I love scripture. There are many reasons for that love, but the main reason is that I see God in them, I see something of God’s character, of who God is, revealed in scripture. And God is who catches and holds my attention.
I don’t like sermons that are all about the preacher, or all about the news, or all about the latest controversy, who is right who is wrong, or something on television or that tell jokes to keep peoples’ attention.
I like sermons that are about scripture and scripture is about God and in seeing God then we see who we are and we see who are to become, it is then that we are able to be in the world in a new way rather than the same ole same ole story.
Rather than the same old boring stories of conflict, control and controversy, rather than anger and despair, rather than the melodramas of the habitually offended, the Good News of God creates something new, a new world of communion and comfort, hope and delight. What is entering this world of redundant soap operas is the uncreated light of God, and that makes for a different way of being in the world.
Take today’s scripture lessons for example, they each in some way show God’s total commitment to setting humanity free from our slavery to sin and death that we may be free to love and serve, to share comfort and hope with one another, God’s commitment to our freedom is absolute and costly.
Jeremiah, the potter’s house. The image is of God’s people being shaped like clay in the hand of a potter. The image is of the pot collapsing, and the potter taking the clay and starting over. The image gives the warning that God creates and destroys, that God can build up, and God can start over if the pot doesn’t turn out well.
It is a powerful image, beautiful and terrifying. I love the idea of God working on us, shaping us, that we aren’t done yet, but then there is the image of the vessel being spoiled in the potter’s hand. If we don’t turn out right God will start over, squashing the clay.
It is a mixed message of hope and warning, for Israel to trust in their God who is an artist and artisan but to also repent or else face exile to Babylon, be faithful or your nation will disappear. The scripture depicts God’s people as foolish and self destructive and unappreciative of God, there isn’t much hope for them.
But God is the interesting part of the scripture, and God is full of hope. The clay isn’t tossed aside, it is good clay, good dirt, the dust of creation out of which God shaped Adam, and God isn’t giving up on this good dirt. No matter how much we mess up God is committed to us, sticking with us, teaching us the hard lessons of what it means to become free to love.
And then there is the Epistle to Philemon. It is almost the shortest book of the Bible. 2nd and 3rd John are shorter and Jude is about the same length. We have almost the whole letter in today’s reading. Paul is writing to Philemon to convince him to set his slave, Onesimus, free so that he could continue to help Paul in his ministry of evangelism. Paul is perhaps innocently or perhaps not so innocently sowing the seeds of what would eventually become the end of slavery. Paul challenges the economics of the time by asking his friend to set a slave free because of what God has done for him. Slavery is not the primary purpose of the letter, what it is primarily about is how much God has given to and for Philemon in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. So it is a little thing for Onesimus to be set free, a minor expression of gratitude.
This is about God’s commitment to humanity in Jesus Christ. And when we see God’s commitment clearly we are then in turn freed up to set the captives free. The cost of Onesimus is small when compared to the cost to God of the death on the cross. God’s commitment to us is costly.
The lesson from the Gospel according to Luke speaks of cost as well. Jesus teaches about the cost of discipleship, of following Jesus, of having to let go of all other commitments and relationships and possessions in order to belong only to Jesus.
We are told to consider, to look ahead, to count the cost of what we will have to give up if we are to follow Jesus. Are we ready to do that? Count the cost before we start on something that we won’t be able to finish.
We are asked to have a commitment to God that is similar to God’s commitment to us, a commitment that is costly to God, it cost the death on the cross. The total demand of discipleship is meant to make us realize that it costs more than we can count, it is greater than we can understand, and that we will fail, and that we will become fascinated not with our own failures, which are old news, but rather with the cost and commitment of God being for us in Jesus Christ.
We are called to follow Jesus, but the interesting thing is that Jesus is God’s full tilt pursuit of us, and this is what makes Jesus Good News and discipleship about grace rather than our own failures and successes. We awkwardly love, follow and worship the one whose love, pursuit and adoration of us go beyond our capacity to grasp.
And that is why I love scripture, it tells us something good about God and because of that we can do more than we can hope or imagine. Because of this we can break the usual news cycle and become part of something new and truly newsworthy.