Email from Church of the Redeemer

Morning Devotion for the Season after Pentecost

November 20, 2023

Invitatory

Thus says the high and lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy, “I dwell in the high and holy place and also with the one who has a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the contrite.”

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.

Maccabees 3: 1-5, 15-22

Then his son Judas, who was called Maccabeus, took command in his place. All his brothers and all who had joined his father helped him; they gladly fought for Israel.

He extended the glory of his people.

Like a giant he put on his breastplate;

he bound on his armour of war and waged battles,

protecting the camp by his sword.

He was like a lion in his deeds,

like a lion’s cub roaring for prey.

He searched out and pursued those who broke the law;

he burned those who troubled his people.

Once again a strong army of godless men went up with him to help him, to take vengeance on the Israelites.

When he approached the ascent of Beth-horon, Judas went out to meet him with a small company. But when they saw the army coming to meet them, they said to Judas, ‘How can we, few as we are, fight against so great and so strong a multitude? And we are faint, for we have eaten nothing today.’ Judas replied, ‘It is easy for many to be hemmed in by few, for in the sight of Heaven there is no difference between saving by many or by few. It is not on the size of the army that victory in battle depends, but strength comes from Heaven. They come against us in great insolence and lawlessness to destroy us and our wives and our children, and to despoil us; but we fight for our lives and our laws. He himself will crush them before us; as for you, do not be afraid of them.’

Meditation: Rebecca Northington

When Judas fought for the survival of the Jewish people, their culture and religious practices, in the 2nd century BC, he fought to reclaim Israel, and to protect the people of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Alexander the Great and his legacy of Hellenistic culture, religion, and politics threatened to not only undermine Jewish tradition but to eradicate it altogether. Judas led the Maccabees in revolt, with heaven on their side as we see in the passage above. Although they were smaller in numbers their guerilla warfare was successful and they were able to recover Jerusalem, reestablish the Temple and the proper Jewish practices. The festival of lights, Hanukkah, comes from this rededication of the Temple and the miracle of the oil that should have lasted one day, but lasted eight.

It is fascinating to me that on the same day that we read from First Maccabees in the lectionary, we also read about Edmund of East Anglia, who was a martyr for the Christian faith as Danes pillaged the countryside of East Anglia(England), in November of the year 870 AD. His faith did not carry him through the battles as it did for Judas; was God not on his side? Or like Christ, did Edmund die as a result of man’s total sinfulness?

Last week Peter posed a number of questions in his meditation that ultimately challenged our sense of relationship with God and the psalmists. Whose God is God? The Jewish people claim God, the Muslim people claim God, we as Christians believe we are in relationship with God. But who is God with-can God be God to all people as Christ and Paul and many of the Church mothers and fathers believed? Did Judas succeed because God was with him and the Maccabees? Did Edmund fail to survive because God had abandoned him? I do not think so.

When I consider the Old Testament and the New Testament I am always struck by the difference in tone and content. God is still revealing Godself to us in both, but the promises have shifted, as though we are young children 5 and 6 thousand years ago and the parenting is more demonstrative and punitive. As we get older, generationally, thousands of years older, the tone shifts, and the consequences to our choices are much subtler and more universally felt. When we reject people, mistreat them, ignore them– we reject, mistreat and ignore God, to the extent that God must die on the cross to show us the impact of our human failings.

The Old Testament is full of bloody, mass killing violence, a la Game of Thrones. The love and the hope is there, but the scale of human suffering is enormous and dramatic. The New Testament exposes pain and suffering; but the focus, to my understanding, has shifted to saving lives rather than wiping out entire cities.

I do not believe I can fully comprehend God’s intent, but there is no question that the violence of the Old Testament is abandoned in the New Testament, and I think we must all ask ourselves why. What is God trying to tell us about Godself, and how are we called to respond? Did the violence of the Old Testament achieve justice, or does the reordering of the New Testament and the New Covenant of Jesus, ask all of humanity to operate differently: to lay down our weapons and violent human instincts and claim the way of Jesus as our protector, just as Edmund did.

The Lord’s Prayer:

Our Father, who art in heaven,

hallowed be thy Name,

thy kingdom come,

thy will be done,

on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our trespasses,

as we forgive those

who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from evil.