Chapter 6: Is There a Balm in Gilead?
Jeremiah’s famous question at a time when it was clear that Jerusalem would fall and the people would be exiled is the same question we ask in the face of persistent illness or a terminal illness.
There is a balm in Gilead, and it is that God in Jesus because the sick person or the dying person. God’s tears mingle with our tears.
“And how do we reach Gilead? Remember, Gilead lies beyond the River Jordan. That’s where God meets us. The waters of the Jordan are made up of the tears of God, blended with the tears of all our grieving. The journey to Gilead crosses that river of tears. It’s the journey we call baptism. That’s what baptism is: being bathed, healed, cleansed, and renewed in the waters that flow from the broken heart of God. That’s the balm in Gilead. The tears of the living God. The tears that make up the water of our baptism. To be baptized in the tears of God: this is the truest balm of all.”
Chapter 7: The Hound of Heaven
“But the truth is the Bible is not fundamentally about us. The Bible is fundamentally about God. And our efforts to translate the truth about God into more or less useful guides for living are never anything other than provisional, and certainly never as tidy as we would like.”
In parable of the lost sheep and of the lost coin, we are not the shepherd or the woman—we are the sheep or the coin. God is the shepherd or the woman. And he relentlessly seeks us.
“God is the hound of heaven who searches us out and knows us; God in Christ is the good shepherd who leaves the ninety-nine to come and find us; God in Christ is the woman who cared so much that she set everything aside to find us, her oh-so-precious lost coin. Faith is not a heroic journey: faith is the acceptance of being found.”
Chapter 8: Speak Tenderly to Jerusalem
The Israelites deserved their fate in Babylon in exile. They had made their own bed and spent 79 years lying in it. Many of us are in exile as well, having done something that we are suffering from and that caused hurt in others and in us. Isaiah’s word to them apples to us as well. “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins” (Isa. 40:1–2)”
What do those words mean to us today?
- We may have caused a lot of hurt. But God will deal with the hurt. “her penalty is paid”.
- We believe that we there is too much distance between us and normal relations that not even God’s forgiveness can get us back. God says that every valley will be lifted up and every hill made low. Don’t worry about the road back.
- We are tired and weak. God will provide the strength. “He give power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless …”
- We are afraid. But God will be with us and when we can’t do it ourselves, he will stoop down and carry us.
“Maybe you’ve been carrying this humiliation, embarrassment, secret, or burden that keeps your head down and your eyes focused on the ground in front of you. You know there’ve been major consequences. But hear this word from God. Comfort ye. You have served your term. Your penalty is paid. It’s over. There may be high mountains and deep valleys between you and where you should be, but every one of those valleys shall be exalted, and every one of those mountains and hills shall be made low, and every crooked path shall be made straight, and the rough places be made plain. God is making a straight way for you, a highway to Zion. You may feel so weak that you feel like grass in the wind, but you will be borne up like an eagle on the wings of God’s Spirit. And God hasn’t utterly forsaken you. God will lead you like a shepherd, and where you can’t find it in you to go further, God will carry you in God’s heart. Feel your body coming back to life—its bones, its flesh, its organs, its limbs, its heart.
Quotes from: Samuel Wells. “Be Not Afraid.” iBooks. https://itun.es/us/_CksC.l