Monday, June 17, 2024
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Ahab covets his neighbor’s vineyard
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.
Naboth would not sell his ancestors’ vineyard to King Ahab. Ahab’s police could do nothing, because “eminent domain” had not yet been invented. Ahab was angry, and he told his wife.
A fine ruler over Israel you are, indeed. Get up, my king. Eat. Be cheerful, while I obtain the vineyard for you.
The gleam in Jezebel’s vindictive eyes could be seen over the hills of Jezreel across Samaria. Like she was looking for someone to harm, looking for something evil to feed on.
In Ahab’s name she sent letters directing the city leaders to proclaim a fast and then find “scoundrels” to accuse Naboth falsely of cursing God and king. Stone him to death, she told them. The elders did as she commanded them.
Jezebel cared nothing for Naboth. In fact, she cared nothing for Ahab, but he was king, he was indeed her king, so she must find ways always to manage him. Again, Ahab seems simple-minded and obedient, but not to Yahweh. Ahab is obedient to Jezebel, who gets him what he wants. And Jezebel worships Ba-al.
Go on now, my king, take possession of the vineyard, because Naboth is not alive, but dead.
This story of corruption in high places might occur anytime in history. Cain and Abel. David and Uriah. Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton. Hindenburg and Hitler. But let’s not get too close to home. The point is simply that when I get someone else to do my dirty work and deny I’m responsible, I have set myself up to be eaten by dogs. Yes, dogs.
As we will soon see.
Now then, Jesus the Powerful has another way to turn away evil.
Offer no resistance. When someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other to him as well. And if some insists on having your shirt, give her your cloak as well. If a soldier or anyone forces you to go one mile, go two. Never turn your back on one who wants to borrow from you.
This of course is not just the better way, it is the only way. Otherwise violence is disguised as redemptive, and revenge falls into the hands of the victims rather than remaining in the hands of our Father. It is mine to revenge, saith the Lord.
Jesus and Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. moved mountains with their nonviolent resistance, what we’ve come to call “civil disobedience.” Even though Jesus and Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. were all executed or assassinated, their deaths changed the course of history. Jesus’ death and resurrection revealed our Father’s love for us. Death had no sting after all.
As Barack Obama quoted William Faulkner, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” Yahweh’s memory is a long one. And in his great compassion He sends his “better angels” after us time after time. As the Reverend Theodore Parker said a few years before the US Civil War:
I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice.
Martin Luther King Jr., acknowledging in his political life that all depended only on God, shared these words with the world. “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” President Obama had the words embroidered into an Oval Office rug. But let us not jump through too many liberal hoops here. As Matt Lewis points out, “Dr. King was talking about the City of God, not the City of Man.
“Let’s render unto Caesar the things that belong to Caesar.”
And let us as well heed the song of the psalmist, “Lord, listen to my groaning.”
Attend to my sighing, O Lord. Heed my call for help, my king and my God! I know you do not delight in wickedness, the arrogant may not stand in your sight.
And so I will breathe in and breathe out, hopeful and grateful, patient and mindful, and wait for the Lord.
(1 Kings 21, Psalm 5, Psalm 119, Matthew 5)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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