Today, we look at a Day 2 text from this year’s summer curriculum, “From Generation to Generation.”
Prayer: Faithful God, blessed are those who put their trust in you. When we take courses that prefer to put matters into our own hands, remind us that only in you do we find the waters of relief amid life’s heat and drought. May we boldly place our trust in you, knowing that you call your people blessed and place them along the stream of life. This we pray through Christ our Lord. Amen. Reading: Jeremiah 17:5-8 (Click to read text) Stop and GROW: After reading the text, discuss/ponder the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Book of Faith questions, which are part of Camp Mount Luther's GROW Time with campers. QUESTION 1: What scares, confuses, challenges, or doesn’t make sense to me in this text? QUESTION 2: What delights me in this text or is my favorite part of the story? QUESTION 3: What stories or memories does this text stir in me? QUESTION 4: What is God up to in this text? Reflection: There was this commercial a few years back that featured a bunch of CGI hamsters rapping Black Sheep’s “The Choice is Yours” in order to sell the 2010 Kia Soul.* I have no idea whatsoever if the commercial helped drive sales for the vehicle itself, but I’ll be darned if I don’t get that track stuck in my head on at least a weekly basis. In the commercial, the refrain of “you can go with this or you can go with that” repeatedly shows how the Kia Soul (this) is better than driving, say, an actual toaster or cardboard box (that). In my head, played ad nauseum, the refrain just spirals any time I have to make some type of binary decision. So when I read the words of the prophet Jeremiah here, it’s no surprise that Black Sheep starts playing in my head as hamsters drive around in neon green vehicles. Blessed or cursed; you can go with this or you can go with that (“the choice is yours!”). On face value, it seems like a choice that I wouldn’t need a group of animated rapping hamsters to help me make. Obviously, I’d want to fall into the group that gets labelled as “blessed are those.” It seems far more desirable to be planted like a tree by water than like a shrub in the desert -- the fate reserved for those who fall under the fate of “cursed are those.” But when push comes to shove, it seems so much easier to go with that -- trusting in mere mortals and making mere flesh the strength -- than to go with this -- trusting in the Lord. When push comes to shove, I know well the temptation to take matters into my own hands, rather than wait for the well-wrought righteousness that comes from God. Yet when I do, it’s only to quickly discover that such a grounding, like a shrub in the desert, provides no relief; before long I’m parched again, having to once again figure out whether to go with this or go with that. If only I’d gone with this -- the placement of trust in the Lord -- from get-go; then I might not be so fearful in the heat or anxious when the next drought of life comes. So you can go with this or you can go with that. But next time, I think I’ll go with this -- God’s nourishing waters of trust-- “cuz this is where it’s at.” -- Justin Lingenfelter * If you’re convinced that this episode must surely only live in my head as a fever dream, see for yourself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4GBJhzfqcU
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