Turning Back from Repentance

God's Creative Word
God Calls For Justice:  Justice Defined
Celebrate Jubilee

Jeremiah 34:8-17

The Message

 ^8-10God delivered a Message to Jeremiah after King Zedekiah made a covenant with the people of Jerusalem to decree freedom to the slaves who were Hebrews, both men and women. The covenant stipulated that no one in Judah would own a fellow Jew as a slave. All the leaders and people who had signed the covenant set free the slaves, men and women alike.
 ¹¹But a little while later, they reneged on the covenant, broke their promise and forced their former slaves to become slaves again.
 ^12-14Then Jeremiah received this Message from God: "God, the God of Israel, says, 'I made a covenant with your ancestors when I delivered them out of their slavery in Egypt. At the time I made it clear: "At the end of seven years, each of you must free any fellow Hebrew who has had to sell himself to you. After he has served six years, set him free." But your ancestors totally ignored me.
 ^15-16"'And now, you—what have you done? First you turned back to the right way and did the right thing, decreeing freedom for your brothers and sisters—and you made it official in a solemn covenant in my Temple. And then you turned right around and broke your word, making a mockery of both me and the covenant, and made them all slaves again, these men and women you'd just set free. You forced them back into slavery.
 ^17-20"'So here is what I, God, have to say: You have not obeyed me and set your brothers and sisters free. Here is what I'm going to do: I'm going to set you free—God's Decree—free to get killed in war or by disease or by starvation. I'll make you a spectacle of horror. People all over the world will take one look at you and shudder. Everyone who violated my covenant, who didn't do what was solemnly promised in the covenant ceremony when they split the young bull into two halves and walked between them, all those people that day who walked between the two halves of the bull—leaders of Judah and Jerusalem, palace officials, priests, and all the rest of the people—I'm handing the lot of them over to their enemies who are out to kill them. Their dead bodies will be carrion food for vultures and stray dogs.

For Reflection

How seriously does God take justice?  How seriously does God take his covenants? Have you read these passages? Do you still wonder?  When is offering repentance not repentance at all?  No one seems to be privileged to warrant special treatment -- no officials, no priests, no one who has justified turning their backs on the holy covenant.  Only those who were obedient to the covenant were favored. 

Pray

that you will have the faith and the courage to stick to your God-centered sense of justice.  Pray that you will mirror God's transformational love and extend it to all -- ALL!

God's Creative Word
God Calls For Justice:  Justice Defined
Living as God's Just People

Luke 10:25-37

The Message

Defining "Neighbor"

 ²⁵Just then a religion scholar stood up with a question to test Jesus. "Teacher, what do I need to do to get eternal life?"  ²⁶He answered, "What's written in God's Law? How do you interpret it?"
 ²⁷He said, "That you love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and muscle and intelligence—and that you love your neighbor as well as you do yourself."
 ²⁸"Good answer!" said Jesus. "Do it and you'll live."
 ²⁹Looking for a loophole, he asked, "And just how would you define 'neighbor'?"
 ^30-32Jesus answered by telling a story. "There was once a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. On the way he was attacked by robbers. They took his clothes, beat him up, and went off leaving him half-dead. Luckily, a priest was on his way down the same road, but when he saw him he angled across to the other side. Then a Levite religious man showed up; he also avoided the injured man.
 ^33-35"A Samaritan traveling the road came on him. When he saw the man's condition, his heart went out to him. He gave him first aid, disinfecting and bandaging his wounds. Then he lifted him onto his donkey, led him to an inn, and made him comfortable. In the morning he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, 'Take good care of him. If it costs any more, put it on my bill—I'll pay you on my way back.'
 ³⁶"What do you think? Which of the three became a neighbor to the man attacked by robbers?"
 ³⁷"The one who treated him kindly," the religion scholar responded.
   Jesus said, "Go and do the same."

For Reflection

It is easy.  Treat all people as neighbors.  In God's kingdom there are no strangers.  Outside God's kingdom there are no strangers.  Treat each one you meet kindly.  Give them your most valuable possession -- your time and your hospitality.

Pray

for those who feel unworthy of a place in the Kingdom of God.  Pray that others will see in you the justice and grace that characterizes God's kingdom.  Pray that others will see in you an invitation into the community of believers.

