God Who Serves
Gen 3:21 Aug 15, 2010
Intro:
I want to begin by thanking Randy for preaching last week, a good message from John 14. I had been at Gull Lake Camp with some of our young boys, and the first morning we were there I went to the 7:30am leaders meeting and heard the general announcement requesting the leaders pay a little more attention to the physical cleanliness of the camp – it seemed there were bits of litter, areas that needed some attention, nothing major but just a request that the summer staff pitch in and do some half-way-through-the-summer cleaning. With around 200 people on site and no full time custodians you can imagine the need for an announcement such as this. Well that day, my boys arrived back from their pre-lunch activity about half an hour before lunch, and so I announced to them that in our little space before lunch we were going to head over to the main lodge and see if we could find anything needing tidying (and I told them about the announcement I had heard that morning).
Now, what kind of reaction would you expect from 7, 6-10 year old boys to that kind of announcement? “Hey boys, come on, let’s go do some cleaning up! We’ve got some free time before lunch, let’s collect garbage and sweep floors!”
Here’s what they said: “okay, let’s go.” No whining, no complaining – now it wasn’t excitement or enthusiasm but it wasn’t resistance either. And I was really proud of them. In fact, I even heard one of them say to a friend afterwards, “I shouldn’t admit this, but sometimes even cleaning can be fun”.
I tell you that story first because I was proud of them, but more because I’m wondering if those simple, un-noticed, acts of service are in fact a deep reflection of Christlikeness. I wonder if one of the most spiritual things we did was pick up garbage and sweep a dining hall. If Jesus was at Jr. Boys and Girls camp in the flesh, is that where we’d find him?
Fundamentals:
This summer we’ve been looking at some of the fundamental practices of our faith – what are the basics about who we are supposed to be and what we are supposed to do as Christians? We talked about Jesus call to deny ourselves, take up the cross daily, and follow (Lk 9:23); we talked about daily walking in step with the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:25), we talked about loving mercy and doing justly (Micah 6:8), and we talked about worship as a living, whole-body, daily sacrifice of worship (Rom. 12:1). This morning I want to talk about the servant heart of God, and ask if you and I have that same servant heart.
Of all your mental imaginations of God…
When I ask you, or a song of worship invites you to think of God, I would guess that the images conjured up in your imagination would be images of the King on a throne, or Jesus on the cross, perhaps a friend walking with you, maybe a mighty conquering warrior, or a source of power to help with the circumstances of your life, how about a wise teacher with counsel for living. The image might be distant and sort of intimidating in His power and holiness; or it might be friendly and close but still with a very definite sense of God and of power and wonder and ability to help and heal and change our lives.
Now, hear me clearly – those are not wrong imaginations of God. God is Holy and awesome, and God is close and intimate in His power. God invites us to relate to Him in those ways, sometimes describing Himself as the mighty Lord of heaven’s armies, sometimes as fierce holiness, sometimes as defender, sometimes as tender Father, and Jesus called us friends. Please continue to relate to God in those ways, as the Holy Spirit leads you and those whom He invites to lead you in worship or in counsel or in teaching.
But they are incomplete. And perhaps confusing, at least when it comes to our response. See, as Christians we believe we are to be transformed into the image of Jesus. We are to become like Jesus. We are to be Jesus’ hands and feet to the world, we are to share the light, we are His ambassadors in the middle of our culture. And those images I’ve just mentioned are not all that helpful to us in terms of us becoming like Jesus, because in all of them we relate to God in a position of power over us. If we then adopt those images as the expectation of how we should relate to others, we are in a little bit of danger… are you with me? If our images of God are all of amazing power and holy distance, and we are to be God’s ambassador, that sets us up to see ourselves in positions of power over others forcing them to do what we believe is right. And while that may be extremely distasteful to us today, it sadly has been the story at many times throughout our history. And if our images of God are of close intimacy with all power to heal and solve problems as we yield to Him out of live, again this sets us up with an expectation that if we are to relate to others we have to have it all together and have to be able to solve their problems for them. Either way, our limited images of God lead us to a hesitancy to really, actually, purposefully engage others with the Gospel, because we cannot bring ourselves to see ourselves the way that we see Jesus. And if we can’t see ourselves as Jesus, how could we possibly shine the light of Jesus through us? Am I making sense??
