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Being God’s Beloved: Day 10: Persistent Love

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

Many of us have a view of the Old Testament as portraying a God who is wrathful, violent and primitive. I had a friend who decided to stop reading the Old Testament entirely because he found the God presented there incompatible with the God that Christ knew. While his behaviour might be quite extreme, this is probably a view that is common to many, perhaps even most Christians. And truth be told, many of us have read little of the Old Testament.

So, one day I decided to start reading the Old Testament to hear the historical narrative and to see what this Old Testament God was all about. I opened at Genesis 1 and kept reading until I got to the New Testament. The thing that stood out most strongly for me from this, was that the God of the Old Testament was a loving God. I could see the angry God bits – they surely are there. But what was more dominant to me, was the loving God bits. And in particular, I was struck by the persistence of God’s love. In the face of repeated failure by the nations of Israel and Judah, God continues to love, and to love, and to love. Despite the persistent failure of God’s people to maintain their covenant with God, God remains faithful and engaged. God never gives up on them. If the Old Testament narrative as a whole taught me anything about God, it is that God persists in love.

Let’s pick up the story in 2 Chronicles after Solomon’s death. Solomon’s son Rehoboam succeeds him (chapter 10). Jeroboam and the people of Israel go to Rehoboam and ask for a lightening of the heavy labour burden Solomon had placed on them. After receiving sage advice from the elders, Rehoboam decides to follow the advice of some younger men who urge him to impose even heavier demands. Naturally, the people turned their backs on him, leading to the split of the kingdom between Israel in the north and the much smaller Judah in the south. Nevertheless, Rehoboam was a wise king in many ways and Judah flourished.

But in chapter 12, we learn that he “abandoned the law of the Lord” (12:1) and as a result “Shishak king of Egypt attacked Jerusalem” (12:2). One of Rehoboam’s prophets gives him a word from the Lord, “You have abandoned me; therefore, I now abandon you to Shishak” (12:5). God’s judgement has come on Rehoboam. Immediately, Rehoboam and his leaders “humbled themselves and said, ‘The Lord is just’” (12:6). In other words, Rehoboam grants that God is right in judging him. God sees their repentance and relents in judgement, “My wrath will not be poured out on Jerusalem through Shishak” (12:7). However, there is a lesson to be learned, “They will, however, become subject to him, so that they may learn the difference between serving me and serving the kings of other lands” (12:8).

This episode is a good example of God being “slow to anger”, which we read yesterday. God was certainly angered by Rehoboam’s abandoning of his faith. But God acts with restraint. And as soon as Rehoboam repents, God relents. The Chronicler summarises, “Because Rehoboam humbled himself, the Lord’s anger turned from him, and he was not totally destroyed. Indeed, there was some good in Judah” (12:12). Rehoboam lived out his life as a capable king. His son Abijah succeeded Rehoboam and was a good king (chapter 13). Abijah’s son Asa succeeded him and reigned in peace for ten years (chapter 14). In one battle, Asa prayed, “O Lord, you are our God; do not let man prevail against you” (14:11). His faith won him the battle. Asa’s son Jehoshaphat succeeded him and reigned for 35 years as a Godly king (chapters 17-20).

Jehoshaphat’s son Jehoram took over next (chapter 21) and aligned with the apostate Israelites. We get the first of nine iterations in 2 Chronicles of, “He did evil in the eyes of the Lord” (21:6). However, “because of the covenant the Lord had made with David, the Lord was not willing to destroy the house of David” (21:7) – here we see God once again, ‘slow to anger’ and exercising his side of the chesed agreement. It would seem appropriate if God had decided to wipe out Jehoshaphat and the people of Judah – they had, after all, forsaken God and their covenant with God. But God remains faithful and engaged. God does not give up.

God shows this engagement by stirring up the Philistines and Arabs, who invade Judah and carry off most of Jehoram’s family and Jehoram himself is afflicted with a horrible and fatal bowel disease. We are told, “he passed away, to no one’s regret” (21:20). Jehoram’s last remaining son, Ahaziah, took over and walked in his father’s footsteps and died (22:9). Ahaziah’s mother, Athalia, a worshipper of Baal, took the throne for six years and endeavoured to exterminate David’s descendents (chapter 23). The high priest, Jehoiada, having protected Ahaziah’s son Joash, organises a people’s rebellion, kills Athalia and crowns Joash (just seven years old) and reinstates the worship of God (chapter 23).

Now, this may not sound like loving behaviour from God – everyone who stands against God suffers and dies. However, it is striking that God remains actively engaged and present in the events of Judah. God never folds his arms, so to speak, or closes his eyes or reads a book. God continues to send prophets to warn the kings and enemies to defeat and humble them. This is always with a clear intention to turn the people back to God. Heavy handed they may be, but the purpose is to reconcile not obliterate.

We see this pattern of God’s blessing when the people follow God’s ways and God’s discipline when they do not through the next few kings. Joash walked for most of his 40 years as king in the ways of God, but forsook God and killed the prophet God sent to warn him (chapter 24). So, God’s judgement fell on Joash in the form of the Aramean army, who executed Joash. Joash’s son, Amaziah, takes over, follows in the ways of God and wins his first battle, then engages in idolatry and suffers defeat at the hands of the Israelites and dies (chapter 27). His son, Uzziah, follows a similar pattern of initial devotion and success, and later abandonment of God and untimely death (chapter 26). And so it continues through Jotham (chapter 27) and Ahaz (chapter 28).

Hezekiah (chapters 29-32) takes over from his father Ahaz and sets out to purify the temple, to renew the covenant with God and to celebrate a massive Passover festival. Hezekiah prayed for the people, “May the Lord, who is good, pardon everyone who sets his heart on seeking God” (30:18-19). The Chronicler says, “And so he prospered” (31:21). Hezekiah was faithful to the covenant and God bestows blessing and chesed on Hezekiah and the people of Judah. Sadly, in his last days, Hezekiah’s pride took him over and the wrath of God fell on him (chapter 32).

Manasseh took over from his father and “did evil in the eyes of the Lord” (33:2) leading Judah back into idolatry. God spoke to Manasseh and the people of Judah, endeavouring to reconcile them to God, but they did not listen (33:10). So, God brought the Assyrians against Judah and Manasseh was taken into captivity. But Manasseh repented and humbled himself, “and when he prayed to him, the Lord was moved by his entreaty and listened to his plea.. Then Manasseh knew that the Lord is God” (33:13). God here continues to engage, chastising wayward behaviour, responding positively and quickly to repentance and rewarding Godly behaviour.

Manasseh’s son, Amon, later took over and did evil in the eyes God and was subsequently killed (chapter 33). Josiah then took up the reigns and “did what was right in the eyes of the Lord” (34:2). Like Hezekiah, he purified the land of idolatry and moreover recovered the lost Book of the Law. After reading it, he called the people of Judah together and they renewed their covenant with God and celebrated the Passover in Jerusalem (chapters 34-35). He had a successful reign, was blessed by God and made a lasting contribution to Jewish faith, which sustained them through the exile. Four kings reigned after Josiah, until eventually Nebuchadnezzar invaded, sacked Jerusalem and took the people of Judah into captivity in Persia (chapter 36).

I agree that this may not sound like the most loving and friendly of relations. But I hope you can recognise that through all the ups and downs of the history of Judah (and a similar pattern can be found in Israel, as recounted in Kings) God remains engaged. God never gives up on the people of God. God repeatedly sends prophets to speak sense into those who deviate from the path of righteousness. God is quick to forgive and restore and bless. Even when God sends judgement it is designed to elicit repentance and a return to faith. Although we stopped at the exile in Persia, we could have continued, seeing God’s persistent faithfulness towards those in exile and their subsequent return to Jerusalem through the edict issued by Cyrus at God’s instigation (2 Chronicles 36:22-23).

