The retired teacher took off his glasses. "I've studied the Bible for forty years in English," he said. "Tonight, I realized I've been reading it with one eye closed."
It was, and always had been, the language of a God who pitches his tent among us.
Selam continued, her voice growing stronger. "My grandmother used to say, 'God did not write his name in marble. He wrote it in a tent of skin.' In Amharic, the Word becoming flesh is not a mystery to solve. It is a neighbor to welcome. God did not send a book. He sent a body. He sefera —he pitched his tent—right here, in our mess, our loneliness, our foreignness."