St John’s Church, Harpenden - a sermon

I love it when I feel like God

We all have them - and some people might admit to them - these fleeting moments (at least I hope they are fleeting…) when we realize that we and the divine creator and sustainer of the universe are very much alike.  For me, such a moment comes with today's Old Testament reading.  God has led the Israelites out of bondage and to freedom - given them a leader and spokesperson in the form of Moses, equipped Moses for his calling, spared the covenant community from death at the hand of the Egyptians - God has been gracious, generous, and loving.

(Much like Lauryn, I can hear you thinking - no that's not the bit where I feel like God!)

But then what happens - God turns away to have a private word with Moses - the two of them disappear off into the hills for a little commandment giving  - and the people forget everything God and Moses have done for them.  They forget their slavery, the long days in blistering heat working under the whip; they forget the joy of liberation, Miriam's song and joyful dance as the Egyptians are left behind; the grumbling people no longer are sustained by manna from heaven, and they forget that the Lord who is both generous and practical has fed and freed them.  Moses isn't gone very long before the people of Israel forget all those things, choose a new leader, and make a new god to worship - an idol, a golden calf.  They build an altar, offer sacrifices of well-being, and, says Exodus 32.6, "rose up to revel."

God can't believe it!! Well, would you? "I have seen this stiff-necked people - now let me alone, so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them."   This is the point at which I feel most like God.  That anger, that burning desire to punish those who deserve it, who have been so foolish that you can scarcely believe it - they deserve what's coming to them.  Those students who insist on chewing gum, using mobiles in the classroom, refuse to do their homework… those children who can not, will not clean up after themselves… those drivers who don't understand that I am late and that they should get out of my way… I burn with righteous anger.  And that's just the little things in life, before I even get started on the issues in the forthcoming American election.  This stiff-necked people

Of course, God's desire to zap his people is thwarted, and his anger is turned. Moses, once uncertain and tongue-tied before the great I AM, now has the audacity - again, because he has done it before - to argue.  He argues with God!  No, don't do it, he pleads  - "turn from your fierce wrath, change your mind, and do not bring disaster on your people.

And, says the text, the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people."  And this, of course, is the point at which the Divine and I are no longer alike. (I did say it was a fleeting resemblance.)   While I continue to burn with futile anger and plot theoretical, if not actual, punishments - against the students with mobile phones, students who swear at me, or the children who NEVER tidy up after themselves - God has already moved on to forgiveness, to mercy.

It is a strange concept, this one of a merciful God.  We say the words often enough - at the end of our intercessions:  "Merciful Father, accept our prayers…" and, in the prayer of humble access before communion:   "God whose nature is always to have mercy…"  We believe that God is all powerful but also all merciful.

What is this quality of mercy?  The Hebrew word can also be translated as compassion, or pity.  It has the same root as "womb", and so points us to something deep inside, to a deep connection, as of a mother with her growing child.  "Mercy" can denote an inner feeling of sympathy or love, a deep affection or yearning, or simply forgiveness.  In Isaiah, for example, ch.63, the prophet begs God to deliver his seemingly forsaken people, and prays, "Look down from heaven and see…where are your zeal and your might? The yearning of your heart and your compassion?"  the RSV bible talks about the "yearning of thy heart and thy compassion", while the NEB uses the translation, "burning and tender love."  Yearning, compassion, burning and tender love.  This is the divine love, love manifested in saving acts of grace.  It is the love which God holds for his covenant people.  It is through God's loving acts of mercy that the covenant relationship is faithfully maintained.

In times of extreme trauma or evil, many scornfully ask, "Where was God?"  It is not a new question.  The Psalmist prays, Ps 79, "Do not remember against us the guilt of past generations, but let thy compassion come swiftly to meet us, for we have been brought so low.  Why should the nations ask, 'Where is their God?'".  The prophet Micah cries, "Thou dost not let thy anger rage forever but delightest in love that will not change.  Once more, thou will show us tender affection and wash out our guilt."  God has promised enduring mercy, and we, aware of our guilt, rely on God's compassionate forgiveness.

The obvious question is, if we believe that God is merciful, does that mean we can do what we want and count on God being merciful at the end of our life if we are quick enough to repent?  This view was deemed a heresy early on by the Church Fathers.  No, we don't sin now and repent later, because faith and love are not just about what God can do for us but are also about what we do for God, how we live with God, and how we reflect God's nature to those around us.  "Why should the nations ask, 'where is their God?"

3,000 years after Moses and the stiff-necked Israelites, God tries again to show compassion, and goes so far as to send his own son, to teach us, to show us.  Today's parables are examples of Jesus trying to teach people what God is like: merciful, ever loving, always searching out the lost, striving to hold and cherish the missing.  And when the shepherd or the housewife find the lost, are they triumphal and boastful in their success?  No, they are joyful.  Happy in the extreme that the lost are found and that love and order are restored, all are again safely in the arms of the one who loves best. Some of you may know the great children's storybook, Where the Wild Things Are, in which Max - the wild child - misbehaves so badly that his mother sends him to his room with no supper.  There, the walls fade away and Max becomes the king in his own adventure - until, at the last, he finds he wants to be back in the place where he is loved best of all - and that is my favourite line in the book, "And Max sailed away in and out of weeks and almost over a year and through a day and into the night of his very own room, where he found his supper waiting for him - and it was still hot."

Mercy, compassion.  God is the place, the resting place, wherein we are loved best.  God is the place in which forgiveness and mercy are gifts given in love.  St. Anselm, the 11th century Archbishop of Canterbury, said, "God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived."

"God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived."

If we think we know what love is like, God's love is greater.  We think we glimpse the vastness of the universe, through our satellites, through the Hubble telescope, but the vastness of God is greater.  We may believe we understand what mercy and forgiveness are about - but the mercy of God is greater than that of which we conceive.

In a world where children are held hostage and murdered, where chaos and sin  too often seem to hold the upper hand, the reality that God's nature is always to have mercy offers both hope and guidance. Individually, we are guided, or challenged to try to be that face of God in the world - we who call Jesus Saviour, we who call God Protector, are to be people who hold out mercy and forgiveness, embodying the divine, not tolerating wrong-doing, for to do so would be foolish - but standing firmly and resolutely as people who understand compassion - compassion everywhere, for every person; people who will go the extra mile, who will find and say the kind word, who will insist on the humanity of each person; we are to be the ones who will surprise one another and the world with mercy when anger is more deserved.

In so doing, in this embodiment of mercy, we draw, for fleeting moments, closer to God. We become bearers of the divine image.  In being merciful ourselves, we find the strength to hope, and we offer hope to the world.  We reflect the face of God to the world - you to me, I to you, each one of us Christ-bearers for this time and in this world.