November 3, 2023

TODAY’S SCRIPTURE READING:

“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” (James 1.27)

“It has been said, ‘Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.” (Matthew 5.31,32)

TODAY’S REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD:

There was a most certain point I wanted to make yesterday. I laid out the foundation for it in yesterday’s reflection bearing in mind the many levels of application. Those levels of application to which I have hinted over the last several days are these: personal in spirit and in truth; relational in family, friends and neighbors; and corporate in community, organizations (secular and non-secular) and globally between nations and as the world in total. In all of these there is a basic reality of individual responsibility at work. As those in this nation, we are far different than a country, will engage in a voting season one vote matters. Whether by omission or by comission, one vote matters. Dare we pay attention to the witness we bear overtly, covertly or apathetically that “one vote doesn’t matter”? What shall we decide for ourselves about ourselves and our civic duty? Are we so committed to worthlessness, ineffectiveness or doubt that we would allow the culture and climate which surrounds us become the central focus? How hard is it to recognize that we are not the central focus either? This is what our nation, and with that in mind- all nations, have come to. The paradigm is based on each individual as the central focus when nothing is further from the truth. Do we think, as Kierkegaard declared, “I pull a flower from the ground and a star falls from heaven.”? Or is it in the contradistinction of such declaration that we operate under the misguided design of “I pull a flower from the ground because it pleases me to do so and nothing will happen as a consequence.”? Why do we matter? What should it matter what we do or that it matters?Is it not because we are not alone? We are a part of a greater picture. Those who think they exist unto themselves have so closed themselves in to that “truth,” they are blind to the reality of the world around them which may actually move out of balance in a direction not even of their own choosing.

We are threads in the fabric of life woven in time for a greater tapestry. The tapestry itself is so great that we cannot see the whole of it. We are never in a position to gaze upon it until it is completed. Even then, I wonder if it will be possible to see it all. That is, see it all if we assume the position of “me” as the center of all truth and reality. If it is not me, nor you, then what or who? Is it not God? Isn’t God who is the same yesterday, today and forever really the central focus? If we “see” God as the One who is beyond us and “out there,” then it is most difficult to grasp the whole of who and what God is. I would draw your attention back to two simple defining calls in our life of faith within the Judeo-Christian community. One is found expressed in Psalm 119.11 where it declares: “Your Word have I hidden in my heart that I might not sin against You.” The commissioning of parents in relationship with God and His Word was to “train up your children in the way they should go so that they will not wander far from it.” We most certainly cannot grasp the whole of God except that we internalize His presence through His Word of faithfulness and truth. It is not a work which saturates our lives and makes us righteous, worthy or good in the biblical sense of the word. It is a truth which permeates our lives and the works which we do that declares the acceptable hour, day, season and life as pointing toward the good which is God.

The second thread that should be finely woven is found in the declaration of Jesus as recorded in the gospel rendering of “the way, the truth and the life” which expresses righteousness. I say “should be woven” only in that it would seem far too much effort has been spent and is being spent on removing this thread as if it is frayed, loose or of no use to the whole of the fabric or the garment made with it. The very name of Jesus as spoken by the angel of God, Gabriel, and then in antiphonal response by the heavenly host, gives us the knowledge of this vital thread. His name is Immanuel, God with[in] us. I invite you to consider this way of interpreting the very “Word” of God made flesh. It is the truth of who Jesus was and is that leads us to pursue who Jesus will be. When He was born of Mary into the family of Joseph bar David of Bethlehem, Jesus was born as a flesh and blood baby. In Him we are able, as Jesus told His disciples at the Seder feast, to see God. In Him we are also able to begin to grasp that indeed God was with us not in angelic presentations and revelations but “in spirit and in truth.” Jesus not only showed us how to “worship and serve the Lord our God with gladness and integrity” but demonstrated the desire of God to be with us. Maybe you can also say “God is for us” as in a sense of affirmation and confirmation. But, even saying or considering that does not mean “God is in the stands cheering us on.” God is in the field of play going through it all with us as if it was happening to Himself. And that is the reality of the world of the gospel. Jesus, God’s Son and His singular representative, was experiencing the world on earth with equal passion and expression as He had experienced the world in Heaven. But, it is not merely “God with us” or “God for us” that is expressed in Immanuel. It is much more than that so much more importantly more than that. Immanuel is “God within us.”

Whether we like it or not, there is a reality of God in us which gives us life, hope and a sense of being. It is there for us to recognize, call upon and be defined by. Sadly, it is also some we can ignore, rebuke and thus be defined by that as well. And there it is: the individuality of freewill which is standing on the precipice of eternal consequences. Regardless of the levels of life in us and around us, our “one” matters to the whole. Jesus represents that “one of God,” “one with God” and “one in God.” Jesus also represents the “God of one,” “God with one” and “God in one.” Why even the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit speaks to the reality and truth of this vital expression of Immanuel. And wrestling with that reality and truth causes me to hear the Spirit uttering in the teaching of Jesus on “divorce and adultery.” When the husband divorces his wife for any other reason than adultery, he makes of her a victim of adultery. It is not an accusation wholly or solely indicting the wife as if she herself was practicing sexual immorality. No, it includes the confession of the husband, intentionally or unintentionally, of the same. Doing so means that the prior commitment to stand “of God, with God and in God” before the presence of all who bore witness to that commitment had been adulterated, violated and set aside. The honus falls on the impact of one victimizing another. That victimization is what we are all guilty of: sin. When we divorce ourselves from living in right relationship with God, we put ourselves into the world of sin with all its consequences. Ultimately, unforgiven sin leads to eternal dying. Those who bind themselves to it would wish that death would come and all life would cease to exist for them, in them and through them. Yes, the power of one person infects the entire community. But, thanks be to God that in one person, Jesus the Christ, that sin-fection can be eliminated and the whole can be cleansed. As in Adam, all people stand condemned. As in Christ Jesus, all may stand redeemed. The choice is clear. The consequence is unavoidable. And we can see this principle at work in every facet and level of life on earth. What and who shall we live for? Ourselves as the center of all life? Or God who is the centering of life lived to the fullest?

PRAYER IN LIGHT OF GOD’S WORD:

Father, You have revealed to us best in Jesus the Christ. By Him and Him alone shall we gain the eternal life and our place in eternal rest, living for You always. Show us more and by Your Holy Spirit instruct us in the way we should go, the truth we should reveal and the life we shall live with you forever. In Jesus’ name, we pray. AMEN.