Letting Go (Ps 46)

Can you remember a time when you were faced with a home repair, and deep in your heart you knew this repair was probably beyond your capabilities, but you dug out your toolbox anyway? You approached that leak or that circuit breaker or that hole in the wall with a tool in your hand and a steel-willed determination in your heart. There was no question. You were going to fix this yourself.

And then, predictably…the problem got worse. The leak accelerated, the hole got bigger, the electricity went out.

The psalm for today, Psalm 46, contains a famous verse I’m sure everyone here knows: “Be still, and know that I am God” (Ps 46:10). What’s fascinating to me is that the root word for the invitation, “Be still,” is elsewhere used to describe the relaxing or dropping of the hands. “Let go” might be an appropriate translation in certain contexts. “Let go” of the tools that you’re wielding. Or “let go” of the weapons that you’re waving. “Let go” of the desperate attempt to fix something beyond your control.

For me, Psalm 46 illustrates one of the paradoxes of the gospel. Letting go is not a prelude to chaos but to care. Conversely, holding on, or “white-knuckling,” is what leads to chaos and confusion (as we hear in the psalm, where “the nations are in an uproar, the kingdoms totter”). The point is not that when we “let go” God will step in and do everything for us. The point is that when we “let go” and know that God is with us, we become open to a power much greater than our own. We become open to help from outside. We become open to God’s inspiration.

The same Hebrew word for “be still” or “let go” also means “weak” in other passages. Which is what I imagine most onlookers thought about Jesus when they saw him affixed to the cross. This was supposed to be Israel’s messiah? Look at him. He’s utterly helpless. He’s “weak.” But for us who follow him, Jesus does not die on the cross as a victim of fate but as victor in love. And what is his victory? In the last week of his life—when he “lets go” and prays to God, “Not my will, but thy will”—he is equipped and empowered by God to do some incredible things. He lovingly washes his disciples’ feet and teaches them that greatness is found not in domination but in service. He forgives the people who put him on the cross and mock him in his death. When he is resurrected, he repeatedly proclaims “Peace”—not once breathing bitterness or vengeance upon the ones who opposed him.

And so it is that the cross, which seems like an emblem of weakness and defeat, becomes for us a symbol of God’s love and forgiveness—and the victory that is found when we “let go.”

"I Alone..." (1 Kings 19:1-18)

Scripture: A Prophetic Showdown 

1 Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword.

Today’s story opens amid an intense conflict between the prophet Elijah and the king and queen of Israel, Ahab and Jezebel. Ahab and Jezebel are perhaps the most notorious royal couple of ancient Israel. When Ahab becomes king of Israel, the storyteller comments, “Ahab…did evil in the sight of the Lord more than all who were before him” (1 Kings 16:30). Later, when Ahab marries Jezebel, the daughter of a Phoenician king, he begins to worship a major god of  the Phoenicians, Baal. He even builds a temple to Baal, this foreign god, in the capital city of Israel (Samaria, at the time).

As a prophet of the Lord, Elijah pronounces God’s displeasure at Ahab and Jezebel’s behavior in the shape of a great drought over Israel. The culmination of this drought is a grandly staged showdown. In the one corner is the challenger, Elijah, the prophet of the Lord; in the opposite corner are the prophets of Baal, the reigning god in the land (1 Kgs 18:20-40). They both prepare an altar for sacrifice and then wait to see upon which altar Baal or God will send fire. When the fire of the Lord falls upon Elijah’s altar, the people fall on their faces and acknowledge that the Lord is God. The scene ends rather gruesomely, as Elijah rounds up the prophets of Baal and kills them. Needless to say…I don’t see Christ anywhere in this final deed of Elijah. I can only conclude it is a symptom of a disease that has overtaken all the people, even God’s chosen prophet. The disease is thinking that right justifies might, that being on God’s side means being in control. The symptom is vengeance. Jesus clearly shows us the diseased nature of this thinking, as he repeatedly refrains from acts of vengeance, choosing instead to forgive his enemies and to pronounce peace upon the world even after the world has crucified him. That is the only way real, sustainable healing will come about.

In any case, God is faithful and will not leave a diseased people—or prophet—to rot. God insists on redemption, on healing, even here. Let’s see how.

Scripture: Elijah’s Great Sadness

2 Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life like the life of one of them (that is, one of the prophets that Elijah killed) by this time tomorrow.” (Here we can clearly see that vengeance begets vengeance.) 3 Then he was afraid; he got up and fled for his life and came to Beer-sheba, which belongs to Judah; he left his servant there.

4 But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.”

If you had seen Elijah a couple of chapters earlier, this desperate man in the wilderness would be almost unrecognizable. Earlier, Elijah was bold and confident, unafraid to speak God’s truth in the face of violent tyrants, undaunted by a life of subsistence amid a crippling drought in the land. But here, now, the same man is wracked with fear, consumed with self-doubt, even wishing to die. In modern psychological terms, we might say that Elijah suffers from an onset of depression. If so, his example would serve as a healthy reminder that all of us, even a man of God such as Elijah, are subject to debilitating feelings of great sadness and insecurity. We can do all the right things and still find ourselves in not just a funk, but a deep, seemingly inescapable pit.

5 Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.” 6 He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water. He ate and drank and lay down again. 7 The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, or the journey will be too much for you.”

In this tender scene, we can see God caring for Elijah in a gentle manner that acknowledges his woundedness and offers the first steps toward healing. Feelings of great sadness and self-doubt lead many people to stop caring for themselves in the even the most basic of ways. Sleep, food, drink…these things are neglected (or overdone). But God’s angel patiently ensures a healthy regimen of all three for Elijah. It’s back to basics. Sleep. Food. Drink. You are worthy of care.

Perhaps even more important, however, are the angel’s final words: “Or the journey will be too much for you.” This potentially daunting phrase is also charged with purpose, a key ingredient to abundant life. Earlier Elijah had despaired of having any purpose left; he had discounted himself, “I am no better than my ancestors” (1 Kgs 19:4). But the angel insists that Elijah is not done, not finished. There is a journey ahead. God needs him. God believes in him.

The same may be said of each and every one of us. God needs you. God believes in you.

Scripture: The Divider

8 He got up and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God. (Forty days and nights in the wilderness. Does that remind you of anyone else? Before Elijah, of course, there were the Hebrew people who spent forty years in the wilderness. After Elijah, there is Jesus, who begins his ministry only after he has spent forty days in the wilderness. The common thread among these three stories is that the wilderness is a place of divine encounter and transformation. We wait to see how Elijah will be transformed.) 9 At that place he came to a cave and spent the night there.

Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” 10 He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.”

“What are you doing here, Elijah?” (1 Kgs 19:9). Again and again in scripture, we find God asking people simple questions of self-reflection. “Where are you?” God asks Adam and Eve. “Where is your brother?” God asks Cain. “Where are you going?” God asks Hagar as she flees into the wilderness. God does not ask these questions for the sake of learning information but rather for the sake of inviting us to be honest with ourselves—honest enough that we might recognize our limits and our need.

Notice how Elijah answers by listing all his achievements and blaming everyone else. “I alone am left,” he laments, giving voice to the isolation that drives all of us deeper into despair. In my opinion, “I alone am left” is at the very root of Elijah’s sadness and despair.

The word “devil” derives from the Greek word diabolos, which can be translated as “to divide” or “to separate.” Which suggests the underlying motivation of the devil. It is not about a battle of good versus evil. It is not about getting people to do bad things. The devil is the Divider. The Isolator. The devil’s underlying motivation has to do with a sense of a separation from God and others. The devil bears and generates an attitude of isolation that drives us into despair and diseased thinking.

We might notice a contrast between Elijah in the wilderness and Jesus in the wilderness. Jesus repeatedly anchors himself in the sense of God’s abiding presence. He roots himself in the divine affirmation that he heard at his baptism, “You are my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased.” Instead of living in despair, he lives in the glow of God’s tender smile. This is not to fault Elijah or to condemn him for being sad or depressed. (I truly believe Jesus himself may have felt a similar way, much later in his ministry, in the garden where he sweat blood and wept before God.) I only make the contrast to suggest the difference between disease and health. The point is not to say to Elijah, “Just trust in God, and you’ll feel better,” but instead to suggest that healing is sometimes a wilderness journey and it takes time and grace and the help of others to even perceive God’s presence and begin to trust again. Which is just we see in the next few verses….