In God’s relationship with you and with me, God always remains engaged. God’s love persists. There are times when we are turned open-hearted towards God and God is delighted and blesses us – a happy parent. But there are other times when we turn away, we ignore, we close our hearts and stop our ears, we transfer out love elsewhere, we forget. This disturbs and upsets God. Of course it does – God wants uninterrupted fellowship with us. But God does not turn away or forget us. God remains always engaged, always hoping for a breakthrough. God may send or permit life experiences that may turn us back to God, and some of these may involve suffering. These too are designed to draw us to God, to soften our hearts, to open our eyes, to restore fellowship.

God’s love persists, no matter what.

Meditation for the Day

Reflect on the persistence of God’s love in the Old Testament history of the Jewish people. Think about your own relationship with God – are you persisting with God right now? How about last year? What does it mean for you that God persists with you, even when you don’t persist with God?

Prayer for the Day

My God, I thank you for the persistence of your love for me. That even when I have lost sight of you, you do not lose sight of me. That you will try and try and try again to get through to me. Please don’t ever give up on me, no matter how hard I try to make you.

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Being God’s Beloved: Day 9: Slow to Anger

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

Yesterday we looked in depth at one Hebrew word, chesed, which refers to God’s unfailing and steadfast love towards those with whom God has a covenant relationship, God’s ‘loving-kindness’. Chesed is used close to 250 times in the Old Testament. In eight of those, chesed is partnered with an important phrase, which is our focus today: “slow to anger”. There is one other place where “slow to anger” is used in the Old Testament – without the word chesed – giving a total of nine occurrences.

Although they are similar in wording, there is one version that has particular meaning to me. It is the version from Joel 2:13, “Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in chesed (love), and he relents from sending calamity.” In the services at our church, we often recite this verse in the context of a time of penitence and confession. For me, it serves two purposes:

  • First, it calls me to repent, reminding me that I am sinful, fallen, broken. It is the first phrase that does that – “Rend your heart”. It was custom among Jewish people in those days to tear their clothes when distressed, bereaved or penitent. It was a public sign of intense, heartfelt emotion. Clothes were not as common as they are today, so ripping up your costly clothing would not be done lightly. Imagine wearing your best, most favourite clothes; and then ripping them. That’s probably not something we’d do! But Joel says that we should not just rend our clothes; rather we should rend our hearts. The depth of feeling that would prompt that kind of ripping is almost unimaginable. Joel calls us to a most heartfelt and intense contrition about our sinfulness. In the preceding verse, God says, “Return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning” (Joel 2:12).
  • Second, it gives me the promise that God will respond positively to my penitence, because God is gracious, compassionate, slow to anger and overflowing with chesed. This four-fold combination gives me the courage to fess up to God, rather than to pretend that I’m okay or to avoid God in the hope that my sin might just go away in time.

Joel wrote during the time of King Uzziah, a time of prosperity for Israel.[1] But a plague of locusts threatened the economy of the region and also the ability of Israel to continue its ceremonial religion. Joel interpreted the plague as a judgement from God, warning the people of Israel that their faith had waned and become formulaic – empty ritual. He warns them of a greater judgement to come if they do not repent and develop a heart-relationship with God. But if they did repent, God would restore them.

That’s a great story of Israel, but it is also a great story of ourselves, perhaps even of you yourself. Most of us go through times of great zeal in our faith, a rich and vibrant relationship with God, a stemming of the tide of sin, growth in faith and witness, and the development of Christlikeness. But most of us probably also go through times of falling away, of cooling down, of relying on self, on flirting with sin, of going incognito and of following our own desires.

Figurative plagues of locusts may be God’s way of calling us to repentance and to a heart-relationship with God. And it is in this context that this promise, that God is slow to anger and abounding in chesed, becomes so important.

Before we go on, let me list the other eight passages where we find this phrase:

  • And he [God] passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in chesed (love) and faithfulness.” (Exodus 34:6)
  • The LORD is slow to anger, abounding in chesed (love) and forgiving sin and rebellion. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation. (Numbers 14:18)
  • They refused to listen and failed to remember the miracles you performed among them. They became stiff-necked and in their rebellion appointed a leader in order to return to their slavery. But you are a forgiving God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in chesed (love). Therefore you did not desert them. (Nehemiah 9:17)
  • But you, O Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in chesed (love) and faithfulness. (Psalm 86:15)
  • The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in chesed (love). (Psalm 103:8)
  • The LORD is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in chesed (love). (Psalm 145:8)
  • He [Jonah] prayed to the LORD, “O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in chesed (love), a God who relents from sending calamity.” (Jonah 4:2)
  • The LORD is slow to anger and great in power; the LORD will not leave the guilty unpunished. His way is in the whirlwind and the storm, and clouds are the dust of his feet. (Nahum 1:3)

Many of these of these verses are partnered with a verse that speaks of judgement, as we see in Numbers 14:18 and Nahum 1:3. We will reflect at a later time on the topic of God’s judgement and wrath. For today, though, let us remain focused on ‘slow to anger’ in relation to chesed.

You will see from these verses that the four main elements are present in almost all of them: compassion, graciousness, slowness to anger and chesed. In addition, we have elements of: faithfulness, forgiveness of sin, not deserting, relenting from sending calamity and powerful. I suggest that all of these elements are different facets of one central concept, namely chesed. It is God’s covenant relationship lovingkindness that manifests in compassion, grace, forgiveness, faithfulness and so on. And God’s slowness to anger is part of that.

‘Slow to anger’ implies that God does get angry. Let us not kid ourselves about that. When we sin, God gets angry at us. God gets angry because sin is everything that is not what God intends us to be and do. Sin is, in essence, us turning away from God’s vision, God’s values, from God himself. And this distresses God and angers God.

But while we may expect God to go ballistic and annihilate us, we are reassured by this passage that God is slow to anger. Read these three verses from Psalm 103:8-10

The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in chesed (love). He will not always accuse, nor will he harbour his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.

Here, “slow to anger” is augmented with “nor will he harbour his anger forever”.  In other words, God relents, cools down. And we are reassured that “he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities” – we do not get our just deserts from God. God forgives, God relents, God concedes.

All of this speaks to a God who lacks anger towards those with whom God has a covenant relationship. It is not that God does not angry at all – that would be disturbing in its own way. Rather, God is not full of anger. And when God does get angry, it is slow in coming.

This is important for those of us who have been raised by people who are quick to anger and prone to excessive and disproportionate anger. We may come into a relationship with God, skittish that God will be like that – one wrong move and you get smacked! We may spend our entire faith-life walking on egg shells to not arouse the wrath of God, to keep the angry giant asleep.

But this is not the God we meet in the Old Testament. The God of the Old Testament is slow to anger.

On the other hand, this same God is quick to love (chesed)! And abounding in love!

I love this contrast! Don’t you?

God is slow to anger and quick to love; lacking in anger and overflowing in love. The contrast is deliberate and points to the heart of God, the character of God. God is not full of anger, but full of love.

Many of us (and I am one of these) harbour a nagging belief that God is fundamentally, deeply disappointed in us. That we are deficient and inadequate and tainted. That we don’t live up to God’s standards. That God is perpetually frowning at us, disapproving, judging. And that if we make one more wrong move, God is likely to smite us.

But, when we take a big breath and look into the inner depths of God, when we dare to investigate what God really feels towards us, we discover that the overriding experience and feeling in the heart of God is love, not anger. Of course, we are not perfect, and we do upset God, and we mess up and sin – all of this is true and God is not unmoved by it. But this does not result in a dominance of anger in God towards us, because God is basically ‘cool’ – slow to anger. Rather, there is a dominance of love, goodwill, generosity, compassion and chesed in God towards us.

I invite you to take the risk of exploring what God really feels towards you.

Meditation for the Day

What do you think God really feels when God thinks about you? Anger or love? In what proportions? If you think God is primarily angry, read again these verses and weigh up again the ratio of anger to love. Test and challenge your belief that anger predominates.

Prayer for the Day

God of abundant love, grace and compassion, help me to truly believe that you love me.

