People in the periphery

Viewed from the 23^rd floor, the Manhattan street doesn’t look all that busy.  But this is an illusion.  There are always cars and people moving here.  As I work today, occasional sirens remind me of a world of crises outside this corporate cocoon.

It’s not only a city that never sleeps, it’s a city that hardly pauses.  

This morning, I came across an intriguing passage in the Mosaic law:

 “For six years you are to sow your fields and harvest the crops, but during the seventh year let the land lie unplowed and unused. Then the poor among your people may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what is left. Do the same with your vineyard and your olive grove.

 “Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work, so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and so that the slave born in your household and the foreigner living among you may be refreshed.   (Exodus 23:10-12)

Here are two examples of rest on the “sevens” – the seventh year and the seventh day.  I tend to think about the Sabbath as a personal observance, something that benefits an individual.  And there is truth to that.  But notice in this passage all the others who God has in mind to bless by fallow fields and a break from work.

For leaving a field unplanted doesn’t mean there won’t be a crop.  There are always volunteers from fallen fruit of the year before.  I know this from the persistent cherry tomatoes that grow despite my best efforts to ignore them.  God intended those fields of volunteers, as well as unharvested olive tree and grape vines, to supply both the poor and wildlife. 

Similarly, the weekly Sabbath brings refreshment to domestic animals, the slaves and the foreigners who lived among – but had little standing with – the Israelites.

The poor, the wild animals, the domestic beasts, the slaves, and the foreigners.  God’s law forces his people to consider them.  It’s not enough just to do the hard work of getting by and providing for one’s family.  There is a ring of need just outside the spotlight of our attention.

We’ll never see them if we don’t step away from the plow.  Set down the scythe.

So, today, I am wondering who is in the periphery of my busy life.  And in my dogged attention to my agendas, who is left no space or no access?

And access to what?  With no crops to offer (believe me, cherry tomatoes have a limited appeal), what would grow in my “fallow fields”?  Attention, surely.  Beyond that, I’ll have to puzzle this out.

It’s easy to read the chapters of the law handed down on Sinai and be taken aback by the severity of the required punishment for infractions.  But seen from a different angle, like a street from the 23^rd floor, there is a running thread of God’s tender compassion for the lowly and disenfranchised, the weak and the wronged.

The people right now on our periphery.

Father, God of all mercy and grace, how deep and tender your love is for all of your creation.  You have blessed us, your children, with purpose and energy, and we pursue our agendas – on our better days – as service unto you.  But help us to step back, to give space for those you would use us to refresh.  And show us who they are.

Reader: I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.