My Blog

The Fourth of July always presents a daunting challenge to preachers. Every congregation includes a super-patriot or two whose motto is “My Country, Right or Wrong!”; some folks who actually DO love America and want to address how it could be better; and most of the rest, all who think that Red, White & Blue is a lovely color-scheme. And then there’s God. This could be a field-day for those of us who are Prophetic, unafraid to speak Truth, Justice and Peace to the rest of us: prophets need to address those things of the world which are not of God; and to equally announce the things that ARE of God to a hungry world. Do we pride ourselves on being rebels??

Ezekiel’s commissioning (2:1-5) has YHWH sending Ezekiel to a “nation of rebels”, the people of Israel. You’ll need to tell the back-story: armies of Babylon had destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple, and had taken anyone who was someone off to Babylon. Ezekiel, of the priestly class, was one of those exiled. Could YHWH be even in that awful city, Babylon? Or had YHWH abandoned & excluded the People? Ezekiel was called even by the Chebar River of Babylon to say “Thus says the Lord God”–would anyone listen? Some will, some won’t. Making this an analogy for today can be the whole sermon/study class: Is YHWH in charge even in this alien culture? When nothing’s the same, will there still be standards of faith & justice? Will God find us even when we think we’re alone?

Paul was writing to a contentious group of churches in Corinth, II Corinthians 12:2-10. What at first seems desperate self-justification yields eventually into a realization of being held in a grip not of our own choosing. If nothing else springs out, the phrase “My grace is sufficient for you…” can keep us together despite a surrounding arrogance of “We’re #1!”

Mark 6:1-13 tells about Jesus going home to Nazareth, probably for the holiday weekend. The home boys recognized him as son & brother to a local family, and derided his holiness–talk about a rebel nation! “And he could do no deed of power there….he was amazed at their unbelief.” As if in response to his Ezekiel-like experience, he himself sent out his twelve friends to the rebels all around: they were to travel light, accept hospitality, and to expect rejection by some. Even so, they managed to preach a turn-around and to cast out demons, important to Mark.

Somewhere amid the flags & multi-colored cupcakes comes the Word of the Lord. We speak Truth, Justice & Peace the best we can, knowing that some will do something about it and others won’t. Don’t take it personally, like Paul did. Sabine Baring-Gould wrote, “Crowns & thrones will perish, kingdoms rise and wane, but the Church of Jesus constant will remain.” Our small voice is yet important in the Grand Scheme of Things. Rejoice! The Lord is near!

In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King

My encounters with scripture assigned to the upcoming weekend can be visited every Tuesday at horacebrownking.com

Readings for this Summer weekend are what we need to hear: that God is in charge even when sickness and death come calling, even when the powers of the universe buffet us around. In a departure from the norm, we’ll look at a psalm of comfort, some thoughts of St. Paul about equity, and two stories about Jesus. Under all of these is a God-awareness that supports the helpless and bereaved. I hope this isn’t you–but it just could be…

Psalm 130 acknowledges that we often call upon God for mercy when the chips are down, when other helpers fail and comforts flee. The psalmist notes that she waits for the Lord in expectant hope of God’s nature, since God created dawn to push away the curtains of night with its attendant terrors. Watchers for the dawn can be confident that sooner or later the day will be brighter. “For in the Lord is love unfailing, and great is [God’s] power to set [humans] free.” God alone delivers, and no lesser human substitute will suffice.

Paul has been taking a collection from his planted congregations for the relief and comfort of the congregation in Jerusalem. Some of these churches gladly kicked in what they could; but others were dubious of Paul’s motives, and didn’t much want to help their formerly (?) Jewish brothers & sisters. To the church in Corinth he writes (II 8:7-15), “it is a question of a fair balance between your present abundance and their need”, a matter of sharing the wealth just as Jesus treated all persons equally. They could claim any prosperity and power as holy attributes, and now Paul was testing the genuineness of their love. Some expounders of the Word use this passage as a bludgeon to guilt their people into digging deeper–DON’T DO IT!! But do bring Jesus into this: “For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.”

