Tuesday, February 16, 2021
Some Days Are Deceptive
We Think Troubled Waters are Elsewhere,
But the Heavens Tell Us Otherwise!
1 Kings 8:59-60
Let these words of mine, with which I pleaded before the Lord, be near to the Lord our God day and night, and may he maintain the cause of his servant and the cause of his people Israel, as each day requires; so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the Lord is God; there is no other.
Revelation 15:4
Lord, who will not fear and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your judgments have been revealed.
Words of Grace For Today
We bring our petitions to God each day, praying for justice. Many people think of countries far away, where we hear reports, believable reports of war and genocide, of intentional starvation and deprivation of populations in opposition to or of different ethnicity than those in power, gender and sexual orientation based violence and murder. We pray indeed that God will bring justice to these places around the globe, for we know that we are all in this together.
Covid 19 has taught us that there is no population anywhere on earth that can be separated from the rest of us, denied safety measures and care, without that allowing Covid 19 to multiply, mutated and spread faster, deadlier to all of us on this planet. The effects from infection are deadly to the elderly, at first. Now we learn that for all others, even those with minor symptoms the ravages of this virus can be chronic and debilitating, or give rise to sudden deadly mis-health events like stroke, heart attack, and sudden death. No age, no degree of health before the infection seems to be ‘safe’. We are all in this together, whether we like it or not, whether we admit it or not.
It is good that we pray for many peoples far and wide. Our petitions for justice closer to home are harder to pray. We are right in the middle of horrendous injustices. We call for awareness of women killed by violent men; and we ignore that ten times more men are killed by violence than women. Why?
It is good that we pray for the vulnerable, for women, for children, for elderly, for the poor, for those caught in systemic prejudice, for the homeless, for those now caught by Covid 19 restrictions and tossed into poverty, for the disabled, and for those of different faiths, customs, genders, sexual orientation, colour, nationalities, and abilities. It is not nearly enough for we ignore so much reality when we pray only these prayers, when we work to bring God’s justice only to these people.
We need to pray for those with privilege, power, influence, and wealth. They perpetrate injustices while hiding from themselves perhaps and definitely from others their complicity in and complacence to injustice which helps guarantee their continued privilege, power, influence, and wealth. We need to pray not just for our government leaders, and all in government, elected and hired. We need to pray not just for those in business, large and small, who benefit greatly from the greed based economy of the world. We need to pray not just for those who serve as police, enforcing injustice as much as they enforce law and order. We need to pray for judges and justices who determine how laws are applied, or as it is in Alberta, how laws are ignored along with truth, as they knowingly, gleefully, and even cruelly hand down decisions that are irrational, unjust, and favour those with connections, influence, and wealth.
Bill Hordern wrote:
Therefore, as Reinhold Niebuhr saw so clearly, governments are never simply a protection against injustice, they are also strongholds of injustice. Although the Christians ought to seek to have the government protect the weak from the strong, in fact most governments tend to protect the strong from the weak. The sword is wielded to maintain the status quo and all its inequities. Therefore, we should be prepared to see that service to God rather than to man may sometimes bring us into conflict with the rulers over many more matters than just the niceties of theological doctrine or ecclesiastical practice. (Living by Grace p.195)
These words were quoted by a now bishop in a text study decades ago. This year a good pastor added: Hence the wisdom from the theology of the survivors of WW2, and the wisdom of the Civil rights warriors like John Lewis who said: ‘Get into good trouble!’
We need to pray everyday that God’s day of judgment will come soon, and save us all. So we plead with our ancestors:
Let these words of mine, with which I pleaded before the Lord, be near to the Lord our God day and night, and may he maintain the cause of his servant and the cause of his people Israel, as each day requires; so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the Lord is God; there is no other.
and
Lord, who will not fear and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your judgments have been revealed.