Morning Musing: Exodus 22:22-24

“You must not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. If you do mistreat them, they will no doubt cry to me, and I will certainly hear their cry. My anger will burn, and I will kill you with the sword; then your wives will be widows and your children fatherless.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

How any society treats its most vulnerable members is a reflection of that society’s moral fiber. The Nazi regime, for instance, rounded up their weakest members and systematically eliminated them. Darwin was right that nature tends to operate on the law of the survival of the fittest. The strongest survive and thrive while the weakest get eaten. People and animals, however, are not the same. We are made in God’s image, and are called to reflect that in our interactions with one another. When it came to the question of how Israel was to treat some of their weakest and most vulnerable members, God was pretty clear on what He expected. Let’s explore what He says here and what it might mean for us.

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Digging in Deeper: James 1:26-27

“If anyone thinks he is religious without controlling his tongue, his religion is useless and he deceives himself. Pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter

So, last time, we started out by spending some time looking at our culture’s struggles with the idea of religion. I told you that one of the common self-distinctions people often make when it comes to religious identity is that they are “spiritual, not religious” (SNR). People claim this identity because although they have been trained by either personal or impersonal experience or both to think poorly of religion, they don’t consider themselves secular or even merely agnostic. They just don’t like religion. For professed Christians who would claim this identity this is a real problem because they can’t grow well without the church and the church is a form of religion. As I asked before: What do we do with this? 

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Digging in Deeper: 1 Timothy 5:4

“But if a widow has children or grandchildren, let them first learn to show godliness to their own household and to make some return to their parents, for this is pleasing in the sight of God.”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

What follows here is Paul offering Timothy some advice on how to establish and create guidelines for a program of caring for widows in his church.  There is much to comment on here, but let’s settle now for a few observations on some themes. Read the rest…