O LORD, who shall sojourn in your tent?
Who shall dwell on your holy hill?
He who walks blamelessly and does what is right
and speaks truth in his heart;
who does not slander with his tongue
and does no evil to his neighbor,
nor takes up a reproach against his friend;
in whose eyes a vile person is despised,
but who honors those who fear the LORD;
who swears to his own hurt and does not change;
who does not put out his money at interest
and does not take a bribe against the innocent.
He who does these things shall never be moved.
(Psalm 15 ESV)
Psalm 15 and Psalm 24 are 2 of the entrance liturgies we find in the Hebrew Scriptures. And when we read these we are struck by something that is different than we expect…
Who can enter into God’s space… O LORD, who shall sojourn in your tent?
Who shall dwell on your holy hill? From Leviticus and Numbers we expect it to be about purity. It is about those who keep the laws and live by the law. If you are purified according to the Law you are in…
But that is not what the above says. The above is about how we ethically treat each other and what the community is like that is gathering around God. It is about respecting your neighbor and living a life of love that is abounding to all.
It is not about keeping a prescribed code that was given to help us understand what it means to love our neighbor. It is about loving our neighbor.
You see we have come to understand that we have to follow the law because that is what purifies us and makes us love God, but we can not love God on our own. We need Him to move us to the point of seeing the love He has for us and that will move us to allow that love to over flow to the other. It is not about keeping a list of rules to make us love God. It is about letting the love God has poured on us to spring forth in the lives of all around us.
aSacredRebel 