Texts for Preaching, Year B

A Lectionary Commentary Based on the NRSV

Walter Brueggemann, Charles B. Cousar, Beverly Roberts Gaventa, James D. Newsome Jr.

• Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press
• Year: 1993
• ISBN:
  9781611644647
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Ministry

Based on the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, this unique and comprehensive resource--the first in a series of three volumes--provides resources for an entire year of sermons and offers practical help to preachers and others involved using the Revised Common Lectionary. Beginning with Advent, it deals with the texts for Year B. Each of the four texts--the Old Testament, Psalter, Gospel, and Epistle--are treated in relation to each Sunday and important festival day, including Christmas, Ash Wednesday, and Good Friday. A brief introduction gives the general thrust of the texts and the relationship among them with emphasis upon interpretation of the texts. Suggestions concerning the implications for life today are also included.

FIRST SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY

(BAPTISM OF THE LORD) Ordinary Time 1

It is rather unusual to find four texts assigned for a given Sunday in the lectionary cycle that demonstrate as much commonality as do the texts for this Sunday. Any combination from among the four would be appropriate and would lend itself to reflection about the sacrament of baptism, about new beginnings, about the power of God in the human arena, about divine revelation.

Water is an obvious and prominent symbol in the four passages, and yet it functions in different ways. In both of the Old Testament texts (Gen. 1:1–5 and Ps. 29), water represents the surging chaos out which God brings order, the stormy deeps over which Yahweh rules. In the New Testament passages (Acts 19:1–7 and Mark 1:4–11), however, the symbolism has changed, and water is linked to baptism. It represents the utterly new beginning that comes with the gift of the Spirit.

More consistent in the texts is the presence and reality of the Spirit/wind, demonstrating the surprising, uncontrollable power of God. Not like a gentle breeze, but like a mighty gale, the Spirit tames the formless void (parallel in Ps. 29 to “the voice of the LORD”) and pushes back the destructive waters. Likewise in Paul’s baptism of the Ephesian believers in Acts 19, the Spirit intrudes, controls, and re-creates. Those who receive the Spirit are led to a profound worship and a powerful proclamation, unlike anything they have known before.

In the account of Jesus’ baptism, the Spirit accompanies the violent rending of the heavens and the sound of a voice, identifying Jesus as the beloved Son. It is the same voice of the Lord about which the psalmist sings. It is a moment of revelation for Jesus—and for us who read the story.

Genesis 1:1–5

The first and most familiar words of the Bible announce the themes that recur in this set of lections: new beginnings, water, and spirit. This reading itself is surprisingly truncated in the lection, but it is extended enough to exhibit these themes with enormous power. The scope of our reading is “the first day,” the day when life begins out of the ominous dark.

The first two verses of Genesis present a difficult grammatical problem which turns on the first word of the Hebrew text. How the first word is read determines the relation between the first two verses. There are two important alternatives in reading that first word.

On the one hand, the more conventional and familiar translation is “In the beginning, God created….” This rendering makes v. 1 an independent and absolute statement, introduced by a temporal phrase. The upshot is that Creation is an absolute new beginning. As a result, v. 2, which speaks of a chaotic deep, is quite subordinate, though it is difficult to understand from whence came the ominous deep of v. 2 if v. 1 witnesses to an absolute beginning.

On the other hand, in a reading offered in NRSV (marginal reading) and preferred by a great number of scholars, the first word of the Hebrew text is taken as a temporal, dependent clause: “When God began to create….” The result is to make v. 1 dependent and to make v. 2 the main clause. Consequently, God’s creation activity is not an absolute beginning point, but God began the work of creation by operating on the already existing ominous material of chaos. This suggests that creation is not ex nihilo, but consists in the magisterial ordering of chaos that is there from the beginning. (The text, on this reading, is not curious about the origin of the extant chaos; the chaos is simply there as a given.)

In any case, the beginning of the world’s story features three elements. There is the dark, formless, disordered watery chaos that is ominous, threatening, rebellious, and destructive. The imagery is that of surging waters. Any contact with the wild, relentless force of an ocean tide lets us know about the unbridled power of “many waters,” a power that cannot be managed, channeled, domesticated, or resisted.

The second feature in this tale of beginnings is the God who is the subject of this awesome, magisterial word “create.” This God, so the text suggests, has no point of origin, no antecedents, but is simply there at the outset, undertaking the inexplicable activity (which only God can undertake) of ordering, forming, shaping, willing, decreeing, and summoning an ordered potential life-space. There is no anxiety or precariousness about this God, who proceeds deliberately to fashion a context for viable life.

