It is what you think it is. But it is not only that.In the New Testament, the Greek word πορνεία (porneia) is commonly translated as “sexual immorality.”  This term appears frequently in I Corinthians, and it becomes a central point in Paul’s teaching to his Gentile churches. Unfortunately, due to the influence of Puritanism and because of the different ways this word is rendered in English - fornication, licentiousness, lewdness - our understanding of porneia is usually restricted to matters of sexual behavior. We then conclude that the Corinthians in the first century must have been sexually depraved; or that Paul was so concerned with moral behavior that he considered it a key element in his presentation of the gospel. We should remember however that in his letters, Paul rarely if ever imports words or ideas that are outside of the Biblical story. His primary and most important reference in everything is Scripture. We should understand his use of porneia Scripturally, that is to say, according to the way it is used in the Prophetic literature. And in the prophets, specifically in Hosea and Ezekiel, “porneia” or “harlotry” is the classic Scriptural metaphor for turning away from God; thus it is the prototype of any and all kinds of sin, including but not limited to sexual ones.In Scripture, God’s will is expressed in his commandments, the first of which is to love him by keeping his laws and statutes, and to demonstrate that love by caring for any and all needy brethren. That is why, in the letters of Paul, when he addresses any problem or issue, his ultimate reference is the way we treat others. It is never simply the issue itself - marriage vs celibacy, fasting vs eating, praying with head coverings vs with no covering; but it is always a matter of behaving in a way that is pleasing to the Kyrios to whom we are enslaved, that is Jesus Christ. Join me in a discussion of 1 Corinthians 6:12-20.Notes:See also Hosea 2See also Ezekiel 16, 23Photo by ArtHouse Studio: https://www.pexels.com/photo/crop-man-with-tattoo-on-arm-reading-old-book-4530615/Original music composed and performed by Raphael Shaheen.

Homily: The Prodigal Son, The Lost Sheep, and the RavenFr. Marc BoulosSunday, February 8, 2026In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.Today’s Gospel (Luke 15:11-32) forms a diptych with the parable of the Lost Sheep (Luke 15:3-7), which unfortunately is used systematically by the followers of Epstein, or, more accurately, by those captivated by the mentality of Epstein ecclesiology: the business model of church growth that treats the neighbor as a commodity.Which is everyone.Because if you are an American, or a European, or anyone who subscribes to the ideology of the elite class, the success ideology, the growth ideology, the manifestation ideology, you ultimately view your neighbor as property, as lesser, as acquisition. Or, as Satan has taught the Church in the West to say, you refer to your neighbor as a “giving unit.” It is a disgusting phrase.No less ugly than what they used to say when I was a child. They claimed to count souls, but they were counting giving units.Now, the key to hearing the parable of the Lost Sheep is to hear the accusation of the Pharisees and the scribes that prompted the parable, and to hear it in the context of Noah, which governs Luke. Jesus gives the parable of the Lost Sheep because he is accused of receiving:“This man receives sinners and eats with them.” (Luke 15:2)That is the key. He is accused of receiving sinners. What is returned to him from the wilderness is what is received.The prodigal, as you should know by now, is not praised for coming back. He simply returns. The parable of the Lost Sheep is about instruction, about remaining under command whether inside the fold or outside it. This is what is at stake when the follower says “No.”It is also what is at stake with the two birds in the account of the flood. You have a raven (Genesis 8:7) and you have a dove (Genesis 8:8-12).For those of you who study what I teach, you know the significance of the raven. For those who do not, the work is here. The rest is between you and God.In Hebrew, the word often associated with the raven is derived from three consonants, ʿayin, resh, bet. It refers to a migratory, nomadic bird, associated with the locality of the ʿArabah, the Syro-Arabian wilderness known to you as Mesopotamia, encompassing Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, and Iraq. The raven is nomadic in a very specific biblical sense. It pertains to peoples who mix among tribes and who come out at night. These are the tribes that fed Elijah. That is the raven Noah sends out.The word used is “release.” It corresponds to the same verb Jesus uses when he sends out the Twelve to proclaim the judgment of the Kingdom in Luke chapter 9, verse 2. He releases them under instruction.What is interesting is that this corresponds to the usage of the word “Bedouin” in the Qur’an. You have heard me speak about Bedouins, and many of you assume I am speaking about Arab culture. I could not care less about culture. I am speaking about Scripture.The Bedouins appear in the Bible and in the Qur’an, and they have a function. In Genesis 8:6-12, Noah sends out the raven before the Lord breaks his silence. The Lord had not spoken since the flood began, when he shut the ark with his own hand behind Noah (Genesis 7:16). He does not speak again until Genesis 8:15. There is release from Noah, but there is no command from God. The raven goes out into a world not yet ordered by divine speech. Noah releases the raven into disorder in anticipation of God’s instruction, which alone can establish order. The same is true of the dove. Both are