Today's Scripture Readings
Exodus 32: 7-14 (NRSV)
John 5: 30-47 (NRSV)
Blog Reflection
The news today is bursting at the seams over the murder of Trayvon Martin. A 17 year old, African American who was doing nothing more than walking home, when George Zimmerman shot him. His community, family and folks all across the nation are outraged by the failure of the Sanford City Police Department to appropriately apprehend the suspect. Martin's parents are calling for justice for their son. Rightly so, this issue has brought to light the issue of racism, and the dangers that exist for African American's in our country. Clearly, something has gone terribly wrong.
It appears from Exodus that something had gone wrong. The Israelites who had been brought out of the land of Egypt by God's strong arm, created for themselves a golden calf and began to worship it. All of this is happening as Moses is up on Mount Sinai receiving from God the Commandments by which the people are to live. God is enraged that God's people would forget God's mighty acts and make for themselves a graven image to worship and sacrifice to, in the place of the Almighty Yahweh. Moses pleads to God on behalf of the people, to not destroy them, suggesting that God's reputation is on the line if God does something so evil. I love what happens here. God changes God's mind.
We must remember that the accounts of God in the Hebrew Scriptures as well as in the New Testament are written from a human perspective. The events were written down only after they had been passed on orally for thousands of years. Our perspective is very limited. And, we are so far removed from that generation of people.
The message that is here for us, is that when we take our minds and hearts off of the God who loves and provides for us, we can give ourselves over to evils and ways that infect us. They blind our sense of God and we stop paying attention to the needs of those around us. Our behavior becomes destructive and we lose sight of what is really important. Our God has given so much for us to love and enjoy. When our physical and spiritual vision no longer sees that, we are no longer worshiping God through our daily lives. Instead, we worship things, problems and everything becomes too big for us.
I do believe in many ways that is what is wrong with the Trayvon Martin matter. When we take our eyes off of recognizing God's creation that gives dignity to every human person, suddenly someone's race, sexual orientation and/or gender expression, etc becomes our god. We have to take control of it. We have to make an "other" out of it. Whatever, we do, we must take a stand and even wipe it out.
So many of us who are white have gotten so use to thinking things that are completely inappropriate about people of different races. The language we hear through the 911 recording of George Zimmerman calling in this incident should wake all of us up. He was labeling Trayvon as a possible drug user, dangerous, but most importantly, he was black. Too many times, we take another person's race and from there, we make presumptions about their activities, their behaviors and make them a target without any thought what so ever to what we are doing. We may not shoot someone down in cold blood, but how many of us have had a conversation about another person's character, and made certain judgments about that person based on race, sexual orientation etc?
In our Gospel today, Jesus is in a conflict with people around him, who are unbelievers. They are people who see things happening in front of them, but they are not convinced. Jesus has just finished telling them about the coming resurrection. Now he is telling his audience about how he cannot do anything on his own and about his testimony. Jesus claims oneness with God, yet he is not the Father. God testifies on behalf of the Son.
In the last part of this Gospel, Jesus says something that I think many who read the Bible literally should pay very close attention to.
It is not by the Scriptures alone that we will find salvation in Jesus Christ. It is through hope in God through Jesus Christ that we can believe in the promise of eternal life.
It is very important to be careful with John's Gospel here. The point is not anti-Semitism. There is a lot of evidence to suggest that the Gospel of John was not written by the Apostle and Evangelist himself. But, was written by the Johannine's. There is even the possibility that it was a combination of things the Johannine's wrote about the same stories, and then they were all put together in one book. "The expression "the Jews" (which should not be understood as a condemnation of Jews in particular or in general) virtually becomes a technical term for those who reject Jesus." (New Oxford Annotated, New Revised Standard Version, New Testament, p. 124).
Jesus challenges us to see God's presence in the work that he is doing. Jesus has been drawing criticism, because he dared to associate with a Samaritan woman (See John 4). He has crossed the lines of cultures and gender associations to bring those outcast by society closer to the heart of God. God is in the midst of injustice and division, bringing inclusion and unity to welcome through hospitality and reconcile through healing and mercy.
As we are all kind of consumed by the injustice of what happened to Trayvon Martin, we are asked to find God working through the injustice of the situation. God never endorses violence as a way to solve anything. God is in the middle of it, communicating to us if we will listen.