Move quickly to the two healing stories recalled by Mark 5:21-43: Jairus’ daughter and an unnamed Daughter of Zion who had an uncontrolled bleeding problem. These can’t only be examples of Godly concern for those who believe, but more, a restoration to “polite society”–Temple worship– for those who many said that God had cursed. Jesus’ main message here is that God continues to hear the prayers of the desperate and outcast. This is a good opportunity to speak of Holiness and Wholeness, that healing is of body, mind and spirit. Both the girl’s father–Jairus–and the afflicted woman had the inspiration to reach out and claim this announced power. Why not make an analogy of it? Just as these ancients claimed the merciful nearness of God, so contemporary believers can and should look to God for their salvation and restoration.

If there’s a golden thread running through these readings, it is one of Expectancy. The psalmist expects dawn to sooner or later usher in comfort and new energy in the midst of bereavement. Paul expects Christian congregations to share their resources with each other. And Jairus and the ill woman both expect Jesus to have the power and desire to make things whole again. God’s Presence is here: claim the Gift and praise the Giver!

In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King

Come join me in exploring God every Tuesday at horacebrowning.com

Humans have a personal sense of time and consequences: “What if…?”, we ask. We hesitate to go over the speed limit unless we know where the police cars are. We don’t speak the truth to our spouses because the repercussions would be disastrous. We stay in a no-end job because we’re afraid of not finding another. AFRAID: that’s the word. A common greeting in the Bible is from heavenly to earthly: “Don’t be afraid!” Yet we are, and lessons to be read this weekend address our personal angst as well as our corporate despair.

I commend to you the Book of Job. Early wisdom, perhaps of Sumerian origin, this saga tells of “righteous” Job, a successful lord of many flocks and herds. He’s laid low when Satan challenges God to test his faith…and calamity ensues. “Why me, Lord? I’ve been good!” Our own question, isn’t it? Finally, “the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind”, (38:1) “So where were YOU when I made all this stuff and called it Good?” Job has a finite world-view, limited by human constraints of time and place; but God sees the big picture, the cosmic stability. We who weep with Job are invited to see that God’s Creation is enough to handle our daily afflictions…thanks be to God!

Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians seems to be a weave of several letters, or parts thereof. 6:1-13 appears to be a bit of self-justification. Yet in all this list of Paul’s troubles–afflictions, beating, imprisonment, riots and more–he announces that he’s overcome his fear of such discord by the love of God. “As dying, and see-we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.” We need to read this as more than the bragging of Paul, seeing Christ’s triumphs over even those afflictions we ourselves own.

Mark’s Gospel tells a story in 4:35-41 about a tremendous storm on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus was zonked out in the back of the boat, while his disciples were wide-eyed with fear of being capsized and drowning! Finally they woke Jesus, and at his word, the storm abated. “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” Easy for YOU to say, but our external life is filled with terror! Our boats are pretty fragile, after all, and the storms of life are indeed raging: we’re vulnerable to being sunk with every passing breeze. Unlike the success-story we’ve been fed since childhood, the disciples haven’t summoned courage out of their heredity or buried resources; they and we need to confess our fears AND our inability to sail with the storm, and lean completely on Jesus.

The writers of Job and Mark have presented us with a metaphor: things can get pretty bad, yet God is still in charge. These are words we crave to hear when we’re feeling overwhelmed with affliction and reversal of fortune. Experienced sailors though we be, we may very well be cowed by the storms. Where is God when you need him?? Right in the back of the boat, available to still the wicked waves.

In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King

My intersection with scripture lessons to be read during the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at horacebrownking.com

When we lived in Waverly NY we often drove past St James Roman Catholic Church, where a flock of pigeons could be seen sunning themselves on bright days. This caused my older son, Steve, to remark, “Look! Birds of Pray!” Evidently these were descended from the swallows mentioned in Psalm 84… Readings for this weekend deal with God’s Providence: not only to birds of the air, but to ALL living creatures. Some who will hear these scriptures may have been feeling insignificant and unlovable; here is another opportunity to remind them that the Creator called “Good!” everything that was made. We and the birds are all part of God’s ecology.

The reading from the Old Order comes from the prophet Ezekiel, 17:22-24. God is portrayed as a caring nursery-man who transplants a vital sprig from the growing edge of a cedar tree to a mountain location. The sprout becomes noble, and the birds build nests in its branches. A bud from the stump of Jesse? These are intended to be words of comfort and life-promises to the Babylonian Exiles, but they’re appropriate for all generations. Who are the refugees in our pews? Have they felt exiled from their Fields of Dreams? Storms and earthquakes come and go; but the word of the Lord lives forever.

