Morning Service for Trinity 15 2022

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September 22, 2022

Today Jeremiah demonstrates the well known phrase, ‘putting your money where your mouth is’. We are very familiar with Jeremiah’s prophecies of doom and disaster, we’ve been hearing them for weeks now, but we are apt to overlook his more hopeful and encouraging pronouncements. Today we heard a dramatic example of Jeremiah’s faith. Even with the enemy laying siege to the city, and Jeremiah himself imprisoned, even then he shows his faith in the future of his nation by buying his cousin’s field – keeping it in the family, as was his moral duty.

Morning Service for Trinity 15 2022

HYMN New every morning is the love NEH 238/AMR 4 – Melcombe

1 New every morning is the love

Our wakening and uprising prove;

Through sleep and darkness safely brought,

Restored to life, and power, and thought.

2 New mercies, each returning day,

Hover around us while we pray;

New perils past, new sins forgiven,

New thoughts of God, new hopes of heaven.

3 If on our daily course our mind

Be set to hallow all we find,

New treasures still, of countless price,

God will provide for sacrifice.

4 The trivial round, the common task,

Would furnish all we ought to ask,

Room to deny ourselves, a road

To bring us daily nearer God.

5 Only, O Lord, in thy dear love

Fit us for perfect rest above;

And help us this and every day

To live more nearly as we pray

PRAYER OF PREPARATION
Almighty God,
to whom all hearts are open,
all desires known,
and from whom no secrets are hidden:
cleanse the thoughts of our hearts
by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit,
that we may perfectly love you,
and worthily magnify your holy name;
through Christ our Lord. Amen

PRAYERS OF PENITENCE

We recall our Lord’s command to love and in a moment of silence we confess

the many ways we fail to keep his command:

Most merciful God,

Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
we confess that we have sinned
in thought, word and deed.
We have not loved you with our whole heart.
We have not loved our neighbours as ourselves.
In your mercy forgive what we have been,
help us to amend what we are,
and direct what we shall be;
that we may do justly, love mercy,
and walk humbly with you, our God. Amen

May the God of love and power
forgive us and free us from our sins,
heal and strengthen us by his Spirit,
and raise us to new life in Christ our Lord. Amen.

THE COLLECT

God, who in generous mercy sent the Holy Spirit

upon your Church in the burning fire of your love:

grant that your people may be fervent

in the fellowship of the gospel

that, always abiding in you,

they may be found steadfast in faith and active in service;

through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.

FIRST READING – Jeremiah 32.1-3a,6-15

The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD in the tenth year of King Zedekiah of Judah, which was the eighteenth year of Nebuchadrezzar. At that time the army of the king of Babylon was besieging Jerusalem, and the prophet Jeremiah was confined in the court of the guard that was in the palace of the king of Judah, where King Zedekiah of Judah had confined him.

Jeremiah said, The word of the LORD came to me: Hanamel son of your uncle Shallum is going to come to you and say, “Buy my field that is at Anathoth, for the right of redemption by purchase is yours.” Then my cousin Hanamel came to me in the court of the guard, in accordance with the word of the LORD, and said to me, “Buy my field that is at Anathoth in the land of Benjamin, for the right of possession and redemption is yours; buy it for yourself.” Then I knew that this was the word of the LORD.

And I bought the field at Anathoth from my cousin Hanamel, and weighed out the money to him, seventeen shekels of silver. I signed the deed, sealed it, got witnesses, and weighed the money on scales. Then I took the sealed deed of purchase, containing the terms and conditions, and the open copy; and I gave the deed of purchase to Baruch son of Neriah son of Mahseiah, in the presence of my cousin Hanamel, in the presence of the witnesses who signed the deed of purchase, and in the presence of all the Judeans who were sitting in the court of the guard. In their presence I charged Baruch, saying, Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Take these deeds, both this sealed deed of purchase and this open deed, and put them in an earthenware jar, in order that they may last for a long time. For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Houses and fields and vineyards shall again be bought in this land.

HYMN Come, gracious Spirit, heavenly Dove NEH 347/AMR 232 – Gonfalon Royal (128/2)

1 Come, gracious Spirit, heavenly Dove,

With light and comfort from above;

Be thou our guardian, thou our guide,

O’er every thought and step preside.

2 The light of truth to us display,

And make us know and choose thy way;

Plant faith and love in every heart,

That we from God may ne’er depart.

3 Lead us to Christ, the living Way,

Nor let us from our shepherd stray;

Lead us to holiness, the road

That brings us to our home in God.

4 Lead us to heaven, that we may share

Fulness of joy for ever there;

Lead us to God, the heart’s true rest,

To dwell with him, for ever blest.

GOSPEL – Luke 16.19-31

“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. He called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.’ But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’ He said, ‘Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father’s house— for I have five brothers—that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.’ Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.’ He said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’ ”

SERMON

Today we heard a dramatic example of Jeremiah’s faith. Even with the enemy laying siege to the city, and Jeremiah himself imprisoned, even then he shows his faith in the future of his nation by buying his cousin’s field – keeping it in the family, as was his moral duty.

