Put Up Your Hand (Vayera 5785)

In the Bible, God destroys

The Wicked

wipes out worlds and cities

scatters the overly ambitious.

In the Bible, the earth opens up and 

          swallows

rebels, and righteousness is vindicated,

in the Bible.

But those days are long gone.

Now God leaves us to destroy

     ourselves and

it’s hard

not to wonder which cities, which

     countries (yes, I’m looking at YOU)

might be blighted with sulphur;

which leaders and their followers might be

          swallowed up

if then was now,

if we weren’t left to our own devices

Would the world be better for it?

Would we?

It’s hard to know for sure

And

it’s also hard not to wish for that kind of

          Salvation

when all that we value

feels threatened

No, I know,

God has empowered US

(Yes, I’m looking at YOU)

     I remember

that God’s gift of Guidance

is the very Book which tells these tales

of wickedness smited,

and then tells us

          (Do Better!)

how to live

Solomon, in his Wisdom

says we’ve been left reminders

of their folly

their sins

their failures

so that they can never go 

      unnoticed

or be forgotten

But it seems we HAVE forgotten

Are there enough righteous

     to be found

to merit whatever salvation we can manage

for ourselves?

I am           counting

I am losing heart but my eyes are

     searching

for the moments of Compassion,

the slivers of Justice

If you want to be counted

Put Up Your Hand so that I can 

          find you

and we can grab onto one another

We must not look back.

There’s no time for regret

Now there is only what we can save

and how we can save them.