Genesis 35:1-15
The word “defile” figured prominently in the preceding episode. Now we find the word “purify.” The challenge to Jacob and his family is that they are living in a land among people with many gods. They are neither to annihilate the people and/or their gods (even if they could), nor be assimilated by them. So the answer is a matter of purification. This, together with the note about changing clothes, anticipates the Christian practice of baptism, which signals the Christian’s new life even while we are “pilgrims in this barren land” as an old hymn says. We find the clothing language in a Christian living context in Ephesians 4:22-24 and Colossians 3:12-14.
And for Jacob the name change announced earlier is reiterated and the promise of blessing renewed.
Prayer:
Lord, you purify me with your Spirit and your forgiveness, and yet I am no better than others. Shield me with your purifying powers from the degenerating ways and attitudes of the world, even while I bear no disdain for those engulfed by those ways. Fill me and all of us only with compassion, a grace-filled obsession to communicate in any and every way and with all our energy and all the resources we can muster that there is a better way, readily available for all. In and through Christ. Amen.
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Communicate in every way? In the last passage, they communicated with violence, revenge, deceit. I'm tempted to get lost in circles of the media being the message.
I like our singing and praying and listening to sermons at Knox. I watch people, and consider how and what they are communicating through their behaviours. I raise an eyebrow at my own.
The first principal of Scarborough Campus, U of T, thought the University would be better represented without buildings - instead we would have large trees and students would gather with teachers in these shaded spots and communicate their ideas.
I sometimes long for that in our large and looming Church.
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