Lectionary Commentaries for November 17, 2024
Twenty-sixth Sunday after Pentecost

When Jesus is no longer physically present, what does it mean to follow him? Has the meaning of following Jesus changed? In this regard, Mark 13 is an interesting chapter. As Jesus speaks about the future, the first readers of Mark might have felt Jesus was directly speaking to them. I think Jesus is telling the readers that discipleship is still the same thing.

Discipleship in Mark has two main components: following and understanding Jesus. The disciples’ understanding grows, however slightly, over time as they follow him.¹ If Peter had heard of Jesus’ proclamation in Galilee (1:14–15), he might have had some understanding of Jesus before he began following him. But Peter’s understanding of Jesus was incorrect or incomplete at this point—and even until the end of Mark. In a sense, Peter was not really following Jesus when he was with Jesus, if following Jesus means denying oneself, taking up one’s cross, and following Jesus to the cross (8:34).² The first disciples of Jesus truly understood and followed Jesus only after the story of Mark ended.

The first readers should also understand and follow Jesus. The readers do know more than the disciples. The readers might have heard about Jesus even before reading Mark. More importantly, the author of Mark tells or shows the readers what the characters in the story do not know. The very first line of the writing says Jesus is the Christ (1:1), which Peter confesses as late as chapter 8. The privileged information creates a dramatic irony, and the readers are led to believe that they know better than the disciples. The Gospel of Mark generates such an image of the readers, only to overturn it at critical points of the story.

At times I feel like Mark’s Jesus is asking, “Do you really know better?” For instance, in chapter 4 Jesus gives the Parable of the Sower, scolds the disciples for their failure to understand it, and provides an explanation of the parable (4:3–20). Jesus then gives a series of parables without explanations (4:21–32). Can you readers understand these parables? If you can’t, you are no better than the disciples. In fact, since the disciples get to hear Jesus’ explanations of those parables (4:34), the disciples know better than the readers. Neither group is better than the other. Each group has their own privileged information about Jesus. Each group faces their own interpretive challenges.³

In Mark, there is an implied timeline of what must happen, and the fulfillment of Jesus’ mission as the Messiah is part of what must happen. This idea is expressed in several different ways. To name a few: First, the use of the Greek word dei (“it is necessary”; usually translated as “must”): “Elijah must [dei] come first” (9:11); “the Son of Man must [dei] undergo great suffering … and be killed and after three days rise again” (8:31). Second, Jesus’ proclamation: the first thing Jesus says in Mark is, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news” (1:15). Third, Jesus’ parables: for instance, Jesus has tied up the “strong man” and is plundering his “property” (3:27).

Jesus’ first passion prediction (8:31), which uses the word dei, is especially important, as it lies at the heart of Jesus’ identity as the Messiah. But even after the third passion prediction, the disciples “did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him” (9:32). The readers might well have understood the passion predictions. But Mark’s Jesus gives them a different set of dei statements in chapter 13.

The word dei is used three times in chapter 13: “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must [dei] take place” (verse 7); “the good news must [dei] first be proclaimed to all nations” (verse 10). Ironically, what must not happen is a must in verse 14: “when you see the desolating sacrilege set up where it ought not to be [ou dei].” Whether that word is used or not, all the events Jesus describes in 13:5–27 are instances of what must happen. The author of Mark’s parenthetical remark, “let the reader understand” (13:14), is a clear indication that Jesus’ eschatological discourse is an interpretive challenge to the readers.

The use of the Greek word sēmeion (“sign”) in Mark also shows that the disciples and the readers are going through the same kind of training process. The Pharisees ask Jesus to give “a sign from heaven” (8:11). Jesus sighs deeply and says, “Why does this generation ask for a sign [sēmeion]? Truly I tell you, no sign will be given to this generation” (8:12). The disciples should know that Jesus’ messianic identity is truly proven through his suffering, death, and resurrection, not through some sign from heaven.

In the eschatological discourse, Jesus says that “false messiahs and false prophets will appear and produce signs [Greek sēmeion in the plural] and wonders” (13:22). They will do so because outsiders like the Pharisees in chapter 8 believe that signs and wonders prove one’s messianic or prophetic identity. The readers should know, again, what truly proves the identity of the Messiah and what does not prove it. Just as Jesus’ passion predictions are given only to the disciples, so too the knowledge of the “sign” (sēmeion, 13:4) of the age is reserved for the readers.

