The Unrequited Love of God

2/28/10

Albertville

Luke 13:31-35

 

Rev. Michael Trask

 

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!”

 

These are not words of anger; these are not words of judgement and condemnation; these are the words of one whose heart has has been broken again and again; these are words of unrequited love. Yes love. If you ever wonder what God is really like inside, what his real motivation is, here it is: it’s love. Love for us. Love for the people of the earth. And it’s not as if he hasn’t clued us in. His favorite way of describing us is to call us his bride. There is no subtlety about that: He wants to marry himself to us. He picked the strongest form of love that we will ever know...the love that requires us to dedicate ourselves to another person for the rest of our lives.... as the metaphor of his love for us.

A lot people fancy themselves as being the initiators of the relationship we have with God. They like to talk about how they searched and searched and finally “found” God. As if God had been hiding out in the woods someplace; as if he had never declared his intentions; as if he never made himself available, and we had to coax it out of him by showing how much we love him. This of course is utter nonsense and self-aggrandizement. For God has loved us before the foundation of the world; loved us while we were yet sinners and were incapable of loving anyone. It is he who does the searching and the finding! It has always been that way.

When Adam and Eve Sinned in the garden, they didn’t search for God, God searched for them. And it wasn’t Abraham that came to God and struck a deal with him so he could be a father of multitudes, it was God who came to him, when he lived in the city of Ur. And Jacob didn’t go into the desert looking for a wrestling match with God, It was God who pursued Jacob.

And furthermore, it would be God who would pursued the descendants of Jacob, known as Israel.As Jesus intimated in the text , Prophet after prophet was sent, each one with the message “Turn back to your God....he loves you.” But they rejected the messengers and killed them. And in so doing, they rejected God; rejected his love.

And it was all of this....this history of God seeking and loving his people that came to Jesus mind on this day that some friendly pharisees came to warn him about Herod. They told him Herod wanted to kill him. Jesus hinted that he would one day in the the not too distant future; under his own power, walk into Jerusalem and meet his death. And in that, God would communicate just how much he loves us, one last time. “Do you see?,” says God, “I’m willing to give my Son and put him through hell in exchange for your lives.” “That’s how much I love you.” To this day, Jesus on the cross stands as one of the most powerful statements of Love in the world. Billions adore it; billions more abhor it.

But let’s make this even more personal now. Actually that’s what God wants most of all, to get personal with you. And you may have noticed that during your life, at various points that God has reached out to you. You may have thought that you were searching for God, that you were somehow wooing him with your prayers or offerings or service or whatever, but really it was he who was searching for you. If you had devout parents, you had them for a reason. God was reaching out for you through them. Or maybe for you it was some uncle or Some Grandma or a Sunday School teacher you had. They were by no means perfect, they might even have been characters of a sort, but in spite of their imperfect humanity, God used them to introduce you to the idea that there is someone in heaven who loves you; someone in heaven who saves you; someone in heaven who wants to spend eternity with you. Oh yeah, think now! Think back on your life. It was not by chance that you know God, it was God seeking you. It has always been about God seeking you. At several points, he has given you opportunities to know him better.

So How have you responded? It was not only to Jerusalem that Jesus would say “How often I have longed to gather you a s a hen gathers her chicks, but you are not willing”; he says that to you. You have have been willing sometimes, but other times, no so willing. Why is that? Well, when you hear that Jesus wants to gather close to himself, your first impulse might be to run the other way because you don’t want to be controlled and you don’t want to give up the perceived freedom that you believe you have when you are apart from him. Jesus is too restrictive, you might think.

But if that’s what you’re thinking, you’re not getting it. Why does a hen put her chicks under her wings? To protect them! To protect them from the chicken hawk, to protect them from the wind and the rain. To protect them. And yes, she might use her wings to move them here and there a little bit, but it’s always so they won’t get eaten or trampled or pecked to death. The hen does not get her kicks out of controlling her chicks. She gets her kicks out of seeing them live and grow and thrive. And our Lord is exactly the same. Jesus said “I have come so that you may have life, and have to the full.” He says also “If the son of man shall set you free you shall be free indeed”

So what is it exactly that you want to do, that causes you to skitter out from under his wing as he tries to gather you? What is it that you are so afraid that you might have to give up? What do you at this moment consider an expression of your freedom? Is it excessive drinking? Oh yeah, that’s freedom, being tied to a bottle. Illicit sexual behavior? Is that freedom or being a slave to your urges? And the aftermath of such behavior is not to be ignored. Or maybe with you it’s greed? The greed causes you to spend all your time counting your money or fooling with all the stuff you’e managed to gather. Is that your life now. Is that freedom? You’ve been pursuing happiness in this way. Have you found it?

Ever hear of the Stockholm syndrome. That term comes from what happened at a bank in Stockholm Sweden. The bank robbers held bank employees hostage for five days. During the ordeal, the victims became emotionally attached to and sympathetic towards their captors and even defended them for a time after it was all over. This same thing has been noticed again and again in hostage situations. I think that is what happens in the situation at hand. We feel emotionally attached to the prince of this world and all of his wiles. Mick Jagger wasn’t to far off when he titled one of his songs “Sympathy for the Devil”. Because we’ve got a world of people who are sympathetic towards him and his agenda. It is not so easy to put aside our agreement with him.

Jesus understands that, that’s why he sent his Holy Spirit. A couple of times he referred to this spirit as “The counselor”. That’s because this one knows us. Knows what’s inside us. Carefully, skillfully with the Word of God he helps us sort out what is real and what is imagined; what is true and what is false. Ever felt convicted about something you have done and are doing; ever felt like it’s time to change and repent? That’s the Holy Spirit bringing you to your senses on a particular point.

When a person is converted and brought into a relationship with Jesus, it is never an all-in sort of thing. We do not instantly become perfect and holy in every way. Nope. It’s more incremental than anything. Only gradually do we learn to reject what is evil and keep what is good. This process goes on all during our life and we never do become perfect until the resurrection when we will be made new with everything else in creation.

But we do and we can become better people in the here and now. And please, don’t ever think that these changes that we make have anything to do with making God love us more. He loved us when we were deep in our sins. He loved us before any changes were made. So no, we don’t do these things to make him love us. We do these things as a response to his love, and out of agreement with the truth that we are growing in. Like those suffering from the Stockholm syndrome we will need to be talked out through it if ever we will begin to see our former captor and all of the sins that so entangle us as our true enemies And then, by the spirit’s power, we will take the appropriate action and align ourselves with the one who aligned himself with us by becoming one of us and dying for us. There never has been on who loves you more than the Lord. AMEN