Judges 17:1-13
The Oxford Annotated Study Bible is helpful in getting a little insight into this interesting passage. It tells us that while the name Micah is short for “who is like the Lord,” this very man (not to be confused with the prophet Micah who will arrive many years later) builds a shrine with an image cast from 200 pieces of silver. The main point of the story seems to come in verse 6 where we are told that “In those days there was no king in Israel; all the people did what was right in their own eyes.” These very words will conclude the book of Judges (25:21) and here indicate the sense of disorder and religious chaos that prevailed. We might be tempted to lay this passage beside any of a dozen stories in today’s newspaper and say to ourselves, “See? It’s just the same. Nothing has changed.” But of course, while the world remains wrapped in chaos as a result of sinfulness, we have a King, or rather a King of kings in Jesus Christ. We have a focal point which replaces all the images and idols of our lives and around whom we may build our lives. And while the sinfulness remains in our daily living, God is at work in Jesus Christ drawing the world to God’s self, and reconciling us to God’s will.
Acts 7:44-8:1a
What a dramatic way for the apostle Paul—still called Saul in this passage—to enter the story! As Stephen is stoned to death a young Saul stands nearby, guarding the coats of the participants and approving of the action. How stark the contrast is between Stephen and Saul at this point! In modern terms I’m reminded of the entry of Darth Vader into the Star Wars series of movies. I can still remember black-clad figure stepping on board a captured vessel. “Leave her to me,” he hisses, and you know there could be nothing good in him. Who would ever expect that Vader would later be reconciled to his son and repent of his evil? Indeed, there is not even a touch of foreshadowing here to indicate what will eventually happen. Nor is there any indication of where Saul is headed in his life. In each case we might be reminded of the words of Judges 17:6: “All the people did what was right in their own eyes.” And yet, as we know, God has other plans for Saul that will unfold in equally dramatic ways. The story always belongs to God.
Monday, August 16, 2010
Friday, August 13, 2010
“We Know, We Know!”
Acts 7:17-29
I can sympathize with Stephen in this reading. Week after week preachers like me enter pulpits all over the world to offer sermons based on material that the majority of our congregations will have heard before. This is why sermons can be, according to Fred Craddock, “twice-told tales.” But preaching offers opportunities as well as pitfalls to the preacher. Stephen, a Hellenist or Greek-influenced Jew who has now converted to Christianity, is telling the most Jewish of audiences the story of their faith. You can imagine the council’s impatience. “We know, we know!” they might be saying. “What right have you to tell us our story?” Yet Stephen, led by the Holy Spirit, was placing that story into a new context and challenging all who heard him to listen with renewed attention. Something different was going on. God was at work in a new way that was offering a new interpretation to past events.
Our lives are always changing, sometimes in major ways and sometimes in minor ones. But God’s word, animated by the Holy Spirit, remains current. There is relevance to be found if we will listen with open hearts and minds. There is assurance to be gained, judgment to be acknowledged, forgiveness to be received, and good news to be shared. As Sunday approaches this week maybe it is time we begin preparing for an encounter with God’s word. Maybe it is time for prayer and reflection so that when we do enter into the worship life of the church and are confronted with God’s word for our lives we will be attuned to the new things that God is doing. This Sunday instead of nodding to ourselves and muttering, “I know, I know,” we should say, “speak Lord, for your servant is listening.”
Prayer: Lord, open our hearts and minds to your word so that we may be filled with its newness for our lives and led to serve you in faithfulness. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
I can sympathize with Stephen in this reading. Week after week preachers like me enter pulpits all over the world to offer sermons based on material that the majority of our congregations will have heard before. This is why sermons can be, according to Fred Craddock, “twice-told tales.” But preaching offers opportunities as well as pitfalls to the preacher. Stephen, a Hellenist or Greek-influenced Jew who has now converted to Christianity, is telling the most Jewish of audiences the story of their faith. You can imagine the council’s impatience. “We know, we know!” they might be saying. “What right have you to tell us our story?” Yet Stephen, led by the Holy Spirit, was placing that story into a new context and challenging all who heard him to listen with renewed attention. Something different was going on. God was at work in a new way that was offering a new interpretation to past events.