sent out, released in hope that they might return. It is not demanded. It is a free gesture. That is how it works.In this absence, the dove’s return unfolds within divine silence, not compelled by a new command but moving in anticipation of the word by which God alone restores order. The decisive reality is the command of God, not human initiative.The prodigal, sitting on the dung heap, cannot boast, “I came back.” He came back because he was hungry. In the house of the Father, every voice is silenced before the obedience of Jesus (Philippians 2:6-11).In the Qur’an, the striking thing about the Bedouins is their obstinacy. (Rise, Andalus, p. 53; Sūrat al-Tawbah, “The Repentance, The Return” 9:97) They exist on the edge. That is why this question of sinners among the peoples on the boundaries, in the night watches, matters. Those are the ones Jesus receives. That is what angers the Pharisees and the scribes in Luke. Those whom they despise, the ravens, exist on the edge, beyond the proclamation of what is read aloud. And now they are stepping within range of that proclamation.The word Qur’an means “what is read aloud,” the proclamation of the word of God. It is rooted in Arabic, a Semitic tongue like Hebrew. Those on the margins live beyond the reach of that proclamation. The lost are released, sometimes under instruction, sometimes in hope of the instruction that alone can call them back.So for Jesus, the concern is whether the sinners and the tax collectors are within reach of the proclamation. What is truly problematic is that the scribes and Pharisees complain when the prodigals return from the edges to hear what Jesus is announcing.That is the issue.But the problem with the Epstein business model of church growth is that it does not care what Jesus is saying. In that model, the neighbor is a giving unit. So it cannot let the prodigal go.In the parable of The Prodigal (Luke 15:11-32), the father never compels the son to return. In Paul’s teaching, you are never permitted to force someone to remain married to you (1 Corinthians 7:15). It is forbidden. This teaching carries over into the Qur’an as well: you are not allowed to compel anyone (Sūrat al-Baqarah 2:256; see also 4:19; 2:231).But in the Epstein model of church growth, it does not work that way. In that model, it is the opposite of what we heard today, namely, that your body does not belong to you:“You are not your own.” (1 Corinthians 6:19)The body to which Paul refers is the body politic of Jesus Christ. You are not permitted to sin against it for profit. You may not exploit any living soul for gain, least of all your own. Not according to the parable of the Lost Sheep.According to that same instruction, a sheep may be sent away and allowed to go until it heeds the call and returns, and is then received with joy according to the command, but never chased or coerced. Some sheep may even be handed over to Satan for a time, unto destruction, if they jeopardize the fold (1 Corinthians 5:5;1 Timothy 1:20). But not in the Epstein model of church growth, which cares only about security, growth, and success.God does not care about buildings, institutions, or church growth. He does not care about constitutions, or borders, or nations, or tribes. He cares about your living, breathing, precious soul.“For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul? For what can a man give in return for his soul?” (Mark 8:36-37)I am not God. But I am responsible to teach what God has commanded us to teach.May we submit to God’s instruction like the dove, returning in hope of the word by which God alone establishes order.To him alone be the glory, the dominion, and the majesty, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.In modern physics, one of the most unsettling discoveries is that observation is never neutral. In quantum mechanics, to observe is not simply to look, it is to interact. A system cannot be measured without being affected, and once systems interact, they cannot be fully disentangled again. What appears to be passive seeing is already participation. Measurement collapses possibility into judgment, not because the observer wills it, but because reality itself does not permit detached inspection. In other words, if you want to know how soft a pillow is, you have to press it, and the moment you do, you have already changed it.Scripture operates under this same constraint long before physics gives it a technical vocabulary. When God speaks, no one remains a neutral observer. Divine proclamation is not information offered for reflection, it is an intervention that binds, exposes, and judges. God’s word does not describe reality, it brings judgment into function. There is no safe distance from it and no untouched hearer. Judgment is not imposed arbitrarily; it arises because no one can encounter God without being implicated. Creation cannot hear the word from afar. It is entangled.Scripture is uncompromising precisely because it insists that the word is spoken aloud before the addressee can explain it away. As someone once said:“The response of the Jew to the Old Testament is to become a Muslim to the Old Testament text. The response of the Christian to the New Testament is to become a Muslim to the New Testament text. And the response of the Muslim is to try to remain a Muslim.”In Luke, sight itself participates in this judgment. To see is to be exposed to divine instruction, and that exposure does not bring comfort but remorse and fear. When God uncovers what was hidden, sight does not reassure, it summons. It places the human being under accountability. Seeing what God reveals dismantles illusion, exposes sin, and confronts human arrogance with the demand for submission. In Luke, sight is never safe. It is judicial.As one of our professors at seminary used to say, “Trust me, you don’t want to see God.”Under this condition, movement itself becomes accountable. Sending in Scripture is never romanticized. It is release into unstable, mixed terrain, space where outcomes cannot be secured by skill, intention, or zeal. The raven, the nomad, the prophet, and the apostle all move within this same exposed zone. Scripture does not praise movement in itself. It measures movement by a single criterion: whether the one who is released remains under instruction.This week I discuss Luke 9:2.