Sunday Sermon

 

God is Sad

Isaiah 59:8

They don’t know how to live in peace, and there is no fairness in their lives. They are dishonest. Anyone who lives as they live will never have peace.

The current book of the Bible that has caught my attention is the book of Jonah because it speaks to how God works in people’s lives to bring healing. It really frustrates me that people only think of this book because of the big fish and they do not grasp what a powerful and wonderful book it is. God tells Jonah to go and tell the city of Nineveh that God has decided to destroy the city because of how evil it is. We need to know that this judgement by God is right. Nineveh is the capital city of the Assyrian Empire and that empire has built its wealth and power by stealing other people riches and leaving people to starve and die. For some reason, we are not told Jonah holds a level of anger for Nineveh that is not healthy. Because of this anger God calls Jonah to go and to tell the judgement of God. You would think that this would make Johan happy because the people he hates have been judged by God to be evil and worthy of destruction. And yet, Jonah does not run to tell the people that God has judged the guilty and instead Jonah runs the other direction. In chapter four of the book we learn why Johan does what he does. You see Jonah is not just random guy but he knows God and how God works which means Jonah knows that God will choose to be merciful if God can. Jonah gets very angry with God when God spares the city because they repent. At this point we learn the whole point of the book. God wants to deal with Jonah’s anger. For some reason this anger Jonah feels has become a problem and God knows that it must be dealt with. We know this anger is a problem because Jonah puts other people in danger of death because Jonah will not do what God has called him to do. Only when confronted does Jonah admit that he is the problem which ends up with him in a big fish. From here we find the grace and mercy of God at work when Johan cries out as he is about to die and God intervenes. I like that God’s salvation of Jonah is not a comfortable place but a place for Johan to think. Only now does Johan do what God called him to do and instead of being joyful when the people of the city repent Johan is just angry. In chapter four we then see God dealing with Johan’s anger. We never know if Johan repents of his anger but we have God working to help Jonah know the impact of the anger Jonah feels. The whole point of the book becomes clear that God is trying to save Johan from the anger Jonah has. What a wonderful God we find here in this little book. God knows the broken parts of Jonah’s life and God will not let Jonah go on with the kind of anger he has inside of him. We worship and serve a God who wants to bring peace into our broken lives and in this book we learn how far God will go to make that happen. This is the God we should be telling the world about because it is the God who loves people enough to save them from their selves.

The concept I want us to understand from the book of Jonah is that we have an intervening God. That concept sounds so dry and uninteresting but it is the most exciting idea that we have of God. When we think of God, we often consider that God is the truth and how that affects our reality or we think about the righteousness of God because it shapes how we act but the fact that God intervenes in the universe He created is the most fundamental part of what makes our faith work. Frequently we celebrate the death burial and resurrection of Jesus because we find real hope for our lives but that whole process starts with the fact that God steps into our reality to fix our broken lives. Everything flows from the fact that we have a God who gets involved in His creation and that is our hope. Our faith is not based on us obeying rules or even doing good things it is based on us building a relationship with a God who wants to be part of our lives. From Adam and Eve to the book of Revelations and all the material in between speaks to a God who loves us enough to be engaged in our lives because God cares about the struggles we have as humans. We need to know that sin breaks God’s heart because is separates from God so God has chosen to reach out to us because we can not get to God. Think about the, the God who created the universe is calling out to us because He loves us and wants us to know how to live the way we were meant to live. The most important thing is that God wants to bring peace to our lives which is the greatest hope we can have. Our problem is that God will never force Himself on us so we must choose to let God work in our lives. Accepting the help God offers though is not easy as we can learn fro the book of Jonah. Overcoming the broken things in our lives takes real work but we have a God who wants to teach us and train us to live with real hope and peace. Are we willing to trust in the God who comes to save us from ourselves?

I don’t know if you have to be a parent to fully appreciate the nature of God but for me I learned a lot about God while I was rasing children. As parents our desire to keep our kids safe drives so much of what we do. When our kids put themselves at risk we get mad at them not because we hate them but because we love them. It seems that God feels a similar feeling about us when we reject God for death and destruction. Our sin makes God angry not because God hates us but because God loves us and wants us to be safe. I have often thought how me must make God sad like our children have on occasion. God longs for us to know lives filled with meaning and purpose. The verse we have speaks to this idea of God talking plainly about how He feels about us and you can sense the hurt God feels. In this verse we have God speaking about how people don’t know how to live in peace and the idea here is that God is struggling with the suffering that is caused by people because they have rejected God’s ideas and concepts so they can do their own thing. Listening to this verse I can hear God feeling sad because He wants people to live in peace and He gave the Israelite people the path to that peace but they have rejected God’s wisdom. Our verse tells us that God does not want what is happening but He cannot stop it all God can do is call out to people and tell them the truth of their situation. God wants people to know peace and God has done all He can to help people be people of peace but we have to be willing to learn what God teaches and that is not easy. I go back to the story of Jonah to see how much God wants to give peace to Jonah. All of the suffering Jonah experiences is because Jonah choose anger over the peace God offers. If we are looking for peace in our lives or in the world it starts with knowing God is the one we need to look to. I want us to feel the pain God feels because we have rejected the wisdom and salvation God wants to pour out because living by God ideas are not easy. In this verse God speaks about the hurt people have because they don’t know how to live in peace and we need to know this is upsetting to God. When we sin God feels the pain of that in our lives and wants to change that pain to peace.

In the next part of the verse God speaks about what is going on that is causing people to not know peace and it is such a stellar piece of diagnoses. God is so plain because the problem is so simple. The Israelite people have stopped being fair and honest which has cause them not to be able to find peace in their lives. These two things will go a long way to help us to live in peace with each other. Being fair is all about cutting the other guy a little slack and yes that will mean that we will have to give up a little bit but the cost is worth the effort. To be fair means we share with people instead of demanding everything be our way. One of the problems of fairness is it takes wisdom to know what is fair and what is not but God has given us a book filled with how to be fair. Look at what God says about the idea of dealing with the poor. In the law God clearly makes provisions for the poor and demands that those who have are to help those who do not. The owner of a field is not to sweep it twice and is to leave the corners. At the same time those who are in need must come and get the food for themselves. This is what God calls a fair system and it is very important that we are people who act in fair ways. Next in the verse is the idea of being honest. God is truth and to be fully human we need to be people who are truthful because it is the only way to build peace. Scripture makes it clear that the enemy is the source of lies so if we are dishonest we are moving in the wrong place. But it is the final phrase that tells us how troubled God is with all of this. God is not making a statement and He is not even condemning what is going on. The words that are found here are more a lament. It wounds God that these kinds of people will not know the peace God longs for us to have. I want us to feel the anguish God feels and the sadness God experiences because instead of listening to Him people have chosen a path that does not bring peace but death and destruction.

One of the things God does is make sure we know everything He says applies to everyone. It is so easy to “Other” someone but over and over God makes it clear we all need to learn from God. In the book of Jonah it is not the Ninevehvites that were the only problem but Jonah is a problem too. Or you have the book of Habakkuk where Habakkuk is complaining about how bad things are in Israel and so God answers by telling Habakkuk He is sending the Babylonians. All of the sudden Israel is too good for that. Every human has made God sad because of our sin and we have to own that or we will never get the peace God wants us to have. What is important is that we don’t need to be better people we need to trust in God more. When we trust in God we will strive to live as God calls us to. Faith is not about obeying it is learning to draw closer to God each day. The whole point of Jesus is not to save us from sin but to open the door to the God who saves us from sin. We have a God who is at work in our lives and we have to learn to listen to that God.