Marvellous? (Zechariah 8:6)

 


Wednesday, October 16, 2024


Psalm 105:1-22

Zechariah 7:1-8:8

1 Peter 1:18-2:3


Observance: Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley, bishops and martyrs (d. 1555)


Marvellous? (Zechariah 8:6)


There are several phrases that, when we see them in the Bible, should make us sit up and pay attention. Anything to do with the “Day of the Lord” is one of them; another is when God speaks about when “they shall be my people and I shall be their God”. This second phrase, which, because of its frequency, risks becoming bland to our hearts, is so tremendously deep and rich in what it speaks of, is nothing less than the gospel of Jesus Christ.


We remember way back in Genesis that God would walk through the Garden of Eden in the cool of the afternoon and speak with Adam and Eve about their day. One can imagine the scene: an enchanted place, a place with no evil, our first parents probably bouncing along, joyfully telling their loving Maker about all the wonderful things they had seen and done.


In today’s prophecy we get a similar image, but transported in the future: what would that Edenic scene look like several thousand years after Adam and Eve had been working at fulfilling the command to multiply and fill the earth? Old men and women, sitting at cafes on the street, cradling their walking sticks between their knees as they slurped down something warm and tasty; children laughing and playing in the street before them; and God in and amongst it all, they his people, he their God.


The kind of joy that comes from the free play of children; the peace that comes from watching children play; and the intimacy of a private audience on a cool afternoon stroll through the garden. These are the images God is giving us to describe to us what it means for him to be our God, and we to be his people. And this is both the future we are working towards, and the present moment we are living in, if we were to be but brave enough to reach out and grasp it. “Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor. In your hearts do not think evil of each other.” It seems almost Utopian; but only almost. God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us, and our priest-king Jesus sits on the throne. Have we got a sense of this big picture towards which we are working? Are we chipping away at the edges, administering justice and showing mercy and compassion to one another? Are we giving God the time to be playful and intimate with him?


God of marvellous deeds, fan the flames of your kingdom in our place and time, and work your marvellous deeds amongst us.

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