the Third Monday of Advent
Scripture Reading for Today:
Isaiah 11:1-9
11 A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. 2 The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him— the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of might, the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the Lord— 3 and he will delight in the fear of the Lord. He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes, or decide by what he hears with his ears; 4 but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. 5 Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist. 6 The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. 7 The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. 8 The infant will play near the cobra’s den, and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest. 9 They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Numbers 16:1-19
16 Korah son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, and certain Reubenites—Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab, and On son of Peleth—became insolent 2 and rose up against Moses. With them were 250 Israelite men, well-known community leaders who had been appointed members of the council. 3 They came as a group to oppose Moses and Aaron and said to them, “You have gone too far! The whole community is holy, every one of them, and the Lord is with them. Why then do you set yourselves above the Lord’s assembly?” 4 When Moses heard this, he fell facedown. 5 Then he said to Korah and all his followers: “In the morning the Lord will show who belongs to him and who is holy, and he will have that person come near him. The man he chooses he will cause to come near him. 6 You, Korah, and all your followers are to do this: Take censers 7 and tomorrow put burning coals and incense in them before the Lord. The man the Lord chooses will be the one who is holy. You Levites have gone too far!” 8 Moses also said to Korah, “Now listen, you Levites! 9 Isn’t it enough for you that the God of Israel has separated you from the rest of the Israelite community and brought you near himself to do the work at the Lord’s tabernacle and to stand before the community and minister to them? 10 He has brought you and all your fellow Levites near himself, but now you are trying to get the priesthood too. 11 It is against the Lord that you and all your followers have banded together. Who is Aaron that you should grumble against him?” 12 Then Moses summoned Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab. But they said, “We will not come! 13 Isn’t it enough that you have brought us up out of a land flowing with milk and honey to kill us in the wilderness? And now you also want to lord it over us! 14 Moreover, you haven’t brought us into a land flowing with milk and honey or given us an inheritance of fields and vineyards. Do you want to treat these men like slaves? No, we will not come!” 15 Then Moses became very angry and said to the Lord, “Do not accept their offering. I have not taken so much as a donkey from them, nor have I wronged any of them.” 16 Moses said to Korah, “You and all your followers are to appear before the Lord tomorrow—you and they and Aaron. 17 Each man is to take his censer and put incense in it—250 censers in all—and present it before the Lord. You and Aaron are to present your censers also.” 18 So each of them took his censer, put burning coals and incense in it, and stood with Moses and Aaron at the entrance to the tent of meeting. 19 When Korah had gathered all his followers in opposition to them at the entrance to the tent of meeting, the glory of the Lord appeared to the entire assembly.
Hebrews 13:7-17
7 Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. 8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. 9 Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings. It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by eating ceremonial foods, which is of no benefit to those who do so. 10 We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat. 11 The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. 12 And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood. 13 Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore. 14 For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come. 15 Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name. 16 And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased. 17 Have confidence in your leaders and submit to their authority, because they keep watch over you as those who must give an account. Do this so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no benefit to you.
NIV
A Little Vindication, Please?
Leanne Friesen has been the Lead Pastor of Mount Hamilton Baptist Church for sixteen years. She is also a writer and a frequent speaker at conferences and retreats around the country. Besides her general work at leannefriesen.com, Leanne also hosts the Instagram page "grieving.room" where she seeks to create space to process loss for grievers and those who want to support them.
I’m gonna just say this flat out: I felt a leetle bit of excitement when I read the first reading from Numbers today.
I know that doesn’t make me look good. I know that this is one of those stories that we are supposed to struggle with in Scripture, and I promise that I do. If you read to the end of the chapter in Numbers 16, you see that there was a reason that God warned Moses and Aaron to take a step back from their accusers. We see Moses making a declaration: If his accusers die a natural death, then Moses is not from God. But, if something unnatural happens, such as, say, the earth opening up and swallowing the men, then that will show God is with Moses. And then the earth opens! It swallows the naysayers, and all their households - even their possessions.
