Daily Devotions with the Dean

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 66; Isaiah 11:1o–16; Revelation 20:11–21:8; Luke 1:5–25 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 13 (“A Song of Praise,” BCP, p. 90); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93)

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Isaiah: a signal for the nations. Isaiah is an extraordinary seer of God’s nuanced future for his people and for the world. In today’s vision, Isaiah foresees an heir to David’s throne (the “root of Jesse” from the first half of Isaiah 11) reigning from Jerusalem, and restoring peace between the northern kingdom (Israel or Ephraim) and the southern kingdom (Judah). Yahweh will “raise a standard” and gather children of Abraham and Sarah from all directions of their dispersion: from east (Elam in Iran, Shinar in Babylon, Hamath in Syria) and south (Pathros in Egypt, Ethiopia) and west (“the [Mediterranean] coastlands”). And God’s army will once again renew his campaign against the surrounding godless nations (Philistia, Edom, Moab, Ammon). 

The New Testament interprets these prophecies’ fulfillment, in part, at Jesus Christ’s First Coming and in the proclamation of the good news of God’s victory over sin and death in the cross and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus, a descendant of the royal line of David, ministers in Galilee and Samaria (the old northern kingdom) and in Jerusalem and its environs (the old southern kingdom). From all around the Mediterranean basin, Jews come to Jerusalem at Pentecost. Here thousands believe in Jesus, are baptized, and receive the Holy Spirit. Then, as the gospel goes out from Jerusalem, it goes first to Samaria—symbolically reuniting Israel and Judah under the banner of Christ. From there, the gospel goes to the nations, claiming hearts for the service of King Jesus. 

Revelation: “I make all things new.” The finality of Isaiah’s promise awaits, of course, Christ’s Second Coming. And that is what John depicts in today’s reading in Revelation. The byline for today’s passage in Revelation comes from the Returning Jesus: “See, I am making all things new” (Revelation 21:5):

• A new heaven and new earth (Revelation 21:1)

• The new Jerusalem (Revelation 21:2)

• The earthly bride (the church) adorned for her husband (Jesus)—newly constituted communion between God and us (Revelation 21:2–3)

• Each human life shown to have eternal significance (Revelation 20:11–15)

• Joy returns—no more tears (Revelation 21:4)

• Life returns—no more death (Revelation 21:4)

• Flourishing prevails—all the things marking the diminishment of human worth and dignity are banished from God’s new creation (Revelation 21:6–8)

Luke: “your prayer has been heard.” The drama of the fulfilling of the Isaianic vision begins, as far as Luke is concerned, with a priest named Zechariah performing his duties in the temple, attending to the incense (a symbol of prayer). The angel Gabriel announces to him that he and his wife Elizabeth, though they are “both getting on in years,” will have a child in answer to their prayers. And not just any child. Their son will minister in the “spirit and power of Elijah” to prepare God’s people for a most amazing visitation from the Lord. Most people probably find the most memorable feature of Luke’s account to be Zechariah’s laugh of incredulity, and his consignment to muteness until time to name the child (as commanded) John. 

Seems to me, the three things to be remembered from this story are: 

• God has a sovereign will and plan to bring redemption to the human race, but he seems to take pleasure in effecting it in response to his people’s prayers.

• Zechariah is not the first, nor will he be the last, person in the Bible who does not respond to God’s promises with a perfect faith—think of Sarah’s laugh when God promises her a son at ninety-something years; and think of Peter’s shaky faith or Thomas’s understandable doubt. Thankfully, God’s grace has a way of overriding our vacillation. When “the spirit indeed is willing but the flesh is weak” (Matthew 26:41), Christ’s prayers for us prevail.

• In Christian art, the Gospel of Luke, by the way, is represented by the “bull” of Ezekiel 1:10 and Revelation 4:7, because Luke begins his narrative in the temple, the place of sacrifice. Christ comes among us humbly, to offer himself as a sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. In imitation of him, we give ourselves—even when God has to override our pride and pretense, our sloth and indifference—in sacrificial service. Even when that sacrificial service amounts, as it did with Zechariah, to something as seemingly insignificant as being where we are supposed be … and paying attention. 

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+

Noonday Prayer

Daily Devotions with the Dean

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 61; Psalm 62; Isaiah 11:1–9; Revelation 20:1–10; John 5:30–47

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 9 (“The First Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 12:2–6, BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94)

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Isaiah’s vision of the ministry of Messiah. In today’s passage, Isaiah opens the curtain for a moment to give the people of his generation an extraordinary peek into the work of the Messiah who was to come. When Jesus came to the earth, he took up precisely the mantle Isaiah describes here. 

