Rev Chris Roth

  Song of Solomon 2:8-13;  Psalm 45:1-2, 6-9;  James 1:17-27;  Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 Our readings today play off of each other in an interesting way. First, we have the Song of Songs, which is also called the Song of Solomon. It’s a bit of an odd book. If you read it outside of the context of the Bible, you might not see why it should be in the Bible. It seems to be a kind of love poem. And at times it is a bit risqué. Some Jewish children weren’t allowed to read it until they were thirteen because of some of its sexual content. It doesn’t even really talk about God. … A second century Rabbi, Rabbi Akiva, was asked by his students if the book should be in the Bible at all. He replied,  “Heaven forbid that any man in Israel ever disputed that the Song of Songs [is holy], for the whole world is not worth the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel, for all the Writings are holy, and the Song of Songs is the Holy of Holies” (Mishnah Yadaim 3.5). [1] ...

  1 Kings 8:1,6,10-11, 22-30, 41-43 ;  Psalm 84 ;  Ephesians 6:10-20 ;  John 6:56-69 The Church has always taught the importance, and even the sacredness, of creation. We haven’t always lived up to that teaching, but the teaching is ancient, nonetheless. The Early Church faced the Gnostics (a complicated and diverse movement) who believed that the material world was evil and that we had to learn to be freed from this material ‘prison’. They even denied that Jesus had a physical body because they couldn’t imagine a divine being dirtying themselves by getting mixed up with physical matter, and the bodily functions that would come along with that. So, for them, Jesus only ‘seemed’ human. To them, he was a kind of hologram produced for our benefit, but not a real human being. The Early Church fought this Gnostic tendency. They asserted that Jesus did have a physical body, and that his physical body was resurrected and ascended into heaven. They asserted that God created ...