“And he sent [ἀποστέλλω (apostello) / ש־ל־ח (šin–lamed–ḥet) / س-ر-ح (sīn–rāʾ–ḥāʾ)] them out to proclaim [κηρύσσω (kerusso) / ק-ר-א (qof-reš-ʾalef) / ق-ر-أ (qāf-rāʾ-hamza)] the kingdom of God and to perform healing [ἰάομαι (iaomai) / ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef)].” (Luke 9:2)ἀποστέλλω (apostello) / ש-ל-ח (šin-lamed-ḥet) / س-ر-ح (sīn-rāʾ-ḥāʾ)The raven, the nomad, the Arab, the prophet, and the apostle all occupy the same literary space: movement through unstable, mixed terrain. Scripture neither sentimentalizes nor romanticizes that movement. It subjects it to a single judgment, whether it remains under hearing, bound to the word that commands it. Movement itself is never praised. It is tested. The only measure is whether it proceeds from hearing or drifts into autonomy.In this light, Luke 9:2 is not missionary enthusiasm. It is the Flood’s test restaged. Just as the world after the Flood could not be navigated by observation alone, so the world into which the Twelve are sent cannot be traversed by initiative, skill, or zeal. Jesus first names the Twelve as a body and then releases them, not to demonstrate competence, but to test obedience.The question is not whether they can move, survive, or succeed. The question is whether they can be released without severing themselves from instruction. Like the raven, they are released into open space. Like the dove, they must remain oriented toward the word. The sending is not about growth or expansion. It is about hearing.“And he sent out the raven [וַיְשַׁלַּח (way-šallaḥ)] and it went out, going out and returning until the waters were dried up from the earth.” (Genesis 8:7)The raven and the dove both move in a world where the word has not yet been reissued. The raven turns endlessly within silence; the dove returns, waiting for rest. But neither restores order. Only when God speaks in Genesis 8:15 does instruction re-appear and motion become obedience again.“He will send his angel before you [יִשְׁלַח (yišlaḥ)], and you will take a wife for my son from there.” (Genesis 24:7)Movement here crosses kinship and territorial boundaries before inheritance is secured. Legitimate motion depends on the commission, carried by the angel, not on human initiative. Authority is exercised through obedience to instruction, not through possession of land.“So Moses sent them from the wilderness of Paran [וַיִּשְׁלַח (way-yišlaḥ)] at the command of the Lord.” (Numbers 13:3)Israel is no longer at Sinai and not yet in the land, suspended between promise and fulfillment, standing at the boundary, like the raven released into open space. The scouts move between wilderness and promise, not because conditions invite exploration, but because the word commands it. Movement is permitted only under instruction.“Then Jephthah sent messengers [וַיִּשְׁלַח (way-yišlaḥ)] to the king of the sons of Ammon.” (Judges 11:12)Sending governs intermingling across contested, mixed terrain. The text frames movement as accountable action, not autonomous diplomacy. Crossing boundaries without instruction is an unacceptable act of rebellion.“So he sent and brought him in [וַיְשַׁלַּח (way-šallaḥ)].” (1 Samuel 16:12)The prophet gives the word and Jesse executes the command. David is summoned from the margins. Authority does not arise from self-promotion or movement itself, but from being called. Release precedes rule and tests obedience.“Then Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria [וַיִּשְׁלַח (way-yišlaḥ)].” (2 Kings 18:14)In an imperial world, movement is constrained by power. Sending now exposes vulnerability rather than strength. The question is not whether the sending succeeds, but whose word governs the sending, the word of the Lord or the word of empire.“Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, ‘Whom shall I send [אֶשְׁלַח (ʾešlaḥ)], and who will go for us?’” (Isaiah 6:8)The prophet’s authority lies entirely in being sent. Movement into unstable public space is not heroic initiative, but obedience to instruction. Hearing precedes going.“I did not send these prophets [שְׁלַחְתִּי (šlaḥti)], but they ran.” (Jeremiah 23:21)The distinction is explicit. Movement without the word is rebellion. Running is not obedience. Only those sent by the word are legitimate in their going.“After glory He has sent me [שְׁלָחַנִי (šlaḥani)] against the nations that plunder you.” (Zechariah 2:8)Post-exilic Judah lives amid many nations and porous borders. Yet even in this supposed instability, God asserts sovereignty over movement itself. Those who traverse shifting terrain do not move autonomously. They move only under instruction.“And He sent them out [ἀπέστειλεν (apesteilen)] to proclaim the kingdom of God and to perform healing.” (Luke 9:2)Jesus forms the Twelve as a body and then releases them. They are not installed as rulers or settled authorities, but sent into mixed populations. He does not consecrate them the way an institution consecrates a building in the folly of ritual. Like the raven released into open space, and like the nomadic peoples of the Arabah, they move where boundaries are porous and transient, like man himself. Their legitimacy rests not in autonomy, but in obedience to instruction, which alone does not pass away.