Written by By Art Ross*
The sermon today is on God. As I begin, I remember the child in church school, drawing a picture. Her tongue between her lips, a furrow in her brow; she was working hard. The teacher asked, “What are you drawing?”
“A picture of God,” she replied.
“No one has ever seen God,” responded the teacher. “No one knows exactly what God looks like.
The little girl looked up; her eyes bright. “They will when I finish!”
I can well imagine that you read the sermon title and asked yourself – “Who does Art Ross think he is, presuming he can preach a significant sermon on God?” Fair question. I will tell you that I am presumptuous enough to think that not only I can, but that it is my calling to do so. I call this a significant sermon – because God is significant to me. I leave it to the listener to decide if the sermon is significant for you.
In the gospel lesson for today, certain people who thought they knew God were grumbling about Jesus. Jesus, who comes from God; Jesus, who is the incarnation of God, tells them stories, stories about God. Listen:
2 I am grateful to Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because he judged me faithful and appointed me to his service, 13 even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, 14 and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 15 The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the foremost. 16 But for that very reason I received mercy, so that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display the utmost patience, making me an example to those who would come to believe in him for eternal life. 17 To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever.[a] Amen. I Timothy 1: 12-17
Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.” 3 So he told them this parable: 4 “Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? 5 When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. 6 And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ 7 Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. 8 “Or what woman having ten silver coins,[a] if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? 9 When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ 10 Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” Luke 15: 1-10.
Listen to the stories and remember three things about God:
God is. God seeks. God rejoices.
God is
First, God is. The Bible does not try to prove God; the Bible reveals God. The great 13th century Christian philosopher, Thomas Aquinas, put forth five proofs for the existence of God. His proofs are impressive, but they are not persuasive. The existence of God cannot be proven – unless one believes the rising of the sun to be proof enough!
In the 16th century, Martin Luther declared that agnostics may be among God’s most beloved children, because agnostics take God seriously enough to doubt God’s existence. I suppose Luther meant something similar to what Frederick Buechner wrote a decade or so ago, “Doubt is the ants in the pants of faith.”
There are many reasons to doubt the existence of God. Inexplicable suffering tops my list. Hurricanes may make us question God; so do Chechen rebels murdering school children. I can find many reasons to doubt the existence of God. But ultimately, at the core of my being, I believe God is. Significant faith starts with that conviction.
Jesus did not come to prove God. Jesus came to reveal God. When religious leaders grumbled about Jesus’ actions and about his friends, Jesus did not argue. He told stories, stories called parables, parables about God. Parables are not proof; parables are revelation. Parables challenge human reason and logic. Parables push the human mind to perceive new truth. Some call revelation the “ah-ha” moments of life – moments when new truth becomes very clear – truth that we cannot fully explain or prove, but we trust. Trust is at the heart of faith. As Paul says, faith begins when we see with the “eyes of our heart.”
Jesus wants people to see God with their hearts as well as know God with their heads.
God seeks
The God we see with our hearts is a God who seeks. God is and God seeks. The God of the Bible seeks people, people who are lost to themselves and lost to God. God seeks Adam and Eve after they have eaten forbidden fruit. God seeks Abraham and Sari when they are childless. God seeks Hagar and Ishmael when they have been cast into the wilderness. God seeks Moses after he killed a man and fled. God seeks David and confronts him after his affair with Bathsheba. The God we know in Jesus Christ is revealed in the rising of the sun – and in the rising of son –s-o-n.
After betrayal and denial, after crucifixion, Jesus rose from the dead and came back to seek out the very ones who had shared in his death. He made them the church, the body of Christ. Church is the only real proof that Jesus lived and died and rose again. All other witness is mere hearsay – hearsay that has resulted in great good and unspeakable evil for more 2,000 years. Unless we worship the God who seeks, the God Jesus reveals, we worship a false god.
Here is what I believe. The most important question of faith is not, “Do you believe in God?’ The most important question of faith is, “Who is the God you trust?” Is God our friend, or is God our enemy? Is the creator of heaven and earth on our side, or against us?
In the early days of faith, some people thought God required human sacrifice. The story of Abraham and Isaac wrestles with the question – and answers it, “No.” The prophet Micah wrestled with the question of God. Micah gave us the wonderful words. “And what does the Lord require of thee, but to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God?” God seeks justice. God seeks kindness. God seeks humility.
When Paul writes his young friend Timothy, Paul writes as one who knows that God seeks. Paul had always believed in God. But the God in whom Paul believed was not the God Jesus revealed. Paul had been a blasphemer, a persecutor, a man of violence. Paul knew what it meant to seek out and destroy those whom he thought to be the enemy of God. On the Damascus Road, Paul met the God who seeks.