Our lives are always changing, sometimes in major ways and sometimes in minor ones. But God’s word, animated by the Holy Spirit, remains current. There is relevance to be found if we will listen with open hearts and minds. There is assurance to be gained, judgment to be acknowledged, forgiveness to be received, and good news to be shared. As Sunday approaches this week maybe it is time we begin preparing for an encounter with God’s word. Maybe it is time for prayer and reflection so that when we do enter into the worship life of the church and are confronted with God’s word for our lives we will be attuned to the new things that God is doing. This Sunday instead of nodding to ourselves and muttering, “I know, I know,” we should say, “speak Lord, for your servant is listening.”
Prayer: Lord, open our hearts and minds to your word so that we may be filled with its newness for our lives and led to serve you in faithfulness. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
I'm My Own Grandpaw
Judges 4:1-19
Acts 6:15-7:16
John 4:27-42
Years ago Dwight Latham and Moe Jaffe composed a song entitled “I’m My Own Grandpaw.” In it the singer recounts how, by birth and by marriage, the relationships in his life have become so complex that he is now his own grandfather.
Oh, many, many years ago
When I was twenty-three
I was married to a widow
Who was pretty as can be
This widow had a grown-up daughter
Who had hair of red
My father fell in love with her
And soon the two were wed
This made my dad my son-in-law
And changed my very life
For my daughter was my mother
'Cause she was my father's wife
To complicate the matter
Though it really brought me joy
I soon became the father
Of a bouncing baby boy
This little baby then became
A brother-in-law to Dad
And so became my uncle
Though it made me very sad
For if he was my uncle
Then that also made him brother
Of the widow's grown-up daughter
Who of course is my step-mother
The song goes on from there, but you get the drift. Our readings for today are not intended to be humorous, but frankly they get close. The Judges account displays a complexity of human relationships. Samson wishes to marry a Philistine woman (against his parents’ advice). But during the wedding feast she betrays him to her kinfolk. This leads Samson to an act of violence and ends the marriage. In the Acts passage Stephen recounts for the council the history of the Jewish people from Abraham to the time of bondage in Egypt. This, of course, is a tale full of twists and turns, of betrayal and reconciliation, of…well, the complexities of human relationships strung out over generations. The gospel reading from John concludes the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well. Here, too, there are riddles to be solved, questions to be answered, and social customs to be navigated. Ultimately Jesus is able to bridge the gap between him and the Samaritans by sharing his message with them.
It is common for people in our own day to despair in the breakdown of human society. Divorce, childbirth outside of marriage, economic hardships, the decline of religious affiliations: all of these and many other factors seem to cascade against the family and any sense of a well-ordered community. No wonder we have so many problems in our world. But if nothing else, our three readings should demonstrate that there has never been a time—even within the community of faith—when relationships or community and family life have ever been “easy.” Human connectedness is always complex. But throughout our readings God remains an active participant with God’s people as well. Things can never get too complex for God’s care and concern. And that is really good news because life doesn’t show any sign of becoming less complex any time soon.
Prayer: Lord, things are often a mess in our lives. We find ourselves being pushed and pulled in so many directions and dealing with so many distractions. As Jesus did in Samaria, build a bridge for us today above and beyond the complexities, that we may focus on you and thus be led to live in peace with one another. Amen.
Acts 6:15-7:16
John 4:27-42
Years ago Dwight Latham and Moe Jaffe composed a song entitled “I’m My Own Grandpaw.” In it the singer recounts how, by birth and by marriage, the relationships in his life have become so complex that he is now his own grandfather.
Oh, many, many years ago
When I was twenty-three
I was married to a widow
Who was pretty as can be
This widow had a grown-up daughter
Who had hair of red
My father fell in love with her
And soon the two were wed
This made my dad my son-in-law
And changed my very life
For my daughter was my mother
'Cause she was my father's wife
To complicate the matter
Though it really brought me joy
I soon became the father
Of a bouncing baby boy
This little baby then became
A brother-in-law to Dad
And so became my uncle
Though it made me very sad
For if he was my uncle
Then that also made him brother
Of the widow's grown-up daughter
Who of course is my step-mother
The song goes on from there, but you get the drift. Our readings for today are not intended to be humorous, but frankly they get close. The Judges account displays a complexity of human relationships. Samson wishes to marry a Philistine woman (against his parents’ advice). But during the wedding feast she betrays him to her kinfolk. This leads Samson to an act of violence and ends the marriage. In the Acts passage Stephen recounts for the council the history of the Jewish people from Abraham to the time of bondage in Egypt. This, of course, is a tale full of twists and turns, of betrayal and reconciliation, of…well, the complexities of human relationships strung out over generations. The gospel reading from John concludes the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well. Here, too, there are riddles to be solved, questions to be answered, and social customs to be navigated. Ultimately Jesus is able to bridge the gap between him and the Samaritans by sharing his message with them.