“He said, ‘Come, I will provide for you and release you [وَأُسَرِّحْكُنَّ (wa-usarriḥkunna)] with a gracious release [سَرَاحًا جَمِيلًا (sarāḥan jamīlan)].’”(Qurʾan, Surah al-Aḥzāb سورة الأحزاب “The Confederates” 33:28)In Qurʾan 33:28, tasrīḥ functions as a lawful release under instruction, not as a failure of covenant but as a test of obedience. The verse places before its addressees a clear choice between remaining bound to the word and being released into open space, a structure that is exactly parallel to the Flood’s test and the sending of the Twelve. As in Genesis and Luke, release is presented as an option governed by divine command, not as an emotional gesture or a moral achievement. Release is permitted, even facilitated, but it is never praised in itself. The decisive question is whether one remains bound to instruction or mistakes release into open space for autonomy, a confusion already exposed in the wilderness instruction of Exodus. Like the raven released after the Flood and the Twelve sent in Luke 9, this scene is not about ability, survival, or advantage, but about obedience under instruction.κηρύσσω (kerusso) / ק-ר-א (qof-reš-ʾalef) / ق-ر-أ (qāf-rāʾ-hamza)Compare with συγκαλέω (synkaleo) for further context.In Luke 9:2, proclamation functions not as invitation but as summons. When God calls, judgment is already in motion, and the call itself places a people under decision. There is no neutral hearing and no safe distance from the word spoken. The only possible human posture is submission, whether in Egypt, Judah, Nineveh, or Israel after exile. Rescue from human rule, if it comes at all, is never prior to judgment but follows it, emerging solely from God’s sovereign will. The kingdom does not begin with reassurance or comfort. It begins when God calls, and both Israel, represented by the Twelve, and the nations are compelled to answer.“They proclaimed [וַיִּקְרְאוּ (wayyiqreʾu)] before him, ‘Bow the knee!’ And he set him over all the land of Egypt.” (Genesis 41:43)Joseph is elevated after interpreting Pharaoh’s dreams, which are themselves warnings of divine judgment on Egypt through famine. The proclamation “Bow the knee” is not ceremonial praise, it is the installation of authority in advance of crisis. Egypt is placed under Joseph’s rule so that it may survive God’s coming judgment. Submission precedes salvation. The proclamation marks the moment Egypt must yield control or perish.“Jehoshaphat was afraid and turned his attention to seek the Lord, and proclaimed [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] a fast throughout all Judah.” (2 Chronicles 20:3)Jehoshaphat proclaims a fast when invasion is imminent. This is not piety but national submission under judgment. Judah does not mobilize first; it submits first. The proclamation suspends normal life and places the people under God’s verdict before any battle is fought. The call acknowledges that judgment is already underway.“Blow a trumpet in Zion, consecrate a fast, call [קִרְאוּ (qirʾu)] a solemn assembly, gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children and the nursing infants. Let the bridegroom come out of his room and the bride out of her bridal chamber.” (Joel 2:15-16)Joel’s trumpet blast is not warning but announcement. The land is already being judged, whether by locust plague or invading army. The call to assemble does not avert judgment automatically, it exposes everyone, including bride and infant, to the Lord’s presence. The proclamation gathers the people so none can claim exemption from the kingdom’s reckoning.“‘Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and proclaim [וּקְרָא (uqraʾ)] to it the proclamation which I am going to tell you.’” (Jonah 3:2)“Then Jonah began to go through the city one day’s walk; and he cried out [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] and said, ‘Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown.’” (Jonah 3:4)“Then the people of Nineveh believed in God; and they called [וַיִּקְרְאוּ (wayyiqreʾu)] a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them.” (Jonah 3:5)Jonah’s proclamation is stark and unconditional. No repentance is mentioned in the message itself. The city is placed under a countdown. The call initiates judgment, it does not negotiate it. Nineveh’s response, fasting and submission, arises after judgment is declared, not before. The kingdom confronts first, mercy follows only if God wills.“The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim [לִקְרֹא (liqroʾ)] liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners.” (Isaiah 61:1)This proclamation follows devastation. Israel has already been judged, exiled, and broken. The announcement of liberty and release presupposes captivity and guilt. The messenger speaks not comfort alone but authoritative reversal enacted by God. The proclamation declares that God, not Israel, determines restoration.“And Jehu said, ‘Sanctify a solemn assembly for Baal.’ And they proclaimed [וַיִּקְרְאוּ (wayyiqreʾu)] it.” (2 Kings 10:20)Jehu’s proclamation of an assembly for Baal mirrors the language of prophetic summons, yet inverts its purpose. The call gathers Baal’s servants into one place so that judgment may fall decisively. A false kingdom is exposed through the very mechanics of true proclamation. The verse reveals that proclamation is never neutral. It gathers for judgment, whether the hearers understand it or not. Jehu’s proclamation is a trap, a judicial assembly disguised as worship.“Thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who lead my people astray; when they have something to bite with their teeth, they cry [יִקְרְאוּ (yiqreʾu)], ‘Peace,’ but against him who puts nothing in their mouths they declare holy war.” (Micah 3:5)The false prophets “cry peace” as a counterfeit proclamation. Their speech manipulates rather than submits. Micah exposes that proclamation without submission becomes an instrument of judgment against the speaker. Here the kingdom judges its own messengers.ἰάομαι (iaomai) / ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef)Across the LXX itinerary, ἰάομαι (iaomai) consistently carries the full semantic weight of ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef), not as “treatment” but as restoration or repair of a condition. In Deuteronomy 32:39, it marks God’s sole prerogative to wound and then restore; in Isaiah 53:5, it names healing that comes through the wound itself; and in Jeremiah 6:14, it exposes false or cosmetic repair that leaves the fracture intact. In each case, ἰάομαι denotes an achieved or claimed state of being restored, whether genuine, paradoxical, or fraudulent, and it applies to individuals, groups, land, or creation itself. This sharply differs from Luke 9:1, where the Twelve are given authority to θεραπεύειν (therapeuein) diseases: there, θεραπεύω (therapeuo) describes intervention exercised over illnesses produced and sustained within human and institutional orders, often under the sway of ruling powers and their claimed spiritual authorities, rather than the deep covenantal or structural restoration signified by ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef) / ἰάομαι (iaomai). Thus ἰάομαι (iaomai) is not merely “medical,” but the Greek verb capable of bearing the full Hebrew sense of repair, restoration, reversal, and re-functioning after divine judgment, ultimately echoing the movement from tohu wa-bohu toward ordered function in Genesis 1.“See now that I, I am he, and there is no god besides me; it is I who put to death and give life; I have wounded and I heal [אֶרְפָּא (ʾerfaʾ)].” (Deuteronomy 32:39)At the climax of the Song of Moses, healing is located within divine sovereignty. Wounding and restoration proceed from the same source. ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef) names reversal after judgment, not mitigation, grounding healing in God’s control over life, death, and history itself.“By his scourging we are healed [נִרְפָּא־לָנוּ (nirfaʾ-lanu)].” (Isaiah 53:5)Here healing is inseparable from injury. Restoration does not bypass the wound but is achieved through it. ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef) denotes a state brought into being by judgment endured, not a process that avoids rupture.“They have healed the brokenness of my people lightly [וַיִּרְפְּאוּ (wayirfeʾu)], saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.” (Jeremiah 6:14)The same root exposes false restoration. What is called “healing” is cosmetic, verbal, and ineffective. ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef) here marks the difference between genuine repair and speech that claims wholeness while leaving the fracture intact.“Render the hearts of this people dull… lest they see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed [וְרָפָא (werafaʾ)].” (Isaiah 6:10)Healing here is explicitly withheld. Restoration is possible but deferred until judgment completes its work. ר-פ-א (reš-fe-ʾalef) marks not availability but restraint.

1 Corinthians 12:27-13:7.In his discussion of the spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians 12, St. Paul uses the expression χαρισμάτων (charismaton).The root of this word is χάρισ (charis), grace. That means, as gifts, they are technically the property of the benefactor and are expected to be used by the recipient in accordance with the will of the benefactor. It is the spirit, that is God, who gives the gifts. And his will is summarized basically in the command to love. That is why Paul’s discussion of the different types of gifts is interrupted by a lengthy aside on love (Chapter 13 in its entirety). Love is the glue that binds together all of the gifts. The value of any of these spiritual gifts is not in the gifts per se, but in that they work for the συμφέρον (sympheron), the common good.   Notes:Matthew 19:1-81 Corinthians 12:4-7Original intro and outro music composed and performed by Raphael Shaheen.

Are You Talking To Me?The real conflict in the story of Zacchaeus is between the ones who murmur that Jesus is going to be the guest of one who is a sinner and Jesus’ declaration that he is also a son of Abraham. That Zacchaeus received Jesus‘s invitation with joy and immediately made haste and came down from the tree should not surprise anyone who has been paying attention to Luke. We had heard, earlier in Luke, that Jesus’ mission was not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance (6:32). Zacchaeus, as a tax collector, would surely fit the bill. That’s why it is critical that we understand Jesus’ words in verses 9 and 10 as being addressed to the ones who are murmuring. The fact that he says that Zacchaeus is “also a son of Abraham” indicates he is addressing Jews, that is, ones who might consider themselves Abraham’s children based on genealogy. And he is presenting Zacchaeus as an example of one who through his behavior proves to be a true son of Abraham. This is precisely according to what John the Baptist had preached to them earlier in Luke: “Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham” (3:8). Notes:ἵστημι (histémi) - to make standπρὸς (pros) - to, towardsLuke 3:8; 6:32Luke 24:36; John 20:19, 26; 21:4“Ruff Enuff” performed by MonoNeon and Prince.

