Park Avenue Presbyterian Church; Des Moines, Iowa
Texts: Genesis 15: 1-12, [13-16] 17-18
Psalm 27
Philippians 3:7 – 4:1
Luke 13: 31-35 *
“What Happens when the Fox gets into the Henhouse”
--} Do you know what happens when the fox gets into the henhouse? You can imagine—I presume—the panic that ensues. One fox, many hens, the birds all disturbed, feathers a-fly. In the confusion, the fox will quickly assess the weakest, easiest hen to snatch. But if hens have a brood of chicks, their first move is to try and gather them, then hold them under outstretched wings in a self-sacrificial act. Because they are “protective” of the brood, these hens suddenly make themselves the quickest, “easiest” grab for the fox. Their demonstrated “protectiveness” is the way they “save” the brood; because the fox snatches the protective hen, and leaves the chicks behind. The fox—not so much a fearsome predator, but “opportunistic” and wily. The kind of character Jesus faced in last week’s encounter with the “accuser”—tempting Jesus away from his protective role.
This image of Jesus similarly “brooding” over Jerusalem has a rich theological and biblical heritage. It “matches” the Spirit that “brooded” over the waters of creation. It “matches” the self-sacrificial image of Jesus who will die in the jaws of the fox in Jerusalem. It “matches” the historic promises of God to deliver God’s people, to “save them” by God’s acting on their behalf. In part, Jesus seems to be trying to teach us to trust that very promise, isn’t he?
In today’s gospel reading, some Pharisees come to Jesus saying, “Herod wants to kill you.” Jesus responds to them pointedly: “go and tell that fox for me”—as if Herod were the “fox” about to pounce. But more than just aiming an accusatory comment at Herod, I think Jesus is indicating the Pharisees themselves. The Pharisees in the Galilean countryside haven’t gotten along well with Jesus. Jesus has been proclaiming a very different reign of God that doesn’t require the posturing and position of the Pharisees who represent religious and national leadership in Jerusalem rather than “ God alone.” So with Jesus threatening their status and position, it’s not hard to understand how much these Pharisees would love to see Jesus moving his preaching and teaching elsewhere. So they bring a supposed word from Herod, “get away from here,” perhaps threatening Jesus with the same fate of that of John the Baptist.
Since many of the religious authorities in charge in Jerusalem and elsewhere bargained with the Romans—becoming “collaborators” in helping the Romans control the Jewish religious population in exchange for some power over the people—the threat might have been real. Israel’s leaders believed that their ability to hang on to their religious practices and observances—especially around the Temple—meant they were being faithful to God’s intentions in the promises to Abraham. But rather than participate in God’s promised vision for the world proclaimed by God’s prophets and Jesus, the Pharisees and their religious supervisors opportunistically abandoned trusting God alone in exchange for the “power” of the Romans backed up by its violence. So Jesus seems to call them what they are—“foxes in the henhouse.”
Here, Luke’s gospel demonstrates a Jesus sent to reclaim God’s vision for God’s special people. With ideas contrary to the establishment’s leaders, Jesus steadfastly defends God’s revelation for creation and God’s special relationship with Israel. Surprisingly, the enemy to this isn’t so much Rome as it is Israel’s own religious and political elites—who were fighting for their lives to hang on to their limited, human, power. For me, Luke’s story provides a warning to the Pharisees and Jerusalem’s religious leaders—naming their collaborative schemes of shared power with the Romans by declaring that the Pharisees have let the “fox”—that is, Herod and the Romans—into Israel’s spiritual henhouse—the religious life of the people of God. The Pharisees and religious establishment have gone from being exclusive agents for God to being agents of Rome; and when Israel can no longer live out God’s vision, worldly chaos ensues.
So Jesus comes with a prophet’s voice to once again challenge the religious establishment’s false and misplaced trust. Insisting on continuing his mission, Jesus lifts up the long line of prophetic voices who historically sought to return Israel to its special relationship with God. Israel—called to be a community that trusts ultimately and only in God—having been claimed, marked, and sustained by God’s love and goodness. Israel—called to be a community that God would continue to lead in and out of wilderness troubles and times of exile. Israel—called to be a community that God resides with and among; but not in a building, but within the people, internally in people’s hearts and actions.