A little bit of a leap takes us to the Epistle, II Corinthians 5:17. It begins with a phrase of assurance, “So we are always confident”. Having heard of a God who tenderly nurtures the World’s Garden, we’re urged to take up residence and citizenship there. Taking the plant analogy to non-Pauline extremes, we recognize that our bad habits, cruel words and careless attitudes are those non-productive tendrils which are pruned away as we become reframed into our true nature as bearers of the Holy Likeness. “From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”

The Gospel of Mark 4:26-34 includes two parables of Jesus talking about seeds. The first–appearing only in Mark–describes the Kingdom of God as a fertile plot upon which someone (God?) has scattered seeds. Sunrise & sunset go by, and eventually the plants ripen and can be harvested. That’s the way things grow, thanks be to God. The second parable may be more familiar: the notice that a mustard-seed (the smallest of all) will eventually grow into a thriving bush which hosts…the Birds of the Air! There is displayed here a mysterious yet vital power of life which takes the tiny and easily-buried virtues of each of us and magnifies them into the fullness which was the original intention of the Creator! Does it look like you’re dead? You’re not…

God really must like birds; God made so many of them! Early in our holy-history we heard about the dove which Noah released, which came back to announce dry land; this then turned into the Dove of the Spirit which ripped through the heavens to anoint Jesus at his baptism. There’s the lonely bird on the proverbial house-top. And we hear about the eagles, whose wings bear up the believer; and the sparrow, who has caught God’s eye. “Fear not, little flock, for you are worth many sparrows!”

In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King

My musings on scripture lessons to be read on the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at horacebrownking.com

I hate snakes. Can’t trust ’em. Always popping out at me, even from the TV screen. Besides, who can trust anything that doesn’t have legs? Readings featured this weekend are stories about TRUST, especially aimed at persons in the pews who’ve had trust issues. Some feel betrayed by spouses or children. Some are smarting because someone at work shared publicly that which was meant to stay private. Others have buried their past guilts because they feel as though there wasn’t anyone to unburden with… I often envy those persons who have the relief of a formal and sacrosanct confessional to unload that which would tie them down! Perhaps these readings will inspire the self- isolated to move forward.

The passage from Genesis 3:8-15 bears the humor of Adam & Eve hiding from God after the Fruit Tree Incident. “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” (God really knew: this was to give Adam an opportunity to ‘fess up.) And now Adam knew what his index finger was for: “Not me, Boss! This WOMAN gave it to me…” Eve jumps into the fray, “The SNAKE tempted me…” The snake, having no fingers to point, just sat there and grinned. And thus guile was born. Up ’til now, everyone trusted the other party–but now humans need to be careful, cuz someone’s gonna snitch…

“Seeing is believing “, the old saw tells us. But, says Paul to the Corinthian church, “the one who raised the Lord Jesus will raise US ALSO with Jesus, and will bring us with you into his presence.” (II, 14:15) There’s evidently more than meets the eye, and God through Christ is reliable, i.e., trustworthy. “We look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen.” There’s an element here of trustworthy expectation: “day after day” we’re being transformed into the holy image covered over by our insecurities long ago…

Mark’s Gospel tells us in 3:20-35 that the traditionalists thought Jesus to be possessed, and set up Jesus’ mother and brothers to make an intervention. How much had he trusted these to go along with him, even though they might not yet understand the full picture? “C’mon, Jesus! Get a real job, get married, have a lot of Jewish children!” Jesus’ non-compliance may be the lesson here, to persevere against the tempting demons, trusting (naively?) in God alone. And there are days when it feels VERY alone…

Somewhere along the road I learned the wisdom: “Love many, trust few; learn to paddle your own canoe.” This is the Popeye wisdom: “I yam what I yam!” The pandemic isolated our general society, and destroyed much of the trusting community. Now more than ever we the Church needs to confess our self-reliance as sinful, and show the way to community to the watching culture. Besides, I hate snakes…!

In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King

My reflections on Scripture assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at horacebrownking.com