To summarize, while the first disciples of Jesus and the first readers of Mark lived in different times, the meaning of following Jesus remained the same: one must truly understand and follow Jesus. It is also not a coincidence that Mark’s Jesus says the same thing to his disciples and to the readers: as you seek to understand and follow Jesus, you should keep awake and pray.⁴

The message is clear. Or perhaps it is not. There have been numerous wild interpretations of Mark 13 in history, and too many people have been misled by them. And so many readers have done what Jesus told them not to do: trying to find the exact time of the end. Jesus said he did not know it (13:32), which would mean that there is no way we can figure it out.

Notes

1. This point becomes clear when Mark is compared with Luke. In Mark, Jesus calls Peter (1:16–18) and then heals his mother-in-law (1:29–31). In Luke, Jesus heals her first (Luke 4:38–39), teaches people sitting on Peter’s boat, and performs a miracle (Luke 5:3–7). Both Peter’s response to the miracle in Luke 5:8 and Jesus’ statement, “Do not be afraid” (Luke 5:10), imply that the miracle is a manifestation of divine power and presence. Luke’s narrative progression shows that Peter understands Jesus first as a healer, then as a teacher, and finally as a divine character. Luke’s Jesus then calls Peter (Luke 5:10). Thus, in Luke, understanding precedes following.
2. For the same reason, the crowds who were physically following Jesus (3:7; 5:24; 11:9) were not really following him.
3. My commentary on Mark 12:28–34 presents another example of Jesus’ interpretive challenge to the readers (https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-31-2/commentary-on-mark-1228-34-7).
4. To the disciples: 8:15; 12:38; 14:34, 37, 38; to the readers: 13:5, 9, 18, 23, 33, 35, 37.

Daniel 7–12 comprises an apocalyptic vision account, and these chapters are the only example of an extended apocalypse in the Hebrew Bible. The stories about Daniel are set in the sixth century BCE, a time when he serves the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar as an interpreter of dreams and wise counselor (see chapters 1–2; 4–6). But the author is writing much later, in the mid-second century BCE, a time in which the Jews are suffering through a severe persecution under the Seleucid king Antiochus IV, a persecution that led to the Maccabean revolt (167–160 BCE). Daniel’s visions cryptically foretell events occurring long after his own time, but they are in fact prophecy after the event. 

Underlying apocalyptic narratives is the belief that earthly events are a delayed enactment of a story that is already unfolding in the heavens—as it has been in heaven, so now on earth. Daniel 12:1–3 describes (in heaven) and predicts (on earth) the final victory of God and deliverance of the faithful. “At that time” refers to a short period of unparalleled anguish on earth leading to Antiochus’s destruction by Israel’s assigned protector, the archangel Michael (see also 11:1). At the end of this war in heaven, those who “are found written in the book” are delivered—that is, those Jews who have remained faithful through the time of persecution. Those not written in the book are Jews who compromised with Antiochus’s demands. 

The belief in a heavenly book that records the names of the faithful, sometimes referred to as “the book of life,” is attested elsewhere in the Bible (Psalm 69:28; Philippians 4:3; Revelation 3:5) and frequently in extracanonical Jewish literature of the time. Jews who had died prior to the final moment of deliverance foreseen by Daniel are summoned for judgment from “the dust of the earth.” This expression refers to the place of the dead, Sheol, where all people go when they die or “sleep.” Aroused from the dust, the faithful Jews will be rewarded with everlasting life and the unfaithful Jews punished with everlasting contempt. 

The author focuses on the Jewish community, not all of humanity, although later readers have understood the promise/threat to apply broadly to universal resurrection and judgment. 

There is likely an allusion in verses 2–3 to Isaiah 26:19. These two passages are the clearest attestation in the Hebrew Bible to an emerging belief in resurrection in the postexilic period. In addition, a special group among the righteous is singled out: “those who are wise … who lead many to righteousness” (see also 11:33). Daniel is representative of this group (1:4, 17). “The wise” in the author’s time were those who, like him, urged other Jews to be faithful to the covenant and resist the demands of Antiochus. 

