Bruce Wydick: Prophets Against Profits? What Occupy Wall Street Misses: The problem doesn’t lie with the 1%. It’s with us.

A spot-on analysis from Professor Wydick, IMO. From Christianity Today online.

The Occupy Wall Street movement shares more than it would like to admit with the Tea Party, its populist complement on the right. Rather than taking the approach of self-reflection and personal ownership of sin that Jesus imparts to his followers, each of these movements seeks to externalize blame onto a culpable Other. It is Immigrants or Muslims or Obamacare or Greedy Corporations or Corrupt Wall Street Financiers who are to blame for our problems. But obviously not … Us.

Read and reflect on it all.

Burning the Word of God and All That

1 In the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, this word came to Jeremiah from the LORD: 2“Take a scroll and write on it all the words I have spoken to you concerning Israel, Judah and all the other nations from the time I began speaking to you in the reign of Josiah till now. 3 Perhaps when the people of Judah hear about every disaster I plan to inflict on them, they will each turn from their wicked ways; then I will forgive their wickedness and their sin.” 4 So Jeremiah called Baruch son of Neriah, and while Jeremiah dictated all the words the LORD had spoken to him, Baruch wrote them on the scroll. 5 Then Jeremiah told Baruch, “I am restricted; I am not allowed to go to the LORD’s temple. 6 So you go to the house of the LORD on a day of fasting and read to the people from the scroll the words of the LORD that you wrote as I dictated. Read them to all the people of Judah who come in from their towns. 7 Perhaps they will bring their petition before the LORD and will each turn from their wicked ways, for the anger and wrath pronounced against this people by the LORD are great.” 8 Baruch son of Neriah did everything Jeremiah the prophet told him to do; at the LORD’s temple he read the words of the LORD from the scroll. 9 In the ninth month of the fifth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, a time of fasting before the LORD was proclaimed for all the people in Jerusalem and those who had come from the towns of Judah. 10 From the room of Gemariah son of Shaphan the secretary, which was in the upper courtyard at the entrance of the New Gate of the temple, Baruch read to all the people at the LORD’s temple the words of Jeremiah from the scroll. 11 When Micaiah son of Gemariah, the son of Shaphan, heard all the words of the LORD from the scroll, 12 he went down to the secretary’s room in the royal palace, where all the officials were sitting: Elishama the secretary, Delaiah son of Shemaiah, Elnathan son of Akbor, Gemariah son of Shaphan, Zedekiah son of Hananiah, and all the other officials. 13 After Micaiah told them everything he had heard Baruch read to the people from the scroll, 14 all the officials sent Jehudi son of Nethaniah, the son of Shelemiah, the son of Cushi, to say to Baruch, “Bring the scroll from which you have read to the people and come.” So Baruch son of Neriah went to them with the scroll in his hand. 15 They said to him, “Sit down, please, and read it to us.” So Baruch read it to them. 16 When they heard all these words, they looked at each other in fear and said to Baruch, “We must report all these words to the king.” 17 Then they asked Baruch, “Tell us, how did you come to write all this? Did Jeremiah dictate it?” 18 “Yes,” Baruch replied, “he dictated all these words to me, and I wrote them in ink on the scroll.” 19 Then the officials said to Baruch, “You and Jeremiah, go and hide. Don’t let anyone know where you are.” 20 After they put the scroll in the room of Elishama the secretary, they went to the king in the courtyard and reported everything to him. 21 The king sent Jehudi to get the scroll, and Jehudi brought it from the room of Elishama the secretary and read it to the king and all the officials standing beside him. 22 It was the ninth month and the king was sitting in the winter apartment, with a fire burning in the firepot in front of him. 23Whenever Jehudi had read three or four columns of the scroll, the king cut them off with a scribe’s knife and threw them into the firepot, until the entire scroll was burned in the fire. 24 The king and all his attendants who heard all these words showed no fear, nor did they tear their clothes. 25 Even though Elnathan, Delaiah and Gemariah urged the king not to burn the scroll, he would not listen to them. 26 Instead, the king commanded Jerahmeel, a son of the king, Seraiah son of Azriel and Shelemiah son of Abdeel to arrest Baruch the scribe and Jeremiah the prophet. But the LORD had hidden them.

–Jeremiah 36.1-26 (NIV)

If you care at all about people, you cannot help but be saddened by this story. It is not about those “rotten Israelites.” It is about the failure of human beings to desire a healthy and right relationship with our God so that we can find peace and bring his salt and light to bear on his broken world.

