God’s metaphors: judge and shepherd 081113
Isaiah 1:10-20 Luke
12:32-34
Last week the prophet Hosea helped us imagine God as a
disappointed parent….I’m mad at how you’ve turned out and I should punish you
AND YET….I love you, I can’t abandon you…….not just the ‘you’ of us
individually but as a people, maybe even a nation that says it’s “under God”
Today Isaiah and the psalm both invite us to imagine God as
judge
As last week with Hosea, here in Isaiah God is talking out
loud again to the people:
What does all your fancy ritual and proper worship do for
me? All your holiday celebrations you
SAY are focused on me are nonsense!
When you reach out your hands to me in prayer I can’t
listen, for your hands are covered in the blood of those you trample and
oppress in your self centered power searches. You’re guilty of failing to be my
people.
AND YET I can let you off with a warning: mend your ways.
Learn how to do good instead of harm,
seek, pursue justice, don’t just cloak your failure with your piety
rescue the oppressed instead of doing the oppressing…
Or you’ll get what’s
coming to you from your own arrogance.
Ouch. Remember what
a prophet is: one who proclaims God’s word to reclaim God’s people. Is God talking to us? Do we praise God with our lips on Sunday and
get blood on our hands by our weekday lifestyle, where we fail to do good,
ignore injustice, and get ahead on the backs of the poor?
And then Jesus brings it even more uncomfortably close to
home. He tells us a hard truth here:
where we spend our money, our time, our energy is where our heart really lies, no matter
what our pious lips think or our self deluding thoughts utter.
I haven’t found the article but someone at Spiritual Lunch
Break this week said there was a WSJ article stating that the US was the #1
nation for military spending, China the #1 in economic spending and s. Korea #1
in education spending
Where your treasure is, there is your heart.
What do our life budgets say? How do we spend our time, our energy, our
money?
A city church has a huge billboard off the expressway that
says Be an organ donor: give your heart to Jesus. I chuckle at the synchronicity of its
appearance this week, then reflect. Some
of us indeed have given our hearts to Jesus, seeking to beat as one with God’s
heart, and we know that not because of a warm fuzzy feeling but because that’s
what our life budgets say…..we do good, we give generously, we seek
justice. But not all of us.
it isn’t easy in this day and age, in this culture; I doubt
if it’s ever been easy to go against the prevailing culture.
AND YET we can do it because of the other image Jesus gives
us: shepherd….little flock, oh the
tenderness there, little flock do not be afraid. It’s God’s pleasure, God’s hearts desire, to
give you the kingdom…..lets just get back into our right relationship, he
pleads, where we ARE God’s people….who do good give generously & seek
justice.
Little flock in Fairport, do not be afraid to trust God with
all of your life’s budgets
May our hearts, and our treasures, belong to Jesus.
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