People's Prayers: Prayers of the People: Fearing Fear ~ 6th Sunday after Pentecost WLWC* ‘25 Yr C

For Sunday, July 20, 2025; Readings: Baruch 2:11-15, 19-23; Psalm 18:2-11, 16-17;

2 Thessalonians 2:1-8; Luke 12:4-7

Harken, Holy One, to our prayer and petition and deliver us…grant us favor…so that all the earth may know that you are the Holy One our God. [Baruch 2:14a,c; 15-a]

The ROCK WHO GAVE US BIRTH is my rock, my fortress, and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge…In my distress I called upon she who hears… [Psalm 18:2, 6a]

…with regard to the coming of our Redeemer Jesus Christ…Be not quickly shaken in mind…nor by word or letter, seeming to have come from us, claiming the day of the Savior is here now…Let no one deceive you all in any way. For it will not come unless the rebellion comes first and the revealing of the lawless one, the one born for destruction…self-exalted…self-proclaimed to be God. [2 Thess 2:3-4]

…fear the one who, after killing, has power to cast into hell. Yes! I am telling you all, fear that one. Are not 5 sparrows sold for two copper coins? And not a single one of them is forgotten before God...Fear not; you all are worth many sparrows. [Luke 12:5b-6, 7b]

The readings for this week begin with the generally obscure Baruch, a scribe for and companion of Jeremiah. His writing is not found in Hebrew Scripture or Evangelical Christian Bibles (NIV, ESV, etc.) but is in the Bibles of Orthodox and Roman Catholicism in the deuterocanonical or second canon. The apocrypha or hidden books, are the same as those in the deuterocanonical but they are in a separate section. They are generally placed between the Hebrew Testament and the Christian Testament in Protestant Bibles such as the New Oxford Annotated Bible, The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), etc., and not considered as part of the official Canonical books of Scripture, yet relevant. Biblical scholars may have issues with authenticity of authorship and content yet feel that the work still contributes to greater understanding.

In this reading from Baruch, those in exile are pleading to be released, begging for mercy, and confessing their sin of turning away from God, ignoring God’s Commandments. They are turning back toward God ~ repenting ~ and asking for God for restoration.

Jeremiah and Baruch are in that liminal space, the in-between space, on the verge of something, between what was and what will be. From the blessings of God to the wondering, worrying, pondering the what-if—what-if-not space that all of us find at one or many times in life. IF I get the job, or can’t pay the rent again, if my lab results are…, if the car breaks down, if I lose my health insurance, if grandma is tossed out of the nursing home, and an endless list of what current everyday-people face and also, many facing actual exile to a country not their own.

The psalm is set before the fall of the Temple in the year 70 CE/AD, in a 7 month siege by the Romans. The psalmist speaks to God’s power and glory and the solace in praying with hymns and poetry set to music. Even in the dark wilderness of exile, God’s presence carries the faithful and calls to those who have abandoned their faith to turn back.

The true writer of 2 Thessalonians isn’t clear and in this Letter, Paul or another, understands that Thessalonica’s Jesus Movement has different issues than the exiled Israelites did, however, they are living in their own land under the foreign rule of Rome. Yet this community of believers have new voices and writings in addition to the comfort of their familiar scriptures. Paul and others keep the message of Jesus alive and growing ~ with the message that God is always present, and knowing the endurance needed and the struggles to keep faith alive, God has not forgotten them. Yet there is also an important message to them and to us in this letter ~ that we are not to allow ourselves to be deceived by others neither by spirit nor word nor letter...claiming the day of the Savior is here now. I'm sure many of us have heard all too often that "the end times are upon us" because of this or that event as has been said throughout known history. It will come when it will come and we will not know, as we've been told in the Gospels, the day or the hour. The “Word” in Christ will overcome as he bids us to “fear not.”

We, who have never experienced exile to a foreign land to escape violent rule, or have one’s country of origin stolen by ruthless invaders, to see children, women, and men simply held hostage and/or massacred to instill deep fear and induce subservience. Yet it is all around us in our own time and has never gone away. Indulgence in too many available and distracting activities can keep us blissfully and intentionally unaware of the desperation of those around us. We are called by the faith we claim to read more deeply into the realities of those we consider as “others” and “less than” and “irrelevant” to imagine the parallel “what ifs” for ourselves. But we don’t always recognize, or perhaps try to ignore, the impact of our own fears of political upheaval, a life-threatening family medical issue, or now, having our children, family, and friends, young or grown, traveling away from us, because of the horrible weather event in a camp in Texas, as if we are suddenly aware of such occurrences.

Jesus is preparing his disciples to carry on his work. They are understandably afraid, perhaps even terrified, and he and they know the persecution they will face. He tells them not to worry about people who kill you because they can’t do anything more to you after you’re dead. (So, um, thanks for that?) He tells them to be afraid of the one who has the power to send you to hell. Then an abrupt shift to the selling of sparrows seems awkward to us but they knew what we generally do not. Sparrows in that time were being sold to the poor as cheap food. Looking at the size of several species of sparrows at my bird feeders, it would take a lot of pairs of sparrows just for lunch. Their price then of 2 copper coins, has less value than one of our US pennies today. But Jesus makes the point that although they were of little worth to be sold at such a price, the little feathered ones that, like us, were created by God are not forgotten. So, therefore, while we may face imagined and unimagined terrors and danger, God is with us and our worth is far more than little birds. Does that help relieve the fear, not really, but if we can hold onto that presence we can endure, if feebly at times, by helping ourselves and others to muddle through.

Fearing the fear in every era, of the “what ifs” in life creates more fear and can lead to a paralysis of one’s spirit. Simplicity in and of faith can move the mountains of anxiety into smaller rocks and pebbles that can become spiritual steppingstones for us to move forward or even backward, when life circumstance seems to stop us in our tracks. The old saying “Life happens when we’re making other plans” applies. When fearing fear takes hold breathe deeply, remember that everything ~ the good, the bad, the weather, the politics ~ is cyclical; keep walking, and when the mountain appears, whisper to Jesus hold me close and remember that we and them and everyone are worth more to God than many sparrows. Meanwhile, I hear them chirping as I write and it’s time to fill their feeders…

LET US, GOD’S PEOPLE, PRAY

Leader: ~ Holy One, Our God, may our prayers and petitions for mercy reach you, SHE WHO HEARS. Grant us your favor and save us from our times of trial. Keep us away from the deceptions and false promises of those who self-exalt themselves as gods, born for destruction and lawlessness, until our Christ returns to free us forever.