When the Day Turns Dark

Scripture Focus: Deuteronomy 32.17-18
17 They sacrificed to false gods, which are not God—
    gods they had not known,
    gods that recently appeared,
    gods your ancestors did not fear.
18 You deserted the Rock, who fathered you;
    you forgot the God who gave you birth.

Deuteronomy 32.39
39 See now that I myself am he!
    There is no god besides me.
I put to death and I bring to life,
    I have wounded and I will heal,
    and no one can deliver out of my hand.

Romans 3.25-26
25 God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— 26 he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

Reflection: When the Day Turns Dark
By Anna Beth Vollema 

Come, let us contest child, 
    if you will not leave me again.
If you will not bend
    to the whisper of the air; 
Soft and Sweet,
    easy and enticing,
    everything you asked for;
When you spoke out of the night,  
    out of desperation and impatience, 
    out of fear and forgetfulness;
    distractedness. 
You’ll want it all,
    and you’ll want it quickly.
Like a junkie wanting his next fix, 
    you’ll strip your gold bangles,
    you’ll pull out your hairs,
    you’ll throw in your shambles,
    you’ll give up your years,
To an idol of your own making; 
    a statue in your own image; 
    a chasing after the wind. 

Tremble my child, and quake.   
 For I AM he; 
    there is no god besides Me!
My presence is life; 
    My absence is death.
The justice you long for is the crown of my head;
    the chaos of the world is reigned by my ropes;
    and the floodgates of my wrath will clear all the wrongs. 
So, bask in the light of my face, oh child; 
    shelter in the rays of my eyes
For I see what you need,
    and I see who you’ll be.
So, be with me.
Or I’ll have to let you go;
    go stumbling after the wind;
    go traipsing into the floodwaters, 
    so that you taste darkness again. 
The darkness of my absence; 
    My face turned away. 
You’ll bear the burden, 
    I bear for you every day. 
You’ll bear the sadness, 
    of remembering what once was; 
The sweetness of the food,
    in the house of your First Love. 
I’ll let you bear this burden
    so that you remember again, 
       who I AM; 
       who I’ve been; 
       the redemption, 
       in my hands. 

Rest my child, be still. 
For I AM He;
    there is no contest,
    there is no god besides Me!
By my life there is Truth; 
    by my death, there is life. 
Justice was quenched by my time on the tree, 
    the chaos of the world will end by my love, 
And from the floodgates of my wrath, 
    you will be protected. 
So, bask in the light of this lamb, oh child; 
    shelter in these lion eyes. 
By wrath and mercy intertwined,
     my love, unified; 
To set you free
    free to run back to Me; 
    free to skip like a child,
    on a holiday at the sea. 


Divine Hours Prayer: The Call to Prayer
Search for the Lord and his strength; continually seek his face. — Psalm 105.4

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.


Today’s Readings

Deuteronomy 32 (Listen7:10)
Romans 12 (Listen 2:58)

Read more about Platforming Idols
What a difference between the gods of the earth and the true God of heaven!

Read more about Idolatry as Parody
We become like our idols: fraudulent, shameful, unable to think, and unable to respond.

From Esau to Jacob—Readers’ Choice

Readers’ Choice Month:
This September, The Park Forum is looking back on readers’ selections of our most meaningful and helpful devotionals from the past 12 months. Thank you for your readership. This month is all about hearing from you. Submit a Readers’ Choice post today.

Today’s post was originally published, on June 2, 2022, based on Malachi 1.2-3, Matthew 12.48-50, and Romans 5.8
It was selected by reader, Barbara: 

“This was one of my favorites.”

Scripture Focus: Malachi 1.2-3
2 “I have loved you,” says the Lord. 
“But you ask, ‘How have you loved us?’ 
“Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?” declares the Lord. “Yet I have loved Jacob, 3 but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his hill country into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals.”

Matthew 12.48-50
48 He replied to him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” 49 Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. 50 For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” 

Romans 5.8
…God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Reflection: From Esau To Jacob

Reflection: From Esau to Jacob—Readers’ Choice
By John Tillman

“Esau I have hated.”

