Desert Scribblings

March 22, 2009 - Fourth Sunday of Lent, Year B

Numbers 21:4-9 - link to the NRSV text

There are certain texts that are just head scratchers.  These are what I term "problem texts" to myself, because something about them tends to pull against my understanding (or lack thereof) of God.  Yet I often find that studying or preaching one of these texts can become some of the most powerful moments of enlightenement.

And as I mulled on the reading from Numbers 21 this week, as I struggled with the idea of God setting serpents upon God's people, as I wrestled with what can be edifying about this story of God's wrath and miraculous healing for a portion of the people through a near-idolatrous item (cf. 2 King 18:4)...I was reminded of today's Gospel reading where Christ on the cross was linked by John's Gospel to the story of the bronze serpent: "And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life" (John 3:14).

John's Gospel gave me a new lens through which to hear the story of the bronze serpent.  I'm not saying that the bronze serpent was actually Jesus on the cross, or that this story somehow anticipates the crucifixion in any precognitive way.  But there is a thematic tie between the serpent and the cross, one that is especially appropriate for us to hear as we near Holy Week.

In both stories, of the serpent and the cross, a cause of death was transformed by God into a symbol of life.

The image of the poisonous serpent, the thing that had been so deadly, became for those Israelites in the wilderness an image that promised healing and life.  In the Christian imagination, the cross was eventually transformed from an instrument of oppression, torture and execution to a vital symbol that reminds us of God's promise of resurrection and restoration.

Now, this doesn't work out some of my other concerns about this story and others like it: God bringing about death as punishment, the semi-magical source of healing, the question of whether or not God asks Moses to violate the commadment to not make an image.  

But now I see a glimmer of why this story might have been kept alive in the imagination of the Israelites such that it was included in the Torah.  The one thing, the one enemy we all share is death itself.  And God takes death and stands it on its head; God announces that out of death comes new, vibrant, resurrection life.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.

Shalom,

Geoff

March 8, 2009 - Second Sunday in Lent

Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 - link to the NRSV text

Identity matters.

However we define the idea of "identity," it is ingrained in us early on.  I remember when I was in pre-school, early elementary school, and I remember when my sister was that age also.  I remember what we were taught.  "You're unique."  "Everyone is special."  Early on we become communicating the idea that identity, what defines "me" as "me," is important.

Our identity matters.  Ignoring whether or not this should be the case, people with recognizable identities are treated differently, either positively or negatively.  A movie star may be bothered in public by fans wanting an autograph or to take a picture with their phone.  On the flip side, a famous athlete may be charged with something illegal and either get off or get less punishment where a non-celebrity very well could have been shipped up the creek without a paddle.

Identity matters.  Reputation, history, character, values, those things that define us, either to ourselves or to other people, all of it is wrapped up into this idea of identity.  And the concept of identity stands right in the middle of our reading from Genesis for this Sunday.

God appears to Abram, who is nearing the century mark in age by this point in the story, and announces God's presence and gives Abram God's identity.  "I am El Shaddai.  Walk in My ways and be blameless" (Genesis 17:1 TNK).

The meaning of El Shaddai isn't one hundred percent clear.  We know that the name "El" was often associated with the supreme god is Semitic religions and came to be used in Hebrew as a general term for a god or to specifically refer to the God of Israel, and is frequently found in Hebrew names (i.e. Israel, Elijah).

But the second part of the name, shaddai, is where we hit the roadblock.  The most widely accepted origin of the name that I came up with was from the Akkadian word s(h)adu, which means "mountain" or "range of mountains" (see HALOT 1421).  Whatever the name means, however, it is supposed to have some effect.  God goes to the trouble to identify God's self beyond just "Hi, I'm God" and instead adds this qualifier of shaddai.

And there's an effect: Abram falls on his face at the identity of the one who is speaking to him.  And God makes covenant with Abram, and then proceeds to change Abram's own identity.  Abram is now Abraham, and Sarai is now Sarah.  The new covenantal relationship alters who Abram and Sarai are and will be, and thus their identities must match their new realities.