Scripture: Seven Thousand Others…

11 He said, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” (For those who are interested, this scene closely resembles a scene in Exodus where Moses appears to have been granted a glimpse of God’s backside.) Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind, and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake, 12 and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire, and after the fire a sound of sheer silence.

This is the verse that is famously translated in the King James and elsewhere as “a still, small voice.” The Hebrew words and syntax render the phrase open to different translations, conferring on this verse a very appropriate sense of mystery. Whatever exactly is being said, we gather that Elijah encounters God not in some magic climactic moment (“the kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed”—Luke 17:20) but in an utterly still, quiet moment of honesty.

13 When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” 14 He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” (Same question as before. Same answer as before. Healing takes time. God does not give up; God is patient.)

15 Then the Lord said to him, “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus; when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael as king over Aram. 16 Also you shall anoint Jehu son of Nimshi as king over Israel, and you shall anoint Elisha son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah as prophet in your place. 17 Whoever escapes from the sword of Hazael, Jehu shall kill, and whoever escapes from the sword of Jehu, Elisha shall kill. 18 Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.”

God’s instructions to Elijah are, on the surface, very practical. Do this. Then do that. Then do this. But these pragmatic directives bear within them a treasure of grace. Two things in particular. First is the sense of purpose. As God hinted at before, there is a journey still ahead of Elijah. God needs him. God believes in him.

But second—and this is so easy to miss—God reveals to Elijah that, contrary to his repeated laments, he is not alone. There “seven thousand [others] in Israel” whose “knees…have not bowed to Baal” (1 Kgs 19:8). God counters Elijah’s “I alone am left” with, “No, you’re not! There are 7,000 others with you.” Against the whispered accusations of the devil, the great divider and isolator, God assures Elijah that he is not alone.

“One Christian…”

Today is All Saints Sunday. Saints are not perfect people who have done big things. They are people like you and me who happen to reveal God’s perfect love—usually in the little things, in glimpses we catch here and there.

When we lose a personal saint in our lives—a loved one in our family, a dear friend—it can feel like wandering in the wilderness. We might encounter a sadness or even depression such as Elijah encountered.

What I gather from today’s story is that such an experience is not the sign of a deficient faith but is in fact divine. God is with us in the wilderness, showing us the most tender care. Here, make sure you sleep. Here, make sure you eat. Here, make sure you drink something. And here, I need you to get up and keep walking—I believe in you! There is something I need you to do!

The process of healing from any loss or any disease is rarely straightforward. In the Hebrew mindset, forty signified something like a season. Forty years in the wilderness meant a season in the life of a people—that is, a generation. Forty days means a season within an individual’s lifetime. Grief takes a season. Healing takes a season. Some seasons are longer than others.

And what threatens our healing more than anything is what we hear in Elijah’s lament, “I alone…” That is the voice of the great Divider, the great Isolator, the one who leads us deeper into despair and disease. There is a saying that was popular among the early followers of Christ: “One Christian is no Christian.”[1]

It is good for us to be together today. We are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses (Heb 12:1), yes—including our loved ones who have passed in the last year. But just as importantly, we are surrounded by living saints. By each other. Fellow Christ-followers who share our sorrows and our joys, who keep us company on the journey as we heal and grow together.

Prayer

Tender God,
Who meets us in the wilderness
With great attention and care—
When we feel alone
In our sadness, in our disease, in whatever ails us
…
Turn our eyes
To the companions you have given us,
Faithfully given in the past, faithfully given in the present,
That we might be strengthen in love. In Christ, who gathers us into your one family: Amen.

 

---

[1] J. D. Walt, “Unus Christianus—Nullus Christianus: One Christian—No Christian,” https://seedbed.com/unus-christianus-nullus-christianus-one-christian-no-christian/, accessed October 27, 2025.

"The Temple of the Lord" (1 Kings 5:1-5; 8:1-6, 10-13)

Scripture: A False Foundation

1   Now King Hiram of Tyre sent his servants to Solomon, when he heard that they had anointed him king in place of his father; for Hiram had always been a friend to David. ² Solomon sent word to Hiram, saying, ³ “You know that my father David could not build a house for the name of the LORD his God because of the warfare with which his enemies surrounded him, until the LORD put them under the soles of his feet.  ⁴ But now the LORD my God has given me rest on every side; there is neither adversary nor misfortune. ⁵ So I intend to build a house for the name of the LORD my God, as the LORD said to my father David, ‘Your son, whom I will set on your throne in your place, shall build the house for my name.’

I’m going to be a bit blunt, a bit provocative, just for the sake of making a point: Solomon’s legendary temple is built on a faulty foundation. It is built on a lie.

When Solomon informs his father’s friend, King Hiram of Tyre, that he will build a temple for God, he justifies his plan by explaining that his father, David, had his hands full with warfare and enemies. David did not have the time to build it. “But now the LORD my God has given me rest on every side,” Solomon says; “there is neither adversary nor misfortune” (1 Kgs 5:4). But if we revisit 2 Samuel 7, just after David has defeated the Philistines and the ark of the covenant has arrived in Jerusalem, we learn, “The king [David] was settled in his house, and the Lord had given him rest from all his enemies around him” (2 Sam 7:1). It is precisely at that moment—when David has rest from his enemies—that he decides to build a temple for God. (Like father, like son.) This moment has apparently slipped from Solomon’s mind; he has conveniently forgotten that, actually, David had had rest on every side just like him. But even more importantly, Solomon seems to have forgotten the response that David receives from God: “Are you the one to build me a house to live in? I have not lived in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day, but I have been moving about in a tent and a tabernacle. Wherever I have moved about among all the people of Israel, did I ever speak a word with any of the tribal leaders of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, saying, ‘Why have you not built me a house of cedar?’” (2 Sam 7:5-7). In other words, God points out to David that God has never asked for a temple. God doesn’t need a house.

Scripture: A Fixed Dwelling for a God Who Has None

1   Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the leaders of the ancestral houses of the Israelites, before King Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the covenant of the LORD out of the city of David, which is Zion. ² All the people of Israel assembled to King Solomon at the festival in the month Ethanim, which is the seventh month.

The “festival” in Ethanim, the seventh month, is none other than the “Feast of Tabernacles” or “Booths,” a festival that celebrated God’s faithfulness to Israel in the wilderness. It would become tradition to build makeshift dwellings of branches and leaves, as a remembrance of the way the Israelites lived in the wilderness and how God was with them wherever they went, always providing for them. It is an intriguing coincidence to me that King Solomon’s stationary temple would be inaugurated on the anniversary of the festival that remembers a God and a people on the move. It seems as if the irony has passed right over Solomon’s head. On the very day that he has fixed a dwelling for God, the people are remembering a God who had no fixed dwelling, who journeyed with them wherever they went in the wilderness.

A little bit earlier, in 1 Kings 6, the word of the Lord comes to Solomon, saying, “Concerning this house that you are building, if you will walk in my statutes, obey my ordinances, and keep all my commandments…I will dwell among the children of Israel” (1 Kings 6:11-13). I can’t help but wonder if there is a gentle rebuke here in God’s expression. God does not promise to dwell in the house Solomon is building. In fact, God’s promise has nothing to do with the temple. Rather, “I will dwell among the children of Israel” (1 Kgs 6:13). Just as God has reminded David, so God reminds Solomon. He doesn’t need a house. He needs a people who will walk in his way, who will be a blessing to the families of the earth and bear witness to a better way (cf. Gen 12:3; Ex 19:5-6).