Yes, I do find this story a hard one. This vengeful God can make me a bit uncomfortable. I am not so much a fan of the reality that innocent women, children, and animals were swallowed up in this group. It’s not an easy text.
But, like I said, there’s that small piece of me that finds this story a teeny bit titillating. It’s not a nice piece of me. It’s the piece of me that has felt like Moses has in this story – the part of me that has been weary with people who have charged that I am a bad pastor, a bad person, or an ungodly leader. Which has happened. In my sixteen years as a pastor, people have left our congregation, and sometimes their reason has been that I do not lead well. And sometimes, it really hurts.
Many years ago, we had a woman attend our church who I will call Jane. Jane was in her eighties and she and her husband Mark had moved to our congregation as seniors after attending a small community church in another part of the city for years. Mark died shortly after I started at the church. His was my very first funeral, and after that, I spent a lot of time with the family. I can honestly say that I visited Jane more than any other person in my time as a pastor. She was a lonely widow, I was new to pastoring and I had been raised with a strong theology of the importance of the pastoral visit. Our church was relatively small and I felt a special connection to her. I was happy to visit often.
Then I went on a parental leave with my second child. When I had my first child, I continued to visit Jane, maternity leave or not. But it was too difficult when my daughter came along, with a toddler also to manage. Plus - you know - I was on leave.
When I came back from my time away a woman from our church gave me a call. She had been to see Jane, who wanted me to know that I was never to come to visit her again. She did not want me to do her funeral when the time came. Why? Because I “never visited her.” The congregant fully understood that I was on leave and tried to explain this to Jane, to no avail. After years and years of supporting Jane and her family, I was completely shut out, villainized, declared a terrible pastor and selfish human being. Jane died a few months later.
The part of me that likes the story from Numbers is that part of me that felt hurt by Jane. It’s the part that wanted the chance to say to her: “This isn’t fair!” “You are wrong about me!” “I visited you a lot!!!” It is the part of me that loves the idea of a little vindication, a moment when God will make clear to the Janes and all the others who have criticized me that I did my best. I’m not saying I want God to swallow Jane and others like her up whole...but a little voice from the clouds saying “Yes, Jane, she visited you often and you are being unreasonable” would be nice.
My guess is that many of us reading that story today can empathize at least a little with this feeling. You don’t have to be a pastor or a leader like Moses to know the feeling of wanting to be proven right. At some point in our lives, most of us want justification. Many of us may have felt this with particular intensity in the last twenty months. Perhaps we have thought “I can’t wait for my Uncle to see that I was right about vaccines!” or “When is my friend going to see she has been so wrong about her COVID theories?” It’s why we share those articles on social media that we secretly hope “that” person will read and finally agree that we are right.
So I was reading Numbers and feeling that ugly part of me bask in the glow of the hope of retribution. And then I turned to the reading in Isaiah. And I saw the rest of the story.
Wolves living with lambs. Leopards with goats, calves and lions lying together.
Yes, it says the wicked will be slain. But here we see a glimpse of God’s big story - the story whose ultimate goal is not retribution, but healing. The story that works towards peace. The story that comes to completion not with vindication for the one who is right over the one who is wrong, but with all gathering together peacefully in a place of rest - and the most unlikely enemies coming together.
As I read the Isaiah passage, I felt the goodness of that story. I felt the goodness of peace, which felt far better than the temporary excitement of vindication. Sure, there are moments when I think how satisfying it would be for God to play a reel for Jane of all my visits with her, of a moment in eternity when I would get to say “See??? I was not a bad pastor!” But what is far more beautiful for me is the thought of a joyful reunion with Jane when all our hard feelings will disappear. That is the hope of us all living in tension: not being proven right, but receiving the gift of peace between us and those with whom we struggled the most. That is the story to which God is working, even in that ugly moment in the desert when God needed to protect his people from harm to make space for His big story to continue.
If you long for vindication in some area of your life today, I get it. Being misunderstood and mislabelled is hard. May the promise of a day when peace will reign comfort your weary heart.
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