It is common for people in our own day to despair in the breakdown of human society. Divorce, childbirth outside of marriage, economic hardships, the decline of religious affiliations: all of these and many other factors seem to cascade against the family and any sense of a well-ordered community. No wonder we have so many problems in our world. But if nothing else, our three readings should demonstrate that there has never been a time—even within the community of faith—when relationships or community and family life have ever been “easy.” Human connectedness is always complex. But throughout our readings God remains an active participant with God’s people as well. Things can never get too complex for God’s care and concern. And that is really good news because life doesn’t show any sign of becoming less complex any time soon.
Prayer: Lord, things are often a mess in our lives. We find ourselves being pushed and pulled in so many directions and dealing with so many distractions. As Jesus did in Samaria, build a bridge for us today above and beyond the complexities, that we may focus on you and thus be led to live in peace with one another. Amen.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
A Question of Identity
Judges 13:15-24
Acts 6:1-15
John 4:1-26
Each of our passages today raise issues of identity. In the Judges passage Manoah, soon to be Samson’s father, converses with an angel of the Lord, but does not recognize him as such (Judges 13:16). By contrast the Acts passage tells us that when the members of the council “looked intently at (Stephen)…they saw his face was like the face of an angel” (Acts 6:15). So Manoah sees an angel and thinks he’s a man, and the council sees a man who appears to them to be angelic. But even more significant questions of identity come in John’s account of Jesus with the Samaritan woman at the well. In the course of their conversation Jesus tells the woman, “If you knew who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him and he would have given you living water” (John 4:10). Even this is not enough of a clue, though, for moments later the woman asks Jesus, “Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob…?” (v. 12)
Most of us have a number of identities based on the number of roles we play in our lives. I’m a husband, a father, a son, an uncle, and a cousin. I’m also a minister and a writer. I am a sports fan and a Facebook user. I’m American, southern, white, Presbyterian, right-handed, an Arkansan who enjoys Cool Whip on pumpkin pie. But at the very heart of my being, right down at my core, who am I really? Once I take off all the masks and identities and characteristics, what do I have left? One contemporary Children’s Catechism begins with the question, “Who are you?” to which the answer is, “I am a child of God.” This is a really good place to begin understanding who we are in our very essence. We are children of God and we bear on us the marks of God’s creative activity, God’s fingerprints as it were. Once we recognize that we are children of God, then the rest of “who we are” can be shaped and ordered accordingly. But if we forget that at heart we are God’s people, products of God’s creation, then we will forever struggle to answer the most basic questions of identity and meaning.
Prayer: God of creation, by whose hands we were pressed into being, help us to recognize our dependence on you and to live as your people. May we also see your love in those whom we encounter, allowing ourselves to be built into a community of faith and light. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Acts 6:1-15
John 4:1-26
Each of our passages today raise issues of identity. In the Judges passage Manoah, soon to be Samson’s father, converses with an angel of the Lord, but does not recognize him as such (Judges 13:16). By contrast the Acts passage tells us that when the members of the council “looked intently at (Stephen)…they saw his face was like the face of an angel” (Acts 6:15). So Manoah sees an angel and thinks he’s a man, and the council sees a man who appears to them to be angelic. But even more significant questions of identity come in John’s account of Jesus with the Samaritan woman at the well. In the course of their conversation Jesus tells the woman, “If you knew who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him and he would have given you living water” (John 4:10). Even this is not enough of a clue, though, for moments later the woman asks Jesus, “Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob…?” (v. 12)
Most of us have a number of identities based on the number of roles we play in our lives. I’m a husband, a father, a son, an uncle, and a cousin. I’m also a minister and a writer. I am a sports fan and a Facebook user. I’m American, southern, white, Presbyterian, right-handed, an Arkansan who enjoys Cool Whip on pumpkin pie. But at the very heart of my being, right down at my core, who am I really? Once I take off all the masks and identities and characteristics, what do I have left? One contemporary Children’s Catechism begins with the question, “Who are you?” to which the answer is, “I am a child of God.” This is a really good place to begin understanding who we are in our very essence. We are children of God and we bear on us the marks of God’s creative activity, God’s fingerprints as it were. Once we recognize that we are children of God, then the rest of “who we are” can be shaped and ordered accordingly. But if we forget that at heart we are God’s people, products of God’s creation, then we will forever struggle to answer the most basic questions of identity and meaning.