Covenant signifies a shift, a change in the relationship, and a change in the lives of those who enter into it.  No longer are they Abram and Sarai, but Abraham and Sarah, the people of the covenant.  No longer do Abram and Sarai have freedom to do whatever they wish because they are now a covenantal people with El Shaddai, this God that will be God to them and to their descendants.

Being a person for and of God requires a shift from self-identity to an identity that is self-denying in many ways.  In Abraham's case, that denial is found in verse 11 which is not a part of our lection: "You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin, and that shall be the sign of the covenant between Me and you."

Look, I'm a guy; the very idea of circumcision at age 99 makes me cringe in horror; and poor Ishmael, who was circumcised by his father at 13!  But God made a gracious move towards humanity and said, "I want to be your God."  But then God asked, "But to show your seriousness, I need you to do something in return."  Identity with God does not always jive with our own expectations and desires.

There is a paradoxical relationship with identity with God; being on God's side is, unfortunately, not the norm.  It goes against this world time and again.  God told Abraham, "You're ninety-nine, your wife is barren, but you will have a son by her."  And Genesis 17:17 tells us that Abraham laughed.  And God replied, "You might think the idea is funny, and I can't blame you.  But when it happens, you will name your son 'he laughed,' as a reminder of what I did for you over and against what you thought was possible."

For many people then and now, life with God doesn't make sense; it turns everything we expect on its head.  Think of some of the things Jesus taught.  "If you want to save your life, lose it, sacrifice it."  "Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you."  "Blessed are the poor, the meek, the persecuted."

Or how about the prophets?  What if Isaiah showed back up on the scene with the same message he had in the 8th century?  

[God] shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more (Isaiah 2:4).

Imagine if Isaiah showed up today and said, "Take your tanks and turn them into tractors.  Take your war budgets and use them to build schools.  Take the resources we use to kill and use them to cure disease and fund hospitals."  

How might America respond to a prophet showing up and saying:

Ah, you who make iniquitous decrees, who write oppressive statutes, to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their right, that widows may be your spoil, and that you may make the orphans your prey! (Isa.10:1-2).

Would we not scoff?  Would we not laugh?  Would we not think this person is insane, foolish, if not outright treasonous?

America is supposedly a "Christian country," according to various people out there, or there are

a lot of people that desire us to be a "Christian country."  But I look around and I wonder.  What about our country identifies us with the crucified Messiah, the ultimate paradox, that life can come out of death itself?  I will acknowledge that historically, our values and our laws in this country were rooted in Judeo-Christian ethics.  But ethics and values alone does not make a disciple, a person of covenantal living!

A disciple is disciplined in the way of her or his teacher.  A disciple emulates their teacher in all things. Having a certain set of values and/or ethics might be a part of discipleship, but that is all it is: a part. Discipleship is something more, something deeper; it is an identity!

Through covenant, through the Torah, through his prophets, through Jesus, God contradicts all that we think we know.  The same El Shaddai that spoke to Abram still speaks to the world today calling us into a new identity as a people.

And that is important for those of us in the church: we are a covenant people. Christianity is not a religion of the individual.  It is a covenant between a community of faith, the church, and the God revealed in the person, character, teaching, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. 

That is why we gather; that is why for centuries, going back to Israel, the faith community has in some way, shape, or form come together to remember and participate in the covenant.  From the old Temple and festivals of the kingdom period, to the synagogue of the Exile and through the rabbinic tradition in Judaism, through the formation of the church up until this era, right here, today, those in the covenant of the faithful gather to remember and observe that covenant: that to Abram and to all his descendants, God will be our God.

We live as a covenant people, as Easter people.  We remember the covenant this Lent as we move to remember the ultimate act of covenantal relationship, the ultimate paradoxical revelation of God: that out of the death of one, true life can be given to all, and God will be our God and we will be God's people.  

Thanks be to God!  Amen.

