Oct 13

Bitterness and Life

Ruth 1:1-22 

This week’s text we meet two women, Naomi and Ruth.  We are told they are both widowed, and Naomi has also lost her two sons.  There are no children or grandchildren to bring them comfort.  Naomi’s family were environmental refugees in the land of Moab.  There she witnessed her sons marrying local women, her husband dying and then her two sons died.  Now she is left with the responsibility of caring for her two daughters-in-law. 

She decides to return to her home in Israel, but obviously her daughters-in-law will not be welcomed there.  She releases them from their obligations to her, sending them back to their mother’s house.  Except, Ruth remains.  Sunday will focus on Ruth. 

But think today about Naomi.  When she returns to Bethlehem, she has changed, people do not recognize her, and she takes a new name with her changed identity.  She is Mara.  Naomi means “pleasant,” and Mara means “bitter (see Exodus 15:23).”  She had gone out full but came back empty.  Life or the Almighty had afflicted her, and she was bitter. 

When have you found yourself in that situation?  You thought you were going after the better life but did not seek the will of God for your life.  You thought you were smarter than others around you but only fell flat on your face.  You have come to the conclusion of the experience only to wind up empty, desolate, and bitter.  This is the story of Naomi, and through the book of Ruth God brings here back to joy.  Find that at the end of the book, Ruth 4. 

Pastor Greg

Oct 05

No Commandment Without a Commander

Deuteronomy 5:1-21; 6:4-9  

 Where do our laws come from?  Some may read this passage from Deuteronomy and say Moses is the commander.  Some have the idea that all law comes from the King or the State, so whatever it says is legal is right.  But an honest reading of the Bible, we clearly see that the Commander, the Lawgiver is God.    

 How important is it for us to see that God is the One giving us these commands?  If it were just an individual’s opinions, they could be challenged, like Korah challenged Moses in Numbers 16.  If it were the State, then the laws would change with the whim of the ruling class.  This means there is no lasting morality to guide the legislation of new laws.  But with God as the giver of these commandment, we have a moral system that does not change and a judge that administers the law fairly.  The good are rewarded and the evil are punished.            

These 10 Commandments (or Hebrew “Words”) are given particularly to Israel, but in generally to the whole world.  God intends for them to be a guide for human relationships, morality, and civil order.  God gave these commands not for us to think we can earn our way to heaven.  God gave them so that we may live a happier life as God’s children.       

For me, one interesting aspect of the review of the giving of the commandments here in Deuteronomy is that God is described as the One that set the slaves free and delivered Israel from bondage in Egypt.  These commandments were for the purpose of humans to live as a free people.  Then with the Sabbath command God says that the Sabbath is to be observed because the people were once slaves in Egypt.  A slave is seen as a worker, the value is only in the work that can be extracted from the slave.  This speaks directly to our model of industrialization used to organize our society.  The purpose of the modern school system (based upon the Prussian public education) is to produce workers for industry and consumers for the products.  The individual is valued only for the work.      

Yet if our God, the Giver of our law, is the God who created male and female in God’s own image, then liberated them from bondage and toil, this means that God sees humans as meant for more than work.  And Sabbath is the space that God commands people to be fully human.      

With God as the Giver of the Commandments, humans are elevated to a purpose higher than the tillers of the ground or the assemblers of widgets.  In the Sabbath, all economic and social levels are the same as we enjoy the freedom provided for us in God’s commands.  

Next Week The book of Ruth and a view of a different type of family. 

Pastor Greg

Sep 28

What’s in a Name?

Exodus 3:1-15


As Moses interacts with the Burning Bush, he asks, “What is your name?’  The voice of God answers, “I am who I am”.  Many have translated this various ways such as “ I am what I am or I will be what I will be (NRSV footnote.)    This is the God that does not allow description.  A name defines something, such as Adam naming the animals in Genesis 2.  But God cannot be defined.  This does not mean that God is unknowable, but that God is not limited by our definition.  From the bush God has given us ways to know this One.  The God of Abraham, Issacc and Jacob, the God that hears the cry of God’s chosen people, Israel, and the God that makes the common place holy.  God is also the One that the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain.  How often do we want to define God?  I have heard so many Christians say, but my God will not do that (and then list something they personally object to.)  Or my God is definitely a he (or she), or my God is against this group or person, or that my God cannot hear the prayers of sinners, or gays, or Muslims, or Republicans, etc.  Each one of these examples show the ways we want to limit the God that will be what God will be.  The thing that is happening is we are limiting the Godself, we are limiting the way God manifest the divine power and presence in our lives.  We do not allow ourselves to see the I AM working in this world, because we are looking for God only in certain arenas.  I often call this the God in the Box attitude.  But with God, when we put him in a box, she breaks out, refusing to be contained, and amazes all who’s eyes are blinded by their puny definitions and conditions on God. The Sovereign “I WILL BE WHAT I WILL BE” comes to Moses this week and will begins the powerful contention with Pharaoh and taking the chosen people into the Promised Land. 

Pastor Greg

Sep 21

Jacob’s Crisis of Faith

Genesis 32

Genesis 32 is one of those chapters that I would enjoy having a four-week long discussion group take up.  This is a very revealing passage on how each of us can struggle in our spiritual life.  The story of Jacob includes miracles and visions.  He saw the stairway between heaven and earth, he saw the manifest blessing of God as his herds increase and how his family has grown, and God has made specific promises to Jacob and told him to go home.  Now as Jacob approaches home, he feels threatened by his brother and is expecting the worst outcome, his and his family’s death. 

Jacob’s prayer in 32:9-12 is an oft repeated prayer from the mouths of believers.  Psalm 44 is one such lament where the psalmist says, “Yet you have rejected us and shamed us (v. 9).”  When we face the troubles of today, the blessings of the past seem so insignificant. 

My sermon this week, that I’ve subtitled “Down and Dirty with God,” is on 32:22-32.  Jacob wrestles with a divine being while he is alone at night anxious about his family’s safety and even his own life.  This is a physical picture of his struggles in his prayer.  Jacob is changed.  Physically he will walk with a limp for the rest of his life, and spiritually he has a new name.  His new name acknowledges his struggle with God, and that name challenges each one of us to struggle with God even in the most desperate times. 

Having a relationship with God is not always blessings and rejoicing.  It almost as often includes struggle, fear, and uncertainty.  Job looks at the full terror of dealing with God when he says, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him. (Job 35:15)” 
Be with us this Sunday as we consider our own wrestling with God at midnight.

Pastor Greg