Children of the Living God

Scripture Lessons: Colossians 2: 6-15 and Hosea 1: 2-10, OT page 835 Sermon Title: Children of the Living God Preached on July 24, 2016 This week a Daily Herald article did a good job of describing the national party conventions which have been in the news. My favorite part of the article was this: The conventions are a multiday infomercial to kick off the fall campaign. The podium is filled with carefully scripted, designed and choreographed advertising for the presidential ticket – and against the other party’s ticket. The impact of that advertising in most years is most strongly felt among the party’s own voters. The conventions remind them of what they like about their party and what they don’t like about the other one, and they offer plenty of things to like about their nominee. I like this description and I agree, that yes, when the Democratic National Convention kicks off tomorrow they’ll try to remind democrats what they like about their party and what they don’t like about the Republicans just as the leadership of the Republican National Convention has done their best to remind republicans what they like about their party and what they don’t like about the democrats, but I have to say, and I hope I don’t offend anyone too much when I say it – that just getting the party faithful excited about their candidates must be more difficult this year than it ever has been before. Sure – there are plenty of things to like about Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump, and it’s the purpose of a convention to offer plenty of things to like about them both, but while I remember so well the words of the pastor who offered Sara and I premarital counseling 13 years ago saying that “those who look for something wrong in a person will always find it” I am troubled by how easy it is to find something wrong in both of these presidential nominees. Will it ever again be said that the nominee for one party was a reality television star who more than once appeared in a professional wrestling match the same year that the opposing candidate was being investigated by the FBI? What are we to say about these things? That it’s time to move to Canada? Maybe, but this year it is so abundantly clear that while the purpose of the political convention is the same as it has always been: to tell their supporters all the things they should like about their nominee and all the things that they shouldn’t like about the other, this year no party can claim that they are the righteous and that their opponents are the unrighteous. No party can claim that they are the innocent and that their opponents are the guilty – but still, our culture moves us to choose one or the other as though things were so black and white because that is what our culture does. In Canada VISA is calling Canadians to boycott Walmart because Walmarts in Canada will no longer accept VISA – and Walmart is sure that her customers will stay loyal despite the inconvenience, but why anyone should be loyal to either the loan shark or the dispenser of cheap plastic stuff is what I want to know. But worse is that more have died while in the custody of the police. More police have died. More groups have been protesting. More angry people have been even more agitated than they were before, so we have to lament to an even higher degree that this year we are short on good options for our President in a time when we so truly need good leadership – and leadership is more than finger pointing, because it is not as though one is clearly good and the other clearly bad. But still, the democrats will say that Trump is bad and Clinton is good just as the Republicans have said that Trump is good and Clinton is bad in the same month when the Black Live Matter activists are saying that the police are guilty of brutality – and I’m not about to say that all police are completely innocent in this – but can the righteous response possibly be to return evil for evil by murdering police? For me the news cycle lately has made this much clear – that while some would divide the nation between us and them – right and wrong – good and bad – I am convinced that we actually a nation made up entirely of sinners. Now that’s not a new claim for Presbyterians. We come here Sunday after Sunday confessing our sins just as publically as can be. We put on our nice clothes and walk in here and week after week we come seeking the Assurance of our Forgiveness because we know we need it and this is just as Hosea would have it. In this first chapter of our Second Scripture Lesson the prophet does something that no other prophet in the Bible has done. Certainly there are a lot of prophets who do strange things. You think of Ezekiel who laid on his left side for 390 days and cooked only using animal dung to illustrate what it would be like for the Israelites when taken into exile, but nothing could be so strange as the prophet who marries a prostitute to illustrate his conviction that a prophet married to a prostitute is the perfect illustration for God being married to us. Think about that. Such a big part of these political conventions are the speeches given by the nominee’s spouse. Who you are married to matters – so Melania and Bill have to get up there to say nice things and as they do they want to look their best and sound their best because they know that they are reflecting on the presidential nominee. Now whether either are successful in reflecting positively on the nominee is beside the point because the point raised by the prophet is: How does it look then for God to be married to the Nation of Israel – God to be married to us? It looks like a prophet married to a prostitute according to Hosea – and the prophet even goes a step further to name his children Jezreel – or “I will punish”, Loruhamah or “I will have no pity,” and Loammi, which means “you are not my people”. How did the preacher who baptized those children feel? In a sense, maybe like every other preacher who looks at that tiny baby, and makes the claim that before the child has done anything wrong – before the child can speak or act – before a thought of selfishness has even crept into his mind – he needs forgiveness, because that is just who we are. And despite that sinfulness – we read in verse 10 of our Second Scripture Lesson: “Yet the number of the people of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which can be neither measured nor numbered; and in the place where it was said to them, “You are not my people,” it shall be said to them, “Children of the living God.” We are sinners. And those who march in the street are no exception. Those who wear a badge are no exception. Those who deny their guilt or have never apologized – they too are no exception to the reality that all have fallen short of the Glory of God. The unfortunate reality is that while no one dared throw a stone when Jesus stood by the woman caught in adultery and said, “Let he who is without sin cast the first” – it’s not just stones thrown today by the self-righteous but mud, bullets, and home-made bombs made for infidels as though some were and some were not – so hear what the book of Colossians has to say: “When you were dead in trespasses – God made you alive. When he forgave us all our trespasses, erasing the record that stood against us – he set it all aside, nailing it to the cross.” You see, while the world denies every email sent – we rejoice knowing that while dead, condemned by our mistakes, God made us alive. And while the world has never apologized seeing confession as weakness – we rejoice knowing that the record that stood against us has been set aside by the one who was nailed to the cross. It’s not that some are good and some are bad. It’s that we all are bad, but still he calls us Children of the Living God. Do not despair in an era short on saviors – for we already have one. Amen.