Things aren't always what they seem. We reach for the mild salsa and get the extra hot. We do what we think is right by Jesus and the church tells us we're all wrong. Other times we do what we think is right by Jesus and Jesus tells us we're all wrong. Like the Hebrews following Moses to the Promised Land and ending up in the desert first, sometimes we have to wonder whether we couldn't have picked a better travel agent.
But as we enter the season of Lent, the desert time, we see again that the love of God--harsh, wild, and full of surprises--makes a way where there is no way and livens up even the driest of bones.
February 7: Powerful Seasoning
Isaiah 58:3-9a, 1 Corinthians 2:1-11, Matthew 5:13-16, Psalm 112:4-9
"You are the salt of the earth." Why thank you, Jesus. We do appreciate that affirmation. As disciples we like to think we add a little seasoning to spice up the ho-hum fare of the daily round. The preserving quality of salt fits our church brand of discipleship too. Preserving the traditions of liturgy, doctrine, and gender of the preacher have certainly kept the church a salt mine.
The trouble is that Jesus was not offering disciples like us an affirmation. Jesus was signaling us with a flash warning. He was offering a metaphor to help interpret the experience of persecution mentioned in verses 11-12. Jesus wanted to make it clear that if we were going to really take seriously this whole new order of God's reign, then we should count the cost.
To speak and live God's truth disturbs the power arrangements of the old order. Persecution is a result of faithfulness to the vision. Jesus warned that it is easy to lose our power to salt. When that power is lost, the salt may look the same, but it is only good for dumping out and filling up the cracks in the road.
Why are so few U.S. churches persecuted? Have we lost our power to salt? Are we still hoping to offer a spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down? Why is the church often the last place to find God's salt of justice?
We are in the midst of another great reformation of the church. It will make the one of the 16th century look mild. We cannot wait around for another Martin Luther or Martin Luther King Jr. to lead us through this one. Jesus warns us it is time to be salt to the earth and light to the world. It is time to leave the low-salt, low-wattage conservation campaigns of our churches.
The no-salt fast is not the one God chooses. "Is this not the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free? Then shall your light break forth like the dawn" (Isaiah 58:6, 8).
February 14: Disarming the Heart
Deuteronomy 30:15-20, 1 Corinthians 3:1-9, Matthew 5:17-26, Psalm 119:1-8
An electrician working on our church building stopped me in the hall one morning without even a hello or a how are you. He asked, "Tell me, preacher, why is it that the God of the Jew, the God of the Muslim, and the God of the Christian is telling the Jews, the Muslims, and the Christians to kill each other?" When the choice is offered between life or death, multitudes of even the religious folk have chosen death.
Jesus said that choosing life in the reign of God means not only banishing killing, but banishing anger as well. Why? Because Jesus knew our hearts. He knew all about the AK-47s that we carry around in our inner chambers. He knew how often our hearts go to war and stay at war, even after the divorce papers are signed or the guilty verdict is rendered. Jesus encouraged us to release the venom of anger and resentment that keeps us bound to our enemies.
The seeds of racism and sexism are planted in such disregard for human worth. Jesus says to "be agreeable" with our adversaries, not agree. Jesus knew that our contempt and anger finally destroys our own souls.
In this Matthew text, Jesus seems to be encouraging us toward releasing our accusers from the sentence of our judgment, even if the judgment is fully justified. To release the contempt for a person or to initiate a reconciliation is to act to release them of their power to hold us bound together in endless combat.
Granny Lindsay was pushed around all her 97 years by racial hatred. A few years before she died, I asked how she kept from being eaten up by anger and resentment. Granny said, "I never was much good at loving everybody, but I got pretty good at loving the Someone who knew how to love them. And that was the beginning of healing."
February 21: God's Family Values
Isaiah 49:8-13, 1 Corinthians 3:10-11, 16-23, Matthew 5:27-37, Psalm 62:5-12
If I were God and I were writing a handbook on family values, I would provide some examples of the model family, like Ozzie and Harriet. But right from the very beginning, the first family blew it. God had to be called in for crisis marriage counseling with Adam and Eve. It was a classic "he said, she said," blaming-each-other argument. God blamed them both and sent them to work in the garden. And I guess you heard about their children. Cain's murder of his brother knocked Adam and Eve out of the running for the Parenting Award.
Life together has never been easy. The law was offered to encourage people to live together in peace and harmony with God and with each other. Jesus felt like people had strayed away from the real purpose of the law and the prophets. To Jesus, the law was not a rule book to enslave people. The intent was to promote the common welfare of the people through just relationships.
In light of God's household of standards, Jesus offered some laws for closer examination. On adultery, Jesus united the distinctions between thought and action. The responsibility was given to the man extending the law against adultery to include lustful thoughts. With the law written on hearts, true adherence to the command would mean that no one would be considered a sex object.
