Lectio Divina (Sacred Reading)

One of our church school classes has considered the story of Jesus’ conversation with the lawyer in Luke 10 for the past several weeks. The passage centers on the matter of neighborliness. We’ve approached it from the perspective of lectio divina, sacred reading, an outgrowth of St. Benedict’s rule. While all four steps of lectio encourage prayer, the final one, contemplation, places a stronger emphasis on it, and has challenged us with the question, “How does this passage open me to a closer relationship with God?” I have a mental image of medieval monks crouched in their hovels asking the same question.

The earlier steps of lectio posed other inquiries: what is the author really saying, how is our understanding of a passage deepened by knowing about the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, and how does all this prompt a change in my morality? We spent a full class session on each, sailing right along. But the fourth step proves harder, because it wants us to think in relational terms.

One approach is to look at this “story within a story” and wonder, “With whom do I identify?” Is it Jesus, the lawyer, the disciples? Or in the parable Jesus relates, is it the priest, the Levite, the Samaritan – or the crime victim?

One thing stands out. In this conversation, the lawyer presses Jesus to define who his neighbor is, and Jesus isn’t having any. “The Story of the Good Samaritan” is a response to the query, “And who is my neighbor?” But Jesus flips it around. He doesn’t respond to that line of thinking. Instead he tells the story, and then asks, "Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?" (Luke 10:36 NIV) When the lawyer says “The one who showed mercy,” Jesus tells him to go and do likewise. What began with the lawyer wanting a recipe for judging others is transformed. Instead of being given the rules to determine who his neighbor is, he’s told to go be one.

So coming back to the lectio, what happens if I really identify with the Samaritan? Or more realistically with the lawyer, who reflects my often self-centered approach to God and others? And how does addressing the issue bring me into a deeper relationship with the Lord? Perhaps it lies in the awareness that just thinking about it isn’t enough. The way I deal with others mirrors my relationship with God. The desire to sort people out and categorize them as deserving or undeserving isn’t kingdom living, while the commitment to show mercy is.

I can evade the issue by pointing out that my "inheritance of eternal life" is found in faith in Christ crucified, not my moral behavior. But I suspect Jesus doesn't want to let it go that easily. He encourages me to see that my present actions intersect with my ability to truly participate in the Kingdom. Well, that should provide something for both me and the class to ponder this week.

Honoring the Body

After the stock market dumped, David Letterman frequently introduced his nightly talk show by asking the audience, “How’s it goin’? Got any money? Of course not! Nobody has any money!”

A broader question might be, “How are you keeping up with the world these days?” The reality we live with is that change comes at us quickly. We want to live in a world where change can be controlled and is predictable – thus "Change!" - the new mantra of the Democrat party.

But some things, like technology, change so quickly we can hardly keep up. I recently joined “Facebook” and after three days felt inundated with messages on my “Wall.” I asked a friend, “How do I get rid of all this stuff people are posting?” He replied, “You don’t. That’s the point!” I’m a bit slow – I have trouble staying in step with my own computer. And who could have anticipated such a rapid transformation in the economic situation? As one investor put it, “We fell off a cliff.”

How to cope? How to live as a Christian in a rapidly changing environment? Dorothy Bass, author of a series on Christian Practices, writes, “The changes that are sweeping the world unsettle life at its most basic levels…”(1) She goes on to say that Christian practices address fundamental needs through concrete actions.

They draw on traditions that are Biblically based, and they’re meant to help us strengthen the ways in which we live. Earlier this year we began a monthly Saturday study group in our church focusing on these practices. We started these sessions with encouragement by the Lilly Foundation as part of Together in Ministry, an initiative intended to foster connections between clergy and laity. As a beginning point we asked what it means to have a passionate spirituality, and how we can put that spirituality into practice on a daily basis.

One of our first discussions focused on one way of living our faith: by honoring the body. The conversation touched on several themes. What does it mean to be created in the image of God? What examples do we have of Jesus honoring the physical reality of the human body? He healed those who were sick, emphasizing good health, and he insisted on washing the feet of his disciples.

Further, in what ways did his followers honor the body of Jesus? The story of the woman who anointed his feet with oil came to mind, as did the description of the women going to the tomb to finish preparing his body for burial.