If You Truly Amend Your Ways

God's Creative Word
God Calls For Justice:  Justice Defined
Living as God's Just People

Jeremiah 7:1-7

The Message

The Nation That Wouldn't Obey God

 ^1-2 The Message from God to Jeremiah: "Stand in the gate of God's Temple and preach this Message. ^2-3"Say, 'Listen, all you people of Judah who come through these gates to worship God. God-of-the-Angel-Armies, Israel's God, has this to say to you: ^3-7"'Clean up your act—the way you live, the things you do—so I can make my home with you in this place. Don't for a minute believe the lies being spoken here—"This is God's Temple, God's Temple, God's Temple!" Total nonsense! Only if you clean up your act (the way you live, the things you do), only if you do a total spring cleaning on the way you live and treat your neighbors, only if you quit exploiting the street people and orphans and widows, no longer taking advantage of innocent people on this very site and no longer destroying your souls by using this Temple as a front for other gods—only then will I move into your neighborhood. Only then will this country I gave your ancestors be my permanent home, my Temple.

For Reflection

Beware of false prophets.  Beware of those who promise to cure the world's ills by unjust means.  Learn to judge that which is just and not merely justifiable.  Use God's standards of love, compassion and grace.  Invite all people into a clean neighborhood of inclusion.  Reject intolerance and fear. 

Pray

that you will recognize the illusionary things which separate us from each other and from God.  Pray that you will continue to work for the inclusion of all people into the circle of God.

Occasions for Stumbling

God's Creative Word
God Calls For Justice:  Justice Defined
Living as God's Just People

Matthew 18:1-8

The Message

Whoever Becomes Simple Again

 ¹ At about the same time, the disciples came to Jesus asking, "Who gets the highest rank in God's kingdom?" ^2-5For an answer Jesus called over a child, whom he stood in the middle of the room, and said, "I'm telling you, once and for all, that unless you return to square one and start over like children, you're not even going to get a look at the kingdom, let alone get in. Whoever becomes simple and elemental again, like this child, will rank high in God's kingdom. What's more, when you receive the childlike on my account, it's the same as receiving me. ^6-7"But if you give them a hard time, bullying or taking advantage of their simple trust, you'll soon wish you hadn't. You'd be better off dropped in the middle of the lake with a millstone around your neck. Doom to the world for giving these God-believing children a hard time! Hard times are inevitable, but you don't have to make it worse—and it's doomsday to you if you do.
 ^8-9"If your hand or your foot gets in the way of God, chop it off and throw it away. You're better off maimed or lame and alive than the proud owners of two hands and two feet, godless in a furnace of eternal fire. And if your eye distracts you from God, pull it out and throw it away. You're better off one-eyed and alive than exercising your twenty-twenty vision from inside the fire of hell.

For Reflection

I know. I know. The Devil makes you do it!  Simplify!  Look toward the elementary.  Life does not have to be that complicated.  It becomes so when one assumes he is in control, that he is responsible alone.  The truth is that one does not have to go it alone.  Who have you helped lately?  In whose way have you gotten?  Acting out of love for each other is acting on God's behalf.

Pray

that you chop off and throw away those things which inhibit you from acting out of the love of God.  Pray for those who are suffering because of their commitment to God.  Pray for the courage and wisdom to approach life simple and with confidence in God's promise.

No Safety from Sinners

God's Creative Word
God Calls For Justice:  Justice Defined
Living as God's Just People

Jeremiah 7:8-15

The Message

 ^8-11"'Get smart! Your leaders are handing you a pack of lies, and you're swallowing them! Use your heads! Do you think you can rob and murder, have sex with the neighborhood wives, tell lies nonstop, worship the local gods, and buy every novel religious commodity on the market—and then march into this Temple, set apart for my worship, and say, "We're safe!" thinking that the place itself gives you a license to go on with all this outrageous sacrilege? A cave full of criminals! Do you think you can turn this Temple, set apart for my worship, into something like that? Well, think again. I've got eyes in my head. I can see what's going on.'" God's Decree!
 ¹²"'Take a trip down to the place that was once in Shiloh, where I met my people in the early days. Take a look at those ruins, what I did to it because of the evil ways of my people Israel.
 ^13-15"'So now, because of the way you have lived and failed to listen, even though time and again I took you aside and talked seriously with you, and because you refused to change when I called you to repent, I'm going to do to this Temple, set aside for my worship, this place you think is going to keep you safe no matter what, this place I gave as a gift to your ancestors and you, the same as I did to Shiloh. And as for you, I'm going to get rid of you, the same as I got rid of those old relatives of yours around Shiloh, your fellow Israelites in that former kingdom to the north.'