Imagine you are a parent and have an only son on whom you are counting to continue your good family name and reputation. This, of course, requires that your son conduct himself in honorable ways and practice living a virtuous life. But as your son grows up, he refuses to do this. He goes his own way and brings shame and dishonor to your family name. What would you do? How would you react? You might get angry with him and threaten to cut him off from the family. You might try to reason with him in the hope that he will change his ways. Whatever it is you would do, you probably would not consider doing nothing, thereby letting your son go on his merry way to destruction.

If you get this concept, you are getting closer to understanding God’s reaction in this story. We have to remember that the Bible is the story of God’s rescue plan for sinful humanity so that we might find God’s healing and peace. Part of that plan included calling God’s people Israel to be agents of his healing and redemption to a sin-sick and broken world. But Israel was every bit as broken as the people they were called to help God redeem, and so became part of the problem rather than part of the solution. Today’s story is a sad and poignant reminder of that fact.

It is easy to read the story superficially and conclude that God is nothing but an angry ogre, bent on punishing his children. But that is a terrible misreading of the text. Note carefully why God threatens punishment on his people. So that they will turn away from their wickedness (the traditional word for doing this is repent) such as idol worship, practicing unjust economics and politics, and turn back to their God.

Why does God want this? Because he loves his people Israel and wants them to help bring about his healing and redemption. You can’t lead people to God if you are not following God yourself (Christians, listen to this if you have ears to hear!). Just like the wayward son in our hypothetical situation above, so Israel was rejecting God’s call to them to be his people and this can help us better understand God’s anger toward his people.

It’s not about punishment. It’s about healing and redemption. Why is this so hard for us to understand?

But sadly most of God’s people would not listen to his warnings to them spoken through his messengers, the prophets, of whom Jeremiah was an important one. This is powerfully symbolized in King Jehoiachim’s burning of God’s word that had been written on a scroll. Jehoiachim’s audacity is even more remarkable when we remember that the Babylonians, very agents of Judah and Jerusalem’s destruction, were at her gates and laying siege to the city! But the King, the leader of God’s people, would not listen to God’s  warning to him contained in God’s word. Instead Jehoiakim burned them.

You know this story is not going to turn out well, either for Judah’s king or God’s wayward people today.

Again, we miss the point if we do not remember God’s end game. God wants us to be reconciled to him and for us to enjoy life as he intends for us and created us to live. Given that he is our Creator, it follows that God knows better than we do what constitutes real life and happy living. But just as God’s ancient people Israel did, we too are stubborn and refuse to listen.

That is why it is even more remarkable that as the culmination of God’s rescue plan, God did not give up on us. God and his love always remain faithful to us. Instead, God became human and suffered and died on a cross for us, thus bearing his just punishment and wrath himself so that we would not have to. He invites us into a life-giving and healing relationship with him and all we have to do is accept his gracious offer and allow his Spirit to live in us and change us into his very image so that we are Christ-bearers to the world. This means we don’t burn God’s word, we submit to it. We do not try to change God’s word into our image, we are changed by it. We don’t make the Christian life about ourselves, we are changed into the very image of Christ so that we make life about service to him and others, no matter who they are.

This is hard work and requires that we die, or at least the selfish, proud, and hard-hearted parts of us. We are baptized with Christ and buried with him so that we can anticipate being raised with him on the last day to enjoy new resurrection bodies and eternal life living in God’s direct Presence in the new heavens and earth.

In the meantime, we have work to do right here and now, work that involves bringing God’s love in Christ to bear on a broken and hurting world and people. We feed the hungry, heal the sick, and pronounce the Good News of God’s love to people by living changed lives. We imitate Christ in his love and service to others and dare to love folks enough to insist that they not stay in their destructive patterns and habits that can only lead to their death. We aren’t their moral police. We are their encouragers and supporters because we understand they don’t answer to us, but to God.

This is the choice that confronts each of us. Sadly, there are more Jehoiakims in the world than their are saints of God. But that doesn’t stop us from offering Christ to others because we know what it is like to have him in our lives, warts and all, so that we have real faith, hope, and love.

If you are looking for meaning and purpose in your life, start engaging God’s word in Scripture to see what is demanded of you and then start engaging God in prayer for additional support and guidance. As you do, don’t forget to hook up with other faithful Christians so that you can have a human touch to help you when you need it most. It’s the hardest decision you will ever love making. In doing so, you will discover that you are being changed in ways you cannot begin to imagine and given a power that is beyond your own means to transcend anything life in this world throws at you. That, folks, is nothing to sneeze at–or burn.