Sunday, July 29, 2007

Sermon: "God of Love"

Hosea 1: 2-10

Reverend Larry Gerber

 

A picture is worth a thousand words.

That's partly because a lot of the pictures we see would take at least a couple thousand words to explain and every picture has a story ? sometimes a seedy story. And by using an airbrush or Photoshop, the story can be manipulated to tell a different story.

Take the early-20th-century Soviet Union. After Leon Trotsky was excommunicated from the party, Stalin went through old political pictures and had him airbrushed out of any images where he appeared with Lenin and other Communist dignitaries.

Or just glance down at the magazine rack at your grocery store ? things are definitely not what they seem. After being released from prison in 2005, Martha Stewart made the cover of Newsweek carrying the caption, "She's thinner, wealthier and ready for prime time." The only problem was that she didn't look thinner, so her face was photo-shopped onto a slimmer woman's body.

What with MySpace and YouTube, et al., we're really into photography these days, and perhaps that explains the appeal of Mark Michaelson's new book, Least Wanted: A Century of American Mug Shots.

Lauding the mug shot as pop art, the book contains hundreds of police images of unknown criminals guilty of un-described crimes. We're left to imagine the thousand words behind these arresting snapshots. We can even head to his photo-sharing site to blog our guesses as to the crimes committed by the captured.

Michaelson suggests that one of the most appealing aspects of the mug shot is that things actually are as they seem. No editing. No airbrushing. The only thing added is a prisoner ID number. Mug shots show people at their most base and honest (or dishonest) moments.

Mug shots are authentic images of hard luck moments. People at their lowest. Unaltered reality.

In this light, Hosea 1 is like a mug shot book with its own authentic images and hard luck stories. Pictures of people telling the stories of God's people at their lowest. Hosea, wife and kids have got to be the most dysfunctional family in the world.

And yet that's the point. God is quite quick to admit it: The relationship between God and God's people has become totally dysfunctional and God is ready to throw in the towel, and Hosea is invited to demonstrate just how badly the relationship has deteriorated.

The whole chapter reads quickly, with details about the characters that are almost as Spartan as the backstory of Michaelson's mug shots. But each snapshot in the lineup tells a piece of the story of God and his people. While there's a debate that understands the Hosea narrative as either historical or fictitious-symbolic, we can't let our interpretation distract from the story's meaning for Israel then and for Christ followers today.

Mug Shot One: Hosea. Hosea is commanded to marry a "wife of whoredom" (v. 2). Think of the media frenzy that would descend upon this story today: "Preacher marries prostitute!" It's sad that while clergy lifestyle scandals have become cliché in our news, nobody is reporting on Hosealike faithfulness in the ministry.

One picture tells two stories here. Hosea's marriage is a narrative of God's fidelity to Israel, and consequently to us today. The prophet incarnated his message, sending a picture of God's unmerited goodness and unbounded patience. The snapshot of Hosea reminds us who God is ? a patient life-mate who endures with grace all manner of infidelity against him.

But the image of Hosea models something of God's people as well ? simple obedience. Verse 3 doesn't say that Hosea thought about marrying Gomer or prayed about it or consulted the wisdom of others or complained to God or chose to find himself a more appropriate wife. It plainly says he went and took Gomer as his wife.

What bounds does our obedience have? Will we lay down future dreams for the kingdom? Will we move to any country to serve God? Will we give more than feels comfortable? Will we purchase based on needs rather than wants? Will we seek relationship with hard-to-love people?

Mug Shot Two: Gomer. This mug shot is convicting. Gomer has spent her life sleeping around ? always seeking comfort and fulfillment in relationships with men. Now married to Hosea, she continues her unfaithful ways (3:1). She goes outside of a relationship of commitment, love and acceptance, and seeks fulfillment through false promises of false satisfaction. Gomer is a picture of Israel ? guilty of idolatry by allowing anything else in life to come before worship of God as first priority (v. 2).

But here is the rub of the prophetic message ? hearers, then and now, are supposed to find themselves in Gomer. We have to take a hard look at this criminal image. We're so uncomfortable with the concept of prostitution that we can hardly see ourselves in it.