Jeremiah had prophesied ruin while all Jerusalem sat content, now he prophesise a new beginning when ruin is so obviously at hand. And he does so at the command and the instigation of his God, still the God of Israel, even if all signs would appear to be to the contrary. Such an investment in a land set to be overthrown would seem foolish in the extreme – Jeremiah, in many ways, and many times was set up to be a fool, a fool for his God. In his foolishness there lay the truth of God. There will be life after Babylon, the land of God’s promise will be his people’s once again.

We have in this account both the action of Jeremiah and the statement of the promise of God, ‘Houses, fields and vineyards will again be brought in this land.’ The claims of faith and the realities of ordinary life are held together. In the exercise of family economic responsibility, the prophet enacts the long-term faithfulness of God. Jeremiah invests in God’s promised future exactly when that future seems completely closed off. When there is no future, no hope, then he proclaims God’s hope.

It was the future that the rich man in the parable of Dives and Lazarus, had no interest in. This story is a difficult one – especially to modern liberally minded ears like mine. Its implications are unpleasant and uncomfortable. The story would appear to have its origins in a number of similar folk tales well known at the time of Christ. One of the most notable was an Egyptian story where, after death, it was the poor man who had performed good deeds that was better off than the rich man whose deeds were bad. It was someone from the realms of the dead who had managed to convince the hero of the tale of the better fate of the poor but honest over the rich but corrupt.

But Luke’s parable departs from the folk tales in interesting ways. Notice that Lazarus is not described as particularly virtuous, only poor. What won him a place next to Abraham in the banquet of heaven was not his good works, but his suffering, his sores, his leprosy. His name, Lazarus, comes the Hebrew Eleazar, meaning he whom God helps. His utter wretchedness is illustrated by the Rabbinical saying ‘There are three whose life is no life: he who depends on the table of another, he who is ruled by is wife, and he whose body is burdened by sufferings.’ Lazarus had no life on 2 out of 3 counts.

On the other hand the rich man – known to many as Dives from the Latin for rich man – was guilty on two counts. The first a failure of common humanity. In his opulent comfort he had failed to show generosity and compassion on a poor beggar at his gate. The second was a failure of Theology – he had not believed in a moral God, nor in a life to come to which this life bore any relation. He is described as possessing the clothes and the beliefs of an aristocratic Sadducee, famous for their refusal to believe in a life continuing from this one. These failures now characterised his continuing life.

The parable is full of rich Jewish imagery from various apocalyptic books of the day that painted their pictures of paradise and its alternative. The rich man now knows his mistake but feels for his brothers, Saducees like himself, believing as he believed, living as he lived. But Abraham replies that if they rejected the truth contained in Moses and the law how will they see it in one risen from the dead.

We must remember that this parable, like last weeks and the week before, are all told in the context of the outcast. Lazarus was cast out to suffer his fate by a society who left lepers to live or to die by what they could beg. In the kingdom of God the outcast will be invited in – and he who cast him out will understand what he did in the only way possible, through the experience of being outcast.

I think the images painted for us in the story, most of them told in Greek expressions unique to the New Testament, are immaterial to the point being made. What we believe affects how we live – if our minds are closed to the moral sense and the compassion of God then we will fail to understand what life is to all about, what God is all about. And such failure will be reversed, we will come to understand, eventually.

What we believe does matter, and how we act on that belief matters too – whether we put our money where our mouth is, and our time and abilities as well. This life is not irrelevant, it is opportunity and possibility. And sometimes we are called by God, to turn the realities of the world on their head. To act with foolish generosity, to proclaim a foolish hope and to hold a foolish faith in the fool on the hill.

AFFIRMATION OF FAITH
Let us declare our faith in the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ:

Christ died for our sins
in accordance with the scriptures;
he was buried; he was raised to life on the third day
in accordance with the scriptures;
afterwards he appeared to his followers,
and to all the apostles: this we have received,
and this we believe. Amen. 1 Corinthians 15.3-7

HYMN Bread of heaven, on thee we feed NEH 276 / AMR 411- Bread of heaven

1 Bread of heaven, on thee we feed,

for thou art our food indeed.

Ever may our souls be fed

with this true and living Bread,

day by day with strength supplied

through the life of Christ who died.

2 Vine of heaven, thy love supplies

this blest cup of sacrifice.

‘Tis thy wounds our healing give;

to thy cross we look and live.

Thou our life! O let us be

rooted, grafted, built on thee.

PRAYERS OF INTERCESSION – Vera Oldham

Loving Father, you know all our thoughts, worries and problems. We do not need to struggle to find the right words for our prayers because you know all that is in our minds. We have come before you, Lord, to offer our praise and our prayers. You are God the creator, Christ the Saviour of the world, the Spirit of truth and love. Be near to us, today and every day.