Shalom,

Geoff

March 1, 2009 – First Sunday in Lent, Year B

Genesis 9:8-17 - link to the NRSV text

The Old Testament/Hebrew Bible lections for Lent this year, other than the Numbers reading on the fourth Sunday, revolve around God's covenant with Israel.  From Noah to Abraham to Moses and Sinai to Jeremiah, the theme of covenant moves us toward Easter and the covenant inaugurated in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

And this journey of covenant begins with Noah; in fact, the word "covenant" (Hebrew: berit) appears for the first time in the biblical narrative in the flood narrative: "But I will establish my covenant with you: and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you" (Genesis 6:18).  I've blogged about the flood story before, so I'm going to shift away from the flood itself (which occurred in the chapters before our reading) and focus instead on the aftermath.

Divine speech encompasses the entirety of our reading; it is God laying out for Noah the covenant that God is establishing as he had promised back in chapter 6.  The verses immediately preceding laid out Noah's responsibilities:
    To be fruitful and multiply (9:1)
    Reaffirmation of humanity's stewardship over the creation (9:2)
    God's permission to eat meat, but not the blood (9:3-5)
    Condemnation of shedding human blood (9:6)
    Repetition of command to be fruitful (9:7)

These commands could potentially be seen as a reestablishment of the relationship between God and humankind as it originally was following creation.  The commands to multiply and the reaffirmation of humanity's stewardship of creation echo similar commands from the creation stories.  The condemnation of human bloodshed seems to echo the Cain and Able narrative as a warning from God to not repeat that mistake.

But the focus of the story is not in Noah's responsibilities.  If these commands are a reestablishment (or at least a recitation) of the divine-human relationship, they are only of any consequence in light of God's choice to enter into covenant with the creation.  "I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth" (9:11).  The continued existence of creation now and in the future rests solely on God's decision to not wipe it all away and start over.

And to seal the covenant, God declares that a sign will be given as a reminder.  "This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth" (9:12-13).  God sets aside a "bow," and instrument of war and destruction, as God's sign that further destruction against the creation will not occur.

I remember as a child being told that the rainbow was the sign that reminded us that God would not send a flood again.  The text, however, as a much different take: the bow is not a sign for us primarily, but a sign for God.  "When I bring the clouds," God says, "and when I see the bow in the clouds, I will remember the everlasting covenant between me and all that is in the earth."

The rainbow, what the ancient author of the flood narrative interpreted as God's weapon laid aside, stands between us and God as a sign of the covenant that reminds us of the mutuality of covenant: that there are two parties, both of which are in this together.

The rainbow does serve as a sign for us, a sign that reminds us of God's promises first and foremost, a sign that reminds us that God remembers us and has not abandoned us.  It is a sign that God's memory is more powerful than our forgetfulness, that God's desire for resurrection and new life overcomes our appetite for destruction and death.

"When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth."  God remembers, God is faithful, and God continues to be in covenant, to be in relationship with us.  And in my book, that is good news.

Shalom,
Geoff

February 25, 2009 - Ash Wednesday, Year B

Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 - link to the NRSV text

How do we respond in times of calamity?

I recall the weeks following September 11, 2001: the prayer services, the increase in attendance in houses of worship, a seemingly collective and united turn towards the divine in order to make sense of what had happened.  For just a moment, we all gathered together around a common need to grieve, to mourn, trying to understand what was happening.  Children and adults, young and old, male and female, we all turned and gathered in common need and supplication.

These are the images that came to mind when I read the words from the prophet Joel:

Return to the LORD, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing…Blow the trumpet in Zion; sanctify a fast; call a solemn assembly; gather the people. Sanctify the congregation; assemble the aged; gather the children, even infants at the breast (Joel 2:13, 15-16).

This does not mean I’m arguing that 9/11 was punishment from God.  But the actions that the prophet calls the people of Judah to are very reminiscent of what occurred here in the United States in the weeks following the fall of the World Trade Center. 

The prophet calls for a collective and united turn towards the LORD their God, to come together, the aged and the children, even the infants.  The tragedy that is on the horizon in the form of an advancing army (cf. 2:12) is one that threatens everyone, and thus everyone should assemble before the LORD.

