BCP Daily Office Lectionary for Nov. 23, 2004
Source: http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/index.htm
Morning Psalm(s): [120], 121, 122, 123 [Presbyterian: 12:1-8]
Evening Psalm(s): 124, 125, 126, [127] [Presbyterian: 36:1-12]
Old Testament: Zechariah 11:4-17
Epistle: 1 Corinthians 3:10-23
Gospel Luke 18:31-43
Presbyterian Readings for the current day:
http://www.pcusa.org/cgi-bin/lectiond.cgi
The reading from Zechariah pictures two kinds of shepherds. Israel’s shepherds (i.e. leaders, rulers) are corrupt. There are two kinds of bad shepherds. “Those who buy them kill them and go unpunished; and those who sell them say, ‘Blessed be the LORD, for I have become rich’; and their own shepherds have no pity on them” (Zech. 11:5). “Those who buy and sell are the Ptolemaic overlords [i.e. Hellenistic rulers of Egypt who controlled Judah in the third century B.C.]; their own shepherds are native appointees” ( R. Lansing Hicks and Walter Brueggemann, NOAB). That would be rather late, but Hicks and Brueggemann cite the reference to Greece in Zechariah 9:13. Earlier, Ezekiel had denounced the shepherds of Israel for failure in leadership (Ezek. 34). In any case, here God will replace the bad “shepherds”; he directs the prophet to “Be a shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter” (Zech. 11:4). The prophet says, “I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter. I took two staffs; one I named Favor, the other I named Unity, and I tended the sheep” (v. 7). But conflict with “the three shepherds” (v. 8) leads the prophet-shepherd to break the staff Favor “annulling the covenant” (v. 10). Apparently, the people reject the prophet’s leadership. He takes his “wages,” “thirty shekels of silver” and throws them “into the treasury in the house of the LORD” (vv. 12-13). Thursday’s reading will return to the subject of the “shepherd.”
Paul, after discussing the Corinthian tendency to form cliques or parties attached to one apostle/missionary or the other–“What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe . . .” (1 Cor. 3:5), compares the process to a garden or plants. Each contributed, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth” (v. 6). But his metaphor changes as the chapter progresses. The church at Corinth, first described as a planting of God, is then described as a building with different contributions. “I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it” (v. 10). He draws conclusions about judgment passed on the builders’ work (vv. 13-16), and then compares the church–the local Christian community in Corinth– to the temple. “Do you not know that you [plural] are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” (v. 16). The Spirit works in the church through his gifts (chap. 12). The temple metaphor is used in chapter 6 of one’s individual body. Don’t involve your individual bodies in sexual sin because “your [plural] body [singular] is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you” (6:19).
Luke presents the third of three Passion Predictions by Jesus. “But they understood nothing about all these things; in fact, what he said was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said” (Lk. 18:34). Perhaps the healing of the blind man at Jericho (vv. 35-43) provided some enlightenment, but they would fully understand only after the crucifixion and resurrection. The blind man understood something: “Son of David, have mercy on me!” (v. 9).
Ronald D. Worden, Ph.D.