A look at the gaps in the lectionary.
This week: the gap between Proper 17A and 18A
The text: Matthew 17:1-18:14
Another good gap in the lectionary. This time, it’s about a chapter and a half.
We go from Peter calling Jesus Messiah, the first Passion prediction, and the rebuke of Peter to the Transfiguration. This may cause some cognitive dissonance for the reader, since we may have just celebrated the Transfiguration just a few weeks ago.
But the Transfiguration, coming after Peter’s rebuke of Jesus and Jesus returning the rebuke (”Get behind me, Satan!”) has, as its pinnacle moment, God breaking in to say “listen to him”. After they weren’t listening.
Meanwhile, down the mountain, the other remaining disciples aren’t listening and can’t heal someone. So Jesus has to do it himself. Which leads to another rebuke. And also another Passion prediction.
So, for those following at home that’s
Jesus: Hey, I’m going to die → God: Listen to Jesus → Jesus: Again, I’m going to die.
One might think that the fact that it needs to be said is telling enough. But it is actually worse than that. Because they aren’t just running around not listening, of course. They are listening and also, as in the original case of Peter, missing the point so badly that he endangers the whole mission.
A pair of notable teachings
There are two small teachings in chapter 17 that are worth noting.
The first is the familiar teaching of the mustard seed. Not the one about it growing into a giant bush, but the other one. The one about faith that small being enough to literally move mountains.
The timing of this first teaching is notable because it connects with the part about their not listening—because they aren’t trusting. It is totally a dig.
The other involves a short side story in which Peter is asked by a leader about Jesus paying the Temple tax. And Peter’s all Of course he does!
Jesus calls out Peter (actually calling him his original name, Simon) about paying taxes. Spooky. Then he instructs Peter to go fishing, then take the first fish he catches, dig a coin out of its mouth, and offer that on behalf of Jesus.
This is a clever dig, and one that may be too easy to attribute to all religious-government relations. But I think that’s not only too easy, but selfish and obtuse. Jesus is all too often used as anti-government pawn or as a supporter of the separation of church and state. Both are gross misunderstandings.
Jesus doesn’t disagree with the idea of people paying the Temple tax. His beef is with the leadership. He will turn over the tables there in a few chapters because of how they are abusing people. How they are taking advantage of people. That’s the source of his outrage and what produces this bit of clever civil disobedience.
Stumbling
The next chapter (18) begins with some more challenging teachings. About rank, stumbling blocks, and temptation.
The disciples ask Jesus who is “first” in the Kin-dom. We should all know by now that this is an all-time stupid question. But it is also so deeply normal for us to think this way, that we can’t help but sympathize. They’re trying to figure out how people and things rank.
Jesus’s response isn’t just intellectual. It is visual.
He puts a child in front of them to show them. Children rank highest. There is tons to say about this as a concept, but we’ll save that for another time. Because I want to highlight the second part of this. Don’t cause them to stumble via a stumbling block you’ve placed before them.
The connection here with Peter should be so abundantly clear. Stumbling block isn’t a concept Jesus talks a lot about. And Peter was getting in the way of Jesus’s mission. Don’t get in the way of kids and what they are called to do.
In some traditions, the word stumble is used to imply sin—often in the form of sexual interactions or addictions. So the idea that we one is causing someone to stumble is essentially doing something wrong by association. That you are encouraging someone else’s sin.
This is a narrow interpretation. And it has the double problem of being synonymous—the only thing someone might think around the concept.
But here, Jesus tells them to not be a stumbling block to children.
So the point isn’t the supposed sin that one is leading another into. It’s about you.
This is a critique of power.
And of tradition.
And of the way tradition is used to abuse and subjugate children. And I don’t only mean literally. I mean culturally, systemically, and socially.
When the disciples ask Jesus who is first in heaven, Jesus says children. Because we make them last on earth. This is a critique, not about how we’re raising our kids, but what place they have in our world.
Humans have treated children like property for thousands of years. They have fewer rights and opportunities than adults. They have no authority in our world and have no say in the ordering of our lives.
Jesus is telling us that we give more power to slaves and prisoners than we do to children.
So then, anything we do mess with them, encumber them, or prevent them from achieving those things God has called them to do is tantamount to abuse.
And that is, therefore, the worst thing we could do. Again, because of order.
If we condemn on earth who is first in heaven, we are rejecting God. We, like Peter last week, are Satan and need to get behind the Rabbi.
A restoration parable
And, because we all know how fixated we get on punishment and the nature of God, Jesus gives us a parable about restoration. One that is as much about us as it is about those who are hurt or lost.
Jesus tells the parable of the lost sheep, saying who wouldn’t leave the ninety-nine and go after the one. Which, let’s be honest, always leads us to sheepishly raise our hands and go “Me. There is no way I’m endangering all those sheep over that one.” This idea just doesn’t match our understanding. We need to understand it better.
But I think it functions here to remind us of the restoring power and mission of God. That we can’t condemn someone so much that they are separated from God. We cannot be condemned that far. And we can’t condemn ourselves, either. All of us is within the love of God.
We need to hear this because our brains like to say we’re irredeemable. To which Jesus says that is impossible.
And I think we need to hear it here because he needs us to get just how terrible it is to mess with kids the way we do and that we can still be redeemed. We need to know that we’re messing junk up big time and that we can turn it around.
Forgiveness
This is the material that leads to the sequence we’ll be dealing with the next two weeks.
This Sunday, we’ll be reading about how to deal with sin in a practical sense. Jesus will share what to do when someone in the community sins; so we know that it isn’t just an individual thing. [Matthew 18:15-20]
And then the following week, we’ll talk of forgiveness. Particularly the extent to which we are called to forgive. [Matthew 18:21-35]
Keeping our minds focused on the through-line in Jesus’s teaching will serve us this week and in the weeks to come.