Reading 1, Wis 18:14-16; 19:6-9

"Some say 'Glory, glory' but I say, 'Cross, cross.' (Luther)

14 When peaceful silence lay over all, and night had run the half of her swift course,

15 down from the heavens, from the royal throne, leapt your all-powerful Word like a pitiless warrior into the heart of a land doomed to destruction. Carrying your unambiguous command like a sharp sword,

16 it stood, and filled the universe with death; though standing on the earth, it touched the sky.

6 For the whole creation, submissive to your commands, had its very nature re-created, so that your children should be preserved from harm.

7 Overshadowing the camp there was the cloud; where there had been water, dry land was seen to rise; the Red Sea became an unimpeded way, the tempestuous waves, a green plain;

8 sheltered by your hand, the whole nation passed across, gazing at these amazing prodigies.

9 They were like horses at pasture, they skipped like lambs, singing your praises, Lord, their deliverer.

This vigorous picture of the liberation, by the active word of God, of the children of Israel from a land that enslaved them, derives from an event so tiny it isn’t even a footnote in Egyptian annals. The exodus is at the heart of Jewish faith in a God who intervenes in history to smite the powers that oppress his chosen people. As such it has become a powerful motif in the “theology of the oppressed” in South America and other places. Unfortunately the God who smites the oppressor is a figment of the imagination, leaving the oppressed to work out their own salvation, through non-violent or violent struggle.  A renewed but equally fictitious faith in a smiting God fuels the warlike ultras of Israel, for whom the very existence of Israel is proof that their God is marching on. Can we find an exodus faith that isn’t wishful or warlike thinking? Christians can do so by considering the exodus of Jesus through cross and resurrection. In that narrative the red sea story finds its truth.

Gospel, Lk 18:1-8

1 Then he told them a parable about the need to pray continually and never lose heart.

2 ‘There was a judge in a certain town,’ he said, ‘who had neither fear of God nor respect for anyone.

3 In the same town there was also a widow who kept on coming to him and saying, “I want justice from you against my enemy!”

4 For a long time he refused, but at last he said to himself, “Even though I have neither fear of God nor respect for any human person,

5 I must give this widow her just rights since she keeps pestering me, or she will come and slap me in the face.” ‘

6 And the Lord said, ‘You notice what the unjust judge has to say?

7 Now, will not God see justice done to his elect if they keep calling to him day and night even though he still delays to help them?

8 I promise you, he will see justice done to them, and done speedily. But when the Son of man comes, will he find any faith on earth?’

Luke wrote his gospel around 85CE by which time some believers had grown weary of waiting for God’s justice to arrive. How do we feel now after two millennia? I remember John Osborne pointing out that the church ought to be done under the trades’ descriptions act: “God doesn’t do what it says in the brochure. Not only does he not beat as he sweeps as he cleans he actually blows the damned dust all over the floor!”

 I sometimes think that the start of any new reformation would be a notice on every church notice-board:

 “Our God does not intervene miraculously to provide justice or health.”

 I see no evidence for Jesus’ claim that God will see justice done speedily. Allowing people to think He might, is one way of ensuring that when the Son of Man comes he will not find faith on earth.