The revised common lectionary texts for this Sunday (June 11) are Genesis 1:1-2:3, (The RCL goes to 4a, but I think that is not an appropriate stopping point as it is the beginning of the second creation story) and Psalm 8. It also includes 2 Corinthians 13:5-14. The latter because this is Trinity Sunday. It is my opinion that preaching on the Trinity is an academic exercise of questionable value because no matter how hard scholars try to explain or define the Trinity, it ends up putting people to sleep because we are trying to explain something that resists explanation and turns into a matter of dogma. God is (IAM) . Jesus happened. Pentecost (Holy Spirit) came upon us. God is (IAM). Just accept it on belief.
The important readings for Sunday are the Genesis and Psalm selections for good reason.
If you took anything from my sermon last week it ought to be that Pentecost, the incarnation of the Holy Spirit in the Church, was the culmination of a cosmic earthquake (the incarnation of God in humanity) that completely (permanently) changed nature of the world. It changed God's relationship with humanity at its very core of creation, because judgment was replaced with grace. (A friend of mine reading the story of Abraham and Isaac on the mountain remarked he felt God was testing us always even now. I suggested Pentecost means, if anything, that is not the case because judgment died with the gift of grace. Grace that erases judgment is accessible to everyone, you just have to accept it.) Hence the title of my next sermon: "We aren't in Kansas anymore!" Though some of my dear African-American friends may object to a reference to the darkest time in this country's history, for me lyrics from the song by The Band, The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down come to mind..."they should have never taken the best," but by the love of God, God did it for the very least of us.
If you read on-line comments on these texts, for example in Textweek, a very good resource, you will find modern interpreters claiming that Psalm 8 is about the relationship of humanity to all of God's creation often diverging into the positive values of ecology and environmental concerns.
Those are all noble and respected efforts but they diminish both the Psalm, God and us because Psalm 8 is another creation story that touches the nature of sin, love and resentment between Humanity and God, and God's ceaseless hesed that leads eventually to complete redemption of humanity by God through Jesus. It is not about the relationship of humans to rest of creation but of humanity to God.
Those are all noble and respected efforts but they diminish both the Psalm, God and us because Psalm 8 is another creation story that touches the nature of sin, love and resentment between Humanity and God, and God's ceaseless hesed that leads eventually to complete redemption of humanity by God through Jesus. It is not about the relationship of humans to rest of creation but of humanity to God.
You will have to await my sermon to hear the rest, but here is Psalm 8 (NRSV) and my more modern paraphrase to whet your interest:
O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
Out of the mouths of babes and infants
you have founded a bulwark because of your foes,
to silence the enemy and the avenger.
When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established;
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?
Yet you have made them a little lower than God,
and crowned them with glory and honor.
You have given them dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under their feet,
all sheep and oxen,
and also the beasts of the field,
the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.
O Lord, our Sovereign,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Here is my take:
All Good Gifts Are The Glory of The Lord
Copyright H. Paris 10/15/05
God of Heaven, you grace the earth.
The cry of the baby is praise of your
work.
Our being is your unfettered glory,
your defender against tyranny.
We
pale in the expanse of an unmeasurable heaven,
Illumined
by stars and moons until time’s end.
How comes such benevolence to us,
the Grace of a parent’s tenderness?
How have we justified the Son of
Man,
only little less than God made by simple command,
crowned in the cloak of purple
ruling birds, fish, animals, and flora fertile?
Even though graced with such power,
we are motes blown upon the wind
humbled by your majesty forever.
Praise
the Glory of The Lord, Our Defender!
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