"So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, 'We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!'" (Luke 17:10)

Welcome to Prime Timers, the best Christian Education Group at St. Martin's for Episcopalians aged fifty and above. We are following a course of study based on the Revised Common Lectionary, a three year cycle of Bible readings used throughout the Anglican Communion and by many Protestant denominations worldwide. You are invited to join us in the Parlor near the church offices, Sunday after the 9:00am service, 10:15am to 11:00. Keep up to date with our Lectionary based readings at the bottom of this page!

The Apostles on the Great Commission stained glass window in St. Martin's Church.

Prime Timers Good News

The Prime Timers hear members Good News each week at the start of class. We charge a dollar and currently donate the money collected to the Amistad Mission in Bolivia. Carol celebrates her birthday. Jean is going back to Mississippi.

Monthly Dinner Event

Each month the Prime Timers get together for a dinner and this month we are going to Candelaris Pizzeria, at 2617 West Holcombe Boulevard, 713-662-2825. This is just west of Kirby, near the Rice Epicurean grocery store. Dinner is on Tuesday, September 28, 2010 at 6:30pm. Our organizer Lynn will be out of town so just come on down and look for other Prime Timers!

The Rich Man and Lazarus

Carol Hartland is the Prime Timers teacher today, as the class explores the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, Luke 16:19-31. Lazarus is beset with many problems, and contents himself with the crumbs from the rich man's table. The rich man, on the other hand, is content that Lazarus knows his place and doesn't cause trouble. Both men die and while Lazarus is "carried away by the angels to be with Abraham" (Luke 16:22) the rich man ends up in Hades in eternal torment. There is a developing theme in these lectionary readings from Luke, the difficulty of reconciling the material world with the spiritual, of desiring God's kingdom while having a hard time giving up your own. In Luke 14:33 Jesus says "So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions." In Luke 15:10 Jesus tells the Pharisees and the sinners "Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents." Last week in Luke 16:13 Jesus tells his disciples: "... You cannot serve God and wealth."

And now we have the rich man trying to beg his way out of Hades, while the poor, diseased man is comforted in God's Kingdom! These are difficult themes for sure! Does it mean we have to give up everything for the promise of a reward in the hereafter? I thought God loved me! As Rev. Elwood said in his sermon this morning, these are themes that even clergy people wrestle with and like to let other clergy speak to!

Class discussion turns to the super rich, like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet. These men pledged half their fortunes to charitable purposes, and actively lobby other rich people to do likewise. Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, is estimated to be worth $6 billion, and just pledged $100 million to the Newark, NJ school system, one of the worst in the country. Others in class mentioned that some of the rich are very like the rich man in the parable, holding on to everything until it is too late.

The parable presents us with a "chasm" between heaven and hell. The rich man wants to bargain his way out of his predicament, but the chasm between him and Lazarus makes it clear that you need to make amends in this world before you get to the next. George told us about a parishioner who gave $1 million every year to a church, but never attended! This sounds a lot like trying to buy your way into heaven, a strategy that rarely works, although we can be pretty sure the church did not turn down the pledge!

Class members make the distinction between being rich and being wealthy. Wealth is material abundance, while you can be rich in spirit, or family, and not have wealth.

Time and again class discussion comes around to how you can keep discovering new things in the Bible each time you read it. Our Rev. Fields believes the best way to experience the bible is for someone to read it while others listen. Listen, not read along. Rev. Levenson tells a story of a person who said he read the Bible thoroughly and believes he knows everything about it! Rev. Levenson's answer is "you're wrong!" When you talk about reading the bible you enter the realm of ultimate concerns, big questions with answers requiring lots of effort on your part. What is God's will? Do I sometimes believe I am doing His will when I am really doing my own? Humility is a good place to start in dealing with the question of the rich man, as Paul tells Timothy.

Finally someone tells a story of a little girl's question: "if we are going to heaven why did God put us on earth?"

