Sermon Illustrations for Proper 27 | OT 32 (2015)
Illustration
Object:
Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17
Ruth followed her mother-in-law to a new land she knew nothing about, but she was faithful and left everything behind. She obeyed Naomi in whatever she told her to do.
In this case she was told to take a bath, put on perfume, and wear her best clothes. She had only been a servant to Boaz, but he was a relative of Naomi, which gave her some clout. Her command to Ruth was strange, almost like she wanted her to prostitute herself, because uncovering a man’s “feet” implied his genitals, and then she was supposed to lie down with him. That is one way to get a proposal! Not recommended for us today if we want to be good Christians. But customs were different in that day, and it worked. Boaz married her
That strange beginning put Ruth in the line of David, and then of course in the ancestry of our Lord. If we follow that ancestry back to the beginning, we don’t find perfect people. We still don’t have perfect people today, but we see how they live and decide whether they are getting their leading from God. It is not an instant thing and we will find ups and downs in everyone (including the preacher!), but eventually we see God acting and begin to trust.
Ruth’s faith was mainly in her mother-in-law, but when she obeyed she found that Naomi’s God was the God she wanted to follow. Are we living that kind of life, so that our children will want to know the same god we know? In Ruth’s case it involved some risk, but she obeyed and it paid off. It paid off for Naomi also, since they called Obed her son and not Ruth’s. Every time we obey and it works, our faith grows and we become more secure in obeying the next time. (I hope you grandparents notice who got the most credit!) We want to be secure in our faith, but we also want our children to be secure also.
Bob O.
Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17
Frank E. Peterson, the first black general in the United States Marine Corps, died on August 25, 2015, at the age of 83. He grew up in the segregated city of Topeka, Kansas. In 1950, two years after President Truman integrated the armed forces, Peterson joined the Marines. He was commissioned as an officer and became the Marines’ first black aviator, flying 350 combat missions in Korea and Vietnam. He eventually attained the rank of Lieutenant General. Peterson noted that racism still exists, though many improvements have been made. He said, “The signs are subtle. As you go off base, look around. If you see a white kid and a black kid going off together to drink a beer, you know that you achieved a degree of success.”
Application: We all need the acceptance and security of being able to walk together.
Ron L.
Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17
And the women said unto Naomi: Blessed be the Lord, who hath not left thee this day without a near kinsman (4:14). Just as this day holds dominion in the skies, so shall your seed produce one who shall hold dominion and rule over Israel forever. Rabbi Hunya said: It was as a result of the blessings of these women that the line of David was not cut off entirely in the days of Athaliah (2 Kings 11). Rabbi Tanhuma said in the name of Rabbi Samuel: Elsewhere it is written “That we may preserve seed of our father”(Genesis 19:32). It is not written “son,” but “seed”; that seed which comes from another place. Who is thus referred to? The Messiah.
(Midrash Rabbah, Ruth, translated by Rabbi Dr. H. Freedman and Maurice Simon, p. 91)
Frank R.
Hebrews 9:24-28
“Was the sacrifice of Jesus, the crucifixion necessary?” I hear that question all the time. The other question I hear is “Did God really send Jesus to die?” How to answer these questions? On what theological basis do I answer? What is the root of the question?
If individuals are wondering how a loving God could bring forth into the world a child simply to kill that child, how do they feel already about God? I have many theological answers, but will they comfort the person? Shall I bring up Augustine or one of the early church fathers? Shall I sidestep the issue by saying I can’t know the will and mind of God? Maybe it is enough to say that had we stayed completely aligned with God, had sin not entered the world, there would have been no need for a savior. And maybe if humanity had listened to Jesus about the kingdom of God being in our midst, in our love for God and one another, people wouldn’t have been afraid of Jesus and his message. And maybe then Jesus would not have been arrested and been crucified.
But I do not have an answer. I know that because Jesus lived and died and rose again I believe him to be the Savior. I know that the crucifixion of Jesus must have angered and saddened God -- and yet Jesus reconciled us to our creator at the cross, saying: “Father, forgive. They do not know what they are doing.” And maybe that is answer enough.
Bonnie B.
Hebrews 9:24-28
Many Bible colleges and seminaries require a year or two of the Greek language for students studying to be preachers and teachers. The Greek language is an interesting one. Like with any language, one has to learn to some degree the tenses of the verbs. It can be confusing, but it is important. One of the most significant verb tenses is called the “perfect” tense. Most Greek teachers simplify the explanation to say that this tense notes a particular act done in the past, but focuses on the continuing results of that act.
