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Primitive religion is not believed, it is danced!

Arthur Darby Nock

Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
And only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries.

Elizabeth Browning



Wednesday, April 10, 2019

God drought


The time is surely coming, says the Lord God, when I will send a famine on the land; not a famine of bread, or a thirsty for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord (Amos)

“Why is Amos in such a bad mood?  Because the rich have used their riches to burden those who will never work their way out of debt.  Because the clever have used their cleverness to trick those who cannot think as fast.  Because making a profit has become more important than anything else in the land – more important than justice, more important than Sabbath, more important than God… Amos is in a bad mood because the health of the market has become a higher good than the health of the people and God can’t stand it anymore… He is stabbing an entire nation on God’s behalf”
                                                                                  Barbara Brown Taylor
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I believe we are going to pay
For calling good evil and evil good
I believe we are going to pay
For putting profits above justice
And power above love
And money above people

It may not be
That anytime in the near future
America will simply collapse

It may not be that those who legislate injustice
Will find themselves voted out of office

It is doubtful that those who with great impunity break the rule of law
will ever have to answer for their crimes.

I am not suggesting imminent calamity

But I am suggesting that we will experience poverty
And a gnawing hunger
And extreme thirst

I am suggesting that we will end up, in this country
Which suggests it is “blest by God”

Will find itself with a God drought

I have listened for years
While the right has talked about how God was “driven” from the schools
and courtrooms.  I have wondered just how you get rid of God, who is in everything and everyone.

The fact is, that we, Sacred Children, carry God with us, everywhere
Where ever we go God goes
Whatever we do God is there (scary thought)
Whatever we think, the Sacred senses
Whatever we say the Sacred hears

So if I walk through any courtroom, or classroom, and think for a moment of God
God becomes real
God emerges as something real and tangible in my heart

But it is possible, Amos reminds us, to stop thinking of God
And stop thinking about all those people in whom God dwells
All those black people, brown people
Poor people
Ill people
Old people

All those convenient and inconvenient people
Who stumble around this planet

It is possible to make power and wealth
To make profit and control
So important that people no longer matter

And when people no longer matter, God no longer matters

We can pretend all we want that wealth and power are signs of God’s favor
They aren’t
Jesus, paradoxically, says poverty is, as is grief, and compassion, generosity, and a thirst for justice.

God’s presence comes
God’s favor comes
When we are people who (you guessed it )
Love our neighbor as ourselves
(and everyone is our neighbor)

But when we focus on power and profit
And when people no longer matter
The Sacred in us dries up

It is not that God is not there
It is not that we can’t tap into that living spring again

But God droughts can and do come
And in those moments
We are thirsty, and hungry
And our souls cry out

For what we have lost
And we are the most miserable of people

Who all too often take our misery out on others

Thankfully, droughts end
Droughts end when we seek God
And they end when we find God, in the people around us
All the people
They end when we feed and clothe,
When we advocate, and comfort (Matthew 25)

I am tired
Tired of living in a ‘dry and thirsty land”

I want living Springs
I want life
I want vitality
I want love
I want justice to roll like a river,
And righteousness to flow like a never-failing stream!

I want God



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