Lectionary Commentaries for July 26, 2026
Ninth Sunday after Pentecost

When my grandson Devon was 13 years old, he wrote a rap song. He performed it for me with a speed and cadence that baffled me. I could not follow the rhythm, nor decode the metaphors his 13-year-old brain deployed with such confidence. So I asked him if he might share the lyrics with me. He handed me a sheet of paper, and the next time he performed the song, the message landed.

This is the work Jesus is doing in Matthew 13. He is handing us a sheet of paper because he wants the parables to land.

The preacher’s problem

Every preacher knows the terror of the metaphor that does not work. You build a whole sermon around an image, and you watch it sail clean over the heads of half the congregation. A metaphor is only as powerful as its audience’s capacity to understand it. Jesus knows this. So he does not offer one parable and move on. In rapid-fire succession, he offers five, with each one hoping to land the metaphor for a different pair of ears.

The structure of the passage reveals a preacher working the room. The mustard seed and the yeast (verses 31–33) speak to those who know the land and the kitchen. The hidden treasure and the pearl (verses 44–46) speak to those who understand acquisition, risk, and the marketplace. The dragnet full of fish (verses 47–50) speaks to those whose livelihood depends on the sea. Jesus moves from agrarian to domestic to commercial to maritime, and his logic is not repetition for repetition’s sake. His is the logic of a teacher who refuses to leave any pupil behind.

 However, no matter which parable grabs your attention, the point is the same: The kingdom of heaven is valuable beyond measure, it is at work even when you cannot see it, and it will cost you everything to participate in it fully.

What the metaphors share

Beneath their surface differences, all five parables also share a common grammar. First, there is the element of hiddenness. The mustard seed disappears into the ground. The yeast is concealed inside three measures of flour. The treasure is buried in a field. The hidden pearl must be found. And even the fish lurk beneath the surface of the sea. The kingdom of heaven, Jesus insists, is not immediately visible. It does not announce itself with fanfare. It operates beneath the surface of things, and it requires that those who desire it seek it out.

Second, there is the element of a disproportionate outcome. A seed the size of a grain of sand becomes a tree large enough to hold nests. A lump of leaven transforms enough flour to feed more than 100 people, and a single discovery in a field is worth liquidating everything you own. The kingdom is not proportional. It does not play by the rules of reasonable expectation. It is expansive, extensive, and extravagant.

Third, there is the element of total response. The man who finds the treasure sells all that he has. The merchant who discovers the pearl does the same. These are not stories about wise investments. They are stories about people who encounter something so extraordinary that they decide to reorganize their entire lives. As John T. Carroll observed in his 2023 Working Preacher commentary, the question these parables pose to every listener is the same: “Are you all in?”

The scandal beneath the surface

It is tempting to domesticate these parables, to turn the mustard seed into an inspirational poster about a small beginning with a big ending. But the parables resist. The message here is about more than the little seed that thought it could. These parables are about the power hidden in what some judge as minor things. Jesus is determined to point out that there are no minor things in the kingdom’s lexicon.

And the yeast? In the Hebrew tradition, leaven was most often a symbol of corruption. Jesus tells the disciples to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees (Matthew 16:6). Paul instructs the Corinthians to cleanse out the old leaven (1 Corinthians 5:7). So when Jesus says the kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman hides in flour, he is offering a provocative image. The kingdom works the way fermentation works—quietly, invisibly, and by a process that, from the outside, looks a lot like something going wrong before it goes right.

And let us not overlook the presence of a woman in these parables. In a teaching sequence full of men, sowers, merchants, and fishermen, Jesus places a woman at the center of one of his most potent images of divine activity. She does not observe the kingdom. She enacts it. Her hands are in the dough. This is domestic labor as theological metaphor, and it has been underread for centuries.

The scribe’s treasure

Jesus concludes this teaching by providing a final image. He says that the scribe trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings out of the treasury things both new and old (verse 52). This is the preacher’s job description. We are not called to offer only the ancient text or a contemporary application. We are called to reach into the same storehouse and make the old word land in new ways, and to let the new context illuminate what the ancient community always knew. We are called to hold and honor both the new and the old, because just like a precious coin, if one side is defaced, the coin has no value.

The sheet of paper

Jesus knows that not every metaphor will land for every listener. He knows that the farmer may not track the pearl, and the fisherman may not track the seed. So he keeps reaching, keeps translating, keeps offering the same truth on a separate sheet of paper. The kingdom of heaven is here. It is hidden. It is growing. It is worth everything. He is handing us the sheet of paper. He is saying: If you could not grasp it at the speed of my first telling, read it again. Take it in. Let it land. And then go be the scribe who brings out the old and the new. Find the metaphor that reaches. Find the language that sticks. Refuse to stop translating until the word has done its work.