Scripture: Divine Disruption

³ And all the elders of Israel came, and the priests carried the ark. ⁴ So they brought up the ark of the LORD, the tent of meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the tent; the priests and the Levites brought them up. ⁵ King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel, who had assembled before him, were with him before the ark, sacrificing so many sheep and oxen that they could not be counted or numbered. ⁶ Then the priests brought the ark of the covenant of the LORD to its place, in the inner sanctuary of the house, in the most holy place, underneath the wings of the cherubim. … ¹⁰ And when the priests came out of the holy place, a cloud filled the house of the LORD, ¹¹ so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud; for the glory of the LORD filled the house of the LORD.

When I read these verses, I imagine the priests who have assembled with great pomp and circumstance, suddenly skittering about and scattering out of the temple, chased out by the expanding cloud of God’s glory. It is a telling turn of events. Yes, God is present, just as Solomon would surely have advertised. But here at the inauguration of the temple, amid all the careful religious choreography, God disrupts and disorders the proceedings. Just when the people want to start worship, God stops it. God puts a stop to the show.

¹²             Then Solomon said,

               “The LORD has said that he would dwell in thick darkness.

¹³             I have built you an exalted house,

                              a place for you to dwell in forever.”

As the dark cloud of God’s glory bursts forth from the temple, Solomon acknowledges that God had said God would “dwell in thick darkness” (1 Kgs 8:12). Curiously, however, Solomon continues, and with either great hubris or great ignorance he declares his contradictory intention. The key here, if you’re reading verses 12 and 13, is the word “dwell,” which appears first in where God says God will dwell, and then second in where Solomon says God will dwell. God had said God would “dwell” in thick darkness (and even Solomon acknowledges this), but Solomon insists God will “dwell…forever” in this exalted house he has built.

For Everything to Be Holy, First Something Has to Be Holy

Growing up, I remember going to church on Christmas Eve. I remember singing in the children’s choir, then later the youth choir. I remember how the sermon was a lot shorter, which I liked. And I remember how the pastor’s words seemed a little bit more sacred, somehow. Maybe because they were less his own thoughts and more a simple recitation of our Christmas faith—that God is with us, no matter the terrors or misery that encroach on our world. I remember walking to the front of the sanctuary to take communion, bumping elbows, a part of everyone around me. I remember holding a candle and singing “Silent Night” and then walking out into the dark chill of night feeling strangely warmed.

I am so grateful for those memories and how they have shaped me. And I share them now before I say anything else just to acknowledge that buildings—such as the church building that I went to Christmas Eve service at as a child, such as Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem—are not bad or wrong or wicked. Not at all. When Israel began wandering in the wilderness, God gave Moses instructions for building a portable tabernacle to symbolize God’s presence amid the people. The basic idea seemed to have been this: Everything in God’s creation is holy, but—in order for everything to be holy, first something has to be holy. That is, as humans, we always have to start somewhere. We have to be able to distinguish holiness in one place, before our eyes can be opened to see it other places too.

We might remember the boy Jesus in the temple, how he called it “my father’s house” (Luke 2:49). Certainly he seems to have learned about God’s holiness there. We might remember how the early church in Jerusalem is described as “spen[ding] much time together in the temple” (Acts 2:46). For them, it was a place to gather and to acknowledge God’s holiness.

An Evolution—Or, a Return: From Building to Body

As the boy Jesus grew up, though, he began to talk about the temple differently. During the years of his ministry, he said (according to John), “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,” referring first to the building and then to his body (John 2:19-21). Paul would later unpack what Jesus was saying here, writing to the Corinthians: “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?”—and here the “you” is plural, which means that the church as the body of Christ has become “God’s temple” (1 Cor 3:16).

What we see in Jesus and his early followers, then, is an evolution in the understanding of God’s temple. It moves from being a building to being a body. The holy presence of God that people may have first recognized in the building (whether it was at a temple feast with many sacrifices or at a Christmas eve service in a brick chapel), they later realize is meant to be with them twenty-four-seven.

But maybe this is less an evolution in understanding and more a return to the ancient, original understanding that we catch glimpses of in today’s scripture, where God makes abundantly clear that no building will contain him. Rather, as God tells Solomon, God’s dwelling place will be “among [the people]” (cf. 1 Kings 6:13). It won’t be in a predictable, containable structure, but in an untamable spirit, a cloud of glory, a holiness that the people may express in the flesh, a holiness that they may express not just in the temple but outside it and even in foreign lands (such as Babylon).

Just before Moses dies, he tells all the people of Israel to choose God’s way of life, and he puts it this way: “[T]he word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart for you to observe” (Deut 30:14). From the beginning, God’s Word has been looking for a home, not in a building but in bodies. Not in a house but in our hearts. God’s mission has always been one and the same. The God who is Love wants to take flesh. To bear witness. To be an example. To spread. To be contagious. The God who is Love does not want to be contained but embodied.

I have a friend named Jay. He’s not particularly eloquent. He doesn’t always have the right words to say. Sometimes he misses social cues. But whenever I’m around him, I feel a certain loosening in my body, like I can relax, like I can be myself. I’ve come to realize that Jay is steadfast. When you are around him, he is with you. He is not trying to make a point or get something or have the last word. It doesn’t matter what you’ve said or done, or haven’t said or haven’t done—he’s with you all the same.

I’ve come to realize that, for me, in a small but real way, Jay embodies our God of Love. The space around him feels holy, sacred. And when I leave Jay, something always seems to have rubbed off on me. I carry the calm, steady peace of our encounter with me.

The God who is Love does not want to be contained in a building but embodied in people, in people like Jay, in people like you and me—so that all the families of the earth might know the God who is Love.

Prayer

Uncontainable God,
Whose love outlasts and exceeds
Every altar we have built:
We are grateful
For all the places
We have encountered your holiness.
…
Inspire us today
To know ourselves
Not as a church who meets in a building,
Nor as Christians defined by holy places or times,
But as the body of Christ
Giving expression to your love,
Wherever we go:
In Christ, who abides in us, and we in him: Amen.

Beyond Our Best Thinking (1 Sam 16:1-13)

Scripture: Israel’s and Saul’s Best Thinking

1   The LORD said to Samuel, “How long will you grieve over Saul? I have rejected him from being king over Israel.

Just to refresh our memory of the story, Saul is the first king of Israel. He’s a real dreamboat, according to the storyteller, who describes him in this way: “There was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he; he stood head and shoulders above everyone else” (1 Sam 9:2). Technically, God had designated Saul as king. But if we remember the backstory—how Israel had demanded a king so that they could be like the other nations and how God saw this as a rejection but decided to leave Israel to its own devices, to let them have what they want—if we take all of that into account, it’s not a great leap to interpret that God had selected precisely the kind of king Israel had desired. In other words, “You want a king? I’ll give you the best king you could think of, a real eyeful, a political schemer and dreamer.” Because that’s what Israel got. King Saul is ever mindful of appearances, of what we might call the “optics” of things. He is charming and calculating, always doing what will garner him the favor of the people. But it is precisely his calculations to win the people’s favor, that earn him God’s stern disapproval. He violates God’s commands for the sake of appearances, for the sake of keeping people on his side. He thinks he knows better. He thinks he can play loose with the way of God in order to achieve victory with his fellow man. Just like the people who wanted a king thought they knew better. Just like they thought they could play loose with God’s covenant to consolidate their place among the nations. But for Saul’s violations, God rejects Saul as king.

To summarize these proceedings, then: Israel’s best thinking—and Saul’s best thinking—have resulted in a real mess.

Scripture: Looking on Appearances

Fill your horn with oil and set out; I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons.” 2 Samuel said, “How can I go? If Saul hears of it, he will kill me.” (In the scene that immediately precedes today’s scripture, Samuel informed Saul that God had rejected him as king. Samuel is understandably worried what Saul will think if he hears that his prophet, Samuel, is carrying around a horn of oil. It was in just such a manner that Samuel had earlier anointed him. If he suspects that Samuel is already anointing his successor, there’s no telling what he might do.)

