Dear All of Us,
So, how high are
your tolerance,
your take it on the chin,
your bounce back levels,
when you get blamed for
something you didn't do?
I don't know about yours.
I'm embarrassed at mine.
I'm in awe of God's.
Unfortunately, in scripture
God often gets a bad rap as
Disrupter/Destroyer in Chief -
petty, punitive,
touchy, torching,
thunder bolt destructive.
Sort of:
"Mess with me and
I'll smack you up
the side of the head.'
The scriptures
seem at times
to be ablaze
with God as the heavy,
the one with the fiery fuse
striking out in retribution:
-Throw the bums out of
this Garden of Paradise.
-Torch sinful
Sodom and Camorah.
-Drown out all that evil
in a world-wide water wash.
If you are willing,
please pause here
to check out
Ezekiel 14:12-23.
It's classic clear
blame game
with God as the
Disrupter/Destroyer
in Chief
and better more.
PAUSE
We misread, misunderstand
scripture
so often.
Often and much
we need to
recalibrate
how we take scripture,
how we let it take us.
Scripture starts with
The Start
- a beautiful, balanced,
plentiful paradise,
original goodness,
everything's all right,
right from the start,
right from the
creative good
that is God.
It came, though,
with a warning label.
This is God Good.
Be careful not to
disrupt/destroy it
by seeking to
know/experience
its flip
- evil -
You can't handle it.
The First Folks
fell foolish anyway,
got acquainted with,
bit into, bought into
- evil -
They insisted on
knowing it.
They let evil
loose and in.
It has been
Paradise Lost
ever since.
IT
destroys/disrupts
to this day,
NOT GOD
All those freaky, frightful
scriptures are actually
the ancient writers'
way of saying that
God is letting us have
the fruit of our picking.
We had it good.
We insisted on having
its opposite and lack
- EVIL -
The Tree of
the Knowledge of
Good and Evil.
It's God saying:
"OK.
Have it your way.
Here it is.
Your choice
and
its consequent."
It has thrown everything
off tilter.
Having a baby is a delight.
It still is, but now it hurts.
Work is wonderful.
It still is, but now it's
brow sweaty hard.
Nature is creatively dynamic.
It still is, but now it is also
disordered, destructive
DISRUPTING
It's not only those
First Folks
who bought into,
were bitten by their bite,
who insisted on knowing
the opposite of God Good.
The ancients did.
We do.
I do.
Those ancient writers
framed the telling
hurt hard.
It was their culture's
literary form.
We do well
not to confuse
form with message.
God doesn't do hurt.
Yet people and nature hurt.
Misunderstood scripture
seems to say
it's God's doing,
it's God hurting.
That's
Deadening Wrong!
Some people suffer from
smoking and from air pollution.
God doesn't sell cigarettes
or emit toxic chemicals
into the atmosphere.
Some people suffer from
shootings and bombings.
God doesn't own a gun or
launch ballistic missiles.
Some people starve.
God provides
Nature's plenty
that a few horde
to other's starvation.
Genes were meant
to pass on good.
Now they also pass on
not so good.
The harsh words of God
in scripture are a
soundboard
God holds up to us,
re-sounding to us
what we say
by our choices
with its consequents.
These scriptures were written
by a long-ago people,
in their manner and mode,
not ours - a manner
quite foreign to us.
We need to translate
both
their ancient languages
AND
THEIR ANCIENT
MODES OF EXPRESSION
into our
tongue, time, tuning.
All of Creation is related,
interconnected.
The disorder of one
throws off the other.
That goes for
people, planet.
A current example is
climate change.
Nature is ordered.
We disorder that.
It hurts.
Not a hurt from God.
The creative,
dynamic energies
of Creation
get twisted wrong
by evil choices.
We suffer.
Not a hurt from God.
As we learn and continue
to read scripture aright,
we encounter a God
who cuts us slack
for our
choices/consequences,
yet constantly seeks
to save us from ourselves.
Let's Pray:
Restoring God,
we are wounded -
we pray,
wounds become
the scares of hope,
We are hollowed out
by pride -
we pray, empty holes
become receptacles
of grace,
We are confused -
we pray,
unknowing holds
the beauty
of holy mystery,
We struggle in doubt -
we pray,
churning creates
the humus
where faith grows,
We strive for comfort -
we pray,
you bust us up
to birth compassion,
Disrupting God -
we pray,
you turn us over
in love.
Amen (1)
God is a love
that lets us refuse love,
damaging and damming
ourselves,
individually, collectively
socially, environmentally.
God is a love
that welcomes us back
the instant we accept love,
- forgives, redeems,
sets right, saves.
"Though your sins
be as scarlet,
they shall be
as white as snow..."
Isaiah 1:18
In the Love that God Is,
God Good lovingly disrupts
the evils of our
DISRUPTING
******
(1) Online Morning Prayer
Spring Forest
Hillsborough, NC
Wednesday
October 30, 2024
Every week
we many
from many lands
and many ways
join in together here.
There's always
WELCOME ROOM
at our table.
This week
we gathered from
India to France,
Iran to The Netherlands,
and fifty wonderful more
peoples and places.
Such good company!
What a Holy Communion!
NEXT ONLINE POSTING
Tuesday morning/afternoon
East Coast USA time
November 19,2024
NEXT EMAIL DELIVERY
Friday
November 22, 2024
LAST FIVE ONLINE POSTINGS
AVAILABLE
by
scrolling down beneath
this posting
Have a God Good week.
Let's join with God
to disrupt our
Disrupting.
Love to all.
God Bless,
John Frank
frankly speaking
spirituality for the street
johnfrankshares.blogspot.com
******
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