In this episode, God invites Solomon to make a request, and Solomon asks for wisdom to lead God’s people well. Solomon’s response to God offers insights for God’s people today about memory, humility, and discipleship. 

God begins (1 Kings 3:5)

While Solomon’s request for wisdom may be the most famous aspect of this text, it begins with God’s initiative. Solomon did not seek God to make this special request, but instead God sought Solomon with the question “What can I give you?” God’s initiative here serves as a powerful reminder of the many ways God seeks to equip those whom God has called.

Solomon remembers (1 Kings 3:6)

Before Solomon actually answers God’s question, Solomon remembers what God has done for David and for him. Solomon begins by recalling God’s steadfast love for David: Just as this episode opens with God’s initiative, Solomon’s logic also begins with what God has done. Solomon recognizes that God sustained David’s kingship, and that David would not have gained or continued in his reign without God’s activity. 

Solomon specifically connects God’s steadfast love for David with David’s own faithfulness, righteousness, and integrity. God sought and chose David because David was a man after God’s own heart—that is, David had a character of faithfulness well-suited for the kind of king God was seeking. Solomon understands that being a king who benefits from God’s provision depends on living and leading with faithfulness. 

Solomon acknowledges that his place on the throne is a direct result of God’s faithfulness to David. Solomon grounds his request to God in the memories of what God has done for him and for David. Memory is often a significant motif in the Old Testament. Frequently, the Israelites remember what God has done for them in the past as the foundation of their hope that God will continue to sustain them in the future. Solomon’s memory of God’s faithfulness to David and to him leads him to gratitude, and this gratitude informs the request he makes. This move from remembering God’s actions to gratitude can be an important example for Christians today. 

In addition to his gratitude to God, Solomon also recognizes how he benefits from David’s faithfulness. He understands that he is not king by his own power: He would not be king if not for David’s character that prompted God to choose and sustain him. Solomon honestly acknowledges that his position and blessings depend in many ways on the actions of others. This recognition can be a significant example for Christians today as they reflect on the ways they have experienced God’s blessings through the faithfulness of others who have come before them or who surround them in their communities.

Solomon’s humility (1 Kings 3:7–8)

As Solomon remembers his dependence on David’s past actions and God’s present provision, his reflections lead him to a deep humility. Solomon first makes explicit what had been implied in his earlier reflections: God is the One who has made him king. Solomon proceeds to marvel at God’s work because Solomon is still a youth: As with David, Solomon would not be king without God’s doing. This reflection prompts Solomon to confess frankly the limits of his own knowledge. Solomon contrasts his limited knowledge with the vastness of God’s people. Solomon rightly recognizes that he will not be able to lead God’s people well without God’s help. This humility shapes his answer to God’s question. 

Solomon’s humility can also be a powerful example for Christians today. Solomon can see himself clearly when he begins by considering what God has done for him. Christians today can also learn this humility by reflecting on what God has done for them and by cultivating a spirit of openness to instruction in their study of God’s word. Growing in wisdom often includes going beyond what one expects God to do and being willing to be surprised by what God is actually doing.  

Solomon’s request (1 Kings 3:9)

Solomon answers God’s question only after remembering what God has done for him and recognizing his own limitations. Solomon asks God for an “understanding mind,” and he explains why this is his request. Solomon wants to lead God’s people well, and he knows he cannot do so without God’s help. He seeks a mind that will be able to see clearly what is good and beneficial for God’s people as well as what is evil and harmful for them. 

Solomon’s request is guided entirely by what will help him fulfill the role that God has given him. He does not request something that will benefit only himself. Solomon’s focus on how he can serve God’s people and fulfill his calling can be a guide for how Christians today can pray. 

God’s delight (1 Kings 3:10–14)

God is delighted with Solomon’s request. The text emphasizes God’s pleasure in 1 Kings 3:10, and in verse 11–14 God explains why God responds in this way. God gives Solomon a “wise and discerning mind” specifically because he did not ask for something that would only benefit himself. God is pleased that Solomon is guided by the needs of God’s people and God’s calling for him. 

God’s delight overflows into additional mercies. Not only does God say Solomon’s wisdom will be unparalleled, but God also gives Solomon things for which he did not ask. In 1 Kings 3:13–14, God promises Solomon wealth, honor, and longevity. While God is pleased that Solomon did not think first of himself, God knows that these bounties will also help him rule God’s people well. However, as with David, Solomon will need to persist in living faithfully to enjoy God’s continued sustenance. 

