Patristic Wisdom: Looking to the Third Sunday in Advent

When the Lord returned the captives of Zion,
We became like those who are comforted.
Then our mouth was filled with joy,
And our tongue with exceeding joy.
Then they shall say among the Gentiles,
“The Lord did great things with them.”
The Lord has done great things with us;
We were glad.
Return, O Lord, our captivity
Like streams in the south.
Those who sow with tears
Shall reap with exceeding joy.
They went forth and wept,
Carrying their seeds with them;
But they shall return with exceeding joy,
Carrying their sheaves. (Ps 126)

Consider, my brethren, what this means: “As torrents are turned in the south, so turn our captivity” (Ecclus 3:15). In a certain passage, Scripture says in admonishing us concerning good works, “Your sins also shall melt away, even as the ice in fair warm weather” (Ecclus 3:17). Our sins, therefore, bound us. How? As the cold binds the water that it does not run. Bound with the frost of our sins, we have frozen. But the south wind is a warm wind: when the south wind blows, the ice melts, and the torrents are filled. Now winter streams are called torrents; for filled with sudden rains they run with great force. We had therefore become frozen in captivity; our sins bound us: the south wind the Holy Spirit has blown: our sins are forgiven us, we are released from the frost of iniquity; as the ice in fair weather, our sins are melted. Let us run unto our country as the torrents in the south.

In this life, which is full of tears, let us sow. What shall we sow? Good works. Works of mercy are our seeds: of which seeds the Apostle says, “Let us not be weary in well-doing; for in due season we shall reap if we faint not.” Speaking therefore of almsgiving itself, what does he say? “This I say; he who sows sparingly shall also reap sparingly.” He therefore who sows plentifully, shall reap plentifully: he who sows sparingly, shall also reap sparingly: and he who sows nothing, shall reap nothing. Why do you long for ample estates, where you may sow plentifully? There is not a wider field on which you can sow than Christ, who has willed that we should sow in Himself. Your soil is the Church; sow as much as you can. But you have not enough to do this. Do you have the will? As what you had would be nothing, if you had not goodwill, so do not despond because you have not if you have goodwill. For what do you sow? Mercy. And what will you reap? Peace. Did the Angels say, Peace on earth unto rich men? No, but, “Peace on earth unto men of goodwill.” Zacchaeus had a strong will, Zacchaeus had great charity. Did then that widow who cast her two coins into the treasury, sow little? No, but as much as Zacchaeus. For she had lesser means, but an equal will. She gave her two mites with as good a will as Zacchaeus gave the half of his patrimony. If you consider what they gave, you will find their gifts different; if you look to the source, you will find them equal. She gave whatever she had, and he gave what he had.

Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms 126.7–8

Building a Heritage

Psalm 127 is interesting because, on a surface reading, it is divided evenly between two separate themes. The first section addresses the building of houses and cities.

Unless the Lord builds the house,
They labor in vain who build it;
Unless the Lord guards the city,
The watchman stays awake in vain.
It is vain for you to rise up early,
To sit up late,
To eat the bread of sorrows;
For so He gives His beloved sleep. (Ps 127:1–2)

The second addresses the blessing of children.

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord,
The fruit of the womb is a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior,
So are the children of one’s youth.
Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them;
They shall not be ashamed,
But shall speak with their enemies in the gate. (Ps 127:3–5)

At least this is the typical division of the psalm with the intent to bolster arguments for either building projects or large families. However, this misses the overall thrust—building a lasting heritage through the Lord’s enablement.

Solomon begins this psalm with an allusion from the building trades (possibly during the temple construction), wherein all the planning and craftsmanship come to naught if God is not the impetus. Without Him, every effort to establish a dwelling or fortified community will collapse regardless of the effort put forth to ensure longevity: it cannot hope to endure. With this basis, he turns to his main thrust: in the same manner that the Lord is necessary for building structures to create community, He is a vital ingredient for raising children.

Parents want their children to do well in justice, mercy, and walking before God when they are sent into the world to make their own way, therefore fathers and mothers, and grandparents secondarily, instill their experience and His Word into following generations. Children are arrows sent into the world: their effectiveness depends on how they are formed, notched, and aimed. Every step of the process has as a final goal to hit the mark, whether an animal for food or an adversary in war.

In order to build the next generation, we have the responsibility to provide for the family, to be engaged in productive work so that the family might have both food and shelter. While much (or most) of American society sees this as drudgery or a necessary evil, the Christian understands that work provides for a heritage. Solomon made this plain.

Here is what I have seen: It is good and fitting for one to eat and drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labor in which he toils under the sun all the days of his life which God gives him; for it is his heritage. As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, and given him power to eat of it, to receive his heritage and rejoice in his labor—this is the gift of God. For he will not dwell unduly on the days of his life, because God keeps him busy with the joy of his heart. (Ec 5:18–20)

Work is a God-given gift bestowed at Creation (Ge 2:15) later made laborious because of Adam’s sin (Ge 3:17). As a result of its source, work retains the intrinsic quality of goodness, so that the final product or service becomes a reward for a job well done, especially so when the product or service might be exchanged or bartered to increase wealth in order to properly provide and leave an inheritance (Pr 13:22).