Prayer: God of creation, by whose hands we were pressed into being, help us to recognize our dependence on you and to live as your people. May we also see your love in those whom we encounter, allowing ourselves to be built into a community of faith and light. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Time to Pay Attention
Judges 13:1-15
Wouldn’t life be so much easier if we had detailed instructions about how to act and what to do? Certainly we have scripture, the word of God, and it is central to what God’s people are to be about. But honestly, sometimes we can get tied up in knots trying to figure out what exactly it is that the Bible is telling us. (One easy example is the debate about exactly how to baptize believers.) Why can’t we have a handy, pocket-sized flow chart to carry with us and use to answer any questions that come up? That’s what Manoah, the future father of Samson, seems to want. When his wife tells him that they will have a son he spends the rest of the passage worrying about what exactly they wife are supposed to do with the child. We can almost sense his panic in verse 8 where we read how he “entreated the Lord, and said, ‘O Lord, I pray, let the man of God whom you sent come to us again and teach us what we are to do concerning the boy who will be born.’” When the messenger does return he says, in short, “relax Dude. Your wife knows what to do.” No instruction book, just a surprising promise from God that events will unfold and that things are going to change. Manoah might fret and worry, but God was going to act anyway.
Acts 5:27-42
Talk about your surprises. According to our reading from Acts the high priest had the apostles arrested for teaching in the temple. But it wasn’t long before they were able to walk right out of jail and go back to sharing the good news. A funny scene follows the next morning when the apostles are discovered to be in the temple instead of under lock and key. What should the religious leaders do with these people? Should they be tolerated? Are they telling the truth? Or are they to be silenced for spreading blasphemy? I’m sure the high priest and his supporters would have appreciated a memo from God telling them exactly what was going on. Instead Gamaliel, “a teacher of the law, respected by all the people” (v. 34) addresses the council with the advice to let the apostles alone. If what they are saying is false then in time they will disappear. But if what they are saying is true, then the council might find itself in the embarrassing position of opposing God (vv. 38-39). Again, no instruction book, just a surprising promise from God that events have unfolded and will continue to do so, events that are going to change everything. Like Manoah before them, the Saducees, the high priest, and the council might fret and worry, but God was acting and it was time to pay attention. We, too, may fret and worry and wish for detailed instructions, but God is at work in our world today and one of our important tasks is to live in faithful obedience and to let God be God.
Several years ago I wrote a hymn text based on the Magnifecat in Luke 1:46-55. One of the verses, intended to place Mary’s Song into our own time, reads:
God is at work in our lives even now,
Called by Christ Jesus we take up the trowel,
Weapons of war we will beat into plows.
God is at work in our lives even now.
Prayer: God of surprises, we sometimes get wrapped up in our desire to know what is going on. We worry and fret about what it means to be your people. And when we do we can miss the opportunity to share in the work of your coming reign. Help us to trust you and to go where you lead us instead of stewing over the details. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Wouldn’t life be so much easier if we had detailed instructions about how to act and what to do? Certainly we have scripture, the word of God, and it is central to what God’s people are to be about. But honestly, sometimes we can get tied up in knots trying to figure out what exactly it is that the Bible is telling us. (One easy example is the debate about exactly how to baptize believers.) Why can’t we have a handy, pocket-sized flow chart to carry with us and use to answer any questions that come up? That’s what Manoah, the future father of Samson, seems to want. When his wife tells him that they will have a son he spends the rest of the passage worrying about what exactly they wife are supposed to do with the child. We can almost sense his panic in verse 8 where we read how he “entreated the Lord, and said, ‘O Lord, I pray, let the man of God whom you sent come to us again and teach us what we are to do concerning the boy who will be born.’” When the messenger does return he says, in short, “relax Dude. Your wife knows what to do.” No instruction book, just a surprising promise from God that events will unfold and that things are going to change. Manoah might fret and worry, but God was going to act anyway.