We also asked, “How does our baptism speak to the importance of physical, as well as spiritual, renewal?” Immersion symbolizes cleansing as well as being raised to new life.
Another pressing question that grew out of our discussion was, “In a world that often dishonors the human body, how do we teach our young people about its sacredness? Bodies are socially devalued in myriad ways. Sex is used to sell everything from clothing to cars, hamburgers to hair restorers. Many of our “heroes,” actors and athletes, treat marriage like a dating game. To say that the body is sacred instead of a tool used to gain immediate gratuity flies in the face of our culture.

According to statistics on spousal abuse, one-third to one-half of adult women have been abused by a spouse or significant other. (2) Human trafficking is a major concern for Christians seeking to do mission work, both here and abroad. The current mission focus of American Baptist Women is “Breaking the Chains,” and efforts to do precisely that are underwritten in several locales in Thailand (see http://www.internationalministries.net/missionaries/109).

Our youth encounter the devaluation of bodies every day. Sex is frequently viewed as a way to win approval and acceptance by young girls, and a way to gain a reputation for being strong and masculine by boys. Youthful clothing fashions stoke the fires, and abortion is readily available if one slips up.

This sense that our own bodies, and the bodies of others, can be used to gain social or financial advantage is exceedingly remote from Biblical teachings:

“Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body (1 Corinthians 6:19-20);” “Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life (Romans 6:13);” and ultimately Jesus’ example in the Upper Room: “And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me (Luke 22:19).”

The greatest mistake we as parents, or as a church, can make is to let our kids figure it out for themselves. Granted, how to best teach them about sexuality and honoring the body isn’t always clear. One possibility is to have regular discussions with our youth, both at home and in youth group, about self-respect, and its flip-side, devaluation. Another approach is to explore ways of maintaining physical and moral health with them, encouraging the setting of boundaries when it comes to premarital intimacy.

A larger challenge is how to move from a small group discussion about honoring the body to a commitment to cultural change in the church. In our group discussions we’re in the process of mulling over suggestions for implementation, wondering how best to communicate what we’ve learned. Our hope is that the desire to practice the faith in more meaningful ways will find fertile ground among our fellow congregants. If you have an interest in furthering Christian Practices, a helpful resource can be found at http://www.practicingourfaith.org/

1 Bass, Dorothy C. Practicing Our Faith. 1997: Jossey-Bass, p. 6.
2 “Statistics on Spousal Abuse,” www.ezinearticles.com/?Statistics-on-Spousal-Abuse&id=1578447

Kingdom Reality

The parables of Jesus have been described as teaching moments, in a form that lifts up one central lesson. A different way to look at them, however, is from a communication perspective, whereby the parables and the conversations in which they occur can be viewed as efforts on Jesus’ part to construct a new social reality, i.e., the “kingdom of God.”

Jesus is quoted frequently in the Gospels with regard to the kingdom: it is “near” (Matt. 10:7), conferred on the disciples (Luke 22:29), belongs to the poor (Luke 6:20) and the persecuted (Matt. 5:10), and is imminent (Luke 9:27). He tells the Pharisees, “But if I drive out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you” (Matt. 12:28). We can assume that his “mission,” the goal of the ministry, is to introduce that kingdom on earth.

Conversation may be seen as the way that our social worlds are constructed. We are continually saying and doing things with others that “make” new realities. Jesus’ conversations, as portrayed by the gospel writers, can be interpreted in this light.

The dialogue with the lawyer in Luke 10:25-40, which includes the Parable of the Good Samaritan, is an example. We can identify several “turns” in the conversation and identify the participants: Luke (telling the story), Jesus, the lawyer, and several observers - the disciples, a crowd of followers, and Luke’s readers. It is a story (the parable) within a story (the Jesus-Lawyer exchange) within a story (Luke’s gospel), and the turns go something like this:

1 Luke: On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus.
1A Lawyer: Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?
1B Jesus: What is written in the Law? How do you read it?

2A Lawyer: (Quoting Deut 6:5 and Lev 16:18) Love the Lord your God…
2B Jesus: You have answered correctly, Do this and you will live.

