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Book: Exodus

Sabbath as Freedom

The Sabbath commandment is a word of freedom and of resistance to an economic system that is destructive to ourselves and our planet.

Whose Sword?

Psalm 149 is not a blank check for our passionate pursuit of personal vengeance. Quite the contrary! It places a sword in the hand of only those who have recognized YHWH’s ultimate kingship.

Tyranny is Nothing New (Nor is Resistance)

Through confrontational or subversive tactics, God empowers human agents to restore God’s liberating and salvific will for the creation.

From Servitude to Service

The laws at Sinai are no ball-and-chain, implementing a new form of slavery. They express the practical dimensions of life in freedom, the boundaries within which the nation can experience a life-giving form of service to the One who graciously rescued them from servitude. In short, they are revolutionary.

Water Margin

We have a history of commentaries that paints real physical need—experienced by billions worldwide daily—as stupid ingratitude. If we ask YHWH for literal water, pleading with him and testing his provision, are we being unappreciative?

Mountain Theology

The transfiguration stories in scripture, and their mountains, are not places of answers. They are places of raw honesty about our own limits. They are places where words give way to water that flows where it will, to sustain life. They are places of confronting grief and loss. They are places of silence. And these mountains are places to wonder at the mystery of the God who created us to need each other and this earth.

God’s Radiant Law

Jesus pronounced judgment on the entire system and dismantled it with a whip – modeling for us how to treat egregious distortions of Christian worship that distract from God’s redemptive work. This is not politics “out there,” in the public square, but in house.

The In/visible Calves of Gold

These systems of oppression, much like the golden calf, do not represent the God of love and righteousness. Instead, the fashioning of what can be tamed points to our depraved greed, moral bankruptcy, and the diabolical strategies we employ for survival.

Can Water Spring from Dry Land?

In Exodus 17, the people of Israel confront a barren landscape that seems to guarantee imminent death. Today police violence, especially against Black people, seems to be similarly embedded in our social landscape. This essay turns to Angela Davis to ask if dry land can become springs of water.

Preferential Option for the Poor Once More

“Seek ye first the political kingdom of God and all these things shall be given unto you.”

Tyranny is Nothing New (Nor is Resistance)

Through confrontational or subversive tactics, God empowers human agents to restore God’s liberating and salvific will for the creation.

From Servitude to Service

The descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob cried out for deliverance, and Yahweh heard them (Exodus 2:23). Notice carefully: Yahweh did not offer to comfort the Hebrews. Yahweh did not tell them to endure their situation because things would all work out in the end, or because after death they would be “in a better place.” Instead, Yahweh acted on covenant promises made with their ancestors by entering history.