This story in Jacob’s life includes themes of romantic love, favoritism, deceit, and poetic justice. Though tempting to find a moral in it—certainly, this lectionary selection is a good example of how not to behave—it may be more fruitful to sit in the uncomfortably honest mess of the emotions and actions of the characters, inviting listeners to imagine and wonder what it would be like to be Jacob, Laban, Leah, or Rachel (or even Zilpah, only mentioned here in one verse as given by one owner to be the slave of another). 

The story begins by announcing how long Jacob had been staying with Laban, his mother’s brother: one month. Jacob had traveled roughly 500 miles, all alone, to get there; now he had been there with family longer than the journey had lasted. 

And apparently, Jacob had not been idle, because now Laban asks Jacob to state his “wages” (Genesis 29:15). This word—maskoret in Hebrew—is relatively unique, but Jacob will use it in chapter 31 when he complains that Laban had “changed his wages ten times” (Genesis 31:7, 41).

The narrator pauses the dialogue between Laban and Jacob to name and describe Laban’s two daughters. The only physical description for the eldest, Leah, refers to her eyes, translated in the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition as “Leah had weak eyes” (Genesis 29:17). The Hebrew word rakh is an antonym for “hard,” so it can also mean “soft,” “delicate,” or “tender” (King James Version). What this means is far from certain: It could be that she did not see well, but it could also be that her eyes were a different color than was typical in that time and place. 

Another possibility gets opened depending on how one translates the Hebrew wӗ at the beginning of Rachel’s name: It could be a disjunctive “but,” contrasting the two sisters, as the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition has translated the verse. It is equally possible that the Hebrew could be translated as the conjunction “and,” indicating that Leah’s eyes were an asset to her appearance “and” that Rachel was beautiful in her bodily form. 

While the words to describe the sisters are indeterminate, it is very clear in the beginning of verse 18 that “Jacob loved Rachel.” Romantic love is relatively rarely mentioned in Old Testament narratives—for example, nowhere does it say that Abraham and Sarah loved one another—so this information stands out. And perhaps Jacob’s love is connected to Rachel’s appearance. Certainly, this love is what motivates Jacob’s terms: He offers to work for seven years to earn Rachel as a wife (Genesis 18:19). 

One rabbi explains that this amount is excessive—one or two years would be more typical—but Jacob wants to demonstrate, both to Rachel and to her father, how highly he prizes her. Laban agrees, and verse 20 of the chapter could be a progress montage, stating that Jacob served seven years, but they seemed but a few days because of Jacob’s love for Rachel.

Jacob is the one who announces to Laban when the time is up: “Give me my wife, for my days are completed, that I may go in to her” (Genesis 29:21). The last clause is a sexual innuendo in Hebrew; Robert Alter translates it as “Let me come to bed with her.” The same words are used in verse 23, that Jacob “went in to her”—but of course, the “her” in that verse is Leah, not Rachel, because Laban brought Leah, not Rachel, to Jacob. 

The New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition translation of verse 25 includes an exclamation point to capture the surprise for Jacob, saying, “When morning came, it was Leah!” The Hebrew adds the phrase “and look,” so the verse more literally reads “And it was in the morning, and look, she was Leah.”

The same verse then skips over any action (such as getting out of bed, getting dressed, or going to find Laban), and goes straight to Jacob’s question for Laban: “What is this you have done to me? Did I not serve with you for Rachel? Why then have you deceived me?” The Hebrew word ramah can be translated as “deceived” or “betrayed,” and also appeared in Genesis 27:35, when Isaac told Esau that Jacob “came deceitfully and took away your blessing.” 

Many have noted how Jacob is now on the receiving end of what he had dealt out: the deceiver is deceived, the favored son of his mother is given the less favored sister, and was unable to see her because it was evening (Genesis 29:23), similar to how his blind father was unable to see which son he was blessing. Yet, if the tables have been turned on Jacob, he will continue to operate with at least tricks (if not deceit) to increase his flocks more than Laban in chapter 30, and will continue to play favorites with Rachel over Leah and with Rachel’s sons over his other children.

Laban explains, in response to Jacob’s question, that it is not the custom to marry off younger daughters before the firstborn—something Laban had neglected to mention when Jacob carefully asked for Laban’s “younger daughter” back in verse 19. In Hebrew, Laban literally says, “It is not done thus in our place” (Genesis 29:26). 

Back in verse 22 Laban had gathered “all the men of the place” for a feast, and it may be those people who, with Laban, constitute the plural noun when Laban explains that if Jacob waits one more week, “we will also give you this one” (Genesis 29:27), for whom Jacob must work seven more years. In other words, Laban will get 14 years (plus one week!) of work from Jacob, and in exchange, Jacob will get both Leah and Rachel as wives. There’s no responding dialogue from Jacob, just the narrator’s notice in the last verse of this lectionary text that Jacob did so, and after a week, he was able to marry Rachel. 