The third factor is the wind, God’s active instrument for ordering the watery materials of life. The older, more familiar rendering of the Hebrew term is “spirit,” that is, God’s life-force, God’s principle of vitality, which sweeps over the waters. More recent renderings, however, including NRSV, take the term rûah as “wind,” thus permitting a more graphic, concrete picture of the wind given by God, which blows over the waters and blows them back, making life-space dry and safe. The term rûah as “wind/spirit” thus permits on the one hand a graphic notion of the waters being restrained by physical force, and on the other hand a direct link between this powerful, palpable life-force and the holy, inscrutable purpose of God.

These first two verses testify that a safe, dry space for life depends on the life-force of God, for none of us has the power or resource to command or master the waters (compare Jer. 5:22; Mark 4:35–41). This life-space is never a creaturely achievement, but is always a free gift of the creator God. One of the lessons from this text is to see that “the spirit of God,” so crucial in the other readings for the day, needs to be understood as the intrusive power for life that only God can command. The wind that blows at baptism or at Pentecost is the same wind as in our text, in each case making new life wondrously and inexplicably possible.

In Gen. 1:3–5 God now speaks for the first time, for God has not yet spoken in vs. 1–2. God speaks in a bold, confident, sovereign voice. This is the voice of a ruler on a throne who will be obeyed, who will be obeyed even by those creatures who exist only when addressed. The light, not heretofore mentioned, exists and functions only at the behest of this sovereign voice. This is the God who “calls into existence the things that do not exist” (Rom. 4:17). It is the light that is prized and is the new gift of God wrought to counter the deep of Gen. 1:2 (compare John 1:1–5).

The darkness, however, is not condemned or rejected. It also is named and valued. This God is not simply on the side of light against the dark; this God values and administers both light and dark. Both are named, both are given statutory legitimacy. Both belong to the ordered world of God, both prized, neither scorned. The day of astonishing beginning anticipates the balanced, ordered, reliable world of “seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night” that will make a viable, guaranteed home for all God’s creatures (Gen. 8:22).

The new beginning is not worked in threat and conflict, but in buoyant ordering (compare Ps. 139:11–12). Our world, that is, God’s world, begins in assurance, summoned by God to a balanced, life-permitting order.

Psalm 29

One of the most forceful of all the hymns of praise in the Psalter, Ps. 29 has been the subject of much scholarly investigation, especially with regard to its possible connections with Ugaritic literature and with the beginning of the autumn rains. However all of that may be, in the form that we have received it this psalm presents Yahweh, the God of Israel, as the Lord of the storm and therefore as the Lord of all of life.

As is typical of many psalms of praise, Ps. 29 is composed of three parts: introduction, body, and conclusion. The introduction (vs. 1–2) calls on the members of the heavenly council, the “heavenly beings” of NRSV, to give glory to the Lord, “glory and strength,” “the glory of his name.” Since the term “glory” (kābôd) is often found in Priestly literature within the Old Testament, where it refers to the theophany of Yahweh (for example, Ex. 16:7; 24:16; compare Ezek. 1:28), the repeated use of the term here emphasizes that this psalm is describing not a God who is a distant abstraction, but a God who has appeared in the life of the people.

The second section, the body (vs. 3–10), describes the manner of the Lord’s appearing. Here the language, some of the most vivid in the Psalter, evokes images of a violent storm. Especially noteworthy is the repeated phrase “the voice of the LORD,” which begins each verse except 6 and 10. At one level this would seem to be a reference to the claps of thunder that accompany the storm, as in Ex. 19:16, but at a deeper level the “voice of the LORD” is synonymous with the “word of God,” that is, God’s self-revelation.

This section lists various aspects of the natural world over which the Lord’s glory presides. First, there are the “waters,” the “mighty waters,” of v. 3. We are not told just which waters the psalmist has in mind (that becomes clearer in a moment), but the presumption of the reader at this point is that these waters are both seas and rivers, as well as lakes and pools. That is to say, all waters are under the rule of the Lord of the storm, the Lord who brings the rains. Next, the forests that grace the land are brought into view (vs. 5–6). The violence of the storm bends and breaks the trees, so that even the solid mountains (“Lebanon” and “Sirion”—the latter meaning Mt. Hermon) appear to skip like frolicking young animals. The lightning and thunder even rattle the uninhabited spaces.