Why the language lesson, you ask? Understanding the “perfect” tense is a good way to understand the sacrifice of Jesus. Prior to Jesus, sacrifice had to be made year after year. The text for today uses the word “repeatedly.” No sacrifice would’ve ever been good enough, on its own, to cover sin past, present, and future. No priest offering any animal could ever do that. Jesus’ one-time act on the cross, however, accomplished that. In that one act, sin is put away forever. It is a one-time act, done in the past, which continues to have impact even now. That’s kind of how we understand the “perfect” tense. It is even more how we understand the “perfect” sacrifice.
Bill T.
Hebrews 9:24-28
According to a 2014 LifeWay Research study, seven in ten Americans think salvation is not certain since we must earn our way into heaven with good works. Our lesson reminds us that we can chill out, that salvation is a done deal. Famed modern theologian Karl Barth made this point clear: “In the atonement it is a matter of... and alteration of the human situation, the result of which is an altered being of man, a being of man divinely altered.... All his mistakes and confusions and sin are only like waves beating against the immovable rock of his own most proper being and to his sorrow necessarily breaking and dashing themselves to pieces against this rock” (Church Dogmatics, Vol. IV/1, p. 91).
The great preacher of the first centuries John Chrysostom made clear that nothing more needs to be done by Christians, that Christ’s sacrifice handled it all, by comparing his work to strong medicine that does not have to be readministered to a sick patient (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 14, p. 448). Once born, a baby doesn’t need to be physically born again. Once you get a doctor’s degree (Ph.D.) and have a teaching job with tenure and a full professorship, you don’t need another formal degree in that subject in order to gain acknowledgement as an expert. Once the seventh game of the NBA playoffs or the World Series is over, there’s no replay. Christ doesn’t need more from us now that his sacrifice on the cross has been done almost 2,000 years ago.
Mark E.
Mark 12:38-44
Do I hear a lesson here for us pastors? Do we have to be careful not to always assume that we are the most important people on earth and seek honor for ourselves (whether we deserve it or not)? (I’ve found that’s especially difficult in some countries like Germany where pastors are almost worshipped.) It is hard to be humble when people are so respectful and humble before us! I encourage my people to call me “Pastor Bob” and not “Reverend Ove.” Jesus lived a humble life, even though he was God’s Son. When he was in the form of a man, he acted like a man. He suggested that we put our offering in an envelope so that not everyone would see how generous we are with the Lord. (Sorry... couldn’t resist that.)
Jesus played down his role as the Son of God in his ministry. He told his disciples to wait until he was raised from the dead. He told many whom he healed not to spread the word around about who had done it. His actions spoke louder than his words. If Jesus was humble, how can we puff ourselves up? He even washed his disciples’ feet! What an example.
Don’t brag about your giving, but don’t put in the widow’s small coins if you can afford more. We know that no one will put in the plate their entire assets and income. (For one thing, then they would need to go on welfare!)
After spending three years in seminary learning about our God, we pastors could receive a much greater punishment for sinning since we should know better! That can go a few steps further. As parents or grandparents, we should not puff up with our own importance before our kids. We should be examples of humbleness.
I recently saw a television documentary about Nikita Khrushchev. He loved the people in America, but he still wanted us to know that he was the greatest. That is still true today in Russia.
What about our country? I have met a senator and a representative who were so humble and open and friendly that I wasn’t sure if I was talking with the person I thought it was -- and then there are others!
You don’t have to lord it over your children. They know who you are. It is better to set an example for them like Jesus did. This church can be your training camp.
Bob O.
Mark 12:38-44
The vulnerability of widows is a recurrent theme in biblical literature, so that to defraud them is particularly despicable. Katesthiontes tas oikias (“they devour widow’s houses”)is a vivid phrase for taking material advantage of them (like our “eat someone out of house and home”); ...How the scribes were alleged to do this can be only a matter of speculation. It could be through excessive legal fees, through mismanaging to their own advantage an estate of which they were made trustees, through taking their houses as pledges for unpayable debts, through promoting the temple cult which “eats” the resources of the pious poor, or more generally through exploiting their hospitality and trust.
(R.T. France, The New International Greek Testament Commentary: The Gospel of Mark, p. 491)
Frank R.
