The Kitchen Sink
An occasional piece of paper
October 3, 2010
Vol. 13 no. 39
The trouble with the Bible is that it is so big. Its size and diversity overwhelm most human souls, including ministers. There are very few scholars who can claim intimate familiarity with everything in the Scriptures, and most of these are lacking humility. The one thing the weight of the Bible’s tome should do to us is keep us properly humble, knowing that we know only in part.
There is a virtue to this bigness - always something is new to read, for you never have exhausted it all. Possibly you have never read a particular book. Often you come back to a familiar passage and it is no longer familiar - you and/or the world has changed and the words read a much different and more exciting version of the old story.
Today is probably one book you have not read before: the Book of Lamentations, immediately following Jeremiah, by whom they are traditionally written. Only five poetic chapters, most believe that they were not written directly by Jeremiah, but certainly captured the moods he could have expressed. Israel has been finally conquered and leveled by the Babylonian armies and a select group of key leaders have been forced marched to Babylon hundreds of kilometers to the East. This was a cruel, but craftily effective method used by many ancient kingdoms to crush the resistance of a subject people. Exile the leaders from the general population and neither will be able to survive with an identity. All they can do is lament their fate.
Yet, as with all prophetic writings we will hear at the end of deep and mournful groans the raised voice of a divinely-inspired hope that will not let us go, even in a lonely city of a strange land.
Knox-Metropolitan United Church
Regina, Saskatchewan