Rev. Eric Anderson What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: Discomforting Words of the Prophet

During stressful times, the prophet Micah spoke words of challenge to those in power, warning them that their injustice risked the fate of the nation.

Here’s a transcript:

I’m thinking about the third chapter of the prophet Micah (Micah 3:5-12).

Micah was a contemporary of Isaiah. Both of them lived in the city of Jerusalem during a period when the Assyrian Empire was extending its power to the west and to the south toward Egypt. That meant that the Jewish nations, Israel and Judah, were right in the way.

The people there trusted that God would preserve them. Micah said their trust was at least somewhat misplaced. Oh yes, God had promised to be with them through thick and thin, but they had made promises as well. And according to Micah, they had not kept them.

In particular, they had a rash of prophets that were declaring God’s faithful protection for them, while ignoring the way in which the nations had not kept their covenant with God. They were prophesying for money and for a bribe, said Micah. The political leadership was also taking bribes and perverting justice. They had established the city, he wrote, on blood.

Now, a nation whose leaders do such things, who enrich or empower themselves at the expense of their people, who pervert justice: itt does not take divine intervention for those countries to crumble. It takes time (and it may take quite a lot of time), but in the end nations which act against their own people will fall. It took, in fact, divine intervention not to crush the nation of Israel (Assyria did that) — it took divine intervention to preserve the nation of Judah and Assyrian army camped around them and then withdrew the siege because of an outbreak of illness. They read that as the intervention of God, an intervention prompted by a reform effort of a pious king named Hezekiah.

Later on in his book, Micah noted that God does not hold grudges or maintain anger forever. God yearns to show forgiveness and steadfast love. It still remains our responsibility to build and maintain communities of justice and compassion. It remains our responsibility because if we do not do so, our communities will dissolve of themselves.

But it is also our privilege and our joy to rely upon our God to forgive our errors and to restore us when we stumble. Just remember Micah’s most famous words, “What does the Lord require of you? To do justice and steadfast love and to walk humbly with your God.”

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you are thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.

Rev. Eric Anderson What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: Receive the Word with Joy

Paul complimented the Thessalonians for doing something so basic and so important: for receiving the word with joy. So may we.

Here’s a transcript:

I’m thinking about the first chapter of Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians (1 Thessalonians 1:1-10). I’m actually thinking about the entire first chapter. Those ten verses are what is laid out as the passage for this coming Sunday in Revised Common Lectionary.

Paul’s custom when opening a letter was to compliment his readers, and First Thessalonians is no exception. The rest of the letter actually continued to be fairly light and loving. In some of his other letters, Paul had more difficult things to say to his correspondents. In First Thessalonians, the occasion for writing seems to have been that Paul was delayed. He had wanted and expected to come to visit. He had been prevented. And he wanted to let them know he was still on his way.

There is an interesting compliment that Paul paid them, which you might look at in a couple of different ways. He commended them for becoming imitators of us (Paul and his companions), and of the Lord (Jesus). For in spite of persecution, they had received the word with joy.

Becoming imitators of figures in the Bible can be a problem. There are plenty of attributes of Biblical heroes and heroines that I would love to imitate. And pretty much all of them have attributes that I would not care to imitate. That, in fact, includes Paul. The hubris, the pride, with which he commends them for imitating him, is probably not something that I should do, not something I should imitate.

There is, however, something that was a characteristic of Paul, and that he noticed in the Thessalonians, that I do want to imitate, and which I commend to you to imitate as well: to receive the word with joy.

It is too easy in religion, any religion, to follow the trails into all sorts of self-condemnation. Any religion has lots and lots of options for self-improvement, and in many cases, those are well-commended to you. But that’s not where we start.

We start with joy.

Paul was abundantly clear throughout his writing career and in all of his work with the churches, that God took the first step through Jesus to bring a new and deeper relationship with people —  relationship which was extended to people that nobody had thought could have that kind of relationship with God — to receive the word with joy.

So that is my advice for you today: to imitate Paul at least to that extent (try and skip the hubris). To imitate Jesus to that extent, because oh my goodness, what joy he could display in his relationship with God. Receive the word with joy and be grateful and exultant in the fact that God loves you.

Receive the word with joy and let the rest of your goodness follow from that.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.

Rev. Eric Anderson What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: A God Who Promises

When they built the golden calf, God got very angry, but remained true to the promises that had been made to them. We worship a God who keeps promises.

Here’s a transcript:

I’m thinking about the thirty-second chapter of Exodus (Exodus 32:1-14), in which Moses learned about the golden calf.

Moses had already received and delivered the Ten Commandments to the people, not the tablets of stone,. God had informed Moses of what the Ten Commandments were down in the camp. Moses in turn had communicated those commandments to the people. These were the broad outlines, the foundations of their relationship with one another and of their relationship with God. Moses had ascended the mountain to learn more, to get more detail, to get more instruction.

At the bottom of the mountain, the people got frightened with Moses gone so long. And they wanted to make their God tangible, they wanted to make their God more real. So they did what people of that age did, they made an idol. People of our age are more likely to invest or build a house or have something that they can touch.

Moses’ brother Aaron — well, he did what they asked, he made them an idol, a golden calf.

Up on the mountain, God saw it and God was angry. They have already broken all the laws that I commanded them, God said to Moses. So what I’m going to do is I’m going to leave these people to die in the wilderness and I will make a nation from you.

I imagine it might have been a tempting offer, but Moses would not go there. Moses said to God, You promised. These people know what you promised. I know what you promised. The world knows what you promised. Can you be seen as a God who does not keep divine promises? “And God changed his mind about the evil that had been prepared.”

God is a God of promises. The promises of Exodus, the promises of First and Second Samuel, the promises of Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel, the promises of Jesus. Despite what we do that hinders our covenant with God, that damages our relationship with God, despite the sins that we commit before God, God’s promises remain and God remains faithful to those promises.

It is a startling thing. What greater love could anyone have than to love through all the misdeeds and the mistakes? All the errors and omissions.

All the things that we do day-to-day to place something else between us and God might not be a golden calf, but if you think about it, you know what it is. And God loves us still.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comments section below. I’d love to hear from you.