Ruth followed her mother-in-law to a new land she knew nothing about, but she was faithful and left everything behind. She obeyed Naomi in whatever she told her to do.
In this case she was told to take a bath, put on perfume, and wear her best clothes. She had only been a servant to Boaz, but he was a relative of Naomi, which gave her some clout. Her command to Ruth was strange, almost like she wanted her to prostitute herself, because uncovering a man’s “feet” implied his genitals, and then she was supposed to lie down with him. That is one way to get a proposal! Not recommended for us today if we want to be good Christians. But customs were different in that day, and it worked. Boaz married her
That strange beginning put Ruth in the line of David, and then of course in the ancestry of our Lord. If we follow that ancestry back to the beginning, we don’t find perfect people. We still don’t have perfect people today, but we see how they live and decide whether they are getting their leading from God. It is not an instant thing and we will find ups and downs in everyone (including the preacher!), but eventually we see God acting and begin to trust.
Ruth’s faith was mainly in her mother-in-law, but when she obeyed she found that Naomi’s God was the God she wanted to follow. Are we living that kind of life, so that our children will want to know the same god we know? In Ruth’s case it involved some risk, but she obeyed and it paid off. It paid off for Naomi also, since they called Obed her son and not Ruth’s. Every time we obey and it works, our faith grows and we become more secure in obeying the next time. (I hope you grandparents notice who got the most credit!) We want to be secure in our faith, but we also want our children to be secure also.
Bob O.
Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17
Frank E. Peterson, the first black general in the United States Marine Corps, died on August 25, 2015, at the age of 83. He grew up in the segregated city of Topeka, Kansas. In 1950, two years after President Truman integrated the armed forces, Peterson joined the Marines. He was commissioned as an officer and became the Marines’ first black aviator, flying 350 combat missions in Korea and Vietnam. He eventually attained the rank of Lieutenant General. Peterson noted that racism still exists, though many improvements have been made. He said, “The signs are subtle. As you go off base, look around. If you see a white kid and a black kid going off together to drink a beer, you know that you achieved a degree of success.”
Application: We all need the acceptance and security of being able to walk together.
Ron L.
Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17
And the women said unto Naomi: Blessed be the Lord, who hath not left thee this day without a near kinsman (4:14). Just as this day holds dominion in the skies, so shall your seed produce one who shall hold dominion and rule over Israel forever. Rabbi Hunya said: It was as a result of the blessings of these women that the line of David was not cut off entirely in the days of Athaliah (2 Kings 11). Rabbi Tanhuma said in the name of Rabbi Samuel: Elsewhere it is written “That we may preserve seed of our father”(Genesis 19:32). It is not written “son,” but “seed”; that seed which comes from another place. Who is thus referred to? The Messiah.
(Midrash Rabbah, Ruth, translated by Rabbi Dr. H. Freedman and Maurice Simon, p. 91)
Frank R.
Hebrews 9:24-28
“Was the sacrifice of Jesus, the crucifixion necessary?” I hear that question all the time. The other question I hear is “Did God really send Jesus to die?” How to answer these questions? On what theological basis do I answer? What is the root of the question?
If individuals are wondering how a loving God could bring forth into the world a child simply to kill that child, how do they feel already about God? I have many theological answers, but will they comfort the person? Shall I bring up Augustine or one of the early church fathers? Shall I sidestep the issue by saying I can’t know the will and mind of God? Maybe it is enough to say that had we stayed completely aligned with God, had sin not entered the world, there would have been no need for a savior. And maybe if humanity had listened to Jesus about the kingdom of God being in our midst, in our love for God and one another, people wouldn’t have been afraid of Jesus and his message. And maybe then Jesus would not have been arrested and been crucified.
But I do not have an answer. I know that because Jesus lived and died and rose again I believe him to be the Savior. I know that the crucifixion of Jesus must have angered and saddened God -- and yet Jesus reconciled us to our creator at the cross, saying: “Father, forgive. They do not know what they are doing.” And maybe that is answer enough.
Bonnie B.
Hebrews 9:24-28
Many Bible colleges and seminaries require a year or two of the Greek language for students studying to be preachers and teachers. The Greek language is an interesting one. Like with any language, one has to learn to some degree the tenses of the verbs. It can be confusing, but it is important. One of the most significant verb tenses is called the “perfect” tense. Most Greek teachers simplify the explanation to say that this tense notes a particular act done in the past, but focuses on the continuing results of that act.