Joel’s call to repentance and religious observance is not one of individual repentance and regret, though that is an element.  Instead, Joel calls for communal faith to be enacted, for the people to come together, to seek God’s presence as one assembly.  This is congruent with advice John Wesley once received and recorded in his journal: “The Bible knows nothing of solitary religion.”  It is only together that true faith can be lived out.

Which brings us to Lent and Ash Wednesday.  Too often Lenten observance becomes an individual thing: what am I going to give up for Lent?  How is my heart before God this Lenten season?  But to restrict Lent to individual piety is to miss the words from the prophet Joel, that true repentance is something done together.

We are symbolically moving into a time of calamity and tragedy, where we remember the dark days of Jesus’ life and ministry as we move from the mount of Transfiguration this past Sunday to the mount of Calvary on Good Friday.  We are entering the valley, beginning our journey towards the cross.

And theologically, what is occurring in this season is a result of our choices: our refusal to be redeemed, our refusal to treat each other with love and dignity, our inability to love God and each other fully and completely, our rejection of God’s Kingdom that Jesus came to proclaim in favor of our own fiefdoms.

Yet what we meant for evil, God used for good.  The One we thought was destroyed through our violence was exalted in glory. 

The day of the LORD is near, a “day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness” (2:2).  The shadows of Lent are coming upon us, preparing us for the new light and life of Easter.

So call a fast!  Assemble the people!  Sanctify the congregation!  Let us come together!  For Lent is here; may we weep for our brokenness as individuals and as communities.  May we cry out for mercy, we who are loved but struggle to love in return.  May we, in our ashes of mourning, repent and turn again to the God of our Salvation.

And in our weeping, mourning, and fasting, may we once again discover the God who loves us so, who is “gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love” (2:13).

Shalom,
Geoff

March 16, 2008 - The Liturgy of the Passion

Isaiah 50:4-9a - link to the NRSV text

We are entering into Holy Week; this is a time for Christians to remember the final week of Jesus’ earthly ministry and to prepare themselves for Easter Sunday. This particular Sunday is most commonly referred to as “Palm Sunday,” and for many there are fond memories of children waving palm branches and the singing of triumphal hymns and choruses.

But to restrict the liturgical action to just the remembrance of the palms and the shouts of “Hosanna!” is to do a disservice to the memory of the story. As Laurence Stookey puts it in his masterful book Calendar: Christ’s Time for the Church:

The final Sunday of the Forty Days is known by various titles but almost nowhere is it any longer simply “Palm Sunday,” in either name or recommended manner of observance. The basic reason is this: To separate out the narratives of the entry of Jesus into the city and interpret the occasion behind them as utterly joyous and victorious is to misread the Gospels...The New Testament writers know fully well that the “Hosanna!” cries of Sunday will by Friday turn into the calls for crucifixion (Stookey, Calendar, 88).

Thus, for Palm/Passion Sunday, there are two connected liturgies to be observed, the Liturgy of Palms, which remembers the entrance into Jerusalem. This liturgy is then followed by the Liturgy of the Passion, which remembers the crucifixion and shows the movement of Holy Week from the cries of “Hosanna!” to the shouts of “Crucify him!”

My worship professor James Abbington once noted that when he was growing up, they kind of had the “Palm Sunday straight on to Easter Sunday” observance one year, with no Good Friday or talk about the Passion beforehand. And so he shows up on Easter and the congregation rejoices, “He is Risen!” “Great!” Dr. Abbington observed. “When did he die?”

Stookey points out this very problem out when he notes that even if we could have once counted on everyone observing Holy Week up to and including Holy Thursday and Good Friday, “that time is long gone” (Stookey, 89). So if you are a pastor or minister, and you are not going to observe Holy Week services, or you believe most of your congregation is not going to participate, then the observance of both the Liturgies of Palms and the Passion should somehow be incorporated into this Sunday. Properly, it should not be a case of “either” the Palms or the Passion, but an incorporation of both.

Our lection for the Liturgy of the Passion is from Isaiah 50, and it is a large portion of a passage that is commonly known as one the “servant songs” found in Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40-55). The context of Second Isaiah and thus these servant songs is the Babylonian exile, and the prophet anticipates the captured Judeans' liberation at the hands of Cyrus of Persia, who did indeed capture Babylon and allowed many exiles to return to Judah.

