제7차 한중일YMCA 평화포럼(2017.12.16-20), Bible Study 1]
PEACE THAT YMCA DREAMS : “Bring Those Bones Back to Life”
Max Ediger(Interfaith Cooperation Forum)
Lighting the Candle of Justice, Peace and Hope
Imagine….lighting candles, candles that hold the vision of justice, peace and hope.
Imagine….that the vision of the candle lighting starts with you.
Imagine….that you, and you alone, are responsible for keeping the justpeace flame and the hope flame burning within yourself.
Without you, there is no light,
Without you there is no justice, peace and hope on earth.
It is why you were born, to keep the flame of justice, peace and hope burning.
Imagine….all of heave standing with you as you “strike the match”, light the flame and share the vision of justice, peace and hope….
Imagine….
Justpeace is not a thing to possess,
But a way of possessing:
Justpeace is not a gift to be given,
But a way of giving:
Justpeace is not a topic to teach,
But a way of teaching:
Justpeace is not a theory to learn,
But a way of learning:
Justpeace is not an opinion to hold,
But a way of holding:
Justpeace is not a resolution of strife,
But a way of striving:
Justpeace is not a creed to preach,
But a way of preaching:
Justpeace is not a God to serve,
But a way of serving:
Justpeace is not a question to ask,
But a way of asking:
Justpeace is not an answer to seek,
But a way of seeking:
Justpeace is not a journey's end,
But a way of journeying.
Bring Those Bones Back to Life
EZEKIEL 37: 1-14 – (The Message)
God grabbed me. God’s Spirit took me up and set me down in the middle of an open plain strewn with bones. He led me around and among them—a lot of bones! There were bones all over the plain—dry bones, bleached white by the sun.
God said to me, “Can these bones live?”
I said, “God, only you know that.”
God said to me, “Prophesy over these bones: ‘Dry bones, listen to the Message of God!’”
God told the dry bones, “Watch this: I’m bringing the breath of life to you and you’ll come to life. I’ll attach sinews to you, put meat on your bones, cover you with skin, and breathe life into you. You’ll come alive and you’ll realize that I am God!”
I prophesied just as I’d been commanded. As I prophesied, there was a sound and rustling! The bones moved and came together, bone to bone. I kept watching. Sinews formed, then muscles on the bones, then skin stretched over them. But they had no breath in them.
God said to me, “Prophesy to the breath. Prophesy! Tell the breath, ‘God says, Come from the four winds. Come, breath. Breathe on these slain bodies. Breathe life!’”
So I prophesied, just as God commanded me. The breath entered them and they came alive! They stood up on their feet, a huge army.
God said to me, “These bones are the whole house of Israel. Listen to what they’re saying: ‘Our bones are dried up, our hope is gone, there’s nothing left of us.’
“Therefore, prophesy. Tell them, ‘God says: I’ll dig up your graves and bring you out alive—O my people! Then I’ll take you straight to the land of Israel. When I dig up graves and bring you out as my people, you’ll realize that I am God. I’ll breathe my life into you and you’ll live. Then I’ll lead you straight back to your land and you’ll realize that I am God. I’ve said it and I’ll do it. God’s Decree.’”
Today our world is in serious trouble. Conflicts existing on all levels from local to global, evidence a world community rife with fear, suspicion, anger, hostility and inequality that threatens to engulf everyone, including the church, in violence.
Yes, the world is awash in injustice, conflict and violence. But conflicts are not new to our world. The prophet Ezekiel lived when his country folk were facing severe suffering. He prophesied during a time of great confusion following Israel’s exile to Babylon in 597 B.C. A former Judean king, 18-year-old Jehoiachin was among the exiles, and the Babylonians had appointed a puppet king, Jehoiachin’s uncle Zedekiah, to the throne in Jerusalem.
In times of crisis, God sent prophets like Ezekiel to bring his message to his people. Judah’s exile was therefore a period of intense prophetic activity. Jeremiah also prophesied during this time.
Ezekiel’s fellow exiles were his main audience, but his revelations also communicated to people who remained in Judah.