The specific word choices in 12:1–3 echo Isaiah 52:13 and 53:11–12. This intertextual allusion aligns “the wise” who were killed during the persecution in the author’s time with Isaiah’s suffering servant: 

See, my servant shall prosper; he shall be exalted and lifted up, and shall be very high … Out of his anguish he shall see light; he shall find satisfaction through his knowledge. The righteous one, my servant, shall make many righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. 

The suffering of the faithful leaders is not merely tragic and meaningless; it leads others to faithfulness and ultimately results in the eternal glorification of the wise. The author renders this glorification in cosmic imagery. The wise who “make many righteous” shall “be exalted and lifted up” to shine like the sky-dome (raqia(, as in Genesis 1:6–7) and like the stars of heaven. They are transfigured.

In the face of the experience of exile and the suffering the Jews endured in the centuries following it, divine providence, how God manages the world, came into question. The idea that the righteous are rewarded and the wicked suffer soured as experience showed that the reverse was very often the case. This was painfully true during the persecution by Antiochus IV. The problem was acute; the righteous were suffering precisely because they were righteous. Where was God in such a time? 

The apocalyptic understanding of divine providence deals with this problem by imagining history as a predetermined scheme in which evil is allowed to flourish for a set time, a time during which the righteous suffer for their faithfulness. Why? The author of Daniel says that it is to test and purify them (11:35). But more broadly, Daniel portrays the powers that oppose God’s forces in heaven and the oppressive empires that are their manifestation on earth as wielding potent and consequential anti-divine power. They must be fought and defeated by the heavenly agents of God, angelic prince against angelic prince, to bring God’s ultimate victory. In the end, all is set right, but in the present there is war and great suffering. God’s control of history is not absolute, only ultimate.

The mythic worldview of apocalypticism is problematic for many Christians today. Helpfully, Walter Wink offers an interpretive framework for understanding it (see his Naming the Powers). He suggests that the mythic depiction of warring powers helps us to identify and understand the inner (spiritual) and outer (mundane) aspects of the powers that rule the world today. The notion of heavenly powers reminds us that our battle is not merely against “enemies of blood and flesh” (Ephesians 6:12). There are indeed material forces of evil to be confronted, but there is an inner reality of oppressive forces that transcends the material and that must be recognized and confronted. Spiritual weapons are needed to confront these forces. 

Martin Luther King Jr., one of “the wise” of his time, emphasized this as he prepared people to confront the powers of racism and oppression. Prayer was not a formality before a protest; it was a necessary and powerful preparation for confronting “the powers of this present darkness.”

Clergy inhabit the role of “the wise,” those to whom the “many” look for guidance in righteousness. The role is challenging. Speaking out against evil and for justice can result in social or professional death. Following the countercultural teachings of Christ Jesus often leads to conflict. Consider the demands of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus’ call to take up the cross, his warnings about wealth and self-aggrandizement, and his parable of the final judgment in Matthew 25. The “cost of discipleship” is high, but the reward is eternal, now even as it was in the time Daniel was written.

First Samuel 1 introduces Hannah, among other characters who appear more privileged and powerful than her. For example, her husband Elkanah has two wives and several children, both male and female, who belong to his other wife Peninnah. In addition to references to Elkanah’s relatives, three other men are introduced: Eli and his sons Hophni and Phinehas, who are all priests. We know that Elkanah is economically advantaged because when he offers sacrifices, he gives portions to his wives and children. He even gives double portions to Hannah because she is barren.   

Hannah’s story is one of incredible faith amid incompetent “leadership.” She lives in a patriarchal society dominated by men who both rule in the household and lead in the temple. In such a context, she is aware that her livelihood and ability to thrive are dependent upon her attachment to men through marriage and/or as the mother of a male son, which she lacks. Persistent provocation and irritation by her husband’s other wife, who is described as Hannah’s rival (1:6), intensifies the disappointment, pain, and perhaps even shame of Hannah’s experience of barrenness. Peninnah bullies Hannah year after year, which drives Hannah to weep and refuse to eat (1:7).  

Before and in response to Hannah’s weeping and food refusal, readers get a glimpse into incompetent leadership by both Elkanah and Eli. One would imagine that Elkanah undoubtedly knows that Hannah is taunted by his other wife and senses that her deity-caused experience of infertility is a deep source of pain for her, yet he poses a series of questions to her: “Hannah, why do you weep? Why do you not eat? Why is your heart sad? Am I not more to you than ten sons?” (1:8). 

