Epiphany 9 / Ordinary Time 9 / Proper 4
Devotional
Water From the Rock
Lectionary Devotional for Cycle C
Object:
Likewise when a foreigner, who is not of your people Israel, comes from a distant land because of your name....
-- 1 Kings 8:41
There is a constant theme of universalism throughout scripture. It begins with the assertion at the beginning of the Bible that all humanity is of one stock and was created by the same God. Adam was a Hebrew word that could best be translated as earthling, and Eve was the mother of all the living. When a particular people was selected by God in the call of Abram, the purpose of the call continued to benefit the rest of humanity: "And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed" (Genesis 12:3b). Here in this triumphal moment of Israel's history, in Solomon's prayer dedicating the temple that he has built for Yahweh, the prayer included the stranger. The purpose of Israel's special relationship with God was never for Israel alone but for the sake of the whole world. "When a foreigner comes and prays toward this house, then hear in heaven your dwelling place, and do according to all that the foreigner calls to you ..." God's desire is that all the world might be reconciled to God's purpose (2 Corinthians 5:19).
This prayer is enacted in Acts 8:26-40 when Philip encountered the Ethiopian eunuch who had come to Jerusalem to worship God. While Solomon in his prayer recognized that no building could contain the universal God (1 Kings 8:27), he acknowledged the importance of a physical place toward which people could look when they wanted to direct their thoughts toward God. While we recognize that God is not in our churches, we also recognize that the very symbol of a church can evoke the sense of awe that prepares a person to turn and seek a relationship with the divine. At the same time, it is a critical part of our faith to remember that the God whose name is evoked by the physical symbol of a church is the God who calls us to be aware of and sensitive to the needs of the stranger that comes to us. It is, after all, in welcoming the stranger that we encounter God in our midst (Genesis 18:1-15; Luke 24:13-35).
-- 1 Kings 8:41
There is a constant theme of universalism throughout scripture. It begins with the assertion at the beginning of the Bible that all humanity is of one stock and was created by the same God. Adam was a Hebrew word that could best be translated as earthling, and Eve was the mother of all the living. When a particular people was selected by God in the call of Abram, the purpose of the call continued to benefit the rest of humanity: "And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed" (Genesis 12:3b). Here in this triumphal moment of Israel's history, in Solomon's prayer dedicating the temple that he has built for Yahweh, the prayer included the stranger. The purpose of Israel's special relationship with God was never for Israel alone but for the sake of the whole world. "When a foreigner comes and prays toward this house, then hear in heaven your dwelling place, and do according to all that the foreigner calls to you ..." God's desire is that all the world might be reconciled to God's purpose (2 Corinthians 5:19).
This prayer is enacted in Acts 8:26-40 when Philip encountered the Ethiopian eunuch who had come to Jerusalem to worship God. While Solomon in his prayer recognized that no building could contain the universal God (1 Kings 8:27), he acknowledged the importance of a physical place toward which people could look when they wanted to direct their thoughts toward God. While we recognize that God is not in our churches, we also recognize that the very symbol of a church can evoke the sense of awe that prepares a person to turn and seek a relationship with the divine. At the same time, it is a critical part of our faith to remember that the God whose name is evoked by the physical symbol of a church is the God who calls us to be aware of and sensitive to the needs of the stranger that comes to us. It is, after all, in welcoming the stranger that we encounter God in our midst (Genesis 18:1-15; Luke 24:13-35).