Alternative Images:
Again I repeat – those images of God are not wrong in any way, they are just incomplete and can lead us to hesitation or paralysis when it comes to doing anything to concretely engage the world around us that doesn’t yet know Jesus. I want to consider another image of God which I believe deeply reflects His heart and His character, and demonstrates very clearly how we can concretely engage the world around us. To do so I want to look at a passages of Scripture from the OT today, and then I’m thinking we’ll return to this theme in the NT in the coming weeks.
An Over-Looked Detail in the Story of the Fall:
The Old Testament image of God I want to look at comes from Genesis 3, which you might remember is the story of Adam and Eve’s disobedience to God and God’s resulting punishment. It is a familiar story, it begins with the serpent lying, twisting, and manipulating (vs. 1-5), continues to Adam and Eve giving in to the temptation and disobeying God (vs. 6-7), then to God strolling about in the cool breezes of the evening, just wanting to be with the people He had made (vs. 8-9), then the exposure of the sin and the resulting punishment (vs. 9-19), and finally the consequences (vs. 20-24).
There are a couple of places where our normal images of God are challenged by this passage, first in vs. 8-9 where we see God just out for a nice evening walk among His creation, hands-on, enjoying it, wanting to spend some time with Adam and Eve. Next in the judgment, we don’t have a court of law, with an intimidating judge high above – we just have God standing there among His creation talking to them. But the one that I really want to point out is in vs. 21, after the consequences have been given out, and as I read it I want you to begin already to ask what this verse tells us about who God is. “And the Lord God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife.” (Gen 3:21).
Now in just a minute we are going to think about all that entails, but first let’s remember again the context. God’s incredible, beautiful, perfect creation has just been severely damaged. Six days of hard work, culminating in God breathing His very image and life into two people, one male and one female, and in one act of disobedience these creatures turn on God and want more – they believe a lie, turn their back on a million incredible good things out of greed for one more thing, and they reject the love of God for them. We know from here and from other passages of Scripture that God already knows, now, that the only way to restore the relationship just broken here will be by the Son of God dying on the cross, “becoming sin”, so that we might be restored to relationship with God. Let’s keep that big picture – really the entire story right here in Genesis 3 – in mind as we consider what the first thing God does after pronouncing the consequences of the entrance of sin into the world. He “makes clothing from animal skins”.
So what all would that entail? First, God would have to lay hands on an animal – a cow? a goat? maybe a lamb? We don’t know, but one of those is likely. One of those innocent creatures created by God for Him and Adam and Eve to enjoy, and now God must kill it. As far as I can see, this is the first recorded death in Scripture, and it comes at the hand of God. This would be a messy business, with blood on God’s hands as he killed and then skinned the animal. What next? We don’t know exactly, but God likely had to treat the hides in some way – maybe he had to remove the fur, scrape the hides clean, hang them to dry, maybe even treat them as a tanner would. Once the skins were prepared, God had to cut them into the right sizes and shapes, and then had to sew them or somehow make them into garments that could be worn, again all with His own hands. Whatever the exact details, when we stop and consider verse 21 we quickly see that this was a lot of hard, messy, work.
So, what kind of image of God does this present us with? I see a butcher, a tanner, and a tailor. I see the God of the Universe with blood on His hands and sweat on His brow, working at physical labor and demonstrating skilled craftsmanship, so that Adam and Eve can cover their shame. When we spiritualize God we imagine Him snapping His fingers and “poof”, clothing appears. But that is not what the passage, in all its brevity, says. It says “God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife”.
Enough of me talking, what kind of image of God does this present to us, and how might that shape our understanding of how to be like God to a needy world around us? What do you think?
