Sunday, June 8, 2008

Pentecost 4A

Hosea 5:15-6:6

Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26

 

WRAPPED IN GOD’S GRACE

 

Grace and peace to you from our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ.  AMEN.

 

“What shall I do with you, O Ephraim?

 What shall I do with you, O Judah?”

It’s the kind of question more than one parent has asked of a wayward child.  Even the most responsible children will have their moments when they lose their way or go astray, and parents will wonder what to do with them.

 

A couple of weeks ago the CBS news magazine 60 Minutes included a segment on the Millennial Generation—those born after 1981 and prior to 1998.  Over 50% of Millennials return home to live after they finish college.  One might suspect that parents of Millennials in their 20’s may often keep on asking “What shall I do with you?”

 

In Hosea 6:4 the Lord is referring to the people of God.  Ephraim is another name for the Northern Kingdom of Israel.  Judah is the name of the Southern Kingdom.  Hosea 4:1-2 reveals why the Lord is exasperated with his people: “There is no faithfulness or loyalty, and no knowledge of God in the land.  Swearing, lying, and murder, and stealing and adultery break out; bloodshed follows bloodshed.”  As a consequence, says Hosea in 4:3, “the land mourns, and all who live in it languish; together with the wild animals and the birds of the air, even the fish of the sea are perishing.”

 

Hosea had married a prostitute named Gomer.  For Hosea the unfaithfulness of his wife Gomer became a metaphor for the unfaithfulness of the people of God.  Hosea also compares the unfaithfulness of Ephraim and Judah to a barren tree (9:13-17), a stubborn heifer (4:16 and 10:11-15), and a rebellious son (11:1-7).

 

In Hosea 11:1-2 the Lord grieves: “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.  The more I called them, the more they went from me; they kept sacrificing to the Baals, and offering incense to idols.”

 

How then does the Lord respond to the unfaithfulness and disloyalty of the people of God?

 

One response would be to ignore it, pay no attention, pretend that it did not happen or that it is no big deal.

 

Such a response, however, would diminish the importance of the relationship of the Lord with his people.  A break in this relationship is serious.  The Lord refuses to sit idly by and do nothing.  The people of God mean far too much to the Lord.

 

A second response would be to reject the people of God.  They have brought shame upon the name of the Lord.  They no longer deserve to be called by the Lord’s name.  The Lord has every right to cut them off and no longer number them among the people of God.  They deserve to pay for their unfaithful behavior.

 

The problem with this response is that it makes permanent the break between the Lord and his people.  It destroys any chance of the Lord fulfilling the promises made to Abraham and his descendents.  The Lord, you see, does not give up easily on his children whom he loves.

 

In Hosea 11:3-4 the Lord remembers his love for them: “Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them.   I led them with cords of human kindness, with bands of love.  I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks.  I bent down to them and fed them.”

 

The Lord contemplates returning the people to Egypt--thereby effectively giving up on them.  But in the end the Lord cannot take this step.  The Lord says: “How can I give you up, Ephraim?   How can I hand you over, O Israel?  How can I make you like Admah?  How can I treat you like Zeboiim?  My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender.  I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.”

 

God’s love for his people is so deep—so firmly embedded in his heart—that God cannot give up on his people.  Their unfaithfulness cannot be ignored or overlooked.  Indeed, it must be named, and the people must be called to account.  But always in the context of God’s great love for them.  God chooses to wrap his people—however wayward they may be--in bands of love.

 

Surely many parents can relate to such love.  No matter how far a son or daughter may wander astray, parents do not stop loving their children.  Loving parents ache to wrap their arms around even the most wayward child.

 

Today 19 of our high school seniors are being wrapped in quilts, a gift from their church family.  Our quilters have made these quilts with great love.  It is our way of wrapping our arms around them as they journey forth into the next stage of life.  We hope these quilts will be a constant reminder of our love for them.  Most of all, however, we hope these quilts will be a reminder of God’s great love for them.  They will remind them that they are wrapped in God’s grace—that is, God’s unconditional love.  Even as they wander astray at times, even as the face the inevitable challenges of life, we want them to know they can count on God’s loving presence in their lives.

 

Today Audrey Christine Flood is being baptized.  In baptism God wraps us in grace, in God’s unconditional love.  As Dan Erlander writes, “an infant has served on no committees, has done no great work, and is helpless, needy, dependent, and unemployed.  In fact, an infant brought to the water for baptism is a sign of how we all come to God—with nothing, absolutely nothing!”[1]  Nonetheless, stresses Erlander, God enfolds or wraps that child in God’s gracious and unconditional love.  So much can be taken from us in life.  But no one can ever take away the reality of being loved graciously and unconditionally by God.

 

St. Andrew member Thelma Topinka died recently.  She was nearly 96 years old.  Shortly before she died, I went to St. Vincent’s Hospital to do a blessing for her.  Her daughter Susie was there as well as Nan Thompson.  St. Vincent’s had given Thelma what is called a “Passage Quilt.”  Volunteers make these quilts for the dying.  They are a tangible reminder that the one dying is wrapped in God’s love.   How comforting to know that as we pass from this life through death into the life to come we are wrapped in God’s gracious love.

 

As people of faith, therefore, we believe that from the beginning of life through all the stages of life to the very end of life God wraps us in grace.  Make no mistake: it pains God when we go astray.  Our unfaithfulness is not overlooked or ignored.  But finally, God cannot stop loving us.  As Eugene Boring asserts, “the point is that the mercy of God, extended to humanity in Christ, takes precedence over all else.”[2]

 

What does God desire from us in response to this great love?  Hosea 6:6 gives us the answer: “I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice.”  Sacrifice was the focus of worship among the people of God.  The hope was that sacrifices and burnt offerings could in some way appease an angry God.  No sacrifice by human beings, however, could ever be enough to overcome our disloyalty or unfaithfulness.  God desires that we respond to God’s gracious love with love—love toward God, toward our fellow human beings, and toward the whole creation.  Sacrifice may have value, but only inasmuch as it grows out of love.

 

Matthew 9:13 echoes Hosea 6:6.  Jesus tells the Pharisees: “Go and learn what this means, `I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’”  The Pharisees were enmeshed in the sacrificial system and in obeying all the precepts of the law.  They truly believed their sacrifices and obedience merited a right relationship with God.  They missed on the reality that our relationship to God is grounded first and foremost in God’s mercy.

 

Baptism and the presentation of quilts to our high school seniors are two special ways in which we work with God to wrap people in God’s grace.  There are, of course, many other ways we participate with God in enfolding people in God’s gracious and unconditional love.  May St. Andrew be a place in which every person who gathers here feels wrapped in God’s grace.

In Jesus’ name, AMEN.