Village Shepherd

At a recent meeting of the church council, an abusive letter was discussed. The letter had been sent by an officer in a village organisation to the secretary of the church council. The officer had been responsible for organising a concert in church and had been negotiating with the church via the secretary, but the two men had failed to hit it off with each other from the start. Intemperate words had been exchanged, unfortunate actions had followed, and before long a full scale row had developed.

The letter received was full of personal abuse about the secretary and the whole church council agreed that it was unacceptable. The council affirmed their support for the secretary and minuted their abhorrence at the contents of the letter, but were unable to agree which course of action to follow. Half the council was in favour of writing back, clearly stating their dismay at the unacceptable nature of the letter and affirming their utter confidence in the secretary. The other half thought that this would only inflame the situation further and strongly suggested that as Christians, the council should "turn the other cheek." Since this direct Bible reference snatched the high moral ground, this action won the day. A brief note was returned, politely thanking the village officer for his letter but ignoring all his comments.

But in adopting this course of action, the council had also ignored the truth. They assumed that their response was the correct Christian response, but were they right? By not protesting in any way, perhaps they had failed in love, for true love is very tough and must squarely face wrong doing by fearlessly naming it.

We in the Christian church may often find ourselves in a similar dilemma. Should we always avoid unpleasantness by "turning the other cheek" or do we sometimes need to "tell the truth in love"?

In today's lectionary reading from the second book of Samuel, the most interesting part of the reading has been omitted. But those missing verses are difficult and unpleasant and challenge our comfortable views of God. By missing them out, the Christian church is avoiding the truth, even though the ancient Israelites were sufficiently comfortable with the truth to tell it how it was. And by avoiding these few verses, the reading has been changed from something worrying, disturbing and challenging to something bland, easy and boring. So what exactly is this reading about?

David had been crowned king, had settled on Jerusalem as his capital city and for the first time had united the Northern tribes of Israel with the Southern tribes of Judah. Jerusalem at the time was an unimportant city, but it straddled the boundary between the North and the South and thus held a very important strategic position. And as well as all this, David had just defeated the Philistines.

Now he wished to bring the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem, to seal Jerusalem's importance with the presence of God himself. The ark was thought of as the dwelling place of God. It was carried with the Israelites on their wanderings and was brought up from Shiloh to lead the people into battle. But it was captured by the Philistines and immediately the Israelites began to lose their battles with the Philistines. The Ark remained in Philistine hands for seven months, but it wasn't necessarily a comfortable situation. We're told that the people in Beth-shemesh found its presence unbearable after its recapture and it was taken by the people of Kiriathjearim and left in the care of Eleazar where it remained for twenty years.

David took thirty thousand men with him to collect the Ark, and two brothers were selected to drive the cart, one going in front, the other at the side. It was a great occasion, a procession with dancing and songs and lyres and harps and tambourines and castanets and cymbals.

But then something so unpleasant happens that it has been avoided in today's reading. The missing verses say this:

When they came to the threshing floor of Nacon, Uzzah reached out and took hold of the Ark of God because the oxen stumbled. The Lord's anger burned against Uzzah because of his irreverent act; therefore God struck him down and he died there beside the Ark of God. Then David was angry because the Lord's wrath had broken out against Uzzah and to this day that place is called Perez-Uzzah. David was afraid of the Lord that day and said, "How can the Ark of the Lord ever come to me?" He was not willing to take the Ark of the Lord to be with him in the city of David. Instead he took it aside to the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite. The Ark of the Lord remained in the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite for three months, and the Lord blessed him and his entire household.

Since the Gittites were hated foreigners, it would appear that David was quite willing for them to receive a goodly portion of God's wrath. But of course, once David saw that Obed-Edom and his entire household had been blessed by God and not struck down like poor Uzzah, David was quite willing to once again collect the Ark and take it to his capital city, as the remainder of our reading tells us. Nonetheless, David makes very sure to offer plenty of sacrifices, just in case.

We would perhaps, no longer regard a heart attack or other cause of sudden death as a sign of God's wrath, although we might well still say, "Why has this happened to us?" as though God has singled us out for a particularly unpleasant kind of punishment for vague and unknown sins. So perhaps we are still superstitious in the way in which we regard God, as though God can still be unpredictably violent. And perhaps this is why the story has been left out - in case it should rouse in us the fear of God which was prevalent in previous generations. We tend to concentrate now on God's love for human beings, shown supremely in Christ and in Christ's sacrifice for us. So we can gasp with horror at the human cruelty and selfish stupidity of Herod in beheading John the Baptist, but we're not encouraged to view God in the same light.

Perhaps it's for the best that the truth has been avoided, but that avoidance for the sake of our tender consciences, has spoilt a good story.