The Sun Stands Still
The Sun Stands Still
Joshua 10:12-14
“On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord in the presence of Israel:
“Sun, stand still over Gibeon,
and you, moon, over the Valley of Aijalon.”
13 So the sun stood still,
and the moon stopped,
till the nation avenged itself on[b] its enemies,
as it is written in the Book of Jashar.
The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day. 14 There has never been a day like it before or since, a day when the Lord listened to a human being. Surely the Lord was fighting for Israel!”
I begin to fill my bathtub with hot water and dump more than half a bag of coconut epson salts into the cascading water. The white pile of salt slowly dissolves. Dipping a toe into the water, I decide to sit down. Today won’t end, I think.
The battle rages inside of me and around me. Will this time be wasted?
There is a cost to long fighting days. Its price is paid in high blood pressure, loss of sleep, and sideways anger.
My toes crumble the remaining salts. They are soft, oily. Their coconut scent fills the tub faster than the water. The sun filters through the blinds in the bathroom. I know I’m not “safe,” but allow myself to find comfort for a worn-out body, and weary soul.
Like the Gibeonites of Joshua 10, I, among a crowd of voices, sent for reinforcements; “Do not abandon your servants. Come up to us quickly and save us! Help us, because all the Amorite kings from the hill country have joined forces against us.” Joshua 10:6.
We wait.
The sun stands still.
The enemy is on the attack, again. He’s shown up with allies, and other kingdoms. He’s out lynching, proudly abandoning indigenous peoples of our country, brazenly perpetrating crimes against immigrants, and fanning fires of hate for Asian Americans.
The sun stands still.
As businesses, government, and society struggle to spin the politics of the pandemic, I witness old evil out destroying. Some lives matter and others just don’t. Videos attract some people’s attention, but other than a viral picture of 2.23 attached to a young Black man’s face, I don’t hear change. I don’t see change. I experience more silence, more erasure.
The enemy is familiar. We know one another well.
In other times, my call for help was less direct. I made politically correct pleas, constructed my requests eloquently, disguised and translated so as not to offend dominant culture.
Vulnerability is weakness. Yes, I need help, but take your time, I told my friends. Not anymore.
The sun stands still.
The coconut epson salts leave a silky film on my feet. Warriors need to take care of their feet. My feet are tired. My writing, exhausted. I’ve buckled the truth around my waist and my feet are ready with a gospel of peace meant to disrupt systems of oppression and their false promises.
Dominant culture embraces the “syntax of forgetting” (Miguel De La Torre’s description of both the colonizer and elite as positioning themselves as the main subject of history – forgetting the humanity of everyone else in the story).
I close my eyes.
The sun stands still.
Joshua came to the Gibeonites’ aid.
Will my friends who say they are my friends show up?
Will the institutions and communities I believe I am apart of stand for justice?
Will they stand against racist acts of violence with more than just a head nod?
The sun stands still.
We need more fighters. We need more anti-racists. We need more compassion, more humanity.
White supremacist ideology has infiltrated American Faith at its core. When the pandemic ripped off the band aid, it revealed an ugly, festering, infected partnership. Some of us knew it was there, rotting out the heart of our nation, others were still asleep. Be asleep no longer!
The longer days make pain last longer. It’s not glorious. The sun is holding out hope that our quarantine daylight will not be wasted.
The sun stands still.
My feet relax, smelling of coconut. Return. Comfort. A dear friend tells me of a family giving away one entire salary to feed others. Another used her stimulus check to buy children portable devices to access school. Still another provides internet for a family that cannot afford it. Another friend sends an email to an institution to call their attention to the lack of diverse voices. Someone close offers me space to be angry – to grieve.
Remember, “8 The Lord said to Joshua, “Do not be afraid of them; I have given them into your hand. Not one of them will be able to withstand you.” (Joshua 10:7)
The Lord is dismantling the systems of oppression, and breaking through spiritual darkness. Soul ties and bonds to power, death, and greed are meant to be broken.
Don’t waste the sunlight, friends.