Ruined Fields



—Psalm 39

7 (6) Humans go about like shadows; their turmoil is all for nothing.
They accumulate wealth, not knowing who will enjoy its benefits.



—from Isaiah 5:13-17 and Isaiah 5:24-25

17b….and those wandering through will eat
from the ruined fields of the overfed.

from the redacted verses 18-23

18 Woe to those who begin by pulling
at transgression with a thread,
but end by dragging sin along
as if with a cart rope.
19 They say, “We want God to speed up his work,
to hurry it along, so we can see it!
We want the Holy One of Isra’el’s plan
to come true right now, so we can be sure of it!”

21 Woe to those seeing themselves as wise,
esteeming themselves as clever.



1 Thessalonians 5:12-28

15 See that no one repays evil for evil; on the contrary, always try to do good to each other, indeed, to everyone.



Luke 21:29-38

34 But keep watch on yourselves, or your hearts will become dulled by carousing, drunkenness and the worries of everyday living, and that Day will be sprung upon you suddenly like a trap! 35 For it will close in on everyone, no matter where they live, throughout the whole world.



I am aggravated. I don’t understand why certain verses are redacted by the editors of the Daily Lectionary. I don’t agree with the practice, and furthermore, I can’t imagine any reasonable justification for it. It appears to me to be hypocritical, and perfectly arrogant. I’m thinking that from now on, whenever I run across censored verses in my reading, I will make sure to devote at least part of my reflection to them.

In this particular case the redacted verses seem to be aimed right at the censors, at those who think that their ideas should be the deciding factor as to what verses should be read by the ignorant public. “Woe to those seeing themselves as wise, esteeming themselves as clever.” They are indeed starting out with just a thread pulling at transgression, but they end up hauling a cart-load of sin with a big old rope.  They say, We want God to speed up his work, to hurry it along, so we can see it!”  so they skip over the tedious or awkward parts of a text in their hurry to get to the parts that they think are more suitable and important.

Why is it that hypocrites who can’t perceive their own hypocrisy are always the worst?

I was just now reminded of a quote from the movie “King Arthur: Legend of the Sword” in which the mage tells the reluctant Arthur: “Don’t get me wrong, I look away; we all look away. But that is the difference between a man and a king.” As far as looking away goes, I think we all should consider ourselves to be kings. What I mean by that is this:  We need to hold ourselves to the standard that Jesus set for us! We must not see ourselves as wise, or esteem ourselves as clever. We must look straight at the hard things. We simply can’t afford to look away.

After all, we live in a world of turmoil, in which we go about like shadows, and it would be silly for us to rely on all the stuff we’ve collected to save us from misery, because we can’t ever know if it will do anyone any good at all— and that includes us.

Paying attention to the wrong things will land us right in the middle of the trap when it’s sprung on us. Letting our hearts get dulled by the worries of everyday living means that we will be sluggish and complacent when the time comes for us to sit up and know that it’s time to stand and deliver. As far as the thing that we will be delivering, it’s so simple that the same words can be used over and over and over:

See that no one repays evil for evil; on the contrary, always try to do good to each other, indeed, to everyone.”





Nomads in the ruined fields—

finding bits of unharvested crop

under every leaf.



Gleaning with the mice and crows—

after everyone has left

and the farm has gone bankrupt.



All alone under the sky—

we can’t afford to hurry,

as dusk falls and stars shine out

over the cold ground.



Best not skip a single row—

we might miss something.

Comments

Popular Posts