Yesterday’s lectionary reading came together easily. Today’s is difficult. The fantastic part, about the fish, is not outside the realm of possibility. The symbolism of the three days in the fish were taken by Christ, and thus the detail matters.

What I have difficulty with is what Jonah does. I hate saying I am wrong. I dislike it when the paths and plans I have don’t work out. And, as new doors open in my life, some of which are very exciting, there is fear. Part of me wants to be quiet, not stir, just get along with others.

But then the second plenary at the meeting I am at was on what is wrong with psychiatric research: and one of the clear issues is the insidious corruption of both the pharmaceutical industry and the state funded research inuustry, for both have agendas.

Sometime we need truth. Johan turned to God, in the belly of a fish, and to the faith of the temple.

And the LORD appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.

Then Jonah prayed to the LORD his God from the belly of the fish, saying,

“I called out to the LORD, out of my distress, and he answered me;
out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice.
For you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the flood surrounded me;
all your waves and your billows passed over me.
Then I said, ‘I am driven away from your sight;
yet I shall again look upon your holy temple.’
The waters closed in over me to take my life; the deep surrounded me;
weeds were wrapped about my head at the roots of the mountains.
I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever;
yet you brought up my life from the pit, O LORD my God.
When my life was fainting away, I remembered the LORD,
and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple.
Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love.
But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you;
what I have vowed I will pay. Salvation belongs to the LORD!”

And the LORD spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land.

(Jonah 1:17-2:10 ESV)

In Casa Pukeko, this is the season of living in the belly. Both sons are facing final exams at the end of this month, and the elder discussed with me — last night, when I was trying to sleep before an 0530 start this morning — that most of the people in his course are doing it so they can get a job and build a life — because going to university is what they have been told to do and that they don’t think about what they are doing.

And that the effort we make has no meaning. I then muttered something about this is the case, without Christ, and he said that without God this is meaningless, and yes, he’d explored existentialism in middle school and it did not work.

In the reforms we are considering, from the Disconvergence to taking the church back from those who thought it was a tool for social action (Right, Left or Green), above all, we need to know which is our altar. Before even which is our tribe and our throne.

To which altar we turn.

And I pray Casa Pukeko continues to choose the LORD, well beyond my generation and time.