With Jesus, the law against divorce granted women economic security. The law on oaths was a way to keep people honest. The letter of the law allowed for oaths to be no more binding than the thing sworn by. Swearing by your fingernail would be less binding than swearing by your hand. Jesus was saying don't cross your fingers behind your back. Keep your word and keep it truthful.
Jesus announced God's reign of right relatedness within the human community. Life together is built with bricks of justice, with mercy and truth dwelling within. "Do you not know that you are God's temple, and that God's Spirit dwells in you?" (1 Corinthians 3:16).
February 28: Spotting Wolves
Genesis 2:4b-9, 15-17, 25-3:7, Romans 5:12-19, Matthew 4:1-11, Psalm 130
As a teacher years ago, I learned that conscientious parents bring many requests for their preschooler. There was no sugar for Isaac, no raisins for Chris, and no "Big Bad Wolf" for Kara. Her parents wanted Little Red Riding Hood read without the wolf, so we wouldn't scare their little darling. Have you ever tried to do that? There is no story at all. Only a little girl visiting grandma.
The curious 4-year-old asked her class friends about the skipped-over pages. They told her. Then she bugged us to tell her the story about the wolf dressed up like grandma. We did. We decided it would help her understand the evening news that she was watching with her parents.
No matter how much we try to stop our ears, close our eyes, and shut our mouths, we all see, hear, and speak evil. The Bible is clear that evil does exist and it is doing some serious work in this world. Evil is slippery and defies pinning down with explanations like bad parenting or poverty living. Evil refuses to bend to our rules of cause and effect.
The Big Bad Wolf is on the loose and it's wearing the clothes of the good grandma, camouflaged under the floral blanket of "holy wars," patriotism, economic competitive edge, and new world order. On closer examination, we might see the big teeth, and a voice that speaks through a big grin, "Come closer, dear."
Jesus was led into the wilderness for a close examination of whose voice was saying, "Come closer." It was the beginning of his ministry. He was led by the Spirit. He was not led there because he had fallen out of God's will. Jesus was led to the desert to discern the one true voice that would keep him true to his mission.
Like Jesus, temptations come to us at our points of strength, not weakness. The stronger we are, the greater the temptations. The closer we get to God, the closer the Evil One moves in on us. "The higher the intention, the more demonic the power," says pastor Gordon Cosby. In the wilderness we discover who in heaven's name we are as God's people. We pray against all that hinders us from living our true vocation. We pray urgently, "Be gone, Satan" (Matthew 4:10).
March 7: Born to Be Wild
Genesis 12:1-4a (4b-8), Romans 4:1-5 (6-12), 13-17, John 3:1-17, Psalm 33:18-22
Nicodemus was a literalist. He was wondering how to enter the womb again. He misunderstood Jesus' words. He thought that Jesus said, "Born again." Lots of sandwich boards and books have used those two misunderstood words. On the other hand, if Jesus really said "born from above," what did he mean?
Nicodemus was under the influence of a religious tradition that taught a faith that was to be managed, protected, and guarded. Yet his late-night visit with Jesus revealed some heart longings that had not completely left him. Perhaps he expected a dialogue in dogmatics, but what he got from Jesus was poetry.
Jesus beckoned Nicodemus into God's wonderland of surprise and topsy-turvy living. To enter meant nothing short of a total transformation and being born of God's Spirit. When this Spirit takes hold, why, it can confuse the controlling and baffle the bigoted.
Nicodemus represented one of the many "secret Christians" of the synagogue. As a Pharisee and a ruler of the Jews, he was a high-profile person. Yet he took a low profile to make the risky visit to Jesus. The nocturnal discussion was like two ships passing in the night. They did not speak the same language. Jesus encouraged Nicodemus to be born of water, be baptized, pledging allegiance publicly to the community of the committed Christ-followers.
The rebirth experience Jesus proclaimed was not a dew glow of gushy feelings but a new action, moving into the community of the persecuted. Jesus saw Nicodemus as one of the thoroughly informed and utterly inert. Nicodemus' faith stayed within the tiny box of human possibility. Jesus' faith expressed a leap into God's Grand Canyon realm of impossibility. Jesus encouraged Nicodemus to throw caution to the wind and allow some real learning to begin.
Look out, Nicodemus! God is in the birthing room and all's wild with the world! "For God so loved the world..." (John 3:16).
March 14: True Freedom
Exodus 17:3-7, Romans 5:1-11, >John 4:5-26 (27-42), Psalm 95
For the newly escaped Hebrew slaves, the Top 10 desert wandering tunes were the blues. Too little food. Too little water. Too little shelter. The people murmured and complained. They used the time-honored method of blaming their leader. Moses' suggestion box stayed full.
