CMC Scripture and Sermon 11-12-2023 from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.

The Prophet Considers a God Who Reconsiders
Text: Hosea 11:1-11
Speaker: Joel Miller

In the Hebrew Bible, it is the privilege and the burden of the prophet to speak for God.  That’s quite the job description, to speak for God.  It’s not a form of speech we hear much these days.  When we do, we have every reason to be skeptical. 

But in the biblical world, that’s what the prophet did, and that’s where the narrative lectionary has us hanging out for a bit.  We’re sampling the prophets, hearing them make claims about God and people, interpreting the present and pointing to possible futures.  Or at least their present, in the past, and their possible futures, some of which came to pass, others of which are still out there on our far horizon – like that day when the lion shall lay down with the lamb, and we will all beat our swords into ploughshares, or whatever updated form of military weaponry into whatever form of productive life-giving technology.  At their best, the prophets stir within us a longing for that which can be, and, by claiming that longing as our own, a bit of that hoped for future makes its way into the present.   

When you meet a prophet, it’s good to at least give them a chance.  They’re speaking for God, and that can get dicey.  It’s OK to be skeptical.  Nobody gets a free pass with their God claims because if there’s one thing we can be certain of its that they, and we, aren’t God.  Even the prophets who made it into the Bible.  So let’s do a brief overview of biblical prophets, before focusing in on the Hosea…

CMC Service 11-5-23 from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.

What Spirit Are You Of? in Four Stories 
1 Kings 18:17-40
Speaker: Joel Miller

Story 1. James and John and Jesus

Toward the end of his ministry, Jesus decided he had to go to Jerusalem.  He was in Galilee, his home region in the north, and sets off on the journey with his disciples.  Luke’s gospel tells about this in chapter 9.  As they go, they send messengers ahead, scouting out places where they might stay along the way – kind of the analog, labor-intensive version of scrolling through the Airbnb app.  The messengers enter a Samaritan village.  Samaritans and Jews had a long running conflict over where the spiritual center of worship should be.  When they learn the travelers are headed to Jerusalem, they refuse the hospitality of their village.  Word of this gets back to the disciples, and James and John approach Jesus with a proposal of how to respond: “Master,” they say, “do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” 

It seems a bit unexpected for a couple guys drawn to Jesus’ teachings, and definitely disproportional to the offense.  But it did have a precedent.  The disciples are referencing an earlier incident in Israel’s history when Elijah the prophet had called down fire from heaven to consume messengers sent to him from King Ahaziah who ruled in Samaria.  I’m not sure how James and John thought they were going to call fire down from heaven, but here, perhaps, was their thinking: If Elijah, our spiritual ancestor, when faced with a similar situation, responded in this way, why shouldn’t we?

Luke says that Jesus “turned and rebuked them.  Then they went on to another village.”  It’s as…

CMC Worship 10_29_23 from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.

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CMC Service – 10/22/23 from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.

October 22, 2023 | The Specter of Royalty

Texts: 2nd Samuel 5:1-5; 6:1-5; Psalm 150

Speaker: Mark Rupp

My husband and I were nearly two-thirds of the way through the most recent performance in our Broadway in Columbus season when a brand new character came out on stage and I had to lean over and whisper “Wait, who is that?” Now what makes this a bit surprising is that the show we were seeing was Jesus Christ, Superstar, a rock-opera retelling of the story of Jesus, and I– an ordained minister in the Christian church–needed to ask my husband–a non-religious heathen who maybe attended Sunday School once in his life–what was happening in the story being presented to us. 

Before you all start drafting emails trying to get my ordination revoked, let me be clear that a couple things were happening. First, I was having a bit of a hard time understanding some of the lyrics from our not-quite-nose-bleed-but-still-mid-mezzanine seats, so I think I can be forgiven for not being able to follow everything exactly. Second, the character that appeared for the first time out of nowhere, showed up in complete contrast to the rest of the production. The show can be done in lots of different ways, but this production gave all of the scenery and costumes a bit of a drab, post-apocalyptic feel with muted earthy tones, industrial looking set pieces, and choreography that evoked almost a tribal, Mad Max feel. This new character, however, came on in bright tones, a long gold lamé cloak trailing behind him, and a face painted white, almost clown-looking in the way he was obviously trying hard to exude extravagance. Even the music shifted, turning…

CMC Scripture & Sermon 10.15.2023 from Gwen Reiser on Vimeo.

Ruth and Persistent-Loving-Kindness | 15 October 2023
Text: Readings from Ruth
Speaker: Joel Miller

“In the days when the judges ruled.”  That’s how the book of Ruth begins.  This was after the Israelites had settled in Canaan, the promised land, but before they had kings.  The leaders were tribal chieftains, judges, who would rise up during times of crisis. 

If you’re tracking the flow of the Narrative Lectionary you’ll note that we have gone – last week – from the giving of the Ten Commandments in the Sinai desert, to the days when the judges ruled.  We have skipped over, conveniently, the conquest stories in the book of Joshua.  That’s when the new generation of Israelites, after the death of Moses, under Joshua’s leadership, emerge from the desert and take control of the land of Canaan through military conquest.  All this conquesting was done in the name of their God.  These stories do not fit real well into Mennonite peace theology.

If it’s any consolation, the consensus among scholars is that this didn’t actually happen the way it’s described.  The leading theory, based on archeological and DNA evidence, is that the people who became the nation of Israel were mostly native Canaanites, especially the underclass, joined by other ethnic groups, during a time when Egypt’s control of the region was collapsing.  The Exodus and conquest stories then become the narrative glue that holds this diverse group of peoples together as one nation.       

What this suggests is the power of a common story to bind people together – more powerful than having a common blood ancestor.  Stories can even be more powerful than military conquest.  There’s a little sprinkling of peace theology.                               

And if we’re looking…