Year
AParaphrases of the Scripture Lections
for Proper 7 - Year A - Sunday 2 June 2008
Lections from The Revised Common Lectionary.
Copyright 1992 by the Consultation on Common Texts (CCT)
P. O. Box 340003, Room 381, Nashville, TN 37203-0003, USA. Used with Permission.
* Genesis 21: 8-21
........Sarah nursed her son Isaac until he was about three years old, and on the day he was weaned, his father Abraham threw a big party to celebrate. But Sarah saw Ishmael — the son of Abraham and his Egyptian servant, Hagar — laughing at Isaac. She said to Abraham, “Get rid of that slave woman and her son. I don’t want my son Isaac having to share his inheritance with the son of a slave woman. Kick them out of here.”
........Abraham felt really cut up over this, because both of the boys were his sons. But God said to him, “Don’t stress over your servant and her son. Go along with whatever Sarah demands of you, because it is Isaac’s descendants who will be known as your offspring. But I know that Ishmael is also your son, so I will make sure his descendants become a great nation too.”
........So, early the next morning, Abraham got up and packed some food and water into a backpack and put it on Hagar’s shoulders. Then he sent her and the child away. She left and wandered aimlessly in the desert wilderness known as Beer-sheba. The water Abraham had packed for them soon ran out and, in despair, Hagar abandoned the child under a bush. She herself went and sat down about a hundred metres away because she couldn’t bear to watch the child die there in the desert. As she sat there, she cried loudly and bitterly. God heard the sounds of distress from the child and sent a messenger from heaven to speak to Hagar. The messenger said, “What is the matter, Hagar? You have got nothing to fear, because God has heard the boy crying where you left him. Come on. Pick the child up and don’t let go of him again, because I will make him the father of a great nation.”
........Then God opened her eyes and she spotted a small water hole. She refilled her water containers with clean water and gave the boy some to drink.
........God was on-side with Ishmael, and he grew up living in the wilderness and became an expert bushman and hunter. He lived in the desert at Paran, and his mother got a wife for him from her homeland, Egypt.
©2002 Nathan Nettleton LaughingBird.net
* Psalm 86: 1-10, 16-17
Tune in and answer my cries, LORD,
........because I have been left with nothing and no one.
Protect me and save my life,
........for I am your devoted servant and I trust you.
You are my God.
........All day long I cry out to you, Lord,
........begging you to give me a break.
Give me something to smile about, Lord,
........for I am your servant and I being up front with you.
After all, Lord, you are good and forgiving;
........full of unfailing love for those who look to you for help.
Tune in to my prayer, LORD,
........and give your attention to my plea for help.
This is the worst day of my life,
........but I’m confident you will answer my cry.
None of the things people worship compare to you, Lord;
........your actions are in a league of their own.
You made every nation, Lord,
........and they will all come and honour you,
........bowing down and naming you as the greatest.
So they should, given all the great and amazing things you do,
........for you are the one and only God.
I am your servant, Lord,
........and my mother was your servant too.
Take note of me, and treat me with compassion;
........save me and give me strength.
Give me a sign that you are on my side;
........something that will be seen by those who hate me
................and send them off with their tails between their legs.
You, LORD, have come to my help;
........you have given me comfort.
©2002 Nathan Nettleton LaughingBird.net
* Romans 6: 1b-11
........Do you think we should continue to sin in order to provide opportunities to showcase God’s generous forgiveness? No way! We have put to death our relationship with sin, so how could we possibly share another living moment with it? Surely you know that all of us who have been baptised into union with Christ were, in that baptism, dying with Christ. You will understand then, that having died in baptism, we have been buried with him; and so now, in the same way that Christ was raised from the dead by the awesome power of God, we too can re-enter life in a whole new way.
........You see, if we have been united with him in sharing the same kind of death, you can rest assured we will be united with him further in sharing the same kind of resurrection. We are no longer the people we used to be. Our former selves were put to death with him on the cross in order to eradicate the sin that had taken over our lives, and to thus allow us to live free of it. Everyone knows that death is the only escape from a sin-infested life — once you are dead, you are free of it. For us, though, that’s no dead-end solution. If we have died with Christ, we are convinced that we will live with him too. This much we know for sure: Christ has been raised from the dead and will never have to die again. Death has lost any further power over him. When he died, he took sin out with him, once and for all. The life he now lives, then, is lived in union with God. So you should now think of yourselves in the same way — your former lives, ended; your new lives, begun. Your old relationship with sin, dead; your new relationship with God, alive and flourishing in Christ Jesus.
©2001 Nathan Nettleton LaughingBird.net
* Matthew 10: 24-39
While briefing his followers about their mission, Jesus said:
.....
“New recruits do not get more credit than their coach, and workers do not get more credit than their boss. But when everyone is doing their job — recruits and coach, workers and boss — they are all lumped in together as a team and treated as one. So if people have been accusing the team leader of being the Prince of Evil, you can imagine what they are going to be saying about the rest of the team!
.....“So don’t be intimidated by them. The time is coming when the truth will be exposed and all that has been done behind closed doors will be on the public record. So don’t bother keeping the lid on things in the meantime. Broadcast to the world anything I tell you in private. Release to the daily news anything I whisper in your ear. Don’t be silenced by the threats of those whose ability to hurt you is only physical. The one whose tune you should be jumping to is the one who has the ultimate power of life and death over the whole of you, body and soul.
.....“Think about it. What does a pet budgie cost? A couple of bucks? And yet if a budgie falls off its perch, God is there like a concerned parent. God’s care extends to every last hair on your head, so don’t let anyone put the wind up you. You are worth far more than a tree-full of budgies to God.
.....“If you stick up for me in the face of public opinion, then I will have no hesitation sticking up for you when my Father in heaven asks the hard questions. But if you pull your head in and go all quiet when people mouth off against me, why should I speak up in your defence?
.....“Don’t make the mistake of thinking I’m here to make everything peaceful and nice on earth. I am not here to paper over the cracks, but to drive a wedge into them so that everyone will have to take sides: for and against.
My challenge will drive a wedge between father and son;“Some of you will find that the most extreme hostility and opposition comes from members of your own families. If you are more committed to your parents than you are to me, you don’t deserve my commitment to you. If you are more committed to your children than you are to me, you don’t deserve my commitment to you. Unless you are ready to risk defying the death squads to follow me, then you don’t deserve my loyalty to you. Those who are focussed on getting a life for themselves will lose whatever life they had; while those who give up their life, for me, will find that they have really got a life!”
between mother and daughter;
and between daughter-in-law and mother-in-law.