Written from the dark side of the moon. Oh, nothing special; I’m just fatigued with headlines about poverty, immigrants, vaccine mandates, the military…and now there’s an oil spill from a pipeline off California. The owners of said pipeline have been warned multi times, but the abuse of the earth goes on. Scriptures assigned to this upcoming weekend bring questions of darkness to the fore–part of the Church’s mission is to acknowledge these imperfections and to let the gathered faithful know that they’re not alone nor are they aliens when they’re frustrated by each generation’s problems.
We’re still struggling along with JOB (23:1-9, 16-17) as he searches for God in all his afflictions. Job’s faith tells him that God will ultimately free him from his pit of despair–if only he could make his pitch to YHWH. Across the centuries the cry goes forth, “Where ARE you, God?” How will Job and his righteous descendants find their way in the dark? “If I go forward, [God] is not there; or backward, I cannot perceive [God]…” Nor can we encounter God by stumbling either right or left. Is God hiding from Job/us, sick of our whining?
The Epistle is the anonymous “Letter” to the HEBREWS, 4:12-16. Beware of that two-edged sharp sword that will puncture our preconceptions, which will plunge into our weakness, deception and pride! I often think that I’m being arrogant with this weekly writing, or by standing in a pulpit expounding how culture is affected by the Holy Writings. Those who know me may well say, “Yep, he’s a fake!” “Before {God] no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account.” Yet the Letter continues, introducing Jesus, our great high priest, who also wept over Jerusalem and whose final coherent words were, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” And the New Order was about to dawn in grace to him, to the Hebrews, and to us.
We’ve been following Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem as remembered by MARK: today we turn to vv.10:17-31. Matthew and Luke also present this encounter with the earnest man who wanted an assurance of eternal life, but found that his many possessions stood in his way. “What can I DO?” “Begin by giving away all your stuff which blocks your view.” Money. Patriotic pride. Self-satisfaction. Well, what other junk do we have to hurdle on the way to the Kingdom? The disciples asked, “Who can be saved?” Wrong question, Jesus told them: we’ll discuss eternal life/salvation some other time, but what can you do NOW to point to the Kingdom? The darkness grows as I realize how captive I am to my Stuff.
“So what’s the GOOD news?” asked my friend Ken in lectionary study. I suspect that it’s found in Jesus’ answer to his friends, “…for God all things are possible”! A motto of our country which some find archaic is “In God We Trust”. Alas, most of us trust more in our pension plans, the pentagon and our nostalgic “remembrance” of How It Used to Be. I sound like an old curmudgeon (which I am). I could go away to a cave in the desert and be a hermit, ‘cept I like running water and TV…
In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King
Join me every Tuesday as I writhe before God, dealing with lessons assigned to the upcoming weekend; at horacebrownking.com
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