Acts 5:27-42
Talk about your surprises. According to our reading from Acts the high priest had the apostles arrested for teaching in the temple. But it wasn’t long before they were able to walk right out of jail and go back to sharing the good news. A funny scene follows the next morning when the apostles are discovered to be in the temple instead of under lock and key. What should the religious leaders do with these people? Should they be tolerated? Are they telling the truth? Or are they to be silenced for spreading blasphemy? I’m sure the high priest and his supporters would have appreciated a memo from God telling them exactly what was going on. Instead Gamaliel, “a teacher of the law, respected by all the people” (v. 34) addresses the council with the advice to let the apostles alone. If what they are saying is false then in time they will disappear. But if what they are saying is true, then the council might find itself in the embarrassing position of opposing God (vv. 38-39). Again, no instruction book, just a surprising promise from God that events have unfolded and will continue to do so, events that are going to change everything. Like Manoah before them, the Saducees, the high priest, and the council might fret and worry, but God was acting and it was time to pay attention. We, too, may fret and worry and wish for detailed instructions, but God is at work in our world today and one of our important tasks is to live in faithful obedience and to let God be God.
Several years ago I wrote a hymn text based on the Magnifecat in Luke 1:46-55. One of the verses, intended to place Mary’s Song into our own time, reads:
God is at work in our lives even now,
Called by Christ Jesus we take up the trowel,
Weapons of war we will beat into plows.
God is at work in our lives even now.
Prayer: God of surprises, we sometimes get wrapped up in our desire to know what is going on. We worry and fret about what it means to be your people. And when we do we can miss the opportunity to share in the work of your coming reign. Help us to trust you and to go where you lead us instead of stewing over the details. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Monday, August 9, 2010
The Light That Has Lighted the World
Judges 12:1-7
Acts 5:1-12
John 3:1-21
In his conversation with Nicodemus Jesus says that despite the presence of God’s light people have chosen to dwell in the darkness. This is because their deeds were evil (John 3:19), a fact which the light would make visible. Human “evil,” that which makes all of us crave the darkness and not the light, puts us into conflict, not only with God, but also with one another. And even when we think we know the truth, or how to pronounce “the secret word” (Judges 12:6), we are apt to discover that we are clueless. Nicodemus, “a teacher of the people,” didn’t understand what Jesus was talking about, and the high priest and the Saducees were equally “in the dark” as to the message of the gospel (Acts 5:1f). Too often we would rather assail those who don’t know how to “speak the way we do,” than to lay down our weapons and together share the light that has come, not to condemn the world, but that the world may have salvation through it.
The late George Harrison, a former Beatle, was well-known for his adherence to eastern religion. On occasion his spiritual musings sound an awful lot like Christian teachings. In his song “The Light That Has Lighted the World” Harrison speaks of the human tendency toward darkness:
The thoughts in their heads manifest on their brow
Like bad scars from ill feelings they themselves arouse
So hateful of anyone that is happy or “free”
They live all their lives without looking to see
The light that has lighted the world.
The Son came not to condemn the world but to save it. Would we rather live in the light of truth or cower in the darkness that hides our ill will?
Prayer:
Lord, forgive our tendency to divide, to insist that ours is the proper way of speaking or seeing, especially when it sets us at odds with each other and with you. “Heal our warring madness” and “bend our will to your control” that we may live whole lives, as individuals and as communities. Amen.
Acts 5:1-12
John 3:1-21
In his conversation with Nicodemus Jesus says that despite the presence of God’s light people have chosen to dwell in the darkness. This is because their deeds were evil (John 3:19), a fact which the light would make visible. Human “evil,” that which makes all of us crave the darkness and not the light, puts us into conflict, not only with God, but also with one another. And even when we think we know the truth, or how to pronounce “the secret word” (Judges 12:6), we are apt to discover that we are clueless. Nicodemus, “a teacher of the people,” didn’t understand what Jesus was talking about, and the high priest and the Saducees were equally “in the dark” as to the message of the gospel (Acts 5:1f). Too often we would rather assail those who don’t know how to “speak the way we do,” than to lay down our weapons and together share the light that has come, not to condemn the world, but that the world may have salvation through it.
