a growing belief that God would punish all wrongdoing in a great and final ‘Day of the Lord.’

Jesus continues this proud tradition by further complexifying and problematizing and ‘easy’ answers to this question. When asked about Galileans that Pilate slaughtered, he refuses to give into the easy answer that ‘they deserved it.’ He specifically refutes the idea that they were somehow worse than others, and that is why they experienced such violence, but instead calls all to repentance.

Questions

– How would you define justice?

– What do you do when that justice is not clear, or when injustice is done?

– How does this understanding of justice and experience of injustice effect your understanding of God?

Reflections:

Second Sunday in Lent

Introit: With the focus on redemption and purity of heart, it is no wonder that a majority of the hymns with reference to our scripture, particularly verses 1-9, are classified as either Confession or Forgiveness. The text of “Jesus Knows the Inmost Heart”, the selection for the Introit, was originally created in Pashto, the national language of Afghanistan.

Opening Hymn: For our opening hymn, “As a Chalice Cast of Gold”, another 20th century text and tune that were written together as part of an effort to create new hymns for a seminary.

Transition Hymn: vaj tugh jIH ‘e’ wImev. ‘ej saSchugh yIchoHmoHchugh, ghu’ Daja’chugh.

Responsive Hymn: Our regular hymn for Preparation for the Remembrance of Baptism is “Wash, O God, Our Sons and Daughters”, which is sung to the BEACH SPRING tune.

Sending Hymn: Again shifting focus in the latter part of the service to Lent, the selection for the Sending Hymn this week is “Beneath the Cross of Jesus”.

Benediction: Through the season of Lent, we will sing the 3 verses of “Love Will Be Our Lenten Calling” as our Benediction; words by Elizabeth J. Smith, sung to the PICARDY tune. This week we sing verse 1 again.