The identity of the servant is very much debated; Brevard Childs speaks of the servant as the embodiment of the nation Israel (see Childs, Isaiah, OTL, 382-85, 394). Many Christians have understandably read Jesus back into these songs, explaining why this is our text for Passion Sunday, and see them as predictions in the prophetic-fulfillment mode of interpretation. Most Jews and many scholars identify the servant of the songs as Israel, both the land and the people. Ultimately, I think to identify one person or one group as the servant is to miss the point. Maybe the author of the servant songs had a particular person or group in mind, but you could easily argue (or interpret) that the description of the servant found in verses 4-9a are not just indicative of the servant, but of any servant of God.

The song opens by describing the servant in prophetic terms; the servant has been granted the ability to speak (v. 4a, cf. Isa 6:6-7, Jer 1:6-9) and the ability to hear God (v. 4b-5a). The song then speaks about the obedience of the servant, “I was not rebellious, I did not turn backward” (v.5b), and describes an obedience even to the point of physical abuse and violence towards the servant.

The rest of the reading describes the servant’s confidence in the LORD God. God is twice described as a helper, and is the one who “vindicates” the servant. Thus, the servant sets his face like flint and knows that he cannot be disgraced, and asks if God is his helper and vindicator, who can truly oppose him?

For Christians preparing for Good Friday and Easter, it’s easy to see Jesus in this reading and it is not inappropriate, but don’t be too quick to get there. Many people of faith have faced adversity, faced suffering as servants of God. Think of faithful Jews who chose to die at the hands of Antiochus IV Epiphanes instead of going against their deeply held beliefs (cf. 1 Macc. 1:62-63). Think of the faithful martyrs of the church who gave their lives instead of denying the Lord Jesus. Think of priests and pastors putting themselves in the way of danger instead of allowing the Nazis to take the Jewish children that had been entrusted to their care.

The list could continue on for much longer, but the point is made. The servant of the song is not necessarily a particular person. Instead, the servant is a model of and for anyone who hears God, who is given a “word” to comfort, and gives of themselves to be the servant they are called to be. Of course, Christians confess that Jesus is the perfect embodiment of this ideal, God Incarnate, the Word-Made-Flesh, the perfect obedient servant to the will of the Father. But to reduce this passage to just a prediction about how Jesus would act in the face of crucifixion is to do the vision of the prophet a disservice.

Instead, this passage is a poetic and powerful motif for what it means to stand for God in the midst of injustice and evil, to be willing to suffer abuse and scorn for the kingdom of God, and to speak a word from the LORD even when you know that it is going to be unwelcome. The fate of the servant in this song is the possible fate for anyone who “speaks truth to power,” as Walter Brueggemann would say.

Or as Jesus taught before his own crucifixion, “If you want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the [good news], will save it” (Mark 8:34-35). Are we willing to be that kind of people, that kind of witness to God’s command, to God’s ideals of compassion and justice and mercy?

The words of the servant still hold for those of us who are willing: “The Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced…It is the Lord God who helps me; who will declare me guilty?”

Personal Note: I’ve been extremely pleased and humbled by the amount of traffic this past week, and I especially want to thank Jenee Woodard for posting my entry for last week on textweek.com. If you are finding this helpful, or you have thoughts to add, leave some comments! I’d love to hear from you.

Shalom,
Geoff

Passion/Palm Sunday, Easter, and the Easter Season

The lectionary gets a little unusual around Easter when it comes to the OT readings.  So, for Palm/Passion Sunday, I will be focusing on the OT reading from the Liturgy of the Passion, which comes from Isaiah 50:4-9a, since a good bit of the Psalm for the Liturgy of Palms is repeated on Easter Sunday.  Then for Easter Sunday and the rest of the Easter season up through Pentecost, I will offer commentary on the readings from Psalms.