First, he attempts to alleviate Hannah’s pain by giving her a double portion of the sacrifice, as if his “gifts” could remedy the pain of her inability to produce a child and as if the sacrificed portions could provide Hannah lasting economic security. Economic security seems to be a tenacious concern raised in Hannah’s song in the second chapter as she spotlights and asserts the reversal of fortune for the oppressed and downtrodden. Elkanah is prosperous, and he uses his wealth as a tool to address her distress, which illustrates ineffectiveness in identifying and addressing her needs. He asks why she weeps, knowing his other wife antagonizes her because she does not have children, yet he does nothing to intervene, thereby enabling Peninnah to torment and terrorize Hannah.    

Elkanah’s last question is further evidence of his ineptitude. He asks Hannah, “Am I not more to you than ten sons?” Elkanah knows the value of sons in patriarchal contexts such as his. His question displays his willful downplay of her vulnerability and concern about the need for security should something happen to him. Elkanah offers Hannah gifts and is depicted as speaking “tenderly” to her, yet neither his actions nor his words assuage her pain. She is deeply distressed and distraught, yet Elkanah ceases speaking to her after this set of rhetorical questions. He becomes silent and turns to eating and drinking (1:9). 

Afterward, Hannah rises and presents herself to the Lord. She continues to weep as she prays, which is indicative that Elkanah’s actions and support are ineffective. She is still deeply affected by her perceived hardships. 

When Hannah presents herself to the Lord, the priest Eli, who is seated beside the doorpost of the temple, observes her mouth as she is praying and perceives she is drunk. It seems he is at a distance and can see her lips moving but cannot hear anything. He presumes that her moving lips are a sign of drunkenness, not a posture of prayer and gesture of petition. 

Eli assumes before he asks a question for clarity, which is a sure sign of incompetence as a leader. Further, he endeavors to publicly shame her by rebuking her. But when she corrects him by indicating that she was “pouring out [her] soul before the Lord,” shame is brought upon him through the exposure of his physical, intellectual, and spiritual ability to perceive that she was communicating with God.  

Not only does Hannah correct Eli, but she does so reflecting brilliance and rhetorical prowess, using a wine metaphor to express her mode of communication with the Lord and to juxtapose her actions with those of her husband and others. She fasts and pours out her soul before God while her husband and others eat, pouring out and consuming wine after sacrificing to God. She sets herself apart by abstaining from wine so that her presentation of herself to God will be pleasing. Further, she vows to commit her son, if she is blessed with one, as a Nazirite who, like her, will abstain from wine and intoxicants. In doing so, she aligns her future child’s identity with hers, marked by a dedication to address and transform the lives of the needy and poor.  

Hannah’s incredible faith during sadness, anxiety, and vexation for a son who would later become a great leader stands in stark contrast to the incompetent leadership of her husband and the priest. She was deeply troubled, which was undoubtedly intensified by the perceptions and actions of Elkanah and Eli, but she allowed her faith to “trouble” their incompetent leadership so that her turmoil, vexation, and anxieties could be transformed into peace.  

People are not sure what to think when they are asked questions like, “Do you want to be close to God?” or “How will you grow in trust and intimacy with God?”¹ The answer sounds too simple to be true: Read the Psalms. Over and over. The language, and the mind and spirit behind the language, creates just this closeness, this tender intimacy. 

Psalm 16 can do this work for us, as the psalm itself is witness to that work having been done in someone, and in the many someones who’ve prayed, sung, chanted, and pondered these words for centuries. The words of our final verse are unmatched when it comes to simple eloquence, the single-minded articulation of the benefits of sticking close to God. When we pray repeatedly for God to 

show me the path of life.
In your presence there is fullness of joy;
in your right hand are pleasures forevermore (verse 11),

we begin to experience that joy. We’re on the right path.

From various angles, the psalm explores this life lived close to the heart of God, asking, “What is good? With whom do you hang around? Where is your trust placed? Are you content?” Our society, perversely, describes the “good life” as precisely what the church has warned us are the “seven deadly sins”: envy, greed, sloth, anger, gluttony, pride, lust. But they are still trouble, leaving us hollow. Our psalm, like Psalm 73, makes plain that our only good is God.