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[1] Patterson, R. D. (1985). Joel (in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

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Being God’s Beloved: Day 8: Chesed

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

We use words to describe and communicate experiences of life. These words are often inadequate to capture the whole of the experience. And when we try to translate them from one language to another, things get even more complicated.

One such word is the Hebrew word chesed. The 1535 Coverdale Bible translated it as ‘loving-kindness’. The NIV uses several English words or phrases, depending on the context, including love, unfailing love, great love, kindness, unfailing kindness, mercy, faithfulness and devotion. Chesed appears almost 250 times in the Old Testament. About three quarters of these occurrences refer to God’s chesed for humanity, while most of the remainder refer our chesed for one another.[1]

Chesed is most importantly a relational term. It is a pattern of interaction that takes places within established relationships. God’s love is made available to the whole of humanity – it is universal and all-embracing. But God’s chesed is a particular form of love that is exercised within established and intimate relationships between God and us. In other words, once we enter into a committed relationship with God, we experience an additional quality to God’s love, which is chesed.

Chesed may be best understood as a covenant love. Abraham entered into a covenant relationship with God in Genesis 17. At one level, the covenant is a contractual relationship between God and Abraham (and his descendants). But it is much deeper and whole-hearted than just a contract. It is a deep commitment of each to the other, much more like a marriage contract – an enduring and intimate investment in one another. With this mutual commitment comes chesed – loving-kindness, unfailing love. Chesed is the relational term that sums up the covenant.

God speaks about this in Isaiah 54:10, “‘Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my chesed (unfailing love)[2] for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed,’ says the LORD, who has compassion on you.” And again a few verses later, God’s covenant and God’s chesed are paired, “I will make an everlasting covenant with you, my chesed (faithful love) promised to David” (Isaiah 55:3b).

Chesed is not merely a warm feeling of love towards a person with whom you have a committed relationship. Rather, it is a demonstration of that commitment in acts of kindness or mercy. It is love in action, based on commitment or loyalty. Neither is chesed simply random acts of kindness to strangers – the enduring and close relationship is central. We get some sense of this in Isaiah 63:7, “I will tell of the chesed (kindnesses) of the LORD, the deeds for which he is to be praised, according to all the LORD has done for us—yes, the many good things he has done for the house of Israel, according to his compassion and many chesed (kindnesses).” Compassion and kindness here have different meanings. Compassion is more about mercy and pity, with a significant emotional component, while kindnesses refer to acts of kindness rooted in God’s relationship with God’s people.

Because God is eternal and because God’s covenant is permanent, God’s chesed endures and persists for eternity. In Jeremiah 33:3, God says, “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with chesed (loving-kindness).” And in Psalm 89:28, God says, “I will maintain my chesed (love) to him forever, and my covenant with him will never fail.” Because of this assurance, the Old Testament writers repeatedly attest to God’s everlasting faithfulness: “But from everlasting to everlasting the LORD’S chesed (love) is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children” (Psalm 103:17); “The LORD will fulfill his purpose  for me; your chesed (love), O LORD, endures forever—do not abandon the works of your hands” (Psalm 138:8); “Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his chesed (love) endures forever” (1 Chronicles 16:34).

This last phrase, “His chesed (love) endures forever”, appears numerous times in the Old Testament. It becomes a refrain in Psalm 118, which opens and closes with the whole phrase, “Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his chesed (love) endures forever”, and which repeats the refrain in verses 2, 3 and 4. Psalm 136 also opens with the whole phrase, and has the refrain in each of the Psalm’s 26 verses. Psalm 136 is a kind of Jewish Creed, in which all of God’s great acts to that time are recited, including God’s creation of the heavens and the earth, God’s liberation of Israel from Egypt and God’s giving to them the land of Israel. “His chesed (love) endures forever!”

God’s chesed is experienced particularly when we are in the midst of adversity. Psalm 94:18 says, “When I said, ‘My foot is slipping,’ your chesed (love), O LORD, supported me.” And Psalm 32:10 says, “Many are the woes of the wicked, but the LORD’S chesed (unfailing love) surrounds the man who trusts in him.” The sense here is that God’s chesed is grasped at while we are still in the adversity. Chesed does not necessarily remove the adversity or even the distress and anxiety that adversity evokes. Within each situation, we have to seek out again God’s chesed and rediscover what it means to be loved while we struggle with life. Chesed becomes a lifeline or an anchor onto which we hold for dear life. While we struggle someone may reassure us that God loves us, but actually that is something we have to find for ourselves.

God’s chesed is what we particularly cling to when our life is in danger. In Genesis 19, when the angels of the Lord rescue Lot and his family from Sodom, Lot says, “Your servant has found favour in your eyes, and you have shown great chesed (kindness) to me in sparing my life. But I can’t flee to the mountains; this disaster will overtake me, and I’ll die.” In the midst of this threat on his life, Lot experiences the angels’ deliverance as an act of chesed. In Psalm 119, especially, life and love are intimately tied up together: “Preserve my life according to your chesed (love), and I will obey the statutes of your mouth… Hear my voice in accordance with your chesed (love); preserve my life, O LORD, according to your laws… See how I love your precepts; preserve my life, O LORD, according to your chesed (love)” (119:88, 149 & 159).

God’s chesed gives us courage to approach God, even when we have messed up. Our sin – the myriad ways we fall short of God’s ideal for us – hinders our relationship with God. But our knowledge of God’s chesed is the mandate for us, nevertheless, to come close to God, to ask for mercy and forgiveness. Old Testament writers have a unique ability to remind God of God’s own values, and then to call on God to live according to these! It’s what we’d call chutzpah (Yiddish for audacity)! For example, Psalm 51 opens with these words, “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your chesed (unfailing love); according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.” David, the author of this psalm, calls on God’s chesed and compassion to access God’s mercy and forgiveness. Psalm 6:4 similarly calls on chesed to access God’s deliverance: “Turn, O LORD, and deliver me; save me because of your chesed (unfailing love).”

Perhaps one of the more audacious examples is in Numbers 14:17-19, where Moses intercedes with God who is fed up with the grumbling of the Israelites during their time in the wilderness. He quotes back to God, God’s own words! And then, standing firm on God’s promised chesed asks for God’s forgiveness of the people. “Now may the Lord’s strength be displayed, just as you have declared: ‘The LORD is slow to anger, abounding in chesed (love) and forgiving sin and rebellion. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation.’ In accordance with your great chesed (love), forgive the sin of these people, just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now.” Reminded of his own words, God says, “I have forgiven them, as you asked.” We, like Moses, can have confidence to rest in God’s chesed, because God is committed to us.

God’s chesed is abundant. It is not meted out stingily. Psalm 33:5 affirms, “The earth is full of his chesed (unfailing love)” and Psalm 119:64 echoes, “The earth is filled with your chesed (love), O LORD.” The Psalms describe God’s love as reaching to the heavens – to the moon and back! “For great is your chesed (love), higher than the heavens; your faithfulness reaches to the skies” (Psalm 108:4). And God’s chesed reaches thousands of people (probably meaning everybody), “Know therefore that the LORD your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of chesed (love) to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commands” (Deuteronomy 7:9).

God’s lovingkindness – God’s chesed – is part of the relational package for all those who have entered into a covenant relationship with God. We can rely on God to be true to God’s character and promise, that God will keep his covenant of love with us. We can rest, peacefully, on God’s promise and God’s consistency. What God has said, God will do. It is one of the anchors of our life, not dependent on our feelings of relational security or self-worth. Not even dependent on the purity of our life. It is dependent on God’s consistent orientation towards us, an orientation of chesed.

But what if you are not in a covenant or committed relationship with God? What if you have not yet surrendered your life to Christ? While chesed is reserved for those in a covenant relationship, God still loves you and deeply wants to have a covenant relationship with you. This is God’s deep desire for each one of us – to have this sort of deep, intimate, loving relationship with you. All it requires from you is a decision to relinquish yourself to God – to surrender. Recognise your brokenness and the hollowness in yourself without God. Acknowledge your desire for and need for God. Thank God for being open to receive you into relationship. Thank God in particular for his Son Jesus Christ who has cancelled our sin and opened up the path to a wholehearted relationship with God. And commit yourself to God’s chesed. Welcome to God’s family! And to a lifelong experience of God’s chesed.

