The “otherness” of God

  

Genesis 22:1-3 - Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”

“Here I am,” he replied.

Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”

 

We can’t talk about Abraham without talking about this awful story.  I encourage to go read the rest of Genesis 22, but the quick summary is that Abraham obeys God by taking Isaac to the appointed mountain and gets ready to sacrifice him.  God stops him at the last moment and promises him to reward him for his being willing to obey this terrible command.

There are so many troubling aspects to this story – problems that I cannot and will not explain away.  Why would God ask such a heinous thing?  Why was Abraham willing to do it (full disclosure, I wouldn’t)?  Why is God’s “reward” for Abe’s obedience the same thing that he had already promised multiple times before?  These are just some most glaring problems with digesting this story.

So you may ask, “Eric, if you have no intention of explaining this story, why the heck did you even bring it up?” 

Here’s my reply.  The reason I bring it up is to point out what Karl Barth called the “wholly otherness” of God.  God can not be fully explained and /or domesticated.  There will always be things about God that causes us to want to walk away because we cannot fit them into a neat, tidy, nicely-wrapped God package.  God is “wholly other” meaning that we will never get God into a manageable box.  This story is one of those stories (there are many others) that remind us of that.  It creates questions that cannot be answered in this life.  It reminds us that faith, trust and obedience aren’t produced by having all our questions answered.  God can be wholly other and wholly trustworthy at the same time.  The witness of this story is that God is both – other and trustworthy.

So trust God even though there are unanswerable questions.  That’s what Abraham did.  It worked out for Abe and it will work out for you and me.  We may not always understand God and at times, trusting God may actually be terrifying.  But I have found that God’s otherness has become one of the very reasons that I do trust God.   We’ll talk more about that tomorrow as we finish up our time with Abraham.

For more on Abraham, read Genesis 22 – 25:11

 

Prayer:  God, we don’t know more than we do know about you, but help us to trust you anyway. Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for people you know who do not believe in God

 

Song:  Crowder – Praise the Lord – We’ve used this one before, but it goes especially well with today’s devo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhP8orOTHis

Abram, A New Name?

 

Genesis 17:1-8, CEB - When Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am El Shaddai.  Walk with me and be trustworthy.  I will make a covenant between us and I will give you many, many descendants.” Abram fell on his face, and God said to him,  “But me, my covenant is with you; you will be the ancestor of many nations.  And because I have made you the ancestor of many nations, your name will no longer be Abram but Abraham.  I will make you very fertile. I will produce nations from you, and kings will come from you.  I will set up my covenant with you and your descendants after you in every generation as an enduring covenant. I will be your God and your descendants’ God after you.  I will give you and your descendants the land in which you are immigrants, the whole land of Canaan, as an enduring possession. And I will be their God.”

 

                When you make a covenant with God, it changes who are.  You begin living not just for yourself, but for God and the people God has called you to serve.  And make no mistake;  you ARE called to serve God and you ARE called to serve specific people.  My simple message today is that you consider how you are different (if indeed, you are different) because God called you to serve.  Do you know clearly what specific people God wants you to serve?  If not, pray for God to give you clarity about that. 

                Abram’s name changed because God invited him into covenant.  Abram means “father of many” whereas Abraham means “father of many nations.” 

 

Questions:  What is your covenant with God and how has it changed the trajectory of your life?

 

Reading Further: Genesis 17-21

 

Prayer:  God, help us understand more fully what it means to be in covenant with You.  Put on our hearts the specific people You have called us to serve.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for Annual Conferences throughout Methodism who are meeting throughout Methodism in the month of June. 

 

Song:  El Shaddai – Amy Grant

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qJMl95lb9k

Outliving Your Life

 

Outliving Your Life

 

Genesis 15:1-6 - Some time later, the Lord spoke to Abram in a vision and said to him, “Do not be afraid, Abram, for I will protect you, and your reward will be great.”

But Abram replied, “O Sovereign Lord, what good are all your blessings when I don’t even have a son? Since you’ve given me no children, Eliezer of Damascus, a servant in my household, will inherit all my wealth.  You have given me no descendants of my own, so one of my servants will be my heir.”

