Psalm 80:9–12; Deuteronomy 8:1–9:6; Luke 6:12–26

Psalm 80:8–12: Our psalmist turns to an agricultural metaphor to review Israel’s history fromEgypt to Canaan as he addresses God: “You carried a vine out of Egypt,/ You drove away nations and planted it.” (9) As he extends the metaphor of Israel as a vine, we understand that it is God who facilitated their settling in Canaan. And as we read in Deuteronomy, it is God who allowed them prosper because at first, anyway, Israel obeyed God and kept his commandments: “You cleared space before it/ and struck its roots down,/ and it filled the land.” (10)

We can see the poet’s fond memories of a time long past in a place long distant as he writes, “The mountains were covered by its shade,/ and by its branches the mighty cedars.” (11) The vine of Israel grew and as vines do, it covered a broad kingdom from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River: “You sent forth its boughs to the sea/ and to the River its shoots.” (12)

These nostalgic verses anticipate Jesus’ metaphor of the vine and branches in John 15. In that sense when Jesus says, “I am the vine and you are the branches,” he is telling us that in the context of the vine metaphor here in the psalm, it is Jesus who has become the new Israel—and it is in Jesus where we grow and prosper.

Deuteronomy 8:1–9:6: As his long second sermon continues, Moses elucidates the fundamental rationale for the 40 years in the wilderness: “your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, in order to humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments.” (8:2)

We encounter a verse that Jesus quoted word for word at the Sermon on the Mount as Moses reminds the people that God has done all these things “in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.” (8:3) And it is those words by which they—and we—grow and thrive as Moses tells them that “as a parent disciplines a child so the Lord your God disciplines you.” (8:5)

So, Israel’s response once again must be to keep God’s commandments and in doing so, they will reap enormous benefits because “the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with flowing streams, with springs and underground waters welling up in valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey.” (7,8)

But once again, Moses reminds them of the consequences of “failing to keep his commandments, his ordinances, and his statutes, which I am commanding you today.” (11) The problem is pride. It is forgetting that what they are enjoying is a gift from God and come to believe that prosperity is the result of their own skills and work: “when your herds and flocks have multiplied, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, then do not exalt yourself, forgetting the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” (13, 14) Instead, Israel—and we—must “remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth.” (18)

Which is exactly our problem today. We believe that what has been created around us, our possessions, our technologies are entirely our creation when in actuality is is God who has given us physical and mental resources to create a prosperous society. But as we look around it’s easy to see that our prosperity and our freedom will all come to naught as we continue as a nation to chip away at God’s moral bedrock.

To drive that point home, Moses reminds them (once again!) that it is God who is going to bring their victory over the Canaanites: “Know then today that the Lord your God is the one who crosses over before you as a devouring fire; he will defeat them and subdue them before you, so that you may dispossess and destroy them quickly, as the Lord has promised you.” (9:3) And when God does that, Moses warns, “do not say to yourself, “It is because of my righteousness that the Lord has brought me in to occupy this land”; it is rather because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is dispossessing them before you.” (9:4) Right here is the moral justification for Israel’s invasion of Canaan: the people who are there are wicked who among other things, sacrifice their children to small-g gods.

But that victory will be God’s alone and again, Moses warns them not to allow pride to turn their heads because “the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to occupy because of your righteousness; for you are a stubborn people.” (9:6) The Israelites are God’s means of accomplishing his larger purpose. This casts a new light on God’s ultimate purpose: to wipe out an evil people and simultaneously “to fulfill the promise that the Lord made on oath to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” (9:5)

Is this rationale—that the annihilation of people is because they are evil in God’s sight—justified? That will remain one of the great unanswered questions of a God we will never fully comprehend.

Luke 6:12–26 : Luke, ever the detailed historian, provides us the roster of Jesus’ 12 Apostles. What’s worth noting is that Jesus’ choices came only after “he went out to the mountain to pray; and he spent the night in prayer to God.” (12) This also tells us there is nothing random about Jesus’ choice; it is the result of long and probably agonized prayer. In his list, bring up the rear, Luke tells us that “Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor” (16) was also a conscious choice, not an error on Jesus’ part. The question hangs in the air, did Jesus know at that early point that Judas would one day betray him?

His fame continues to spread as Jesus continues his preaching and healing ministry: “with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon.” (17)

Luke, as doctor, goes farther than the other gospel writers in describing how Jesus healed people, He states that “power came out from him and healed all of them.” (19) Having just read that Jesus engaged in frequent and lengthy prayer, it’s not an unfair conclusion to think that it is praying to his father which is the ultimate source of this healing and preaching power.

We come to Luke’s shortened version of the Sermon on the Mount. Luke;s focus is on Jesus as bringer of social justice and personal joy: