Dare to Imagine God’s Embrace!

Advent

Several weeks ago, Lee and I went to a seminar on “preaching on the last things” – eschatological sermons (if you like). The speaker noted that in the church’s teaching of the first centuries after Jesus, there were four “last things”: Death, Judgment, Hell, and Heaven. He organized his remarks around these four headings, but he also added something about them that surprised me.

Today is Second Advent. We have four Sundays in Advent, and each Sunday has its own special theme. This year the four themes are hope (which Pastor Lee talked about last week), peace (our theme today), joy, and love. These four, or some variation of them, are the usual themes for Advent, but they are not the original Advent themes. Guess what the original themes were: Death, Judgment, Hell, and Heaven.

These four original themes – dark and foreboding – lie behind our contemporary emphasis on peace and joy. It makes sense really. Think of our four themes. Why do we need hope? Because we are afraid of the problems and struggles that we face in this life. Why do we long for peace? Because we live in a world of hurt and conflict. Why do we celebrate joy so eagerly? Because we see so much grief and sadness around us. Why do we rejoice in God’s love? Because we have experienced the hatred and anger of a world without God.

The message of Christmas, to which all four Sundays of Advent point, is that God enters our death-filled world and uses what we call the judgment to get rid of all evil in what we call Hell, making you and me able to live forever with God, a state that we call Heaven.

Peace

Our focus statement this morning is, “Imagine the wideness of God’s embrace of all creatures and creation! It will widen our hearts to do the things that make for peace.” Consider where this peace comes from. It sure does not come from the world around us. Looking around our world, we see people in conflict with each other. I have lived a third of my life in Canada, a third of my life in the USA, and a third in Zambia and Zimbabwe. Four countries, and in each country, I have seen how the power of Evil corrupts people and breeds conflict.

There are good people everywhere, and I love the people in each of these countries. There is so much that I love about Zimbabwe – such as the idea of “ubuntu”, the way that we become fully human in community. An Ndebele proverb says that we become fully human in and with other people. I love it! But I have also seen how people in Zimbabwe can shut out people who don’t fit in their group. I grew up as part of a White minority, only four percent of the population, who held complete political and economic control over the whole country. This is the precise opposite of wide-open hearts that make for peace.

I love the USA. In Canada, we are ready to point out the problems of our southern neighbours, but the truth is that Americans can be remarkably helpful and friendly. But we also see how they can turn against each other, fighting against each other over an amazing array of issues. Their gun culture, for example, makes many of us walk a little more carefully when we cross the border.

I love Canada. Canada has become home, and Manitoba is a wonderful place to live. But we have our problems, and we see people turn against each other and shut each other out. Every place I have lived has this mixture of good and bad. I have avoided specific examples because I think you can provide your own illustrations better than I can. We see the problems all around us, and it takes a lot of imagination to think of God embracing the whole of creation. The Advent idea of judgment is not so far-fetched!

How do we move from the problems we see to the vision of God’s wonderful, saving embrace? Let’s look at the Scripture texts that we read.

Malachi 3

The book of Malachi is set in the period after the return from Exile in Babylon and Persia. The Jews had experienced great distress, being carried off into exile by the Babylonians a few hundred years before. Now they have been back in their own home for perhaps 200 years – long enough to have fixed the political and economic problems that they had faced. But life is still hard. They live with constant danger and problems. There was a growing expectation that God the Lord would come to God’s people – what we refer to as the coming of the Messiah.

The prophet speaks to the people about this expectation of God’s coming. “The Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming.” This is good news! But then the prophet changes his tone. “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?”

Before joy comes judgment. Before we can realize our hope, we must be purified – made right with God and with each other. Before we can walk in the way of peace, we must look squarely and honestly at all that we do that destroys peace.

That is where Malachi leaves us: Hoping for the coming of God who makes all things right, but recognizing that we need purifying before we can stand in God’s presence. We are broken people, and we need fixing.

Luke 1

Often during Advent, we listen to and preach on Mary’s Song: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God, my Saviour.” Mary sang this song when she visited her cousin, Elizabeth. They had both been visited by an angel telling them that they would have a son. Now birth announcements are cool, but these two were unusual. Elizabeth was “barren and getting on in years” (1:7), and Mary was a young woman who was still a virgin (1:27). One guesses that the young woman looked up to her older cousin and went to visit her when she discovered that they were both pregnant. Mary’s song is her response to Elizabeth’s celebration of her pregnancy.

A few verses later, Elizabeth gave birth to John, and in response, his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and sang his own song of joy, a prophecy about his baby son’s life.

·         Verses 68-71: He gives praise to God for saving them from their enemies. This sounds like he thinks that John will be the Messiah who sets Israel free from their enemies. In their time, the primary enemy was the Roman Empire.

·         Verses 72-75: He thanks God for the mercy of salvation, which restores God’s covenant with Israel and makes them able to live rightly with God and with each other. It may still sound like he is talking about his son, John, but the next verse makes it clear he sees that John’s birth actually means that the Messiah will follow him.

·         Verses 76-78: John will be “the prophet of the Most High”, who “will go before the Lord to prepare his ways”. The Lord – that is God, in the person of the Messiah – is coming to guide God’s people “into the way of peace”.

We see the same progression as we noted earlier – from death and judgment to mercy and hope, from conflict and despair to peace and joy. It is notable that when John comes, he preaches, “Repent, for the kingdom of God is near.” In the same way, when Jesus comes, he has the same message, “Repent, for the kingdom of God is near.” “Repent” is actually a simpler word than we might think: It means simply “turn around”, go in a new direction. But it is harder to do than we often realize: We are really stubborn; it takes a lot to make us change direction in our lives.

Death and Peace

I’ve been thinking a lot about death and dying recently. The seminar Lee and I went to was actually a seminar on how to talk about death and how to prepare for funerals. It’s just over a year ago that I spent 10 days in the hospital, wondering if I was on the verge of major heart trouble. Then, yesterday, a friend sent me an article from the Atlantic magazine by Tim Keller.

Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, New York. He has been ordained in the Presbyterian Church since 1975. He recently wrote a book on his experiences walking with people near the end of their lives. Then, a month after the book came out, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

As he wrestled with the diagnosis, here is part of what he writes in the article:

Our beliefs about God and an afterlife, if we have them, are often abstractions as well. If we don’t accept the reality of death, we don’t need these beliefs to be anything other than mental assents. A feigned battle in a play or a movie requires only stage props. But as death, the last enemy, became real to my heart, I realized that my beliefs would have to become just as real to my heart, or I wouldn’t be able to get through the day. Theoretical ideas about God’s love and the future resurrection had to become life-gripping truths, or be discarded as useless.

Keller notes that as death approaches, Christians and non-believers alike struggle with the reality of our own end. There is no panacea or simple strategy to make death easy. As Christians, however, we have the opportunity to discover the reality of our relationship with God. As Malachi puts it, God comes to us, even though we are afraid of God’s approach.

The Hope and Joy of Peace

Where in this struggle with death – which is really the struggle that we all have with life itself – where in this struggle is peace? Tim Keller describes his own experience this way: “I found that to embrace God’s greatness, to say “Thy will be done,” was painful at first and then, perhaps counterintuitively, profoundly liberating.”

That is, the path of peace is repentance – repentance in the sense of turning around, re-orienting our lives to God’s life, seeking God’s presence, walking in God’s will. My Dean at Providence has described something that he learned through his wife. She was taking a course on spiritual formation, and they talked each day about what she was learning. From their conversation, my friend said that he has adopted a simple yet profound spiritual discipline. As part of his prayer every night, he asks two questions: “When today was I most aware of God’s presence? When today was I least aware of God’s presence?” (These are adapted from the Examen in Ignatian spirituality.)

These are useful questions. Reflecting daily on how we have lived in God’s presence can reveal what the true goal of our lives is. When we realize that our true goal is anything other than God and God’s reign in our lives, we repent. We turn from the deepest goals we have that take us away from God, and we pursue God. That is what Mary did. That is what Elizabeth and Zechariah did. They experienced the presence of God and knew the promise of salvation and the paths of peace.

Conclusion

The truth is that God wants everyone to turn and follow God. God wants us all to know the peace of life in Christ and the peace of living with each other in true community. We also want that peace and security – at least, most of us do. But we often think that we can create peace on our own. We can’t. We live in a world that is fundamentally crooked. Until the second advent, when Jesus returns in power and great glory, our world makes real peace impossible.

Advent is the reminder that our impossibility is God’s possibility. Where we cannot make peace, Jesus does. Where our ability to embrace others runs out, God’s saving embrace stretches wider and wider. God purifies “the children of Levi” – that means the priests, and we are “a kingdom of priests. Purified by God, we find ourselves able to join Jesus in his wonderful saving embrace of the whole of creation.

Last week we heard that beyond our fears lies God’s hope. Today we hear that beyond our conflicts lies God’s peace. We look forward to the coming of the Lord, even if it means that we fall down before him, overwhelmed with his greatness and goodness. As Paul puts it, “What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? … Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Focus Statement: Imagine the wideness of God’s embrace of all creatures and creation! It will widen our hearts to do the things that make for peace. 

Scriptures:

Malachi 3:1-4

The Coming Messenger

3 See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. ² But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?

For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap; ³ he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the Lord in righteousness. ⁴ Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years.

Luke 1:68-79

Zechariah’s Prophecy

⁶⁷ Then his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke this prophecy:

⁶⁸ “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them. ⁶⁹ He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David, ⁷⁰ as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, ⁷¹ that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us.

⁷² Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors, and has remembered his holy covenant, ⁷³ the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham, to grant us ⁷⁴ that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear, ⁷⁵ in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

⁷⁶ And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, ⁷⁷ to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of their sins. ⁷⁸ By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, ⁷⁹ to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

Thinking Ahead Question: How do you connect the birth of Christ and the return of Christ in your own thinking? Today's advent word is “Peace” – what does the path to peace look like as you read today's scriptures?

Steinbach Mennonite Church

5 December 2021

Peace Sunday 2021: Defending Hope

We live in a world of despair. You can read and see it in the media. Stories from North Korea tell us of continuing despair in the face of an unacknowledged pandemic, combined with hunger for food and hunger for power. Stories from South Sudan tell us of continuing ethnic strife, so that help provided for marginalized people is eaten up by warlords. Stories from Palestine tell us of the continued struggle to hold on to ancestral homes. Israelis and Palestinians tell competing narratives that leave no room for compromise. Stories from Colombia waver between the hope of a country searching for peace and wealthy people using their power to dispossess the marginalized. 

 

Of course, you don’t have to go so far away to find despair. What do we make of the news in our own backyard, when we hear of a double homicide and a third person who lies in critical condition? As the news trickles out, the despair deepens. We find that the victims are known to some of us – good friends and neighbours. 

 

How can we defend hope in a world of despair? How can we live with the terrors of our world and sing the songs of Zion? “We are people of God’s peace” – sure, but how do we get there? 

 

Romans 12 

The passage we read from Romans 12 reminds us that we are responsible for our part in the various activities of our world. In verse 18, Paul says, “If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” This verse summarizes a series of statements that Paul makes: Bless others; care for them; live in harmony; don’t repay evil with evil; always do what is right. Then he adds this summary: In your relationships with others, so far as your part is concerned, be a person of peace. 

 

This is incredibly difficult advice, but Paul meant it, just as Jesus meant it when he preached the Sermon on the Mount. We want to water it down and make it practical. Don’t be a doormat, we say. If someone attacks you, you can fight back and defend yourself. But that’s not what Paul says. 

 

He continues, “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good.” Wow! This is a radical take on “live at peace with everyone”. 

 

What it means, I think, is this. We live in a world where despair lurks around the corner all the time. Hope is a candle that seems on the verge of going out. We are the defenders of that hope. We are the ones who keep the candle burning. We keep it burning by being people of peace in every situation. 

 

How? When someone treats you unfairly, of course you defend yourself, but you refuse to treat them the same way. When someone acts out their hate in relating with you, you respond with love and care. The only way to end the despair that comes from the violence in our world is to end the violence. And the only way to end the violence is to end it in ourselves. Which brings us to Psalm 23. 

 

Psalm 23 

I have often been troubled by one verse in this well-beloved Psalm: “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.” I like how it continues: “You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” But that one verse sounds as though it is having my enemies on the outside looking in that makes the meal God serves me really satisfying. “You feed me, and they have to watch unfed!” 

 

That’s not the only way to read it. What if David (assuming David wrote the twenty-third Psalm) meant something else. What if the enemies are present because they are invited to the feast? What if God wants to restore those who hate me – not just to restore me, but to restore my enemies to life in God’s presence? What if God wants everyone to be at the marriage supper of the Lamb (as the book of Revelation calls it)? 

 

If that’s what God wants, then God is going to have to do the heavy lifting. I can’t make my enemies into God’s friends. I can’t bleach the hatred and anguish out of their lives. But God can. That’s what the cross and resurrection are all about. God taking broken and hurting people and restoring them to life. God taking people trapped in violence and making them people of peace. 

 

Synthesis 

The reason that we keep our candle of hope burning is that God is at work in us and in our world. God is making peace where we can’t. I think of an old friend of mine. He used to be the bishop of my church in Zimbabwe. In the early 1980s, his father owned a store out in the country in the south of Zimbabwe. Some drunken soldiers came in one day and ordered him to give them beer. He didn’t sell beer, so they gathered up discarded bottle caps from the soda bottles and stuffed them in his mouth. Then they beat him around the mouth with their rifle butts and left him. 

 

He ended up in the hospital in Bulawayo with gangrene in his mouth, which in the end took his life. Before he died, my friend visited him one last time. As he stood there, looking at his father, dying from violence endemic in the poverty of the countryside, he imagined in his mind taking those soldiers’ children, lining them up against a wall, and machine-gunning them. His father saw what was in his eyes and said to him quietly, “Don’t, Dan. Don’t.” 

 

Dan listened to his father and set hatred and revenge aside. He taught his own children to love and not to hate. His son now lives in Winnipeg, where he is the director of CHAI, a ministry to immigrants in Winnipeg. Our world is filled with fear and hatred, but my friend chose peace and love. He is a defender of hope in a world that tilts towards despair. 

 

God is calling you and me and our families and our friends to be people of peace, keeping our candle of hope burning in the winds of hate that blow around us. Join me in following God’s call, so that we also can eat at God’s table in the presence of our enemies. 

 

 

 

Focus Statement: As a people of peace, we defend Hope in a world that specializes in Despair. 

 

Scriptures: Psalm 23; Romans 12: 9-21 

 

Thinking Ahead Question: Think of places around the world where violence is common – such as South Sudan, Colombia, or Palestine. How can we continue to hope in the face of such violence? 

 

7 November 2021 

Steinbach Mennonite Church

 

Appeal to a Higher Court (God in the Dock)

Introduction 

Job, part three. An impossible task: trying to understand why someone like Job would experience so much pain and trouble. An impossible task: trying to explain the presence of evil and hurt in our world. 

 

Two weeks ago, Lee introduced Job as “a good man in a bad way”. Last week, Lee observed that Job’s friends echo the kind of thoughts we torment ourselves with when we are in a bad situation. He summarized their counsel with three basic thoughts, especially the idea, “If I only try harder, pray harder, work harder, all of the bad stuff will go away.” 

 

The friends end up saying essentially, “Job, it’s your fault. We thought you were a good man, but no one would suffer this much if they didn’t deserve it. We don’t know what you did, but clearly your problems are your fault.” 

 

Part Three: I Want God! 

Now we come to part three. Reading the speeches by Job and his friends is interesting. They keep saying, “It’s your fault.” Job keeps saying, “I know I’m not perfect, but I have kept faith with God. I want God to judge me. I want to appear before God.” 

 

At the beginning of chapter 13, he says, “‘My eyes have seen all this, my ears have heard and understood it. What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you. But I desire to speak to the Almighty and to argue my case with God.” 

 

In 13: 20-24, Job continues, “Only grant me these two things, God, and then I will not hide from you: ²¹ withdraw your hand far from me, and stop frightening me with your terrors. ²² Then summon me and I will answer, or let me speak, and you reply to me. ²³ How many wrongs and sins have I committed? Show me my offence and my sin. ²⁴ Why do you hide your face and consider me your enemy?” 

 

Then in chapter 19, Job uses words that echo powerfully in Handel’s Messiah: “²¹ ‘Have pity on me, my friends, have pity, for the hand of God has struck me. ²² Why do you pursue me as God does? Will you never get enough of my flesh? ²³ Oh, that my words were recorded, that they were written on a scroll, ²⁴ that they were inscribed with an iron tool on lead, or engraved in rock for ever! ²⁵ I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. ²⁶ And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; ²⁷ I myself will see him with my own eyes – I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!” 

 

Throughout the book, Job calls on God for a direct meeting. He wants to know what has happened to him, and why. He wants relief. He claims in faith that he knows God will answer him, but in his pain and distress, death seems closer than God does. 

 

Chapters 27 to 37 

This brings us to the chapters we gave for our four-part outline. At the centre of these chapters, another voice speaks up, the voice of Elihu. Job’s friends and Elihu see the same thing – a good man in a bad way, a righteous man whose life has fallen apart. 

 

Job’s friends conclude that it’s all Job’s fault. Elihu listens to them and to Job’s responses, and he looks at the other side of the equation. He looks at God. Elihu hears the question that Job keeps hinting at. What kind of a God would do this to me? 

 

Stop and think about it. Lee noted this question in the first part of this series. When we find ourselves in trouble, it is natural to question God. I know someone who worked with a Christian organization, going around the world to trouble spots where people were in great distress. He reached the point that he could not believe in God and left both the church and faith in God. 

 

Elihu is concerned to defend God. He sees where Job’s questions lead. Job’s friends accuse Job; Elihu defends God. Given that Job represents all of us, consider for a moment what these responses feel like when we are in distress. 

 

The passages we read earlier tell you how Job felt. In chapter 27, he makes it clear that he believes God is in some way intimately connected to his distress, but he does not allow that knowledge to change his commitment to live in covenant with God. He holds on to life with God: “Until I die I will not put away my integrity from me. I hold fast my righteousness and will not let it go.” 

 

We may quibble and say that Job has no righteousness in himself; all that he has comes from God. Job agrees! Job knows well that no human being stands “righteous” before God. His “righteousness” is precisely his covenant with God. He has placed his trust in God and will not place it anywhere else. 

 

This covenant actually sharpens his distress. It should be the guarantee of a good life, but it has become the occasion of all his trouble. Still, he will not let it go. He holds on to God no matter what happens. 

 

In chapter 29, then, Job remembers with longing the life he had before his troubles came crashing over his head. He longs for God’s presence watching over him and caring for him. He longs for God’s presence protecting him. He longs to know the truth of the Psalm we read earlier. “Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.” He longs for God. 

 

Je Suis Job 

Six and half years ago, a radical attacker killed 12 people in the offices of the French magazine, Charlie Hebdo. In the aftermath of the shooting, millions of people around the world adopted the French phrase, “Je suis Charlie.” I am “Charlie Hebdo”. A sign of solidarity with those who were killed. Their action reflected the truth that the attack was really an attack on everyone in France, not just on the people who worked in a that magazine office. In the same way, we can say, “Je Suis Job.” I am Job. You are Job. Job’s experience is everyone’s experience. 

 

Our sermon series is not really about a Middle Eastern man from 3,000 years ago. The series is about us, about you and about me. When life becomes hard, what do we do? How do we respond? Where do we turn? 

 

I think of friends of ours who walked through the near-death of the husband. He recovered from a devastating heart attack, and now they are in distress again. The wife has been diagnosed with cancer and the family again is wrestling with the real possibility that one of the parents will die. I don’t know how they feel about it, but I know how their distress affects me. I begin to wonder what God is doing. I wonder why they face such difficult experiences. I know them. They are a wonderful couple and a wonderful family, with a strong faith in God. They don’t deserve this! The question “Why?” swirls around us in many different variations. 

 

I think of another friend who died recently of ALS. He was in his mid-50s. He faced death with a real faith and without complaining. I never heard him ask why, but I know that I do. 

 

I think of situations I know around the world. You have heard of the 17 missionaries in Haiti who have been kidnapped by the 400 Mawozo Gang. A Globe and Mail news story tells us this: “Weston Showalter, spokesman for the religious group, said that the families of those who’d been kidnapped are from Amish, Mennonite and other conservative Anabaptist communities in Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, Oregon and Ontario, Canada.” These are our brothers and sisters, threatened with death because of the violence and inequity that is endemic to Haiti. 

 

They were in Haiti to demonstrate God’s love, and now they face death. We find ourselves asking why they are rewarded for their compassion and love with the possibility of execution. We ask questions about the situation: Why does such a tragedy come to such good people? Why does God allow the 400 Mawozo Gang to continue to operate? 

 

Job and Elihu: The Point 

Elihu defends God’s honour in the questions that we raise about God’s goodness. God is good. God is just. God is gracious. God is loving. Job agrees with this truth: God is good and just. But Job is still in distress and pain, and he wants something more than reassurances that God is good. Job wants to see God. 

 

This is the point. Some people try to find answers for all the questions we ask about the pain and suffering of our world. Job knows those questions, and his friends make sure that he hears the kind of answers that people give. But Job wants something else. Job wants to see God. 

 

Je suis Job. When I am in distress, I also want to see God. That is not as simple as it sounds. C.S. Lewis expresses it eloquently in his book on the death of his wife, A Grief Observed.

When you are happy, so happy you have no sense of needing Him, so happy that you are tempted to feel His claims upon you as an interruption, if you remember yourself and turn to Him with gratitude and praise, you will be — or so it feels— welcomed with open arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence.

Have you ever experienced that dreadful silence? No wonder Job appealed to the supreme court of God. No wonder Job wanted to state his case. No wonder Job sounds like he is trying to place God in the dock. Job wants to see God! 

 

Lewis also describes the desperate thoughts that go through our minds at such times. He writes: “Not that I am (I think) in much danger of ceasing to believe in God. The real danger is of coming to believe such dreadful things about Him. The conclusion I dread is not ‘So there's no God after all,’ but ‘So this is what God’s really like. Deceive yourself no longer.’” Or again: “Talk to me about the truth of religion and I'll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I’ll listen submissively. But don't come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don’t understand.”

Note: Lewis is simply recording what he felt in his experience of grief and distress. What he says here is actually quite profound. In our grief, we sing and pray and worship. This is “truth and duty”. We feel relief in that exercise of duty, but it doesn’t heal us. Rather it is the soil in which God’s salvation grows. Only God can heal us.

Does this sound like Job? His friends tried to console him, but they were (as he says) miserable comforters. They tried to justify God to him, but they could not bring a real sense of God’s love into his life. No wonder Job wanted to see God. 

 

Conclusion 

That’s where we must leave Job today. He has had enough of explanations and accusations. He wants one thing and one thing only. Job wants to see God. 

 

Remember that you and I are Job. At some point in our lives, we will come to the end of our ability to understand what is happening. Like Job, we appeal to the highest court, the court of God in Heaven. Our appeal may sound like an accusation of God’s character. But in truth we really want one thing more than anything else. We want to see God. 

 

When we appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada, we are looking for a verdict. We don’t care if we meet the Right Honourable Richard Wagner (the chief justice of Canada), or if we get to share a meal with the Honourable Malcolm Rowe or the Honourable Sheilah Martin. We care about the verdict that they render. 

 

When we appeal to the highest court in the universe, the court of God, we may still care about the verdict, but even more we echo Job’s words, desiring that situation in which we are again in close communion with God. More than anything else, we want to see God. 

 

 

 

 

 

Focus Statement: When we reach the end of our rope, we turn to God. In the end, we want to see God more than anything else in the world. 

 

Thinking Ahead Questions: When we call on God, what do we really want to happen? Why do we turn to God when all else fails? 

 

Scriptures: 

1) Psalms 121.    2) Job 27: 1 to 6; 29: 1 to 6

27 Job again took up his discourse and said: ² “As God lives, who has taken away my right, and the Almighty, who has made my soul bitter, ³ as long as my breath is in me and the spirit of God is in my nostrils, ⁴ my lips will not speak falsehood, and my tongue will not utter deceit. ⁵ Far be it from me to say that you are right; until I die, I will not put away my integrity from me. ⁶ I hold fast my righteousness and will not let it go; my heart does not reproach me for any of my days.

29 Job again took up his discourse and said: ² “O that I were as in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me; ³ when his lamp shone over my head, and by his light I walked through darkness; ⁴ when I was in my prime, when the friendship of God was upon my tent; ⁵ when the Almighty was still with me, when my children were around me; ⁶ when my steps were washed with milk, and the rock poured out for me streams of oil!