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30 October – 5 November 2016

Pass it on

Resources to share for DIY discipleship

To the leader: this page offers extracts from the ROOTS weekly resources to share with others in your church community to help them explore the Bible and grow as disciples.

Highlight and copy the text to print, email, or put it on your church website – pass it on! Please include the copyright acknowledgement to ROOTS that appears with the extracts.

When and where? ROOTS resources can be used all week. We’ve included some notes below to suggest when and where you might share them. Don’t forget house groups, youth groups, the housebound, care homes, toddler groups and school assemblies. See also: A guide to using Pass it on.

30 October 2016

Seeking and saving: Luke 19.1-10

Lectionary Bible readings, RCL Proper 26 Year C

Isaiah 1.10-18

Psalm 32.1-7

2 Thessalonians 1.1-4,11-12

Luke 19.1-10

We explore: reciprocal hospitality; God’s priorities; dramatic change.

Resources to share

To help the listener

Bible notes: Short version

Bible notes: Long version

The links between the lectionary readings

PostScript

Prayers

Live in faith

Children's Sheet

Picture pointers

To help the listener

To the leader: these brief notes help to set the scene for the readings.

When & where? Read out the notes before hearing the readings in worship; share on a weekly bulletin, church website, etc. with Bible references so that people can get more out of reading the passages for themselves.

The reader could use these words to provide context:

The prophet Isaiah warns rulers against worship that covers up the evils of injustice and oppression.
Jesus meets a member of a despised social class, whose transformed life is good news.

Bible notes

To the leader: we offer two sets of Bible notes each week. The short version comes from the Children & Young People resources and the long version is from the Adult & All Age resources. You could share a version to help people learn more about the reading.

When & where? Before or after we hear the reading in worship; in a Bible study group; distributed to people who can’t get to the service; in a youth group.

Short version

Luke 19.1-10

The story of Zacchaeus is about a real person, rather than a parable, and an unlikely role model for rich Christians in Luke’s church. It is a multi-layered story of inquisitive approach, repentance, dramatic change and restitution.
Zacchaeus’ abundant wealth is derived from imposing Roman taxes on an occupied people, and collecting extra levies. As chief tax collector he would have subcontracted the work, which made it open to further abuse. Great wealth and power is usually associated with high status, yet he is reviled by his neighbours. This is a classic cause of stress and may have contributed to his odd behaviour in climbing a tree to see Jesus.
Jesus takes the initiative by speaking to Zacchaeus and is rewarded with the tax collector’s hospitality. Jesus meets many people around the meal table and makes it a place of reconciliation. As Jesus is welcomed into Zacchaeus’ home, so he welcomes Zacchaeus into God’s kingdom and inspires radical change. Zacchaeus’ offer to reimburse those he has defrauded goes far beyond the biblical law of restitution (Leviticus 6.5).
In the Old Testament, Isaiah offensively describes Israel’s leaders as no better than the oppressive rulers of Sodom and Gomorrah (Isaiah 1.10), saying that their animal sacrifices and ritual washing are pointless if they ignore injustice. But God is not concerned about offence if the end result is radical salvation, whether that is blood-stained sin bleached clean like snow (v.18), or a corrupt tax man restored to God and his community.

Long version

Old Testament: Isaiah 1.10-18

Isaiah prophesied during the reigns of four kings of Judah in the second half of the eighth century BC, when the Assyrian empire dominated the region. The ‘book’ that bears his name is the longest single prophetic collection in the Bible, and includes material from nearly three centuries. Isaiah 1 is an introductory collection of poems and fragments. Verses 10-18 are difficult to date. Their critique of worship in the face of injustice is common to several prophets (see also Jeremiah 7.21ff.; Hosea 6.4ff.; Amos 5.21-24; Micah 6.6-8), and also appears in the Psalms (e.g. Psalm 40.6; 51.1-17).

Isaiah accuses Israel’s leaders of making their land no better than that of the archetypal symbols of inhospitable oppression, Sodom and Gomorrah (see Genesis 19). Temple worship may well be flourishing, with its animal sacrifices (v.11), incense (v.13), prayers (v.15) and ritual washing (v.16), but by ignoring injustice, worshippers have the wrong sort of blood on their hands. Their attempts at cleansing are merely superficial, and God is simply not interested (vv.15-17).

The wellbeing of the groups mentioned in verse 17 should be a particular concern of rulers (see Psalm 72). So the prophet demands an altogether different kind of worship, which will benefit rather than disregard those at the sharp end of an unfair society. Rulers too have much to gain: their sins will be healed and transformed as dramatically as the bleaching of blood (v.18).

