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God's Good Pleasure, July 19, 2007 |
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Written by Marcia Hauer
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Saturday, 08 September 2007 |
God's Good Pleasure
Isaiah 1:1; 10-20 and Luke 12:32-40
August 19, 2007
Rev. Marcia J. Hauer
The reading from Isaiah this morning is not exactly uplifting. Isaiah refers to the people of Judah as "rulers of Sodom and people of Gomorrah" and he tells them that their offerings and sacrifices and celebrations--their worship services--are abomination. But, the prophet says, if the people are willing and obedient they shall eat the good of the land, but if they refuse and rebel, they will be devoured by the sword.
This is a passage that could be used in many ways and it probably has--
• God is angry and vengeful
• God wants people to be subservient and meek--good little girls and boys
• God delights in punishing even the smallest transgressions
But that is not at all what the prophet is saying. In comparing people of Judah to Sodom and Gomorrah, Isaiah is saying that like them, the people of Judah have, to quote Ezekiel and Jeremiah, "Excess of food and prosperous ease but [they] did not aid the poor and needy." And "They commit adultery and walk in lies; they strengthen the hand of evildoers so that no one turns from wickedness." (Ez. 16:49-50 & Jer. 23:14) The people of Judah have taken the good things that God has given and forgotten who they are and whose they are. They have come to believe that what is important is their material things and social status. They have forgotten the commandment to love God with all their being, to love themselves and to love their neighbors, and now the vulnerable in their society, the widows, orphans and strangers--all those without land--are suffering and are not included. The prophet is telling the rulers of Judah that their very worship is hollow, vacuous, and worthless because it is superficial. They are going through the motions without any awareness of the God who brought them up out of Egypt.
The gospel passage takes up the same theme when it talks about where your treasure is where your heart will be also. The writer of Luke tells us that giving alms is more than giving out of our excess. It is giving from our substance--"Sell your possessions and give alms," says Luke. Caring for the vulnerable is at the heart of what the Gospel and at the heart of what the prophets have to say. This caring for the vulnerable--the homeless, immigrants, mentally ill, addicted, outcast--is not simply "giving to the less fortunate." When we take that tack, we are excluding the recipients of our largess from community--from having a place at the table, from being part of the flock, part of Jesus' flock.
Ours is a culture that celebrates individuality--the self-made man and woman, the one who is able to pull him/herself up by the bootstraps, the Lone Ranger. Men get the brunt of this teaching but women aren't immune. How many of us have been taught that we ought to be able to solve life's problems with out the help of our neighbors? After all, if we talk about whatever the problem is, they might find out that we are not the self-sufficient individuals they thought we were.
We think of ourselves as relating to God as individuals. We pray alone. We study alone. Our individualism is particularly evident in the churches where altar calls are prevalent. Individuals are called forward if they want to accept Christ into their hearts. If they do this they will be saved.
Isaiah and Jesus' culture was far different. Their culture believed that they related to God as a group and so it's no surprise that the prophets brought God's condemnation down on whole people because of the actions of some of them. There is no way of knowing the number of people Isaiah included as the "rulers of Sodom and the people of Gomorrah." There is no doubt, however, that some of the people did remain faithful.
Individuality works very well if we are considering a system in which our relationship with God is dependent on our actions. If that is the case, then I need every one of those good deeds to be credited to my personal account. I don't have any to give away. Our denomination celebrates God's grace, particularly as outlined by John Wesley, but we United Methodists have as hard a time as any other group with letting someone else take credit for something we have done. If we truly believed our own theology, it wouldn't matter who got the credit.
Jesus calls us to rejoin the flock. It doesn't matter that some of the other sheep are scoundrels who don't have a big stock account in heavenly securities. To join the flock is to take seriously the promises of God's grace. Staying isolated and self-sufficient is simply another way of saying we want separate bank accounts because we don't trust God's promise and we feel the need to build up a healthy balance.
It may be that those words of Jesus that sound so immediately comforting are on second hearing very challenging--at least in our present world and culture. We are challenged to take the Gospel promises seriously. We are both promised and given the Kingdom in one fell swoop. For in the Kingdom, defined as the way things are under the rule of God, we are one people, the beloved ones, the forgiven ones, the set apart ones. To identify with the flock is to become part of the Kingdom of God.
The people who really hear this message and take it to heart might start singing “Us” instead of “Me” and “We” instead of “I” in our various hymns. If we did, we could get away from the personalized piety of so many of our worship materials that simply reflect our difficulty in being part of the flock gathered around the throne of God.
Jesus then calls us into a life of discipleship that would certainly be frightening if we were to be in it alone. But he never asks us to do that. The community he creates with his words is not even based in this world of fear and striving but is in the one true home to which he calls us. In that place we do not need all the things we are told daily we "must have." We are given the gift of freedom to be the agents of God in the world.
Many of us grew up not trusting, but Jesus speaks words that invite us to entrust ourselves to him in this world as his disciples. Such trust serves as a sign of our trust in him for our futures when this life is past. Our witness then becomes one clear statement. We are not just miserable souls waiting for the relief of death but people who are called to live seamlessly from now on until we are at home with God.
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