Genesis 9:8-17<\/p>\n
We started with remarking on the number of\u00a0 40 day periods in Bible stories. The Flood and Jesus’ temptation were the ones in today’s lectionary but we recalled also Moses’ 40 day trial\u00a0 after the golden calf incident,Elija’s 40 days on Mt. Sinai, the Jew’s 40 years in the wilderness. SC made the point that the trial, as in the flood, was a period to be endured but there was a promise at it’s end.\u00a0 We discussed what was the new covenant between God and the people after the Flood as represented by the rainbow.\u00a0 It was not unlike other ancient gods’ symbols in the sky.\u00a0 The bow was a warrior’s bow. The arrows were lightening. God was already becoming a more loving, less judgmental, figure in this story.\u00a0 PG cited a commentary that compared the promise at Creation to the promise after the Flood.\u00a0 God had Created the earth by separating the elements, containing the waters and the heavens to their own realms.\u00a0 At the flood, the boundaries of the elements were dissolved and there was chaos again.\u00a0 When God set the rainbow in the sky,it was to show the elements were back in their places. God promised never to destroy the earth and all its creatures again.\u00a0 God promised to stay in the people’s lives.<\/p>\n
We went on to Mark 19-15<\/p>\n
Jesus’ baptism and temptation, AD commented, had the same water and time elements as the Flood story.\u00a0 She’d read a commentary that spun out the water allegory, describing how water both bathed and was tranquil and ran over objects (rocks) over time wearing them down.\u00a0 We discussed how trial or temptation was part of the process of being faithful, waiting through the bad times trusting in the outcome.\u00a0 PG mentioned a commentary that described Lent as a time to open ourselves to letting God have God’s way with us.\u00a0 God’s forgiveness after the Flood, like baptism, made things “good” as in Creation, “and it was good”. (Wesley called it sanctification, to become holy in heart and life).\u00a0 The testing or wilderness is where we sort out our paths, learning to find\u00a0 God’s direction for our lives, and, like Jesus, the third step in faith\u00a0 is mission or service.<\/p>\n
We ended by going back to the image of the rainbow and how perfect a symbol of our perception of God’s covenant it is.\u00a0 We see it only briefly and occasionally. The cycle of our moments of sanctification, wilderness and mission is constant and various and reflected in the church year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Genesis 9:8-17 We started with remarking on the number of\u00a0 40 day periods in Bible stories. The Flood and Jesus’ temptation were the ones in today’s lectionary but we recalled also Moses’ 40 day trial\u00a0 after the golden calf incident,Elija’s 40 days on Mt. Sinai, the Jew’s 40 years in the wilderness. SC made the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-308","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-worship-and-teaching"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=308"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":309,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308\/revisions\/309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}