Bible Text: Genesis 18: 1-15 (21: 1-7), Matthew 9:35 – 10:20 | Preacher: Rev. Berlin Guerrero | Series: 2020 | There is humour in the Bible.

In Genesis 12 God calls Abraham seemingly out of the blue to leave homeland and kin in order to go to a land he has never seen. And God promises to Abraham, or Abram, as he’s called in chapter 12 three (3) things:

1) That Abraham will have many descendants; he’ll be a “great nation” (12:2).

2) That Abraham and his descendants will inherit the land of Canaan (12:7).

3) That they will be a blessing to the whole world (12:3).

There is one major problem with this scenario – Abraham and Sarah are childless. We don’t know much of anything about Abraham (before chapter 12), but one thing we do know is this: his wife Sarai/Sarah is barren (Genesis 11:30).

It’s hard to be the ancestor of a “great nation” if you don’t have even one child.

To make the story short, Abraham and Sarah tried to have a child through another woman, Hagar, Sarah’s handmaid. And they succeeded. Hagar gave birth to Ishmael. But was that it?

Not to God. God was more precise in God’s promise: “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name.  I will bless her, and moreover I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall give rise to nations; kings of peoples shall come from her” (17:15-16).

But would a promise of a child be fulfilled to a woman 90 years old? No way, Sarah and the 100-year-old Abraham thought. But God’s ways is not our ways so God was insistent: “…your wife Sarah shall bear you a son, and you shall name him Isaac,” (17:19), which, of course, means “he laughs”. And then God goes on to promise that Ishmael will become the father of a great nation, too, but God’s covenant will be with Isaac – the promised child.

This is the comedy of a God who acts in unexpected ways to fulfil a promise. It is entirely appropriate that the child of the promise should be named “Laughter.”

The “seriousness” of the Good News

In contrast to the breaking of good news to Abraham and Sarah, Matthew’s account is presented in all “seriousness”.

We ask, how can we proclaim God’s work of salvation and the call to discipleship in a funny way, rendering believers in fits of laughter?

Jesus mission was to proclaim and teach about the good news of the kingdom of God (Luke 4:18) and his teaching goes hand-in-hand with doing. The good news is salvation through the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth which is realised in the cure of the sick, life and resurrection of the dead, cleansing of lepers, and the casting out of demons.

Which can be summed up in two words: liberation and healing.

For whom: the crowds who were harassed and helpless under the dispensation of the Roman Empire. Jesus saw them and he had compassion for them. They were like sheep without a shepherd.

There is a need for shepherding. Jesus comes up with another parable, comparing the people as the plentiful harvest with few labourers to do the work of reaping and therefore there was a need for more labourers or disciples.

This is why councils representing the religious institutions at that time, the governors and kings all were in opposition to the good news of Jesus and for his call to follow the tenets of God’s kingdom. Even today we ask: Why can’t governments follow the tenets of the kingdom.

There is a call for discipleship. Jesus called at least a dozen of them to “Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.” What would discipleship look like if we were to follow Jesus based on these four commands?

For Matthew, discipleship always perform the critical acts of curing or healing and liberation.

Wherever you go today, in any country for that matter, the cry of the people is always about healing and liberation. The pandemic brought to the fore the need for physical healing for the coronavirus. But there is a need for social healing. This means human relationships have been broken in the way that one group rules over the others. There is economic inequality and power is used to exploit and oppress rather than to serve the purpose of upliftment and liberation.

There is also a need to free the mind and liberate it from a wrong understanding of history. This week we heard one of the Prime Minister’s comments about the Black Lives Matter rallies, saying ”While slave ships continued to travel around the world, there was no slavery in Australia.” To which many called for fact-checking.

Someone said that history is always written from the point of view of those who are in power and this version of history serves to perpetuate them in power.

And so, in understanding history, we should read history from the point of view of those who are marginalised, enslaved, oppressed and exploited. There is a need to rewrite history from the point of view of those who struggle to change the world into a better place.

We need to identify with the people who are harassed and helpless; with those who have no one to defend them, and nothing to fight with; those who have been robbed of their share in economic wealth, robbed of their freedom and of their future.

This makes our proclamation of the good news and ministry to all of God’s people not a picnic. We are sent in the midst of wolves and therefore we should be wise as serpents and be innocent like doves.

Amen.