Monday, September 22, 2014

Lectionary 26 A - Ezekiel 18:1-4, 25-32

Ezekiel 18:1-4, 25-32
So what gives? Didn’t God commission Moses to set in stone the small print following the second commandment? “I the Lord your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject me.” (Exodus 20:5 & Deuteronomy 5:9) Or what about the good news / bad news of Numbers 14:18? “The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, BUT he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.” On the flip side of the covenant coin both Jeremiah (31:29-30) and Ezekiel preach personal responsibility. Whoever does the crime does the time. So which is it? Jesus trumps both sides in favor of neither (the man born blind story in John 9 – “whose sin is it?”) and negates the conditional clause (neither this man nor his parents sinned) in favor of the gift of sight revealing the works of God. The work of God is this: the One who knew no sin (and I’m just guessing here but his Abba was pretty much perfect too) was made to be sin so that those who are in bondage to sin (parent and child) might be set free. So turn to the God who takes no pleasure in the death of anyone and live. 

2011 post

No comments:

Post a Comment