Like anyone in the midst of the powers of the world, Israel sees the world around it and - you might say - falls in love with it - from "Out of Babylon" by Walter Brueggemann.
Before long, of course, Israel reentered the world of the nations. Its mandate as a different people could not exist in a vacuum, but only inn the real world. But being different in the real world created new desire in Israel to forgo its distinctiveness: "Appoint for us, then, a king to govern us, like other nations....No! but we are determined to have a king over us, so that we also may be like other nations, and that our kind may govern us and go out before us and fight our battles" (1 Samuel 8:5, 19-20).
Wanting to be like the Jones is an old predicament. We want to be like them - we want to have what they have - we want to go around through life as they go around through life. Oh, by the way, that means we would rather have a king lead us and fight our battles. The God who liberates from the power of empire is ditched for the taste of empire. Soon after the arrival of the king in Israel, we have the rise of Solomon. In some storytelling he is the wise king. And yet, just beneath that famous story of the two mothers and the baby, Solomon's wisdom is that of empire and world and power. He is able to build the temple in Jerusalem - he is able to build fortresses throughout the land - he is able to shape relationships with neighboring powers. Solomon becomes the world - empire - brutal - enslaving. Therefore, the faithful storytelling will have to turn away empire building and begin to listen to the voices of the prophets who remember who the people are to be - following God alone.
Connection: We would be foolish to think we can point fingers at the empire building of Solomon. It is really a story about all of us. That pull is so great it enters into the very fiber of our lives. We can even look at Israel today. These chosen people have become - in many ways - the face of empire and yet they are able to maintain their use of language that portrays them as the chosen who are threatened and therefore must be like empire
O God, keep us honest with ourselves as we look at our place in the world as followers of Jesus. We need to be empowered to hold firm to our servant life and reject the temptation to rise to power in the world. Amen.
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