Micah 4:1-4
In days to come the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised up above the hills. Peoples shall stream to it, and many nations shall come and say: “Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.”
For out of Zion shall go forth instruction, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between many peoples, and shall arbitrate between strong nations far away; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more; but they shall all sit under their own vines and their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken.
This is a scripture about teaching and about learning. In Micah’s vision the “mountain of the Lord’s house” has been raised up and people are coming there from all over in order to be taught – taught the ways of God and how to live in God’s ways.
And the end result of this teaching is that the people learn to “beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore; but they shall all sit under their own vines and their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid.” Perhaps it’s time for us to acknowledge that we really do not know enough and that we, too, need to stop and learn from God.
Those of us especially who are white and middle-class are waking up to the fact that what we have long considered “normal” has not been normal for a whole lot of people for a whole long time. It has taken some of us a long time to wake up, and some of us are still denying it. But it has in recent weeks become a national scandal and we can’t pretend to not see it anymore. A huge number of our brothers and sisters DO live in fear and an absence of peace because we have not been listening or learning.
Somewhere along the way the idea of a straight, able, white, European culture has become our baseline “normal” and anyone else has to seek our permission to gain entry. Probably, we personally haven’t done this but by our silence we have allowed it to go on. African-Americans have been most prominently in the news recently, but Hispanics, all those we ignorantly lump together as Asians, and—most ironically—Native Americans, who were here long before the rest of us, have struggled for generations to be recognized as part of this country. June is Pride Month, reminding us once again that our LGBTQ+ kin are in many ways still struggling to exist. Trans people in particular right now are going to be seriously injured by recent actions from Washington. And people of differing abilities have long had to fight just to be seen—and not invisible to the world at large.
How did we go so wrong? How did we get so far from the Old Testament vision of a just and peaceful, shared world? And how did we get to the point where we who claim to follow Jesus can allow anyone to discard those who doesn’t look like them or act like them? When did we begin to look at the lives of some parts of God’s “it is good” creation as not having any value—as things to be casually used up and tossed away or ignored? As it has been pointed out a lot recently, for many, even the dark-skinned near-eastern Jesus would be outcast.
It is time for us to humble ourselves, ask pardon if we have been any part of this, and submit ourselves for some teaching—first, from the Word of God--we do have an entire book about this after all--and then from those who have been trying to wake us up for so very long. This is our task as Christians. To be an active part of building that world where “all can sit under their own vines and their own fig trees, and no one can make them afraid.” This is our work.
Jesus’ teachings all point to this. He could not have been any more clear: Love one another as I have loved you. Period. Loving that way is going to require some honest effort from us all. Prayer and an heartfelt desire to learn and change the way things are.
May God who loves us all, teach us, and may we learn. Amen.
And the end result of this teaching is that the people learn to “beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore; but they shall all sit under their own vines and their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid.” Perhaps it’s time for us to acknowledge that we really do not know enough and that we, too, need to stop and learn from God.
Those of us especially who are white and middle-class are waking up to the fact that what we have long considered “normal” has not been normal for a whole lot of people for a whole long time. It has taken some of us a long time to wake up, and some of us are still denying it. But it has in recent weeks become a national scandal and we can’t pretend to not see it anymore. A huge number of our brothers and sisters DO live in fear and an absence of peace because we have not been listening or learning.
Somewhere along the way the idea of a straight, able, white, European culture has become our baseline “normal” and anyone else has to seek our permission to gain entry. Probably, we personally haven’t done this but by our silence we have allowed it to go on. African-Americans have been most prominently in the news recently, but Hispanics, all those we ignorantly lump together as Asians, and—most ironically—Native Americans, who were here long before the rest of us, have struggled for generations to be recognized as part of this country. June is Pride Month, reminding us once again that our LGBTQ+ kin are in many ways still struggling to exist. Trans people in particular right now are going to be seriously injured by recent actions from Washington. And people of differing abilities have long had to fight just to be seen—and not invisible to the world at large.
How did we go so wrong? How did we get so far from the Old Testament vision of a just and peaceful, shared world? And how did we get to the point where we who claim to follow Jesus can allow anyone to discard those who doesn’t look like them or act like them? When did we begin to look at the lives of some parts of God’s “it is good” creation as not having any value—as things to be casually used up and tossed away or ignored? As it has been pointed out a lot recently, for many, even the dark-skinned near-eastern Jesus would be outcast.
It is time for us to humble ourselves, ask pardon if we have been any part of this, and submit ourselves for some teaching—first, from the Word of God--we do have an entire book about this after all--and then from those who have been trying to wake us up for so very long. This is our task as Christians. To be an active part of building that world where “all can sit under their own vines and their own fig trees, and no one can make them afraid.” This is our work.
Jesus’ teachings all point to this. He could not have been any more clear: Love one another as I have loved you. Period. Loving that way is going to require some honest effort from us all. Prayer and an heartfelt desire to learn and change the way things are.
May God who loves us all, teach us, and may we learn. Amen.
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