God Is Disappointed In You (18 page)

A:
Dear Habakkuk, who says I’m not going to punish the Babylonians, too? You’re right, they’re much worse than you are. They are idolatrous, blood-thirsty and as greedy as death. If they’re the punishment for your sins, just imagine what kind of crazy shit I have in store for them. Don’t worry, by the time I’m done, everybody will get the punishment they deserve.
Q:
No, no, you misunderstand. I’m not asking you to punish them, too. I’m asking you to ease up on all of us. To be honest, I’m not going to care if they’re punished if I’m a severed head sitting on a pike somewhere. Sigh. Forget it. Look, I don’t mean to tell you how to run your Universe, Lord. I guess you know what’s best.
You’ve done amazing things for us in the past, and I’m sure you will come through for us again. And there’s certainly no question that you have the power to do whatever you want. If you wanted to, you could split a mountain in half. You could beat up a river. You could kill the moon with a spear. You’re the greatest thing in the Universe and everyone everywhere should bow down to you as the Almighty God. But if I could just make one humble request of you before I go, it would be this:
Don’t rely entirely on your power to prove your greatness. Mercy can be an act of greatness, too. So if you could see your way clear to saving me from disembowelment, I sure would appreciate it.

I’ll kill anything that moves,” sayeth the Lord. “And those who survive will be living in shabby little mounds of rubble. I’ll swat the birds right out of the sky. I’ll beat up on fish for no good reason. That’s how furious I am. The only reason I created human beings in the first place was so I could have some company, but since day one, I’ve been ignored, belittled, and jilted for hipster gods, like Baal or Moloch.
 

“I’m saving my worst revenge for you, my ‘Chosen People,’ because you are always cheating on me. I’m going to run through the streets of Jerusalem at night with a lantern, so I can flat-blast you while you sleep. I’ll dropkick your princes and smoke your merchants like cigarettes. I’ll knock people out just for wearing foreign clothes. If you don’t like it, ask Baal to save you.

“Don’t think I’m joking, either. When I dish out my revenge, people will bleed like torn sandbags and shit out their entrails. You’ll try to bribe me to make it stop, but guess what? I don’t need your money!
 

“And it’s not just the people of Israel who need to be worried, either. You’d better watch your ass, too, Philistines. You don’t want me coming over for breakfast. And you Moabites have been talking a lot of smack lately. Ever hear of Sodom and Gomorrah? When I’m done, there will be nothing left of you but weeds and salt. Good luck convincing people to come live on your weed and salt farm!

“Don’t laugh, Ethiopia. You’re next on the list. And listen up, Assyria, because I am going to shake you up. Hard. When I am done with you there won’t be a single owl left standing in a tree.

“Then I’ll be sorry I hit you. I’ll come around with flowers and try to take you out for brunch. I just don’t understand why we have to keep going through all this. If you human beings would just be the friend I created you to be, I’d take care of you just like I did in the old days. I’d heal the sick and pamper the healthy. I’d massage the old and tickle babies. I guess I don’t know what else to do. Maybe a few earthquakes and lightning attacks will get your attention. I just hope that when I’m done with all this killing, we can be cool. I really do want you to like me.”

After thirty years in exile, the Jews were back home in the Holy Land, rebuilding their houses, spackling their walls, and fixing their endtables. The prophet Haggai was troubled by the fact that, even as the nation was rebuilt, the Temple of Solomon still stood in ruins. He made it his personal mission to convince the people of Israel to return the temple to its former glory.

“Listen, O Israel,” said the prophet Haggai. “Now that the Lord has delivered you back unto the land of your fathers…”

“You mean Darius,” someone interrupted.

“What’s that?”

“It was the Emperor Darius who let us return to Israel.”

“That’s right,” someone else chipped in. “I remember. It was all over the news.”
 

“Ah,” Haggai replied, “but who do you think made up Darius’ mind to do so?”

“Darius.”

“Okay let’s call it a
joint
effort,” Haggai conceded. “God and Darius have allowed you to return to Israel. The point is this: You’ve all been building your panel houses, and don’t get me wrong, some of them are really cute, but now that we’re back, thanks in some part to God, shouldn’t we rebuild
his
house, too?
Remember that drought we had? I bet God would’ve spotted us some rain if we had asked him in his clean new temple.

“Are there any old people here? You may remember what the old temple looked like. Was it covered in rubble and rat shit? Is that the way you remember it? Me neither. You may also remember what a picky eater God was. If we tried bringing him a steak, and it touched his peas or his bread, we had to throw it out and start all over again. Does that sound like the kind of god you want eating in a pile of graffiti-covered ruins?”

Haggai turned to the governor, Zerubbabel, and said, “God told me that some day, very soon, he is going to conquer all the kingdoms of the Earth and rule the world himself from right here. From his temple. And
you
can be the man who makes all that possible.
Now, that’s the sort of favor God doesn’t forget.”
 