For Reflection

All of us who turn to unjust solutions to our national problems are guilty of neglecting the God-centered response to stressful times.   Therefore, all who have contributed actively or passively by not speaking out have contributed to our national guilt.  Since few appear as God-centered intercessors, all must share in the unjust consequences.  God-centered judgments are needed to refine appropriate justice.  In this season of political choice, ask yourself, "to what extent are the proposals for action (as hypothetical as they may be) contribute to God-centered just ends?"

 Pray

for our world leaders.  Pray that they turn to justice as a guiding principle. Pray for all those who suffer injustices, that they may be comforted and emboldened to work for justice.

God's Indignation over Injustice

God's Creative Word
God Calls For Justice:  Justice Defined
Living as God's Just People

Ezekiel 22:23-31

The Message

 ^23-25 God's Message came to me: "Son of man, tell her, 'You're a land that during the time I was angry with you got no rain, not so much as a spring shower. The leaders among you became desperate, like roaring, ravaging lions killing indiscriminately. They grabbed and looted, leaving widows in their wake.
 ^26-29 "'Your priests violated my law and desecrated my holy things. They can't tell the difference between sacred and secular. They tell people there's no difference between right and wrong. They're contemptuous of my holy Sabbaths, profaning me by trying to pull me down to their level. Your politicians are like wolves prowling and killing and rapaciously taking whatever they want. Your preachers cover up for the politicians by pretending to have received visions and special revelations. They say, "This is what God, the Master, says..." when God hasn't said so much as one word. Extortion is rife, robbery is epidemic, the poor and needy are abused, outsiders are kicked around at will, with no access to justice.'
 ^30-31 "I looked for someone to stand up for me against all this, to repair the defenses of the city, to take a stand for me and stand in the gap to protect this land so I wouldn't have to destroy it. I couldn't find anyone. Not one. So I'll empty out my wrath on them, burn them to a crisp with my hot anger, serve them with the consequences of all they've done. Decree of God, the Master."

For Reflection 

When the going gets tough one's depth of hope and trust begins to predominate.  The less hope and confidence in God (or for that matter, from a humanistic point of view, a good outcome.)  one' predominate style prevails.  if that style is injustice, it is, I suppose, motivated by fear of untoward outcomes.  If at those times one allows hopeless to take over, injustice abounds.  Just consider our treatment of the Japanese Americans during the second world war or the attitude toward and the treatment of Muslims in today's circumstances.  When times get tough, how do you respond?  To what extent do you allow your fears to undermine your God-centered responses? 

Pray

that when the going gets tough you take your stand for God.  Pray that you understand the difference between secular and sacred responses. Pray that you avoid common cultural responses and turn to toward the hope found in a life lived in the hollow of God's hand.

Walking on Water

God's Creative Word
The Word Will Be
The Bread of Life

John 6:16-21

The Message

 ^16-21In the evening his disciples went down to the sea, got in the boat, and headed back across the water to Capernaum. It had grown quite dark and Jesus had not yet returned. A huge wind blew up, churning the sea. They were maybe three or four miles out when they saw Jesus walking on the sea, quite near the boat. They were scared senseless, but he reassured them, "It's me. It's all right. Don't be afraid." So they took him on board. In no time they reached land—the exact spot they were headed to.

For Reflection 

Storms of our lives frighten us.  They sometimes make us doubt the saving grace of God's promise.  Jesus seemed to have abandoned the disciples.  Then, in a display of his power to comfort and save, Jesus walked on the stormy water, reassured the frightened disciples, and lead them to the spot on shore which was intended.  Christ will do that for all of us. He will deliver us from our fear.

After  the Christ event, truth became knowable.

Pray

for confidence in Christ to deliver you into his loving presence.  Pray for all those who live in fear.  Pray that they will find comfort in the hollow of God's hand.