Day 101
Deuteronomy 15:1-16:20, Luke 13:31-14:14, Psalm 44:1-12
In these passages God sets out the kind of community that he would like his people to be. A community of love and forgiveness, a community that is fair and where no one person oppresses another. Although the people started off well, Israel did not manage to stick to God's plan in the entirety and certainly society today is way off the mark! God sets out an economic blueprint that impacts on other areas of life. He starts with debts and moves on to slaves. After 7 years both debts and slaves are to be released. The lender or Master is not to have a burdensome everlasting power over those in their debts. The relationship certainly changes if you know that you are to be released in 7 years, no 25 year mortgage in that culture.
It was not just finance that God was talking about. If the only long term slaves are those that want to be there, and those who are released go with a pile of food in their pocket, then they are more likely to part on happier terms. And if people are able to release their fellow countrymen from economic servitude, then certainly they should be able to forgive and release people in moral sense too. The issue goes much deeper than we see on first reading, it goes away from the purse to the very core of their hearts.
Through Christ, this law is fulfilled in that God is the one doing the forgiving. We do not have to wait seven years, seven months or even 7 minutes. God is ready to forgive now. In Luke, (ch13 v34ff) Jesus is talking to the people about the destruction of the temple (remembering what we said a couple of days ago about the importance of the temple), "your house is ... desolate". Those who acknowledge Jesus as Lord, who say unto him "blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord", then they are ones who will see him again. This is the God who is ready to forgive in the here and now.
God is ready to forgive, he is ready to bump us up the table, for we are invited to his banquet. We have already said it in relation to the Old Testament some weeks ago, but get your party outfits on, their is a party to go to, and you are the guest of honour.
In these passages God sets out the kind of community that he would like his people to be. A community of love and forgiveness, a community that is fair and where no one person oppresses another. Although the people started off well, Israel did not manage to stick to God's plan in the entirety and certainly society today is way off the mark! God sets out an economic blueprint that impacts on other areas of life. He starts with debts and moves on to slaves. After 7 years both debts and slaves are to be released. The lender or Master is not to have a burdensome everlasting power over those in their debts. The relationship certainly changes if you know that you are to be released in 7 years, no 25 year mortgage in that culture.
It was not just finance that God was talking about. If the only long term slaves are those that want to be there, and those who are released go with a pile of food in their pocket, then they are more likely to part on happier terms. And if people are able to release their fellow countrymen from economic servitude, then certainly they should be able to forgive and release people in moral sense too. The issue goes much deeper than we see on first reading, it goes away from the purse to the very core of their hearts.
Through Christ, this law is fulfilled in that God is the one doing the forgiving. We do not have to wait seven years, seven months or even 7 minutes. God is ready to forgive now. In Luke, (ch13 v34ff) Jesus is talking to the people about the destruction of the temple (remembering what we said a couple of days ago about the importance of the temple), "your house is ... desolate". Those who acknowledge Jesus as Lord, who say unto him "blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord", then they are ones who will see him again. This is the God who is ready to forgive in the here and now.
God is ready to forgive, he is ready to bump us up the table, for we are invited to his banquet. We have already said it in relation to the Old Testament some weeks ago, but get your party outfits on, their is a party to go to, and you are the guest of honour.
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