Not a Happy Note

This is not a happy note.
It speaks of God's abandonment.
When God turns her back to all.
And walks away in sorrow.

Only for a time, of course.
But time enough to undo God's blessings.
And give the nation what it truly wants:
Money, power, prestige and wantonness.

And in getting what it wants, it dies.
And the good, the bad and the ugly die right along with it.
There is no choice in all the dying.
Once the wheels of divine abandonment are set in motion.

No choice at all, once the choosing-time passes us by.
And then the course of history.
The slow grind of time.
When all is lost, and tears flow hard and hot.

And people wonder where their god has gone.
And why now all of this horror.
Because the choosing-time is gone.
You had your chance, but Baal you choose, and so the story goes.

This is not a happy note.
It speaks of God's abandonment.
When God turns her back to all.
And walks away in sorrow.

Ancient Israel Wanted Clout - from F. Buechner

Today's reading (Nov. 2) from Frederick Buechner's Listening to Your Life really caught my attention.

Here it is:

Israel did not want to be a holy nation. Israel wanted to be a nation like all the other nations, a nation like Egypt, like Syria. She wanted clout. She wanted security. She wanted a place in the sun. It was her own way she wanted not God's way; and when the prophets got after her for it, she got rid of the prophets, and when God's demands seemed too exorbitant, God's promises too remote, she took up with all the other gods who still get our votes and our money and our 9 AM to 5 PM energies, because they are gods who could not care less whether we are holy or not, and promise absolutely everything we really want and absolutely nothing we really need. ~ Nov. 2 reading, Listening to Your Life - excerpted from The Clown in the Belfry.

The church in America is Ancient Israel all over again. We've sold our soul to the gods who promise us clout, security, and a place in the sun.

Gods who couldn't care less about our holiness and are more than happy when we substitute narrow-mindedness for faith, snottiness for discernment, and overly-scrupulous concerns for private/personal behavior - centered in the genitals - for the purposes of life given by Jesus in his hometown sermon. 

We despise the prophets, like a Jeremiah Wright, who call our "greatness" to account, who reveal the false gods for what they are, who shine the light of grace on narrow-mindedness, snottiness and petty morality and dare to call down God's judgment upon us.

We preach health, wealth and happiness and are more than content to ignore the Prophets and turn Jesus into some kind of a mental-health guru who will turn us into business geniuses, transform our marriages, guide out children into prosperous careers, eliminate acne and dandruff, make our nation strong, feed our needs for oil, prevent global warming, trample our "enemies" and make us happy.

But the happiness never arrives.

We still have acne and dandruff.

And God still waits for us to hear his Son in the Nazareth Synagogue.