000 Allen FMT (i-xxii) - The Presbyterian Leader

Verses 8–9 return to Hosea’s theme of the trauma in the heart of YHWH,
whose everlasting covenant with Israel means that God is stuck with this
people by God’s free decision. Unlike the “unmoved mover” of Aristotle
and classical Christian theism, YHWH is the “most-moved mover” of
the Torah, the prophets, and the rabbis. God cries: “How can I give you
up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel?” (v. 8). In travail, God
declares: “My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender”
(v. 8c). God identifies God’s self as “the Holy One in your midst” (v. 9).
This is an incarnational statement: God dwells within the people Israel.
In Israel’s theology, God is the God of the past (the exodus and deliverance),
the God of the future who calls Israel forward onto a journey
through history, the God of the above whom Israel is given and called to
adore, and the God of the below, the ground of Israel’s being. But God is
also “God with us,” God who pitches a tent among, dwells with Israel. If
Israel goes into exile, the Holy One in Israel’s midst goes with Israel.
When John wants to talk about Jesus Christ as God with us, he speaks the
language of Israelite faith: the Word “lived among us,” pitched a tent
among us (John 1:14). God’s nature is relational, not one of dwelling in
impassible perfection.
Verses 10–11 speak of God’s womblike love leading Israel home: “They
shall come trembling like birds from Egypt, and like doves from the land
of Assyria; and I will return them to their homes, says the LORD” (v. 11).
Again, God’s gracious love has the last word; God’s heart yearns for Israel’s
turning again to the Lord.
Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12–14; 2:18–23* (Paired)
Proper 13 [18]/Year C 259
The main body of Wisdom literature (Proverbs, Wisdom of Solomon,
and Ecclesiasticus) derives from people whose lives are comfortable and
for whom wisdom (coming from observation of life; see Proper 19/Year
B) provides principles by which to live a meaningful and satisfying life. Job
and Ecclesiastes belong to wisdom, but their observations of life lead them
to dissent from the perspectives of typical wisdom teaching (on Job, see
Propers 22–25/Year B). 76
Scholars agree that the main theme of Ecclesiastes’ interpretation of
life is 1:2: “Vanity of vanities. . . . All is vanity.” In 1:12–14, the author
reports engaging in the quintessential activity of wisdom teachers by
observing “all that is done under heaven” and then naming what was
learned. “It is an unhappy business that God has given to human beings
to be busy with.” Life is “vanity and a chasing after wind.”