Meditation for the Day

Reflect on the meaning of chesed – God’s attitude of lovingkindness towards those with whom God has a covenant relationship. How would you relationship with God be different if you fully accepted God’s chesed?

Prayer for the Day

Loving God, remember your covenant of love to me. Let me never turn away from you. Let me never forget all your lovingkindnesses to me in the past. Let me always rest secure in your chesed.

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[1] VanGemeren, W. (Ed.). (1997). New international dictionary of Old Testament theology and exegesis. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan. This is the primary source of information that informs today’s chapter. I have also made some use of the Brown, C. (Ed.). (1986). New international dictionary of New Testament theology and exegesis. Carlisle, UK: Paternoster.

[2] In all the quotations from the NIV Bible today, I am placing the NIV translation of chesed in brackets, so that you can see both the original use of chesed by the biblical writers and the varied translations of chesed into English by the NIV translators.

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Being God’s Beloved: Talk 1: Who is Your God?

On Wednesday 12 March, we started the series of five talks on the theme of “Being God’s Beloved” at St Martin’s Anglican Church in Irene, South Africa. The first talk asks the question “Who is your God?” and gives attention to the essence of the Triune God and the creation of humanity. The 21 minute was part of a one-hour programme, involving prayer, small group discussion and large group feedback.

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Being God’s Beloved: Day 7: The God who Draws Near

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

Moses has fled for his life into the desert after killing an Egyptian guard. One day, while tending the sheep, he sees a burning bush. Oddly, although it was on fire, it doesn’t burn up, so he goes closer to get a better look. Then God speaks to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!” Moses says, “Here I am.” (I don’t know about you, but this sort of things doesn’t happen to me much. Actually, if I think hard, I can’t ever recall God speaking to me out of a burning bush! It’s enough to blow your mind.)

Then God says, “Do not come any closer. Take off your sandals for the place where you are standing is holy ground.”

Generally, when the Bible speaks about God as holy or the things of God as holy, it means two related things. First, it is about purity and second, it is about being separate. God is God, holy, exulted, powerful, tremendous, pure, untouchable, unseeable, unspeakable. God is so high and lifted up that we cannot even look upon God’s face. The theological word for this is ‘transcendence’. It means that God is enormously different from us, to such an extent that we cannot really connect with God. It includes all the omni’s – omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence and so on. It is why some people kneel or bow or genuflect – a sign of our smallness in comparison with God’s greatness, our unworthiness in comparison with God’s sublime splendour.

Here God says to Moses that even the ground around the bush through which God’s voice is projected is so holy that Moses must remove his shoes. It is, in a way, the holy of holies before the temple was built, before even the tabernacle. This is a great example of transcendence.

Transcendent is often how we perceive God to be in the Old Testament. God seems massive and fearsome, austere and remote, more likely to smite you than bless you. The Old Testament God is not the Jesus who draws alongside people, who shares a meal of bread and fish, who touches the leper, who weeps at a graveside, who calls God ‘Abba, Dad’. The New Testament God seems to us to be much warmer and a lot more approachable. The Old Testament God has to be appeased with offerings before being willing to forgive, setting out strict rules and striking down those who accidentally look into the Ark. And because of this, many of us spend a lot more time reading the New Testament than the Old Testament – it helps us feel closer to God, because God seems more accessible to us.

But here in Exodus chapter 3, we now read a most remarkable passage:

The Lord said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers. And I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey.”

This is absolutely one of my all-time favourite passages in the Bible! It is hard to write when you’re jumping up and down with excitement.

Notice how God describes his actions:

  • I have seen…
  • I have heard…
  • I am concerned…
  • I have come down…

Do these sound like burning-bush, holy-ground words? Are these the words of a transcendent and remote God? Is this an austere and slow-to-warm deity? No! Not at all!

These are the words of a God who is intimately connected with human experience, particularly human suffering. These are the words of a God who empathises – who shares our feelings and suffers along with us. These are the words of a God who does not observe passively from afar, but who engages and intervenes. These are the words of a God who moves into human experience rather than remaining aloof. These are the words of love.

God says, “I have seen the misery of my people… I have heard them crying out.”

As a counsellor and as a person who has been in counselling, I have come to learn that being present with someone in their suffering is very often all that is needed. Not everyone is willing to see and hear another person’s suffering. Truly, it is painful to see and hear suffering. Sometimes when someone starts talking about their not-so-happy life, we’d prefer to change the topic, or cut them off because we have an appointment, or do the empty-hearted uh-huh’s that mimic real listening while our thoughts wander. It hurts to really listen and truly witness another person’s suffering. This is exactly what God does here: I have seen… I have heard. God is willing to be emotionally present with us in our pain.

Many years ago, I suffered from a major depressive episode and wound up in a psychiatric ward. I spent my first week there trying to make myself feel better – pulling myself up by my bootstraps, putting on a brave face, hoping that I could trick myself out of depression. Of course, that did not work. One day, in the second week, I surrendered to the depression, and spent an hour long therapy session weeping. I could not speak – only tears – I had dropped to the depths of my despair and pain. My therapist spent the hour sitting beside me, saying nothing, passing me tissues. She saw me. She heard me. She did not flinch away or try to patch me up. She did not offer comfort or advice. She did not give me medication to dull the pain. She simply sat with me in the darkness, like Job’s friends (initially) sat with him in his despair. This was the first day of my recovery.

God’s willingness to see and hear the misery of his people reveals God’s love. God is willing to sit with us in the worst of our experiences, in the darkest or most savage feelings, in the worst thoughts. God does not close his eyes or block his ears. God opens Godself to hear and see our lives, just as they are.

God says, “I am concerned about their suffering.”

It is possible to see and hear someone’s suffering without being moved by it. Sometimes caregivers become so burned out that they witness suffering without feeling it – they are emotionally disconnected and shut down. But God is emotionally engaged and present. God feels! God is not unmoved. God suffers with us.

There is a difference between physical presence and emotional presence. Physical presence involves being present with someone without emotional connection. You are there, listening, using all the right counselling skills, doing your job well, but not allowing yourself to be impacted by the person’s experience. On the other hand, emotional presence involves also allowing oneself to be touched by and even hurt by the other person’s experience. It involves emotional risk, because sometimes another person’s pain can be overwhelming and frightening. It hurts to engage with another person’s hurt.

The Hebrew word translated ‘concerned’ is yada.[1] It has a range of meanings, including to recognise, perceive and care about. It is also the word used for ‘know’ – to really know someone, to understand, to have insight. And it’s the word used in Genesis 4:1 for ‘know’, as in Adam knew (had intercourse with) Eve. It is used some 20 times in Hosea to speak about our knowing and loving God. The word conveys an intimate and deep knowing of another person. It is about being in continuous and open-hearted relationship with someone. So, when God says, “I ‘know’ their suffering”, God is speaking of an intimate knowledge of human experience rooted in God’s relationship with us. It is a knowing that is so intimate it is as if God is the one who is suffering.

Today, we’d call that empathy. God empathises with us. Think on this. God is perfect wholeness and balance. There is no want, distress, need or lack in the experience of God. God is like custard with no lumps – smooth and satin. But when God chooses to be ‘concerned’, God allows the crunchiness of human experience and the sharpness of human suffering to disturb that perfection. No-one likes lumpy custard! But God chooses the lumps; God chooses to be immersed in these aspects of our life. Because God loves the whole of us – the joys and triumphs, and the darkness and sorrow. God is whole-hearted towards humanity, towards you, embracing every aspect of your life, not only certain parts of it.

God says, “So I have come down.”

