Be Ready!

Deut. 34: 1-12
The greatest prophet of all. That’s what the passage calls Moses—

10 Since that time there has not arisen in Isra’el a prophet like Moshe, whom Adonai knew face to face. 11 What signs and wonders Adonai sent him to perform in the land of Egypt upon Pharaoh, all his servants and all his land! 12 What might was in his hand! What great terror he evoked before the eyes of all Isra’el!

But his is also the saddest story. God tells him, “Enough!” and withholds the fulfillment of the Promise, even though he gets to see the whole extent of the Land he has led his people to find. Instead he’s told that he is going to die. He does die, and is mourned by a whole people, who then bury him in an unmarked grave and travel on. No one builds a monument or a mausoleum for the great man.
I think that this is a Bodhisattva story. The unfulfilled promise and the loyalty without reward; the impossible task and the relinquishing of desire. See how the unmarked grave makes the whole earth Moshe’s tomb? How could anyone put a grave marker on the entire world?

Romans 10: 14-21

Paul is talking about God trusting us; “trusting our report.” It’s from Isaiah 53— "Who believes our report? To whom is the arm of Adonai revealed?”

16 The problem is that they haven’t all paid attention to the Good News and obeyed it. For Yesha‘yahu says, “Adonai, who has trusted what he has heard from us?”

The last verse of Isaiah 52, right before the phrase “Who believes our report?” is this: “For they will see what they had not been told, they will ponder things they had never heard.”
So the story moves from Moses, the great God-Truster; to God, the great Human-Truster.

20 Then Isaiah is so bold as to say, "I have been found by those who did not seek me; I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me."

What report do we make to God? What is it that he trusts us to tell? “We have found what we were not looking for”? “We got what we didn’t ask for”?

Matthew 24: 32-51
44 Therefore you too must always be ready, for the Son of Man will come when you are not expecting him.

Be Ready!

Without expectations.

See the unseen 

and reflect on the unknown.

Find what you never looked for 

and get what you never asked for.

Arrive when no-one notices 

and leave behind nothing 

but an unremembered grave.