People are coming together to express concern about what happened. We are seeing people of many different races and backgrounds raising their voices in outrage and calling for justice for not only Trayvon, but also anyone who has to fear what might happen to them, the next time they are walking peacefully down a sidewalk. People are recognizing that what happened to Trayvon is about what can happen to any of our children.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people know all too well about youth being bullied in our schools, communities and even their own families. To ignore these things and allow them to go unacknowledged, only lets them to get out of hand. It is our business to speak up in the face of injustice and oppression and be the voice of reason, when people irrationally invoke violence as a means for dealing with prejudice in our communities. Christians have the message of hope and salvation in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. All scapegoating and stereotyping stops there. Any prejudice that becomes violence done, using the Cross as it's excuse, is a counterfeit Christianity.
As we have only two weeks left before Holy Week, let us ask God to help us to see and hear God working in the midst of injustice. May we seek to be God's peace makers in the times we live in. May we be part of the solution, by choosing love and inclusion as our way and purpose for what we do.
Prayers
Exodus 32: 7-14 (NRSV)
The Lord said to Moses, ‘Go down at once! Your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have acted perversely; they have been quick to turn aside from the way that I commanded them; they have cast for themselves an image of a calf, and have worshipped it and sacrificed to it, and said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” ’ The Lord said to Moses, ‘I have seen this people, how stiff-necked they are. Now let me alone, so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them; and of you I will make a great nation.’
But Moses implored the Lord his God, and said, ‘O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, “It was with evil intent that he brought them out to kill them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth”? Turn from your fierce wrath; change your mind and do not bring disaster on your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, how you swore to them by your own self, saying to them, “I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it for ever.” ’ And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people.
John 5: 30-47 (NRSV)
‘I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge; and my judgement is just, because I seek to do not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
‘If I testify about myself, my testimony is not true. There is another who testifies on my behalf, and I know that his testimony to me is true. You sent messengers to John, and he testified to the truth. Not that I accept such human testimony, but I say these things so that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light. But I have a testimony greater than John’s. The works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. You have never heard his voice or seen his form, and you do not have his word abiding in you, because you do not believe him whom he has sent.
‘You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. Yet you refuse to come to me to have life. I do not accept glory from human beings. But I know that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not accept me; if another comes in his own name, you will accept him. How can you believe when you accept glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the one who alone is God? Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; your accuser is Moses, on whom you have set your hope. If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?’
Blog Reflection
The news today is bursting at the seams over the murder of Trayvon Martin. A 17 year old, African American who was doing nothing more than walking home, when George Zimmerman shot him. His community, family and folks all across the nation are outraged by the failure of the Sanford City Police Department to appropriately apprehend the suspect. Martin's parents are calling for justice for their son. Rightly so, this issue has brought to light the issue of racism, and the dangers that exist for African American's in our country. Clearly, something has gone terribly wrong.
It appears from Exodus that something had gone wrong. The Israelites who had been brought out of the land of Egypt by God's strong arm, created for themselves a golden calf and began to worship it. All of this is happening as Moses is up on Mount Sinai receiving from God the Commandments by which the people are to live. God is enraged that God's people would forget God's mighty acts and make for themselves a graven image to worship and sacrifice to, in the place of the Almighty Yahweh. Moses pleads to God on behalf of the people, to not destroy them, suggesting that God's reputation is on the line if God does something so evil. I love what happens here. God changes God's mind.
We must remember that the accounts of God in the Hebrew Scriptures as well as in the New Testament are written from a human perspective. The events were written down only after they had been passed on orally for thousands of years. Our perspective is very limited. And, we are so far removed from that generation of people.
The message that is here for us, is that when we take our minds and hearts off of the God who loves and provides for us, we can give ourselves over to evils and ways that infect us. They blind our sense of God and we stop paying attention to the needs of those around us. Our behavior becomes destructive and we lose sight of what is really important. Our God has given so much for us to love and enjoy. When our physical and spiritual vision no longer sees that, we are no longer worshiping God through our daily lives. Instead, we worship things, problems and everything becomes too big for us.
I do believe in many ways that is what is wrong with the Trayvon Martin matter. When we take our eyes off of recognizing God's creation that gives dignity to every human person, suddenly someone's race, sexual orientation and/or gender expression, etc becomes our god. We have to take control of it. We have to make an "other" out of it. Whatever, we do, we must take a stand and even wipe it out.
