letting our pain out

Good afternoon sisters and brothers,
Job has suffered. So far he's given the "right" responses; the acceptable religious answers about accepting bad from God as well as good. Now, after seven days of silent mourning with his friends, Job truly lets out the pain of his heart. This raw, honest, angry grief opens up the rest of the book for us. No matter how we feel or how we express it, God loves us and can take our most unfiltered feelings.

God bless,
Sam

Job 3:1-10

After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. ²Job said: ³“Let the day perish in which I was born, and the night that said, ‘A man-child is conceived.’ ⁴Let that day be darkness! May God above not seek it, or light shine on it. ⁵Let gloom and deep darkness claim it. Let clouds settle upon it; let the blackness of the day terrify it.

⁶That night—let thick darkness seize it! let it not rejoice among the days of the year; let it not come into the number of the months. ⁷Yes, let that night be barren; let no joyful cry be heard in it. ⁸Let those curse it who curse the Sea, those who are skilled to rouse up Leviathan. ⁹Let the stars of its dawn be dark; let it hope for light, but have none; may it not see the eyelids of the morning— ¹⁰because it did not shut the doors of my mother’s womb, and hide trouble from my eyes.

anger and healing

Good afternoon friends,
Today's reading is a follow up reading to yesterdays. Elijah heals the widow of Zarapheth's son. One thing that stands out to me about this healing is that it's not just a healing, but also a full out expression of anger by the woman and Elijah against God. God can handle our anger; he loves us even when we're angry.

God bless,
Sam


1 Kings 17:17-24

¹⁷After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became ill; his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him. ¹⁸She then said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance, and to cause the death of my son!” ¹⁹But he said to her, “Give me your son.”


He took him from her bosom, carried him up into the upper chamber where he was lodging, and laid him on his own bed. ²⁰He cried out to the Lord, “O Lord my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I am staying, by killing her son?” ²¹Then he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried out to the Lord, “O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.” ²²The Lord listened to the voice of Elijah; the life of the child came into him again, and he revived. ²³Elijah took the child, brought him down from the upper chamber into the house, and gave him to his mother; then Elijah said, “See, your son is alive.” ²⁴So the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”

putting on Christ

Good evening friends,
Today's reading reminds us that when we become Christian it means finding our identity in Jesus and rejecting those parts of our old identity that are opposed to God's kingdom. That means taking off the prejudice, selfishness and consumer identity the world encourages us to wear and putting on the love, openness and justice Jesus stood for. It also means putting forgiveness at the heart of our relationships with others. Jesus forgave us, so we forgive others; seeking love in all that we do. Letting our faith transform us can be hard because the world keeps bombarding us with contrary messages, but if we allow God to do so, the Spirit will work inside us to make us new in Christ.

God bless,
Sam

Colossians 3:8-17

⁸But now you must get rid of all such things—anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. ⁹Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices ¹⁰and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. ¹¹In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!

¹²As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. ¹³Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. ¹⁴Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. ¹⁵And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. ¹⁶Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God. ¹⁷And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

righteous anger

Good morning brothers and sisters,

We saw Moses plead with God for mercy on behalf of Israel, now Moses sees Israel's sin for himself. His anger is understandable, but even so God written word is destroyed in Moses' rage. Jesus warns his hearers that anger is closely related to murder. Anger is part of being human, but a part we need to watch carefully. May we always be angry with injustice, but may we use our anger in just ways.

Blessings on your day,

Sam

Exodus 32:15-20

15Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain, carrying the two tablets of the covenant in his hands, tablets that were written on both sides, written on the front and on the back. 16The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved upon the tablets. 17When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war in the camp.”18But he said, “It is not the sound made by victors, or the sound made by losers; it is the sound of revelers that I hear.”

19As soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses’ anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets from his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain. 20He took the calf that they had made, burned it with fire, ground it to powder, scattered it on the water, and made the Israelites drink it.

tears and anger

Good morning sisters and brothers,
Yesterday we saw the triumph of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem and his enthusiastic welcome. Today we see his entry from an emotional perspective. Jesus is touched by being in Jerusalem and knowing that he will be rejected. He's known that for a long time, since he's told his disciples about his death three times, but there seems to be something powerful about being in the city in person. Jesus weeps for Jerusalem because it doesn't recognize the opportunity to return to God through his visit. Knowing Christ means knowing peace; Jesus knows that Jerusalem as a whole will not know him.

We get anger as well as grief in this scene as Jesus drives the merchants out of the temple. He's angry because commerce seems to have overwhelmed faith. The commercial activity actually started out with good intentions. Sacrificing animals had always been a part of temple worship, so making animals available for people from far away made sense. Roman money, which most people would have to use in their daily lives wasn't acceptable to give to the temple because it had an image of Caesar on it in conflict with Jewish law. "Money changers" in the temple exchanged Roman money for coins without the image so people could make a financial offering as well. To Jesus' eyes at least, this activity distracted from the worship of God and may have been an opportunity to cheat people, especially the poor. Are there any distractions we need to drive out of our worship life to focus on God?

God bless,
Sam

Luke 19:41-48

41As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, 42saying, “If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. 43Indeed, the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. 44They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another; because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.”

45Then he entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling things there; 46and he said, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer’; but you have made it a den of robbers.” 47Every day he was teaching in the temple. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people kept looking for a way to kill him; 48but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were spellbound by what they heard.

voicing our sorrow

Good morning friends,
The Psalms are a great part of the Bible for expressing human emotions: the good, the bad and the ugly. We've heard the psalmist praise God with joy and talk about the comfort of following God. Today we hear the psalmist cry out in lament for the trouble s/he is facing. Many of the Psalms raise similar issues: arrogant or wicked people oppress the psalmist, illness is a constant sorrow, the psalmist looks for comfort in God and is still waiting. Some Psalms are full of anger against God for allowing such terrible things to happen. Most of the time these laments have a foundation in hope and trust in God, but sometimes the grief is too much to see that far ahead. The great thing about psalms of lament is that when we find ourselves full of sorrow or anger these words let us express our feelings honestly. God can handle our grief and anger. God can handle our hurt. And ultimately God will bring us through trouble to a new dawn of joy.

God bless,
Sam

Psalm 119:81-88

81My soul languishes for your salvation; I hope in your word.
82My eyes fail with watching for your promise; I ask, “When will you comfort me?”
83For I have become like a wineskin in the smoke, yet I have not forgotten your statutes.
84How long must your servant endure? When will you judge those who persecute me?
85The arrogant have dug pitfalls for me; they flout your law.
86All your commandments are enduring; I am persecuted without cause; help me!
87They have almost made an end of me on earth; but I have not forsaken your precepts.
88In your steadfast love spare my life, so that I may keep the decrees of your mouth.