As the story continues beyond this, Genesis 29:30 specifies that Jacob “loved Rachel more than Leah.” While that language could suggest that Jacob had some love for Leah, the very next verse describes Leah as “unloved,” or even “hated” (King James Version, English Standard Version). Laban’s trick was the starting point for sad years of competition between these two sisters, vying for the attention and affection of their shared husband. Yet Leah, the less preferred, will be the mother of both Levi, the ancestor of Israel’s priests, and Judah, the ancestor of Israel’s kings. If not a moral, it is certainly a reminder that God works through anyone.

The sheer size of Psalm 119 alone (176 verses) frequently leaves the interpreter paralyzed.¹ To complicate the interpretive challenge, the complex acrostic structure of the psalm, coupled with its seemingly repetitive emphasis on tora, can leave one stymied at best or, perhaps worse, somewhat jaded as to its homiletical possibilities.

At the beginning of the 20th century, noted German scholar Bernard Duhm puzzled over the length of this psalm (and its content) and concluded that this psalm is the “most empty product that has darkened a piece of paper.”² Such an assessment, however, fails to grapple with the theological undercurrents of tora. This intense reflection on God’s instruction invites us into the rich intersection between theological anthropology and theology proper; it invites us into the space where our understanding of the human condition finds its response in God’s faithful work through God’s word.

If, in our preaching, however, we fail to lead people to that same intersection, we run the risk of trivializing what it means to be a people of God’s word.

Tora as active, not acted upon

Regrettably, some have diminished the notion of tora so that it means little more than a “set of rules” to be obeyed; for some, tora is simply something we “do.” Such an obligatory sense of tora undercuts its transformative capacity on us—or, perhaps better yet, God’s capacity to transform us through it. James Mays reminds us that “in the psalm’s understanding of God’s way, tora is the means by which the LORD deals with human beings and they with the LORD.”³

As the Israelites leaned into God’s tora, they did not lean into a set of “laws” to be followed, but instead, they leaned into a God who sought to shape his people through his word. Perhaps our first homiletical move in dealing with this text is to invite our congregants to adopt a more vibrant understanding of tora. Following tora, following the ways of God, can never be construed as legalism. To the contrary, following this God always leads to life—a transformed life.

Tora as wonder-full

In the opening line of our text, the psalmist declares that God’s decrees are pele’, “wonderful.” At first glance, such a confession sounds merely descriptive, similar to how one might say a painting is “beautiful.” But by invoking this term, the psalmist is saying much more. The noun pele’ is used more than 33 times in the Psalter, most often in reference to God’s “wonder-filled work” in delivering Israel out of Egypt. But here we might do well to pause and remember:

God did not liberate a random group of people from Egypt so that they could one day become his people, but instead, he liberated his people from Egypt so that they might live into their identity as the people of God.

The “wonder-filled” work of God always seems to move in that trajectory—God liberating us so that we might discover our identity anew. The psalmist confesses that God’s instructions have this same liberating “wonder-working power,” and that is why “my soul keeps them” (verse 129).

In light of the first line, perhaps a second homiletical move might be to consider the places where the wonder-filled work of tora, the word of God, intersects with human life. When we are in darkness, God’s ways bring forth the light (verse 130). When we are in uncertainty, God’s decrees point us along right paths (verse 130). When we are weary-worn from searching, God’s instruction renews us.

These all seem like simple truisms, perhaps too simple to even mention to your congregation. But in the congregation where I minister, darkness, weariness, and uncertainty remain unabated, and people are panting in pursuit of a liberating word from God. Their lives are not where they want them to be, and they long for a sense of the divine pele’ that is at work in them and on them.

The world in light of the tora

God’s instruction not only transforms us, but it transforms how we see the world. There are those who might assume that careful attention to God’s instruction could lead to a sense of pious rigidity that places us over and against the world around us. Contemporary examples of such a mindset need not be called out because they are so pervasive within Christian circles. But not so with this psalmist. Rigidity is replaced with tears.

In Hebrew, the word for “tears” is peleg. This entire stanza is the pe stanza in this lengthy acrostic poem, and consequently, the first word of each line begins with a pe. Perhaps we would do well to pause and consider the juxtaposition between the first word in the opening line and the first word in the closing line, between pele’ and peleg, between “wonder-filled” and “tears.”