3 Luke: But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus
3A Lawyer: And who is my neighbor?
3B Jesus: A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, … Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?

4A Lawyer: The one who had mercy on him.
4B Jesus: Go and do likewise. (NIV)

If we assume that Luke, Jesus and the Lawyer are each trying to “make” something new or different as they speak, what might it be? Luke is in dialogue with his readers, while Jesus and the lawyer are in conversation with each other, the disciples, and the onlookers. From Luke’s perspective (1, 2), the lawyer is trying to make a social world in which Jesus is challenged and publicly discredited. And since he is writing to the early church, he may be trying to construct a religious world that is Gentile-inclusive.

As Luke describes the interchange between Jesus and the lawyer, the lawyer assumes that eternal life is something to be inherited, possibly as a descendent of Abraham. He asks Jesus what must be done to accomplish this, waiting, from Luke’s perspective, for Jesus to trip himself up. Jesus directs him to the law (1A-1B). The Law of Moses is a source of authority for everyone involved in the conversation (perhaps even you).

The lawyer, in a perfectly socially acceptable way, quotes from Deuteronomy and Leviticus (2A) and Jesus affirms his answer (2B). Notice the switching of roles. Before the lawyer was in Luke’s view judging Jesus; now Jesus critiques the lawyer’s response.

In 3-3A the lawyer presses the point. “Who is my neighbor?” One interpretation is that he sought to justify himself in front of the crowd, an attempt to “make” a social situation in which he was considered righteous.

Communication theory talks about culture as well as conversational episodes. We might assume that in this culture not only was the Law highly regarded, but it was clearly understood that “neighbor” referred to fellow Jews – and in the lawyer’s mind, those who rigorously kept the Law.

But Jesus challenges him with a story (3B) in which the heroic role is assigned to a Samaritan, culturally acclaimed as unrighteous. If Jesus were to have spoken to our culture, he might have had Mother Theresa and Billy Graham passing by the robbery victim, with a transvestite stopping to help him.

Low status of a Samaritan would be likely be assumed by the lawyer, the crowd, and possibly the disciples. So Jesus forces the issue by asking, “Who was the neighbor?” and the lawyer is logically pressed to say, “The one who had mercy” (4A).

So we might ask, “Is Jesus using this conversation in an effort to “make” the kingdom of God a reality in the social world of the participants? If so, what does that new reality look like? Here are some possibilities, with the understanding that no evaluation of a conversation is ever quite complete:

Kingdom reality affirms the Law of Moses, but it demands attention to the spirit, rather than the letter of it.

Neighbors aren't defined by race or class, but by purity of heart.

Attempts at self-justification are out of bounds.

The kingdom is intended to include the outcast.

We fall into Jesus’ trap if we assume that we are more righteous than the lawyer.

Choosing Grace

A close friend who is undergoing cancer treatment commented recently that he had observed both "understated, raw courage" in fellow patients, and "mundane grace as performed by those who accompany them." He is interested in how people “make” moments of grace, using the situations we find ourselves in to "make love rather than hate; courage rather than fear; joy rather than terror or defeated resignation."

Implicit in his query is the assumption that social situations are constructed as we go along. They are made collectively as we initiate and/or act into relationships and social situations. To "make" moments of grace assumes an understanding of what grace is. From a New Testament perspective, especially as interpreted by evangelicals, grace is "undeserved merit" towards people by God. That definition is limiting.


In my world grace is what is provided to others who are not so much "undeserving" as they are unable to get what they need to be fully human on their own . It's the provision of the unattainable by one to another, be it love, food, shelter, encouragement, or healing. Such grace may indeed come from God, but my friend cites the presence of "mundane" grace - that which is human and earthly.


The possibility of creating grace in the mundane situations in which we find ourselves may depend largely on how we construe our connection to others involved. If we perceive ourselves to be in relationship with them, strained or otherwise, the door is open to deepening the bond by acting and speaking in ways that address their unmet needs. If we view ourselves out of relationship the desire to act graciously is minimized.


But it is also minimized if we continue to act habitually, especially if our habits are self-centered. Making grace requires empathy, and the williingness to explore it as a new way of communicating.