Gospel: Luke 19.1-10

After last week’s fictional hero, Luke introduces us to a real tax collector. Jesus has already been criticised for mixing with his kind (Luke 5.30; 15.1ff.). Zacchaeus becomes an unlikely role model for rich Christians in Luke’s church, a perfect foil for the respectable and well-intentioned rich man who is unable to rise to Jesus’ demands and who is left disappointed (18.18-23).

The Romans contracted out the collection of taxes to locals. As chief tax collector in the Jericho area, Zacchaeus would have further subcontracted the work. Taxes were levied on a wide range of goods and services – land, agricultural produce, fish, imports and exports – as well as on individuals. Collection was open to abuse from the additional levies that tax collectors were free to impose. This was a risky business run by disreputable people, some of whom profited greatly at the expense of their own people. So it is not difficult to imagine why Zacchaeus and his kind were regarded with such widespread contempt.

We are not told why Zacchaeus wants to see Jesus. And Jesus seems to take at least as much initiative (v.10), thereby realising the message of the parables of the ‘lost’ in chapter 15. If the fractured family of Abraham is to be healed, a spirit of compassion is needed (see 18.13). For his part, Zacchaeus is prepared to invest his commission in the poor, as well as the victims of the unfair imperial economics that he represents (he pays back far more than the law of restitution in Leviticus 6.5 and Numbers 5.7 requires). The story shows how hospitality and generosity are among the hallmarks of a down-to-earth vision of salvation that would surely fulfil the hopes of Isaiah and the prophets.

Rowan Williams notices the significance of Jesus’ being on the receiving end of hospitality here (vv.6-8). Jesus’ welcome sets people free to invite him into their lives, and to embrace others, too. This turns the Eucharist into a parable of salvation, in which, says Williams, ‘we are welcomed and we welcome; we welcome God and we welcome our unexpected neighbours’.

(Rowan Williams, Being Christian: Baptism, Bible, Eucharist, Prayer, 2014, SPCK p.43, ISBN 978 0281071715).

The links between the lectionary readings

The vision of salvation in the Gospel has far more in common with Isaiah than with 2 Thessalonians. Paul’s extravagant language in 1.7-10 drives a deep divide between believers and the rest. Isaiah, Jesus and Luke are far from shy in offering sharp critique – particularly of the self-contained and self-satisfied – but they also seek to heal the wounds of the divided family of Abraham.

PostScript: Turning life around

To the leader: this reflection and comment on current news and events is written afresh each week and appears on the ROOTS website by Thursday morning.

When & where? Useful for sermon preparation; includes a prayer that can be used in worship and questions for young people. You could share it after the Sunday service or use in house/youth groups sessions.

Prayers

To the leader: these prayers support individual and family prayer life during the week.

When & where? Print/email them in a bulletin, post on your website.

A personal prayer

Lord, there are things I want to change in my life,

but I don’t know how – my priorities, my busy-ness,

my need to have, and to be in charge.

Where I am anxious, make me adventurous;

where I am driven, help me to rest;

where responsibilities overwhelm me, help me to be realistic;

where my quiet time has slipped away, help me to make space for you;

that when the demands of each day come knocking at the door,

I may welcome them with a sense of peace, not resentment or fear.

Help me to change today, Lord.

Amen.

A way into prayer

Think about people or groups of people that are on your conscience: for example, those you haven’t written to or emailed or visited, those you haven’t prayed for. Imagine a table and invite God to bless each one of those people/groups as they come to sit with you. At the end of your prayer time, try to contact one person who was at your imaginary table.

A prayer for all ages together

Begin by saying: ‘Zacchaeus climbed a tree because he wanted to see Jesus. What do we want to see?’

Then, in turn, each person stands up to speak their words, beginning with, ‘I want to see…’ (e.g. justice for the poor/an end to cruelty to animals/more opportunities for young people).

A children’s prayer

Forgive us, Lord, when we only invite

our friends to eat or play with us,

and not those who are lonely.

As you have been kind to us,

so may we be kind to others. Amen.

Live in faith

To the leader: these are suggestions, linked to this week’s Bible reading, for putting faith into action.

When & where? Print/email them in a bulletin, post on your website.

For children

Encourage the children to look out for someone who is left out or lonely this week. They could try to include them in a game or invite them round for tea.

For young people

Think of someone with whom you don’t normally spend much time, and whom you could take for a drink at a café or invite to your home. Then take/invite them.

For adults

Donate one good thing to a local charity shop that works on behalf of the poor.

Children’s Sheet

To the leader: a question to ponder, a picture to colour, activities, a prayer, and a related book/film to share, aimed at 5- to 9-year-olds.

When & where? Print it out for families to take away, email it to families each week.

This week's Children's sheets

Picture pointers

To the leader: a picture from this week’s resources with questions for reflection and discussion.

When & where? Use in a house group, project as people prepare to worship, share after the Sunday service.

This week's Picture Pointers

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