Oversimplifying things? The great saints have taught us what they learned: Gradually shedding other goods until there’s nothing left but God is the fullness of life, the experience of complete joy.

What company do we keep? Verse 3 names the holy, noble ones. We might think of a friend as “someone like me, someone I enjoy.” In ancient times, Aristotle suggested that a friend is someone who makes you wise. St. Augustine said a friend is someone who helps you to love God. As I try to pray, what impact do the people around me have on my praying, and on my life?

Verse 4 warns against adhering to false gods. If we recall that a god is whatever we cling to, whatever we think will deliver us and bring the good life, then we begin to notice many gods clamoring for our attention, crowding out the one true God. Fawning after what isn’t God is the “multiplication of sorrows.” We have plenty of sorrow anyhow, without augmenting it by the sneaky griefs we bear when chasing after what promises to alleviate sorrow but cannot.

Surely we hear an echo here of Genesis 3: Adam and Eve seize the fruit, and then God explains the struggles and pains that will ensue, not as God retaliating against them for sinning, but as the inevitable outgrowth of what life at odds with God the creator will be like.

These “boundary lines” that have “fallen in pleasant places” aren’t about luck or good real estate investments. It’s all about being content. When Israel entered the promised land, the property was divided up by lot, as they perceived that God was giving the whole nation enough land—and here’s your part. Not wishing for the other guy’s plot of land, but accepting what you have, only then do you realize you do have more than enough. Desire and envy are nothing but fear of insufficiency. But God is always sufficient. Even if we only have a little.

Verse 7 envisions a benefit of proximity to God as having excellent “counsel” or “guidance.” Most Christians err by not having all that much to do with God until they are in a pickle or have to make a tough decision—and then they dial up God for some guidance.

But if you’re close to God all the time, you may not get in as many pickles, and the guidance isn’t a one-off bit of advice for what to do in a challenging situation, but a constant moving forward in sync with God. One so close to God isn’t blown about like autumn leaves or a small ship in a storm. “I shall not be moved” is a regular declaration of being on solid footing with God.

In religion courses or seminary, we learn that in the Old Testament there’s no eternal life, no individual resurrection. But is there a glimmer of such hope in this psalm? Could it be that by letting the remarkable, overarching words of this psalm come down to us, we see God affording a peek behind that curtain of death—maybe seeing through the glass not so darkly after all?

What the psalmist experiences is knowing God face-to-face, up close, personally, intimately. Isn’t this what eternal life really is all about? Not the reward for a good life, or the prize for believing, or the payoff for accepting Christ as savior. Eternal life is this, or nothing: that God loves; that we have a relationship with God that is so very precious, not just to us, but to God; that death isn’t strong enough to sever it. God’s intense, relentless love for you is such that, even if you die, God’s not done; God wants, even needs it to continue.

As mentioned earlier, verse 11 doesn’t need to be exegeted. We just hear the words, immerse ourselves in the thought, letting it take on its own lovely reality in the soul and body. Cross-stitch this and hang it above the mantel. Get a tattoo running down your arm. Memorize it and make it your mantra. You may hear Mick Jagger singing “I can’t get no satisfaction,” and in that moment, you respond, with no smugness but only humble joy, “I can.”

Notes

1. Commentary previously published on this website for June 26, 2022.

Hebrews 10:11–14 offers several comparisons between the Levitical priesthood and that of Jesus. The first point of comparison is the frequency of sacrificial offerings. Under the Levitical priesthood, the priest stands day after day for his priestly duties and repeatedly offers the same sacrifices. In contrast to the daily offerings of earlier priests, Jesus has offered a single sacrifice for all time.

The question of frequency relates to the second point of comparison: the consequences or efficacy of the sacrifices. The recurring nature of these sacrifices indicates their limited value. If these earlier sacrifices were fully effective, they would not have to be offered repeatedly. This understanding explains why the author insists that the earlier sacrifices “can never take away sins” (10:11). 

On the face of it, the author’s words seem to question much of Israel’s sacrificial system. They stand in tension as well with parts of Leviticus, which give the impression that sacrifices do remove or take away sin from the Israelites (see, for example, Leviticus 5–6). For the sake of clarifying, we may want to add a modifier to the words of Hebrews 10:11—the earlier sacrifices can never take away sins fully or completely. 