And the LORD said, “Take a heifer with you, and say, ‘I have come to sacrifice to the LORD.’ (In other words, God is giving Samuel a little cover here. God is saying, “Prepare a worship service, complete with sacrifice. You can do the anointing bit quietly in the service, and only the people who need to know what’s happening will know.”) 3 Invite Jesse to the sacrifice, and I will show you what you shall do; and you shall anoint for me the one whom I name to you.” 4 Samuel did what the LORD commanded, and came to Bethlehem. The elders of the city came to meet him trembling, and said, “Do you come peaceably?” (By now, Samuel has acquired a bit of a reputation as a prophet and a judge. Why else would he come to a little, no-name town like Bethlehem unless he was on God’s business? The people are afraid that perhaps this is a disciplinary visit, that he comes with a rebuke from God.) 5 He said, “Peaceably; I have come to sacrifice to the LORD (in other words, “I’ve come only to worship with you”); sanctify yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice.” And he sanctified Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice.

6   When they came, he looked on Eliab and thought, “Surely the LORD’S anointed is now before the LORD.”  7 But the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature (we might hear echoes here of Saul, glowingly described as head and shoulders above the rest, the most handsome man in Israel), because I have rejected him; for the LORD does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.”

This verse is almost literally at the center of the book of 1 Samuel, which is perhaps no coincidence, because it certainly seems to be the central point of the book. God sees things differently than we do. We look on the appearance of things, God looks on the heart.

“Don’t judge a book by its cover,” we’ll sometimes say, acknowledging the all-too-human tendency to do just that, to judge by appearance. I think it’s worth pausing a moment to explore this tendency. Why do we judge by appearance? What’s the motivation? It seems to me that we take appearances as signs or visual shortcuts that show us the end of things. A tall, muscular man, head and shoulders above everyone else, signifies strength and victory. Dark, heavy clouds in the sky signify rain. We look on the appearance of things so that we can make better calculations and stay in control of the situation. In one sense, looking on the appearance of things is proto-scientific (or at least pseudo-scientific). It is an endeavor to discern the mechanics of things so that we might better position ourselves for a favorable result. If I had to summarize the motivation of judging appearances, I would say that, in a word, it is control. It is a function of our best thinking in the moment, which is seeking the best possible result.

And we learn here in this central, pivotal verse that God doesn’t think like this. God is not calculating toward the best possible result. (As we will discover in Christ, God’s concern is not results, but the way, not winning, but witness. The scandal of our faith is this: God’s victory comes not in battle, but on a cross, where we see God’s way of love most clearly.)

Scripture: Relinquishing Our Best Thinking

8 Then Jesse called Abinadab, and made him pass before Samuel. He said, “Neither has the LORD chosen this one.” 9 Then Jesse made Shammah pass by. And he said, “Neither has the LORD chosen this one.” 10 Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel, and Samuel said to Jesse, “The LORD has not chosen any of these.” 11 Samuel said to Jesse, “Are all your sons here?”

In my reading, this is the turning point of the story, the crucial moment. God has made the selection process a collaborative effort. God will designate the next king, but only when the next king is presented. In other words, if Samuel and Jesse had stopped right here and thrown up their hands, saying, “Well, we’ve reviewed all the candidates, all the best possibilities we could think of. What more can we do?”—then God would have been at a loss. It reminds me of when Jesus is unable to heal those people who do not believe. In a similar way, God is unable to make a choice when people do not allow for that choice. Happily, in this case, the prophet Samuel knows that God does not calculate in the way that humans do. Samuel knows that God’s will is beyond our best thinking. And so he asks Jesse if there’s possibly another son.

And he said, “There remains yet the youngest, but he is keeping the sheep.” (Perhaps this description of the young boy David is meant to indicate something about his heart, that is, his attitude and disposition. He has stayed behind with the flock while his family has gone off to see what all the fuss is about with the visit of the prophet Samuel. He is faithfully carrying out his work, even though there’s little or no reward.) And Samuel said to Jesse, “Send and bring him; for we will not sit down until he comes here.” 12 He sent and brought him in. Now he was ruddy, and had beautiful eyes, and was handsome. (Whereas Saul had what we might call noble or regal good looks, the figure of a natural leader, David has what we might call boyishly good looks. He’s sweet or adorable but does not bear the imposing profile of a warrior.) The LORD said, “Rise and anoint him; for this is the one.” 13 Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the presence of his brothers; and the spirit of the LORD came mightily upon David from that day forward.

“My Best Thinking Got Me Here”

In 1930, the British economist and philosopher John Maynard Keynes, one of the best minds of his day, famously predicted that because of technological advances, in a hundred years’ time the average work week would be about 15 hours. Well, we’ve got five years to go before we reach the centennial of Keynes’ prediction, but I’d say the odds aren’t looking too good. Not because technology hasn’t advanced. In fact, I’d imagine that technology has advanced in ways that Keynes couldn’t even begin to imagine. But even with the leaps and bounds we’ve made in electronics and travel and robotics and automated machinery, we’re nowhere closer to the chimeric fifteen-hour work week. Why is that, I wonder?

There is a saying in Twelve-Step recovery that I think applies equally well to our spiritual life. “My best thinking got me here,” someone will say. It could be a world-renowned surgeon, a wealthy businessman, a published professor, someone whom others esteem as a great mind or thinker. And yet that same person with their brilliant mind fell victim to an inescapable addiction. Not despite their best thinking. But precisely because of it. “My best thinking got me here” is a way of confessing that I cannot think my way out of here, because my thinking is what got me here.

Think back to our advances in technology, all of which were the result of some brilliant minds. And yet look around at our world, at how frenzied we still are, how rushed, how hurried, how there are never enough hours in the week. What happened? I’m tempted to say, “Our best thinking got us here.” In other words, the same willful, resolute spirit that has pushed our thinking to the limits, to search endlessly for ways to improve our lives, has also kept our nose to the grindstone even as advances have been made. The same voice that says, “More, more, more,” and keeps technology advancing at a breakneck speed, says “more, more, more” to our hearts, always ramping up expectations and the desire to use our newfound power for previously unimagined gains. There is a sense in which our relationship with technology (and we might say the same about our relationship with money or politics) has become an addiction. The very thing that propels us forward keeps us enslaved. There never will be a fifteen-hour work week, as long as we follow our “best thinking.”

When God says to Samuel, “The Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart” (1 Sam 16:7), the invitation or challenge that I hear is not to somehow develop sharper, more intuitive sight, or deeper, more sophisticated thinking. I don’t think scripture is inviting us to be able to see what God sees. I think, rather, that the invitation is to relinquish our best thinking. Which means, more specifically, to relinquish our focus on results, our tendency to judge by appearances and all the available data so that we might calculate the most favorable result. What concerns God is not that we achieve the right end—because as we have seen countless times, the right end can be pursued by horrible, ungodly means. (One could argue that was Saul’s problem, who wanted what was good for himself and Israel, but whose obsession with results led him to live in a less than faithful way.) What concerns God is not the ends but the means, not the results, but the way. We see this exemplified in Christ, who identifies himself as “the Way”—and who died on the cross, a horrible end, a terrible result, and yet it was the very embodiment of God’s love and forgiveness, the very way we know just how much God cares for us.

For me to relinquish my best thinking and my fixation on results, means that instead of trying to think my way out of a situation, I am content to live God’s way in any situation. That’s what God desires from God’s people, not that they be winners or conquerors, but that they be witnesses to God’s better way. When Samuel is selecting a king, God is not looking for an individual who stands head and shoulders above the rest, who will secure results by hook or crook; God is looking for an individual who will bear faithful witness to God’s way, who will live with God’s same shepherd-like care for others. (That David regularly fails on this front does not negate God’s judgment but shows us the fallibility of all of us—especially when we, like David in his weaker moments, decide to take matters into our own hands.)

In the case of Israel, their best thinking got them into a terrible mess with King Saul, who was handsome and charming and an astute politician, and precisely because of this cared more about appearances than about bearing faithful witness to God’s way. But what we see in today’s scripture, I think—and certainly throughout the broad arc of Israel’s story—is that there is no mess too great for God. There’s never a point beyond which we cannot stop and relinquish our best thinking. There’s never a point beyond which we cannot choose instead to live one step at a time in the gentle and humble way of our God, whom we know in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Prayer

Incomprehensible God,
Whose power is not might and muscle,
Or calculation and cunning,
Whose power is, rather,
A Love that does not make sense,
A Love that surpasses all limits—
Grant us the grace
To relinquish our best thinking
…
That we might receive in its place
What is even better:
Your love guiding us to live
In a loving way.
In Christ, crucified and risen: Amen.

