Christmastide 5

Lord and God,

You made Moses like God to Pharaoh, commanding, through his prophet Aaron, his own will and yours: the deliverance of Israel. You were patient even with the villains, the captors of your people. You had ten full recourses of signs before your fury was poured out, that they might believe and be spared. You were met with hardness of heart. Even when explanations began to fade away, and the wise men were confounded into belief, the hardness remained.

Yet it would not be long before Israel too would harden itself in the wilderness. Even now, your Son has walked the earth—not a man made like God, but God made man. He has declared to us his own will and yours—for he only ever does what he sees you doing. He has spoken with the voice that flashes forth flame, yet he has spoken tenderly to “sin no more.” Though he knows the sin that is within us, he does not accuse us.

How could we refuse this speaker, this word, and this breath, which carries it? What madness is within us that we say no to life everlasting? Why do we prefer Moses to Jesus and Pharaoh to Moses? The law bears glorious witness to the grace and truth of the only begotten one. Yet we will not come. What is it we hope to gain? Search our hearts, Father, as we search yours in your word. Plant your love within us, and break our bonds. Hallelujah! By your hand, the work is already begun.