Awkward

That's the only word I could use to describe what is happening in my spirit. My daily devotional time, until now quite orthodox, seems to have taken a turn that prayer seems only to strengthen. New thoughts contrary to my fundamentalist upbringing cause me angst, when I reflect upon what the mainstream church might soon think of me. The thought of using an explanation for the contrast between the Old and the New Testament, as simply an old and a new covenant, seems foreign to the idea of an unchanging God. Perhaps (a word I use too often as I leak out my deepest thoughts) those who framed the Canon intended it as a means of boxing in the church and her colonized nations, and has overly sold us on the thought that each verse was God breathed? I sense danger here, but not from God. Better yet, let me frame the writings I love, as God inspired! Holy men and women must have felt led to capture their God journey as they then saw it. Over time, the scripture then becomes more about the people's response to the God of Israel than a dialogue directly with God, as their words would imply. But imbedded in those words are the undeniable, most convincing mystery of the scriptures, the Word of God. The Old Testament contains a prophetic thread which frames the very moment when the Word became flesh. The sacrifice so intricately detailed in the Old then fully revealed in the Christ of the New. One can hardly argue with the texts that name the very birthplace of the Messiah. The Psalms describe the suffering of his crucifixion. If we dare believe, the story leads us to the moment when on the Hill of the Skull, this gentle lover bore our sins, much like the serpent which Moses hurriedly hung upon a pole. Yet the life, the compassion, the mercy of this God become flesh seems so unlike the God of the Old. As I age and with all respect for my Christian associates, now having served in the "belly of the beast" we call church, under several amazing pastors, I can hardly go to my grave without thinking there is as much more to learn as when this journey first began. We serve a God beyond finding out! No wonder the religious of old found their prophets so revolting and the Christ so unlike the God they had come to know! I find it amazing that their gods required brutal sacrifice, even their own children and at times their first born. Yahweh then identified with their need for sacrifice, but moved their minds from brutality, to that of a first born spotless lamb. God knew from before creation this would be necessary for mankind to escape sin's deep guilt and so God in Christ became that Lamb! Just needed to get that out there! Yes, I love church, but she is far from enough to understand the God who speaks each morning in new wonders!