Purifying the Heart (1 Sam 3:1-19)

Scripture: “Rare in Those Days”

1   Now the boy Samuel was ministering to the LORD under Eli. The word of the LORD was rare in those days; visions were not widespread.

Which is not to say that the Lord was not revealing himself in those days, but only to say that few were paying any attention. It’s not to say that the Lord was not speaking, but only that few were listening.

That few were listening becomes evident in the story itself. Three times God calls to the boy Samuel in the night. Three times Samuel mistakenly presents himself to the priest Eli, saying, “You called?” All of which demonstrates that God can be speaking, and his word can go unheard. No one is listening.

This is what we heard Moses warn the Israelites about last week, when he told them not to forget God upon entering the promised land, not to think to themselves, “My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth” (Deut 8:17). Just before today’s scripture, we learn that Eli’s sons “look with greedy eye” on the sacrifices that people bring to God (1 Sam 2:29). They eat the meat that is meant for God. They also take advantage of some of the women who visit the temple. They take into their hand whatever is in their power and might to take. The storyteller explains the root of their behavior this way: “They had no regard for the Lord” (1 Sam 2:12). They are not listening or looking for God. Their only god is their appetite, whether that’s meat or women or money. These men may be professional priests, but they are practical atheists, living only for themselves.

We live in a very different world—but with a very similar problem. We live in an age of distraction and insatiable appetite, constantly turning from one screen to another, from one bank account to another, from one outrage to another, from one purchase to another. If things themselves do not distract us, then our thoughts do. There is very little space for listening. Just turn on the television and listen as leaders and commentators speak right past one another, pushing their interest above all else. If we cannot hear even a person who is right in front of us, then how much more so will we have trouble hearing the God who speaks silently in our heart.

Scripture: “You Called Me”

2   At that time Eli, whose eyesight had begun to grow dim so that he could not see, was lying down in his room; 3 the lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the temple of the LORD, where the ark of God was.

It’s worth pausing here to remark upon the setting. We are in the center of the temple. We are just feet away from where the ark of God rests, the very symbol of God’s presence with the people. If a glimpse of God were to be caught somewhere, or if God were to be heard speaking, it would be precisely in this setting.

4 Then the LORD called, “Samuel! Samuel!” and he said, “Here I am!” 5 and ran to Eli, and said, “Here I am, for you called me.” But he said, “I did not call; lie down again.” So he went and lay down. 6 The LORD called again, “Samuel!” Samuel got up and went to Eli, and said, “Here I am, for you called me.” But he said, “I did not call, my son; lie down again.”

Twice, here in the middle of the temple where God’s presence is symbolically located, a priest of God does not even consider the possibility that Samuel has heard the voice of God. We’ve been told that Eli’s eyesight has grown dim, but it’s also become clear that his spiritual antenna is no longer picking up on God’s signal. He’s not tuned into God’s frequency. No wonder “the word of the Lord was rare in those days.”

7 Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, and the word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him. We might surmise that Samuel is also not dialed in to God’s frequency, but it’s through no fault of his own. All his role models—Eli and Eli’s two sons—have shown that their regard is not for God but for their own appetite and self-preservation.

8 The LORD called Samuel again, a third time. And he got up and went to Eli, and said, “Here I am, for you called me.” Then Eli perceived that the LORD was calling the boy. (Today’s story has the feel of a folk tale. Third time’s charm, as they say. Finally, Eli wakes up to the possibility that maybe, just maybe, here in the middle of the temple, where people come to pray and seek God—maybe God is speaking.)

9 Therefore Eli said to Samuel, “Go, lie down; and if he calls you, you shall say, ‘Speak, LORD, for your servant is listening.’” So Samuel went and lay down in his place.

10   Now the LORD came and stood there, calling as before, “Samuel! Samuel!” And Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant is listening.” 11 Then the LORD said to Samuel, “See, I am about to do something in Israel that will make both ears of anyone who hears of it tingle. 12 On that day I will fulfill against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house, from beginning to end. 13 For I have told him that I am about to punish his house forever, for the iniquity that he knew, because his sons were blaspheming God, and he did not restrain them. 14 Therefore I swear to the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli’s house shall not be expiated by sacrifice or offering forever.”

I don’t want to go down a rabbit hole, but I do want to point out that this depiction of divine punishment does not quite align with what we see in Christ. Which is not to say that it’s completely wrong or mistaken, only to say that as followers of Christ we might interpret it a bit differently. Jesus regularly tells parable where there are regrettable consequences, but never does he directly identify these consequences with divine punishment. Jesus seems to have a different picture of God, and we see this picture in the way Jesus himself lives. Repeatedly he forgives others and invites us to do the same. For Jesus, judgment seems to be less about God’s personal punishment and more about the natural consequences of sin. “If only you had known the things that make for peace,” he utters in lament over Jerusalem, and “those who take the sword will die by the sword,” he insists, after he has called Peter to drop his weapon. Likewise, we might read the demise of Eli and his sons as a natural result of their self-centered ways. Seeking only their gain and paying no attention to God, they are on a road that will not end well.

15   Samuel lay there until morning; then he opened the doors of the house of the LORD. Samuel was afraid to tell the vision to Eli. 16 But Eli called Samuel and said, “Samuel, my son.” He said, “Here I am.” 17 Eli said, “What was it that he told you? Do not hide it from me. May God do so to you and more also, if you hide anything from me of all that he told you.” 18 So Samuel told him everything and hid nothing from him. Then he said, “It is the LORD; let him do what seems good to him.”

19   As Samuel grew up, the LORD was with him and let none of his words fall to the ground. From our interpretation thus far, we might draw the conclusion that “the LORD was with” Samuel not simply because Samuel was special or God has chosen only him, but rather because Samuel was with the LORD. The LORD was with Samuel, because Samuel was with the LORD. That night in the temple, Samuel had learned something that few others in Israel had learned. He had learned how to listen. “The word of the Lord was [not] rare” for him, because he had learned how to listen.

From Rare to Regular

I remember one Saturday, about half a year ago, when I was stretched out on the couch in an empty moment. For once, I had absolutely no plans. Sometimes that can be a terrifying place. But in this particular moment, the lights in the house were out, the sun had just set, the sky was a muted orange and violet, and the tree limbs out the window were elegant shadows against the colored background; and I felt myself almost dissolving into the evening, as the shadows gathered and everything slowly receded into darkness. My plans, my worries, even my thoughts seemed to evaporate. I felt a profound peace. It was not that God had suddenly appeared, but rather that all those things that usually get in the way of God had disappeared.

I imagine you have experienced similar moments of transcendence at various points in your life. I will often hear from someone who is grieving a loved one, how in the midst of their sorrow they see a sign—a butterfly, a bird, a cloud, perhaps some creature or item of great significance to their loved one—and they feel in the depths of their heart a great assurance that their loved one is safe in God’s embrace. And for that moment, it feels like they too are wrapped in God’s embrace. Or I’ve heard from folks who struggle with addiction talk about hitting bottom as a moment of profound grace and freedom. In moments of great loss or great love, our world is often stripped bare to its essentials. It is not so much that God suddenly appears, as that the things that obscure God disappear.

For most of us, these moments are rare. Why is that?

In the 4^th century, Christianity became the official religion of the Roman empire. You might think this was a good thing. Finally, an end to persecution. Finally, sympathetic leaders who might make life a little easier for Christians. But in fact, for many followers of Christ, it became harder and harder to hear God as the wider culture welcomed them into its open arms and invited them into its quests for power, prestige, and possessions. This is the time when church leaders started cozying up to the emperor, church councils were convened to establish authoritative creeds, basilicas replaced living rooms as the gathering places for worship. And yet this is also the time when a number of Christ-followers fled the cities for the wilderness. They left behind the new possibilities for political might, societal advancement, and accumulation of wealth, because they recognized these things to be spiritual blockages, barriers that got in the way of being with God and with one another.

