Fourth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 9), July 6, 2025: 2 Kings 5:1-14;
Psalm 30; Galatians 6:(1-6)7-16; Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
For the third week in a row, the epistle is a reading from Galatians. As you all remember, Paul is engaged in an extended argument about what is necessary for Christians: do those who were not Jews now have to follow all the Jewish law? Is there another way in? Paul is on the side of welcoming outsiders, making them part of the community without raising barriers.
Today’s reading focuses on what we do, and what it means. “You reap whatever you sow“, Paul writes. This is toward the end of his argument about the importance of Jewish law; he is not opposed to the law, but he is not imposing it on those who are not already Jewish. So the people who will reap what they sow are those who are insisting that all converts to Christianity also follow Jewish law. They are living according to their world, closing doors and excluding. Instead, he argues, they should be transformed by the spirit, creating a new community, and reap eternal life from the Spirit.
Paul knows this is not easy. “Let us not grow weary in doing what is right … when we have the opportunity, let us work for the good of all“. Not our private good, our individual good, but that of all. It’s worth noting that this does not mean forgetting your own needs, but placing them in community. This is what really matters: not the law, but “a new creation“. That is everything. In being transformed by the spirit, we are part of a new creation, a new order. Actions have consequences, we tell children, usually when they misbehave. But Paul is interested in what happens when we follow Jesus. We are transformed. You reap whatever you sow.
Today’s gospel is one that always reminds me how hard it was to follow Jesus. It too focuses on actions and consequences. Jesus has appointed the seventy (considerably more than the twelve disciples) to go in pairs to all the towns he planned to go to. They are to “carry no purse, no bag, no sandals” and be focused on their mission: to preach the kingdom of God, to heal the sick. If they enter a town and are accepted, good, but if not, leave. The seventy are to count on finding people who will house them and feed them: they have no money. It’s scary. Yet they succeed, and return “with joy” describing their success. And Jesus pushes back: they should not be proud that they had cured those who were possessed, but instead should be proud that their names were “written in heaven”.
It is difficult in our world to turn away from what we are required to do every day. Yet our readings today ask us to do so, to focus on the requirements of the spirit, of God. Those standards are different. They ask us to trust God: Jesus’s followers are to be housed and fed. They have needs. But those needs are met in new ways.
These readings remind us that the spirit who descended on the disciples at Pentecost is still with us. If we are attuned to the spirit, we will welcome all to our community of faith, only asking that they follow Jesus. That welcoming and inclusive community, focused on the good of all, not just its leaders, will indeed be a new creation.
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