• Jesus is of David’s royal lineage: “from the stump of Jesse” (Isaiah 11:1; Luke 1:32; Acts 13:22–23, “of [David’s] posterity God has brought to Israel a Savior, Jesus, as he promised”). 

• Jesus ministered in the power and under the illumination of the Holy Spirit: “The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him…” (Isaiah 11:2; Matthew 3:16; John 1:32, “the Spirit descended from heaven … and rested on him”).  

• He clothed himself with justice, righteousness, equity, and truthfulness, not self-promotion, ego, favoritism, and prevarication: “Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist….” (Isaiah 11:3; John 5:30; 8:16, “Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is valid”).

• The Kingdom-gospel that he proclaims brings conviction of sin; it exposes sham religiosity and deathly false dealing: “with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked” (Isaiah 11:4b; Romans 1:17–18; John 16:7–9, [the Spirit] “will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment”). 

• His good news turns enemies into friends; he unites republican and democrat, pacifist and militant, extrovert and introvert, Red Sox fan and Yankees fan, dog lover and cat lover “The wolf shall live with the lamb…” (Isaiah 11:6–8; Ephesians 2:14, “For he is our peace…”). 

• The life-giving gospel that emanates from Jerusalem’s holy mountain will go to the ends of the earth: “for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the earth” (Isaiah 11:9; Acts 1:8; Matthew 28:18–20, “make disciples of all the nations”). 

Revelation and the “now” and the “not yet.” In the Book of Revelation, John is given a breathtaking vision of the way that Jesus’s messianic ministry plays out both in the “now” and in the “not yet”—that is, how it begins in his First Coming and culminates in his Second Coming.

Revelation 20 is one of the trickiest passages in all of Scripture, and there are several schools of thought about its overall thrust. In the course of a devotional writing, I ask your indulgence to allow me to offer insights from where I land in the landscape of interpretations. To cut to the chase, I believe that in Revelation 20:1–3, John is not looking into the distant future. Instead, I believe he is looking back at what transpired during Jesus’s earthly ministry, that is, during his First Coming. He “bound” Satan through his exorcisms, his healings, and his allowing himself to be lifted up on and nailed to the cross (Revelation 20:2; Matthew 12:29; Mark 3:27; Luke 13:16; John 12:31–32; Colossians 2:14–15). Most significantly, the work that Jesus began in his exorcisms and that culminated on the cross means that Satan is no longer able to “deceive the nations,” so that the saving good news of our liberation from sin and death can be spread and joyfully embraced around the world (Revelation 20:3; Acts 26:18; Hebrews 2:14–15). 

What began in Jesus’s First Coming is a long period of time (of which 1,000 years is symbolic) in which our now Ascended Jesus reigns. Believers have experienced the “first resurrection,” that is, their new birth in Christ (John 3:3’s “You must be born again”; alternatively, this language of “first resurrection” may refer ironically to the deaths of martyrs, as representatives of all believers). As a “kingdom of priests” (Revelation 1:6; 20:6) believers (and especially the martyrs) share in Christ’s reign: they see Christ’s victorious gospel spread from pole to pole and all around the globe. 

Isaiah foresaw all of this, if only from a distance. But what he also saw was a complete elimination of all that is evil—something that awaits the Second Coming. We know that the peaceability that Isaiah described between enemies and rivals has never yet been completely realized. Revelation 20 spells out the exact nature of Satan’s circumscription during this age: he cannot prevent the gospel’s advance among the nations. As Jesus tells Paul when he commissions him to take the good news to the Gentiles: “...to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me” (Acts 26:18). At the end of the (symbolic) 1,000 years of gospel-expansion, Satan will be released for one (in the terms of biblical theologian Herman Ridderbos) “final explosion of evil.” And then the Lord will return—his Second Coming. At that time, he will consign the Devil and his cohorts to their eternal lot, eliminating all evil from the human and cosmic experience (Revelation 20:7–10). 

John and belief. Meanwhile, the Lord Jesus himself calls for one main thing: belief. Not an unteachable belief in the details of the final scenario (we’re all going to be in for surprises in that regard, I’m sure). No, belief that he is Lord. Belief in him. Belief that, as he says in today’s gospel reading: “The works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me” (John 5:36). Belief that the Father has sent him for you and me—and for many who as yet do not know him. Belief that life right now may be full of the sense of newness in him and gratitude for a share in his reign. Belief that when he comes again, we will be able to welcome him with joy and anticipation at the eternal fellowship that awaits. 