The exiles lived as captives in a foreign country while others waited hopelessly in the homeland for peace and the return of prosperity. All longed for an end to the conflict and the opportunity to return home but most were living without hope, like dry, sun-bleached bones in a dead valley.
The Psalmist described the situation like this: “By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!” How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land?”
They had already been given so many false hopes, and when those hopes failed to bring peace and a return to a peaceful life, they fell even deeper into despair. Their despair filled the dry valley in which God had taken Ezekiel. Ezekiel, too, felt that same sense of despair. “Can these bones really be brought back to life?” Only God knew.
Earlier, in Ezekiel 3, 10-16 the prophet felt a burning anger at the dire situation created by political and religious leaders in the exiled community. Some political leaders assured the people that peace was coming. Peace, they claimed, would soon be made with the king of Babylon and all the captives would be able to return home. The country would once again be strong and rich. The report made the people happy because these were the words of comfort they wanted to hear.
The prophet Ezekiel, however, was not happy with what he saw and heard. His prophecies were a direct challenge to those in power: “You have built a flimsy wall out of stone, sticks and mud and you tell the people this wall will give them security and peace.
Other lesser leaders, perhaps religious leaders, saw that the wall erected by the political leaders made people happy and hopeful so they covered it with more whitewash (false hopes and lies) so that it looked even more beautiful and inspired more confidence.
But when the rain and winds came, the wall simply collapsed because it had no substance. Then the people shouted at the leaders, "Where is the peace you promised to give us?" They sank ever deeper into despair.
In anger, Ezekiel shouted Gods words at these leaders, "You give my people false hopes when you shout peace, peace but there is no peace!"
Many people in our world today also shout peace when there is no peace. They give us false hopes that things are improving through every growing military might, growing GDPs, political promises, development programs that ignore the roots of violence and conflict, and through economic structures that cannot produce security and prosperity for all. Some religious leaders not only nod their heads in agreement but also strongly affirm these false hopes and, with beautifully painted arguments we call whitewash, make that false peace look plausible and probable. They claim their words are inspired by God, but in truth their words are like putting a pile of loose stones or bricks together and throwing some slushy whitewash upon them. When this promise of peace collapses and the whitewash runs into the gutter people will then ask, "What has become of all your promises of peace, assurances of safety and prosperity, your smooth words and plausible arguments, your phony pretenses, and your flattering prophecies?” And the prophet shouts out loudly, “You give my people false hopes. You shout peace, peace, but there is no peace in these frivolous promises.” The prophet Jeremiah echoed these sentiments when he said, “My people are broken—shattered! — And you simply put on band-aids, saying, ‘It’s not so bad. You’ll be just fine.’ But things are not ‘just fine!”
Structures that need to be beautified with whitewash are not built on a foundation of justice for without justice they quickly crumble and decay, driving the people’s despair deeper and deeper. Justice is the key word and in reality, we do not build peace, but rather we transform injustice, and once justice exists in all our economic, political and social relationships, peace can and will be available to all.
In the original Hebrew and Greek, the words used for justice are the same as those generally rendered as “righteousness.” Justice had primarily to do with right conduct in relation to others. In a larger sense justice is not only giving to others their rights, but involves the active duty of establishing their rights.TheologianPaulMarshalldefinesjusticeas,“Rightrelationshipsamongallthingsinthecreatedorderofthings.” So Justice is about living in harmony with all people and with all of God’s creation.
The prophet Amos suggests that living with justice/righteousness is an obligation for those who wish to live in harmony with God. “But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.”
Peace, on the other hand, is a gift from God. “Peace is what I leave with you; it is my own peace that I give you. I do not give it as the world does. Do not be worried and upset; do not be afraid.” However, it is a gift which many are deprived of because of the injustices that surround them. We must transform injustice so this gift from God can flow freely to all people. That is our important task as Christians and as Christian organizations. That must be the foundation of our dream of peace.