My mother was born in Bethlehem, Palestine, a land where hospitality is not sentiment, not a virtue to be cultivated, but obedience. It is not taught, debated, or defended. It is enacted. The land itself bears witness to a scriptural way of life that precedes institutions, borders, and claims of authority. The earth remembers what human beings forget. It remembers what it means to live under decree rather than under ownership.Scripture itself is formed by this memory. It speaks in a Semitic grammar in which unity precedes sequence and must never harden into possession. Genesis opens not with “the first day,” but with yom eḥad, one day. Creation does not begin with order imposed over time, but with a complete, bounded unity named before anything is divided or accumulated. Wholeness precedes sequence. Unity precedes control.Arabic preserves this same grammar. Like Biblical Hebrew, Arabic counting does not begin with an ordinal. One says yawm wāḥid, one day, not “the first day.” Ordinals only begin with “second,” al-yawm al-thānī. Linguistically, “one” does not mark position. It marks unity, closure, and intelligibility. Only once unity is given can differentiation follow. Counting does not produce wholeness. It presupposes it.This is not a linguistic curiosity. It is a refusal written into the language itself. Scripture does not allow the world to be treated as an object assembled piece by piece. The land is first named as a whole before it is ever divided. Life is first declared worthy before it is ever administered. Unity is given, not achieved.That is why in that land, people did not write treatises on coexistence. They did not construct ethical systems to justify themselves. They lived. They lived because Scripture was never an abstraction. It was not an idea to be mastered but a Command to be obeyed. Hospitality was not a moral accomplishment but a reflex, the uncalculated response of those who know that they are not masters. The outsider is received not because one has reasoned it to be good, but because this is what life looks like on land that belongs to someone else.Israel in the Scriptural text is itself constituted according to this same grammar. Twelve is not a governing structure but a symbolic totality, the whole addressed by God for a purpose. The Twelve in the Gospels function the same way. They do not rule. They signify. They address Israel as a whole, not as an institution to be preserved. Once that address has been made, unity is not hardened into continuity. It is released.Paul’s mission embodies this release. What was gathered symbolically is carried outward. Election is not converted into ownership. Unity is not turned into administration. It is sent, so that the nations may be addressed.Scripture consistently contrasts this covenantal unity with another numerical grammar. The nations appear as ten, the number of human totality, the fullness of empire and power. Ten names what human beings claim when they totalize, when they consolidate, when they rule. Scripture does not resolve history by allowing twelve to rule ten. It resolves history by confronting ten through twelve, by addressing power without becoming power.God alone remains uncounted and undissolved, because God is not one element within the sequence. God is the unity that makes all counting possible. God is not the first proprietor among others. God is the only Proprietor.That is why what happened in Gaza was wrong. Not because one group could assemble better arguments about history or entitlement. It was wrong because mothers and children were killed. This is not political speech. It is witness. The decree that rendered the land worthy is the same decree that rendered every life upon it worthy. To violate that life is not to offend an ideology but to profane what was entrusted. Those who claimed the land while denying the life upon it testified against themselves. They forgot the one thing Scripture never negotiates.There is only one Proprietor.Scripture arose to interrupt such forgetting. When kings enthrone themselves and devour, when power names itself necessity, when land is reduced to possession rather than received as inheritance, Scripture speaks. It does not bargain. It does not flatter. It calls heaven and earth to witness. The land does not belong to those who conquer it, nor to those who administer it, nor to those who explain it away. It belongs to the One who provides it. Everything that breathes upon it is under his protection, whether rulers approve or not.There is only one Ruler.Those who lived there knew this without commentary or defense. When neighbors arrived from Europe, speaking other tongues and carrying other memories, the question was never whether they had a right to be there. They came. They were received. Some remained. That was not the transgression. The transgression came when the memory of Scripture was erased by claims of ownership, when inheritance was renamed possession, when sovereignty displaced obedience.I was born in St. Paul, Minnesota. I am not formed by charters, statutes, or arrangements of power. What governs my path is older and heavier than law. My neighbor is not determined by documents but by encounter. Those who have come to this place, as others once came to the land of my mother’s birth, are my neighbors because they have been placed in my path by him and because they walk upon land that is not mine. This land too belongs to the same Proprietor. And because he has deemed it worthy, all who dwell upon it are worthy, whether they are welcomed or rejected, named or erased.By his decree, I am a Minnesotan, just as surely as all who dwell herein, every fragile life bearing the terrible gift of his living breath.Hear the word of the Lord. Every encounter is a divine summons. The mother. The child. The worker who serves your food. The one who teaches God’s children. Do not deceive yourself. It is not them you face. It is the One who holds their breath in his awesome and terrible hand.Surely, he is not mocked.You fools!Who is like God?This week, I discuss Luke 9:1. This episode is offered in memory of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, whose voice the land itself lifts before God.