"My heart is changed within me"
Hosea 11:1-11
There is something so beautiful about the reading from Hosea that I can't figure out a way to paraphrase it. I need to put it down here, or most of it, at least:
"When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. But the more I called Israel, the further they went from me..."
"It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the arms, but they did not realize it was I who healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love; I lifted the yoke from their neck and bent down to feed them...My people are determined to turn from me..."
"How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel?...My heart is changed within me; all my compassion is aroused. I will not carry out my fierce anger, nor will I turn and devastate Ephraim. For I am God, not human--the Holy One among you. I will not come in wrath...I will settle them into their homes, says the Lord."
Listen to God's longing for the people, how tenderly God loves us. Listen to the anguish, the decision God has to make about whether to act in anger or in love, to destroy or to heal.
There is nothing like it, this compassion. These verses resonated deeply with me this week. As I noted last week, I'm having conversations with an old friend who was the victim of a hate crime in 2002. In our most recent conversation, she told me that what hurts her the most now is that so many people refused to cooperate with the police investigation. There was a spiral of silence, wide and deep, in our community--the clerks at the store where the crime began, the alleged perpetrators themselves, their family members, their friends. The police essentially knew exactly who had committed the crime, but there was no way to prove it because not a single witness would speak up.
I can remember the anger I felt then, and continue to feel, about this silence. There is a quote from Audre Lorde, which I have on a bumper sticker on my car: "Your silence will not protect you." To me, it's a reminder of my obligation to speak out about injustice, including injustices that don't affect me. I know I have not always done so.
There is nothing like the pain of multiple people turning away, ignoring, staying silent--nothing else hurts as much. It is like the pain of a child who suffers in an abusive household, knowing someone could stop what is happening, knowing there must be a way to make it end, and wondering why she herself does not have the power to do so.
The idea that God aches in the same way that my friend ached for acknowledgement, that an abused child aches for acknowledgement, is incredible. That God has been there since the beginnning, teaching us to walk, taking us by the arm--and not just each one of us individually, but our entire communities--is perhaps the most profound message in the bible. Our God is not all-powerful; our God cannot control what we do, the messes we get ourselves into, or the messes we end up in the midst of by no fault of our own. All our God can do is choose whether to respond to us in wrath or in love.
And God chooses love. "For I am God, not human--the Holy One among you," God says, showing us that choosing love is the way to pull ourselves out of the misery of our human existence, that love is a higher way.
Love. How does a child who suffered love the father who hurt her, the people who ignored what was happening, inside the house and out? How does a crime victim love the perpetrator, the people who stayed silent? Maybe it's not possible. Maybe the best we can do is let go of the anger and turn the love back to ourselves so that we will survive. Maybe the best we can do is act out of love when we see injustice.
I struggled a long time with the question of how powerful God actually is. Can God sweep down and change things, and if so, what makes God choose to do so in some situations and not others? Can God change people in the profound ways people in the Old Testament or St. Paul was changed--and if so, why doesn't God do so more often? Can God destroy, and if so, why are hateful people allowed to remain hateful? Can God keep destruction from happening--and if so, why doesn't God do so more often?
I don't know exactly how I let go of these questions, but I have. I have learned to see God as love, pure love, as a being who struggles always between reacting in anger and reacting in love--or, rather, a being that feels anger but does not let the anger turn to hate. A God who can fuel the work God does with love rather than anger or hate. A God who can teach us to do the same.
The Bible is the story of God's love for the people God created and nourished, creates and nourishes--and the story goes on. We are part of it, called to heal ourselves and the world, called to speak out, called to ask forgiveness and try again when we fail to do so.
"My heart is changed within me. My compassion is aroused," God says. If only we could say this, every time we watch other people hurt themselves or others, every time we realize we've hurt ourselves or others. If only we could allow ourselves to struggle as God strugged in this passage and decide to choose love.
There is something so beautiful about the reading from Hosea that I can't figure out a way to paraphrase it. I need to put it down here, or most of it, at least:
"When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. But the more I called Israel, the further they went from me..."
"It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the arms, but they did not realize it was I who healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love; I lifted the yoke from their neck and bent down to feed them...My people are determined to turn from me..."
"How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel?...My heart is changed within me; all my compassion is aroused. I will not carry out my fierce anger, nor will I turn and devastate Ephraim. For I am God, not human--the Holy One among you. I will not come in wrath...I will settle them into their homes, says the Lord."
Listen to God's longing for the people, how tenderly God loves us. Listen to the anguish, the decision God has to make about whether to act in anger or in love, to destroy or to heal.
There is nothing like it, this compassion. These verses resonated deeply with me this week. As I noted last week, I'm having conversations with an old friend who was the victim of a hate crime in 2002. In our most recent conversation, she told me that what hurts her the most now is that so many people refused to cooperate with the police investigation. There was a spiral of silence, wide and deep, in our community--the clerks at the store where the crime began, the alleged perpetrators themselves, their family members, their friends. The police essentially knew exactly who had committed the crime, but there was no way to prove it because not a single witness would speak up.
I can remember the anger I felt then, and continue to feel, about this silence. There is a quote from Audre Lorde, which I have on a bumper sticker on my car: "Your silence will not protect you." To me, it's a reminder of my obligation to speak out about injustice, including injustices that don't affect me. I know I have not always done so.
There is nothing like the pain of multiple people turning away, ignoring, staying silent--nothing else hurts as much. It is like the pain of a child who suffers in an abusive household, knowing someone could stop what is happening, knowing there must be a way to make it end, and wondering why she herself does not have the power to do so.
The idea that God aches in the same way that my friend ached for acknowledgement, that an abused child aches for acknowledgement, is incredible. That God has been there since the beginnning, teaching us to walk, taking us by the arm--and not just each one of us individually, but our entire communities--is perhaps the most profound message in the bible. Our God is not all-powerful; our God cannot control what we do, the messes we get ourselves into, or the messes we end up in the midst of by no fault of our own. All our God can do is choose whether to respond to us in wrath or in love.
And God chooses love. "For I am God, not human--the Holy One among you," God says, showing us that choosing love is the way to pull ourselves out of the misery of our human existence, that love is a higher way.
Love. How does a child who suffered love the father who hurt her, the people who ignored what was happening, inside the house and out? How does a crime victim love the perpetrator, the people who stayed silent? Maybe it's not possible. Maybe the best we can do is let go of the anger and turn the love back to ourselves so that we will survive. Maybe the best we can do is act out of love when we see injustice.
I struggled a long time with the question of how powerful God actually is. Can God sweep down and change things, and if so, what makes God choose to do so in some situations and not others? Can God change people in the profound ways people in the Old Testament or St. Paul was changed--and if so, why doesn't God do so more often? Can God destroy, and if so, why are hateful people allowed to remain hateful? Can God keep destruction from happening--and if so, why doesn't God do so more often?
I don't know exactly how I let go of these questions, but I have. I have learned to see God as love, pure love, as a being who struggles always between reacting in anger and reacting in love--or, rather, a being that feels anger but does not let the anger turn to hate. A God who can fuel the work God does with love rather than anger or hate. A God who can teach us to do the same.
The Bible is the story of God's love for the people God created and nourished, creates and nourishes--and the story goes on. We are part of it, called to heal ourselves and the world, called to speak out, called to ask forgiveness and try again when we fail to do so.
"My heart is changed within me. My compassion is aroused," God says. If only we could say this, every time we watch other people hurt themselves or others, every time we realize we've hurt ourselves or others. If only we could allow ourselves to struggle as God strugged in this passage and decide to choose love.
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