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Outcry
The One Who Is & Shall Be said to Abraham: “I am sending angels to the place of Violent Fire, to assess the veracity of the people’s cries against it. If their cries are true, I will destroy it.”
Abraham pleaded: “Surely you have more integrity than those who are stoking the Violent Fire. Perhaps you will find fifty or even ten who are still tossing pails of water at the Violent Fire.”
So the One Who Is & Shall Be agreed to search for any relief efforts in the midst of the Violent Fire. When the angels arrived at the place of Violent Fire, Lot offered them shelter, food, drink, and a rag to wash their feet, but he discouraged them from staying more than one night in the place of Violent Fire.
When it became known that Lot had welcomed angels into his home, the Violent Fire raged against him. “Messengers of relief are not welcome in this place,” they shouted. “No knowledge can be allowed except the knowledge of Violent Fire. Send out your angels so we might scorch any hope of reprieve they have to offer.”
Lot went outside to defend his guests, saying, “Isn’t it enough that my whole family resides in the Violent Fire? My daughters grew up in this place; they have chosen husbands from this place. God knows, the Violent Fire will burn them one day.”
But the Violent Fire swelled and sparked: “No judgment against the Fire can be allowed! No hint of relief can be tolerated! If you listen to angels, we cannot tolerate you.” And the Violent Fire rose to consume Lot where he stood with his back to the door.
From inside Lot’s home, the angels reached out their hands and pulled him out of the Violent Fire’s reach. They warned him, “The Violent Fire will not stop until every possible hope of relief has evaporated. We must leave this place of Violent Fire, because the One Who Is & Shall Be cannot nurture life in a place without hope.”
Lot’s family expressed doubt. “It won’t get worse,” said his daughters’ fiancées. “At least the Violent Fire was warm,” said his wife longingly as she looked back over her shoulder. Even Lot said to the angels, “There’s too much to risk if we resettle somewhere new.”
But the One Who Is & Shall Be extinguished the place of Violent Fire. Abraham saw the smoke billowing up from that place and grieved that the angels had found no signs of mercy or hope there.
a retelling of Genesis 18:16 – 19:29
Reminders
“When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between [me] and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” – Genesis 9:16 (NRSV)
The world needs more reminders.
Guns need not just one safety lock but five safety reminders, plus a mandatory essay about violence, before each firing of a single bullet. Bombs need civilian ballot measures that pass by majority vote before being detonated against an enemy. Our emails should come with a tone-check, in addition to a spell-check, that we must review and approve before sending. Our picket fences should be engraved with “borders are a social construct” on every post, lest we forget that no one really “owns” the property on which they live.
We need more reminders that we are interrelated, fewer indicators that we are islands. We need more prompts to slow us down before we cause harm, and fewer restraints that limit us from love.
Make it a bow around the finger or a bow in the sky, but make it something that effectively deters us from destruction. Even God needed such a reminder. How much more humanity?
God set a reminder in the clouds to never again allow flood waters to separate living creatures from God’s presence. Paul expanded the list: It’s not only flood waters that cannot separate us from God; neither can angels or empires, histories or futures, perils or threats, nor anything else imaginable separate us from God.
With this assurance, we must remind ourselves constantly not to be separated from one another either.
Prayer: You remember, O Eternal God, what I too easily forget: that I am not my own, that I am inherently caught up in and bound to all others. Remind me.
cross-posted with the Daily Devotional (ucc.org)
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