When these desert-dwelling Christ-followers talked about the spiritual life, they focused especially on what they called “purifying the heart.” They took Jesus at his word when he said that the kingdom of God was at hand (Mark 1:15), here in their midst (Luke 17:21), and that the “pure in heart” would see God (Matt 5:8). They would point to the sacred moments that we have all experienced and say these are evidence God is really with us. But they would also say that as long as these experiences remain spontaneous and rare, they are not the full measure of life with God. Rather, they are glimpses of what could be. With practice, we can open ourselves up to receive God’s grace more regularly. We can work on removing the blockages that get in the way, that make “the word of the Lord…rare” and “visions…not widespread” (1 Sam 3:1).

Practices of Subtraction

The spiritual practices through which these desert-dwellers purified their heart and opened themselves up to regular encounter with God are deceivingly simple. Silence was a key practice. Solitude was a key practice. Simplicity, or having few possessions, was a key practice. The medieval mystic Meister Eckhart says that the spiritual life has more to do with subtraction than addition, and I see that in the practices of silence, solitude, and simplicity. Each one is a practice of subtraction. Each one has more to do with letting go than grabbing hold.

I said these practices are “deceivingly” simple because, if you’ve ever tried to practice one of them, you’ve probably found yourself quickly distracted by impulses to get up, get out, grab hold, do, do, do. And so the desert fathers and mothers developed unique ways to practice purity of heart. One abba kept a stone in his mouth for three years just to keep himself from incessantly speaking. Another abba taught his students, saying, “Sit in your cell, and your cell will teach you everything.” (An object lesson illuminated this point. Pouring water into a bowl, an abba instructed his students to look into the bowl. The water was turbulent and they could see nothing. A few minutes later, he asked them to look again. In the still water, they could see their own face as in a mirror. So it is with a person who moves from crowds to solitude, the abba pointed out.) Another abba made it a practice to never talk back or defend himself when someone else spoke ill of him.

I don’t share these examples to recommend them specifically. (Keeping a stone in your mouth might raise more than a few eyebrows!) But I do find it helpful to pause and ask, “What practices help to purify (or unblock) my heart? What practices put me in a place where I am more open and better prepared to encounter God?” Prayer certainly qualifies (although I think it’s worth distinguishing between “my will” prayers and “thy will” prayers). For a lot of people, reading scripture at the beginning of the day can help center or anchor their spirit in God’s will. Some people practice silent contemplation, paying attention to nothing other than their breath, which they recognize to be the very breath of God. What all these practices have in common is that element of subtraction. Subtraction of the noise that distracts us from God. We let go of things instead of grabbing hold of them. We stop talking and start paying attention. In our own way, we say with Samuel, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening” (1 Sam 3:9).

Prayer

Loving God,
Eternal Word of life,
We long to hear you
…
In a world of noise,
Teach us ways
To listen,
To be with you
As you are already with us.
In Christ, the living Word: Amen.

"Enough" (Exodus 16:1-4, 13-18)

Scripture: The Great Equalizer 

1   The whole congregation of the Israelites set out from Elim—which was Israel’s first encampment site after their dramatic exodus from Egypt. Elim’s description suggests that it was a rare oasis in the desert: twelve springs of water, seventy palm trees. Needless to say, it probably wasn’t easy convincing the people to pack up and leave.

[A]nd Israel came to the wilderness of Sin—which is just a Hebrew place name; it has no connection to our word “sin”—which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had departed from the land of Egypt. So it’s been about a month since they’ve left Egypt. Any adrenaline from the excitement of escape and their newfound freedom in the wilderness is probably beginning to wear off. Reality is setting in. This barren landscape is their new life.

2 The whole congregation of the Israelites complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness.

It is worth pausing here to note who is complaining: “the whole congregation.” Not just the poor. Not just the misfits. Not just the Eeyores and grumpy old men and the glass-half-empty folks. Everyone. The phrase—“the whole congregation”—only appears seven times in Exodus, and over half of those occurrences are in this story (i.e., Exodus 16). The reason will become clear pretty quickly. The wilderness is a great equalizer. In the wilderness, there are no barns or storehouses. In the wilderness, there are few goods to accumulate, no real estate to secure. You only have what you can carry on your own back.

All of this to say, the wilderness has made all the Israelites equal in their need. And specifically in their hunger. They are equally famished, equally desperate. And so they cry out together, in unison. 

Scripture: Nostalgia: Mistaken Memory

3 The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill of bread; for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.”

The Israelites’ hunger is real, but their memory is mistaken. More than once in their wilderness wanderings (cf. Number 11, 14), they romanticize the past and express a desire to return to Egypt. They get things completely upside down, mistaking the wilderness for a death trap and Egypt for a paradise, when in fact it is the opposite. Egypt was a miserable life of slavery unto death. They did not recline by a buffet of meat and bread, eating their fill. They groaned in their slavery and cried out in their pain. The book of Exodus tells us that their lives had been made bitter. (To this day, during the Passover seder, the Jewish people eat bitter herbs to help them remember the bitterness of slavery in Egypt.)

My suspicion, though, is that Israel’s mistaken memory contains a grain of truth in it. In other words, there were pots filled with cooked meat, and there were people who ate their fill of bread. It just happened to be other people. Their Egyptian taskmasters. The Pharaoh, the princes, the nobles. Egypt’s grandeur did not come out of nowhere. It was the product of a well-organized hierarchy, a chain of power and command. Later in Israel’s life, when the people begin to clamor for a king, the prophet Samuel will warn them that a king will take their best land, their sons for warriors, their daughters for cooks and bakers, a portion of their harvest, and so on (1 Sam 8). In other words, in such a hierarchy, goods and benefits are apportioned unequally. Pharaoh and his entourage most certainly reclined by a buffet of pots filled with meat and plates filled with bread. But the Israelite slaves? They would have been given the bare minimum to survive.

And yet, I think the Israelites’ mistaken memory makes sense. Egypt is all they know. Egypt is the best that they can dream. When they earlier heard God’s promise of a land of milk and honey, they probably computed that promise in terms of the world that they knew. They expected that God would be leading them to the other side of the hierarchy, where they would be the ones enjoying the surplus, the profits, the abundance. They would be on the ones reclining in front of a buffet. And so it’s no great surprise when this dream for the future leaks out in their memory of the past. They remember Egypt correctly—with one little revision. They imagine themselves in the place of the haves rather than the have-nots.

Scripture: “As Much as Each of Them Needed”

4   Then the LORD said to Moses, “I am going to rain bread from heaven for you, and each day the people shall go out and gather enough for that day. In that way I will test them, whether they will follow my instruction or not.

…

13   In the evening quails came up and covered the camp; and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. 14 When the layer of dew lifted, there on the surface of the wilderness was a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground. 15 When the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. In Hebrew, the Israelites said, “Man-hu?” (“What is it?”) You can hear how their question becomes the basis of the word “manna.” Man-hu. Manna. Thus the name itself encases a reminder that God’s provision often exceeds our best calculations or imaginations. As Paul will later put it in Ephesians, God “is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine” (Eph 3:20). With this in mind, we might recall that the best the Hebrews can dream of right now is Egypt upside-down. The best they can hope for is a reversal. So they imagine a society of surplus and lack, abundance and hardship, but where they are on the top rather than the bottom, they are the haves rather than the have-nots. But God has something different in mind…

Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the LORD has given you to eat. 16 This is what the LORD has commanded: ‘Gather as much of it as each of you needs, an omer to a person according to the number of persons, all providing for those in their own tents.’” 17 The Israelites did so, some gathering more, some less. The “some…more, some less” seems to refer to larger and smaller families. Larger families gathered more according to their need, smaller families gathered less according to their need. Because, as we read in the next verse… 18 [W]hen they measured it with an omer, those who gathered much had nothing over, and those who gathered little had no shortage; they gathered as much as each of them needed.

What is the lesson of God’s manna? It is manifold. God hears us when we cry out in our need. God provides. God’s grace is sufficient to our need.