Listen again to verse 33 where Jesus declares,
“…I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.”The prophetic witness in scripture is that time and again prophets were sent by God to proclaim God’s word of return and blessing, that God wanted to guide, nurture, love, and sustain God’s special people. But usually, to no avail. Many a prophet ascended to Jerusalem to collaborate with kings and priests only to be turned away. Luke’s Jesus seems intentional about joining that long line of prophetic voices, ascending to national and religious leaders appealing for a return to the ways of God.
Jesus offers us words and imagery that seem to come directly from the voice of Almighty God—like so many prophets before him:
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”“You were not willing”—a reminder that time and again, God’s special people rejected God’s leadership. A pointed remark to the “collaborators” who had given over God’s authority for human authority; given over faithfulness to God for faith-less-ness with the Romans; giving away God’s eternal promises to provide and sustain God’s people on God’s own terms.
So commentator Daniel Deffenbaugh observes that this long line of prophets, including Jeremiah, Isaiah, and now Jesus, offered Israel grand new visions.
“In the days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest of mountains…; all the nations shall stream to it.” In this time of peace, swords are to be beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks—images that remind us of God’s original call to Adam as steward of creation.But Deffenbaugh points out that “this prophecy could never come to pass as long as the faith of Israel remained tied exclusively to the primacy of the temple” and not to God alone. Instead, as the prophets often declared, God would have to do a “new thing.”
Rather than participate in God’s vision and its powerful hope, Israel’s religious establishment consorted with the Romans and propped themselves up with the human powers of violence and domination—hoping God might still be happy. But Jesus calls them “foxes” and still intends to “save” God’s people from the foxes in the henhouse—ultimately trading his life for the life of the world.
By not bowing to the treat and continuing his mission, Jesus explodes God’s power to do a “new thing” amongst God’s people—delivering them once again from the strain of oppressive, worldly leaders. And by the time Luke is writing his gospel, the Temple in Jerusalem is about to be, or already has been destroyed by the Romans; and Israel’s religious infrastructure that had collaborated with the Romans, keeping God’s people from the relationship God intended, was vanishing. Do we dare say the witness of the early Church in the prophetic voice of Luke and others, continues the “saving deliverance” God in Jesus intended?
If so, shouldn’t our question be what’s the fox in our religious henhouse?
Amidst our Lenten Season, our congregation faces any number of challenges. We might have several foxes to deal with! Financial foxes. Membership concern foxes. Older building issue foxes. All added to the customary “foxes” in our culture, issues facing our city, fears around the world. What are the things that keep us from our right-relationship with God? What “foxes” have gotten in to cause “panic” or threaten us? What keeps us from trusting in God more than bread, worshipping God alone, and never putting God to the test?
But hear this.
- Last week we began the season of Lent with the image of God being poured out for us. Poured out… in the waters of baptism, the cup of the Lord’s Supper; God “filling us up.” But not just filling us to the brim, God’s goodness poured out so that as the Psalmist declares, “our cup of God’s goodness runs over,” …and over and over and over. So that we are “filled” by God, but “overflowing”—enough for us and others!
- “Baptism” is our “mark” of God’s claim on our lives making us God’s own “special” people—the sign, seal, and covenant reminder of God’s special relationship with us. This “mark” of God’s relationship goes all the way back to Jesus and his baptism; back beyond Jesus, to a time of Israel’s prophets and kings, even further to the wandering of God’s people in the wilderness, back all the way to Sinai and the commandments, the Exodus deliverance from hardship and slavery—all the way back to Abraham himself. Another name for baptism is “sign of the covenant.”
- And in last week’s gospel lesson from Luke, we heard Jesus proclaim the terms of covenant life: “one does not live by bread alone;” “worship the Lord your God and serve only him;” and “do not put the Lord your God to the test;”—all tried and true images of God’s intention to “save” and “deliver” God’s special people—like a hen protecting her brood of chicks.
--+ AMEN.
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