TGBC: what do YOU think?

The Good Book Club
FRIDAY, March 16. Luke 17:11-37

 On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, they called out, saying, ‘Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!’ When he saw them, he said to them, ‘Go and show yourselves to the priests.’ And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice.

He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus asked, ‘Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?’ Then he said to him, ‘Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.’

 Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, ‘The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, “Look, here it is!” or “There it is!” For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.’

 Then he said to the disciples, ‘The days are coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it. They will say to you, “Look there!” or “Look here!” Do not go, do not set off in pursuit. For as the lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of Man be in his day. But first he must endure much suffering and be rejected by this generation. Just as it was in the days of Noah, so too it will be in the days of the Son of Man. They were eating and drinking, and marrying and being given in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed all of them.Likewise, just as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building, but on the day that Lot left Sodom, it rained fire and sulphur from heaven and destroyed all of them—it will be like that on the day that the Son of Man is revealed. On that day, anyone on the housetop who has belongings in the house must not come down to take them away; and likewise anyone in the field must not turn back. Remember Lot’s wife. Those who try to make their life secure will lose it, but those who lose their life will keep it. I tell you, on that night there will be two in one bed; one will be taken and the other left.There will be two women grinding meal together; one will be taken and the other left.’ Then they asked him, ‘Where, Lord?’ He said to them, ‘Where the corpse is, there the vultures will gather.’

THOUGHTS FOR FRIDAY. The leper who returned is pointedly a Samaritan, an enemy for all the reasons discussed here before. The nine lepers who did not return to give thanks presumably were not Samaritans but Galileans, Jews not foreigners? If Jesus is right though, Samaritans also are within the love of God, and are grateful. This is shocking. Going and showing themselves to the priests completes the requirement for ritual cleansing. The story shows the gospel that the lovingkindness of God and God's dunamis, healing power, is open to Gentiles. It also hints, for benefit of the early Christian church, why the church is rapidly losing its Jewish roots and becoming more and more Gentile.  

Luke still and always has Jerusalem as Jesus’ destiny as a prophet. The story also shows that Luke has no grasp of the geography from Galilee through Samaria to Judea and Jerusalem, but that is of no consequence except from a criticism perspective to discern that Luke was not a Jew, not a Palestinian.

Once again, except that the coming of the Son of Man may be an apocalyptic concept, Jesus, unlike Paul, does not seem to understand the Kingdom of God as an end time event, but as present here and now (“the kingdom of God is among you”); however, Luke’s description here is definitely an end time scenario. The conversation needs YOUR input: what do YOU think was Jesus’ view of the kingdom of God? Did Jesus’ kingdom view accord with that of the church as it later developed?

On a personal note, because this is still and all MY blog. Early to bed again last night, asleep before the sun went down as in RLS Bed in Summer:
In winter I get up at night  
And dress by yellow candle-light.   
In summer, quite the other way,   
I have to go to bed by day.   
   
I have to go to bed and see          
The birds still hopping on the tree,   
Or hear the grown-up people’s feet   
Still going past me in the street.   
   
And does it not seem hard to you,   
When all the sky is clear and blue,   
And I should like so much to play,   
To have to go to bed by day?

it just don’t seem right, do it? though at this age, to bed by day is play. But mixing in Exhausting Day + change to Daylight Saving Time + switching back and forth between Central Time and Eastern Time = my mind no longer knows WTH time it is. So up for the day at two o’clock EDT, coffee and open blog. Going to lunch with dear old friends at 1:00 PM means that a new (old to me, I did it all those Navy years) practice of only coffee until 12 noon won’t work today. Breakfast then: salmon salad sandwich topped with slice of cheddar on extra thin ww bread alerts kitty cats. Moral of story: do not turn back on sandwich even to get another cup of black coffee.  

In lieu of television - - to avoid sickening politics amid brave and determined students who ultimately will be ignored and waited out by evil, selfish, greedy politicians who, elected by you, value “rights” over the lives of schoolchildren, and who are too owned to be ashamed - - interesting and fun reading matter last evening and this morning:
and also. When my grandparents, my father, and my father’s sisters Ruth and Marguerite (Evalyn was away at college in Tallahassee) left St Andrews that day in 1923, selling the Old Place and fleeing unending agony and guilt over the death of Alfred, they drove two cars to their new home far from the sea in Ocilla, Georgia: a Model T Ford touring car, and a Hudson touring car. Mom's chickens in cages strapped to the running boards of both cars, as I have said before. Pop driving, with Mom and Marguerite in the Hudson; Ruth and my father (age 11) driving the Ford. I can easily visualize the Ford. But I never asked either Pop or my father anything about the Hudson, and still am trying to fix a picture in my mind. Search and find a couple of candidates:

1919 Hudson above, or perhaps 1923 Hudson below?