Quite a lot happens in this couple of chapters, and a lot of the emergent themes seem to be similar to those already observed.  Even so, it's worth a bit of a ponder.

God's self-limitation

At the start of the chapter, God tells Moses that the people are to go to the land they have been promised "but I will not go up among you, or I would consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people."

This is intriguing.  God seems to caught in something of a bind... there is a promise that will not (cannot?) be rescinded and a reality that the nature of the people is such that God would be driven to destroy them.

I'm not sure what to make of this - and neither, it seems is Moses.  The people on hearing the news are devastated and respond by removing all the ornaments they had been wearing up until that point.

Some people when they seek to make sense of the 'Cross Event' speak of God's hands being bound in love... that God's nature somehow precludes God from intervening.  In this story, God's instinct seems to be to destroy, but love means that God exercises restraint, even though some consequences are inevitable.  I'm sure someone, somewhere has written about this, and I probably ought to go and research it a bit more.

As to a Friend

We are told that God would speak to Moses 'as to a friend', a truly intimate relationship.  How do we speak with our friends?  What sorts of things do we discuss, what emotions do we express, how do we handle disagreements and fall outs?

This seems very different from the 'chummy' language sometimes used in songs and prayers that we may fear trivialises worship or our view of God, it's not about the forms of words, but the depth of relationship.

If God, or Jesus, or the Holy Spirit, really are as friends to me, then presumably they will know my secrets, my fears, my hopes, my regrets, my yearnings... They will speak truth to me, even if it is not what I want to hear, but they will do so motivated by love, for my best interests, to enable me to fulfil my potential.

Friendships are not all the same, some last a lifetime, others years or months.  Some are very deep, others are more superficial.  Pretty much all have their roots in a shared experience or common interest.  So I find myself wondering about the nature of my own "friendship" with God/Jesus/Holy Spirit, and how well or badly I tend it.

Do I open myself to God as to a trusted friend? Do I hear from God as from a trusted friend?  Would anyone ever say of me that I am "a friend of God"?

Glimpsing God's Back

Moses wants to see God face to face, but God says no.  Instead he is granted a glimspe of God's back.  Theologian Paul Fiddes in one of his many excellent books (probably Tracks and Traces, I'm not sure) speaks of catching a glimspe of the back of a God who has just passed by.  As I recall it, he is noting that it is often only afterwards, when God has 'just passed by', that we glimspe any hint of God's presence.

It is an image that I have found comforting and encouraging over many years, and not in any way contradictory to other ideas or images of a God who is either omnipresent, immanent or transcendent.  Sometimes there can be a sense that there is God's back, glimsped ahead of me, heading onwards, inviting me to follow, if I will... and assuring me that every step of the path I walk has already been trodden.

When churches face challenges, especially stepping into the unknown, such an image, such a promise is, I hope, comforting too.

Shining Countenance

Moses comes back down the mountain after another very long time (40 days and nights) with newly engraved copies of the commandments (a, somewhat bizarre, selection of which are reiterated in the narrative) and his face shines, so much so that the people are afraid.

Every now and then I see people whose faces seem to glow, to have a quality not physical but transcendent.  The new bride or bridegroom; the baptismal candidate, still dripping wet; the person who shows off their engagement ring; the new father holding his child... Fleeting, ephemeral, incapable of being captured in a photo there is something 'extra' going on here.  Was it something like this that the people saw?

It's hard to read this story and not think of the Tranfiguration and the way that the disicples reacted to the 'whiter than white' Jesus chatting to Moses and Elijah.  I am reminded of the lure of the mountain top experience, the yearning to extend, even perpetuate the moment, and the absolute impossibility of so doing (elsewhere we will read of Moses' face fading).  The preacher at my ordination reminded us of the necessity of moving between the 'mountain' and the 'plain' and he was surely right.  Easy to crave the mountain in the routine of the plain, but maybe I need ro remind myself that to attain the mountain top first comes the steep climb, and then the equally step descent back to routine.

A bit of a bitty passage, but lots in it for me to ponder especially about divine self-limitation.

I wonder what, if anything has resonated for anyone else?

When spending time on social media (a habit I need to reign in before my return to work) a friend had posted this photo.

It's a poem my Dad used to quote quite often (along with Kipling's 'If') when we were growing up.  At the time, I never stopped to consider why these poems and not others, I just enjoyed the sound of them and the determination and encouragement they evoked.  As an adult they have, when recalled, been a source of comfort and encouragement during (now long past) struggles.