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+

Lessons & Carols

Sunday Worship - Advent IV

Noonday Prayer

Daily Devotions with the Dean

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 40; Psalm 54; Isaiah 10:5–19 (and 10:20–27, from Saturday’s readings); 2 Peter 2:17–22 (and Jude 17–25, from Saturday’s readings); Matthew 11:2–15. 

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 10 (“The Second Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 55:6–11; BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93)

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Biblical faith is irrepressibly hopeful. In the middle of the night, it always prepares for day. Advent insists that darkness, disease, and death will not prevail, and that Christmas is just around the corner. And it’s not just that we can be confident that vaccines will suppress viruses, or that (at least in our system of government) checks and balances will eventually prevail over the feverish madness of authoritarians or libertines. No, really, Advent’s hope and Christmas’s promise is that a day will come when there will be no diseases to be protected from, nor bad rulers to be reined in. One day, death will be no more, and one righteous King will rule. 

Isaiah catches several glimpses of that hope over the course of his prophesying. In his tenth chapter (the readings for today and tomorrow), Isaiah raises his voice against the Assyrians who attack the northern kingdom of Israel, savaging its people and ravaging the countryside. Assyria has been Yahweh’s disciplining instrument against his covenant-violating people in Israel: “Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger—the club in their hands is my fury!” (Isaiah 10:5). But in its overweening pride, Assyria thinks it is doing its own bidding, and presumes to come against the southern kingdom of Judah as well. Yahweh will have none of it: “When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the arrogant boasting of the king of Assyria and his haughty pride” (10:12). 

Isaiah invokes the language of the centuries-past exodus from Egypt and conquest of the Land of Promise. Yahweh will act once again on his people’s behalf: “O my people, who live in Zion, do not be afraid of the Assyrians when they beat you with a rod and lift up their staff against you as the Egyptians did. For in a very little while my indignation will come to an end, and my anger will be directed to their destruction. The Lord of hosts will wield a whip against them, as when he struck Midian at the rock of Oreb; his staff will be over the sea, and he will lift it as he did in Egypt. On that day his burden will be removed from your shoulder, and his yoke will be destroyed from your neck” (Isaiah 10:24–27). Further on, Isaiah promises a forerunner who will prepare the way for that new exodus and conquest: “A voice is calling out: In the wilderness prepare the way for the Lord” (Isaiah 40:3).

That forerunner is John the Baptist. When the imprisoned John the Baptist sought assurance about whether Jesus was the Messiah and inaugurator of the new exodus and conquest that God had been promising, Jesus answered John’s question with a resounding “Yes!” He instructed the Baptist’s messengers: “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepersare cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (Matthew 11:4–5). Those acts, prophesied by Isaiah 700 years earlier, are signs of the “breaking in” of God’s great deliverance: “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped…” (Isaiah 32:5).

The most intriguing verse in today’s passage in Matthew is the twelfth verse, with its note of conquest. I’m pretty sure the translation of the Evangelical Heritage Version gets verse 12 right: “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been advancing forcefully (biazetai) and forceful people (biastai) are seizing it” (and see also the marginal note in the NRSV). The Greek verb biazetai is in the middle/passive voice, and therefore could be translated either with an active sense (“advancing forcefully”) or a passive sense (“suffering violence”). And the noun biastai denotes “forceful people,” but it could indicate literal force (“violent people”) or metaphorical force (“assertive people”). 

Most translators and commentators take the latter option for both words, thinking that in this verse Jesus is saying that ever since John began his ministry, the kingdom has faced resistance. While that is true enough, I don’t think it is what Jesus means here. In the previous chapter, Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword” (Matthew 10:34). And in Matthew 16, Jesus will insist that the gates of hell will not stand against the church that he himself will build (Matthew 16:18). Jesus’s ministry as a whole is one of carrying out God’s warfare against the evils of demon possession, of sickness and death, and of people’s subjugation to sin’s condemnation. In Jesus’s ministry, God’s kingdom is forcefully asserting itself against the kingdom of darkness. And with Matthew 11:12’s “forceful people are seizing it,” Jesus commends an assertive faith, a faith that resists the negativity of sin, death, and demonic influence. With his challenge, “Let anyone with ears listen!”, Jesus urges a faith that boldly takes hold of God’s kingdom promises. 

