First Reading · Ezekiel
"Is it my way that is unfair?"
Where we are
Ezekiel 18 is the great chapter on individual responsibility, written to exiles who had a proverb about it: "the fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge." The chapter's whole business is to retire that proverb. Today's verses are the objection it provoked, and the answer.
What happens
"You say, 'The way of the master is not fair!' Hear now, house of Israel: Is it my way that is unfair, or rather, are not your ways unfair? When someone virtuous turns away from virtue to commit iniquity, and dies, it is because of the iniquity he committed that he must die. But if he turns from the wickedness he has committed, and does what is right and just, he shall preserve his life; since he has turned away from all the sins he committed, he shall surely live, he shall not die."
What to notice
The complaint in Hebrew is lo yittakhen derekh Adonai — the master's way is not gauged, not measured out, not weighed properly. And the verb is one we met five days ago: Proverbs 21:2 says tokhen libbot Yahweh, Yahweh weighs hearts. The exiles are using the scales word against the one who holds the scales. They are accusing him of bad measurement. Then look carefully at what the passage claims, because it is not the comfortable half only. It runs in both directions. A virtuous man who turns to iniquity dies for it; a wicked man who turns and does right lives. Neither past is binding — and it is the first of those, not the second, that produces the charge of unfairness. A record of good conduct earns no credit that cannot be spent. What Ezekiel dismantles is the idea of a moral balance carried forward. There is no accumulated account. There is only the direction you are facing.
Responsorial Psalm
"Remember not the sins of my youth"
The whole psalm
An acrostic prayer for guidance from someone both in trouble and aware of having deserved some of it. Its repeated noun is derekh, way — the same word the exiles are complaining about in the first reading.
The selected verses
Psalm 25:4–5. "Your ways, Yahweh, make known to me; teach me your paths. Guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are Theos my rescuer, and for you I wait all the day."
Psalm 25:6–7. "Remember that your compassion, Yahweh, and your hesed are from of old. The sins of my youth and my frailties remember not; in your hesed remember me."
Psalm 25:8–9. "Good and upright is Yahweh; thus he shows sinners the way. He guides the humble to justice; he teaches the humble his way."
What to notice
The psalm asks for exactly what Ezekiel's audience says they cannot get: derakhekha Yahweh hodi'eni — your ways, Yahweh, make them known to me. One group calls the way unfair; the other asks to be shown it. The difference is the whole distance between the two readings. And Psalm 25:8 contains a sentence worth stopping over: al ken yoreh hatta'im ba-darekh — "therefore he instructs sinners in the way." The therefore is startling: it is because Yahweh is good and upright that he teaches sinners, not despite it. Goodness is given as the reason he bothers with the wrong people — the argument the Gospel is about to make in narrative form.
Second Reading · Philippians
Empty glory, and self-emptying
Where we are
The lectionary read the hymn alone on the Exaltation of the Cross, thirteen days ago. Today it comes with the five verses that introduce it — and those verses show what Paul was using it for, which is not christology in the abstract but a quarrel in Philippi.
What happens
"Complete my joy by being of the same mind, with the same love, united in heart, thinking one thing. Do nothing out of selfishness or out of vainglory; rather, humbly regard others as more important than yourselves, each looking out not for his own interests, but also for those of others. Have in you the same attitude that is also in Messiah Jesus, who, though he was in the form of Theos… emptied himself, taking the form of a slave… he humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Because of this, Theos greatly exalted him."
What to notice
Two of Paul's words in the introduction are chosen with the hymn in view. Eritheia — selfish ambition, the word for canvassing for office. And kenodoxia — "empty glory," kenos plus doxa. Then, four verses later, the hymn says heauton ekenōsen — he emptied himself. Same root. The Philippians are told to abandon kenodoxia, empty glory, and to take the mind of one who performed a kenōsis. The pun is exact and almost certainly deliberate: there is a way of being empty that is a vice, and a way of emptying that is the whole gospel. And the verb Paul uses for the required attitude is phroneite — think this among yourselves — the verb behind Matthew 16:23, read here four weeks ago: "you are not thinking the things of Theos but the things of men."