Conclusion:
Ok, so with this image of God alongside our normal images of God as all powerful and the one who can fix everything, and our conviction that being God’s people means that, by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are to tangibly and actively reflect God to our society, how then are we to live? What attitudes should we carry with us into action, what posture should we take towards our community, what actions should we do as ambassadors of Jesus?
You may, and I hope do, have personal examples. We have shared some over the past weeks, praying for people from the gym, seeking ways to begin conversation with people that ride the same bus day after day, encouraging one another to be like Jesus on the Emmaus Road and simply join people in their spiritual journey where they are and listen to them, and those are all right and good and exciting, and wherever those happen the church is there.
Did that last clause surprise you, or sound a little unusual? I hope so, because I want to continue to challenge how we understand the church from a theological viewpoint. We are used to understanding the church from a sociological viewpoint, as a gathering of people with shared conviction and desire for mutual benefit, with its own culture and traditions and understandings of the world. We’ve understood church as a place we come together to do spiritual things. And that is fine and normal. But it is not what God understands His church as – to God His Church is a “bride”, a “body”, an empowered and sent people with new citizenship who exist to serve and to bless. While there are recognized sociological dimensions of the church, to God the Church is fundamentally God’s sent Children obediently carrying out God’s mission, which began in the Garden of Eden, was completed in the resurrection, and is now left to us to tell the story both in content and by our way of life.
In other words, we need to roll up our sleeves like God did for Adam and Eve, we need to work hard and get dirty like God did for Adam and Eve, we need to serve the needs of people who are hiding because they are scared and ashamed, and demonstrate that God is not waiting in the bushes to jump out and yell “AHA! CAUGHT YOU BEING BAD… NOW YOU ARE GOING TO GET IT…”. God didn’t reject Adam and Eve, shove them naked and ashamed out of the garden and leave them to completely fend for themselves while God stood back with arms crossed and a look of damnation on His face. And neither must we.
Further, I believe that we must do this working together – not just on our own in the situations and opportunities we have in our day-to-day lives. That has been part of our individualism, and perhaps rooted in our image of God as the one to solve all the problems and thus left us feeling like we each, on our own, have to fix all the messes and solve all the problems if we are to be like Jesus. God’s description of His church as a “body” screams against this individualistic perspective and instead challenges us to understand ourselves, the church, fundamentally as a group of Jesus-followers eager to serve and bless our world so that we can point to God who has so eagerly and freely served and blessed us.
And this, my friends, is where Wednesday evenings comes into play this fall. We’ve talked some about this, sent a letter, invited response, and have already been doing some planning. Basically, Wednesday evenings are going to be our attempt to be the church in action in our world. We are going to start with dinner together at 5:30 – simple healthy food costing $3-4 or so each, and we are going to share a meal and our lives around the table. Then we’ll have a brief time (max. 20 minutes) focused on preparing ourselves to be God’s people – in the Word, in prayer, and in orientation to the specifics of the evening. Then by 7pm we intend to be out serving our community, being the people of God engaged with the things we see in our community. Like what? Well we are going to begin by asking God what He sees, looking for the needs and opportunities, and listening to God’s leading. From there, we don’t yet know… we could pick garbage, we could throw neighbourhood carnivals, we could go to JPHAWC or the Mustard Seed, we might just go play soccer with others from the community at the park looking a little bored, we might start tutoring or community kitchens. We won’t know details until we ask God together and discern where He is leading.
But just imagine this with me for a moment. Imagine 80 or 100 people – that is most of us – every week spending an evening trying to bless and serve our community as an expression of our love for God and commitment to be like God. Now don’t imagine it from a perspective of filling all the empty pews or having more money in our budget – that is certainly NOT the point though if it happens that would be cause for celebration. But the bigger celebration is in our obedience to the command to “love our neighbor as ourselves”, our neighbor being the one (according to Jesus), who is an outcast lying in desperate need while many religious people cross the road so they won’t be late for Bible study. Imagine, instead, us – the people of God – out looking for people to serve and to love, crossing the road to the needs, in obedience.