The transcendent God becomes immanent – God draws near, coming right into the human sphere. God is not watching from a distance. God is present and active. ‘Coming down’ might not seem like a big deal, but consider that God is beyond time and space. God created space and time, thus lives outside it. So ‘coming down’, entering our world, is a very big deal. It is a foretaste of the incarnation of the second person of the Trinity into the individual named Jesus of Nazareth – that great emptying out of God’s divinity to be immersed into a single human life. ‘Coming down’ is, perhaps, the most remarkable aspect of God’s engagement with humanity.

The presence of God makes all the difference. God’s presence in human suffering gives suffering perspective. God’s presence in suffering gives us hope. God’s presence in suffering gives us comfort. God’s presence gives us the assurance that God knows what it is like to be us.

We cannot adequately explain suffering. But there is comfort in the testimony that God sees, hears, knows and comes. All of these are real demonstrations of God’s love for humanity. God did it for the people of Israel, which lead up to the Exodus. God did it for me when I was depressed in hospital. God does it for you in whatever situation you find yourself facing today.

Meditation for the Day

God is nearby, seeing and hearing you, knowing and feeling concerned about you, desiring to come down to be with you. Reflect on the nearness of the God who loves you and open yourself to experience God’s presence with you. 

Prayer for the Day

Oh God, my parent. Be present with me today. Help me to recognise your heart, turned towards me, with empathy and compassion. Let me lean on you.

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[1] VanGemeren, W. (Ed.). (1997). New international dictionary of Old Testament theology and exegesis. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

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Being God’s Beloved: Day 6: Abraham’s Commission

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

Abraham is an important figure in history. He is the father of three faith traditions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam. He is held up, in both Old and New Testaments, as a great example of faith. The New Testament letter to the Hebrews, in particular, encourages us to follow Abraham’s example of faithfulness.

We first meet Abraham in Genesis 12, where he encounters God for the first time. This is the calling of Abraham (still, at that stage, named ‘Abram’), when god calls Abraham to leave his home country, indeed to leave his life, and set out to a land that God had chosen for him. God says to him:

“I will make you into a great nation,
and I will bless you;

I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;

and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.”

(Genesis 12: 2-3)

See how the word ‘blessing’ is used five times in these two verses. Once it is about God blessing Abraham, once it is about God blessing other people, once it is about others blessing Abraham and twice it is about Abraham blessings others. This is a real sharing of blessing! ‘Bless’ is, in Hebrew, barak .[1]

In the Ancient Near East (the cultures and groups surrounding the Jewish people during Old Testament times) the concept of ‘blessing’ was almost always from Divine to human – God blessed us, we did not bless God. And for these people and the Jewish people, securing God’s blessing for oneself personally or for one’s nation was paramount. God’s blessing would bring about everything one hoped for: abundant crops, success in battle, fertility, longevity, wealth, power and happiness. The more powerful the god, of course, the more potent the blessing. And a blessing could be passed on to one’s progeny.

We remember, in Genesis 1:22, how God blessed the living creatures. And then in verse 28, he blessed the first humans, saying “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground”. God’s blessing transfers authority and right, status and role. It is almost as if God imparts something of Godself to humanity when blessing us.

It is thus surely clear from this passage in Genesis 12, that God is making a great promise to Abraham. We can see this with the five uses of “I will”. God asserts that God will bless Abraham, by making him into a great nation, by blessing him, by making his name great, by blessing those who bless him and by cursing those who curse him. “If God be for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31). If we had to set this to music, we’d use the tune “I’ll stand by you”.

Such promises convey a central message: God loves Abraham. If we had to condense this passage into just a short phrase, wouldn’t that be appropriate? A little while ago my father wrote to me, “I kill da bull for you!” I interpreted that not as a threat against bulls or an expression of pent up aggression. No! It was an expression of love for me – how far he would go to protect and champion me as his son. Similarly, here in Genesis, God perceives what Abraham really longs for (a people, descendants, respect, land) and says, “I love you so much, I will give you these things that your heart desires.” This is, first and foremost, a love poem.

Can you imagine encountering God and hearing God say these things to you? God says, “I love you so much, I will give you these things that your heart desires”. Perhaps these are promises that we can and should claim for ourselves, as children of Abraham. It is God’s promise not only to Abraham as an individual, but also to his children and his children’s children, the ages, down to we who follow in his faithful footsteps.

But lest we get stuck in the wonderfulness of God loving us, let us remember that three of the five uses of blessing are targeted at the nations, not at Abraham – one of these by God and two by Abraham. The blessing that God gives to Abraham is not intended to stop with Abraham. Abraham is not supposed to get fat on God’s blessing. Rather Abraham will be a conduit or a channel of God’s blessing, passing it on to the nations, to “all peoples on earth”.

Some years ago, Scott Wesley Brown wrote a great Gospel song called “Blessed to be a blessing”, which I love to sing. But I think the theology of the title might be a bit problematic. Genesis 12 does not convey the conditional sense that the song title does. God does not say “I will bless you so that you will be a blessing”. Rather, God says “I will bless you and you will be a blessing”. The blessing that Abraham receives is given whole-heartedly and fully to Abraham himself, because God loves him. Period. And in addition, inevitably, people will be blessed because of Abraham.

This is important! God’s blessing of us, God’s love for us, is not conditional. It is given without strings attached, out of God’s overabundance of love. God loves because God loves. And we can receive it without terms and conditions – no small print.

But in addition to this, God’s love is for everyone, not only for us. The well of love from which God draws has no limit, no bottom, no end. God is able to draw infinitely to bless us for eternity with unimaginable love. And God desires that love to reach everyone. And Abraham was that channel of love. After he died, he passed that blessing on to his children, and to their children, and eventually to greatest of the Sons of David, Jesus Christ, who truly became a blessing for all peoples. And Christ commissions us to continue to be a blessing to all nations, passing on the love of God to everyone we encounter.

It is a sad truth, I think, that the Old Testament has more stories about the nations being attacked by the people of God or excluded from the blessing of God than being blessed with the blessing of God. It seems that Israel never quite grasped that they had a commission to bless all people. The notion of being ‘chosen’ and ‘set apart’ went to their heads. The blessing was kept and protected. Like Gollum’s “my precious.”

But repeatedly throughout the pages of the Old Testament, the idea of a blessing to be passed on comes up. We hear is in a different form in Exodus 19:4-6, where God says through Moses, “You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” The first sentence speaks of God’s blessing – God’s liberation of Israel from bondage in Egypt. This great and national blessing is the cornerstone of Jewish theology and spirituality – it is the event in Jewish history that most powerfully demonstrates God’s tremendous love for the nation of Israel. The second sentence stresses their chosen-ness, though here we hear a condition – if you obey me fully and keep my covenant.

But it is the last verse that is most important for us now. God emphasises first that the whole earth belongs to God. The earth is God’s beloved creation, a most cherished object. Nevertheless, God chooses to appoint Israel as “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation”. This echoes yesterday’s reflection on Adam being commissioned to tend and care for God’s beloved garden. It’s the same pattern, but on a larger scale. Just as Adam was hired to love the garden, Israel was hired to love the nations.

Israel is to be a “kingdom of priests”. The term ‘priest’ is not used in many churches these days, but in the Anglican Church we continue to use this term to refer to our minister or pastor. It conveys a sense that this is a person who mediates God to us. This is not to imply that we cannot or do not encounter God directly through Christ Jesus! We each have full access to the presence of God. But it does imply, particularly for those who have not yet encountered God, that the priest’s role is to reveal God to them, to be the embodiment of God for them. So a kingdom of priests would mean that anyone could look at the nation of Israel and see God, experience God’s blessing, know God’s love.

Israel is also to be a “holy nation”. On the one hand, holy here means set apart for God so that the nation is separate and pure, not tainted by the pollution of the world. And it also means set apart for God to do God’s specific work. So, a holy nation will be one that is not so much aloof and standoffish, but one that that is invested in doing God’s work in God’s world. And what is that work? Is the priestly work of revealing, mediating, channelling God’s love, God’s blessing to all people.