 Harlot. Hooker. We cringe even at the words. But the image should not be avoided, sanitized, or airbrushed away.

How are we, as Christians, giving ourselves away to the world around us? How are we, as Christians, idolatrous? In our spending? In our priority on our image? In what we allow into our minds? In too many hours given to our careers? In striving to keep up with the Joneses? God's faithfulness is not understood without recognizing our own unfaithfulness to him. And it's hard but healthy for us to see our sin and idolatry in its relational context ? as a marital violation of the covenant to be faithful to only One.

Mug Shot Three: Jezreel. The children of this union are now identified and become warnings of impending judgment. Jezreel means "God sows" or "scatters." His is a portrait of gruesome murders by former king Jehu in the valley of Jezreel. This son is a warning to the kings and rulers of Israel that God will bring an end to their reign and power because of the violence committed. But for us today, the picture is a sobering reminder that God does not forget sin and that sin can carry painful consequences and repercussions. We can't think that our irresponsible actions and behavior are something we can get away with or that they don't have serious consequences.

Mug Shot Four: Lo-ruhamah. Lo-ruhamah is the daughter and her name means "Not Pitied." Imagine the reminder every time this girl was called by name ? God will be merciful toward Judah in the south, but will not show pity toward Israel in the north.

This picture of God can seem capricious and unfair, especially to those new to the faith. But we're reminded again of elements of God's true character. While Judah received mercy for a while, it wasn't because Judah was deserving of it. If leniency and pity are given based on merit, we call this the justice of God. If God withholds or extends mercy ? when neither half of the nation was deserving of it anyway ? we simply witness the mysterious mind and will of God. Truth is, we almost always get what we don't deserve from God, rather than experiencing the opposite.

Mug Shot Five: Lo-ammi. Lo-ammi is the second son born and means "Not My People." The image of this child shows a God with limits. God calls his chosen people "not my people" and says he is not their God (v. 9). God gives up ? throws up his hands in despair, as it were, not willing to force anyone to love him or to be in covenant with him. So God honors our choice to ignore God.

God says: "For a mere moment I have forsaken you, but with great mercies I will gather you. With a little wrath I hid my face from you, for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you" says the LORD, your redeemer" (54:7-8).

What's striking about this verse is that God actually admits that he at one time forsook his people. God acknowledges that he "hid [his] face" from us. We like to think that forsaking us is not something God ever did, or does, or would ever do. He did forsake us!

These last three mug shots tell the story not only of our forsaking of God, but of God forsaking us.

Yet the story doesn't end with these sad, sorry pictures.

The Isaiah text hints at reconciliation: "With great mercies I will gather you." And "With everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you." It is God's nature to turn his face toward us, to extend a hand in mercy.

The New Testament confirms this: In 1 Peter a reference is made to this specific prophetic context. The writer says that we are a "royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light" (1 Peter 2:9).

The writer then reaches into his hip pocket to produce the mug shots of Lo-ruhamah and Lo-ammi. But the shots look different. They haven't been photoshopped, but they've definitely been grace-shopped. "Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy" (1 Peter 2:10).

Once you were Lo-ruhamah, not you are ruhamah. Once you were Lo-ammi, not you are Lo-ammi.

By the Grace of God you are changed. Grace makes beauty out of ugly things."  You are pitied and you are my people.

Our response can be honest confession of sin and hopeful clinging to one who calls us "Children of the living God" (v. 10). We remember that there's image altering that isn't manipulative like that of our magazine covers. God is ever altering the image of those who love God ? drawing the imago dei into fuller and fuller expression within us.
For this, we thank God for his grace and patience.

We have adopted the God of Israel. His Grace is sufficient. Are we airbrushing the Image of God, or are we allowing God to alter the image of us through His Love and Grace?  Let us pray???

Sources:
Celebrity mug shots: mugshots.com.
June-Friesen, Katy. "Arresting faces." Smithsonian Magazine, January 2007. smithsonianmagazine.com/issues/2007 january/mug shot.php.
On photo manipulation: tc.umn.edu/~hick0088/classes/csci_2101/false.html, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photo_manipulation.