When God has God’s way with us and his instruction begins to form and transform our lives, then we see the world as it is, and we long for it as it could become. We do not simply long for people to “obey God’s law”; that is much too facile. Rather, we long for the wonder-filled work of God’s instruction that liberates us and frees us (verse 134), even as it satiates us (verse 131), to be extended. We long for that work to work on the world around us.

Notes

1. Commentary previously published on this website for July 26, 2020.
2. Bernard Duhm, Die Psalmen, Kurzer Hand-Kommentar zum Alten Testament, ed. D. Karl Marti (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1922), 727.
3. James Luther Mays, Psalms (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1994), 383.

The end of Romans 8 provides the preacher with a chance to declare boldly and unequivocally that  the Triune God is wholly, unremittingly, and irrevocably for us and loves us with a boundless and overwhelming love. God, who in Christ took on human fragility and weakness, meets our weakness again in the prayers of the Spirit (8:26–27) and the intercession of the Son (8:34). God’s love is demonstrated most fully in the death and resurrection of Christ, through whom we participate in God’s victory over sin and death as we rest securely in the embrace of God’s love in Christ Jesus (8:39). 

Prayers of the Spirit

The Spirit’s help in verse 26 follows closely on from the previous passage where Paul speaks about the posture of defiant hope that those who have the Spirit inhabit as they wait for God’s act of redemption (8:23–25). In verse 26, Paul makes clear that the Christian life, and indeed the character of Christian hope, is marked by the embrace of weakness. This is consistent across Paul’s letters, and Paul is likewise consistent in his insistence that God meets with us in our weakness and frailty. 

Preachers might notice the agency and the personhood of the Spirit in verses 26–27. The Spirit “helps us in our weakness” and “intercedes with groanings too deep for words.” Furthermore, God knows the “mind of the Spirit” because the Spirit intercedes for the saints. Not only is the Spirit personal in this passage, but the Spirit stands in solidarity with the children of God. In verses 23–25, the whole of creation is groaning, including those who have the Spirit. There is a deep longing within creation—within every creature—for God to redeem what is broken. 

For Paul, sin works to bring death to every facet of God’s good creation, and thus, we experience groaning for redemption in situations that feel intensely personal, such as the sudden illness or death of a loved one, in our communities, and globally. Sometimes these situations feel so overwhelming that words fail, and astoundingly, Paul assures believers that the Spirit joins our groaning with the Spirit’s own groaning that is “too deep for words.” 

God’s goodness and suffering

In verses 28–30 Paul makes the confident assertion that “we know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.” The context of the passage makes clear that Paul is not discounting the presence of suffering and hardship in the present, so verses 28–30 present the preacher with a theological challenge. If “all things work together for good,” does that mean that God causes suffering? Or does that make our suffering “good”? Paul’s own words in verses 31–39 suggests that his answer to both of these questions is a firm “no.” 

Rather, God’s goodness is so overwhelming and powerful that God is able to bring good out of any circumstance, even those circumstances that are painful and horrific. This does not mean that the painful and horrific circumstances become good in themselves but, rather, that in the midst of all things—even horrific things—God is faithful, and God is working to bring God’s goodness and glory to creation. We see God’s commitment to bringing goodness and redemption out of the horrific most fully in the death and resurrection of Jesus, and so we can be confident that God is still working to bring life and love in the midst of suffering and death as we await God’s final redemption in Christ’s return. 

Confidence in God’s love

In verses 31–39, Paul expresses his confidence in God’s unwavering love. Paul asks, “If God is for us, who is against us?” The answer Paul expects is “No one.” For Paul, there can be no question that God is wholly for us because God’s love for us has already been demonstrated through God’s self-giving in the Son. Jesus, whom the Father raised from the dead, is interceding on behalf of the saints, and therefore, no accusation can stand against those whom God has justified. 

Paul goes even further to assure his audience that nothing in all of creation can separate them from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. This was surely good news for Paul’s Roman audience when he wrote his letter in the mid-50s, but one wonders if they clung even more tightly to his promise when they faced Nero’s persecution in the 60s CE. 

For the preacher, the manner of God’s victory is as important to notice as the victory itself. God overcomes the powers of sin and death through God’s self-giving love. Paul describes the violence and suffering that still mark our creaturely existence: famine, hardship, persecution, and distress (8:35). One need only turn on the nightly news to see that these marks of sin and death’s reign are still present, and to notice that humans so often meet violence with more violence. 

In Christ, God does not meet our human violence with divine violence or retribution but, rather, takes on our human violence and overwhelms it with God’s self-giving love (8:32–34). In Christ, God promises to bring justice and wholeness through God’s overwhelming love. In Christ, God’s love has had the final word, and in Christ, the ending is sure.