The late George Harrison, a former Beatle, was well-known for his adherence to eastern religion. On occasion his spiritual musings sound an awful lot like Christian teachings. In his song “The Light That Has Lighted the World” Harrison speaks of the human tendency toward darkness:
The thoughts in their heads manifest on their brow
Like bad scars from ill feelings they themselves arouse
So hateful of anyone that is happy or “free”
They live all their lives without looking to see
The light that has lighted the world.
The Son came not to condemn the world but to save it. Would we rather live in the light of truth or cower in the darkness that hides our ill will?
Prayer:
Lord, forgive our tendency to divide, to insist that ours is the proper way of speaking or seeing, especially when it sets us at odds with each other and with you. “Heal our warring madness” and “bend our will to your control” that we may live whole lives, as individuals and as communities. Amen.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Finding Hope In the Potter
Jeremiah 18:1-11
Jim:
There is something very comforting in this passage from Jeremiah, and I’ll get to that in a second, but first a word of comparison. The promise that God makes through Jeremiah in verses 7 and 8 could easily be placed in the book of Jonah. “At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it.” You can almost see Jonah sitting under his little bush, waiting for the destruction of Nineveh to begin, only to be disappointed by God’s mercy. Of course God is not beholden to you or me, and owes no one an explanation or excuse when God relents from a word of judgment. That, in and of itself, should be good news enough. God allows for repentance, for turning around, for getting back on one’s feet and doing it God’s way this time. God allows for us to give it another shot.
But let’s go back to the potter, because for me and for today, at least, that’s where I’m finding the greatest comfort of all. No matter how badly flawed I may feel myself to be, no matter how awful I think I turned out, or how difficult it is being me, or how cracked or imperfect my life may feel, God can always mold me into a useful person, a life with value. I may think things are a mess, but God still has the ability to use me. I am as clay in God’s hands and as such I have the divine fingerprints all over me. And so do you. And so does the noisy neighbor, or the obnoxious driver one car ahead during rush hour, or the candidate from the other party, or anybody else you can think of. We all are clay in God’s hands and we all bear the mark of God’s fingers. That means, first of all, that we each have value and purpose and that no one can take that away from us. Our lives are important to God. But it also means that God has work for us to do, because God is not molding us into a life just to cast us aside. God is making us into God’s people, and as God’s people we have a responsibility to share God’s blessings with the world, with all the others who have been shaped by God and who need to hear the good news.
Jim:
There is something very comforting in this passage from Jeremiah, and I’ll get to that in a second, but first a word of comparison. The promise that God makes through Jeremiah in verses 7 and 8 could easily be placed in the book of Jonah. “At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it.” You can almost see Jonah sitting under his little bush, waiting for the destruction of Nineveh to begin, only to be disappointed by God’s mercy. Of course God is not beholden to you or me, and owes no one an explanation or excuse when God relents from a word of judgment. That, in and of itself, should be good news enough. God allows for repentance, for turning around, for getting back on one’s feet and doing it God’s way this time. God allows for us to give it another shot.
But let’s go back to the potter, because for me and for today, at least, that’s where I’m finding the greatest comfort of all. No matter how badly flawed I may feel myself to be, no matter how awful I think I turned out, or how difficult it is being me, or how cracked or imperfect my life may feel, God can always mold me into a useful person, a life with value. I may think things are a mess, but God still has the ability to use me. I am as clay in God’s hands and as such I have the divine fingerprints all over me. And so do you. And so does the noisy neighbor, or the obnoxious driver one car ahead during rush hour, or the candidate from the other party, or anybody else you can think of. We all are clay in God’s hands and we all bear the mark of God’s fingers. That means, first of all, that we each have value and purpose and that no one can take that away from us. Our lives are important to God. But it also means that God has work for us to do, because God is not molding us into a life just to cast us aside. God is making us into God’s people, and as God’s people we have a responsibility to share God’s blessings with the world, with all the others who have been shaped by God and who need to hear the good news.
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