Taking the hint, the governor immediately put construction crews to work, rebuilding the temple.

“I can’t tell you how happy I am at all the progress you’ve made rebuilding the temple,” Haggai told the governor. “And believe me, God notices. In fact, he told me that when he does come back to rule the world, you’re going to be his right hand man. You’re going to rule the world together.”

“Really?”

“Oh, yes. Trust me, the day will come when everyone in the world will know the immortal name of Zerubbabel. But, for now, get back to work on the temple.”

I know Haggai’s already
gone over this with you, but we need to really to step it up on rebuilding the temple. Let’s set the whole reconstruction effort on rhumba beat and get it done as soon as possible, okay?

Once you get the temple built, God will send us a Messiah—a leader who will free our nation of foreign rule. A king who will gather all the Jews scattered around the world, bring them home, and set up the Kingdom of God here on Earth. But God can only send the Messiah AFTER the temple’s finished. Don’t ask me why, that’s just what he told me.

And it’s not enough to rebuild the temple, either. You have to really be into it. You can’t just fake-it-until-you-make-it the way we used to. God wants our obedience, but more than that, he wants a people who genuinely love him, and treat each other with respect. It doesn’t work to sing inside the temple and curse the widow begging on the steps. It’s because we didn’t listen to him when he commanded us to be decent people, that he didn’t listen to us cry for help when we were getting stabbed in the ass by Babylonians.

In the old days, the temple was a happy place, somewhere we could go to slay some goats and apologize to God. A healthy source of guilt and remorse, always there to remind us that we were being watched and shamed. And we need some shaming, to be frank. We need the temple to inspire us to behave like God’s chosen people, or he won’t even bother with us. No Messiah, no Kingdom of God— nothing.

How do all I know this? Well, let me tell you about the dreams I’ve been having:

First of all, there was this flying scroll. It was like thirty feet long and it said that all the thieves and liars would be banished from the land. Then this angel appeared and said, “Come here, there’s something I want to show you.”
He showed me a basket. He opened the lid of the basket, and there was a tiny woman trapped inside. “This is the sin of Israel,” he said, slapping the basket lid shut before she could scramble out. 

The angel disappeared with his scroll and his basket with the tiny woman and then the Lord himself appeared to me and said, “You have all sinned against me, but whatever, I just want to be together again. I want to go back to living in my temple. I want to take care of you. I want to make Jerusalem an unmovable rock, and when other nations attack you, I’ll make their eyeballs rot out of their sockets and their tongues fall out of their mouths. I’ll do the same to their horses, just to show you how much I love you.

“And when I come back, there’ll be no more dicking around with emperors and kings and shit, I’ll just rule the entire planet myself. I won’t just be the god of the Jews, but of the entire human race.
And I will invite all the nations of the Earth to Jerusalem to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles. Those who don’t come won’t get any rain for their crops while those who do will receive excellent gifts, including, but not limited to, free cookware.” 

Sounds great, doesn’t it? But it all starts with getting the temple rebuilt.

People of Judah:

This is God. First, I wanted to thank you for getting the temple rebuilt and open for business. That said, I have a few things I need to go over with you. 

After thirty years in exile, I knew you were bound to be a little rusty, but come on, priests.
These are hands down the worst animal sacrifices I’ve ever had! A blind goat, really? Would you want to eat a blind goat? Or worse, that puking cow you sacrificed last week? Try taking the governor a cow that vomits every thirty seconds and see where that gets you. I’m sorry, but this meat is downright disgusting. 

And it’s not like you don’t have plenty of nice, healthy animals to sacrifice. I see them running around all over the place. You’re simply skimping on my sacrificial meat so you’ll have more money to spend on shepherd staffs and robes, or whatever you kids are into these days.
 

I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve such miserly contempt, but the next time some pagan empire comes storming through your country, enslaving your kids and stealing your women, don’t ask me for help. I’ll be saving money on lightning bolts.

Oh, and do NOT try to cheese me out of my 10%. That’s right, when you tithe, it’s a full 10%.
Maybe it will help if you don’t think of tithing as an investment in my financial well-being so much as an investment in your own. You know those crops you plant? Well, you know who keeps them from being devoured by grasshoppers and mice every year?
That would be me. So ask yourselves, do you want your crops to be looked after by a God who’s fat and sassy? Or a God who’s gassy from choking down epileptic sheep? 

Am I making you nervous? Well, good! Because one day I’m going to judge each and every one of you according to your deeds. And my judgment will be like a crucible of fire, or a really strong laundry soap. Every stain, every impurity will be wiped out, and all that will be left will be honest, righteous men. Adulterers, liars, guys who bully widows, orphans, and immigrants, they will be set on fire, while the righteous will frolic like happy little rabbits.