“Etching of two loons.” By John James Audubon, 1836. Minnesota Historical Society.“And he called together [συγκαλέσας (sugkalesas)] the twelve [τοὺς δώδεκα (tous dodeka)] and gave them power and authority over all the demons and to heal diseases [νόσους (nosous)].” (Luke 9:1)συγκαλέω (synkaleo) / ק-ר-א (qof–resh–alef) / ق–ر–أ (qāf–rāʾ–hamza)Across the Semitic scrolls, the root ק־ר־א / ق–ر–أ names a single, unified action: to call aloud. It covers proclaiming, summoning, reciting, and reading aloud without separating them into distinct conceptual domains. The act is always vocal, public, and final.In Hebrew, קָרָא (qaraʾ) indicates to call, proclaim, or read aloud. Reading is not silent decoding but a voiced utterance that places both speaker and hearer under what is spoken. In Arabic, قَرَأَ (qaraʾa) likewise indicates to read aloud or recite, preserving the same logic, most clearly heard in the word Qurʾan, “that which is recited.”Reading is voicing, calling is utterance. Authority does not reside in the possession of a text or the mastery of supposed “meaning”, but in the act of sounding words into the world. To qaraʾa / קרא is not to control speech, but to submit to it by giving it voice.“Pharaoh also called [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] the wise men and the sorcerers, and they also, the magicians of Egypt, did the same with their secret arts.” (Exodus 7:11)The itinerary begins under tyranny. Confronted by a divine act that exposes his limits, Pharaoh calls in order to retain control, summoning rival experts to simulate power and suppress obedience to God’s word. Calling functions as domination.“Now Joshua called [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] the Gibeonites and said to them, ‘Why have you deceived us, saying, “We are very far from you,” when you are living within our land?’” (Joshua 9:28)The call moves from imperial control to covenantal adjudication. Deception is addressed not to reassert tyranny but to assign a place within Israel, transforming false distance into ordered belonging under God’s rule.“Then Joshua called [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] for all the men of Israel and said to the chiefs of the men of war who had gone with him, ‘Come near, put your feet on the necks of these kings.’” (Joshua 10:24)The call exposes defeated power. Joshua summons witnesses so that Israel learns not to fear kings. Calling here dismantles human sovereignty rather than securing it.“Then Joshua called [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh,” (Joshua 22:1)The call becomes release. Authority is exercised only to conclude obligation, restoring freedom and refusing to convert unity into ongoing control.“And Joshua called [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] for all Israel, for their elders and their heads and their judges and their officers, and said to them, ‘I am old and advanced in years.’” (Joshua 23:2)The call gathers Israel at the edge of leadership’s end. Memory and instruction replace personal authority, preparing the people to live without a controlling figure.“Then Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem, and called [וַיִּקְרָא (wayyiqraʾ)] for the elders of Israel and for their heads and their judges and their officers; and they presented themselves before God.” (Joshua 24:1)The call reaches covenantal fullness. Israel is addressed as a whole before God, not to establish administration but to choose obedience once leadership is withdrawn.“She has sent out her maidens, she calls [קָרְאָה (qareʾah)] from the tops of the heights of the city:” (Proverbs 9:3)The call leaves covenantal space and enters the public world. Wisdom speaks openly, without coercion or enforcement, establishing God’s hegemony outside the mechanisms of human judgment.“For behold, I am calling [קֹרֵא (qoreʾ)] all the families of the kingdoms of the north,” declares the Lord; “and they will come and they will each set his throne at the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem.” (Jeremiah 1:15)The call now belongs exclusively to God. Nations are summoned without consent or awareness, exposing imperial power as subordinate to divine decree.“‘In that day,’ declares the Lord of hosts, ‘every one of you will call [יִקְרָא (yiqraʾ)] for his neighbor to come under his vine and under his fig tree.’” (Zechariah 3:10)The itinerary resolves after accusation is silenced. Joshua the high priest stands bearing communal impurity while the accuser prosecutes. No repentance is demanded and no defense is offered. God rebukes the accuser and restores without precondition, exposing the deeper sin, the attempt to secure life through legitimacy rather than decree. With accusation ended, calling descends into ordinary life. Speech no longer controls or judges but invites. Peace becomes possible because God’s wisdom now governs without human enforcement.