Why the language lesson, you ask? Understanding the “perfect” tense is a good way to understand the sacrifice of Jesus. Prior to Jesus, sacrifice had to be made year after year. The text for today uses the word “repeatedly.” No sacrifice would’ve ever been good enough, on its own, to cover sin past, present, and future. No priest offering any animal could ever do that. Jesus’ one-time act on the cross, however, accomplished that. In that one act, sin is put away forever. It is a one-time act, done in the past, which continues to have impact even now. That’s kind of how we understand the “perfect” tense. It is even more how we understand the “perfect” sacrifice.
Bill T.
Hebrews 9:24-28
According to a 2014 LifeWay Research study, seven in ten Americans think salvation is not certain since we must earn our way into heaven with good works. Our lesson reminds us that we can chill out, that salvation is a done deal. Famed modern theologian Karl Barth made this point clear: “In the atonement it is a matter of... and alteration of the human situation, the result of which is an altered being of man, a being of man divinely altered.... All his mistakes and confusions and sin are only like waves beating against the immovable rock of his own most proper being and to his sorrow necessarily breaking and dashing themselves to pieces against this rock” (Church Dogmatics, Vol. IV/1, p. 91).
The great preacher of the first centuries John Chrysostom made clear that nothing more needs to be done by Christians, that Christ’s sacrifice handled it all, by comparing his work to strong medicine that does not have to be readministered to a sick patient (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 14, p. 448). Once born, a baby doesn’t need to be physically born again. Once you get a doctor’s degree (Ph.D.) and have a teaching job with tenure and a full professorship, you don’t need another formal degree in that subject in order to gain acknowledgement as an expert. Once the seventh game of the NBA playoffs or the World Series is over, there’s no replay. Christ doesn’t need more from us now that his sacrifice on the cross has been done almost 2,000 years ago.
Mark E.
Mark 12:38-44
Do I hear a lesson here for us pastors? Do we have to be careful not to always assume that we are the most important people on earth and seek honor for ourselves (whether we deserve it or not)? (I’ve found that’s especially difficult in some countries like Germany where pastors are almost worshipped.) It is hard to be humble when people are so respectful and humble before us! I encourage my people to call me “Pastor Bob” and not “Reverend Ove.” Jesus lived a humble life, even though he was God’s Son. When he was in the form of a man, he acted like a man. He suggested that we put our offering in an envelope so that not everyone would see how generous we are with the Lord. (Sorry... couldn’t resist that.)
Jesus played down his role as the Son of God in his ministry. He told his disciples to wait until he was raised from the dead. He told many whom he healed not to spread the word around about who had done it. His actions spoke louder than his words. If Jesus was humble, how can we puff ourselves up? He even washed his disciples’ feet! What an example.
Don’t brag about your giving, but don’t put in the widow’s small coins if you can afford more. We know that no one will put in the plate their entire assets and income. (For one thing, then they would need to go on welfare!)
After spending three years in seminary learning about our God, we pastors could receive a much greater punishment for sinning since we should know better! That can go a few steps further. As parents or grandparents, we should not puff up with our own importance before our kids. We should be examples of humbleness.
I recently saw a television documentary about Nikita Khrushchev. He loved the people in America, but he still wanted us to know that he was the greatest. That is still true today in Russia.
What about our country? I have met a senator and a representative who were so humble and open and friendly that I wasn’t sure if I was talking with the person I thought it was -- and then there are others!
You don’t have to lord it over your children. They know who you are. It is better to set an example for them like Jesus did. This church can be your training camp.
Bob O.
Mark 12:38-44
The vulnerability of widows is a recurrent theme in biblical literature, so that to defraud them is particularly despicable. Katesthiontes tas oikias (“they devour widow’s houses”)is a vivid phrase for taking material advantage of them (like our “eat someone out of house and home”); ...How the scribes were alleged to do this can be only a matter of speculation. It could be through excessive legal fees, through mismanaging to their own advantage an estate of which they were made trustees, through taking their houses as pledges for unpayable debts, through promoting the temple cult which “eats” the resources of the pious poor, or more generally through exploiting their hospitality and trust.
(R.T. France, The New International Greek Testament Commentary: The Gospel of Mark, p. 491)
Frank R.