Indeed, that word “need” pops up more than once. It is worth reflecting on for a moment. This manna, this bread from heaven, is not apportioned the way food is often apportioned in our world. It is not “for the predator.” Not “for the powerful or the privileged.” Not “for the lucky or the entitled.”^[1] It is rather for those who have need—which is “the whole congregation,” everyone.

Later in the story, some Israelites will try to accumulate the manna, to gather more than the designated amount, more than enough for that day. The best they can dream, remember, is Egypt. A society of surplus and lack, abundance and hardship. They just dream of being on the other side of the power balance. And so some of them try to start accumulating the manna, storing it up, saving it. The more you have, the more leverage, the more power, the more control. They want to recline in front of buffets of food like Pharaoh.

But the ploy fails. The manna spoils the next day. God is teaching the Israelites a radically different way of life than the way they know. God is teaching them the lesson of “enough” (the word God uses in verse 4). God is teaching them a lesson and a habit of simplicity and sharing. When each person takes only what each person needs and shares the rest, there is always enough. God’s grace is always sufficient to the need.

Later in Deuteronomy, Moses elaborates on the test of manna in the wilderness. He warns the people about life after they have entered the land: “When you have eaten your fill and have built fine houses and live in them, and when your herds and flocks have multiplied….do not exalt yourself, forgetting the Lord your God. … [God] fed you in the wilderness with manna that your ancestors did not know, to humble you and to test you, and in the end to do you good. Do not say to yourself, ‘My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth’” (Deut 8:12-17). Moses recognizes that having land and gathering one’s own harvest might be seductive. It could lure Israel away from the way of simplicity and sharing, where God’s grace is enough for the need of everyone. To trust in God’s grace is to receive what is needed and to share the rest, as the people did with the manna. But Moses foresees that in the promised land the people might relapse into the way of Egypt, the way of profit and power, the way of storing up a surplus at the cost of others.  (All in the name of security, of course….But when the energy is always moving toward “more, more, more”—as seems to be the case in our so-called “growth” economy—one must eventually ask how much “more” a person needs to be secure, especially while many remain with their basic needs unmet.)

The Church in the World

I recently read a story that led me to wonder about how the church bears witness to the truth that God’s grace is enough, how it bears witness to the way of simplicity and sharing that the people of Israel learned in the wilderness. An old pastor originally shared this story:

There was a young pastor, fresh out of seminary, who had been at his first church for several years. He felt like he had paid his dues and finally was earning some currency, and he was ready to push through his first big idea. The church could provide a day-care center for the community.

“He explained to them why he thought a day-care center would be a good idea for the church. The church had the facilities. It would be good stewardship to put the building to good advantage. [It] was idle most of the week [anyway]. [And] it might be a good way to recruit new members. The church could be social activist and evangelistic at the same time.

But then a church member, Gladys, “butted in, ‘Why is the church in the day-care business? How could this be a part of the ministry of the church?’”

“The young pastor patiently went over his reasons again: use of the building, attracting young families, another source of income, the Baptists down the street already having a day-care center.

“‘And besides, Gladys,’ said Henry Smith, ‘you know that it’s getting harder every day to put food on the table. It’s become a necessity for both husband and wife to have full-time jobs.’”

“‘That’s not true,’ said Gladys. ‘You know it’s not true Henry. It is not hard for anyone in this church, for anyone in this neighborhood to put food on the table. Now there are people in this town for whom food on the table is quite a challenge, but I haven’t heard any talk about them. They wouldn’t be using this day-care center. They wouldn’t have a way to get their children here. This day-care center wouldn’t be for them. If we are talking about ministry to their needs, then I’m in favor of the idea. No, what we’re talking about is ministry to those for whom it has become harder every day to have two cars, a VCR, a place at the lake, or a motor home. That’s why we’re all working hard and leaving our children. I just hate to see the church buy into and encourage that value system. I hate to see the church telling these young couples that somehow their marriage will be better or their family life more fulfilling if they can only get another car, or a VCR, or some other piece of junk. Why doesn’t the church be the last place courageous enough to say, “That’s a lie. Things don’t make a marriage or a family.” This day-care center will encourage some of the worst aspects of our already warped values.’”

The story continues, but I had to take a breather there—in awe and wonder at Gladys’ stinging rebuke. I have to confess, I was both offended and convicted. Offended because I take it for granted that folks like you and me who have not only what we need but also some comforts and conveniences aren’t doing anything wrong. And if any one of us were struggling to make ends meet, I’d have sympathy. But I was convicted because I had just read the story of Israel in the wilderness, where God instructs the people in a different way from what they have learned in Egypt, a way of enough, a way of simplicity and sharing, a way where God’s grace is indeed sufficient to meet everyone’s need. By extension, I concluded, the church as ambassadors of God’s way is not meant simply to help the world live in the way it is already living, to help people who have more than enough to continue to live with more than enough. (To live with more than enough is a fool’s errand anyway, according to scripture, as such hoarding leads to the spoiling or rotting of God’s good gifts.) The church, instead, is meant to bear witness to a better way.

I went to the grocery store the other day and saw a sign that said something like, “Together we can end hunger.” And I found myself thinking, “Yes. And no.” Yes, God’s grace is sufficient to meet our need. Hunger can be ended. But in a supermarket that reflects a culture that resembles Egypt, with advertisements all around us, telling us we need more, we don’t have enough, why not indulge yourself in this new thing you didn’t know you needed—in such a world, it is so easy to forget God’s grace and relapse into the quest to secure our own lives, to be a have not a have-not, to think “my power and the might of my hand has gotten me this wealth” (Deut 8:17), I deserve it, don’t I?

I don’t want to wrap this sermon up for you. (Frankly, I don’t know how to!) I want to leave it open as a question. I want to invite us to ponder how the church stands as a stark alternative to the world around us. As a new people. As a different kind of community. As a colony of heaven.

What does it look like when we live as though God’s grace is enough?

Prayer

Loving God,
Who leads us out of the slavery
Of “more, more, more”—
Where our needs
For food, sleep, shelter, love,
Are met,
Grant us peace
…
Inspire us by the example of Christ
To live simple lives,
So that we might receive your grace
With wonder and gratitude
And share it with those in need.
In Christ, the bread of life: Amen.

 

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[1] Walter Brueggemann, “Bread Shared with All the Eaters,” https://churchanew.org/brueggemann/bread-shared-with-all-the-eaters, accessed September 29, 2025.

God with Us (Ex 2:23-25; 3:1-15)

Scripture: The Knowledge of God

2:23 After a long time the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned under their slavery and cried out. Their cry for help rose up to God from their slavery. 24 God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 25 God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them.

I know my brother very well. I know his favorite flavor of ice cream (strawberry). I know his favorite getaway (the Black Mountains of North Carolina). I know his wintertime fantasy (getting snowed in a ski resort and having nothing to do but ski for days on end). I know some of his favorite childhood memories (getting ice cream from a little shack called the Nibble Nook in the Black Mountains of North Carolina). I know some of his greatest hopes and his deepest fears, his dreams and his nightmares.

I know my brother not by head but by heart. I know a lot of things by head—things that I read in books, things that I hear on the news, things that I learn in a classroom. Sometimes when people have an exhaustive head knowledge of a subject, we say that they have “mastered” it. We might say, “She has a masterful knowledge of American history.”

But heart knowledge is not about mastering. It is about relationship. I have not mastered by brother. I know him the way you know that someone needs a hug…or needs space. I know him in a way that makes it almost impossible to judge him because I know where things come from. Instead of judgment there is compassion. Instead of control there is care.

When scripture says, “God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them,” the Hebrew literally says, “And God knew [them]” (Ex 2:25). “Knew.” It’s a word in Hebrew (yada’) that suggests not intellect but intimacy. You may recall the common biblical idiom, “And he knew her,” indicating the consummation of a relationship, the intimate connection between two partners, two becoming one.

Popular portraits of God paint an omniscient deity, an all-powerful God. It is a fantasy of mastery and control, a God who oversees and directs everything. But the biblical portrait of God’s “knowledge” is very different. Here is a God who knows intimately not intellectually, whose knowledge is not mastery but relationship.

