Sabbath Created for Humans

There is a television show that I really enjoyed. It is called "New Amsterdam." The first three seasons were great, and then it went off the rails bringing in a villain rather than changing the system. What I liked about the show was that it really did look at the problems of our health care system, and never lost sight of who they serve, the patients and people that were coming through their hospital. Some of it was pie in the sky, but other episodes, when they tried to solve the opioid crisis, racism, and abortion access, they came up short. The main character, the chief of staff, Dr. Max Goodwin, no matter if he was talking to the Board of Directors, the janitor, or a patient, his first question was almost always, "How can I help?"

Too often in our society and throughout history, human institutions, including religious ones, have focused on right and wrong, rather than life and death. Often the right and wrong become focused on what is right for us and everything not right for us is wrong. This is truly found in the Bible, for example when the stories in Joshua says it is right for Israel to take over the land promised to them no matter what. All lives don't matter, just those of God's chosen. This is carried into our political arena today where Christian nationalists believe the rules are there to give them their rights, their privileges, and their power. It maybe Biblical, but it sure isn't the way of Christ, God's Kindom.

Jesus is early in his ministry, just one chapter away from being baptized in the Gospel of Mark. There were lots of laws and rules and practices in Judaism. Whereas many Christians believe in orthodoxy as the foundation of their faith, Judaism has mainly has functioned as a orthopraxy religion, that it is the actions that matter most, observing the Sabbath, covenant, doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with your God. What actions to follow and which to reframe from have been the ongoing dynamic of Judaism. So when Jesus feeds the disciples by pulling grain off of heads in the field, there were those who thought this practice was against the covenant with God. Doesn't matter the need or the circumstances, this was forbidden in the eyes of the Pharisees. Doesn't matter that the Pharisees themselves didn't follow every command and kosher practice, Jesus was wrong because he wasn't following them. Again, Jesus entered a synagogue, and there was a man with a withered hand. They watched what he would do. Again, it was the action that they were concerned about. I do imagine that Jesus asked, "How can I help?" The man asked for healing and Jesus told him to stretch out his hand and it was restored.

"Is it better to save a life or to kill?" Jesus asks. Then the Gospel writer has Jesus saving a life, and the Pharisees and the Herodians plotting on how to kill Jesus. Very stark in the difference of their goals and their aspirations. We cannot lump all Jews together as being against Jesus in his time, just as we cannot blame all Jews if we disagree or vehemently oppose what is happening in Gaza right now. Moses tells the Israeli people that God has set before them the ways of life and death and tells them to choose life. I will interpret this to talk about not just life for myself and my own, but the life of all people and the life of the planet itself. We can choose to heal, to feed, and challenge the systems that get in the way of people being helped and living life.

Sabbath is created for humans not the other way around, Jesus tells us. Sabbath is for rest and restoration and health. If we need food, eat. If someone is hungry, feed them. If someone is injured, heal them. If the system denies someone food, challenge it. If the system denies someone health, fix it. If the system kills, change it. For God so loves the world, that Jesus came to give us abundant life, not of material wealth, but of love and wonder and community. Jesus, in his actions. brings people together, always opening the door, setting another place at the table. May we follow this way of life in our world today. Amen.

A Tale of Two Females

In a book called, "The Year of Living Biblically" by A.J. Jacobs, he tried to follow all 435 commands found in the Torah or Pentateuch. One of those commands was that you couldn't touch a woman while she was having her period so he wouldn't hug, kiss, or hold the hand of his wife during her cycle. She learned that he couldn't sit where she sat, so when she became frustrated with him she would sit on every piece of furniture in the house so he would have to stand or sit on the floor the whole day. We don't know what kind of hemorrhaging this woman in the crowd was suffering, but for her to be so afraid of Jesus and the crowd that she didn't ask for healing, but just touched his cloak and had faith that she would be made well, we have to assume that she has spent twelve long years not being able to hug, kiss, or hold hands with her family and friends. This physical and social isolation seems to be more damaging as she persisted with this illness for twelve

That you have turned their hearts back

I read Mahatma Gandhi's autobiography about 20 years ago. I talked to a pastor while we were going to a National Youth Event with youth and I told him I was trying to figure out how I could make my own clothing. He smiled and replied, "Most people come away with that urge after reading his book." Mahatma Gandhi read the Christian Testament and was very impressed with Jesus of Nazareth, especially the Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes. He also relied heavily on his cultural and Hindu roots as well. When he took on the British Empire, he employed "soul force" or satyagraha. Satyagraha is about non-cooperation, or what Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would call "non-violent resistance" and the basis of this was to ground themselves in love and disrupt the evil of oppression. It was through these acts of have Indians make their own salt, make their own clothes, and fasting to call attention to the unjust system that he was able to free India from th

Selling Out

Last Fall, I read a book called, "A History of Burning." It is a multi-generational story about a family that migrates from India to Uganda for hopes for a better future to help the British build a railroad, whose children through education secures a government job, but then Uganda throws off their colonial oppressors and gains independence and turns against the Indians who live there, and they have to migrate again and start all over in Toronto, Canada. It is a sad story of colonial power of the British Empire bringing in foreign cheap labor to build their infrastructure that leaves out the local population. And once Uganda gets independence, the corporations still control much of the economy and fosters division between the Ugandans and Indian to keep the country unstable. It is a triumphant story of human determination in the face of adversity, but only a few make it. One of the first paragraphs in a Wikipedia search about Africa told me that Africa is politically unstab

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