How Long?

How Long?

 God takes his stand in the council of heaven; *
he gives judgment in the midst of the gods: 
² "How long will you judge unjustly, *
and show favor to the wicked? 
³ Save the weak and the orphan; *
defend the humble and needy; 
⁴ Rescue the weak and the poor; *
deliver them from the power of the wicked. 
⁵ They do not know, neither do they understand;
they go about in darkness; *
all the foundations of the earth are shaken. 
⁶ Now I say to you, 'You are gods, *
and all of you children of the Most High; 
⁷ Nevertheless, you shall die like mortals, *
and fall like any prince.'" 
⁸ Arise, O God, and rule the earth, *
for you shall take all nations for your own.

Psalm 82.  Some Psalms are crying to God for relief, lamenting to God, "How long?" In this, God asks those in authority that question. 

How are people and politicians who profess Jesus ("Why do they call me 'Lord, Lord' and don't do what I tell them?"); how are these persons deaf to this Word?

I guess we/they go about in darkness; and the unjust actions have actually cosmic consequences, "shaking the foundations of earth." [v. 5b]

Scholars have no consensus on all the assemblies of gods, gods dying like humans, and so forth. Let's just say that no beings escape accountability! It is clear where God stands!  Injustice is the world-shaking cause of dying like mortals. As Paul said, sin is the bringer of death, and we have only to look around to observe that fact.

Interestingly enough, Jesus quotes v. 6. in Jn 10:34 in an argument where he is revealing his own nature. God speaks calling listeners to themselves, their own natures. In response, the community asks God to move. 

Sometimes I think that because I'm old and kind of frail there's not much I can do about all the injustices battering so many; but at least I can pray this Psalm, asking the Sovereign of all to take all nations for God's own.

*************

Psalm 25—The Lord Is My Teacher

We reach a turning point with God when our “show me” changes from a demand for proof to a humble request for guidance: “Show me 

your roads, Lord! Teach me your ways” [v. 4].

“Show me” (hodieni) is the causative form of the verb “know.” Cause me to know, Lord, bring to awareness, apprise me, cause me to be 

concerned about, inform me, and—a last connotation—give me the signal.

“Remember not the sins of my youth,” sounds expected; the parallel, though, is not a request to remember my virtues but to, “Remember 

me according to your love (chesed) Lord; for the sake of your goodness, Lord” [v. 7]. Not our goodness, but God's, saves us.

This goodness connects to God's teaching: “Good and honest is the Lord; therefore (God) instructs sinners in the road.... guides the 

humble in justice...teaches humble ones (God's) road” [vv. 8-9]. 

Love shows the way.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

What way is the Lord showing me now? And what way can I show God my love?

1. How does God show you things? [vv. 3-4]. Give 2-3 different examples.

2. Have vv. 7-12 and vv. 15-21 dialog with each other. What is the result?

3. How would you experience vv. 5-6, 15-19 as having been heard? How would you know you were forgiven and remembered?

©1997, Patricia Caplan Andrews; limited license to reproduce for use in licensed congregation only. Published by LeaderResources.

The Halfway Meditation

"And when he spoke to me, a spirit entered into me and set me on my feet...." Ezekiel

Made me think of the invalid by the pool on the Sabbath (in John) and the sermon I heard about it last Sunday. And now today, the Scripture delivers life.

I identify with the pool man and have written about him before. He showed up to the pool. If he hadn't been there, presumably Jesus would not have spoken to him. I too am perpetually halfway there. I sometimes think I lead a halfway life because of chronic pain and negativity. Sometimes I have to force myself through each next thing; and so imagine this invalid had to drag himself out of bed. "Oh, do I really want to go to the pool today?" 

So the man got there to the pool, and Jesus said, "Get up!" the same thing he said to the little dead girl in--Mark? Matthew? "Talitha qum!"

I'm always fascinated that Jesus didn't help the man into the pool; he just told him to get up. And the outcome was definitely a healing, as proved by the fact that the Sabbath legalists got mad. It's not forbidden to just talk to someone on the Sabbath, to have a conversation. But even Jesus' enemies could see that a healing had occurred.

Last Sunday's sermon on that healing talked about the stirring. The stirring of the waters shifted to a stirring within the invalid. The sermon must have penetrated because I thought about it all week.  Get stirred up, the preacher said.