Peter picks up this language in 1 Peter 2:9, “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.”

There is a long history in the Bible of royal priests and holy nations whose job it was to bless the world by revealing God’s love to the world. It starts with Adam, becomes well-defined in Abraham, struggles for centuries with Israel, and climaxes in Jesus Christ.

After Jesus’ ascension, this job is handed to all those who are known and loved and blessed by God. If you have accepted Jesus into your life, then you are known, loved and blessed. And you have a commission, a job. To bless the world, to love those around you, to be the presence of God in a hungry neighbourhood. God says, “I will bless you, and you will be a blessing”.

Meditation for the Day

God loves you, blesses you. Reflect on that today. And reflect also that you will be a blessing to others, will reveal God’s love to others. Today.

Prayer for the Day

Loving God who calls the faithful, bless me in my endeavours today, and inspire me to pass on that blessing to those I encounter, through a generous heart, warm words and helpful hands.

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[1] VanGemeren, W. (Ed.). (1997). New international dictionary of Old Testament theology and exegesis. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

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Being God’s Beloved: Day 5: The Call to Work

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

Most everyone works. Many people work in the open labour market, earning a salary to provide for themselves and their families. Many work at home, without earning a salary, to raise children, care for a house and take care of our families. Many do volunteer work in the community, without remuneration, adding value to the lives of those who could not otherwise afford it. Many others are looking for work, doing piecework to make ends meet. And some have given up looking for work, perhaps living on welfare or relying on others who do work. Whether or not one works, the notion of work is central to our society.

The theme of work is central also to the creation story in Genesis. The writer of Genesis 2: 1-3 tells us that God had laboured – worked – in creating the heavens and the earth, and that by the end of the sixth day God needed a rest. God had invested time and energy and self in creation, and was – may we say it? – ‘tired’.

Yesterday we emphasised God’s activity as creative. But it is appropriate also to think of God’s activity not as a hobby, but as work. God had a ‘career’ for those first six days, as a creator, a kind of celestial construction worker. As with much of the early chapters in Genesis, this gives us a glimpse into God’s intentions for us, a model of human society – we are intended to work, in the same way that God worked. If God worked six out of seven days, should we not also work six out of seven days?

Working, in its various forms, is an essential aspect of society and of the individual human experience.

God’s working emanates from the overflowing of love. We saw that yesterday. The fullness of joy and love between Father, Son and Spirit cannot be contained and bursts forth in the tremendous work of creation. God does not work to earn a living – as it is, God works as an unpaid volunteer – rather, God works to express love.

There is something important in this for us, though many of us are not privileged to experience it. Work, intrinsically, is intended to be an expression of love. It is not just a means to an end, namely to earn money. It is supposed to have value and meaning in and of itself. In creating, God was productive. God expressed what was in the Godhead. God enacted love. God was creative. And in similar ways, our own work should be productive, self-expressive, loving and creative.

There is a saying – do you live to work or work to live?

Many people work to live. Work has no intrinsic meaning for them – it is a treadmill that we trundle just to earn a salary to survive. Sometimes this is because the job is so routine that there is no room for creativity or self-expression – one thinks of domestic work, cleaning someone’s home, doing the same thing, day in and day out. Sometimes the job involves doing a small fraction of a larger job, so that you’re focused on your small and seemingly trivial function, unable to see how your efforts contribute to a larger creation – one thinks of the factory line, where each person does just one activity, over and over. Sometimes the job is creative and diverse, but we define for ourselves our work as a means to an end – we choose to work only to earn a salary, to not regard the work as inherently meaningful.

But God lives to work. Indeed, God’s work is life, and God’s life is work. There is really no split between work and life, as there is for many of us. God’s creative efforts in the first chapters of Genesis have inherent meaning, are self-expressive and are filled with love. This kind of work is both means and end. There is joy and pleasure in the doing of the work itself; and it is purposeful and productive, making a difference after the work has been done.

This is the kind of work that God desires for us – work that gives life. We know this because just a few verses later, God hires Adam as the first (unpaid) employee in the first career. Genesis 2:15 says, “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.” The NASB says, “to cultivate it and keep it”. The AV says, “to dress it and keep it”. The NLT says, “to tend and watch over it”.

Adam was a gardener. The first career was gardening. Noble, but humble beginnings.

It is clear from this verse, that God did expect Adam to work. Working – being productive, contributing to society, developing the world – is a part of God’s plan for us. God worked; God wants us to work. Working is a central activity of the divine and has intrinsic value. In other words, the act of working is good for the soul. That does not necessarily mean you have to earn a salary – there were no salaries in Genesis 1 and 2 – you could work as an unsalaried volunteer or a home maker. But whatever it looks like, working is something we should all be doing.

Adam’s work in the garden is described with various verbs: work, care, cultivate, keep, dress, tend and watch over. Such a variety of English words to translate those original two Hebrew words! The first word is abad, which ordinarily means “to serve”, and the second word, samar, means “‘to exercise great care over’, to the point, if necessary, of guarding… to protect”.[1] What do they have in common? What is the central element of God’s job description for Adam?

Adam was hired to love the garden.

The Garden of Eden was part of God’s creation – a special and central part of it. God called Adam to take special care of it, to show love to it, to protect it, grow it, nurture it, sustain it. Adam was to be the garden’s caretaker, investing in it the same love and devotion that God had when God created it.

It is somewhat like being hired to look after someone’s infant child. The mother bears that child for nine months, goes into labour to give birth to that child (labour is such an appropriate word to describe childbirth!), loves and cherishes that child as she raises the child to adulthood. When she hires someone to assist with the child’s care, she entrusts to that person a most precious responsibility – to care for her child with the same love and devotion that she herself does. Caring for that child cannot involve going through the motions, cannot be routine and pedestrian, cannot be something done just to earn a salary. It has to involve an investment of love – a wholehearted activity of caring, tending and watching over. This is what Adam was tasked to do with God’s garden.

This ought to be true for all jobs. Because it is intended by God to be true for all work. All work is an instance – a particular example of – Adam’s caring for the Garden of Eden. Whatever work it is that we do – packing shelves, teaching school children, working on the stock exchange, picking fruit – we should recognise that this is an opportunity for us to love the world, to honour God’s creation. In working, we walk in Adam’s footsteps, tending and caring for the garden.

Consider the idea that we need to redeem work – all of us as a society, but also each one of us as individuals – you and me. As much as human beings need salvation, so too does work need to be saved. It is needs to be rescued from sin and death, and brought back under the headship of Christ. Work has, for many people, become soulless, even soul destroying.

This is not God’s vision for us! Work is intended to be spiritual, edifying, sanctifying and nourishing.

Some Christians put this into practice by using the workplace as a vehicle to evangelise or by holding prayer meetings at work. This is a good thing – it is about giving witness to our faith in the workplace. But I think this misses the important point that we find in Genesis 1 and 2, which is that the work itself should be a faith-filled activity. It is not what we add to the work that will redeem it – holding prayer meetings at work or having your Bible on your desk is not what will redeem work.

Rather, it is how we do the work that redeems it. When we regard our work as a spiritual activity, not just a chore to be done; when we ask the Spirit to breathe into our work the love and power of God; when we express the best of what God has created us to be in our work ethic; when we express our deepest love, the love we feel for our spouse or our children; when we remember that our working is a shadow of God’s working in creation – then our work will be redeemed. It will become an expression of faith, it will be sanctified, it will bring joy to God and to the world. And through that, we too will find our faith growing.

In a word, we should learn to love working.

Meditation for the Day

Consider your own work, if you have one, and how you can learn to love doing it. Reflect on how your work will change if you accepted that God had tasked you, created you, for now, to do this work.

Prayer for the Day

Creator God, you have shown us the way of work – to work with joy and love. You have mandated humans to work in your commissioning of Adam and Eve. Nurture in me a greater love for my work. Help me to express joy and love in my work today.