Everyone needs a bit if encouragement now and then.  Most people probably have moments when they feel like throwing in the towel and quitting.  I'm sharing this partly as a memory, and partly because maybe there is someone reading this stuff who needs to be enouraged to "keep on keeping on"

Among the various things I've been doing with my time during this convalescent period is to begin knitting garments for "fish 'n' chips babies" in Africa.  If you search online you can find out more, and even download a pattern if you fancy giving it a go.  The project began as a response to a terribly sad situation where tiny babies born with HIV/AIDS would be wrapped in newspaper to keep them warm for the very short time they would live.  The wrapping in newspaper, effective, practical and cheap, earned them the name "fish 'n' chips babies".  People, on discovering this, were moved to knit simply garments that would keep these babies warm, and communicate a message of love and worth however short their lives... These would be the only garment the child would ever possess.  Times have moved on, and there are evidently less of these very tiny babies, but the need to for warm clothes remains, and the simple 'jumpers' and 'beannie hats' are gladly received.

As I knitted, I found myself recalling how the two former Liverpool bishops, Warlock and Shepherd, were often referred to as the "fish 'n' chips bishops" - always together and seldom out of the newspapers.  This brought a smile, as I remembered the united walks of witness between the two cathedrals - and the endless singing of "Halle, halle, halle, lu-u-yah" - as a crowd composed of local people, curious onlookers and angry objecters lined the streets.

And then I recalled something else about things that appear in the newspapers... read today, round the fish 'n' chips tomorrow, forgotten the next day.  As one of life's worriers, or at least an over-reflector, I am reninded that I will still be mulling over my actual or perceived failings long after everyone else has forgotten them.  Which is a tad daft, because I never dwell on those I perceive in others.

Nowadays in the UK, fish 'n' chips are wrapped in clean off-white paper, health and safety having long since deemed newspaper too grubby.  Perhaps somewhere in this is a metaphor worth pondering...

Only one chapter today because of my weird thing about even numbers, or at equal proprotions or whatever it is... just be grateful it's not catching!  For all that it's a l-o-n-g post.

We've just spent time with Moses up the mountain with Joshua nearby.  Moses has a huge list of rules and regulations and instructions for the creation of the tabernacle and the ordination of the priests.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Moses has been gone for such a long time that the people wonder if he will ever come back.  There is no sign of him returning, and he has given no clue of how long he will be.  Perhaps it isn't so surprising that the people become restless and start to question the status quo.

Open-ended waiting is hard; having leaders who assure you that all will be well and yet nothing seems to change can be frustrating.  The people have left the familiarity, and remembered comparative comfort, of Egypt, have travelled a long way, faced some challenges and now feel well and truly let down.

Looking back, I am sure there were times when the good people of Dibley wondered what we at, as it took seemingly forever to get planning consent, and then even longer to sell the site where worship had been conducted for over a century.   There were a few who vocalised disquiet but the majority stoically got on with things, trusting God, and trusting the team charged with overseeing this, and trusting the professional advisers.  Did we get all of it right?  Of course not.  But we never faced the situation Moses did when he came back from the mountain.

Chaos and a Calf

The description we have is a sorry one.  Aaron (and the elders) seem to have allowed things to get out of control, perhaps adding to the frustration of the people.  Perhaps the response to their request to make them a god is the result of an attempt to regain favour.  Certainly the people seem to be unified in their endeavour, hand over their gold and Aaron makes for them a calf to be their God.  With some slightly confusing language about 'gods', Aaron then instigates "a festival to the LORD" which finds expression in sacrifices before the calf and a good deal of revelling.

I suppose what this makes me wonder is what alternatives are attractive to use when we grow frustrated or impatient with church or with God?  And perhaps for my own role, what I my learn from the story... in what ways might I be like, or be tempted to be like, Aaron?

Meanwhile, back on the Mountain... Does God's Mind Change?

Events on the plain are not hidden from God on the mountain - God sees, hears, smells, etc. and is raging mad.  So much so that God declares a desire to exterminate the entire population apart from Moses.  Moses, however, will still found a great nation (how or what that might have been, we'll never know).

Moses is horrified and pleads with God to spare the people.  There are two strands to the argument:

• how will it look to the Egyptians if you do this?
• what about your promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob?

And, we are told, God's mind is changed.

Do we ever speak to God like this?  Do we ever look around and wonder what other faiths or other people groups will think about the God we claim to worship?  How much of what is perceived is about the nature of God (as we understand and claim it to be), or the image of God that our attitudes and actions portray?  Do people look at us and think, "well I'm not wanting anything to do with a God like that!"

Do we ever find ourselves reminding God of God's own promises?  Not in the twee way I sometimes hear along the lines of "Lord have said in such and such a book, chapter X and verse Y that..." but the big promises of God, the eschatological hope towards which we direct our lives in the present?  And if so, what difference do we think that makes, to God or to us?

Does God's mind change?  Scriptures tell us it does, or that it can be if the cirucmstances are right (remember the pleading over Sodom and Gomorrah?).  And if we think God's mind can change, usually it seems from a position of anger, vengeance and judgement to one of compassion, forgiveness and redemption, then what does that say to us?  I wonder who are the people, or people groups we consider to be under divine judgement and for whom we should cry to God to change God's mind?  I wonder too, what it might mean if we dared to believe that God's mind has been changed about those who the scriptures identify as cursed or damned...

Strong stuff!

Human Anger...