Then the Lord said to him, “No, your servant will not be your heir, for you will have a son of your own who will be your heir.”  Then the Lord took Abram outside and said to him, “Look up into the sky and count the stars if you can. That’s how many descendants you will have!”

And Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord counted him as righteous because of his faith.

 

A couple of things to point out about Abram here.  First, he felt close enough to God to be a bit cheeky with the Almighty.  God says, I’ll protect you and reward you and old Abe shoots back, “what good is that if I don’t have descendants to inherit it?”  It might seem like a lack of faith, but it’s exactly the opposite.  Abram had already been promised by God that he would be the Father of many nations.  He obediently left all he knew because he believed that promise. Abram is not challenging God.  He’s trying to understand what God is doing.  The wealth and protection was great, but if you read the larger story of Abram, you know he’s not motivated by either of those things.  He’s focused on how God will keep God’s promise.  So his question is seeking insight.  Abram was called a “friend of God”(James 2:23) and good friends are comfortable asking probing questions is seeking deeper understanding. 

The other thing I want to point out here is Abe’s long view.  As I just stated, Abram had wealth and other blessings, but his interest is more for those who will come after him than himself.  I point it out because we live in a culture of NOW – one that is way too focused on the short view.  I’m talking politicians who make decisions on whether it will help them win re-election in the short term rather than how it will help more people in the long run, companies who focus on next quarters profits versus the long-term security of their employees, and consumers who sacrifice future savings and safety nets to have what they want now.  Those are easy targets for me to take shots at, but I’m included in that last one.  One of the things we can learn from Abram is that the finish line isn’t our death. 

Abram was instinctively aware pf this truth without the promise of eternal life that we Christians often cherish.  There was no such notion in his faith.  Yet what God had given him is a vision for how his life could continue to matter for many others long after he was in the ground.  And because of that, Abe began to live not for himself, but for those who would come after him. 

 

Question:  How would living for those who come after you change what you’re doing right now?

 

Prayer:  God, give us a vision for our lives that is bigger than the days we have left in this life.  Help us to live for those who will come after us. Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for hospital personnel nationwide as hospitals reach or approach capacity. 

 

Song:  Friend of God - Israel Houghton

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UI0cgUKMqRs

Old Testament Heroes – Abraham

Old Testament Heroes – Abrahm

 

And now, for something completely different – This series, which may take us well into July, will be a change of pace from the forgiveness series.  I will try to make the reflections a bit shorter and I’ll encourage you to read more about the heroes in the Bible itself.  So here we go. Our first hero is Abraham (first called Abrahm).

 

Genesis 12:1-3  - “The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father’s family, and go to the land that I will show you.  I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and make you famous, and you will be a blessing to others.  I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt. All the families on earth will be blessed through you.” 

 

All three major world religions revere Abraham as a patriarch of their tradition.  He is praised for his great faith.  In this snippet from Genesis, we see him being called to leave his country for a land he knows nothing about.  When I really think about that, I’m floored.  The closest experience I have to that is being an itinerant preacher, I have on a few occasions now, been sent to a place I didn’t know.  That was actually the case in being sent to Hernando, where I am now.  But that’s hardly comparable to being asked by God to pick up your family and go to a completely different country.  I know I can be sent anywhere in Florida.  Wherever I go, it’s still Florida. 

Abraham was not even told at this point where he was going.  The promises were amazing, but the sacrifices being asked for were real.  We celebrate Abraham’s faith but do we have Abraham’s faith?

A theme throughout Abraham’s life Is that God was always calling him to deeper faith.  This is true of us as well.  God loves you completely right where you are right now.  However, because God loves you, God is calling you forward in your faith.  There is never a time when that is not true. 

 

Question:  What is God asking you to do right now that makes you uncomfortable?

 

Further reading:  Genesis 12-14

 

Prayer:  God help me be clear about what you are asking me to do right now. Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for those who are crippled by fear right now.