Let me ask you a question. What is your favorite Bible verse about God? For some people, their favorite verse in the Bible is John 3:16. “For God so loved the world, that God gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes on him might not perish but receive eternal life.” I love those words, but they are not my favorite. If I had to pick a favorite verse, I might pick the next verse, John 3:17, “For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.”
God sends Jesus to be like the good shepherd who seeks out the lost sheep. God sends Jesus to be like the woman who lost a coin and turned the house upside down to find it. When she had found the coin, she gave a party that cost more that the coin was worth. God seeks.
For the past several years, since the tragedy of 9/11, we have heard great debate as to whether the God Muslims worship is the same God Christians worship. In one way the answer is clearly, “Yes.” Muslim faith, like Jewish and Christian faith, centers on the God of Abraham. God seeks Abraham and makes a promise. When Abraham and Sarah fail to trust God’s promise and choose to have a child by Hagar, God seeks Hagar and her son Ishmael in the wilderness. God preserves their life. God leaves the ninety-nine and seeks the one. Muslims trace their faith in God to Abraham, and to Ishmael.
The God of Muslim faith, the God of Jewish and Christian faith, is the same God. But that is not to say all Muslims actually worship that God – or that all Christians worship that God. The God who seeks is the God who commands that we love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. Unless we honor that God, we are worshipping a false God. The God who seeks is the God who commands that we forgive others as we ask for forgiveness in our own lives. Unless we obey that God, we are worshipping a false God. The God Jesus reveals loves and cares for all people.
Jesus told his parables to people who believed in God, but those same people grumbled because Jesus was seeking tax collectors and sinners and eating with them. Pharisees and scribes had forgotten that God seeks.
When Muslims bomb buildings sending thousands to their death, they do not honor or worship the God who seeks and forgives. When Muslims take school children hostage, and children end up dead or maimed for life, they are not honoring the God who seeks.
And, when people who call themselves by the name of Christ wear white sheets and lynch black people, they are not honoring the God we know through Christ – no matter how many crosses they might wear. When Nazis invoke the name of God and of Christ as they slaughter millions of Jews, they are blasphemers and persecutors. When people who call upon the name of God fail to care for the poor, refuse to forgive their enemies, or love wealth more than charity, we do not worship the God who seeks; we worship some false God – a God made in our own image. The God of the Bible, the God and father of Jesus the Christ, seeks and saves. That God rebukes, but does not condemn.
God is. God seeks. And, God rejoices.
God rejoices
Joy is a sign of deep faith. The shepherd returns with the lost sheep, calls his neighbors and friends, and says, “Rejoice with me.”
The woman finds the lost coin, then calls friends and neighbors, saying, “Rejoice with me.”
Hatred of people never honors God; rejoicing with people does.
So, how would I draw a picture of God? The God I draw would be a shepherd with a sheep on his shoulder, and a woman with a lost coin in her hand. The God I draw will have a twinkle in the eye, a smile on the face, yet also a tear in the eye. One hand will be stretched out in welcome, the other hand will be next to the mouth, as God calls us to turn away from every act of blasphemy, and persecution, and violence – whether verbal or physical – and invites us to rejoice, to rejoice in love and mercy, to rejoice in grace and forgiveness, to rejoice in service and sharing, in healing and in hope.
Significant sermon: Significant God. Amen
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Art Ross is a native of North Carolina; he served in the army as in infantry officer and served churches in Brooklyn, NY, Charlotte, NC, Jacksonville, FL, Morehead City, NC and St. Petersburg, FL. From 1994 until 2009, he was pastor of White Memorial Presbyterian Church in Raleigh, where he now lives.
Currently he is a trustee of the Biblical Theological Seminary in Wroclaw, Poland, a member of the StepUp North Carolina Board, Chairs a Commission for New Hope Presbytery, works with congregations, businesses and individuals as a Pastoral Resource, and is involved in community racial reconciliation efforts. He has served as trustee of four Presbyterian-related institutions: Queens University, Columbia Theological Seminary, Davidson College, and Union Presbyterian Seminary, where he chaired the Board for five years.
Ross is the co-author of Romans (Interpretation Bible Studies), John Knox Press, with Martha Stevenson, 1998; and made 3 contributions to Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, 2008. In 2010, he authored a paper, Wise Leadership for the Church. In 2012 and again in 2013, he was an invited contributor to the Feasting on the Gospels series.