A heritage is received and sustained when the family is built on Scripture, raising children to fear Him, and putting one’s hand to the plow, distaff, workbench, keyboard, lesson plan, etc. fulfilling your vocation as spouse, parent, neighbor, or citizen. This is especially true when we consider that the most long-lasting inheritance is a spiritual one. Material goods and wealth will rust or rot despite our best efforts, but the spiritual component will abide long after our children’s children no longer walk this earth. It behooves us to remember that our family and possessions are gifts from the Lord. Let us build our heritage with Christ as the foundation.

Audacious or Ordinary?

In recent years I have noted an increasing emphasis by pastors and other teachers to express that the normal Christian lives in a gregarious or extrovert manner: anything less is missing God’s plan for your life.  Terms such as radical, audacious, and outrageous are freely (and overly) used to spur believers from a place of lethargy to a state of high alert to make the gospel known to every other person by whatever means necessary, or spur them into being crowning examples of how the Christian life is to be lived in the fullness of the Spirit.  Heroes of the faith—the first disciples or those who gave all on the mission field—are brought out as examples to mimic.  The hype replaces the work being done by the Holy Spirit, so that zeal is mistaken for Spirit-filling.  Inflamed by a holy desire to win every person for Christ, believers pour forth initial boundless energy until finally strength wanes because of self-reliance or overwork.  Stumbling dazed and confused, they wonder why the Lord would allow such a thing in this holy pursuit.  The problem is that not every Christian is called to be the apostle Paul or Hudson Taylor.  Usually, we are called to be more like Aquila and Priscilla: ordinary, boring followers of Christ.

Of those believers mentioned in the New Testament, few would have a more mundane existence that Aquila and Priscilla.  This Jewish couple were tentmakers, originally living in Rome.  When Claudius commanded all Jews to leave, they moved to Corinth where they plied their trade and met up with Paul on his second missionary journey, then finally to Ephesus where they met Apollos and instructed him of Christ more correctly (Acts 18:1-26).  Maybe this seems to be a big deal, but when you look closely, there is nothing to see.  As opposed to Paul, who received an apostolic commission from the Lord Jesus Himself on the way to Damascus and was later confirmed by the Holy Spirit at Antioch, Aquila and Priscilla were normal people with a family business who found ways to share the gospel while in their vocations.  No great call was received, no great vision to evangelize the world, no impassioned message to be outrageous for Christ.  All they had was an everyday existence lived in the gospel.

There are two epistles written early in the apostolic era that explain how the typical believer is to be and act.  The first comes from James:

Who is wise and understanding among you?  By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom.  But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth.  This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.  For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.  But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.  And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.  (Jas 3:13-18)

Do you understand things better than everyone else on the planet?  Fine.  Show it by your good, peaceable, gentle conduct.  The wise man does not get into someone’s face or try to convince against the will, rather there is reason and sincerity.  Maybe you are smarter and wiser than the person breathing your air, but the Lord has made known that He desires you to sow in peace, and that yields the harvest of righteousness.

The next epistle text comes from Paul:

Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another, for that indeed is what you are doing to all the brothers throughout Macedonia.  But we urge you, brothers, to do this more and more, and to aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you, so that you may live properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one.  (1 Thess 4:9-12)

Paul desires the zealous believers in Thessalonica who have made a name for themselves by their zeal in the gospel to live quietly and mind your own affairs.  That is how one lives properly before their neighbor.

There are multiple sources that call for us to tout the audacious Christian life; God works through ordinary means.  He may exalt any one of his children depending on the circumstance and need, but until that happens, be ordinary, be true.

Worship While You Work

[Martin Luther insisted] that the command not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was simply a means whereby God established a form of external worship.  Adam and Eve were not intended to keep this commandment in order to earn their relationship with God but rather as a means whereby they might show their gratitude and love for God.¹  Similarly Gordon Wenham has observed in his writing on Genesis 1–2 that the activity of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is described using terminology and linguistic constructions similar to the account of the activity of the priests in the Tabernacle later in the Pentateuch.²  Faith therefore gives rise to freedom for vocation, which glorifies God by reflecting his glory.  Vocation is therefore a liturgical act.

Jack Kilcrease, "Kenosis and Vocation: Christ as the Author and Exemplar of Christian Freedom,"

Logia, Vol XIX, No. 4, 27.

¹ Luther's Works, American Edition, 1:104, 106
² Gordon Wenham, “Sanctuary Symbolism in the Garden of Eden Story,” in Proceeding of the Ninth World Congress of Jewish Studies, ed. Moshe Goshen-Gottstein (Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies: Magnes Press, Hebrew University, 1988), 19–37. Wenham mentions verbal parallels in Nm 3:7–8, 8:26, 18:5–6.