God as a Surprise

PROPERS:         PROPER 6, YEAR B    

TEXT:                 1 SAMUEL 15:34 – 16:13                

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, FOLEY, ALABAMA, ON SUNDAY, JUNE 17, 2018.

ONE SENTENCE:        God’s movement in the world typically comes in surprising ways.        

                                    

            The 20^thCentury poet, Ogden Nash, once penned a short rhyme:

                        How odd of God

                        To choose the Jews.

            His pithy little verse spoke volumes about the recurring theme in salvation history: God does the unexpected.

            Consider what our sacred scriptures have told us about the nature of God and how he has moved through history.

            We believe, as heirs of the Judeo-Christian tradition, in a God who reached down and made a covenant with a wandering shepherd, Abraham, and expanded that covenant to include his offspring, ultimately the 12 tribes of Israel.

            He selected a wandering, seemingly-insignificant Semitic people – without land or respect – to be his chosen people.

            As Paul Harvey used to say: “And now you know the rest of the story.”

            But we forget that truth from time-to-time.

            We confine God to a box, and we expected the expected.

            We fail to see God as an active, dynamic presence in the world who has shown us repeatedly – down through salvation history -- that he will do the unexpected.  He will not be constrained. The hand of the divine will not be shortened.

            Think of examples down through the millennia:

·     God, we are told, chose an iconoclastic, stuttering fugitive from Egyptian royalty to lead an enslaved people out of Egypt into a promised land full of milk and honey.

·     God chose a foreigner – a Moabite – named Ruth – to be the forbearer of Israel’s greatest king, and an ancestor of the one we call Christ. 

·     God repeatedly sent his prophetic messages – his unvarnished truth – through people without power or influence – people now known as the Major and Minor Prophets.

·     God selected a young, single woman in a remote country village of a few dozen people – all likely cave-dwellers – to be the bearer of the one we say is the Savior of the World.

·     The anointed one, the Christ, was nailed to a Roman cross, died, and on the third day rose from the dead.

·     His followers – a band of fishermen, tax collectors, and tradesmen – moved out to transform the known world.

·     And, as a final example, a passionate, fiery Pharisee who had persecuted the young church, became the most important missionary in Christian history.

What would be the pay-out if Las Vegas made odds on a story such as that?

So, we should not be terribly surprised – but we should be reminded – of the serendipitous nature of God in the story we have in the first lesson, from First Samuel.

To briefly recap that story:

·     The prophet Samuel, grieving over the unfaithfulness of King Saul, perceives a call to anoint the next king of Israel.

·     He travels to Bethlehem to anoint a son of Jesse – of the tribe of Benjamin.

·     He looks upon seven of Jesse’s sons, but God tells him that none of them is his chosen one.

·     Samuel asks Jesse if there are any others. Jesse tells him that the youngest of the sons is tending the flock.

·     Samuel sends for the youngest, and David comes from the fields.

·     Samuel sees that David is the chosen one and anoints him to be king.

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            It is so easy and tempting to put God in a box – to expect what we expect. It eases our fears and calms our anxieties.  The temptation is to rely on our expectations. We are much more comfortable with a God that can be predicted; whose actions and movements will not surprise us.

            I was in Italy this past week and had the wonderful experiences of seeing the sights of Milan, Padua, Venice, Pisa, Florence, Assisi, and finally, Rome. The great art and monuments speak of the deep appreciation for God during the past 2,000 years, especially in the first 15 Christian centuries.

            And then I remembered.  Something unanticipated transpired during that 16^thChristian century. I remembered how an unknown friar in a small German monastery five-hundred years ago had turned this great and formal culture on its ear.  Martin Luther, a small cog in a very large wheel, began the Reformation. He shook the very foundations of the church.

            The Church was changed.  And we are heirs of that change.

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            As I said earlier, we are much more comfortable with God as something that is predictable, even controllable. It is our hope that if we get enough people on our side, that God can be manipulated. The outcome will be what we hope. An impossible situation will be resolved to our benefit.  

            A term which describes that approach is deus ex machina– God in the machine.

            A more accurate and faithful approach, I think, is to see God working in all things.  While, as Paul notes, we will “see through a glass darkly”, we can rest assured that all thingsare ultimately in God’s hands.  There is no place we can go, no place where life may take us, that is beyond the ultimate redeeming power of God.  As St. Paul says, “Neither height nor depth…”

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            There is an earlier story about Samuel, from when he was just a young lad.

            His then-barren mother had prayed desperately for a child.  She was given Samuel.  As an act of gratitude, she gave him over to service in God’s house. There, he assisted an elderly man Eli.

            One night, while Samuel, slept, he heard a voice call to him: “Samuel, Samuel.” Thinking it was Eli calling him, he ran to Eli’s side.  Eli said, “I did not call you, son.”

            This happened several times, and the wise and elderly Eli saw what was happening. He told Samuel that it was likely the Lord calling to him.  He advised Samuel to respond, “Speak, Lord, for your servant listens.”

            When the voice called to him again, Samuel spoke those words: “Speak, Lord, for your servant listens.”

            And the Lord spoke.  He spoke words of condemnation on the sons of Eli – Samuel’s mentor.  The words were harsh.

            The next morning, Eli asked Samuel what he had heard, and encouraged not to hold one word back.  Samuel told him what the Lord had said.

            Eli’s response was one of great faith – devastating thought the words were. “It is the Lord. Let it be as he wishes.”

            He accepted that this was the providence of God.  It was not what he had hoped for, nor was it what he expected. He knew that ultimately God would be who God would be, and that all things are in God’s hands.

            As the camp song says:

            Surprise, surprise, God is a surprise,

            Right before your eyes,

            It’s baffling to the wise.

            Surprise, surprise, God is a surprise,

            Open up your eyes and see.

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