We may wonder: Does God randomly hate people? Am I one of those arbitrarily hated by God?


It is normal to struggle with difficult passages, especially those that have been misused. For example, some passages in Malachi 1, including this one, have been twisted to support slavery. Those who did this surrendered to culture and profit and selfishness, all the while proclaiming themselves wise, biblical, and superior. May we not make similar mistakes.

It’s impossible in a 400-word devotional to unpack a difficult passage like this. I won’t attempt it. Let us simply meditate on a few details from scripture.

  1. “Esau” doesn’t mean the individual. God is using these names as collective nouns to speak to the descendants of these brothers, not the brothers themselves. We don’t do this much in our culture. The closest thing we might understand is using the name of a country’s leader to refer to actions of that nation. For example, “Volodymyr Zelensky” meaning Ukraine, or “Xi Jinping” meaning China.
  2. God’s “hatred” isn’t arbitrary. It refers to justice for Edom’s actions—what they collectively did and continued to do. Esau, the individual, while reconciled to his brother, enjoyed God’s blessing. His descendants continually opposed Israel throughout their history and came to represent, poetically, all people opposed to God and God’s people.
  3. God’s “hatred” is not absolute. Edomites are not arbitrarily cursed or hated throughout history or in totality. In many places, God implies hope for Edom. He shows he cares for them, gives them their own land, and commands that no Israelite should despise an Edomite. (Deuteronomy 2.1-8, 12; 23.7)
  4. This statement’s purpose is to show love, not hatred. God speaks poetically to reassure his people. He points to justice done on their behalf, which proves his love. To Micah’s readers, this justice was the downfall of “The Wicked Land” (Malachi 1.4) that harmed them.

We can be assured of God’s love and justice. We are not innocent. Yet, we are not hated. We are loved. This is demonstrated in Christ as God turns “Esaus” into “Jacobs.”

God loved us when we were like Esau—sinners, rebels, and persecutors. (Romans 5.8) All of us have been children of Esau, but by God’s grace, we can become children of Jacob and brothers and sisters of Christ (Matthew 12.50). Through Jesus, we cry “Abba, father,” (Romans 8.15; Galatians 4.6; Mark 14.36) for “Jacob, have I loved.” (Malachi 1.2)

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
It is not the healthy who need a doctor but the sick…And indeed I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners. — Matthew 9.12-13

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Jeremiah 27(Listen -3:52)
1 Corinthians 4(Listen – 3:15)

This Weekend’s Readings
Jeremiah 28(Listen -3:05)1 Corinthians 5(Listen – 1:58)
Jeremiah 29(Listen -5:44)1 Corinthians 6(Listen – 3:03)
Jeremiah 30-31(Listen 11:21)1 Corinthians 7(Listen – 6:09)

Read more about Running to Forgive
In this moment, in a limited way, Esau demonstrates the welcome of the gospel. The wronged party shows undeserved mercy.

Readers’ Choice is Here!
There’s still room for your recommended posts from the last 12 months. Which ones did you share with a friend?

From Esau To Jacob

Scripture Focus: Malachi 1.2-3
2 “I have loved you,” says the Lord. 
“But you ask, ‘How have you loved us?’ 
“Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?” declares the Lord. “Yet I have loved Jacob, 3 but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his hill country into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals.”

Matthew 12.48-50
48 He replied to him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” 49 Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. 50 For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” 

Romans 5.8
…God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Reflection: From Esau To Jacob
By John Tillman

“Esau I have hated.”

We may wonder: Does God randomly hate people? Am I one of those arbitrarily hated by God?

It is normal to struggle with difficult passages, especially those that have been misused. For example, some passages in Malachi 1, including this one, have been twisted to support slavery. Those who did this surrendered to culture and profit and selfishness, all the while proclaiming themselves wise, biblical, and superior. May we not make similar mistakes.

It’s impossible in a 400-word devotional to unpack a difficult passage like this. I won’t attempt it. Let us simply meditate on a few details from scripture.

