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Choose a path of blessing
In Hebrew scripture, we hear the story of a stark decision is laid before a people who've wandered the Sinai wilderness for more than a generation. Nearly all the original sojourners have died in this wasteland. Their children and grandchildren are now preparing to enter territory promised to their elders 40 long years ago. We can imagine they're tired, poor, and not a little doubtful of the terrain ahead. Will their terrible wandering finally come to an end? Have they really arrived "home" at last?
Moses delivers the terms of the deal: "See, I have today set before you life and good, death and evil... the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live" (Deut 30:15, 19). These are crystal clear instructions. Yet they won't be as easy to fulfill as they sound.
How do we choose the blessing and avoid the curse? How do we move in the direction of life and away from ways of death? Blessings and curses come to us by our deeds and intentions. Do we seek the good of all people and, indeed, the good of all creation in the course of an ordinary day's choices? This is the way of life. Or do we harbor dark hopes for some and view the natural world through a lens of exploitation? This is the path of death.
If we want to come "home" to ourselves and our divine call, we much choose the purposeful way of blessing. Come home, weary wanderer, and live in blessed peace with others!
—Alice Camille,
reprinted with permission from TrueQuest Communications
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