Tough Texts

Walter Sundberg also writes, "He told me he was teaching a summer school course on Mark and that he decided to let the students pick the passage. They found one quickly: Mark 4:11-12 … It is the hard passages of the Bible that grab our attention. They are the ones about which we want to learn. … My colleague's next comment, delivered in an ironic tone, was especially interesting. 'Naturally,' he said, 'Mark 4:11-12 does not appear in the lectionary.' I understood what he meant. … But one does notice that the gospels, which are read according to the principle of lectio continua, are not read in their entirety. This makes one curious as to what is left out and by what criteria."

There are many passages that are neither in our current three year lectionary nor the Historic one year lectionary. You may look for yourself to see if your favorite passages are included. I have a friend that has noticed that several of the texts he has been preaching on lately do not appear in the Lectionary at all. Walter Sundberg will also give you more texts which are not included. I do not know the reason for their exclusion. Some people will point out that there are texts left out of the Three year Lectionary which are included in the Historic One year Lectionary. These people say it is for Theological reasons.

I have been convinced by my use of the Revised Common Lectionary and Lutheran Service Book Three Year Lectionary that there are theological reasons for differences. Committees which developed these lectionaries have used their theological Biases upon Scripture. This means that in some cases the harder texts are removed. Luther would have decided to avoid Revelation, and James, while Roman Catholics may avoid Romans and Ephesians. We will deal with this more later.

But the point here is that more texts need to be added. We need to take out our biases toward different texts. Lutherans need to handle the works texts and others need to handle grace texts while yet even others need to handle predestination texts. The entire scripture should be found in our weekly readings. Thank you.

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