Justpeace is, therefore, a peace that emerges as the injustices of the world are transformed and rights are restored for all people. This peace goes beyond simple treaties or contracts. It goes beyond programs that only help people live a bit more comfortably within systems and structures that are oppressive and unjust. It recognizes the history, the culture and the complexity of a conflict and it tries to address each of those creatively and courageously. Justpeace takes into consideration all forms of conflict and injustice, including economic violence, political violence, social violence, cultural violence, gender violence, ethnic violence and military violence. Each of these forms of violence is created by injustice and to create a justpeace these injustices must be transformed.
The challenge from Isaiah is to stop depending on our religious rituals, our constant meetings to discuss hunger and suffering, our hollow words and our loud prayers.
Why this frenzy of sacrifices?” God’s asking. Don’t you think I’ve had my fill of burnt sacrifices, rams and plump grain-fed calves?
Don’t you think I’ve had my fill of blood from bulls, lambs, and goats?
When you come before me, whoever gave you the idea of acting like this, Running here and there, doing this and that—all this sheer commotion in the place provided for worship?
Quit your worship charades. I can’t stand your trivial religious games: Monthly conferences, weekly Sabbaths, special meetings—meetings, meetings, meetings—I can’t stand one more! Meetings for this, meetings for that. I hate them!
You’ve worn me out! I’m sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning.
When you put on your next prayer-performance, I’ll be looking the other way. No matter how long or loud or often you pray, I’ll not be listening.
And do you know why? Because you’ve been tearing people to pieces, and your hands are bloody.
These are very harsh words. I suspect they were not well-received by most. They would not be well received today I am sure.
But the prophet goes on to tell us what God wants. “Learn to do good; seek justice, relieve the oppressed, hold the fatherless, plead for the widow.”
Now, let’s go back to the valley of dry bones for just a moment. Suppose those dry bones are actually a metaphor for the hopes of the people which have been beaten about by the storms of oppression, war, poverty, racism and ethnocentrism for so long that they have become like sun-bleached dead bones in a dry valley. Then Ezekiel might say something to us like this:
God grabbed me. God’s Spirit took me up and set me down in the middle of an open plain strewn with the bones of despair. God led me around and among them—a lot of despair! There was despair all over the plain—like dry bones, bleached white by the sun.
God said to me, “Can hope ever live again?”
I said, “God, only you know that.”
God said to me, “Prophesy over this despair: ‘Despair, listen to the Message of God!’”
God told despair, “Watch this: I’m bringing the breath of life to you and hope will come back to life within you. I’ll attach sinews to you, put meat on your bones, cover you with skin, and breathe life into you. You’ll come alive and you’ll realize that I am God!”
I prophesied just as I’d been commanded. As I prophesied, there was a sound of rustling! The dead hopes moved and came together, hope to hope. I kept watching. Sinews formed, then muscles on the hopes, then skin stretched over them. But they had no breath in them.
God said to me, “Prophesy to the breath of hope. Prophesy! Tell the breath, ‘God says, Come from the four winds. Come, breath. Breathe on these slain bodies. Breathe the life of hope!’”
So I prophesied, just as God commanded me. The breath entered them and hope came alive! Hope rose up, a huge movement for justpeace.
God said to me, “These bones are the hopes of all my people who have suffered so much. Listen to what they’re saying: ‘Our hopes are dried up, our hopes are all gone, there’s nothing left of us. We have given up.’
“Therefore, prophesy. Tell the people, ‘God says: I’ll bring your hopes back to life—O my people! I have given that responsibility to the people who still have love and compassion in their hearts. When they bring your hopes for justpeace back to life, you’ll realize that I am God. I’ll breathe my life into you and you’ll live. Then I’ll lead you straight back to a time of justpeace and you’ll realize that I am God. I’ve said it and I’ll do it. God’s Decree.’”
What does this mean for the YMCAs of the world, and for those of us who stand alongside the YMCAs, holding the same deep dream for justice and peace? I think it means that we have been given a very important and a very heavy responsibility. We must think very critically about what God is asking of us. God has grabbed us and brought us to a valley filled with the dry bones of hopelessness and despair and asked us to prophesy. What can we do to bring hope back to life for those who live in so much misery?