2 Peter and Jude on keeping hope alive. Before taking on the false teachers’ bogus teaching to the effect that the Lord is not returning (in 2 Peter 3), Peter fires one last salvo against their lethal combination of pretended profundity and ethical laxity: “They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption” (2 Peter 2:19). There’s a world of depth in this simple thought. It is worth long and slow pondering. Certain things that seem to offer liberation actually wind up subjecting us to the most desperate and debilitating of life patterns. 

For help in keeping ourselves properly oriented to a vibrant hope during Advent, we give Peter’s spiritual twin Jude the last word (from tomorrow’s reading): “But you, beloved, build yourselves up on your most holy faith; pray in the Holy Spirit; keep yourselves in the love of God; look forward to the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life” (Jude 20–21). 

May your readings, your worship, and your meditation take you further into the glory and richness of our “most holy faith.” May the Holy Spirit deepen and enliven your prayers, especially that we may see Kingdom-come. May the love of God hold you tight. May the mercy of King Jesus await you at his return. 

Be blessed this day.

Reggie Kidd+

Noonday Prayer

Daily Devotions with the Dean

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 50; Isaiah 9:18–10:4; 2 Peter 2:10b–16; Matthew 3:1–12

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 8 (“The Song of Moses,” Exodus 15, BCP, p. 85); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3–4, BCP, p. 94)

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God hates the mess that sin makes of our lives. During Advent we inventory the ways that Scripture indicts sin. If flashes of self-recognition come, they give us the chance to come clean about the disarray. They invite us to step deeper into the grace of the Incarnate Lord and his determination to mend what is broken, heal what is sick, straighten what is twisted, and clean what is polluted. 

Common themes unite Isaiah, Peter, and John the Baptist today: greed, oppression of the poor, vacuous spirituality, adulterous hearts. Providentially, this morning’s psalm—Psalm 50—provides helpful hooks for the naming of our sins, and for putting ourselves on the path to their purging. 

“… and toss my words behind your back…” — Psalm 50:17. This Psalm of Asaph paints a graphic picture of what it is to disregard what God says. I think of receiving a letter with news I don’t care to hear, reading it, then crumpling it up and tossing it over my shoulder. To ignore his Word is to say “Not so much!” to what God says is important. In the spirit of the psalmist, Isaiah rails against “iniquitous decrees” and “oppressive statutes.” He means unrighteous laws that allow rich and powerful people “to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their right, that widows may be your spoil, and that you may make the orphans your prey!” (Isaiah 10:2). Israel’s story is replete with reminders like this one: “You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt. You shall not abuse any widow or orphan” (Exodus 22:21–22). Those are not words to toss lightly aside. 

“… and you thought that I am like you.” — Psalm 50:21. The psalmist knows how easy it is for us imagine God to be merely a projection of ourselves. We can delude ourselves into thinking he is there to affirm our preferences, endorse our values, and carry out our plans. Like the psalmist, John the Baptist will have none of it. He is preparing people for the coming of the great Day of the Lord. He confronts those who think that on that day “the Big Guy” will simply baptize the status quo, and lock in the privileged position of those at the top of the social pyramid.  The Scribes and the Pharisees are supposed to be stewards of the vision of God’s kingdom. Instead, they have recast God in the image of themselves. They have refashioned his kingdom and made it reflect their own self-worth. Bad idea. 

“… you who forget God.” — Psalm 50:23. Deep down, we know that this sort of thinking is bogus. We know God is not like us! So we simply block out the very thought of him. Alas, we give ourselves a “God-amnesia.”  Every one of us knows exactly what it’s like to contemplate doing something against conscience, but then shouting conscience down because we want to do what we want to do. It’s as though a fog of forgetfulness rolls in on us, and we welcome it. Peter understands this truth as well as the psalmist does. That’s why he warns against filling our eyes with adultery, becoming insatiable for sin, yielding our unsteady souls to sin’s enticements, training our hearts in greed—in a word, leaving the straight road and going astray (2 Peter 2:14–15). Peter recalls the example of Balaam whose greed allowed him to “forget” God’s call on his life, until the voice of a donkey snapped him back to reality. 

“Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving…” — Psalm 50:14,24. The psalmist offers an antidote to the folly of sin, whether of disregard for God’s Word, making God over into our likeness, or forgetting about God altogether. That antidote is the offering of thanks. Clearly, the psalmist doesn’t mean simply getting the liturgy and the prayer formulas right: “I do not accuse you because of your sacrifices … all the beasts of the forest are mine … If I were hungry, I would not tell you …” (Psalm 50:8–12). What the psalmist says that God is after is a heart full of gratitude. Accordingly, I pray: 

Lord, I thank you the words of your Scriptures that shout to me the good news that you have rescued me from sin and death. You Word says that though I was lost, you found me. Your Word says that though I was nothing, you so valued me that you sent your eternal and only Son to make me your child and heir. I am thankful, therefore, for the opportunity to reflect your character and your love to the lost and the least who cross my path this day. Amen. 

Lord, I thank you that you are not like me, but are a great God, king of the universe. I gratefully take my small place in your large design. I give myself anew to furthering your kingdom, not mine. Amen. 

Lord, in this Advent season especially, I thank you that though I am prone to forget you, you did not forget me. You came in grace and mercy so that my story would not end in dissipation through the indulgence of the sins of the flesh or of a heart alienated from you. As the thief on the cross, I ask, “Remember me” … as I remember you. Amen. 

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+

Midday Eucharist

Daily Devotions with the Dean

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 119:49–72; Isaiah 9:8–17; 2 Peter 2:1–10a; Mark 1:1–8

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 11 (“The Third Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 60:1–3,11a,14c,18–19, BCP, p. 87); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 16 (“The Song of Zechariah,” Luke 1:68–79, BCP, p. 92) 

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2 Peter: why we still need Advent. The reason that Peter feels compelled to write this second letter to the churches in Asia Minor is that he has learned that some teachers have emerged among them who challenge the idea of the Lord’s return: “…saying, ‘Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since our ancestors died, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation!’” (2 Peter 3:4). 

In the third chapter of this epistle, Peter refutes the content of their teaching (the Daily Office covered that chapter over the course of the first two Sundays of this Advent—so we did not take them up in our Daily Devotions with the Dean). Basically, Peter’s response is to assert that God doesn’t reckon time the way we do, and then to reiterate Jesus’s teaching: “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed” (2 Peter 3:10). What’s more, he concludes, we need to live our lives in full, sober, and eager anticipation of that day, “leading lives of holiness and godliness” (2 Peter 3:11) 

It is important to understand this dynamic in order to appreciate what Peter is getting at in this second chapter of his letter. As he faces martyrdom, what motivates him to write is not just that he wants to make sure his own voice is extended into the next generation. He knows what will happen—in fact, he fears it is already happening—to a church that no longer leans into the hope of Christ’s return. 

… in their greed they will exploit you … those who indulge their flesh in depraved lust and who despise authority — 2 Peter 2:3,10a. Peter, you may recall, has to assert that his teaching is not the fabricating of myths, but the recounting of the facts of Jesus’s life and ministry, including the Transfiguration that revealed the glory that awaits us. The false teachers are mocking that very hope as a fantasy: “Where is the promise of his coming?” In doing so, they are presuming to countermand the authority of Jesus himself (not to mention his apostles). 

Peter warns against something that many of us have experienced: a church that decides it can treat biblical teaching as just so much mythology (miracles, a virgin birth, a literal resurrection from the dead, and the hope of Christ’s return). If it is all mythology, it can be demythologized and then remythologized in terms that are more palatable to our predetermined values and worldview. When that happens, the faith just becomes a projection of our own fantasies and desires. 

No matter how idealistic the veneer that is laid over the language of faith (such as “faith” = “being true to yourself”; or “resurrection” is something that happens in our hearts; or that the “second coming” is something we make happen as we transform society into the “Kingdom of God”), Peter knows that what will take over are base desires: greed, licentiousness, depraved lust. For, as Ashley Null so nicely sums the heart of Thomas Cromwell’s thinking, and thus the genius of true Anglicanism: “What the heart wants, the will chooses, and the mind justifies.” 

Stay true, says Peter, to the biblical story line—especially the parts that step on our toes, and perhaps even more especially the part that says we still need the Return of the King. That story, and no other, keeps our hearts from re-spinning God’s truth into a projection of our own dissolute desires. Apart from the living and ascended and returning Christ’s work in us, our desires are depraved. With the living and ascended and returning Christ living within us, however, our desires participate in that great makeover that Peter has already described: “participation in the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4). That’s what’s at stake in resisting the false prophets who say that this is all there is. Advent is our “No!” to that lie!

Be blessed this day, 

Reggie Kidd+