A look at the gaps in the lectionary.
This week: the gap between Proper 12C and Proper 13C.
The lectionary makes a big jump forward a chapter, from Luke 11:14 to 12:14. Which is seriously unfortunate given the central theme of this teaching.
Your Bible no doubt breaks this section up into a lot of little bites, making it seem like it is chock full of ideas, but chapter 11 is really a pretty seamless theme told in a few movements.
Remember that chapter 10 ends with Martha and Mary, a moment easily misunderstood as one of judgment rather than instruction. There, Martha chooses to see her sister with eyes of disdain. Mary chooses to see Jesus with eyes of love. Mary’s choosing the better part is therefore two-fold. She is looking with love upon Jesus.
So we should use those same eyes to gaze upon the characters in the story, including Jesus. That he isn’t commenting on Martha’s playing host nearly as much as her outrage and manipulation.
When chapter 11 begins, we get prayer. The Lord’s Prayer to be precise. But then he teaches about “perseverance” in prayer, which is a pretty weak interpretation. Especially frustrating in the context.
The better way to see this is Jesus telling a story about shame.
Almost as an inverse of the Mary and Martha story, this woman is hosting a guest but she doesn’t have any food! Oh no! It would be her shame to not be generous to her guest. And it would be her neighbor’s shame to not be generous to her. So at the root of this story is the idea of shame (and not just hospitality).
So the teaching about God and giving the child a scorpion is about shame and generosity, not meaningless persistence. It’s about loving and offering what is needed, helping with responsibilities. Not just wish fulfillment.
The Missing Texts
The next few pieces dig into the same idea of seeing, particularly without judgment/condemnation.
Jesus is exorcising demons and some in the crowd worry that he’s king of the demons. But they’re seeing him wrong. What of other exorcists? Who is behind this? Would evil dispel evil or is it more likely that God who is good does this?
But then he continues, telling them to beware that evil likes coming back. Like the cat comes back. Or better, like it knows a home when it sees one.
Both of these talk about good and bad, interiors, and the place of the holy. Kind of weird in isolation, but really useful setup for what’s coming.
Jesus moves to a blanket generational conviction—that they are blind to see what is before them. But, just like the city of Nineveh, the people will accept the change needed to be saved.
And this is when we get the big moment.
The Theme Encapsulated
In these themes of seeing and shame and refusing condemnation and being willing to change when God calls us to, we get the central image of chapter 11 in verses 33-36.
‘No one after lighting a lamp puts it in a cellar, but on the lampstand so that those who enter may see the light. Your eye is the lamp of your body. If your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light; but if it is not healthy, your body is full of darkness. Therefore consider whether the light in you is not darkness. If then your whole body is full of light, with no part of it in darkness, it will be as full of light as when a lamp gives you light with its rays.’
Luke 11:33-36
So there are these interior holiness ideas and the themes of seeing with generous eyes.
See also how this sounds just like Jesus’s rebuke of Martha? She was seeing her sister with darkness in her eyes, rather than light.
We get so focused on these images and thinking of them in such universal terms that we worry more about each other and whether there is light in their eyes. But it’s our eyes he’s speaking to hear. Our judging, condemning eyes.
A Fateful Dinner
It is with lit eyes that Jesus goes to dinner with a group of Pharisees. He doesn’t wash up beforehand, which upsets the host. But Jesus is using it as an object lesson.
They clean their outsides, but its the inside that’s dirty. In other words, there is no light in their eyes. They are condemning wantonly and seeking honor. They worry more about how they are seen by the people they have power over than the one who has power over them.
Jesus is laying into them and one of them speaks up in a way familiar to any modern prophet:
“One of the lawyers answered him, ‘Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us too.’”
Luke 11:45
But this only goads Jesus on. This bit of whataboutism and bothsidesism doesn’t prevent him from rebuking their condemnation and hatred.
[Which, as an aside, can be a tough nut to crack. But condemning condemning isn’t equal to condemning a person. Think of it the way many anti-racists describe this seeming paradox. One person refusing another’s right to exist isn’t the same as rejecting hate speech. We shouldn’t call them both “opinions.” They don’t get the same points on a scoreboard.]
His very poignant response is to speak to the particular sin of these 1st Century lawyers: exploiting others. They burden, oppress, and prevent others from equal conditions and education.
And the chapter ends with the comment that
“the scribes and the Pharisees began to be very hostile towards him and to cross-examine him about many things, lying in wait for him, to catch him in something he might say.”
Luke 11:53-54
Summing up Chapter 11
So the focus of chapter 11 isn’t the disciples particularly. It’s a teaching about how we see each other. If we are looking with light in our eyes toward Jesus, we are loving, generous, hopeful. We’re giving to our children and protecting the weak.
But if we have darkness in our eyes, we’re condemning, exploiting, and finagling an advantage for selfish gain.
So, in a sense, there’s an interesting balance revealed here. Jesus is teaching that our outward focus should be loving and generous. But if that outward focus is condemning, we turn toward selfish hoarding.
This begs the question: how should a follower of Jesus see themselves? What then of the interior?
Introducing Chapter 12
Jesus turns his attention to his followers. And almost like an answer to the lawyer from the previous chapter who was all isn’t your trashing lawyers, like, some kind of same condemnation you don’t like, dude? the author gives us a different confirmation:
“Meanwhile, when the crowd gathered in thousands”
Luke 12:1
Yeah, it sounds a little like rousing the 99% by trashing the super-rich. But the focus is still on the mission, not a winning electoral message.
Jesus warns his disciples of the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. They’re trying to catch Jesus on a few things when they are on board with a whole exploitation system. Jesus is focusing on the whole thing which is corrupt, not the little human laws which, by the way, reinforce that corruption.
And it’s almost like he can read their minds from the last chapter and a half. And he’s totally going to respond, just not with what they expect.
He doesn’t tell them what to believe. Because he has already told them what to pray. Pray for equality. He’s already told them what to do: share, love, be with each other.
He’s told them what not to do: exploit, condemn, hate.
So his answer to the unspoken question how should a follower of Jesus see themselves? is this:
Live like the only eyes that matter are God’s.
Yes, people will condemn you. And yes, the very people who should have light in their eyes will look at you with darkness. This is a given.
But live for God anyway. God will offer words, hope, love to you, even in your darkest moment.
Jesus Keeps Going
This week’s gospel keeps this theme going.
And even though Jesus just said Don’t worry about this junk somebody pipes up with a particularity. Jesus says Don’t major in the minors and then somebody goes Okay, I’ve got this minor…
These themes are still playing out that question from weeks ago: who is my neighbor? Because that question is about seeing and judging. Who gets to be my neighbor? Who do I get to count as not my neighbor? And Jesus says everybody’s your neighbor.
This all reminds me of the question of forgiveness. Peter is all OK, Jesus, I know we’re supposed to forgive, but like, what’s the upper limit of that? Seven times? And Jesus is like try multiplying that by seven and then we’ll talk.
Neighbors, friends, tribes, teammates, political parties, congregations, denominations, Christians, people of faith, citizens, immigrants, all these boxes we love to throw each other into are handy for differentiating, but they don’t help us truly understand Jesus’s mission of equality. Precisely because they restrict our ability to truly see each other with dignity.
No doubt you can see all sorts of current ramifications for what Jesus is doing in this in-between section. And to be honest, I’d prefer the end of chapter 11 or the start of chapter 12 in place of our gospel for Proper 13C. It feels so stripped of context for the purpose of a universal declaration of good behavior.
A much better sermon would be preached on that dinner from 11:37-54. Is anyone daring enough to go for it?