“Really meaning it”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Wednesday, November 9, 2022
Joel 2:12-19 (Forward, p 11) CEV p. 924
I guess that the Lord knows us, us fickle and changeable humans, all too well. At times, we remind me of petulant, sulky and reticent children, who, when ‘caught out’ with some misdeed or found to have hurt someone else intentioned, will be heard to say—rather faintly, I must say—“I’m sorry.” But the tone of voice and their manner clearly state that they are not sorry at all. And, what goes for children, also goes for adults, and for civic leaders at local, regional, national and international levels. They say they are sorry, but it is quite evident from their manner, and from their subsequent behaviours, that they are not.
God knows that this is also true between us and Him. He tells His people, in today’s passage, not to go about rending their garments to show their sorrow. (Elsewhere, He also nixes out the offering of lots of sacrifices.). Instead, they are to mean it, to repent or change their ways and the direction of their lives. They are to return to Him with sincerely and fully, with hearts that are truly broken and contrite. And, they are to express all this with crying and mourning over their sins, with fasting and with prayers that are real. And, above all, perhaps, this is to be lived out in their lives, with lives that are fit for His worship.
And, if they really mean it, God will hear them and respond, for, after all, He is a God who cares for them and loves them, a God of mercy and forgiveness, rather than one of vengeance. Punishment is not really the first thing on His mind, but instead He yearns for the return of His people into His loving arms and care.
And so, with us: God is always ready and willing to invite us back, to welcome us—like the Father in the parable of the prodigal son—to welcome us home. Indeed, like that Father is standing there expectantly, watching and waiting for even the slightest, least response on our parts. But we must not be ‘play-acting’ like some spoiled children, merely going through the motions. We must mean it. And, if we do, He is always there for us, waiting for us. Amen.
Forward notes: “Then the Lord became jealous for his land and had pity on his people. In response to his people the Lord said: I am sending you grain, wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied; and I will no more make you a mockery among the nations” (verses 18-19).
“This day’s reading strikes such a contrast with yesterday’s. While yesterday’s passage in Luke’s Gospel felt harsh, Joel ends on a sad but hopeful note. God is ‘jealous’ over his children. The turn of phrase feels a bit like a shock. God is jealous? Isn’t that a sin?
“While jealousy can be an occasion or temptation to sin, the sinful part stems largely from what we decide to do with the emotion. Of course, God’s response to the feeling of jealousy is dramatically different from ours. When I reflect on my own battles with jealousy, I usually find that my response is to be angry or hurt. But that is not how God responds. God chooses to reach out to us, supplying our needs, offering us comfort in our distress, and covering our weakness by protecting us from judgment and ridicule.”
Moving Forward: “The next time you’re jealous, think about ways you can respond more like God.”
A concluding note: here, in today’s Forward Day by Day meditation we make an ever-present, frequent mistake, namely in incorrectly ascribing to God the same sense of the feelings that we have in common. Here that feeling is described, in most translations, as ‘jealousy’. But jealousy for God is not at all like ours.
In most cases—though not always—our jealousy is self-centred, centred in how we feel (anger or hurt, for instance) or in what we feel that we have lost or are in danger of losing (like a relationship, or like an achievement or praise or such like). It is rarely centred in ‘the other’.
However, God is not jealous--for the most part at least--because He feels hurt or angry or has experienced a sense of loss. (Though one translation, the Amplified Bible, interprets it this way: “He was ready to defend it [the land] since it is rightfully and uniquely his”). (In a similar fashion, another translation speaks of Him feeling ‘possessive’ towards it.)
However, I think that the correct interpretation and understanding comes from the sense that God is deeply concerned, or passionate for His land, that He cares very much for it. In other words, His feelings have to do
more to do with the land and its welfare and well-being, and less to do with Himself. He cares about what is happening to it, and by extension, with what is happening to its people. And, I would say, the same is true for us: God cares about our communities, our country and this earth, but all the more so about us, His people.