Eight Maids A-Milking
The eighth day of Christmas my true love gave to me eight maids a-milking, and here I am with my standard skeptical cynicism about most things religious, including Christianizing a memory-challenge penalty rewards game-song in which members of an increasingly more inebriated group of friends or family try to remember the gifts for each day as they sing the verses over and over and over!
Anyway, here's what Artificial Intelligence has to say about the song that one somewhat caustic writer called "the holiday's most annoying carol."
AI Overview
- Blessed are the poor in spirit
- Blessed are those who mourn
- Blessed are the meek
- Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness
- Blessed are the merciful
- Blessed are the pure in heart
- Blessed are the peacemakers
- Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake
What I really have in mind though - - as I wish you Happy New Year and Harry Golden's words to ward off the Evil Eye, from the Yiddish neighborhood of his memories, Wishing You Long Years, and Wishing You A Hundred and Twenty Years - - is the gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday, 5 January 2025.
There are three options, and even as I fiddle with a sermon for the morning, I have no idea which story I will see in the bulletin when I climb into the pulpit at HNEC at the eight o'clock Eucharist.
Here are the three options:
The Gospel
Matthew 2:13-15,19-23
After the wise men had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him." Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, "Out of Egypt I have called my son."
When Herod died, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother, and go to the land of Israel, for those who were seeking the child's life are dead." Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And after being warned in a dream, he went away to the district of Galilee. There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, "He will be called a Nazorean."
or
Luke 2:41-52
The parents of Jesus went to Jerusalem every year for the festival of the Passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up as usual for the festival. When the festival was ended and they started to return, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. Assuming that he was in the group of travelers, they went a day's journey. Then they started to look for him among their relatives and friends. When they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem to search for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him they were astonished; and his mother said to him, "Child, why have you treated us like this? Look, your father and I have been searching for you in great anxiety." He said to them, "Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" But they did not understand what he said to them. Then he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them. His mother treasured all these things in her heart.
And Jesus increased in wisdom and in years, and in divine and human favor.
or
Matthew 2:1-12
In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, "Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage." When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, "In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet:
`And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for from you shall come a ruler
who is to shepherd my people Israel.'"
Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, "Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage." When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.
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There are a couple of good old Time Sunday school Bible story favorites of course, "The Coming of the Magi" and "Jesus in the Temple at Age Twelve" but also the story of the Holy Family's flight to Egypt to escape Herod's murderous fears and wrath.
All three are great stories, and I'm okay with whatever, as what I'm coming up with for my pulpit Time can accommodate any of them. Sunday is the day before January 6 Epiphany, and all three stories are epiphanic in nature.
Including Matthew with his gospel for members of his Jewish Christian Church - - the Visit of the Magi calls on Hebrew scripture to witness Jesus as the long expected Jewish Messiah - - as does the Escape to Egypt. Writing maybe about 85 AD, Matthew is in a near panic situation because Jews in his Jewish Christian congregation are abandoning the Church to return to their families' traditional Judaism.
There are at least a couple of reasons for that!
One is that to the Jewish members, the church is being defiled as more and more Gentiles come to Christ and especially as Gentiles take on leadership roles in the church that originally was understood as a messianic sect of Judaism.
Another is that the church is developing its theology that Jesus Christ was not only a Son of God as David was (indeed, historically, beginning with king Saul, all the Jewish kings as anointed messiahs were thought of as sons of God), but the astonishing (and to the Jews blasphemous) belief that Jesus Christ was not simply "God's Only Son," but "God the Son," a divinity in strictly monotheistic Judaism - - and
Jews who had gone over to the church recognizing Jesus as the expected new messiah (anointed king to reestablish the throne of David) were not prepared to accept a man made into God. And their family members at home are warning them to either leave the church or be disowned from the family. So, Matthew's agenda is to convince his audience of Jewish Christians to stay with the church and with Jesus.
That was too long, sorry, it's my wandering nature, but there you go.
Luke's story of Jesus in the Temple at age 12, astonishing the temple elders, is also an epiphany about who Jesus is. It's an epiphany for those elders who are so astonished with his knowledge and wisdom; it's an epiphany for Mary and Joseph as Jesus tells his mother (KJV), "Wist ye not that I must be in my Father's house, and about my Father's business?" (I mean, after all, earlier in Luke's gospel, Mary was told by the angel who Jesus would be, so she shouldn't have been surprised). At any event this is his messianic Coming Out); and it's an epiphany for us as Luke's agenda for his gospel: to proclaim Christ.
Further, for Luke, Jesus in Jerusalem and in the Temple as his rightful place and where he belongs, is a central theme of Luke's gospel story. Luke begins in the Temple, places Jesus in the Temple from his circumcision, brings Jesus back to Jerusalem and the Temple, and reports Jesus dying in Jerusalem. So this gospel story is totally consistent with all that Luke has to say.
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Finally and again, I'm good with all three stories, and I'm thinking that in my pulpit Time this coming Sunday, I may also reveal some things about my own story - - as epiphanic in nature.
So, there you go!
RSF&PTL
T89&c