 

Song:  Phil Keaggy – Abraham

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBmMa_6r7kY

The Forgiveness Community

Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:32, NASB)

Bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. (Colossians 3:13, NASB)

Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you your transgressions. (Mark 11:25, NASB)

Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ forgive him.” (Luke 17:3-4, NASB)

 

                As we finish our series on forgiveness today, I ask your forgiveness for missing yesterday.  I have no excuse except that the day just got away from me.  I am seeking to make amends by writing on Saturday 😊

                One the reasons I chose to write this series on forgiveness is a bit selfish.  I have felt a calling to write a book on forgiveness for more many years and have worked on that book off and on since then.  For whatever reasons, it has been really hard to get it done.  Beginning to write these devotions every weekday at the beginning of the pandemic established the discipline of regular writing for me.  So I chose to use that established discipline to work toward the goal of getting the book done.  Thank you for indulging me in hearing about forgiveness longer than anyone except myself wants to hear. 

                The working title of the book is Forgiveness Revolution.  I remember vividly when I put those two words together for the first time.  I was preparing to preach for the first time the sermon series that would come to be named the same as my intended book title.  After reading all the scripture I could find on forgiveness and several books as well, I was asking myself a question that I was taught by my preaching professors to always ask when preparing to preach; “what do I want to happen as a result of people hearing this?” 

                The answer that hit me like a flood is “I want a revolution.”  We live in a world where so many feel like their mistakes have damned them.  I’ve listened to countless people talk about the crippling shame they feel.  Further, I’ve watched my entire life as it seems we become more and more divided.  Divorces outnumber lasting marriages.  Family feuds begun because of relational mistakes escalate into complete community upheaval, which has escalated into a whole culture of “us vs. them.”  The world seems to be more and more fractured and by what I see as a lack of ability to forgive and working towards reconciling our relationships.  People are becoming more and more isolated.  We struggle with experiencing the forgiveness of God and so we struggle with forgiving each other.  Sometimes, we even struggle with forgiving God.  We need a revolution.

                A revolution can start with one person but it is impossible to sustain without a community.  Jesus, the Son of God incarnate knew that.  The movement He started would never have the legs to continue if He didn’t build a community.  So He gathered disciples and spent three years immersing and training them in the ways of God’s kingdom, which, by the way, are intrinsically communal. He also taught them to do the same community building after he ascended.  One of those ways of the kingdom was forgiveness.  The needed revolution I talked about earlier was started over two thousand years ago by Jesus.

                We don’t need to “reinvent the wheel.”  We just need to re-establish the patterns of forgiveness that Jesus taught so long ago.  Jesus chose and called the Church to do exactly that.  Bask in the lavish forgiveness of God.  Adopt the discipline of forgiving each other as God as forgiven us.  Practice grace and forgiveness every day.  When we have something against God, we keep talking and relating to God until we work it out.  My friends who call themselves the church, this is who we are.  We are a forgiveness community!  Let’s start acting like it.

 

Question:  How can the church model forgiveness in a way that helps the world become a more forgiving place?

 

Prayer:  Lord Jesus, thank you for giving us the experience of forgiveness.  Help us share and celebrate that experience of forgiveness with each other and, at the same time, show the world what it is missing.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for your church today.

 

Song: Reconciliation Song - Buddy Owens, Claire Cloninger, Morris Chapman

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1D4wXOGNKrk

Making Amends

Matthew 5:23-24, NIV - “Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift.

 

Matthew 25:40, NIV - ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

 

                As we wind up our series on forgiveness this week, we come to the topic of making amends.  We’ve talked about God’s forgiveness of us, us forgiving others, and even us forgiving God.  But what do we do when we have received forgiveness from others or God.  The appropriate thing to do is to make amends.  In our relationships with other humans, making amends can even be the appropriate thing to do when the person we have hurt has not forgiven us.  Making amends, in these cases, can even help the other person be more receptive to forgiving you.  It should be noted that making amends is NOT a way to manipulate the other into forgiving you.  Making amends requires a genuine desire to benefit those we have hurt.

                But what exactly is making amends?  Biblically speaking, it is very close to the biblical notion of repentance.  In the original biblical language Greek, repent means “to turn away.”  When we repent, we turn away from the hurtful behavior.  We work not to repeat the actions that harmed others.  So to apply this to the notion of “making amends,” this means that we begin to act towards the person we hurt in ways that demonstrate our commitment to not hurting them again.  Certainly showing kindness, empathy, and compassion is part of this, but the heart of making amends is helping the other to see that we know what we did was wrong.  We know it caused harm and our actions show that we are doing all we can not to repeat the behavior. 