It is striking, I think, that having persuaded God not to destroy the people, Moses finds himself so utterly furious that he casts down and breaks the stone tablets he has carefully carried down the mountain.  Striking, and perhaps resonant... Sometimes I can 'do' the right thing and be professional and calm and rational in one context only to find myself exploding in another.  Sometimes it is easy to forgive at a universal, largely hypothetical level, and really hard to do so at a local, personal level.

Moses gets mad and stamps his feet.  So, sometimes do I.  So, sometimes do we all.  Even when we've asked God to be merciful and forgiving.

Perhaps the challenge, for me at least, is to reflect on the nature and purpose of such anger as I experience... what causes it, is it justified and what am I going to do about it, consistent with my faith claims.  Are there (and there are) big issues that raise my ire that I ought to be more active in pursuing?  Are there aspects of my reaction to small things (and I'm sure there are) that I need to address to make them more healthy?

Who is on the Lord's Side...?

Moses asks this question and the levites say "we are".  What happens next is horrific.  As demonstration of thier commitment they are sent to kill family members and friends. 

I can't find anything positive to say about such an action, and yet even as I type this stream of consciousness stuff, I find myself recalling words of Jesus "If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters--yes, even their own life--such a person cannot be my disciple." (Luke 14:26).

If we believe the words of Jesus to be true, then we still have a jealous God who expects to be Number 1 in our lives.  If we are not to 'hate' our loved ones (and let's face it, we are in fact called to love everyone) then still we are expected to put our discipleship first.

I do struggle with this, because I see family and community as gifts of God and vocations in their own right.  I struggle because I know all too many families where working for a church has damaged or destroyed relationships.  I know too many people my own age whose parents were out every night doing good work, arguably Godly work, who now never cross the threshold of a church.  I sturggle because looking back over my own life, I have often been so busy with church or Girls' brigade stuff that I have neglected family and other relationships.

Who is on the Lord's side?  Jesus also told us that no-one sets out to build a tower without counting the cost, or goes into battle before they are confident of victory.  Perhaps it is useful to remind myself of this, that disicpleship is costly, demanding, slometimes disappointing, sometimes dispiriting, and that I might not always like what it means... and only then to rededicate myself afresh to be 'on the Lord's side' not killing, maiming or destroying those close to me, but at the same time recognising that sometimes there will betough calls to make.

It Wisnae Me

This is an intense and troubling chapter, so perhaps we need just a tiny bit of levity.  When Aaron is challenged by Moses about the making of the golden calf he lies in a way that is as funny as it is ridiculous... he lemted down the gold and out popped this golden calf.  Aye right.

The dog ate my homework... or the one my Dad evidently once said, "the pigeon frightened the coal hammer" (the context of which is lost in the mists of time)... or as someone once said to my English teacher, "my Mum sold my homework at a tupperware party"....  Excuses and lies that are risible and yet can disarm a heated situation... My Dad always claimed he escaped punishment for whatever misdemeanour it was because his own father fell about laughing; certainly the entire English class was in tucks at the idea of an essay on Shakespeare being sold at a tupperware party.

Sometimes I am told that I am too honest, that I say things that would be better left unsaid.  Sometimes my best endeavours fall way short of what I'd hope.  For personal and historical reasons, I am really uncomfortable with lies and half-truths, even when they are ostensibly 'white' or good'.  I get it at a head level but not at a heart level.  Sometimes, too, I need to learn not to take myself quite so seriously!

Not sure this goes anywhere, but let's just enjoy the ridiculous image of a golden calf leaping from the flames surrounding the melting pot..!

That's a lot of stuff from one rather troubling chapter, and I've missed quite a few bits.  Maybe, just maybe, there is something worth pondering in these ramblings.  Maybe if you read/have read the chapter you will find other things to ponder too.

This week one of the tasks I've set myself is to create a "memory book" for my Mum who has recently being diagnosed with dementia.  Photos not of high days and holidays, though there are a few of those, but mainly just snaps of family members through the years which can, hopefully, act as a prompt for conversations and, when memory eventually fails and we become as strangers, she will look at our photos and recall her middle-aged children.

The grainy black and white photo above was taken by one of my brothers aged about 7 on a little kodak brownie 127 camera.  My parents are stiting on the grass outside the 'Old Rectory' where we lived in one of two large four bedroomed flats.  In the background is the parish church where we would go on Mothers' Day afternoon for a children's service and return clutching posies of spring flowers (the rest of the time we went to the Methodist Sunday School).  I hope that by looking at the photo - and others - my Mum will be able recall days gone by... and I hope too that the majority at least of the memories stirred are good ones.

It's strange the things that this photo prompts in my memory, from the crunch of the gravel, to rain coming in through the walls, to the nights we sat around listening to stories before bed, to grazed knees and the smell of germolene, to the roses in the garden and the yew tree we climbed when no-one was looking.  Definitely a rose-tinted list there, but mostly the time at this house was, for me, happy, and it's good to remember.