For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap; he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the Lord in righteousness. (Malachi 3.2b-3)
It is tempting for me, sitting here in Denver, far removed from the conflict over land, water and religion in the Middle East, remembering the stories of suffering I heard from the people of Bethlehem, to read these words and shout……YES! At last, God will bring justice for the Palestinians! God will burn away all impurities….the fear, the hatred, the jealousy….and finally the people of Israel, transformed by God’s scorching love, will treat the Palestinians with justice and with dignity.
But the fiery conflagration Malachi promises is not for the people of Israel. It is for all of us….Jews, Palestinians, Christians, Muslims, Arabs and…..yes, Americans an ocean away.
In God’s own good time, we will all be purified—Israelis, Palestinians, Egyptians, Jordanians, and even Americans. It is my own purification the prophet foretells, God’s own fiery way of turning the world into the creation God intended, with the bounties—the freedom and security—God intended for us all.
The news Malachi tells sounds like hope to all the people who are now suffering—whether it’s having to lift your shirt for the soldiers at the checkpoint at Qalandia, or being unable to get the papers to leave Gaza for chemotherapy, or whether it is losing your baby in the unexpectedly turbulent waters as you flee across our own southern border in search of safety and a full stomach.
Malachi offers hope, but he also foresees pain. Since I’m not one of the hopeless ones, Malachi’s prophecy is a bit terrifying. What will be burned out of me?
Whatever it is, I’m sure it will be painful. If it’s my greediness, then I’ll have to give up admiring those beautiful shoes in the window in Cherry Creek. If it’s my apathy that will be refined in the fire, then I’ll have to give up my hour of Law and Order SVU. If it’s my self-righteous indignation that burns to ash in the flames, then I’ll have to give up feeling superior to everyone. Whatever is burned away, I’m sure to miss it. Or will I?
God’s refining fire promises to make all things new, but, like childbirth, even the most welcome and exciting new things do not come without the pain of change.
Photo: Ruth, one of the Women in Black--Israeli Jewish women who have been protesting the occupation of Palestinian lands at a busy intersection in Jerusalem for 30 years.
What pain would I have to endure for peace in the Middle East? Cheap gas? Admitting that the U.S. does not always have the right answers? That this “Landofthefreehomeofthebrave” has not always lived out its promise? Taking a chance that Palestinians are capable of choosing their own leaders?
God of the cleansing fire, we pray today for the flames that will refine and purify us, making us the people you have created us to be…people formed in your image We ask forgiveness for our selfish, prideful ways and ask you to use us to complete your creation, looking around us to see how we can make your world more like what you intended for us. Amen.
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