JUDGES 4:1-7, PSALM 123, 
1 THESSALONIANS 5:1-5; 11, AND MATTHEW 25:14-30

Reflection for November 13, 2011

Rev. Dr. David Breeden, Minister
Minnesota Valley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship

Focusing Scriptures: 

Judges 4:1-7

The Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, after Ehud died. 2So the Lord  sold them into the hand of King Jabin of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor; the commander of his army was Sisera, who lived in Harosheth-ha-goiim. 3Then the Israelites cried out to the Lord  for help; for he had nine hundred chariots of iron, and had oppressed the Israelites cruelly twenty years. 

4At that time Deborah, a prophetess, wife of Lappidoth, was judging Israel.  5She used to sit under the palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim; and the Israelites came up to her for judgment. 6She sent and summoned Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali, and said to him, “The   Lord, the God of Israel, commands you, ‘Go, take position at Mount Tabor, bringing ten thousand from the tribe of Naphtali and the tribe of Zebulun. 7I will draw out Sisera, the general of Jabin’s army, to meet you by the Wadi Kishon with his chariots and his troops; and I will give him into your hand.’”

Psalm 123

1To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens! 

2As the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a maid to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the   Lord  our God, until he has mercy upon us. 

3Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us, for we have had more than enough of contempt. 

4Our soul has had more than its fill of the scorn of those who are at ease, of the contempt of the proud. 

1 Thessalonians 5:1-5; 11

Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers and sisters, you do not need to have anything written to you. 2For you yourselves know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.   3When they say, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them, as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and there will be no escape! 4But you, beloved, are not in darkness, for that day to surprise you like a thief; 5for you are all children of light and children of the day; we are not of the night or of darkness. 

11Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed you are doing. 

Matthew 25:14-30

“For it is as if a man, going on a journey, summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them; 15to one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. 16The one who had received the five talents went off at once and traded with them, and made five more talents. 17 In the same way, the one who had the two talents made two more talents.  18But the one who had received the one talent went off and dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money. 19After a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them. 20Then the one who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five more talents, saying, ‘Master, you handed over to me five talents; see, I have made five more talents.’ 21His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’   22And the one with the two talents also came forward, saying, ‘Master, you handed over to me two talents; see, I have made two more talents.’ 23His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’ 24Then the one who had received the one talent also came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed;   25so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.’   26But his master replied, ‘You wicked and lazy slave! You knew, did you, that I reap where I did not sow, and gather where I did not scatter? 27Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have received what was my own with interest.  28So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents.   

29For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.   30As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 

Meditation:

Yes, “the times and seasons.” Reading scripture gives us, simultaneously, a sense of perspective and recurrence: Deborah, the only female judge of Israel, getting down to business in about 1200 BCE; the Psalmist two or three centuries later; Jesus and Paul, the disciple Jesus never met, in the first century CE. Compared with Deborah’s problem of how to deal with an oppressor with nine hundred iron chariots, a flat tire doesn’t seem quite so large, yet those chariots of iron keep rolling in. 

How contemporary rings the words of the Psalmist—“ we have had more than enough of contempt”—as the shouts from motorists passing by at our local Occupy site still ring in my ears: “Losers! Get a job!” Yes, “our soul has had more than its fill of the scorn of those who are at ease, of the contempt of the proud.” 

How apropos to our time and season sounds the parable that Jesus tells in Matthew 25. No—this parable isn’t about how good it is to double your money. This chapter of Matthew is building toward Jesus’ vision of separating the sheep from the goats according to the metric not of how much return on monetary investment we get, but on how dedicated we are to serving “the least of these.” We hear from car windows and from the television news, 

‘You wicked and lazy slave! You knew, did you, that I reap where I did not sow, and gather where I did not scatter?   Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have received what was my own with interest.   So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents.   

Yes, those to whom much is given have every reason—and every opportunity—to double the master’s money and hear the good news: “I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.”   

Ah, but the rewards of speaking truth to power: 

I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed;   so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.   

“Toss out this worthless slave!” shouts the unjust master, unwittingly speaking one of the great spiritual laws even as he rages: 

For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.   

Yes, true words in the world of profit and loss; but truer words in the realm of the spirit, where the first is last and the last first. As the Zen koan puts it, “If you have a cane, I will give you one; if you have none, I will take it away.” What is it that we have heard Jesus say about a camel and a needle’s eye? Fact is, the unjust master has no joy to enter into. What was it Jesus said about the rich fool and his grand plans? “That night he died” (Luke 12:21). 

When they say, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them . . . 

Unfortunately, there is always another nine hundred chariots of iron to deal with. Always we must roll up our sleeves and got on down to the Wadi Kishon—or the local Occupy outpost—to meet them. Always it is our lot to encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed you are doing. 

Prayer:  May we have the vision of Deborah.