Worship Notes February 16, 2014

Worship Notes

The Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, Year A

February 16, 2014

The Season

Today we are in the third of four consecutive Sundays in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Last Sunday we heard Jesus declare, “You are the salt of the earth . . . you are the light of the world.” Today our Gospel reading picks up where we left off last week.

In Word

“Happy are they whose way is blameless, who follow the teaching of the Lord!” (Psalm 119:1). Every parent knows that the rules they impose on their children are for the sake of the health and wellbeing of their children, not their destruction. Living within the realm of the parents’ “constraints” means life; going outside those boundaries might very well mean death. How much more so is our life in relationship to God and to our fellow human beings?!

In our First Lesson, Moses implores the people, “Choose life so that you and your descendants may live . . .” (Deuteronomy 30:19b). Choosing life means “loving the Lord your God, obeying him and holding fast to him . . .” Obedience does not mean servitude; rather obedience means a response of love in action.

Our psalm for today is the highest praise of God’s instruction for us. Torah, often narrowly translated as law, is more appropriately understood as instruction, teaching, and, yes, law. This longest of all psalms is an extended acrostic: eight verses for each of the 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet, thus 176 verses! In the original Hebrew, the psalmist uses many synonyms for Torah, translated in the ELW as: teaching, decrees, ways, commandments, statutes, judgments, promise, etc.

In our Gospel for today, Jesus would have us look beneath the letter of the law to the spirit of the law, the intent of the law. He introduces certain prohibitions of the Hebrew law with the formula, “You have heard it said,” followed by, “But I say to you . . .” Regarding the law, we heard Jesus say in the Gospel last Sunday, “I have come not to abolish but to fulfill” (Matthew 17b). Jesus is the One who fulfills the law that we, in our weakness, cannot and will not do. The nub of these sayings in today’s Gospel has to do with reconciliation with our brothers and sisters: “So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift” (Matthew 5:23-24). Herein lies the scriptural basis for our Sharing of the Peace in our worship service, just before the offering. Behind all this we might be hearing our Lord say to us, “Living in reconciliation you will find life; outside it you will surely find death.”

The Apostle Paul in our Second Lesson returns to the issue of division and quarrelling among the church in Corinth: “For as long as there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not of the flesh, and behaving according to human inclinations?” (1 Corinthians 3:3b).

In Song

Our Song for the Day, “The Peace of the Lord” (ELW 646), was written to teach the meaning of the Sharing of the Peace within the liturgy and its placement just before the offering. The lyrics insist that the peace that is ours from our risen Lord Jesus cannot live within us unless we open ourselves to share it: “The peace of the Lord kept within cannot live, so open yourselves now to share it.”