That Bad Wind Plays

That Bad Wind Plays

(“I have come to buy your threshing floor. We must build an altar to the Eternal there so that this epidemic will be lifted from the people.” 2 Samuel 24:21)

Do you hate the way that bad winds play on the scorched ground
where corn and grapevines once thrived? Do you think the smoke
from a burning bull well appease or please the divine? Would God
desire something more than just an altar built on a threshing floor?

Oh David, whose heart beat for God, did you believe one more
sacrificed cow could end what looked like anger from the throne room
of the eternal one? Could God have listened even without the
sacrificial altar built on the mud?

You paid a pretty penny for the privilege, but you had a lot more
in your stockrooms at home. You didn’t want the altar to be
an act of charity
but a sort of penance paid in cash.

Did God hear you because of the burning flesh of cattle,
or because of the hope in your heart, though there was nowhere
close to sacrifice your offering? I think God had a
soft spot for you David. I think God saw beyond your
cultic reasoning and would have answered your empty-
handed prayer.

God would have answered that heart that, full of remorse,
couldn’t bear to see the plague spread any further. Did you
know
the temple would be built on this sludgy ground? Did you
realize it would fall and later would be full of crowds making money
off the religious acts of the poor?

The plague stopped that is true. Even with the later
load-bearing walls of a magnificent temple, all God wanted
was enough faith to come to him with humility and truth.