14 July 2005

Skipping over a chapter of Paul dealing with his role as Apostle, we turn to 1 Corinthians 10.

I don't not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, and they were struck down in the wilderness. (1 Cor. 10:1-5)

Promise was with them. The Gracious Liberator was with them. The one who saves us and delivers us from the brutality of the life of this world was with them. Those ancestors could have stayed put in Egypt and let Moses go off by himself, but they were drawn into the promise that was handed to Moses. It became their food and their drink. It was everything that sustained them whenever they needed to be uplifted, healed, fed, or refreshed. No other power could or would do that for them - God alone. That...is good news. That is gospel happening right in the middle of one of the most dramatic stories of the Hebrew scriptures. God acts for us - without hesitation. Today within the Church, we call that the love of God in Christ, Jesus. Ah...the rock...Christ - Messiah - Savior - Liberator. As we would then expect to happen in stories about all of us, there is that inevitable "nevertheless." In the middle of all that promise...people are unsatisfied with what is given to them and they...begin to rumble about in what they would have for themselves. Tomorrow we will see a bit more about what it is we do even when we are given life in its fullest. It is most often tragic...and idolatrous.

Connection: The promise is still for us and with us. It doesn't fade away...although we may find that we drift away from the embrace of that promise. There are so many other ways to live and see the life around us that we are a people who seem to gladly turn our back on how God is and will be for us and with us because we have things we must grab for ourselves. Old stories really never stay old - do they?!?

How great it is that you, Liberator of Life, take us by the hand and lead us beyond our imaginations into the reality of your loving and caring embrace. It is beyond our comprehension that you then - never let go even as we pull away from you as we long for other ways to rescue and preserve ourselves. Praise to you, O God Most High. Amen.