Scripture: Moses in the Wilderness

3:1 Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness and came to Mount Horeb, the mountain of God.

Today’s story begins with a peaceful, pastoral scene. There against the wide backdrop of wilderness Moses moseys along, his eyes resting on the flock of sheep and goats around him.

If you knew Moses from his younger days, then this relaxed, easygoing shepherd might surprise you. A long time ago, Moses had a very different reputation. You might remember his darker past:

Having grown up as a Hebrew orphan in the Egyptian palace, Moses one day went out and saw the slavery of his people. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just some Egyptian masters bullying their Hebrew slaves. One Egyptian, however, went a bit too far. His bullying became beating. Moses was inflamed. His heart burned within him. He fixated on this one Egyptian man, and when the coast was clear, he killed him.

As it turned out, though, the coast had not been clear. The murder became well known, and Moses fled from Egypt to the land of Midian, where we find him today. By now, he has settled down. He has befriended a local shepherd, married this man’s daughter, and had a son. This is no longer the man who stood up to Egyptian brutality. This is a man who has cooled off, who has put down roots and is happy to live out his days in peace (cf. 2:11-22).

And so here he is, ambling alongside his flock in the wilderness, when suddenly something catches his eye.

Scripture: An Odd Repetition

2 There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed. 3 Then Moses said, “I must turn aside and look at this great sight and see why the bush is not burned up.”

“Moses and the Burning Bush”—it’s a beloved Sunday School story. I generally think of it in straightforward terms, as a scene of divine recruitment, when God the employer contracts Moses to a very special job, when God the commander hands Moses a mission impossible: bring my people out of Egypt. But as I read the story this week, what I discovered was not a distant, commanding God, a God sitting above the chessboard of our world, cool and calculating, masterfully making moves, transferring players from one square to another. What I discovered is the opposite. Not a God of intellect but a God of intimacy. Not a God above the chessboard, but a God on the chessboard. What I discovered is a God who is with us, even amid suffering.

4 When the Lord saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” 5 Then he said, “Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” 6 He said further, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.

7 Then the Lord said, “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, (here’s that same word “know” again, indicating God is intimately familiar with Israel’s suffering) 8 and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the country of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.

There’s an odd repetition in the story of the burning bush. First, God tells Moses that God has seen the Israelites’ misery and will come down to deliver them. At this point, Moses and we are both pretty happy. That’s the God we want.

Religion has long held fantasies of a God who is above all and all-powerful and who will fix everything in the blink of an eye. When God tells Moses, “I have come down to deliver [my people] from the Egyptians,” I imagine that Moses nods his head approvingly, thinking to himself, “Amen!”  That’s the God Moses wanted. That’s the God we all want. The God above who will come down in power and fix it all in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.

But as Moses finds out, that’s not quite who God is. Cue the odd repetition…

9 The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. (I imagine Moses blinking here, thinking, “Yeah, you’ve already said that.” Then God continues.)  10 Now go, I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” Woah, what now? God’s tune has changed. First, it was: I’ve seen their suffering, I’ve come down to deliver them (cf. 3:7-8). But this the second time around, it becomes: I’ve seen their suffering—“so come, I will send you” (cf. 3:9-10)! So which is it?  Is God coming down to deliver the Israelites from Egypt, or is Moses going to bring the Israelites out of Egypt? Let’s put a bookmark here, and we’ll return to it….

Scripture: God’s Name and the Promise of Presence

11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” In other words…I think deliverance is really part of your job description, not mine.

12 He [God] said, “I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you that it is I who sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.”

But Moses hasn’t run out of excuses yet.

13 But Moses said to God, “If I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The Godof your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” He said further, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I am has sent me to you.’ ”

15 God also said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘The Lord, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you’:

This is my name forever,

and this my title for all generations.

In the ancient world, the name of a god usually identified or described that god’s particular character. The name Zeus, for example, seems to originate from a word that meant “sky” or “bright,” thus describing Zeus as a sky god. A few weeks ago, we noted that the Babylonians had a goddess named Tiamat, a word that described the chaos of deep waters.

So what about the name that God reveals to Moses? To this day, its pronunciation is a mystery, as its original writing did not contain vowels. At one time, people thought its pronunciation was “Jehovah.” The present consensus is “Yahweh.” Whatever its exact pronunciation, its roots are clear. It comes from the Hebrew word “to be.” Thus God says, “I am who I am,” and “Say to the Israelites, ‘I am has sent me.”

The promise encased in God’s name is profound. Presence. God is. Which means at any moment, God is there. In joy, God is there. In suffering, God is there. As David sings in Psalm 139, “Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence?” (Ps 139:7). It is impossible, because God is always here, now, wherever “here and now” is. For many people, it seems sometimes that religion is about escaping the present world for another world, a different world; religion is the dream of a distant future. But what I hear in God’s name suggests otherwise. Religion is really just another way of talking about reality, about what is, because wherever we are, whatever we experience, God is there. And as God’s message to Moses makes clear, God’s presence is not a static, inert thing, but an inspiring, life-giving thing. God’s presence moves us to what is good.

A Tale of Two Fires

To me, God’s in-dwelling presence helps explain that curious repetition that we heard earlier. Which is it? Is God coming down to deliver the Israelites from Egypt, or is Moses going to bring the Israelites out of Egypt? In a word: Yes. Both.

God and Moses together. Not like a tag team: God pulling one punch, Moses pulling the next. But rather like a call and a response. To the outside observer, only Moses will be leading the Israelites. But he would not be leading them if he hadn’t become aware of God’s presence in that blazing fire.

Speaking of fire...I can’t help but wonder if this is not really a tale of two fires. Remember how long ago, Moses like God had seen the suffering of the Israelites? Remember how that had inflamed him? It had ignited such an anger that he killed a man. But the fire within his heart had long since cooled, as he settled down in Midian and married and had a son.

God’s heart, however, has not cooled. The God whom Moses encounters is a never-ending fire. It’s a fascinating comparison. God and Moses had seen the same thing. Both of them witnessed the suffering of the Israelites. But one ran away from the suffering and settled down, cooling off. The other stayed a blazing fire.

The key to this eternal divine combustion?  I think we heard it at the start of today’s passage: “God knew [them],” that is, the Israelites (Ex 2:25). Because, remember, this is not a cool, masterful knowledge. It’s not an intellectual knowledge, which stands at a distance. God’s knowledge is the knowledge of intimacy and relationship, a knowledge of care and compassion. God’s heart beats for the Israelites—as indeed God’s heart beats for all the families of the earth.

The Good News of God’s Presence

The good news of today’s scripture, as I hear it, is not that God fixes things instantaneously from on high, or that Jesus waves a wand and cures all our problems. Those are fantasies that have long tempted religion, fantasies that bear a curious resemblance to our own methods of throwing money or quick-fix programs at a problem. The good news is that rather than keeping a safe distance from our suffering, God is in the midst of it with us. The good news is that God knows us intimately and desires our wellbeing. If we want to find God, we don’t need to escape to another world or look longingly at a distant future. We need only look around us.

The great “I am” is here, with us. Not as a cure, but as a call. A call to be with others, as God is with us. A few weeks ago, we saw in the creation story how God called all the chaotic elements of the world into creative relationship, to be with one another in a vitally good way. Today we see Moses experience God as a call to be with his Hebrew people and to mediate God’s care for them. We might experience God as a call to be with a friend who grieves. To be with a marginalized person who cries out in pain. To be with an enemy whose resentments stoke our own. Not to fix or control or master the situation, not to cure the hurt or win the argument or achieve the best result, but simply to make clear the good news through our very presence that they are not alone. Rather they are deeply known and loved by a God who is with us and will never leave our side.

Prayer

Great “I Am,”
Whose spirit we cannot escape,
Deepen our awareness
Of your abiding presence with us
And your compassionate knowledge of us
…
And kindle within our hearts
The same spirit,
That we might welcome others
Into the joy of your presence
And the salvation of your knowledge.
In Christ, who is with us: Amen.