So many of us who are white have gotten so use to thinking things that are completely inappropriate about people of different races. The language we hear through the 911 recording of George Zimmerman calling in this incident should wake all of us up. He was labeling Trayvon as a possible drug user, dangerous, but most importantly, he was black. Too many times, we take another person's race and from there, we make presumptions about their activities, their behaviors and make them a target without any thought what so ever to what we are doing. We may not shoot someone down in cold blood, but how many of us have had a conversation about another person's character, and made certain judgments about that person based on race, sexual orientation etc?
In our Gospel today, Jesus is in a conflict with people around him, who are unbelievers. They are people who see things happening in front of them, but they are not convinced. Jesus has just finished telling them about the coming resurrection. Now he is telling his audience about how he cannot do anything on his own and about his testimony. Jesus claims oneness with God, yet he is not the Father. God testifies on behalf of the Son.
In the last part of this Gospel, Jesus says something that I think many who read the Bible literally should pay very close attention to.
"‘You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. Yet you refuse to come to me to have life. I do not accept glory from human beings. But I know that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not accept me; if another comes in his own name, you will accept him.'"
It is not by the Scriptures alone that we will find salvation in Jesus Christ. It is through hope in God through Jesus Christ that we can believe in the promise of eternal life.
It is very important to be careful with John's Gospel here. The point is not anti-Semitism. There is a lot of evidence to suggest that the Gospel of John was not written by the Apostle and Evangelist himself. But, was written by the Johannine's. There is even the possibility that it was a combination of things the Johannine's wrote about the same stories, and then they were all put together in one book. "The expression "the Jews" (which should not be understood as a condemnation of Jews in particular or in general) virtually becomes a technical term for those who reject Jesus." (New Oxford Annotated, New Revised Standard Version, New Testament, p. 124).
Jesus challenges us to see God's presence in the work that he is doing. Jesus has been drawing criticism, because he dared to associate with a Samaritan woman (See John 4). He has crossed the lines of cultures and gender associations to bring those outcast by society closer to the heart of God. God is in the midst of injustice and division, bringing inclusion and unity to welcome through hospitality and reconcile through healing and mercy.
As we are all kind of consumed by the injustice of what happened to Trayvon Martin, we are asked to find God working through the injustice of the situation. God never endorses violence as a way to solve anything. God is in the middle of it, communicating to us if we will listen.
People are coming together to express concern about what happened. We are seeing people of many different races and backgrounds raising their voices in outrage and calling for justice for not only Trayvon, but also anyone who has to fear what might happen to them, the next time they are walking peacefully down a sidewalk. People are recognizing that what happened to Trayvon is about what can happen to any of our children.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people know all too well about youth being bullied in our schools, communities and even their own families. To ignore these things and allow them to go unacknowledged, only lets them to get out of hand. It is our business to speak up in the face of injustice and oppression and be the voice of reason, when people irrationally invoke violence as a means for dealing with prejudice in our communities. Christians have the message of hope and salvation in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. All scapegoating and stereotyping stops there. Any prejudice that becomes violence done, using the Cross as it's excuse, is a counterfeit Christianity.
As we have only two weeks left before Holy Week, let us ask God to help us to see and hear God working in the midst of injustice. May we seek to be God's peace makers in the times we live in. May we be part of the solution, by choosing love and inclusion as our way and purpose for what we do.
Prayers
Almighty and most merciful God, drive from us all weakness of body, mind and spirit; that, being restored to wholeness, we may with free hearts become what you intend us to be and accomplish what you want us to do; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen (Thursday of the Fourth Week in Lent. Holy Women, Holy Men, Celebrating the Saints, p. 57)
Almighty and everlasting God, you hate nothing you have
made and forgive the sins of all who are penitent: Create and
make in us new and contrite hearts, that we, worthily
lamenting our sins and acknowledging our wretchedness,
may obtain of you, the God of all mercy, perfect remission
and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives
and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever
and ever. Amen. (Collect for Ash Wednesday, Book of Common Prayer, p. 217).
O God, you made us in your own image and redeemed us
through Jesus your Son: Look with compassion on the whole
human family; take away the arrogance and hatred which
infect our hearts; break down the walls that separate us;
unite us in bonds of love; and work through our struggle and
confusion to accomplish your purposes on earth; that, in
your good time, all nations and races may serve you in
harmony around your heavenly throne; through Jesus Christ
our Lord. Amen. (Prayer for the Human Family, Book of Common Prayer, p. 815).
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