Shalom,
Geoff

March 9, 2008 - Fifth Sunday in Lent

Ezekiel 37:1-14 - link to the NRSV text

    Many of us have our own “valley of dry bones.” We have circumstances, relationships, communities and groups that are torn asunder and falling apart. We have families shattered by betrayal and anger and abuse and addiction. We have churches divided over theology or worship style or ministry goals. We have a country separated by partisan politics, by rhetoric, by the color of the state, and by our stubborn refusal to even hear the other side and to try and work together for a common good. Sometimes we’ll look around at these shattered relationships, these crushed dreams and hopes, and we’ll assume that’s the end of the story.

    This may have been the same kind of thinking that many of the Judean exiles may have been feeling in Babylon, especially after the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. Is our relationship with God over now that God has allowed this to happen? Have we been abandoned to our fate? Is there anything left to cling to? The future of God’s people was in jeopardy. The Temple was gone; the dwelling place of the Almighty was razed to the ground. Many of the Judeans most likely would have felt abandoned, cast off. Or as our reading from Ezekiel for this Sunday puts it, “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely” (v. 11).

    It’s within this context of exile and fear of the unknown future that we have to examine Ezekiel’s famous vision of the valley of dry bones. Many interpreters have assumed that the text speaks of individual resurrection from death, but to do so misses the rhetorical point that the text is trying to truly make.

    Ezekiel describes his experience as a visionary journey, where Ezekiel is taken from his present location to another place where he experiences the revelation from God. In this case, Ezekiel says that the “hand of the LORD” picked him up and placed him in a valley of bones. God commands Ezekiel to prophesy to the bones and to tell them to “hear the word of the LORD” (v. 4). The results of this will be that God will bring the bones back together, restore to them their flesh, and breath into them so that they will live. All of this is so that the bones will know that “I am the LORD” (v. 6).

    Ezekiel then performs two prophetic actions. His first prophetic act restores the flesh and muscle as promised, but there is no breath (Hebrew, ruach) in them. God commands Ezekiel to now prophesy to the breath and command it to enter the bones so that they may live. The breath obeys; the bones live and stand together as a “vast multitude” (10). This dual prophetic action in some ways mirrors God’s own actions in the creation story: God forms a man from the dust of the ground, and then breathes into it the breath of life (Genesis 2:7).

    God then explains to Ezekiel the meaning of the vision: the bones are the exiled house of Israel, cut off and dried up, with no breath or life. God’s word through Ezekiel, that they shall live and know that the LORD has acted, is in contrast to Israel’s words of defeat and despair. This is repeated twice in verses 12-14, that Israel will be restored from the “grave” and thus they shall know “I am the LORD” and that “I, the LORD, have spoken and will act.”

    The prophetic vision here is one of restoration, of recreation, and maybe even reconciliation. As possible rebellion against Babylon loomed, there were different views on what the kingdom should do. The prophet Jeremiah, seeing the coming war and ensuing destruction that would be caused, urged the kings to submit to Babylonian rule, believing that whatever befell Judah as a result of the war was punishment for Judah’s apostasy and failure to live up to the commands of justice and righteousness commanded by Torah. His viewpoints caused several clashes with the authorities and Judean nationalists, even including an arrest and jail time in a cistern (Jeremiah 38:1-13).

    So maybe those things that divide us and leave us as the “dry and cut off bones” of the body of God’s people are not insurmountable. Maybe we can be restored, we can be reconciled to each other and to God, and we can be recreated and resurrected into the kinds of communities, families, countries, or people that God desires us to be. Our fatalistic words of hopelessness and abandonment are not the final word, for God’s word still comes to our valleys and brings us up from our graves (v. 13). But it takes more than just speaking to our brokenness, more than just commanding restoration and reconciliation, more than just saying that resurrection is possible. It requires the breath of God moving in and among the bones; it needs the spirit of God infusing us with new life, moving us to better ways of living and being.

    Ezekiel’s vision is not one that is regulated strictly to some distant time past, but one that speaks in the face of all places of spiritual and emotional exile and death. Restoration is possible, but true restoration will only occur when the spirit of God moves and is put within the communities and circumstances that need it. Then we shall live and we shall know that “I, the LORD have spoken and will act” (v. 14).

Shalom,
Geoff