What was Moses going to do about these recurring problems? Had he brought them all out here to the desert to die of thirst? Moses turned to God with a perennial pastor's question, "What shall I do with this people? They are ready to stone me" (Exodus 17:4). The new prophet search committee was being formed just as God intervened. Moses struck the rock at Horeb and water poured forth for the people to drink.
The Hebrew people were not chronic whiners complaining about the food service. They were desperate people faced with annihilation. No wonder they asked, "Is the Lord among us or not?" The slaves thought their liberation from Egypt would immediately plop them down in the Promised Land. But God's first freedom act was deliverance into the severe and harsh wilderness. Perhaps only in the land of hopelessness could God hope to see a people let Pharaoh go and embrace the God of life. Wilderness provides the necessary time to rid oneself of having someone other than God name and define you.
True liberation delivers us from all that binds us, diminishes us, and enslaves us. This holy word springs from God's ever-flowing freedom fountain. It was the word from Jesus offered to the societally defined and disregarded Samaritan woman at the well: "Whoever drinks from the water that I shall give will never thirst; the water that I shall give will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life" (John 4:14).
March 21: Opened Eyes
1 Samuel 16:1-13, Ephesians 5:8-14, John 9:1-41,Psalm 23
Who sinned? Inquiring minds wanted to know. The disciples wanted to know if the man was blind because of his sins or his parents'. Jesus said that was the wrong question. The question was, How can we work the works of God here? Jesus restored the man's sight. Then the neighbors wanted to know who sinned. They brought in the concerned Pharisees too, who wondered about this miracle.
The Pharisees checked their rule book under "Sinners" and found the symptoms: blindness and healing on the Sabbath. So Jesus was a sinner too. But some Pharisees were scratching their heads, puzzled: "But how can a sinner do what he just did?"
The blind man was called in for questioning. He said he didn't know about Jesus, but what he did know was this: "I was blind, now I see." The healed man could not offer theological or biblical references to support the unusual happening. But he insisted on sticking by what he knew by heart, and by his own encounter with Jesus, even if unconventional. Who sinned? The interrogators voted on this man.
With the news of the excommunication, Jesus showed up. He opened his arms to affirm this follower and to pronounce judgment. Who sinned? Jesus said it was the ones who remain blind to God's light shining in the world's darkened corners.
The Johannine community who first heard this story rejoiced. Knowing excommunication from the synagogue, these Christ followers heard their story in the blind man's story. They heard a reassuring word: Keep bearing witness. Don't expect to change the minds of the powers of this world. Jesus is coming back with judgment. Your job is to jump in the middle of God's work. Expect resistance and ridicule, but walk on toward the light. "Once you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord; walk as children of light" (Ephesians 5:8).
March 28: Bone-dry Deliverance
Ezekiel 37:1-14, Romans 8:6-11, John 11:(1-16) 17-45, Psalm 116:1-9
A long time ago, God despaired. It was during the time when the prophet Ezekiel was the shepherd of a flock of hopeless people. Ezekiel was the preacher to a congregation forced into exile in Babylon. The people were moaning: "Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are clean cut off" (Ezekiel 37:11).
The priest and prophet Ezekiel offered pastoral words to a frightened and desperate people. As God's messenger, his concern was not with job security or getting a book of the Bible named for him. He was concerned with breaking the exiles open to hearing a word of deliverance from God. Ezekiel worried that his dramatic techniques were not getting the people's attention. He started thinking it was all on his shoulders. Ezekiel despaired.
But then one day God plopped Ezekiel down in the middle of a valley of dried-up bones. This time, God despaired. God took a good look at God's people and saw dried up hopes, dried up dreams, dried up programs, and dried up congregations. And God said, "Can these bones live?"
Ezekiel did not respond to God by pointing out all the good things that were happening in spite of the stench of death. Ezekiel did not respond to God by putting on a happy face, shoring up a positive mental attitude, and looking on the bright side. Ezekiel had the wisdom and humility to respond with a confession, "I don't know. Only you know, God."
At the death of her brother Lazarus, Martha despaired. She complained to Jesus that he could have prevented this tragedy if he had gotten his priorities straight. But then she spoke confidently of her faith in the God who hears and answers. Jesus told her, "I am the resurrection and the life." He then asked, "Do you believe this?" Martha responded in confession, "Yes, Lord. You are the Christ."
Resurrection comes to despairing, dried-up people. The only hope we have is in a God who can breathe life into our dried-up lives. Beyond our despairing no and our optimistic yes comes the bone-rattling, air-stirring Spirit of new life.
Nancy Hastings Sehested was pastor of Prescott Memorial Baptist Church in Memphis, Tennessee when this article appeared.
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