2024-2025 Seeds and Ways Focus and Roadmap: Embodied Jubilee: Justice, Righteousness, and Redemption

In the biblical narrative, justice and righteousness were often encapsulated in the same word. In fact, when reading the text, when encountering the word “righteousness”, it would be entirely appropriate to substitute the word “justice.” In Year C, with an emphasis on the Gospel according to Luke, the emphasis will be on reclaiming justice as an essential element of the reign and realm of God and both a hope and sign of the kindom of God manifested on earth. Luke’s account gives particular attention and significant emphasis on the marginalized, oppressed, and silenced in society. Individual righteousness, a derivative or consequence of following the way of justice, will be treated as such. 

Jubilee, represented by the settling of all debts, will be claimed as the ultimate destination of the collective and communal faith journey. The call to discipleship throughout this liturgical year will be to participate in Embodied Jubilee. The Suggested Congregational Response to the Reflection will point to and offer a path to engage with this call. 

Finally, no treatment of justice and jubilee would be complete without a focus on the redemptive acts of the Holy One and God’s disciples in human history. That is good news. Let’s proclaim it! 

2024-2025 Christmas and Epiphany Series: Posted Sentinels

Christmas celebrates the birth of the Christ child. Epiphany demonstrates the power of incarnation revealed. We tell the story of Jesus entering the world with the joy of hindsight while a careful reading of the text reveals a prophetic tenor and tone. Angels bring the birth announcement, and the good news is proclaimed by stars, elders, and prophets.  The Word becomes flesh, dwells among us, and begins the work of dismantling the oppressive systems that crush human flourishing. Baby Jesus poses a potential threat to the powers that thrive on fear, intimidation, and hopelessness. Young Jesus knows the power of their mission. Mature Jesus reveals themselves in word, deed, and glory. Love has come to heal, to restore, and to transform.  

“The reign of God is coming toward us from the future. God’s epiphany will result in the twin phenomena of judgment and new life and will be marked by a tumultuous transition from the old age to the new. Importantly, the justice and righteousness that characterizes God’s reign, and therefore the new age, is the compassionate justice embodied in the image of Jubilee, rooted especially in Leviticus 25, but further radicalized and expanded in the prophets and apocalyptic visionaries.”

Christian T. Collins Winn, Jesus, Jubilee, and the Politics of God’s Reign

During the seasons of Christmas and Epiphany , we focus on the gospel passages in conversation with Isaiah 62:6a:

Upon your walls, O Jerusalem, 
I have posted sentinels; 
all day and all night 
they shall never be silent. 
Isaiah 62:6a NRSVue

The Rev. Dr. Cheryl A. Lindsay, Minister for Worship and Theology, United Church of Christ, (lindsayc@ucc.org), also serves as a local church pastor and worship scholar-practitioner with a particular interest in the proclamation of the word in gathered communities.