5th Sunday after Epiphany 9 February 2014 Sermon

5th Sunday after Epiphany 9.2.14 God’s ways are not our ways

It is good for us to pause sometimes and consider the greatness of God.

We believe He created the world and all that is in it. Further, that He knows and understands every detail of that creation including everything that happens to each one of us.

He is dealing with billions of people and thousands of years and He is aware of it all.

And then we come along and try to tell Him what to do! We should not do it and we cannot do it. We just do not know enough to be able to direct an infinite intelligence.

We need to learn the same lesson that Job learned. After forty or so chapters of questioning God’s wisdom, Job realized he should have kept quiet. And he repented in dust and ashes (for his complaining spirit).

On the other hand we are encouraged to ask for what we need; only that we should do that with due reverence and humility, always being ready to defer to God’s longer vision.

We do not want to go to the other extreme of seeing God as so remote it is not worth trying to reach Him.

Sometimes He will give us what we ask instantly. And sometimes it looks like the prayer is not being answered even for years at a time. It is in this latter situation that we are tempted to tell God what to do.

One of God’s ways we find particularly hard to grasp is described in today’s Gospel – the wheat and the tares. We cannot understand why God would let evildoers have such freedom and for so long; that a person can go for decades doing damage to others, and seemingly escape punishment.

We have an impatience to see justice done. There are two things we have to remember:

One, we have to be patient regarding time. We need long-term trust in God’s wisdom, not expecting that everything can be sorted out immediately.

Two, we have to be very large in our vision. If we want God to smite our enemies, for example, it may be that we need smiting more than the enemy. We have to be careful what we wish on someone else. We must learn to bless, not curse.

Ultimately we must desire the salvation of other people even those we do not like; even those who directly harm us.

This takes a largeness of heart that just may not be there until we cultivate it.

There are people who think everyone who has ever died is now in heaven. That is not likely to be true. But it is a good thing to want, all the same.

We do not want anyone to be lost, even though we think there are various people who probably are lost. Thinking it and wanting it are very different matters.

If I don't want my enemy to be saved, Lord, make me want it – as You already do.

We lose ourselves in the larger vision of salvation that God Himself had, and this will save us a lot of heartburn as well as making us better Christians.

The Epistle today tells us how we should all get along. If Christ is our focus how can we have any discord between us?

The idea of us all singing psalms and giving way to each other might sound idealistic, but what else can a group of people be like who all seek to follow Jesus Christ?

Our spiritual growth requires that we shed any past limited perspectives on how God should act.

We trust Him totally, as to when and how to act. And if we do not yet trust Him then we ask for the grace and wisdom to be silent in wonder before His much greater wisdom.

We cannot make Him less than He is. Omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, eternal. We do not even need to try.