Gospel · Matthew
The two sons
Where we are
In the temple, in the last week. Jesus has driven out the traders; the chief priests and elders have demanded to know by what authority; he has asked whether John's baptism was from heaven or of human origin, and they have refused to answer. This parable is what he says to men who have just declined to commit themselves.
What happens
"A man had two sons. He came to the first and said, 'Son, go out and work in the vineyard today.' He said in reply, 'I will not,' but afterwards he changed his mind and went. The man came to the other son and gave the same order. He said in reply, 'Yes, sir,' but did not go. Which of the two did his father's will?" They answered, "The first." Then: "Tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the reign of Theos before you. When John came to you in the way of righteousness, you did not believe him; but tax collectors and prostitutes did. Yet even when you saw that, you did not later change your minds and believe him."
What to notice
The verb for what the first son does is not the expected one. It is metemelēthē — he regretted, he had a change of feeling — not metanoeō, the standard word for repentance. Matthew uses metamelomai only three times, and one of the others is of Judas at Matthew 27:3. It is a weaker word than "repented," and Matthew chose it: the son does not undergo a conversion, he changes his mind about a chore. And the second son's answer in Greek is egō, kyrie — "I, sir" — two words, perfectly respectful, entirely hollow. Then the application, and its tense matters: proagousin hymas, they are going before you into the reign of Theos. Proagō means to lead the way. It does not say instead of you. They are in front on the same road — sharper and stranger than exclusion, and said to men still standing there. Finally, the closing charge is not that they disbelieved John. It is that they watched people change and did not.
The lectionary has built this Sunday on a single mechanism: the last word is not the one that counts.
Ezekiel states it as law, without the sentiment usually attached. His hearers have complained that the divine way is badly weighed, and the complaint is provoked by the harsh half of the rule — that a lifetime of virtue can be forfeited. Ezekiel does not soften it. He points out that the same rule runs the other way, and that a rule which lets a wicked man live cannot be called unfair by people who want their own record banked.
Matthew's parable is that law told as a domestic scene, and its cleverness is that the chief priests deliver the verdict themselves. Which of the two did his father's will? They answer correctly, in public, before they can see where it goes — exactly as Simon the Pharisee did with the two debtors ten days ago. The trap is not rhetorical cruelty; it is a demonstration that they already know the principle and have not applied it to themselves. And the detail that gives the parable its edge is how little the first son does. Matthew's verb is metemelēthē, he thought better of it. There is no conversion narrative, no remorse, no speech. He said no to his father, then went out to the vineyard, and that is the whole of his righteousness — against which the second son's "I, sir" is impeccable and worth nothing.
Then Philippians supplies the interior of the movement. Paul asks the Philippians to stop competing — nothing out of selfish ambition or empty glory — and the model he gives is not a man who was humble but a man who moved: from the form of Theos to the form of a slave, from equality to a cross. The hymn is a story about direction of travel, which is precisely Ezekiel's category. Not what you are, but which way you are going.
And Psalm 25 is the prayer of somebody who has understood all this and wants in. Your ways, Yahweh, make known to me… the sins of my youth remember not. It asks for the two things the readings say are available: instruction in the way, and a past not held against him. And its reason is the sentence that holds the day together — good and upright is Yahweh; therefore he instructs sinners in the way. Not despite their being sinners. Therefore.
A Question to Sit With
The first son said no to his father's face, and then went and worked all day. Nothing suggests he apologised, or explained, or felt much about it — Matthew's word means he
thought better of it. What he did was show up.
I am fairly good at "I, sir": the agreeable answer, given sincerely at the time, which quietly does not become a day's work. Where have I recently said yes and not gone — and is there something I said no to that I could simply do this week, without going back to correct the sentence?