Part of my Lenten discipline this year is going through The Thoughtful Christian (TTC)“Pausing on the Road to Jerusalem” Bible study and, as part of that, sharing my thoughts with you all based on the Scripture for the week and the study itself. A lot of this is just personal reflection, but I hope that maybe you can gain a little insight into your own faith and how these themes and ideas may apply to you, the larger community, the Christian church, and the world today. Click the following to see my reflections from Week 1, Our Temptations: Part 1 and Part 2. I started this post immediately after doing the study, but then forgot about it (oops!). Thus, it is very short. But worry not, I make up for it in the next four studies ;)
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This week’s study is based on the Luke 13:31-35
31 At that very hour some Pharisees came and said to him, ‘Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.’ 32He said to them, ‘Go and tell that fox for me, “Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work. 33Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed away from Jerusalem.” 34Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! 35See, your house is left to you. And I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when you say, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” ’
Initial Reaction
Upon first reading the passage for this week, I could only say, "whoa"! I'm usually not a fan of taking Scripture out of context and applying it directly to a current situation with very little study, but I immediately thought to my context in Jerusalem and the West Bank/Palestine and, in particular, the recent Christ at the Checkpoint conference held here in Bethlehem. I recently posted on hearing Shane Claiborne speak at the conference. What you may not know, however, is how much flack the conference, its organizers, and speakers got for the event they put on. I recommend reading this very interesting article from Ma'an News, and the 2012 Press Release and conference manifesto. There were charges of speakers being anti-Semitic, anti-Israeli, pro-terrorist, but as someone who both attended and reviewed such claims (in fact, I posted a tweet on Twitter about something Shane Claiborne said received a reply tweet from someone who wanted to claim that Claiborne, a non-violence peace activist, was somehow extremely anti-Semitic and pro-Hitler...which is so far from the truth) I can assure you that the Christ at the Checkpoint conference included various evangelical Christian perspectives (Messianic Jewish and Palestinian Christians alike) and had an overarching theme of non-violent resistance (the images of Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were brought up many times, for what it's worth). Anyway, my main point is that there was certainly an element of people trying to squash the prophetic voice of the Palestinian Christians, who spoke about both the Occupation as well as problems their own churches face. I couldn't help but think of how attempts were made to kill this prophetic voice and stone those who are sent to it (I talked to a couple from the States who were criticized for making the trip over). I'm not saying there aren't things to be criticized about what some of the speakers said, but I am saying that using the same false accusations that all Palestinians are a threat to our safety and therefore have nothing to contribute to the conversation about their own fate and how we live together in this world doesn't seem too Christ-like. Just sayin.
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