ANOTHER SHOT AT KEEPING THE COVENANT

            Covenant – as opposed to a contract with fixed terms, conditions and boundaries – is a shaped relationship remaining open at the front end.  When God tells people (Micah 6:8) they know what He requires – to act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with Him – He shapes the relationship without limiting its growth.  Ditto when Jesus calls the heart of covenant with God that we love God with all our might and neighbor as ourselves.  We are not just designed for covenant living; we attain the fullness of humanity only within that context, whether in the most intimate setting of the marriage covenant or in the social covenants of friendship and constitutional community. 

            In California we’ve done a poor job – at best – of keeping covenant with God and with one another.    

            We lead the nation in divorce and co-habitation without marriage, and these are covenant breaking and refusal to covenant at all, respectively.  Yet most of us remain blissfully unaware of – and in denial of – the degree to which covenant breaking is a lifestyle in our culture and history.  When our ancestors arrived in California they discovered more varieties of Native American tribes than in any other state.  They entered into covenants – treaties – with more frequency than in any other state – and we have broken virtually all of them.  That breaking has often been accompanied by violence of a unique ferocity.

               The Natural Bridges Massacre is one of the worst examples.  The gold miners of Weaverville lived in peace with the Nor-el Muk band of the Wintu nation until a famine came and six Indians begged food from a hate-filled Weaverville grocer.  He suggested they eat grass instead.  When his body was found with grass stuffed in his mouth a posse formed and reacted.  They never found the suspects, but they murdered more than one hundred fifty women, children and elderly Wintu at Natural Bridges for revenge.  To this day tourists and locals alike think the area a playground instead of the shrine it ought to be; graffiti covers the rocks where the dead are still not permitted to rest in peace.

            Even worse was the Etna area massacre of Shasta people.  Whites entered into a peace treaty with the tribe and – to celebrate – invited the tribe to a barbecue.  They laced the beef with strychnine and three thousand Shastans died.  Those who did not succumb to the poison were gunned down as they fled.  To this day the federal government denies the event took place, but I saw xeroxed copies of contemporary newspaper accounts of the slaughter.  It happened; denial only worsens the atrocity.

            Covenant breaking is unique among the master sins of California in that it does not stop with polluting the physical environment as much as the hearts of we who live in it.  It degrades our very nature as beings designed for one way of living and one only.  What does repentance resemble?

            The first thing is simple enough – fess up where we have messed up.  The second is just as simple – choose to recognize the God Who makes us as the God Who understands our best interests far better than we; re-focus our attention on Him and His ways and forget our excuses that too much time has passed or we are not our ancestors.  We accept the Gold Rush benefits they bequeath cheerfully enough; we can accept responsibility for righting their Gold Rush wrongs with the same cheerfulness.

            Of course such recognition would change our decision-making – one decision at a time – from whatever seems necessary to me to whatever seems important to my Maker.  It would embody Jesus’ words that when we sacrifice life claims for others we come into His abundant life, but when we hang on to self-serving survival we only postpone death for awhile.

            Prayer is the most important third dimension.  When we pray before and after doing we are reminded – should we forget – that the Good Samaritan remains the model of ultimate covenant keeping and Micah 6:8 still defines the covenant lifestyle.