  1. “Esau” doesn’t mean the individual. God is using these names as collective nouns to speak to the descendants of these brothers, not the brothers themselves. We don’t do this much in our culture. The closest thing we might understand is using the name of a country’s leader to refer to actions of that nation. For example, “Volodymyr Zelensky” meaning Ukraine, or “Xi Jinping” meaning China.
  2. God’s “hatred” isn’t arbitrary. It refers to justice for Edom’s actions—what they collectively did and continued to do. Esau, the individual, while reconciled to his brother, enjoyed God’s blessing. His descendants continually opposed Israel throughout their history and came to represent, poetically, all people opposed to God and God’s people.
  3. God’s “hatred” is not absolute. Edomites are not arbitrarily cursed or hated throughout history or in totality. In many places, God implies hope for Edom. He shows he cares for them, gives them their own land, and commands that no Israelite should despise an Edomite. (Deuteronomy 2.1-8, 12; 23.7)
  4. This statement’s purpose is to show love, not hatred. God speaks poetically to reassure his people. He points to justice done on their behalf, which proves his love. To Micah’s readers, this justice was the downfall of “The Wicked Land” (Malachi 1.4) that harmed them.

We can be assured of God’s love and justice. We are not innocent. Yet, we are not hated. We are loved. This is demonstrated in Christ as God turns “Esaus” into “Jacobs.”

God loved us when we were like Esau—sinners, rebels, and persecutors. (Romans 5.8) All of us have been children of Esau, but by God’s grace, we can become children of Jacob and brothers and sisters of Christ (Matthew 12.50). Through Jesus, we cry “Abba, father,” (Romans 8.15; Galatians 4.6; Mark 14.36) for “Jacob, have I loved.” (Malachi 1.2)

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
I will walk in the presence of the Lord in the land of the living. — Psalm 116.8

Today’s Readings

Malachi 1 (Listen – 2:47)
Matthew 12 (Listen – 6:41)

Read more about Identity Lost, Identity Gained
God, our father, longs to bless us…No one who comes to him will need cry, “Do you have only one blessing, my father?”

Read more about Running to Forgive
In this moment, in a limited way, Esau demonstrates the welcome of the gospel. The wronged party shows undeserved mercy.

The Naked Emotion of God

Scripture Focus: Hosea 1.2
2 When the LORD began to speak through Hosea, the LORD said to him, “Go, marry a promiscuous woman and have children with her, for like an adulterous wife this land is guilty of unfaithfulness to the LORD.” 

Romans 9.25-26
25 As he says in Hosea: 
“I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people; 
and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one,” (Hosea 2.23)
26 and, 
“In the very place where it was said to them, 
‘You are not my people,’ 
there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’ ” (Hosea 1.10)

Reflection: The Naked Emotion of God
By John Tillman

From the life of Daniel, exiled in Babylon, we travel back in time to a pre-exile Israel and the life of Hosea.

Abraham Heschel explained that other prophets focus on what God has done for his people, while Hosea tells us more of what God feels. (The Prophets)

Many prophets engaged in actions that today would be considered questionable stunts. They publicly insulted kings and officials. They wore strange clothing or no clothing, going naked. (Isaiah 20.1-4) They wore the yoke of oxen. (Jeremiah 27.1-15) They starved. They ate disgusting foods. They built and destroyed elaborate models. They lay in one place for months. They sang offensive songs with pornographic lyrics. (Ezekiel 23.14-21)

In marrying Gomer, Hosea engages in the most extreme performance art depicted in the Bible or performed anywhere. It is more all-encompassing than the way Sacha Baron Cohen plays his character of Borat in real life situations. It is beyond the way Steven Colbert created a character out of his own name and likeness for The Daily Show. Hoseas’s stunt goes beyond acting or putting on a show. It is his real life. There is no “character” to hide behind. Instead, he is exposing the character of God. 

Hosea strips bare the inner emotional life of God. Hosea and God are emotionally united in a unique way. Neither will hold back in expressing his love for the people but neither will they hold back in expressing pain, anger, bitterness, and sorrow at how callously they are betrayed. 