                Note the urgency of Jesus’s instruction in the first scripture above that is taken from the Sermon on the Mount.  Why would one not offer a gift to God (worship) before making every effort to make amends with those who have something against us.  The urgency comes from the fact that our relationships with others have a direct influence on our relationship with God.  The second scripture above also makes this point.  The way you treat others is, in effect, the way you treat God.  The importance of making amends is not only for improving our relations with people.  It is a way of improving our relationship with God. 

                As I said before, the purpose of making amends is NOT to extract forgiveness from others.  Therefore, even if our efforts to make amends with others does not result in a restored relationship with the other person, genuinely knowing we have done all we can to try and repair our human relationships still improves our relationship with God.  It also sets us up for better relationships with other people because we have changed our hurtful behavior.  Making amends where we have made mistkes is part of healthy spiritual, emotional, and relational growth.  It is part of becoming a better version of ourselves.

 

Question:  Thinking about someone who you have hurt in the past, is there something you need to do to demonstrate your commitment to not repeating the offense?

 

Prayer:  Jesus, thank You for your instruction in making amends.  However, the nitty-gritty of exactly how to do it in specific relationships is really heard.  Guide my heart to know how I can “turn away” from the behavior(s) that harmed the other and the courage to replace those mistakes with action that helps assure the other that I am committed to change.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for people who have lost a loved one recently.

 

Song:  Turn My Heart – Lynn DeShazo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QhJKj4e8o4

Forgiving God?

 

Job 19:25, NIV - I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth.

 

The quote above is from Job.  Job has lost everything and the really disturbing thing is that it is clear from the story that Job’s suffering was allowed by God.  This has proven to be an ultimate challenge to Job’s faith, and at times, Job has very strong words for God.  He cannot reconcile the suffering he has experienced with the God he thought he understood.  Job is at odds with God.

                It is possible for us to find ourselves in the same boat from time to time.  Things happen that cause us to question and even be angry with God.  Many of the central characters of scripture have found themselves in this position as well (Moses, Joshua, Jeremiah and others).  The first 50 Psalms express this disoriented, disillusioned, and even sometimes angry faith of the authors.  Jesus himself quotes a Psalm when He cries out from the cross, “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” To the extent that we have ever felt that we needed to “forgive” God, we are not alone. 

                Here is some guidance gained from the book of Job that helps us work out our difficult issues with God.  First, be real.  God is able to hear you unedited feelings and comments.  God is able to handle us being angry and not return our anger and pain with retribution or punishment.  God’s love for us endures even the worst we can throw at it.  Along these same lines, honestly address our issues with God trusting that God can take them and help us move through them to a better relationship with God.  We trust God to get us to a better place.

                Be patient.  Wait for God to respond with faith that the response will indeed come.  God has proven faithful in the past and there is no reason to expect anything different now.  Often, what we will find is that God was not we thought He was.  Job, after encountering God says, “I had only heard about you before, but now I have seen you with my own eyes.”  As Job’s story concludes, he finds that he has discovered an even deeper faith and trust in God.  The same should be the vision for us as we move through difficult periods in our relationship with God. 

                God loves you with an everlasting and unshakable love.  To the extent that you feel lost from God, know that God is searching/reaching out for you.  God is not your enemy or foe; God is your Ally and Friend.  God is your Helper, not you punisher or destroyer.  God’s plans for you are good.  Whatever the problem is you have with God, God can help you overcome it.  Trust that.  Expect that.  Move forward knowing the way will be cleared for you. 

 

Question:  Do you have any uncomfortable feelings for God that you need to work through with God?

 

Prayer:  God, I cannot hide the difficult issues I have in my heart with respect to You.  Help me feel the safety to be able to open up completely to You and trust you to respond compassionately.  Remove the clouds of doubt, confusion, and anger.  Heal my heart and our relationship. Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Pray for people you know who don’t have any kind of relationship with God.

 

Song:  Praise the Lord – Crowder

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_c-9LxROAkI