Sarcastic Lutheran and Colbert on Lord of the Rings
My favorite characters in the Lord of the Rings are the Ents. These were an ancient race of giant living talking breathing trees in Tolkien’s Middle Earth. So I have a little confession to make: whenever I hear that reading we just heard from Isaiah 55 where it says The mountains and hills before you shall burst into song and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. I always picture the Giant Ents from Lord of the Rings. And then I picture these clapping trees from Isaiah holding little Hobbits in their branch arms in what ends up bring a willful conflation of Middle Earth and Major Prophet. I suppose to some people that might feel wrong. Maybe a little like the visitor we had at Pentecost who was greatly dismayed at some people snickering during the reading from Acts. You know, the one where Peter stands up and tells the crowd that clearly these men couldn’t be drunk since it’s only 9 o’clock in the morning. Every year people laugh at that. My guess is because every year it’s funny. But laughing in church can dismay some folks because sometimes it feels like religion has become more about decorum than delight. It’s so often more about judgment than joy.
-link, Sermon on Isaiah 55, The Parable of the Sower and those big talking trees form Lord of the Rings
-- Colbert::
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Hey, thanks for engaging the conversation!