“By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’ How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land? If I forget you, O Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill. May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, if I do not consider Jerusalem my highest joy.” (Psalm 137:1-6)
The couple of times we visited, I loved to walk the streets of Jerusalem, pondering the past and wondering about the future. But I also loved being in Babylon… not the Babylon of Persia, but the squatter camp where we worshipped the Sunday we were in Windhoek, Namibia. Someone nicknamed this dirt-road community, consisting of thousands of makeshift houses, ‘Babylon.’ I doubt it was intended to be a compliment since Babylon is often portrayed in Scripture as the enemy of God’s children.
But remember God’s heart toward all cities. “And wherever he (Jesus) went – into villages or cities or countryside – they placed the sick in the marketplaces. They begged him to let them touch even the border of his garment, and all who touched him were made whole.” Jesus wants to make us whole… and it does not matter whether we live in Jerusalem or Babylon. God gives us the choice to receive him or reject him and perhaps the ones you would think have the advantage end up missing out. “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!” All of us Americans were greatly impacted as we worshipped in a church building that would not meet the standards of most church buildings in the US. Why did the worship of the poor in an African nation seem so much more passionate than what we usually experience in our land?
“It’s what’s inside that matters,” Jesus taught. You can eat the right foods, follow all the rules, live in the right neighborhood, say the right words… and be far from God. “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.” Jesus quoted Isaiah and confused many people. He did not want anyone, especially his disciples, to miss the point. “Jesus called the crowd to him and said, ‘Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. Nothing outside a man can make him ‘unclean’ by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him ‘unclean.’”
So… if it is not where I live, or what I eat, or what traditions I keep that make the difference, what does? Jesus! I must be made whole! I must be healed! I must be forgiven! I must be made clean! “What comes out of a man is what makes him ‘unclean.’ For from within, out of men’s hearts come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and make a man ‘unclean.’”
God accomplished everything we need through his Son and Jesus stands today with open arms to receive all that will humbly come. “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” “This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”
“The church that is at Babylon, chosen together with you, sends you her greetings…” I Peter 5:13