2 Samuel 23:1-7
Proper 29 (34) "Reign of Christ" - Year B
O how readily we associate our own behavior with the light of the angels of the morning. With us in charge everything will be ordered, secure, and prosperous.
Oh, yeah?
Well, let's play that out a generation. Care to track David's sons? Care to look beyond Solomon to the division of the nation? Care to travel down that line to Exile?
If all that happens to the bright, morning star of David, to whom will it not happen?
How easily we slip from intentions of justice to worthlessness/godlessness. Vigilance, friend, and courage.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/november2003.html
So, who are you? We need to listen to other's perception of us. There will be some truth there. It will give us a clue about who we have been, are, or might yet become.
For this to be most helpful it is good to have some idea that we are fulfilling a meaningful interaction with the other and with a community larger than our immediate community. With this larger perspective we can take other perceptions and not battle them. Sometimes we can even claim them (probably to the consternation of those who were trying to get our goat).
I am who I was born to be. This is a deep truth each of us have access to. When we do connect with it, it is amazing what power is set free within and through us.
Here is an empowering exercise. Stand in front of a proverbial mirror and say aloud, until it is firmly stated, "For this I was born – to testify to wholeness." Stating this truth continues our completion and emboldens us to assist others to arrive at a similar spot for themselves. This is leadership.
- - -
where did I come from
alpha
where am I going
omegaright now I'm between
mu and nu
I am glad to be here
me and youfor this I was born
for this I will die
in the meantime
we enjoy between timeswe are and were
and are yet were-ing
to a new witness
all are loved freelook up and down
jump and kneel
remember and anticipate
amen and amen
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_11_01_archive.html
In looking back, David cuts through the good and absence of good to summarize a road better taken even though it is not In looking back, David cuts through the good and absence of good to summarize a road better taken even though it is not descriptive of his own journey. If you were to look back over your life, what would you distill from it? Would someone who knows you well recognize you in the maxims you see as critical or foundational? Even if your distillation of wisdom doesn't exactly fit your own life, is it generally true over a longer time than your life and in a context of a series of cultures?
It is very tricky to divine meaning from the various journey points of a life. We keep getting caught in in the specifics of what appears to be cause and effect. How do you discern fair governance in David's relationship to Bathsheba and Solomon? Are these details extraneous to some larger picture?
To sharpen your thinking about psychohistory, remember to browse, again or for the first time, Isaac Azimov's Foundation series from 50 years ago. The always intriguing Wikipedia has discerned three disparate responses to the series, which leaves room for yours: "In Learned Optimism, psychologist Martin Seligman identifies the Foundation series as one of the most important influences in his professional life, because of the possibility of predictive sociology based on psychological principles. He also lays claim to the first successful prediction of a major historical (sociological) event, in the 1988 US elections, and he specifically attributes this to a psychological principle; Paul Krugman, winner of the 2008 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, credits the Foundation series with turning his mind to economics, as the closest existing science to psychohistory; and Osama Bin Laden, the leader of the Al Qaeda terrorist organization, may have been influenced by the novel in its formation as a method to expand Islamic fundamentalist influence, even extending to the name 'Al Qaeda', a translation of the word 'Foundation' into Arabic which otherwise has no natural direct counterpart in the language."
How do you see actions in your personal life and the lives of individuals around you limiting the duration of a coming "dark age", to be a sun rising on a foggy day?
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2009_11_01_archive.html
Can one rule over another justly? I expect you know that is an extended oxymoron.
A larger question is how we can assist one another to live justly. This takes the best of each of us, even from those who model simply ruling over others.
If you are looking for an everlasting covenant that orders and secures all things, you’ve mistaken David and Pilate for Jesus. Order and security are ultimately unjust. Just note the ending that those the orderly and security-minded consider to be thorns in their side are summarily thrown aside. Order and security demand G*D to be on their side. No rising up of the youngest or most unexpected will be allowed.
On this culmination of a year’s work toward being a bit more whole, we have a passage that warns rather than congratulates us. David is putting the best spin he can on his short time as king, but it can’t cover-up the disaster to come or the difficulties so easily forgotten. This spin doesn’t bring a webbed marvel, but only dizziness for being so out of touch with our realties.
May you imagine a much better covenant than order and security even if it breaks your heart at being so distant.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2012/11/2-samuel-231-7.html