God’s “Law”

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Deuteronomy, Exodus, love your neighbor as yourself, Luke, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

There are many iterations in the Bible of what God expects of us. In today’s lectionary readings we have the text from the book of Exodus (Ex. 20: 1-17) that has come to be known as “The Ten Commandments.” The older I get, the more I find reason to live by “The Golden Rule” which calls us to “Love the Lord your God with your whole heart, all your soul and all your strength.” (Deut. 6:5) I found 25 translations of that verse today and then from the Christian Scriptures a whole other group of texts including one from Luke (10:27) that adds “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

It’s all about love no matter how you read it and I find that the most difficult and necessary way to live. Some people are easy for us to love and some most difficult. The ways that we come to love must be good for each person. For some, it is what is known in our culture as “tough love” while for others it is quite easy to find the road to loving “with all your might,” as the Scriptures say. We can only do our best and wake up each morning ready to try again to move toward the love with which we are loved by God.

The Choice

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choose life, Deuteronomy, life, Moses, risk, Sister Helen Kelley, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today Moses takes the podium with a clear choice for the people. (DEUT 30: 15-20) “Today I set before you,” he says, “life and prosperity, death and doom.” Who wouldn’t choose the first option? Oh, but there are conditions: obeying the commandments, statutes and decrees he sets down, walking in God’s ways rather than adoring their other gods… Not so simple when I start reflecting on the everyday experience of my living…(What “other gods” are still pulling me in the wrong direction? I ask myself.)

Moses is persistent, repeating his charge again and urging them toward the correct choice, saying, “Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him…” (Sounds like a choice that would be hard to resist, but then I think of the habits that are so persistent, especially in the down, difficult days of winter…)

A more evocative version of the challenge, perhaps, came to me long ago from Sister Helen Kelley, whose name remains anonymous to me but whose words always return when I listen to the speech of Moses in Deuteronomy.

Choose life, only that and always, and at whatever risk. To let life leak out, to let is wear away by the mere passage of time, to withhold giving it and spreading it is to choose nothing. (See berkana.org)

The Seventh Day

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Ancient Songs Sung Anew, keep holy the Sabbath day, life, listen, Psalm 95, Sabbath, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, voice of God

No matter what’s happening, when I wake up on Sunday morning I always feel different from other days. The Scriptures for today remind me of the reason that is true for me. The first reading (for Year B) recounts the Ten Commandments, the fourth being described as follows: Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day. Six days you may labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord, your God…no work may be done.

Sometimes these days it’s impossible for everyone in these United States to observe Sabbath in their traditional way. Just the fact that work schedules span the 7-day, 24-hour work week for certain employees makes that easy to see. Whether we have to carve out our own Sabbath time because of our life circumstances or are able to join with traditional services where we live, the observance of Sabbath is clearly an essential element of our well-being. A reminder in Psalm 95 today says it well.

So come, then, let us bow before this God of ours, and offer up our beings to the Lord. Listen deep within yourself to hear the voice of God who shepherds you and leads you forth to life. (vs. 6-7, Ancient Songs Sung Anew, p.241)

 

 

 

 

 

O Adonai, Come!

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Adonai, Creator, Master of the Universe, Moses, O Antiphons, Old Testament, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

The second of the “O” Antiphons (see yesterday’s post) harks back all the way to Moses and the giving of the covenant on Mount Sinai. The Hebrew word Adonai means Lord or Master and is used to signify sovereignty. It is difficult for us to conceive of that concept for God as it is used in the culture of Old Testament times, especially as we are considering the coming of Christ as the human Jesus. If, however, we think of God as Creator of the universe, willing and able to manifest in whatever way will speak to humanity for good in any time and culture, it is a powerful statement. Below are three translations of the antiphon. Consider each as the work of the “Master of the Universe” and see if they are fitting as preparation in Judeo-Christian history for the fulfillment of what we know as the “Christ event.”

1. O Adonai, you are the covenant maker and the promise giver. You appeared to Moses in the burning bush and gave him the commandments. Come, set us free to serve you.
2. O Lord of Ancient Israel, giver of the Law of Moses on Sinai, rescue us with your mighty power.
3. O Lord, fulfill our deepest longings…Come!

 

 

 

 

 

Love Revisited

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Baton Rouge, disaster, flooding, Louisiana, love, love your neighbor as yourself, Matthew, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

When I saw the gospel passage for this morning (MT 22:34-40) I thought, “How can I say anything new and inspiring about one of the most familiar texts in Scripture?” We’ve all heard the sermons that tell us it isn’t about loving our neighbor as much as ourselves; that would be a disaster in many cases, given the lack of self-esteem in some of us. The implication there is that we actually have to love ourselves too. Lately an interpretation that has come to prominence is that I need to love my neighbor as if s/he were really, actually myself – because we are all one in God. I can accept all of that but what makes me move from theory to practice is an experience of that depth of loving.