Hmmmn. Not that I believe obstacles can be swept away by a positive outlook (although Jesus did say that with faith you can make a mountain jump into the sea). Even though my own circumstances are good today, I see and know they can be crushing. For example, when my little sister first came down with her mysterious crippling ailment, my father told my mother,  "No matter what the doctors say, I know she'll recover." Well, she didn't. Not in this life at any rate.

It turns out the above is a digression. The point is love, the things we do for love. Love stirs us up. It is Christ who stirs me. He stirs me with his words; the Spirit enters. How important it is, then, to be present so we can hear the words that heal; How important to drag myself halfway there/here.

-30-

Ash Wednesday 2013

I dread the thought of the place:

The place where you walk out your front door and there's a hallway with not totally

Clean carpeting and a nurses' station at the end of it.

The other residents or guests or whatever we are dress

    in outfits and get their hair

    permanent waved and act

    content.  (The ones you see.)

They go to activities.

They eat together by the clock in a dining room not

In front of TV with a computer on their laps.

There's a schedule

And to go somewhere you ride the van.

To get out you punch a code!

I don't think Grandson would run over there to bake biscuits and play Monopoly.


Well!

Good Morning!

He Meant to Pass Them By?

Secretly... there are a lot of things I can not figure out!

Mark 6: 45-52. Jesus compels them to get into a boat.

                         Then: he saw them laboring.

                         Then: he comes to them (erchetai).

                         Next: he would have passed them by?????

                         But:  they, all of them saw him....

                         Then: he encourages them ("It is I" ego eimi!)

                         Gets in the boat and the wind fell. They were amazed because they "did not understand about the loaves, for was their heart hardened."

I keep this old, falling-apart interlinear New Testament because it has notes from Synoptics class. This passage is highlighted and in the margin it says, Ex 13:14-19 (where Jacob asks Esau to "pass him by" (Esau, whose face was "as the face of God" to Jacob--and whom he feared). It also says I Kgs 19 (Elijah in distress is succored (sp?) by the Lord and then the wind passes by; giving way to the fire, and the still small voice); and Job 9:11 "He passes me by and I see him not; he moves on, but I do not perceive him...."

Now what do you make of that? The whole thing? The most I can make of it is, they were on the way but they weren't there yet.
He is divine (ego eimi); his coming is preceded by tumult; they don't understand--but they do see him!

What do you make of this??  And as my Rector David Buck would ask, "Where in the midst of what tumult that you struggle against, do you see the Lord passing by?

----

What Do You Want?

John 5:2-9

Q: "How many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb?"

A: "Only one, but the light bulb has to WANT to change."

In Mark a paralyzed man needed four helpers to get in front on Jesus in Capernaum. In John's story the sick man by the pool of Bethesda by the sheep market lies by himself in the mist of a big crowd. He doesn't even know who Jesus is, much less try to get in front of him.

In Mark the man had friends who would take off the roof to get into Jesus' presence. The man at the pool lies all alone in the midst of a huge crowd that is shoving and pushing to get to the water when it stirs. No one to help him into this pool so he can't get through. That's why he's still sick after 38 years.

I don't know how the invalid gets to the pool every day, where he sleeps at night; the story doesn't say he's "parlutikon"; he is astheneia, "infirm." Presumably there is a mental component to the infirmity, as there was presumably a spiritual component to the paralytic's. Because, while Jesus' first words to the paralytic were, "Your sins are forgiven," when he sees the invalid he says, "Do you WANT to get well?" (Hukios="sound, whole")

Well, I don't know does he? He is in the crowd by the pool after all. He's not begging in the streets or in a room somewhere looking out the window.  Presumably he sort of wants to be well because he is THERE.  

But maybe he sort of doesn't because his answer isn't, "I want!" as for example the blind man when Jesus said, "What do you want?" immediately said, "I want my sight back!" His answer is, "I can't. I can't get to the pool."

The invalid is blocked in some way; is it really the crowds; or maybe his block is thinking he needs this pool.

Jesus says, "Arise!" Same verb to indicate rising from the dead. Jesus says, "Come alive!" Doesn't even bother with trying to round up some people to help the guy force his way through the crowds. Doesn't mean, "If you really want it, you'll get through to that pool." Just says come alive and walk. "Get moving" as the exercise buffs say. So important for life to move.

I like the way Jesus says take up your bed, also. So the man does come alive, immediately or very soon. Maybe you could say Jesus motivated him. Boy I would like to know more about that experience, that encounter.

Meditate on -- change. Getting well would mean a change for the man, not a very attractive personality I don't think.

Think about, why would the invalid want to change?