I stumbled along the path in front of me as the night
closed in on both sides. I can’t remember a night before or since being so black:
holding out my hand in front of me, it disappeared into the darkness. I
wondered where all the stars had gone. It occurred to me that if I stepped off
the path now, I might disappear into the Canadian shied forever. I was at a
chaplaincy retreat in a rural retreat centre and my cabin was unusually far
from the main camp. I stopped, alone on the path, wondering what to do next. I
couldn’t keep going this way, unable to see a thing in front of me. Salvation
came in the form of my cellphone. The light was tiny and dim, but it was just
enough to get me safely back to the cabin. In the morning, as the sun shone on
the path as I walked back to camp, I had to laugh at myself for being so
worried the night before. The path was so obvious in the sunlight!
This morning the Israelites find themselves stumbling
through a similar darkness, wondering where God has gotten off to and how they
can possibly reach their destination without his light guiding them. They have
made the journey through the wilderness from exile in Babylon back to Israel, and
after years of hard work, they have finished rebuilding their temple. But they
remain under the control of the Persians, a fierce nation that was strong enough
even to overthrow Babylon.
The Persians encouraged the returning Israelites to
rebuild their temple, but it seemed to always be on Persian terms. The
Israelites could have a sanctuary, but not a watchtower; an overseer but not a
full order of priests. For decades the Israelites had been dreaming of the day
they would return to their homeland, when their independence would be restored
and God would be their king. They
dreamed of the days of Jubilee, when the poor would be treated fairly and they
could earn a living wage without having to give half of it back to the Persians
in taxes.
But that day didn’t seem to be coming. It seemed to be
a lost dream, because even though they’d finally returned to their hometown,
things weren’t much better than they’d been in Babylon. There were still orphans
living in the streets, single moms forced to work as prostitutes, warlords
keeping an eye on everyone and taking the best of everything. “Where on earth
is God??” They wondered. “Has he abandoned us here? Whatever happened to the
“God of justice” who’s supposed to be always with us?” They seemed to be living in-between-times: between the glory days
when the temple was full of laughing children and groups of young men studying Torah;
and the promised future, when God’s messenger would come to restore his people
and his temple.
When they were honest, though, the Israelites had to
admit that they contributed to the problem about as much as the Persians did.
They got tired of waiting for God to deal with the Persians, so they developed
a few of their own strategies: just a little dishonest deal here, skipping the
temple tithe there; cutting corners on the way of life God required of them
just to get ahead a little. Living in between the glory of the temple’s past
and the glory of its future seemed like wandering in the darkness, hoping for a
little light to lead the way.
2400 years later, we once again find ourselves wandering
between times. The Church in Canada, once filled with laughing children and
curious youth, is closing more doors every week. We find ourselves longing for
the days when our buildings were the hub of the community, brimming with
activity seven days a week. A couple weeks ago I went on a tour of a church just up the street and heard stories about the 20’s and 30’s when
there were 1500 people on the parish list and 200 teachers in the Sunday
school. The parishioners filled the neighbourhood, and the needs of the
community were the needs of the parish.
Yet by 1940, war brought exile to the community and
just as the Israelites were sent off to Babylon, the young men of the parish
were sent across the ocean to fight in Europe. When the war was finally over, the
parishioners began moving to the suburbs and leaving the old church behind. The
parish entered a long, dark, in-between time, when they longed for the days of
the past and wondered what the days of the future would bring. As the
neighbourhood became filled with poverty and violence, some people even
ventured to ask the question others were thinking, the same one asked by the
Israelites: “Where is the God of justice we keep hearing about?”
“But look!” Malachi says to the Israelites, “God has
not forgotten you! During these times of darkness and uncertainty God
strengthens you and leads you by a small but strong light- his promise to be
faithful."
Malachi goes on to remind the Israelites of what God’s
faithfulness looks like- God will send his messenger; the purity of temple
worship will be restored; justice will reign (though it will not be easy,
especially for the oppressors). But a prophet’s primary concern is never what
is going to happen in the future. Malachi’s main point is to show his people
that God’s promise to be faithful is light enough to guide them today, through the darkest valley and
the most uncertain times.
Since the beginning, Israel’s relationship with God
has been based upon God’s promise of faithfulness. He makes promises to care
for them, to go ahead of them, to provide for them- all that is asked of Israel
in return is that she remain faithful, trusting that God’s promises will carry
her through.
In the book of Malachi we have reached the end of the
Old Testament, and God’s promises of faithfulness will have to be enough to
carry the people through for four hundred
years, until Jesus is presented in the temple as the light of the world
they’ve been waiting for. In the promise of the coming messiah, God takes hold of his people and does not let
them go. For four hundred years they will be without another prophet,
struggling to defend their temple, living in oppression under one foreign power
after another. But they cling to God’s promise to restore Israel, knowing that it
is enough. And even when they forget,
complaining against God and taking matters into their own hands, God carries
them through by those same promises as they move toward the coming messiah.
Today we celebrate the dedication of the baby Jesus in
the temple, the light of the world long awaited by the people of Israel. But now
we also find ourselves in a strange
in-between time, wondering when Christ will return in glory to establish the
kingdom of justice and mercy long ago promised to us. Sometimes we even dare to
ask one another, “Where is the God of justice?”
The good news is that today the prophet Malachi comes
to us to proclaim the same hope as he brought to the Israelites long ago. We
have often heard that God is a God of covenant, which means that God
communicates and sustains his people through his promises. The ancient feast of
lights or candlemas, which we celebrate today with the presentation of Christ
in the temple, is really a celebration of God’s faithfulness- his promise-keeping.
God does not leave us alone in the uncertainty of the
future, but promises to carry us safely into the future just as he brought
Israel through her uncertainty. “I will never leave you and I will never
forsake you” he tells us in Joshua, “and I have plans to give you hope and a
future” he promises to Jeremiah. Malachi reminds us that while the journey into
the future we hope for is not an easy one, God’s justice will purify and refine
us into the community we’ve been called to be.
So now that God has made the promise to bring us into
the future and to care for us along the way, we are given the same choice as
the Israelites. We can take hold of God’s promises and engage them, or we can
sit back and wait for them to happen. As we wait for the promised messenger to
arrive so that justice can be established, we learn that God’s promises are
messengers for the in-between times. One way that we take hold of God’s promise
to be faithful is by stepping out into an uncertain future by trusting in the
God who promises to go there with us. The light of God’s faithfulness doesn’t
promise to show us the entire path back to the camp; but it is enough to keep
us going, trusting in the one who calls us to new adventures during these
in-between times. And just as Israel grew and changed, learning more about
herself and about God in the journey between Malachi and Jesus, may we also
grow and be changed into God’s likeness.
