Genesis 32:22-31 Psalm 1212
Timothy 3:14-4:5 Luke 18:1-8
Lectionary Link
In the world of freedom, God does not always seem apparent, apparent in the very best ways in which we been taught to believe about divinity.
Lectionary Link
In the world of freedom, God does not always seem apparent, apparent in the very best ways in which we been taught to believe about divinity.
Why is it that God does not always seem to be apparent? If we over-identify God with the current situation which faces us, we can either equate God as being the one who prefers us by giving us the experience of good fortune, or the one who punishes us with the experience of bad luck.
This seeming quick change in the apparency of God's presence and favor highlights what might be called the weakness of God.
And to hint at the weakness of God seems to defame a notion of God as the all-powerful and Great One.
So is it an oxymoron to suggest that God is weakly powerful or powerfully weak? And how might one speak of God's weakness?
The weakness of God is seen in the God of freedom creating a world with creatures,entities, and beings sharing genuine creative freedom.
And though we may want God to be at our beck and call to intervene with conditions continuously in our favor, the truth of actual human experience is that we are subject to the full range of things which can happen to us. And sometimes it seems as though conditions of human experience make it seems as though pain, evil, and injustice are winning.
And this is where the parable of Jesus, which is in our appointed Gospel, is particularly insightful.
Jesus told a parable about a widow who was encountering an unjust judge. Unjust judge is the ultimate oxymoron. In the parable, the unjust judge represents one of facts of the freedom of this world: Injustice can and does occur; so often that it can seem to be the normal condition of life, especially for those who have to face the brunt realities of injustice. This parable of Jesus was being recited within minority communities of people who did not enjoy the full privilege of justice within their greater societies.
How does one live when it seems as though injustice is prevailing and seems to be the habit of one's social situation? How many people have long live through the conditions of the duration of injustice? How many still do? How many still live in the horrible wake of the habits of injustice?
Jesus asked, "When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith?" When it comes to appraising how we as people lived with the conditions of freedom, will we be found to have lived with faith as creatively adopting to the conditions of freedom in this world?
And how might that faith be characterized?
First, with prayer. The widow in the parable represents the faith life of prayer; a continuous holy nagging protest against injustice. The widow's persistence was a resistance: "I will not let the actual state of injustice be declared as what is normal and what is godly. I will endlessly protest against the evils of injustice with my last breathe, until I can see the apparency of justice become a reality in the conditions of living."
Now nagging does not seem to be a very romantic notion of prayer; but it is expressive of the grit of persistence amid the harsh reality of the injustices of life. We may prefer prayer to be quiet, peaceful, mediations in our silent retreats near the lake or in the mountains provided to us by spirituality cottage industries of our church institutions. But we, and many other people, do not always have the luxury of easy prayer. And even when life is apparently easy for us, we need to be involved as holy prayerful naggers on behalf of those who face the oppression of injustice in its many forms.
How else might faithful living be characterized? When God does not seem apparent in favor to others, we need to be the apparent favor of God to each other as we are inspired to live lives of love and caring and justice.
When the circumstances of the world seem to instantiate injustice, we need to instantiate and make apparent the superiority of love, kindness, and justice.
The writer of the Epistle of Timothy exhorts readers to be persistence, but also be sound in teaching, which means being honest to God and honest to the actual conditions of freedom. The writer uses a negative meaning of myth. The misuse of the stories of Jesus to present his life as not being true to the actual conditions of freedom in life, is the unsound teaching that the writer was referring to.
The reality of freedom in the world means that we must present the truths of how the life of Jesus inspires a faith that helps us to live creatively with the free conditions of life, especially when the conditions are not in our apparent favor.
What is our response to be? Holy nagging prayer for the superiority of justice, love, kindness, and health. And what are we to do when it doesn't seem apparent to us or to others? We are to be the apparency of justice, love, caring, and kindness so that the nagging prayers of the disenfranchised might know the reality of God's love compatible with the conditions of freedom.
May God give us grace to find faith as the creative way to live with the truth of freedom. Amen.
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