In contrast, the single offering of Christ “has perfected for all time those who are sanctified” (10:14). The verb translated as “has perfected” (teteleiōken) in the New Revised Standard Version can be understood in different ways. For many English readers, the language of perfection may carry strong moral and ethical connotations, like scoring a perfect score on an exam or having a perfect driving record. This may lead to the conclusion that Christians are incapable of committing sins after the single offering of Christ. Human experience and a range of theological traditions, however, make such an understanding difficult to maintain. 

The priestly context of the verb provides clarification. In the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, when the verb is applied to priests (see Leviticus 4:5; 8:33; 16:32; 21:10; Numbers 3:3), it has the sense of “consecrate” or “set apart for sacred service.” Along with a special anointing, the consecration of the priest formalizes his priestly responsibilities, such as the ability to access the tabernacle (skēnē). We can understand the reference in Hebrews 10:14 in a similar way: Jesus’ singular offering has consecrated for all time those who have been set apart. Like the priests in Leviticus, this consecration provides worshippers with access to the divine presence. 

This way of understanding teteleiōken has significant exegetical and pastoral advantages. First, exegetically, it frees up the way that this verb is used to describe Jesus. It is hard to reconcile the idea that Jesus, though without sin (4:15), somehow had to become “perfect” in any moral or ethical sense (see 2:10; 5:9; 7:28). Rather, when applied to Jesus, the verb refers to the consecration or appointment of Jesus as high priest. Second, pastorally, this reading does not require us to think that the Christian is somehow magically incapable of sinning. The emphasis is not on the moral or ethical fitness of the worshipper but on the surpassing value and efficacy of Christ’s sacrifice, which has finally and fully removed any obstacles to approaching God. 

In Hebrews 10:15–18, the author returns to the language about the new covenant in Jeremiah 31, which he has engaged more fully in Hebrews 8:7–12. Here the language about the new covenant no longer has as strong a future orientation. Instead, it verifies a present reality: God no longer remembers sin and lawless deeds. As the author concludes in verse 19, where there is forgiveness of sins and lawlessness, there is no offering for sin. The author thus reads Jeremiah 31 as a description of the finished work of Christ, which was the divine intention all along. 

Hebrews 10:19–25 acts as something of a hinge, connecting the material in Hebrews 5–10 with Hebrews 11–13. In verses 19–21, the author summarizes key elements of the preceding argument. First, the author reminds the hearers that they have bold confidence (parrēsia) to enter into the sanctuary by the blood of Jesus (10:19). They can do so because of the “new and living way” that Jesus has opened up for them (10:20). And they can do all of this because they have Jesus, a great high priest over the house of God (10:21). The point is clear: Jesus has removed all obstacles that might keep the hearers from entering into God’s presence. The problem, as the exhortation in verses 22–25 makes clear, is with the hearers’ willingness to keep drawing near.

Each verse in Hebrews 10:22–25 contains a verb of command followed by a number of modifiers or additional phrases: let us approach, let us hold fast, and let us consider. The first command has the sense of taking full advantage of the access to divine presence that Jesus provides. The second has a more static sense of holding fast to the confession of hope; this is a positive version of not drifting away from the message of salvation (2:1). The third commands the audience to see one another as a stimulus to community-building actions (“love and good deeds”) and to ensure that no one withdraws from it (“neglecting to meet together”). 

I have long understood the reference to not meeting together to be one of the major reasons the author wrote Hebrews in the first place. An element of the author’s religious and theological brilliance is his attempt to say that the inauspicious gatherings of a religious and political minority community in Asia Minor are the very location where people enter into the presence of God. As Hebrews 10:32–39 makes clear, though, the habit of meeting together has not always been easy. 

In these days of growing secularization, many ask explicitly or implicitly, “Why church?” Hebrews answers by insisting that the gathered community enters God’s presence. We in the Western world may miss just how bold this claim is. We may think of it as a commonplace or even deserved reality. Yet, this would have been a staggering and audacious claim in the first century. We also have a tendency to individualize and spiritualize it, thinking that we can draw close to God in the privacy of our own hearts, whether from a mountaintop or on our couches. Hebrews challenges this understanding. 

Our lectionary text this week offers the preacher challenging and inspiring answers to why Christians in the 21st century should not neglect their meetings together and should recommit to community-building actions of love.