The Rev. Claire Fischer-Davies is rector of St. Martin's Episcopal Church in Providence, Rhode Island. She has written:

"We have to live as if the Kingdom were already here. And that means living lives worthy of the resurrection. And that means understanding that we cannot serve God and wealth.
"If you're like me, you don't put yourself and 'rich' in the same sentence. 'Rich' is people like Donald Trump or Bill Gates. We tend to describe ourselves as 'comfortable'—implying that we have just enough, but not really a lot to spare. Take a look. Look at the people of Haiti—look at our brothers and sisters in Guatemala and in the Sudan—look at the people in Montgomery County who are trying to support a family on what they make at Macdonald's.
"Do we step over them? Do we ignore them? Do we keep making that chasm deeper, thinking that we're protecting ourselves—or do we recognize that we have been baptized into a reality where the chasm doesn't exist? Are we brave enough to live in the Kingdom? Can we live a life worthy of our calling?"

Carol concludes class with a short prayer.

The Readings for Sunday, October 3rd are from Lectionary Year Three, Proper 22-C, "Being Good Servants"

The Readings for this week are Lamentations 1:1-6; Psalm 137; 2 Timothy 1:1-14 and Luke 17:5-10. The text this week is from the New Revised Standard Version.

Lamentations 1:1-6

¹How lonely sits the city
that once was full of people!
How like a widow she has become,
she that was great among the nations!
She that was a princess among the provinces
has become a vassal.

² She weeps bitterly in the night,
with tears on her cheeks;
among all her lovers
she has no one to comfort her;
all her friends have dealt treacherously with her,
they have become her enemies.

³ Judah has gone into exile with suffering
and hard servitude;
she lives now among the nations,
and finds no resting-place;
her pursuers have all overtaken her
in the midst of her distress.

⁴ The roads to Zion mourn,
for no one comes to the festivals;
all her gates are desolate,
her priests groan;
her young girls grieve,
and her lot is bitter.

⁵ Her foes have become the masters,
her enemies prosper,
because the Lord has made her suffer
for the multitude of her transgressions;
her children have gone away,
captives before the foe.

⁶ From daughter Zion has departed
all her majesty.
Her princes have become like stags
that find no pasture;
they fled without strength
before the pursuer.

Psalm 137

¹ By the rivers of Babylon—
there we sat down and there we wept
when we remembered Zion.
² On the willows there
we hung up our harps.
³ For there our captors
asked us for songs,
and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying,
'Sing us one of the songs of Zion!'

⁴ How could we sing the Lord's song
in a foreign land?
⁵ If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
let my right hand wither!
⁶ Let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth,
if I do not remember you,
if I do not set Jerusalem
above my highest joy.

⁷ Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites
the day of Jerusalem's fall,
how they said, 'Tear it down! Tear it down!
Down to its foundations!'
⁸ O daughter Babylon, you devastator!
Happy shall they be who pay you back
what you have done to us!
⁹ Happy shall they be who take your little ones
and dash them against the rock!

2 Timothy 1:1-14

¹Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, for the sake of the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus,
² To Timothy, my beloved child:
Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.

³ I am grateful to God—whom I worship with a clear conscience, as my ancestors did—when I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. ⁴Recalling your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. ⁵I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. ⁶For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands; ⁷for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.
⁸ Do not be ashamed, then, of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner, but join with me in suffering for the gospel, relying on the power of God, ⁹who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to his own purpose and grace. This grace was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, ¹⁰but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Saviour Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. ¹¹For this gospel I was appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher, ¹²and for this reason I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know the one in whom I have put my trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard until that day what I have entrusted to him. ¹³Hold to the standard of sound teaching that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. ¹⁴Guard the good treasure entrusted to you, with the help of the Holy Spirit living in us.

Luke 17:5-10

⁵ The apostles said to the Lord, 'Increase our faith!' ⁶The Lord replied, 'If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, "Be uprooted and planted in the sea", and it would obey you.
⁷ 'Who among you would say to your slave who has just come in from ploughing or tending sheep in the field, "Come here at once and take your place at the table"? ⁸Would you not rather say to him, "Prepare supper for me, put on your apron and serve me while I eat and drink; later you may eat and drink"? ⁹Do you thank the slave for doing what was commanded? ¹⁰So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, "We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!" '

NRSV