The final verse of this section (v. 10) forms a climax to the body of the psalm and brings us back to the “waters” of v. 3. The “flood” here is nothing other than the waters of chaos that God pushed back at Creation, making place for heaven and earth (Gen. 1:7). These are the same waters, the flood, which invaded creation in the time of Noah (Gen. 7:11), but which God then expelled and over which God promised to rule forever (Gen. 9:11). Now we understand the “waters” of Ps. 29:3 and all the other images of this psalm: God is the ruler of all of life. Every aspect of our existence is subject to the divine sovereignty. “The LORD sits enthroned as king forever.”

The third section of the psalm (v. 11) is a prayer that expresses the hope that God will bless the people with strength and peace.

There are at least three elements in the psalm that make it appropriate for use on the Sunday which, in many churches, is observed as a festival to commemorate Jesus’ baptism (compare the Gospel lection for this week). The first is the element of water. The psalm assumes that the reader is aware of the old stories, known by both Hebrews and other ancient peoples, which describe God’s conquest of the unruly waters at Creation. In the story of Jesus’ baptism, not only is the water peaceful and calm, but—by the power and love of God—it has become a medium for the revelation of God’s love. It symbolizes the washing away of human sinfulness, God’s forgiveness of the dark side of our nature. It also symbolizes a sinless Jesus’ identification with this sinful humankind.

A second element in the psalm that makes it appropriate for this day is that of theophany, that is, God’s self-manifestation. The recurring use of the word “glory” (vs. 1, 2, 3, 9) reminds the reader of God’s continual indwelling in human life in order to lead and save the people. And the almost incessant “voice of the LORD” points to God’s nature as One who communicates with the people for their instruction and redemption. This anticipates the voice “from heaven” of Mark 1:11, which announces to a sinful humankind the Sonship and Kingship of Jesus.

The kingly nature of Jesus connects with a third element within Ps. 29 that renders it appropriate for this day. That is the majestic (v. 4), regal (v. 10) nature of the God of the theophany, the Appearing One. This is the Lord of the Universe, who rules with strength (v. 1), who bestows strength on the people (v. 11) in order that they may live in safety and peace. Strength is thus seen as one of the qualities of the Son, King Jesus, and his baptism therefore becomes not only a moment of his identification with sinful humankind, but also a moment of his anointing as the Lord and Ruler of life.

Acts 19:1–7

The story of Paul’s initial encounter with the “disciples” at Ephesus, though containing several perplexing details, provides an occasion for the church to raise questions with itself about its own theological deficiencies. I deliberately use the expression “raise questions,” because that it is precisely Paul’s way of dealing with the Ephesians. He does not berate them for their failures, nor does he chide them because they have apparently departed from their roots in John the Baptist. He merely asks a relevant theological question, followed by another, and then by instruction. Their ignorance or regression into syncretism is not an occasion for blame or even harsh confrontation, but for patient probing that leads to an empowerment for mission.

Who were these “disciples” (also called “believers”)? The preceding story relates the preaching at Ephesus of Apollos, an eloquent interpreter of the scripture and one who “taught accurately the things concerning Jesus” but who “knew only the baptism of John.” It was Priscilla and Aquila, Paul’s friends, who took Apollos aside and privately tutored him in a fuller understanding of the faith (Acts 18:24–26). Apparently, “some disciples” (19:1) still adhered to the message of the early Apollos, which they received prior to his instruction by Priscilla and Aquila, and they were the group Paul found when he arrived at Ephesus. They knew about Jesus; they had received John’s baptism; but they did not know or had forgotten that John was a voice announcing that Jesus would baptize with the Spirit. The point is that their faith was deficient at a critical point, not yet what it could or should be, and Paul’s perceptive queries became the means for growth.

What do we learn from Paul’s instruction of the Ephesian “disciples”? First, we learn that the Spirit comes through the message and baptism of Jesus Christ. What was lacking in the theology and experience of these people could not be remedied by a gimmick or by an urging, but only through hearing and a sacramental act. The dialogue between Paul and the “disciples” is remarkably sparse—pointed questions and simple answers. Could the narrator by the sparseness mean to convey that the absence of the Spirit is not due to complex social problems that have to be engaged or mysterious theological questions that have to be answered? What the Ephesians needed was simple—a clear statement of the witness to Jesus and Christian baptism. (The narrator is inconsistent about whether the sacrament precedes or follows the gift of the Spirit. The order was apparently not an issue. See Acts 10:44–48.)

