Pastor John Wright

This Sunday’s Scriptures are an important opportunity to reflect on the details of our lives in light of the biggest picture possible. We live in a world that has taught us to think and live “pragmatically” – what’s practical. I read yesterday a good definition of pragmatism as “’A doctrine according to which truth is a relation, entirely immanent to human experience, whereby knowledge is subordinated to activity, and the truth of a proposition consists in its utility and satisfactoriness. . . . In relations with God, act as you do in your relations with people.” There is no norm of convictions, or loyalties, or truthfulness.
The problem with this is that nothing is “naturally” practical or pragmatic, because all our lives and activities have goals or purposes or ends already embedded within them. What looks “practical” or “pragmatic” with one goal or end in mind, could be horribly “impractical” given another purpose, goal, or end. Of course, Christians must commit themselves to a norm of convictions, loyalties, and truthfulness as Christians must ultimately confess their end in God. Our Scripture passages this week help us to think of our practical activities in light of our end in God.

Jeremiah 17:5-10
The Jeremiah passage has strong language. Why is trust in “mere mortals” bad? How does “pragmatism” lead to such a trust? Why is it blessed to trust in the Lord? What is this renewing?
Given these two directions, or ends, in life, why does the passage seemingly turn motifs to talk about the heart’s deviousness versus the Lord’s testing?

1 Cor. 15:12-20

How does Christ's resurrection change our perception about the end, purpose, goal of our lives? How does this passage relate to the Jeremiah passage? Why would it be that "if for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied"? Obviously the resurrection requires faith; it is not contrary to reason, but reason cannot "prove" the resurrection -- we can only say why the conviction that Christ is raised from the dead is "reasonable" and the importance of its implications. Why would Christians deny the resurrection to focus solely upon life in this world? What happens to the church when we become focused stricly on "this life only"? Is the only option to focus solely on "the life that is to come"? How do we order the relationships between "this life" and "the life that is to come"?

Luke 6: 17-26

This passage begins with Jesus healing persons of their illnesses. How does this set the stage for the teachings to follow?

What is required for the blessings and curses to make sense to us, not merely abstractly, but for our life in this age? How does this passage relate to the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15 and Jeremiah's sayings? Of what must we be convinced to see participation in a group described by Luke 6 as a "pragmatic" way to live our lives? How would a strictly pragmatic response relate to Luke 6?

Maybe it might be a good conversation to talk about the relationship between the three passages. What does this say about our life as a congregation, the body of Christ, and you, individually members of it?

Have a wonderful evening!