νόσος (nosos): The Biblical Function of Sickness From condition, to manifestation, to imposition, to endurance, and finally to perception, the itinerary of sickness in biblical Hebrew shows that what Scripture names as sickness (nosos in Luke) cannot serve as a basis for human judgment. What the human eye sees does not disclose righteousness or guilt. Sickness in Scripture is not evidence for human judgment but a warning against it.1. חֳלִי (ḥoli)Sickness as condition, prior to visibilityThe itinerary begins with ḥoli, sickness as a state of affliction. This is not a diagnosis. It names a condition of being struck, weakened, or under burden. In Deuteronomy and Hosea, ḥoli appears in covenantal contexts where the central question is how suffering is understood and responded to. At this stage, sickness is bound to judgment and response but has not yet entered the realm of appearance. Nothing can be seen, measured, or concluded. 2. תַּחֲלֻאִים (taḥaluʾim)Sickness as visible manifestationThe itinerary moves from condition to manifestation. Taḥaluʾim is the plural of the same, gathering afflictions together as visible signs. What was once endured internally now appears externally. These sicknesses can be listed, pointed to, and displayed as evidence, inviting explanation and evaluation. 3. מחלה (maḥalah)Sickness as imposed instrumentWith maḥalah, sickness becomes something that can be given or withheld. In Exodus 15:26 and 2 Chronicles 21, illness is no longer merely endured or observed but administered. This marks a critical shift. Sickness is now treated as an instrument that can be attached to obedience or disobedience. Here the illusion of interpretive control emerges. Illness is easily used as proof of divine intent, and human judgment begins to emerge.4. מַדְוֶה (madweh)Sickness as duration that resists explanationThis is sickness not as event but as endurance, the long wearing down of life. Lingering illness resists clean interpretation. It is not dramatic enough to confirm judgment, nor absent enough to dismiss it. 5. עַ֫יִן (ʿayin) / ع-ي-ن (ʿayn–yāʾ–nūn)Sickness as perception, and the collapse of judgmentThe itinerary culminates not in the body but in the eye. In Job 24:23, sickness itself is no longer the problem. Perception is. The wicked appear secure. The afflicted appear abandoned. The eye reports stability where injustice persists and suffering where righteousness remains. Scripture exposes the failure of the entire interpretive system. What is seen does not reliably correspond to reality.The lexicon places ʿayin here because the final crisis is not illness but interpretation itself. Sickness has become a matter of reputation and judgment, and the human eye has assumed authority it does not possess. The itinerary ends by dismantling the assumption that visible condition reveals divine verdict.The function of sickness in Scripture is not to license judgment but to expose its futility. Judgment belongs to God alone.“He provides them with security, and they are supported; And His eyes [עֵינָיו (ʿenayw)] are upon their ways.” (Job 24:23)“And be patient for the decision of your Lord, for indeed you are in Our eyes [بِأَعْيُنِنَا (bi-aʿyunina)], and exalt with praise of your Lord when you arise.”(Qurʾan, Surah al-Ṭūr سورة الطور “The Mount” 52:48)In Luke 9:1, the Twelve are not constituted as a new power. They are given authority over powers. The text is precise: authority is granted over demons, not over people, not over Israel, not over land. In the ancient imagination, these “demons” are not psychological abstractions. They are the gods, the spiritual powers bound to territories, regimes, cults, and systems of rule. They are inseparable from earthly authorities, because political power always presents itself as divinely backed.This is why Luke pairs authority over demons with healing of diseases. Together they represent the two pillars by which domination sustains itself:spiritual legitimization (the gods)bodily interpretation (sickness as verdict)Jesus dismantles both at once.This dismantling follows the logic already declared in Zechariah 3. There, victory is not achieved by reform, conquest, or purification, but by decree. The accuser is silenced, not defeated in battle. Joshua, the high priest, does nothing. God rebukes Satan, removes the filthy garments, and restores without precondition. Victory is defined as the end of accusation and the collapse of the system that derives authority from them and their judgments. The decree is not an abstraction: “Each of you will call his neighbor to come under his vine and under his fig tree.” (Zechariah 3:10). Love of neighbor becomes possible only when the system of accusation and judgment has been withdrawn.Luke 9:1 enacts that decree.The Twelve are not elevated above Israel as rulers. They are earthen vessels, called together and then sent out to the Ten. Their authority is not institutional or administrative. It is a decree enacted, exercised only in proclamation and healing. They do not replace one hierarchy with another. They announce the collapse of a system in which gods justify power, and sickness justifies judgment.Twelve signifies that Israel has been fully addressed, not that it is now fully controlled. Once the address is complete, unity is released outward. The Twelve do not consolidate authority; they disperse it. They preach. They heal. They unsettle the alignment between the gods and empire that once made domination appear necessary.So Luke 9:1 does not found a ruling body. It commissions witnesses whose task is to proclaim that the powers governing the world, both seen and unseen, no longer have authority. Judgment does not belong to them. Nor does it belong to human eyes reading sickness or success as divine approval.The Twelve stand as proof before the Ten that God’s authority now moves through speech and healing, not through domination. Victory is not the seizure of power but the withdrawal of its legitimacy. Power is exercised precisely by refusing to become power, because the decisive victory has already been spoken by decree.