Open-ended,
Life-centred,
Gospel-Focused Explorations of Hebrew Bible Readings from the
Australian Prayer Book.
MALACHI 4:1-2a...25th S. after Pentecost, C... (for LK 21:5-19,
scroll.)
NOTES: 1]Always read the Hebrew Bible in the light
of our understanding of God in the New Testament.2] Malachi ( = 'my messenger')
one of the 'Minor' Prophets is probably an anonymous work from about
the mid 400s BC. The Hebrews
are back from
exile in Babylon, have rebuilt the Temple, & are facing issues like
the breaking down of old standards e.g. of worship & marriage. 3] What a contrast between the
opening blast & the promise of the sun of Righteousness! WARMING UP: Why is it
often easier to blast people than relate to them another way?
TREASURES OLD & NEW:
Identify God at work in anything this week?
ENTERING INTO THE STORY:
1 Does the
message of a prophet, any prophet, necessarily have to begin with a
blast to catch people's attention? Or, is that a tactic best left back
in olden days? Do we ourselves respond better to a carrot than a stick?
Do we even have any prophets today? Can we identify any in the
Church(es)? Could a true prophet even operate within our Church(es)
& their 'control systems', or would they be forced outside? Are
those of us within a Faith Community any more likely to be able to: a)
discern a true prophet, &, b) respond to them than 'outsiders'?
Is it a
requirement of Christian faith that we still believe a day will come
'burning like an oven' when 'all the arrogant & evil doers will be
stubble'? And all the other 'baddies'? But not us? Why is it such an
attractive proposition that God will 'destroy the wicked'? How well
does that sit with the Person & message of Jesus? Is it inevitable
that for God to vindicate those faithful to Him, He must destroy the rest? Isn't
what Jesus says in today's Gospel (above) focussed instead on how
people destroy themselves & each other?
How scary
is the thought of being left 'neither root & branch'? How important
is it to our own persona to have 'root & branch', if we have one /
them, that is? What about those who have no 'root & branch'? Do we
all have some deep down hankering that we will be preserved in our
descendants? That our property will be preserved in our descendants? Is
that where our real preservation, continuation lies? Or in something
else? Somebody else? What really gives us 'root & branch' that
matters for ever?
2a
Is 'revering God's Name' as central to our faith today as it once was?
If someone were to ask us why it's important to us that we worship
together as a Faith Community, would it occur to us to tell them we do
it, "to revere God's Name"? What does 'revering God's Name' entail?
In
our efforts to avoid idolatry of any kind, might we Christians have
undervalued the imagery of the Sun as representing God & God's
Light & God's Son (in a play on words)? Might we have cut ourselves
off too far from the wisdom of the ancients who saw God at work in the
wonders of the heavens? Does the ancient Celtic symbolism of the Cross
with a Circle (the Sun / Son = centre of the universe) round its
junction offer us any kind of connection between ancient roots &
more modern beliefs?
Are we aware of the sun
itself as a gift of God's healing power as opposed, in imagery at
least, to night & darkness with its shadowing of, shutting down of
people & the rhythms of life? Might one reason for our present love
affair with night-clubs, bars, parties, that kind of thing, be simply
an attempt to escape from the world's darkness into a blaze of
artificial 'light'? Given 'righteousness' means 'living out God's
rightness' can we really appreciate either Sun or Son till we do just
that? Is it somewhere in that process we find our real healing?