Pain and anguish of heart are front and center in a scandalous way in Hosea. This shows us a God unashamed of shame, nakedly confessing his love for the unlovable. 

Gomer is not chosen for her strength but her weakness. She is not chosen for her wisdom but her foolishness. The accusations of culture would fly the other way as well. Hosea, taking a promiscuous woman as his wife would be considered weak and foolish.

Our God uses the foolish to shame the wisdom of this world and the weak to break the strength of the strong. He loves us, the unlovable. He is faithful to us, the unfaithful. He is unashamed of us, the shameful.

When all else is stripped away, the naked emotion of God, seen in Hosea and seen on the cross, is love.

To the world, this is foolishness, but to we who are being saved, it is the power of God.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Greeting
Your way, O God, is holy; who is as great as our God? — Psalm 77.13

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle

Today’s Readings
Hosea 1  (Listen – 2:08)
Psalm 119:73-96 (Listen – 15:14)

Read more about Christ, Our Undeserved Friend :: A Guided Prayer
Though my sins and weakness he sees,
My case before the Father, pleads.
He knows my state and yet he bends
God’s ear to me, for me contends.

Read more about The Flavors of Betrayal
Where do we find ourselves in the garden? What form does our betrayal and abandonment of Jesus take?

Cameos of Love :: Worldwide Prayer

Scripture Focus: Romans 16.1-4
I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a deacon of the church in Cenchreae. I ask you to receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of his people and to give her any help she may need from you, for she has been the benefactor of many people, including me.

Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my co-workers in Christ Jesus. They risked their lives for me. Not only I but all the churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them.

Reflection: Cameos of Love :: Worldwide Prayer
By John Tillman

A cameo is a “positive relief” image and is often a profile image of an individual. This means that the item is carved so that the image to be shown is raised up from the surface. The process of carving a cameo involves cutting away everything that is not a part of the image.

As Paul winds Romans to a close, he carves us a quick image of Phoebe and others who ministered with him. Phoebe was a deacon from the port city of Cenchreae, which served the region of Corinth. She was a co-worker with Priscilla and Aquilla of Corinth. She was being sent to Rome (either carrying this letter or following shortly after) and she was trusted with a mission that was in need of assistance. Paul is confident that her work, which scripture does not specify, will be of spiritual benefit for he testifies that her ministry has already blessed his own life. Paul’s brief description of Phoebe is like a cameo, raising up for us the most important details of her life. And when we look closely, what we see raised up is, in reality, an image of Christ.

May we pray this prayer from Australia, asking that God raise up in us the image of Christ, and carve away from us other parts of our lives to show to the world, his perfect cameo.

Cameos of Love
A prayer of Intercession from Australia

Creator God, all-compassionate Father,
Source of life whose heart is passionate towards all,
May we, your people, be cameos of your love and
compassion to a hurting and fragile world.
Daily we are confronted with the harsh reality of violence, greed,
abuse, unrest, and tragedy. Stir our response by owning your heart and mind.
May we be courageous in challenging injustice,
Ready to listen but hesitant to judge,
Willing to welcome the outcast,
Diligent in seeking and claiming truth.
Oh God of hope,
Your light never fails, is never extinguished.
Warm our hearts with the fire of Christ’s love so that wherever we go we will communicate Jesus Christ.
In His divine name we pray.

*Prayer from Hallowed be Your Name: A collection of prayers from around the world, Dr. Tony Cupit, Editor.

Divine Hours Prayer:  The Request for Presence
Gladden the soul of your servant, for to you, O  Lord, I lift up my soul. — Psalm 86.4

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Job 12 (Listen -2:21)
Romans 16 (Listen -3:30)

Read more about Reflecting the Unity of Christ :: Worldwide Prayer
Dear Lord, mold us into that perfect image that reflects the beauty of Christ in a broken world.

Read more about Christ’s Supremacy :: A Guided Prayer
Help us to let go of anything which strives to take your place.
Make of us a body that serves, be our head which gives us purpose.