Sunday, June 12

The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime (pp. 68-70)

To read this morning's lesson, click here.

The "human problem," as the Bible's narrative tells it, begins with Adam and Eve. Actually, Genesis 1:2 tells us that God turned the primeval soupy tohu va-bohu ("formlessness and void") into a gloriously perfect order, setting human beings into an orderly world so they could live with God and before God in an orderly way. Adam and Eve are part of God's orderly creation.

But, Genesis 3 tells us that Adam and Eve, who here speak of each of us, opted for another way than God's perfect order. The wheels began to fall off, the tohu va-bohu began to creep its way back into the picture, and Cain killed Abel and humans, one after another, began to run east from Eden and do nasty things. And one long-term impact of all this is that the powerless were ignored and suppressed.

Jesus came to do what God said God had to do: "I will judge with equity." Jesus did just that by a Spirit-guided concern with the "affllicted," the "captives," the "blind," and the "oppressed." His mission: to liberate and to proclaim the "year of the Lord's favor" (if you have time, read this in light of Leviticus 25).

With one quick stroke of power we cannot heal the world's ills, but today, tomorrow, and throughout the steps of the rest of our days we can respond to those who are around us who speak of needs, who speak of afflictions, who speak of oppressions -- and when we do, we are doing what Jesus was called to do. Today, God's judging with equity is our own special vocation. Notice, sometime, the diversity -- or what ought to be the diversity -- of God's people. We have heard Jesus proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.