Tag Archives: God’s Love

Hosea 11: Fatherly Forgiveness: 74/365

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There is a label that I think we disassociate from, and disempower too quickly: God as Father.

This intimate name holds all manners of associations such as filial responsibility; headship; love; guidance; and, belonging. However, reflecting back on how we discuss God as Father the concept always seems to be framed in the present tense.

For example, the most common analogy that I have heard in sermons of God’s fatherly access is generally described in the following manner. Imagine a hypothetical of the President of the United Stated – important guy. He is so important and busy that to meet with him requires numerous security checks, secretary appointments, and the like. Just think of the West Wing to get an idea of how much one person can micro-manage their day. Consequently other important people like CEO’s or philanthropists must wait for a meeting and discuss issues in formal terms. Yet the daughter of POTUS can just run into the White House, sit on his lap, and talk to her dad.

Thus, if we apply the concept of Father to God, the analogy infers that we have the same no-holds-barred access to him and the opportunity for informal discussion with an abundantly powerful person. Now this is a cute picture, it does highlight how approachable God has made himself to us, but it doesn’t sit perfectly right with me. It seems like this analogy is heavily weighted towards showing the human perspective only. We see the depiction through the girls eyes.

Yet, with fatherhood, there is a history. Their relationship is deeper than that moment. It has last their entire lives and the Father does much more for his daughter than just listen to him and withhold rebukes for her bursting in on his office so. What this analogy misses out on, Hosea 11 thrives in. Here we see what the legacy of a filial relationship means, both to us and to God.

When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son… It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them in My arms, but they never knew that I healed them.

Herein is a touching description of God’s care for Israel in its infancy. These passages emanate an almost nostalgic tone: the literary equivalent to the movie scene where the parents sit down and lead through old polaroids of family photos whilst sipping coffee and listening to ‘Memories’. The next few memories that God reflects on show the intimacy between He and his son:

I led them with human cords, with ropes of love. To them I was like one who eases the yoke from their jaws; I bent down to give them food.

In my minds eye I get the picture of ‘toddler-Israel’. A chubby, ruddy nosed infant who is fully reliant on God, even for its food. If this were a movie, the scene would follow immediately after teen-Israel – all grown up, gangly and rebellious – slamming the door on God and promising not to come back, “My people are bent on turning from Me”. God is furious and hurt at first, but in his rage has come across the photos and begins to remember the relationship over the betrayal. It is in this moment that he realises:

How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I surrender you, Israel? How can I make you like Amdah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? I have had a change of heart.

God’s fatherly love for us means more than momentary access, it also reflects the deep ongoing relationship that he has shared with us forever. Consequently, despite his hurt and pain at our rejection and rebellion, he still wants to fight for our relationship. He still desires nothing more than to restore our family bonds – irrespective of the cost to him.

It is sobering to realise that when I call God Father, I am calling on the very same bond that I so often spurn when I turn my own way. Yet, based on his values and qualities alone, God chooses to listen and still acknowledge our filial proximity.

Further, in a curious contrast to the parenting trap that so many of us fall into nowadays, God doesn’t intend to let me walk all over him to ‘keep the peace’. No his love is deeper than to merely acquiesce my wrong desires.

They will follow the Lord; He will roar like a lion. When he roars his children will come trembling from the west.

God still will be the boss. It is his call that leads his children. It is his power that they will respect. Further it is his provision that they will shelter in:

Then I will settle them in their homes. This is the Lord’s declaration.

It is pretty awe-inspiring stuff when you consider the emotional journey that is bundled into a label so simple as ‘Father’. Further it is all the more sobering when ‘Father’ is extended beyond the present tense and our eyes are opened to God’s ongoing care, guidance and protection. He is an impressively patient guy, which is a good thing. I am a pretty rebellious one and can do with all the patience I get.

Isaiah 63-64: Like a Leaf! Or a Grape!: 43/365

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We love to sugar coat stuff. Hide the vegies in the mince and the kids’ll never know. We like to call them white lies – isn’t that an interesting phrase: white lies. It is like they are the pure, little angelic lies that transcend our murky world and make things easier, more palatable.

So too, we love to soften rough edges, especially if they prick and jab and cause discomfort. I was astounded by the frank assessment of human nature earlier in Isaiah and this chapter does a similarly good job of dispersing the fog of pleasantries. This time, however, it is the cuddly – grandfatherly – image of God that is dispelled.

I don’t know about you, but for a long time I saw God as a Grandfather figure, instead of a Father figure. He wasn’t a disciplinarian, instead he was here to give me good things, share good times, and protect me. He was a cuddly vending machine to whom I could petition and expect. I think this view can be easily propagated if we read predominantly the New Testament and read it hastily.

