Category: Faith

The First Reading is Genesis 2:15-17, 3:1-7.

We don’t know why God plants trees in the Garden of Eden that Adam and Eve cannot eat. When I visualize the story in my head, I put these trees in the very center of Eden. No matter where they are, they know these trees are there. One of the trees is a tree of immortality. Whoever eats its fruits will become divine. The other tree is the tree we hear about today. It’s a tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

To me, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is a merism. A merism is a figure of speech where polar opposites are used to denote a totality (The Jewish Study Bible, Oxford 2004, page 16). Merisms show up many times in the bible. In the very first verse, God creates the heaven and the earth (i.e. everything). In the second creation story, the first human being is created and then split into male and female. The first human contained the totality of what’s possible in humankind. Merisms show up in other places too. When we find polar opposites in Scripture, we need to look for what’s totally represented. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil represents what everything that can be known. This knowledge contains what we usually call knowledge: science, math, poetry, and language. But knowledge also contains experiences. To be knowledgeable, we need experiences. We need to know how to survive through a broken heat. We need to know what happens when we break someone else’s. We will struggle, feel joy, and sometimes need to take each day just one-at-a-time to survive. Knowledge is more than just learning; knowledge is living.

The totality of knowledge is what God has. And this is what Adam and Eve desire. They see the tree and the possibility for joys. They see the tree and the possibility to be like God. As Lutheran Christians, when we talk about Sin, we mean more than just immoral acts. For us, Sin is our desire to be like God. We want knowledge; we want power; we want control. We want to be God. And this is why Adam and Eve are exiled from the garden. But they aren’t sent out alone. God will replace the loincloths they made for themselves with something better. Even when we try to take God’s place, God never stops being generous to us.

Each week, I write a reflection on one of our scripture readings for the week. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship Bulletin for 1st Sunday in Lent, 3/5/2017.

As I write this reflection, my two kittens are busy playing on the drying rack for my clothes. They are two little balls of fur; spinning, clawing, and jumping on my drying rack like its their personal jungle gym. My shirts, jeans, and other pieces of clothing are no longer clothes; they are cat toys. Every few minutes, I pick each one off the rack only to watch as they jump back on. This cycle is part of the game and it’s a game my kittens will do nothing to break.

The ashes we’re using tonight are not brand new. They are part of their own cycle. Last March, on Palm Sunday, we marked the beginning of Holy Week by celebrating Jesus’ final journey into Jerusalem. We welcome him into the city by waving palm branches in the sky. After the service, we saved the palms, tied them in a bundle, and hid them in a storage room. For the last year, they’ve sat undisturbed, slowly drying out. Yesterday, I took the bundle to our outdoor barbecue. I shared a prayer and burned those palms to ash.

The ashes used tonight show us how our worship is connected to a wider story. When we gather together to share Jesus’ story and live in God’s promises, we are participating in something that is more than one time event. We are connected to God’s story. And God’s story covers the past and the future. By being part of God’s creation, we are included in God’s story cycle. Tonight, when the ashes are placed on our forehead, we will hear words reminding us of that story. We’ll hear words of promise, connecting God’s spirit of creation to the reality of our mortality. And we’ll remember that, through Jesus, we’re always with God, no matter where our life cycle takes us.

Each week, I write a reflection on one of our scripture readings for the week. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship Bulletin for Ash Wednesday, 3/1/2017.

Our First Reading was Exodus 24:12-18.

What did Moses do during his first six days on the mountain? Before my bible study this week with other local Lutheran pastors, I never noticed this detail before. In our text from Exodus today, the Israelites are camped at the foot of Mt. Sinai. After escaping slavery in Egypt, they are learning how to live together. God is in the center of the community, covering Mt. Sinai in a cloud. God summoned Moses so Moses heads up the mountain. For six days, Moses is up there before God calls for him. So what does a person do when they’re waiting for God?

This text is full of allusions to other stories from scripture. In the story of Genesis, God worked for six days before resting on the seventh. During Noah’s great flood, the ark finally lands on a mountaintop as the water recedes from a rainstorm that lasted 40 days and 40 nights. People of the faith like Abraham, Sarah, and Jacob met God on various mountaintops and usually built on the spot where they saw God. And in earlier parts of the Exodus story, God is a cloud providing shade from the sun during the day and God is a cloud of fire providing light at night. In one short text, we see God as a creator, protector, savior, judge, and all-powerful presence. But we also meet a God who sometimes makes us wait.

The text doesn’t tell us what Moses was doing while he was waiting for God. He knew he was in God’s presence. The cloud gave that away. Yet, even Moses had to deal with God being silent. I imagine Moses took care of himself during those six days. He cooked his meals, slept outdoors, and kept himself busy. Moses kept living his life while waiting for God to finally speak. And I imagine we know what Moses waiting game feels like. We will hear in church today words of hope, promise, and hear how Jesus is here, right now, for us to eat and drink. Yet we might wonder why we can’t hear God speaking. I wish I had an answer for your why. But I don’t. Instead, we all have a story where even Moses had to wait. He had to keep living while he waiting for God to speak. But God’s silence does not mean God isn’t present. When we can’t hear God, God is still there. And God’s presence means God will speak and that, someday, we will finally hear. 

Each week, I write a reflection on one of our scripture readings for the week. This is from Christ Lutheran Church’s Worship Bulletin for 2/26/2017.