This is the third of a four-week worship series on troubling texts from the Bible. We have chosen stories from the Hebrew scripture which are often neglected because of the difficulty of the content. Our hope is to wrestle with these stories and see what meaning may lie hidden beneath the difficult circumstances of the women’s lives that are depicted. This week our worship will focus on the story of an unnamed woman from Judges 19:1-30.
Thank you for completing your Deep Commitments. Our Finance Team will meet next week to begin outlining a budget for 2017. Similarly, Matt and I will begin envisioning worship series for the coming year based on the commitments we’ve received. Here is a link to the online form.
OUTLINE: Closer Readings of Troubling Texts
A four-week worship series on troubling texts from the Bible.
October 30: Hagar’s Story
Scripture: Genesis 16:1-16; 21:9-21
November 6: Tamar’s Story
Scripture: 2 Samuel 13:1-22
November 13: An Unnamed Woman
Scripture: Judges 19:1-30
November 20: Jephthah’s Daughter
Scripture: Judges 11:29-40
If your group did not read the paragraphs from our United Methodist Social Principles we sent last week, consider doing so this week.
We continue to recognize the intensity and trauma found in the stories we are reading for this worship series. Once again this week please do your best to be attentive to the feelings individuals in your group might be experiencing as we reflect on these biblical stories. If, at any point, a person is overwhelmed with emotion, please do your best to lead the group into a time of prayer and hold the space for God’s healing presence to be with you. Please let me or Matt know immediately if you would like to process anything that emerges or if you would like us to meet with anyone individually.
In this week’s story from Judges 19:1-30, a Levite from Ephraim sets out for Bethlehem to be reconciled with his concubine (which could also be translated as wife) who has recently left him to stay with her father. Judges 19.3 states: Then her husband set out after her, to speak tenderly to her and bring her back.
The Levite man sets out to speak tenderly, but ultimately fails in horrifying ways. Before turning to the atrocity of his story, invite your Kitchen Table to reflect upon relationships in their own lives in which they have become estranged. Who in your own family or friendship circles has drifted away from you? How might you speak tenderly to this person? What do you imagine tender words might accomplish? Who would you like to receive tender words from in your own life? How do you imagine this would feel for you?
Once your group has had an opportunity to share, read silently together the story of the unnamed woman from Judges 19:1-30.
Judges 19.30 concludes this section: “Consider it, take counsel, and speak out.’”
Feminist Biblical scholar Phyllis Trible writes, “Silence covers impotence and complicity. To keep quiet is to sin, for the story orders its listeners to “direct your heart to her, take counsel, and speak” (Texts of Terror). This horrifying story is echoed today as women continue to experience being trafficked. Too often women today remain unnamed and disposable. How might we recognize, resist and interrupt these cycles of violence What counsel do you need to seek to learn more about human trafficking? In what ways might you speak out?
Share this prayer with your Kitchen Table:
ONE: Loving God, help us to remember that all people
are made in your image and are worthy of care, love and respect.
When we have ignored the needs of the most vulnerable people;
ALL: Forgive us.
ONE: When we have believed the powerful and disregarded the cries of the voiceless;
ALL: Forgive us.
ONE: We pray for each other, remembering: Those who find themselves in despair today;
ALL: God of grace: Hear our prayer.
ONE: Help us to transform our church into a place of safety, where we can tell our stories; where we can choose to show the scars of wounded bodies, hearts and minds; where there is the possibility of healing and a willingness to stand as pain bearers for one another.
ALL: God who bears all things, help us.
Amen.