The narrative may be especially instructive in a day when people struggle for meaning in life and for a new depth of spirituality. Individuals long for something more real than what can be found in a frantic, impersonal, and materialistic world. The very word “Spirit” becomes an attraction by suggesting an animating force, a reality giving ardor, vitality, and warmth of feeling. The quest for spirituality, however, is open to distortion, to the search for strategies and methods that seek to force God’s hand and that neglect the divine freedom. God is free to act where and how God wills. The promise to be claimed from our text is that the Spirit is to be sought in the word preached and the sacrament enacted.

Second, we learn from Paul’s encounter with the Ephesians that the Spirit generates a profound worship and an active mission. The immediate reaction to Christian baptism and the commissioning by the laying on of hands was twofold: speaking in tongues and prophesying. The former is to be distinguished from the experience of the church in Jerusalem at Pentecost, where foreign languages were spoken and understood (Acts 2:4). Here the phenomenon is that of profound worship for which words are inadequate (Acts 10:45–46) and for which in some places the church came to demand an interpretation so that other worshipers could be edified (1 Cor. 14:27–28). The lively Spirit of God produces lively worship.

The other result of the Spirit’s presence is prophesying (fulfilling the wish expressed in Num. 11:29, “Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit on them!”). In the New Testament church, prophesying is an activity nearly synonymous with preaching, with the intelligible speaking of the word of God. Pro...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• First Sunday of Advent
• Second Sunday of Advent
• Third Sunday of Advent
• Fourth Sunday of Advent
• Christmas, First Proper
• Christmas, Second Proper
• Christmas, Third Proper
• First Sunday After Christmas
• Second Sunday After Christmas
• Epiphany
• First Sunday After Epiphany (Baptism of the Lord): Ordinary Time 1
• Second Sunday After Epiphany: Ordinary Time 2
• Third Sunday After Epiphany: Ordinary Time 3
• Fourth Sunday After Epiphany: Ordinary Time 4
• Fifth Sunday After Epiphany: Ordinary Time 5
• Sixth Sunday After Epiphany: Proper 1: Ordinary Time 6
• Seventh Sunday After Epiphany: Proper 2: Ordinary Time 7
• Eighth Sunday After Epiphany: Proper 3: Ordinary Time 8
• Last Sunday After Epiphany (Transfiguration Sunday)
• Ash Wednesday
• First Sunday in Lent
• Second Sunday in Lent
• Third Sunday in Lent
• Fourth Sunday in Lent
• Fifth Sunday in Lent
• Sixth Sunday in Lent (Palm Sunday or Passion Sunday)
• Holy Thursday
• Good Friday
• Easter
• Second Sunday of Easter
• Third Sunday of Easter
• Fourth Sunday of Easter
• Fifth Sunday of Easter
• Sixth Sunday of Easter
• Ascension
• Seventh Sunday of Easter
• Pentecost
• Trinity Sunday
• Proper 4: Ordinary Time 9: May 29-June 4 (if after Trinity)
• Proper 5: Ordinary Time 10: June 5-11 (if after Trinity)
• Proper 6: Ordinary Time 11: June 12-18 (if after Trinity)
• Proper 7: Ordinary Time 12: June 19-25 (if after Trinity)
• Proper 8: Ordinary Time 13: June 26-July 2
• Proper 9: Ordinary Time 14: July 3-9
• Proper 10: Ordinary Time 15: July 10-16
• Proper 11: Ordinary Time 16: July 17-23
• Proper 12: Ordinary Time 17: July 24-30
• Proper 13: Ordinary Time 18: July 31-August 6
• Proper 14: Ordinary Time 19: August 7-13
• Proper 15: Ordinary Time 20: August 14-20
• Proper 16: Ordinary Time 21: August 21-27
• Proper 17: Ordinary Time 22: August 28-September 3
• Proper 18: Ordinary Time 23: September 4-10
• Proper 19: Ordinary Time 24: September 11-17
• Proper 20: Ordinary Time 25: September 18-24
• Proper 21: Ordinary Time 26: September 25-October 1
• Proper 22: Ordinary Time 27: October 2-8
• Proper 23: Ordinary Time 28: October 9-15
• Proper 24: Ordinary Time 29: October 16-22
• Proper 25: Ordinary Time 30: October 23-29
• Proper 26: Ordinary Time 31: October 30-November 5
• Proper 27: Ordinary Time 32: November 6-12
• Proper 28: Ordinary Time 33: November 13-19
• Proper 29 (Christ the King or Reign of Christ): Ordinary Time 34: November 20-26
• All Saints: November 1: (or first Sunday in November)
• Index of Lectionary Readings