My sermon on Sunday focused on the passage in Jeremiah in which he addressed the exiles in Babylon. He gives the odd advice that they should \u201cseek the welfare of the city into which you have been exiled for in its welfare you shall find your own welfare.\u201d<\/p>\n
The word \u201cwelfare\u201d is an inadequate translation of the Jewish word \u201cshalom,\u201d which means peace, wholeness, and abundance of life. Jeremiah is calling them to seek those things for the place where they are exiled because, in so doing, they will find shalom in their own lives.<\/p>\n
Today, you and I are exiled in a land where \u201cwelfare\u201d has become a four-letter word. Some of our fellow citizens seem to have an obsessive fear that a poor person, especially a poor person of color, might get some of their tax dollars. The might get \u201cwelfare\u201d that they don\u2019t deserve.<\/p>\n
\u201cSeek the welfare of the city\u201d God commands; that is \u201chelp the city fare well \u2026 be free of need or want.\u201d That is so God. It isn\u2019t about what they deserve, because these people have taken them away from their home.<\/p>\n
This seems, though, to be how Jeremiah believes that the reign of God expands into Babylon. Work for the Reign of God wherever you are, because your full life of abundance can only exist when others live full lives of abundance. How have we missed that in this country?<\/p>\n
The strange part is that we have to fix the meaning of \u201cwelfare\u201d to hear the verse. It means to keep people free of need and want if we want our own lives to fare well and be at peace. As Dr. Seuss said:<\/p>\n
Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,<\/em> By Michael Piazza My sermon on Sunday focused on the passage in Jeremiah in which he addressed the exiles in Babylon. He gives the odd advice that they should \u201cseek the welfare of the city into which you have been exiled for in its welfare you shall find your own welfare.\u201d The word \u201cwelfare\u201d is an inadequate translation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1064,"featured_media":24,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nnothing is going to get better. It\u2019s not.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nCo-Executive Director
\nCenter for Progressive Renewal<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"