The Bible passages for this week have a “traditional reading” which follows the narrators. The story of Deborah, in Judges 4:1-7, is lifted up as the story of a woman leader in ancient Israel. Psalm 123 begins as an individual lament and ends as a communal lament with statements of assurance that God is a deliverer of those in trouble. This psalm also uses the female imagery for the divine human relation as like a “maid [looking to] the hand of her mistress” (verse 2b). The epistle reading encourages the people of Thessalonica to be vigilant for God’s salvation in Jesus and to encourage and support each other. Matthew 25:14-30 is known as the parable of the talents, where three slaves are given five, two and one talent respectively. The slaves with the five and two talents double them while the slave with the one talent buries it and gives it back to the master. Being called lazy, the slave with one talent is thrown out while the other two are rewarded with an invitation to a banquet. The overarching message of these four readings is to use what one has rather than being caught in fear. We are called to follow the will of God as a deliverer, even if one is not from the group valued by the society.

	Who are the leaders, the Deborah’s, in your community. How do you and others respond to them when they offer advice for addressing community concerns and call for justice?

One could look at these passages and affirm that God is a God of salvation and hope in times of trouble who commissions Deborah’s to rise up to save their nations. This could be seen as a message to LGBT and other oppressed people. Just as Deborah, a woman in a patriarchal society, was commissioned by God to save her people, so may we be called to leadership even when we are from a group often ostracized by the dominant society.

One could also affirm that just as the followers of the Way in Thessalonians 5:1-11 — who were oppressed and not of the ruling classes — should hold to the faith that God is with them, LGBT people hold on and stay “in the light”(verse 5). Similarly, LGBT and other oppressed groups — who are not given their fair share or who are short changed by the system, “given only one talent” — should not bury their gifts, but make the best of their situation and help build the realm of God.

	How have you felt in situations when you were asked to help build an organization or lead an effort which was not LGBT-friendly, but which could have some benefit to your community? What have you learned from that situation?

There is an ironic twist to many of these texts, especially as they are engaged by people living in situations of extreme oppression. First, one can note that in the book of Judges the men in leadership are all flawed. Interestingly the reading for today from Judges ends in verse 7, with Deborah delivering the message of God to Barak. The lectionary passage omits his response that he will only go to war if she accompanies him. Yet, by including this passage we witness a role reversal. As the story unfolds Deborah and Jael come across as “better men than the men in the narrative” — besting the men at their own jobs.

Similarly, in the parable the talents, you can see how the realm of God cannot function without the work of slaves and their raising the funds for it to succeed. One wonders whether LGBT and other oppressed people are welcomed into congregations which are dying to bring in the resources of LGBT people to enhance the church, even though they are still negatively labeled in homophobic sermons. Another way of looking at these texts, however, could be to see God as aiding us in building the realm of God and encouraging us not being stifled by fear.

One troubling aspect of Psalm 123 and Matthew’s parable is the depiction of God as a slave master who either oppresses the slaves or flourishes from their labor. Although we know that slavery was integral to the societies of ancient Israel and the early church, one has to wonder whether the adoption of this imagery is helpful today.

One possibility, however, for a liberation reading of the passage is raised by New Testament scholars who tell us that in the original context that the parables were used by Jesus as a critique of the established social order. This opens the possibility of seeing the slave with the one talent as the one who resists oppression in the system and refuses to cooperate with the “harsh task master.” In this way, being thrown out, he is the only one who is now free. By the same token, the absence of a “parable of the slave revolt” in the gospels suggests that a resistant reading of these images might be the best strategy for LGBT and other oppressed groups.