This week we pick up threads that were started in the last few weeks. This is one of the reasons I love the lectionary: we get to continue the story.

Gospel: Matthew 4:12-23

Last week, in the Gospel of John, we met the future disciples Andrew and John (the author of the Gospels), and Simon got a new name. We are back to Matthew this week. It’s going to feel like a different story; hang with me.

Our last reading in Matthew was Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist. Today we find Jesus in Capernaum calling his first disciples. The verses in between are Jesus’ forty days in the desert. We will go back and read that in a few weeks, during Lent. 

Jesus finds out the John was arrested and so He decides to go to Capernaum. This is a town on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee, and away from his home in Nazareth. The passage quoted is a portion of our Old Testament reading today, so we’ll get to that in a minute. Jesus also picks up John’s message: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!”

The next part of the passage, v. 18-23, can seem like they’ve muddled the timeline. But after reading this and walking slowly with it, it’s evident that this meeting isn’t the FIRST meeting between Andrew, Peter and Jesus. John’s account last week was their first meeting. Now Jesus has come upon them as they work. He also finds James and John hard at work with their dad. He invites them to come along, and they do immediately. (Sorry, Zebedee!)

It occurred to me on this reading that Nazareth is very dry, with no lakes and few rivers. Capernaum was right on the water, a very different environment. Think of how funny Jesus’ statement that He would teach James and John, Andrew and Peter to fish!

And then Jesus begins his ministry: teaching, of course, but also healing. Every disease and every affliction. Can you imagine? This is a rural region, around 200 villages with about 300,000 people. No big cities. Word traveled all around the area that miraculous things were happening!

Old Testament: Isaiah 9:1-4

We read the first two verses here when we read our Gospel reading today. This passage in Isaiah comes immediately after some harsh discussion of punishment—well-deserved punishment!— for following after other gods, consulting mediums, and generally not following the One True God. 

And this passage opens with one of my favorite beginnings, “But.” These things WERE true, but they won’t always be. Guess what? You in the North, where the bad things always happened first, YOU will be the ones to see the oppressor’s rod start to break. YOU will be the first ones to see the great light. YOU will see the end of oppression first.

How exciting is that? The land that the invaders always conquered first. The far reaches of the kingdom—the land of Zebulun and Naphtali. The land of GALILEE. Where Jesus starts His ministry.

Psalm 27:1, 4-9

This is a Psalm by David, full of confidence that even in times of trouble the Lord will be save His people.

One verse in particular is special to me, v. 4: “One think have I asked of the Lord…to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His temple.”

Last year I got a little consumed by the idea of beauty or, more specifically, how little beauty we see around us. I’m not talking about landscapes and flowers but about art, sculpture, literature and poetry. Things that should be created beautiful but, so often, just aren’t. I started pursuing lovely poetry, beautiful language and imagery. Ideas that made me felt elevated, not desolate. Often these were very old poems! Literature that took a moment to wrestle with but that were little jewels, worth the effort. I haven’t done that in a while; maybe I should.

Today I just want to leave you with a question: when was the last time you sat with beauty? Gazed upon beauty that reflected God? Sat in a space that was elevating, or listened to music that made you think of heaven? Again, I’m talking about man-made places and things, not nature.

I fear that we’ve become so accustomed to ugliness or her poor sister, minimalism, that we see beauty as extravagant or wasteful or, tragically, not worth the effort. It’s the reason I try to include a beautiful church building or detail with all of these posts.

Gaze upon the beauty of the Lord.

New Testament: 1 Corinthians 1:10-18

Back to 1 Corinithians, we pick up where we left off last week. Immediately after Paul’s lovely greeting and thanksgiving, he gets down to business: STOP FIGHTING, Y’ALL.

This is a good week to look at the Church in Corinth. The exact timeline isn’t certain, but Paul was the first to bring the Gospel to Corinth, accompanied by his friends and fellow tentmakers, Pricilla and Aquilla. They left, but the community was then visited by Peter and his wife, and by Apollos, who was a great orator. Apollos was likely pretty popular because he was a good speaker in a culture that absolutely loved great rhetoric and argument. This was also likely a very boisterous church because Corinth herself was boisterous, a busy crossroads of trade and culture. This congregation probably touched a lot of people in the area.

With all those influences, people naturally would gravitate towards teachers and methods they found most appealing. And that set up factions. And THAT set up fighting.

So Paul writes: It’s not baptism—it’s the Gospel that matters.

It’s not the preaching—it’s the Gospel.

It’s not the rhetoric, the soaring words, the artful arguments. 

It’s just Jesus. Silly if you don’t believe. Everything if you do.

Prayer

Father, today we want to sit with Your beauty. Beauty that seems trifling to the world, unimportant. But, because of Jesus, it’s beauty that surpasses anything we could aspire to. Unite us in love for You, even as we come to You by different paths. The path of intellectual reasoning, the path of fierce love, and the path of quiet devotion can all lead to You. Help us to love each other better as we are One Church. In Jesus’ name, amen.