In our religious congregation (called by our founder “The Congregation of the Great Love of God”) we often can be heard saying that where one of us is, all of us are. Well, today I am proud to say that I have a walking, talking visceral experience of that truth in what I know will be an outpouring of love of mammoth proportions. Yesterday morning all four of us were in our kitchen commenting on the terrible flood event in Louisiana. Susan wondered about our Sister Chris Pologa who lives and ministers in Baton Rouge. “I planned to call her today!” I said as I prepared to leave for a meeting. Susan offered to take that over. By the time I had returned home we learned (by email since phone service is spotty) that half of the 500 students in the school where she ministers and 30 of the teachers had lost everything. By dinner time we had a plan of how best to contribute and were all thinking of what more we could do. I am confident that this process is rippling throughout our entire province and that the people of Baton Rouge will benefit greatly by our love for God and neighbor. So let me close with those familiar words as I am certain that we all have experiences on which to draw this morning that will solidify and deepen the impact on each of us.

…”Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.” (Emphasis mine)

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Greatest Law

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heart, Jesus, love, love God, love our neighbors as ourselves, Mark, mind, soul, strength, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

When someone asks, as the scribe asked Jesus in this morning’s gospel (MK 12:28-34), What is the first of all the commandments? it’s a safe bet that most people who have any religious background will give the same answer. And we know that the one is really two: love of God and love of neighbor as ourselves. Jesus was quick to answer with the imperative from Deuteronomy that he had learned in his youth: Hear, O Israel! The Lord, our Lord, is One (or Lord alone!) What follows tells us how to love God: with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. Pondering that directive would logically lead us to the next: Love your neighbor as yourself. If we’re spending ourselves in love of God with all of those faculties, everything else must flow from that activity, it seems. In other words, we must become the love of God manifest in the world. If that is true, there is no doubt that all of our intention and function would be an impulse of love – of ourselves and everyone else in God. It would all be seamless – no distinction or separation. And that, for thousands of years now, has been God’s desire for us.

Keeping the Sabbath

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daily ritual, Exodus, Israel, keep holy the Sabbath day, Moses, Muslim, reconfigure a remembrance of God, Sabbath, spiritual practice, sundown, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

When I was in Israel last month it was impossible to be confused about which day was the Sabbath for the Jewish people. Shops were closed, the buses didn’t run (even for the tourists) and all “worldly activities” stopped in mid-afternoon on Friday so that people would have ample time to welcome  their day of rest at sundown. We were on our own until Saturday at sundown – and it became a good time to walk and reflect and perhaps attend Shabbat services. And if we were paying attention during our stay, we would often hear the Muslim call to prayer – a blast that went out all over the city to remind people to “hasten to prayer.” Five times a day (dawn, midday, mid-afternoon, sunset and nightfall – about two hours after sunset) the call goes out and people turn to remember God and right action.

Today’s lectionary reading from the Hebrew Scriptures (EX 20:1-17) lists the Ten Commandments given to Moses. The first three, which speak of our relationship to God, are more detailed than the rest where we find ways of relating to one another in the world. As I read the third, I was reminded of my youth when it seemed there was more congruence of American culture and consciousness of God.

Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day. Six days you may labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord,  your God. No work may be done by you, or your son or daughter, or your male or female slave, or your beast, or by the alien who lives with you…

I can already hear the objections (which I myself have often raised): that people have to work and now stores and other places of business are open 24/7 so it’s impossible to designate a day…We are a true melting pot (or a stew) in this country now so a common Sabbath isn’t feasible…Sunday is the only day I can get the laundry and food shopping done…and it’s all true. The question is a challenge to the creativity of each of us. In the face of all the obstacles, how might I reconfigure a remembrance of God that is more than a one-hour, once-a-week exercise? It might be a daily ritual – or several times a day. It might be a weekly fast day, or a day of compassion each week, or, after practices have become ingrained enough, it may be that we are always celebrating Sabbath because we are always, day and night, turning inward and resting in the presence of God.

It’s the Law

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Deuteronomy, Jesus, Matthew, Moses, Sermon on the Mount, ten commandments, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

All of the readings this morning are focused on law. As we hear in Deuteronomy (CH 4), Moses received the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai as a way to live in the land that God was giving to his people. In giving the laws Moses instructed the people to “observe them carefully, for thus you will give evidence of your wisdom and intelligence to the nations…” He also warned the people, “Take care and be earnestly on your guard not to forget the things which your own eyes have seen, nor let them slip from your memory as long as you live, but teach them to your children and to your children’s children.” It seems then that the laws were not laid on people as a burden but as a guide to right and wise living and were made more intelligible if people looked at them in the light of their own experience. When I think of the Ten Commandments (which is admittedly only part of the Mosaic Law), I usually consider them as rather negative but if I look at them in terms of the culture of the time and fold in these words of Moses this morning, I see that perhaps, after the imperatives of the first three positive statements of how the Hebrews were to relate to God, the proscriptive 4th through 10th commandments were simpler to grasp for a people used to slavery and self-preservation as a way to survive. A new way to think about the Commandments, to be sure.

In the gospel today we find another reference to that Law. Jesus grew up reflecting on and living by it and it’s instructive that he said, “I have not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it.” By the time he arrived on earth, there had been some progress in the way the covenant with God was understood by the Hebrews. The statement from Matthew just quoted is part of the great Sermon on the Mount where Jesus lays out eight statements on how to become holy (“Blessed are…”). It seems then that the way to live a wise and intelligent life could be learned by reflection on the meaning of both sets of laws seen through the cultural filter of Jesus’ time as well as that of our day.

In our current large and litigious culture we might ask ourselves how we might articulate the law of God for Church and society. What would eliminate the rampant greed and violence and focus us again on the good and compassionate works that lead to holiness?