Praying the Shema

*The phrase “a land flowing with milk and honey” is certainly metaphorical. Moses doesn’t mean that the rivers and streams of the promised land literally flow with milk and honey rather than with water. But he does want the people to have such a picture in their minds. He wants them to know they will be leaving behind the nomadic, foraging existence they have known in the wilderness. They will settle in a new land where their cattle will be well fed and will be able to provide them with milk in abundance. They will have the freedom to pursue even more discretionary activities since date honey would seep out of the trees without needing cultivating. God’s promise isn’t just that they will possess the land but that they will find rest, abundance, and health in it.

Deuteronomy 6: 1-9

 Moses: The Eternal your God commanded me to teach you these rules and judgments so that you would obey them in the land that is yours when you cross the Jordan. 2 You are to fear Him and obey His rules and commands, just as I’m teaching them to you now. Do this your whole lives—you, your children and your grandchildren—and you’ll live in the land a long time. 3 Yes, Israel, if you pay careful attention and obey, everything will go well for you in that land flowing with milk and honey; and you’ll have many, many descendants just as the Eternal, the God of your ancestors, promised you.

Moses continues: 4 Listen, Israel! The Eternal is our True God—He alone. 5 You should love Him, your True God, with all your heart and soul, with every ounce of your strength.[a] 6 Make the things I’m commanding you today part of who you are. 7 Repeat them to your children. Talk about them when you’re sitting together in your home and when you’re walking together down the road. Make them the last thing you talk about before you go to bed and the first thing you talk about the next morning. 8 Do whatever it takes to remember them: tie a reminder on your hand and bind a reminder on your forehead where you’ll see it all the time, 9 such as on the doorpost where you cross the threshold or on the city gate.

The Shema is one of the most important prayers in the Bible. The Shema became something that Jewish people prayed every morning and evening for thousands of years, and it is still relevant to us today. It gets at the heart of all the commands given to the people of Israel. The Shema is a call to listen and respond to the truth that Yahweh is the one true God, and the appropriate response is to love Yahweh with all of our being. Knowing and loving God is how we can experience the fullness of life. And when we align our hearts with God’s, we will naturally care about the things he cares about and fulfill our roles as his partners in bringing about human flourishing on the earth.

• How would you describe Yahweh’s character? What do you believe Yahweh cares about? 

• It’s easy to forget about who Yahweh is and what he cares about as we go about daily life. Read Deuteronomy 6:4-9 again. What are some ways you can remind yourself of who Yahweh is on a daily basis?

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*God the Father is the giver of all things and is looking for every opportunity to bless us. But many people have difficulty trusting and receiving good things, even when those things come from God. The problem is that we not only have trouble trusting God’s work in our lives, but we also don’t always respond to God’s voice. People often hear the Scriptures but don’t really listen. People store truths in their brains but never put them to use. For James, the only good religion is religion lived out every day.

James 1:19-27

19 Listen, open your ears, harness your desire to speak, and don’t get worked up into a rage so easily, my brothers and sisters. 20 Human anger is a futile exercise that will never produce God’s kind of justice in this world. 21 So walk out on your corrupt liaison with smut and depraved living, and humbly welcome the word of truth that will blossom like the seed of salvation planted in your souls.

22 Put the word into action. If you think hearing is what matters most, you are going to find you have been deceived.

23-24 If some fail to do what God requires, it’s as if they forget the word as soon as they hear it. One minute they look in the mirror, and the next they forget who they are and what they look like. 25 However, it is possible to open your eyes and take in the beautiful, perfect truth found in God’s law of liberty and live by it. If you pursue that path and actually do what God has commanded, then you will avoid the many distractions that lead to an amnesia of all true things and you will be blessed.

26 If you put yourself on a pedestal, thinking you have become a role model in all things religious, but you can’t control your mouth, then think again. Your mouth exposes your heart, and your religion is useless. 27 Real, true religion from God the Father’s perspective is about caring for the orphans and widows who suffer needlessly and resisting the evil influence of the world.

One of the most famous passages in the book of James is about being not just a hearer of the word but a doer. The author compares these “hearers” to those who see themselves in the mirror and then immediately forget what they look like. The point is that hearing and doing cannot be separated. We don’t truly see the mirror if we forget the image in it, and we don’t truly listen if the message doesn’t change us. We were made to reflect the image of God, but we forget who we were made to be when we do not let God's character shape our thought patterns, attitudes, affections, and actions. We are not truly listening to God's life-changing words if our lives are not changed.

• What stood out to you as you read this passage? According to this passage, what does a pure reflection of God’s character look like? What gets in the way of that pure reflection?

• Where in your life have you heard what God said but forgot to put it into action? Ask him for help and commit to practice what you learn this week.

• How do you think Yahweh feels about current events in our world? How do our Black brothers and sisters feel about current events in our country? How can you listen to their stories this week?

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