By Such Stripes Are We Healed
by Jack Shaver
©The United Church of Canada, 1985
All Rights Reserved
ISBN 0-88622-196-X
7M/12/85/APL
Used with Permission
Friday
Joy in the cross
Hebrews 12: 1-13
I picked this passage because it is, again, a working out of the redemptive connection between God and suffering. Here is another version of how the cross of Christ is good news.
In Jesus' endurance of sinners' hostility we have an inexhaustible source of courage for our own battle against sin, especially when we remember (as the author points out in chapter four, verse 15 of the letter) that in Jesus we have a high priest who is able to sympathize with our weakness, having been tempted as we are.
- In some verses from Proverbs the writer finds a clue to the meaning of some of the stuff we have to endure:
- My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of his
reproof. For the Lord reproves him whom he loves as a father the son in whom he delights. - Some of the painful stuff our lives have to endure is there because the one with whom we "have to do" is treating us like sons and daughters, like children of God. While this, like all discipline, will be painful, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness. That pain is good news. Something real is going on between us and God which is for our good. We get to share God's holiness.
Obviously this is one of the arguments in Hebrews that doesn't put me off. With its quote from Proverbs it gets to me with a word.
But this passage contains a couple of hidden treasures along with the main theme and these were additional reasons for selecting it for our reflection. Both are occasions where the word broke through in off-hand remarks.
The first of these is a remark in verse 13:- And make straight paths for your feet so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.
- For someone who spends half a letter laying down warnings of total punishment for backsliders, I find this a most winning addition. The footnotes suggest that this may be partially quoted from Proverbs. But there is no mention of care for the lame in Proverbs.
I am glad that we are called to order our lives together so that the lame are not put out of joint. Lame Christians of the world, rejoice! Someone is thinking of you.
The other occasion comes in the midst of that great burst of conventional language.- Looking to Jesus ...who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame.
Given the setting in the story of Israel, given the whole evangelistic witness, this aside can't be made to mean simply, "It was all worth it for him because he ended up at the right hand of God." Rather its full intention includes the suggestion that there was joy in his accepting the cross, because it was the work of God's right hand.
Petition
Loving God,
We interrupt our business and quiet the clamour of our desiring, to listen for the sound of crying.
We wait for the cries that go up from our planet Earth to reach us so that we can lift those cries to you.
Who can count the people of the earth who cry for bread? We lift up the cries of the hungry; send them not away empty.
Who can number the refugees of the earth? We 1ift up the cries of the homeless, that host of souls who have been told, "You have no place that's yours." Let them not be forgotten.
Hear the cries of the countless of the earth whose lives are held cheap, who are daily expended because they get in the way of some tyrant or some power struggle. Let them be counted.
Hear the cries of the burdened, who dread the living of their lives. Teach them your easy yoke and your uplifting burden.
Hear the sick, with their cries of fear and pain. Hear the soundless cries of the lonely. Hear the sighs of the weary.
Hear the grim gnashing of teeth of all those who strive in vain to please you, who know not the gospel, and especially those who resist the gospel.
Dear God, where the gospel sheds not its glorious ray, let there be light.
Amen