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[1] Hamilton, V. P. (1990). The book of Genesis: Chapters 1-17. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, p. 171.

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Jesus, the Second Adam

Click here to listen to this 21 minute audio recording of today’s sermon.

In Romans 5, Paul draws parallels between Adam and Jesus (who he refers to in 1 Corinthians 15 as the first man and second man) showing both similarities and differences between them. This is a profound insight by Paul, who recognises that Adam’s (and Eve’s) actions introduced sin and death into the world for all humans, while Jesus’s actions undid sin and death and brought grace, justification, righteousness and life into the world for all humans. In this sermon, which includes quite a bit of congregation participation, I tease out this parallel. I also apply it to a view of the whole scripture as a love story in which God works to undo the negative effects of Adam and Eve’s Fall.

It will help to have Genesis 3 and Matthew 4 open in front of you before you start to listen.

I wish you God’s blessings as you journey through Lent.
Adrian

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Being God’s Beloved: Day 4: In the Beginning

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

The opening words of a novel are regarded as the most important words of a book. The American Book Review lists the top 100 opening lines. Number one: “Call me Ishmael” from Melville’s Moby Dick. Opening lines serve to grab your attention, to focus your energy, to pique your interest and to reveal something key about the text to follow. Writers spend hours finding the perfect opening line.

The opening words of the first book of the Bible are no exception. In these few Hebrew words we are presented with the start of the story of God in relationship with humanity. They provide us with four key elements that set the stage for this great story.

First, we are oriented to the time in which the story starts: “In the beginning”. This is in contrast to what we looked at yesterday, which was before time and space. There we looked at a ‘time’ before the creation of time – a time most of us cannot imagine. The author of Genesis 1 cues us to recognise that there must have been a before in the beginning, prompting us to think about God before creation. But Genesis 1:1 also locates us at the start of time as we now know it. This point in eternity marks a fundamental and supercosmic change from time-less to time-bound.

Second, we are introduced to the central character: “God”. I love those opening two words in the Hebrew: “In the beginning God.” The writer tells us that when everything that we know began, God was already present. God is the originator, the source, the wellspring of everything that exists. Whether you accept a seven-day creation or not, Genesis 1 asserts the reality of the God who is. We could say that this is the fundamental tenet of faith – we believe that at the beginning of everything, God was.

This assertion of God’s presence at the beginning is also important, because it sets God as THE central character of the book. You don’t open a book like this and then have Athaliah (a name I randomly picked out of the Bible) as the central character. That doesn’t make sense. The author here asserts not only God’s existence, but also God’s centrality. This is a book about God. It is, of course, a book about people also. But specifically it is about people in relationship with God, or rather (and please forgive my dreadful use of hyphens) God-in-relationship-with-humanity.

We do not learn a great deal about God as God alone in the Bible. Nor do we learn a great deal about people as people alone in this book. What we do learn a lot about is how God and people interact. About their reciprocal relationship. About how God sees and feels about us, how we respond to God, how we are changed through this relationship with God. In all of this, God is central.

Third, we are introduced to God’s central work, God’s main activity: “created”. This is the first and most fundamental thing that God does – God creates. We are not introduced to a God who speaks, judges, pronounces, descends, incarnates or saves. Though these are all important activities of God, and we shall discover all of them as we continue to read, they are not central to the story. What is central is the God who creates. God makes, shapes, forms, calls into being, moulds, invents.

Fourth, we are introduced to a creative and artistic God, who makes things: “the heavens and the earth.” God does not make a Red Velvet Cake or compose a piano sonata. No. God makes everything that we know – the earth, on which we live, and the heavens, which includes everything around us. And on the sixth day, God created us. The whole of the first chapter of Genesis unpacks in some detail what the author means by the ‘heavens and the earth’ so that we are in no doubt that everything that we know comes from the mouth of God.

Great opening words to a great story!

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

What we don’t get so clearly, is God’s motivation for creating. Why did God make the heavens and the earth in the beginning? What prompted such a remarkable decision in the eternal life of the triune, perfectly complete God? Surely God was not lonely or bored? Surely God was not pressured in some way to create? Surely God knew that the creation would not go according to plan? Surely God knew that God’s existence would change after the creation?

The author of Genesis does not give us a full disclosure about God’s motivation, but we are given hints. Here are the three main hints:

  1. “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness…  So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them” (Genesis 1: 26-27). Here we learn something about the people that God created. This was not like the previous days of creation, where God spoke and described and they came into being. There the creation is described in a somewhat impersonal way – God creates things that are unlike God. But on day six, God creates something that is similar to God in some way: people in God’s image, God’s likeness. Here God chooses to make beings that are in some way like God. Let me suggest that God chooses to make beings to whom God can relate – beings with whom God can be in relationship. God cannot relate to the sun and moon and plants of the earth. But God can relate to people. This decision to create us in God’s image speaks to us about God’s desire to be in relationship with humanity.
  2. “The Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being” (Genesis 2: 7). What is striking about this more detailed description of the sixth day’s creation activity, is that God is no longer just speaking creation into being, as was the case in Genesis 1. Here in Genesis 2 we have a much more tactile, hands-on, earthy description of the creation. God forms the human from the humus,[1] much as a potter might shape a piece of clay into a vessel. The writer does not spell it out, but we are surely invited to imagine God’s hands getting dirtied with the mud, actively and intimately working to shape the earth into an earthling.[2] And if that is not intimate enough, God then breathes into the nostrils of the human to give Adam life. God here imparts something extremely personal and precious to the human. Imagine, if you will, mouth-to-mouth resuscitation – up close and personal. Not only are the first humans shaped to be like God in some way; they are also shaped in a highly tactile, personal and engaged way by God. God desires to invest God’s self in our creation.
  3. “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him” (Genesis 2:18). In this last stage of the opening creation story, God looks at the human that has been made, and recognises something lacking in him – he is alone. The creation is perfect, though. God steps back repeatedly and says, “It was very good” (Genesis 1:31). Adam is not flawed in any way. But he is incomplete – he needs a companion, a helper. And so after looking to all the rest of creation, and finding none that is suitable, God creates a partner, taken from Adam’s rib so that they can stand alongside each other – Eve. God recognises that humanity ought not be alone, because God is not alone. God desires that humans should not be alone, that humans should be in relationship not only with God but also with other humans.

What do we learn when we put these three hints together? We learn that God creates, out of God’s own heart, beings who are in various ways like God and who are endowed with God’s special attention and presence. God creates not just an individual, but a partnership between two people. In the Hebrew of Genesis 1: 26-27, there is a definite shift from singular in the first phrases to plural in the last, suggesting that what may have begun as a creation of one quickly turns into a creation of more than one. The narrative from Genesis 2:18, confirms this – Adam created as one, quickly completed with the creation of a second, moving immediately into marriage – a joining of the two into one, reminiscent of the three-in-oneness of God.

All of this leads to the conclusion that God’s intention was to create a community or people-in-relationship that reflected something of the community or relationship within the triune God. God did not create just one human, because God is not just one person. God created people-in-relationship, because God is three-in-one. We are then, most like God, most conforming to the image of God, when we live in relationship with those around us. Because loving relationship is at the heart of God.

Finally, let me briefly come back to God’s motivation for this creation. Although we are not told this, imagine with me that God created people-in-relationship because God wanted to share God’s own satisfying and completing experience of being in relationship. God was not lonely, because God had eternal relationship already. But out of the fullness and joy of that relationship, and the overflowing love experienced within the Godhead, God created people, in relationship like God, to experience and share some of that love. God created out of love, to share God’s love with you.

Meditation for the Day

Imagine all the fullness of relationship and love within the Triune God – so full that it bursts forth in a great creative activity of God’s desire to share this relational love with others. With you.

Prayer for the Day

God of infinite love and generosity, thank you for creating me and for creating my relationships with my family, my friends and my community. Help me to accept that my existence is a result of your overflowing love.

