Many of us have
had to look on
while someone we
love lingered
for a long time,
waiting and waiting.
Sometimes our
doctors were able
to show their
knowledge
for the whole
person, body and soul.
They were able to
help you see
when it was time
to let your loved one go.
Other doctors
relied exclusively
on the knowledge
they gained in medical school.
That knowledge is
of the physical body,
broken down into
its many parts.
Their sole focus
was on the diseased part,
and healing that
diseased part.
And in that focus,
they lost sight of the person.
They knew the
part,
but didn’t know
the person.
To “know”
something is to take it apart,
and analyze its
different parts
without any
emotion to cloud our objectivity.
Knowledge of
“facts” leads to understanding
how something
works, and how to manipulate it.
To manipulate
something is to control it
to our personal
advantage.
Human knowledge is
about controlling something,
or someone.
Then the LORD
said,
“I have surely
seen the affliction
of my people who
are in Egypt
and have heard
their cry...
I know their
sufferings,
and I have come
down to deliver them.”
First, God
observes the Israelites’ misery.
Then God hears
their moaning and weeping.
And then, God
“knows” their sufferings.
God didn’t know
their sufferings
when he observed
them,
nor when God heard
them.
Human knowledge is
observing and hearing.
But God’s
knowledge is deeper
than sight and
hearing.
God “knows” the
Israelites’ suffering
in the same way
that Adam “knew” Eve.
God’s knowing is
seeing, hearing, and feeling.
For God made all
things and loves all things.
And when God’s
creatures rebel
against their
maker,
they hurt their
maker along with each other.
None of us is God.
None of us can
“know” as God knows.
And that’s a good
thing.
Human beings
cannot bear God's knowledge.
In fact, all of us
have “known”
enough of other
human beings
to sometimes say,
“Enough!”
As it says in
Genesis,
human beings were
made in God’s image.
And the saddest
part of that image
is that we can
choose evil.
We can choose to
ignore the instinct
to act for the
good of others.
We can choose to
ignore our connection
to all living
things,
and act only for
ourselves
at the expense of
other living things.
Yes indeed, the
human race, among all the animals,
is unique.
But here we all
are this Sunday morning,
seeing each other,
hearing each
other,
and in baby steps,
learning to “know” each other.
That is not an
easy thing to do.
“Church” is not an
easy thing to do.
In fact, “church”
may be
the hardest thing
to do,
because to “know”
each other
is to be
vulnerable to each other.
But we who call
ourselves Christ’s Church
are here because
the only thing worse
than hurting each
other
is to live, and
die, alone;
to live, and die,
in our broken parts,
without anyone
ever knowing the whole person;
without anyone
ever knowing us
for who we are.
But the God who
spoke to Moses
from the burning
bush
“knows” us,
“knows” our scars,
and “knows” the
scars we have inflicted.
And God the Son,
with whom we are
walking
on his Way of the
Cross this Lent,
He “knows” all our
scars, and still says,
“Father, forgive
them,
for they know not
what they do.”
No, we don’t
“know” what we do.
But God does, and
still God says,
“I have come down
to deliver them.”
Let us choose to
be “known” by God—
our own scars and
the scars we have inflicted—
And let that be
the first step
to knowing each
other
as God knows us,
and loves us.
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