Our untamed God

In the time of Zephaniah, over 600 years before Jesus was born, many in Israel lamented that God was no longer active in their lives, saying "the LORD will not do good, nor will he do harm."  This is often not unlike our situation today.  Sometimes it seems that we no longer believe God is active in the world.  But our God is bold and has the audacity to have become human in Jesus Christ.  God is with us now, leading us forward to be his people without fear.

22^nd Sunday after Pentecost (Year A) – Sunday, November 13, 2011

Christ Evangelical Lutheran Church, Lancaster, PA

Texts: Zephaniah 1:7,12-18; Matthew 25:14-30

On the first day of school in 9^th grade, I knew it was going to be a long year. I recognized it immediately. Señora Jones, who I would see every morning for homeroom and every afternoon for Spanish class for the next 10 months, just didn't have it in her. You see, high school students have a special sensor inside their brains that can detect immediately when a teacher doesn't know how or just doesn't care enough to control a classroom. They can tell immediately. High school students, am I right? No real lesson plan. The willingness to bargain for good behavior. The aloof demeanor. The incredible fact that although the teacher has eyes and ears, he or she is completely unaware that no one is paying attention, everyone is passing notes and quiz answers, and, nowadays, that all the students are actually on facebook or texting each other. Any of us who has been through school in our life knows what happens in this kind of classroom: the not-so-conscientious students begin cheating, those attuned to fairness get frustrated, the earnest, eager-to please students want to follow the rules but feel like they won't get any back-up from the teacher, so they begin to try to blend in with the troublemakers. Most often, the strong take advantage of the weak. The ring-leaders shrug with a grin on their face, “what does it matter? the teacher's not going to do anything about it.”

This is a lot like the situation in ancient Israel about 630 years before Jesus was born. Zephaniah the prophet records that there were those who sat back, resting complacently on their dregs, saying in their hearts “The LORD will not do good, nor will he do harm.” Eh, God's checked out. He's not going to do anything. Let's have some fun! We know from history that in Israel at that time, the strong and wealthy had purchased large tracts of land and forced the poor to work their huge plots more or less as indentured servants or slaves. This was completely against the vision God had set out for his people Israel while they were in the wilderness. Eh, the LORD will not do good, nor will he do harm, the fat cats said. We know that many of the people worshiped various other gods, but most especially wealth and their own pride. Up to today, these gods of wealth and pride remain constantly in competition with the God of Israel for our hearts and minds. But what does it matter, God's out to lunch!

If the teacher is checked out, what student really wants to learn? What student wants to put in the extra time and effort to challenge herself? Although the teacher may think he or she is being nice, this aloof attitude actually shows that the teacher doesn't care very much about the students' development or future. It shows that the teacher might be more interested in his or her plans for the weekend than in preparing students for a full life of making use of their various gifts and talents.

If God is nowhere to be found, offering neither curses nor blessings, who really wants to follow him? Who sincerely desires to have their life shaped and molded by a god who doesn't care, a god who created the world and then left us to fend for ourselves? How can we have faith in a god like that? How can we trust our lives, and our children's lives, to the lord who will not do good, nor harm? Tragically, all too often WE put God into a box and tuck him away in storage. Sure, we say, God made all the pretty flowers and the blue sky, but really it's up to us to save ourselves. It's up to us to figure out how to order the world according to our own ideas and plans. Surely, we can figure everything out. As ridiculous as it sounds, this is the story of the modern world. The idea that we, as humans, have figured it all out. We can study hard enough, work hard enough, conduct enough tests and socially engineer a perfect society, all on our own. It's as if God has left us all alone, and the world confirms our fears. Our leaders seem not to know what morality even is, although they speak about it endlessly to get elected. The strong in our global economy relentlessly take advantage of the weak. Everything is about us – how strong, how beautiful, how smart, how connected, how wealthy we are.

Even, perhaps especially, in the church, we think it's all in our hands. We think that God is no longer active, that sure God did a bunch of amazing things in the Bible, but this is the 21^st century, we have to take care of things now. We say, implicitly, subconsciously, that God doesn't really care about how we spend our money or how our elected officials treat the poor. We say, in the back of our minds, that there is nothing we can do, that our actions and decisions and words no longer matter. Churches are dwindling in numbers and budgets are collapsing under the weight of aging buildings. What can we do? How can we go on? The LORD will not do good, nor will he do harm. Our faith is reduced to a ticket into a distant heaven, far removed from this mess we call our planet.

Such was the despair of the people of Israel in the day of Zephaniah, but their God, our God, showed them that this world still belonged to him, and if he had anything to say about it, he would have the final word. Like a concerned teacher correcting her students, like a caring parent chiding his children, through the words of Zephaniah God powerfully showed that he is still here! That he cares what happens in this world he created. Be silent before the Lord GOD! For the day of the LORD is at hand! God's judgment through Zephaniah is fierce and penetrating. Their sin, and ours, is exposed. Our God is anything but tame or checked out. Their conviction was pronounced, and so is ours – we cannot handle things on our own.

Our untamed God did have the final word. Our bold God had the audacity to come to earth and join his divinity to our humanity in Jesus of Nazareth, our Messiah, our Christ. This Jesus didn't mince words and he didn't ask permission. He didn't act the way anyone thought the Messiah would. He challenged the political and religious authorities head on and denounced misguided religious practices, self-serving authorities and false worship of wealth and of ourselves. Ultimately, Jesus, God the Son, through human weakness, through his death on a Roman cross, achieved the final victory over our sin and was raised to new life by his Father through the Spirit.

We have been baptized into Christ's death and resurrection, into the mystical and mysterious union that Christ enjoys with the Father and the Spirit. It's amazing, it's incredible, and it's true! When we partake of this meal of bread and wine, Christ is actually there, not kinda, not sort of, not in a spiritual way, but really there. It's mysterious, it's counter to everything we know about physics and chemistry, we can't understand it, and it's true! God doesn't do what we think God can or should do. God makes his own choices, and he chooses to be here, broken and poured out for you. He chose to be on that cross, dying for you. And through his Spirit, God chooses to be in you and your life, in the life of Christ Lutheran, and in the life of the world. We don't deserve it, but it's God's choice, not ours.

God is in us and all around us. God is working in the world, even when we can't see him or don't expect him. We do not follow an absentee or aloof God, but an incarnate God who cares enough about this world and each of us to come down and experience all we go through. A God who cares enough to discipline us and teach us and, most of all, to give up his life so that we may have life abundantly. We can trust our lives, and our children's lives, to God. We can have faith in our real and present God who is already out there, leading the way for us. What we do matters. This church matters.

We don't have to operate out of fear and bury the treasure God has given to us, as in the parable we heard today. No, empowered by the same Spirit of God who raised Jesus from the dead, and who gives us new life in baptism, we can go out into the world and take risks. We can put our reputation on the line and share our love with those the world forgets – the prisoners, the sick, the homeless, the immigrants, the lost and left behind. We can use our various talents and gifts to try new things, to step out on a limb to reach new people with the love of God. We can surprise our community and do the unexpected, just like our God. Sometimes things will go smoothly, sometimes they won't. Sometimes we'll lose more than we expect, sometimes we might be the target of criticism, just like our God. But our active and present God joined his life to ours forever, and in his power we have nothing to lose and nothing to fear. Amen.