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[1] Alter, R. (2004). The five books of Moses: A translation with commentary. New York: W. W. Norton, p. 21. This is based on Alter’s evocative translation of the Hebrew poetry in Genesis 2:7, ‘adam (human) from the ‘adamah (soil):  “The Lord God fashioned the human, humus from the soil”.

[2] Trible, P. (1978). God and the rhetoric of sexuality. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, p. 78. This is based on Trible’s translation, “Yahweh God formed the earth creature of dust from the earth”. A third translation is from Korsak, M. P. (1998). ‘Et genetrix’. In B. Brenner (Ed.), Genesis: The feminist companion to the Bible (second series, pp. 22-31). Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, p. 27, “YHWH Elohim formed the groundling, soil of the ground”.

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Being God’s Beloved: Day 3: The Heart of God

Being God’s Beloved: Reflections on God’s Love.

What do you think is the central characteristic of God? What is that quality that is at the heart of God? What is it that makes God God?

There are many different answers to this question. And perhaps, in truth, it is not an answerable question. It is even harder than answering the question, “What is the central characteristic of your most loved family member?” Or even “What is the central characteristic of me?” People are complex, with many characteristics – reducing that complexity to just one characteristic is not only impossible, but also silly. How much more so with God, who is infinite – infinitely complex.

Nevertheless, it is an important question to attempt to answer. We should treat any answer we get cautiously, tentatively, and humbly. But endeavouring to understand the heart of God is a worthwhile and credible undertaking.

Let us think back to before the beginning of time, before creation, before God was interacting with creation. What do we know of God then? What can we imagine of God then?

Before the beginning, before God created time and space, there was God. Just God. We believe that everything that is was created by God. That there is nothing that is that was not created by God. That everything that is not God was created by God. That’s pretty inclusive! One of the implications of this belief (this doctrine) is that before creation, God is all that was.

What do we know of God before creation? Truly, we know very, very little. This suggests a very short chapter for today!

But what we do know about God is that God existed as three-in-one. The triune God. Three persons with one nature (or substance or being) is how the church finally agreed to define the Trinity in the Nicean Creed that we recite today. A theology of the Trinity is not provided in the Bible. But Christians throughout the centuries, reviewing and  weighing up all of the evidence provided in the Bible and in our experience of Christ’s journey on earth, have repeatedly concluded that Father, Son and Holy Spirit all are God, distinct from each other in some way, yet one God, not three.

It gives me a headache! Like trying to imagine infinity. My brain is too small to adequately grasp it.

Happily, this is a devotional, not a systematic theology, so I am freed from the burden of having to define or explain it rationally. Instead, if you accept the doctrine of the Trinity, I invite you to work from that as a point of departure and see the implications of it. If you have difficulty accepting it, just suspend those for a few minutes and follow the path with me, and see if it speaks meaningfully to you.

Imagine this:

Timeless fellowship between Father, Son and Spirit. Perpetual, complete, whole, seamless, perfect, fulfilled, intimate, satisfying fellowship.  Intuitive mutual understanding. Never hurting – always cherishing. Always working together toward common goals. Never competing – always cooperating.

What word can we us to describe this kind of relationship?

Love

When we imagine God before creation, we come to one basic conclusion. That God is characterised by love. Eternal, complete and perfect love. A love so strong, so intimate, that the three-ness of God draws so closely together to become one. Three in one.

There is a Greek term for this: ‘perichoresis’. It has various English translations, the most common of which is ‘interpenetration’. The idea is that Father, Son and Spirit penetrate into or merge with one another so closely, so intimately, that they become one. It is a mutual indwelling – a reciprocal choosing to immerse one’s self into the other – Father into Son, Son into Spirit, Spirit into Father. Three distinct persons. But so mutually and lovingly woven together that they are, in fact, one.

The heart of God, then, is love, for this is the quality of relationship inherent in the triune God from before the beginning of time. The most prominent characteristic of God is love.

But, many of us have been raised to believe that the most common characteristic of God is holiness or righteousness. This theology emphasises the purity and perfection of God, a purity that is repulsed by sin and brokenness, a perfection that can associate only with perfection.

Of course, the gap between God and us is immense. God is infinitely more pure, holy, righteous and perfect than we are. The apostle Paul is right to associate us with filthy rags. We are very much not up to God’s standard.

Placing God’s holiness as central to the character of God, which many of the Christian traditions do, means that we are always confronted with God’s frown. God looks at us and frowns, because we don’t look right – we smell off. We are sin-tainted, fallen, and imperfect. What follows is wrath – God’s wrath is poured out against humanity because we are, fundamentally, repugnant to God.

There is much in the Bible to support this view. Much of the Old Testament emphasises God’s purity and our impurity. We think of the Ark of Covenant – so holy and untouchable that one, well-meant touch by Uzzah lead to his annihilation (2 Samuel 6:6-11). We think of the temple and its many courts, each drawing closer to the Holy of Holies. And that inner place was so holy and so filled with God’s presence that no-one could enter, save one person (the High Priest), only once a year (Yom Kippur), and with much ritual and prayer (Leviticus 2). There is certainly a strong narrative thread throughout the scriptures emphasising God’s transcendent purity and evidence of God’s wrath in response to our lack of purity.

The problem with this view of God’s essential character is that it is anthropocentric – it centres on humanity. This only makes sense in God’s relationship to humanity. Indeed, only to humanity after the Fall. In effect, this theology rests on ourselves, rather than on God.

But a true theology of God must rest on God and God alone, distinct from God’s relationship with creation. And the only meaningful way to do that is to imagine God before creation, so as to get to the God who was independent of humanity.

When we do that, the concepts of holiness and perfection lose their meaning. Holiness makes sense only in relation to that which is not holy. Similarly, perfection makes sense only in comparison with that which is less than perfect. Set alongside imperfect and sinful humanity, God is indeed perfect and holy. But when we reflect on God as God, God without comparison, God in God-self, these concepts are as dry as the dust that blows away in the slightest breeze.

Instead, what does remain, when we think of God as God, God alone, God before creation, is God in love. God’s love is inherent within the triune relationship between and within the three persons of the Trinity. It is not a characteristic that requires comparison with anyone or anything else. It is a characteristic that is fulfilled within the nature of God.

And thus, we can and should regard love as a far more fundamental characteristic of God than holiness or perfection. God is indeed holy and perfect and surely does not like sin. But these characteristics come after creation, perhaps even after the fall, and are thus secondary to God. They speak, at most, to God’s response to our brokenness. They do not point to the heart of God.

When we look into God’s heart, we will not find wrath. Judgement, rage, shunning and impossibly high standards are not to be found in the heart of God.

Instead, when we look into God’s heart, we find love. Complete, whole, seamless, all-embracing love. A love that is strong enough to satisfy God for eternity. A love that is powerful enough to bind three into one. A love that could have continued to exist forever without any creation.

This love remains at the heart of God. It was not somehow watered down in creation. It was not lost in the Fall. God does not set aside love in God’s relationship with you. God’s first thought when glancing your direction is not anger or revulsion. It is love. Surely, God gets angry! What parent does not get angry at their children? But this anger is on the surface. It is a momentary and situational response. It is not the bedrock of God’s character. Nor is it the predominant feeling of God towards the world. Nor is it God’s predominant feeling towards you.

When God digs down into the depths of the heart of God, God finds love. God’s most basic impulse is to love. God’s greatest joy is to love. God’s most authentic self-expression is love. As John writes in his first letter, “God is love” (1 John 4).

We have to look more closely at God’s heart – particularly those of us who have been well schooled to think of God as wrathful. We have to peer back through time, back through creation, to perceive what is truly God as God, what is essential to God, what was present in God before everything else. When we do so, we will find Love.

Meditation for the Day

Imagine God as God, before creation. Imagine the relationship that existed between Father, Son and Spirit, Imagine the love that they shared, that made them complete and one.

Prayer for the Day

Loving God, help me to unlearn what I have learned about who you are. Instil in me a deeper appreciation for the love that is in the heart of you. Help to me share in that love.

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