We can sign petitions, we can kneel in prayer, we can write articles, we can march, we can carry out nice and safe community programs, and we can organize meetings, but are these acts enough to transform despair among the oppressed into hope? We are called, I believe, to prophesy to those who use political and religious power, fear, military might, money and whitewash to keep people in despair and hopelessness. Hope can only rise from the valley of despair when we involve ourselves directly with the oppressed, learn from them, share with them, and act together with them for justice. Albert Camus once wrote, “Christians see the poverty, they do not see the machine that produces the poverty.” As Christians with a prophetic vision, we must see the machine, be appalled by it, and we must have the courage to prophecy against it, calling it to repentance and transformation.
Like us, the prophets of old were normal women and men who were called by God to speak truth. Like us, too, they were very human; they experienced fear, some tried to hide from God, others courageously spoke to kings and prime ministers, some wept, some resorted to strange actions to wake up the people and some were killed. But God used each one of them, despite their weaknesses and fears, to confront power and to bring solace to the hopeless. God uses prophets to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable. We must be those prophets and go to the valley of dry bones and despair and bring them back to life with God’s breath of hope, compassion and love.
What is the justpeace that YMCA might dream of?
We must become the prophets of the 21stcentury. We must prophesy to the valley of despair and hopelessness and bring hope and justpeace back to life among the most dejected, rejected and oppressed people of this world. We cannot sit even one day in comfort while they suffer such feelings of despair. We must comfort the afflicted.
We must speak honestly and courageously to those in power who shout “Peace, peace when there is no peace.” Who put bandages on the wounds of the poor and oppressed and say, “It isn’t so bad. You’ll be better soon.” They will not be better soon if they are not brought out of the valley of death and into the life of hope, justice peace and equity. We must afflict the comfortable. We must have the courage to prophecy to the empire.
We need to make a justpeace Covenant among ourselves based on a firm faith and conviction that God is with us and directing us. Such a Covenant is spiritually charged. When Jacob and Laban agreed to keep the peace, they didn’t just say, “I’ll do this, you’ll do that. OK?” They called God as witness. (Genesis 31:50) David and Jonathan called God as witness between them, too. (1 Samuel 20:17) Covenants are taken seriously, and for good reason: two or more people are joining together based on little more than their words. They trust a divine being to hold them accountable. Together we must make this kind of Covenant to work actively for justpeace with God as our witness and as our strength. And to make such a Covenant together, each of us much be firmly anchored in our faith and our commitment to the Covenant.
We must recognize that we are all in this together as one. In a covenant two or more become one and so it must be with us. Paul said, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for all are one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3: 28). Perhaps today Paul would say, “There is neither Japanese nor Korean nor Chinese, there is neither Asian nor American, There is neither black, brown nor white, there is neither female, nor male nor transgender, there is neither Christian, nor Muslim, nor Hindu, nor Buddhist, for all of us are one in the work for God’s justpeace in the world.”
We must prophecy in courage and with faith. Being prophetic is not an easy calling, nor a safe one. Speaking to those in power has many risks. Yet the valley of dry bones is waiting for us and we must always remember that God is with us. A quote from Martin Luther King can fill us with hope that our faith in God is sufficient:
“With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.
“With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nations into a beautiful symphony of brother/sisterhood.
“With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for justpeace together, knowing that we will be free one day to live in harmony as one.”
Adapted from “I have a Dream.
May our prayers be translated into courageous actions that transform despair into hope. May we have the courage to be God’s prophets in this conflicted and dangerous world so that all the valleys of dry bones can once again feel the loving breath of God and no longer fall into despair when the white washed walls of fake promises crumble into muddy stones and sticks. May we be examples of the justpeace the world craves. Let us dream of a peace far beyond the peace the world offers. Be assured, God is with us on this journey. Amen
(https://www.esv.org/resources/esv-global-study-bible/introduction-to-ezekiel/)
Psalms 137: 1-4
Jeremiah 6
From the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia.
Amos 5:24 (RSV)
John 14: 27
Isaiah 1: 10-16
Isaiah 1:17
한중일평화포럼 자료집 보기 (성서연구 포함)