Boy, oh, boy has Isaiah got some news for this god-view! Lets start with the question asked in verse 2:

Why are Your clothes red, and Your garments like one who treads a winepress?

The childlike innocence of this question is quickly disrupted with an honest and vivid answer.

I trampled them in My anger and ground them underfoot in My fury; their blood splattered My garments, and all My clothes were stained… I crushed nations in My anger; I made them drunk in My wrath and poured their blood on the ground.

…?! Don’t you sometimes wish you could take back certain questions!

Like, wow. What an answer. To be honest I don’t know what alternate answer I was expecting. I don’t think God would’ve looked down and said with a wry grin “Food dye” or “I’ve been eating raspberries”. Yet the detail of this response is shocking.

What does this tell me about God’s character? Is my father an axe wielding lunatic? A bomb waiting to explode? I don’t think so. I think it shows the phenomenal power that he holds. I think it also shows his amazing restraint to wait so long. I think that it is too easily to paint God’s character in black if you, like culture dictates, automatically see the victims as innocent (even the nomenclature of the word ‘victim’ suggests this!). But it is important to remember that this response is anything but unprovoked:

But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit.

Isaiah 64 expands further on our plight:

How can we be saved if we remain in our sins? All of us have become like something unclean, all of our righteous acts are like a polluted garment; all of us wither like a leaf, and our iniquities carry us away like the wind. No one calls on Your name, striving to take hold of You.

I think it is all to cultural to mistake patience for weakness. I know my students make that mistake with me all the time, they think because I am waiting I have forgotten. Because I am careful and patient for them to improve, they think I am too forgiving and soft. Now I’m a flawed human, I can only imagine the multiple-fold that this must apply to God in his patience.

God is definitely not the doting Grandfather who occasionally forgets our transgressions in this image. No, he is cogent; and active; and powerful; and articulate; and intense. I can see where the phrase fearing the Lord comes from when you read passages like this.

In this light, it is worth remembering that it is by virtue of our relationship with God that saves us from our deserved wrath. Isaiah 64:8-9 makes this clear when it appeals:

Yet Lord, You are our Father; we are the clay, and You are our potter, we all are the work of your hands. Lord, do not be terribly angry or remember or iniquity forever. Please look – all of us are your people!

There is no mention of our qualities or abilities in this appeal. No sense of entitlement or expectation. Rather, there is a wholehearted reliance on our relationship to God. I think this is a useful reminder to people who think that just ‘going through the motions’ of turning up to church is adequate for salvation. If, as established earlier in Isaiah, “all of our righteous acts are like polluted garments” then what hope can we hold onto bar our relationship with God.

The act of attending church means little if you’re not relationally engaging with God.

Go to: Isaiah 65-66

Isaiah 62: Bridezilla: 42/365

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I don’t remember much of my wedding day. It is one of the conditions that has landed me in hospital, namely my abysmal medium-long term memory. However, I have seen the photos. And whilst I cannot recall the moment, seeing the grin on my face I can safely assume that I was close to a terminal velocity of happiness. It seriously looks like my cheeks are about to burst.

Now whilst I don’t remember that day, I can reverse engineer how I must’ve felt based on those images and also the values that I have imbued in my marriage. Namely, Jo is my joy who manages to light up even the darkest day. She is the woman who I have dedicated the vast majority of my energies, hope, dedication, and even frustration to. I get frustrated when I can see solutions to her difficulties that she ignores. I also love it when she loves what I love.

Last night we played a new board game and she was squealing with glee (and yelling out in frustration too)… it was brilliant. And even though I couldn’t experience that level of emotional engagement in the game, I thoroughly enjoyed seeing her do so.

Why go on about my relationship with my wife and why she is so important to me. 1. She reads this blog (Hi Love!). 2. The real reason – the following bible verse:

And as a groom rejoices over his bride, so your God will rejoice over you.

What a stunning, and profound, simile.

Now I’ve written about the marriage metaphor that Isaiah uses earlier but this is icing on the cake. The lines of thought that this simile opens up for exploration are vast. My initial reactions are to consider the giddy delirium, the pride, the hope, the sense of fulfillment, the desire to protect, it goes on and on and on.

And this is how God wishes to interact with us? I feel like a Bridezilla!

You’ve seen the shows yes? Horror brides who think the wedding day is all the more important than their marriage. Consequently they get upset at anything and, in all likelihood, everything. I feel like God is waiting to appreciate our relationship and I’m getting drastically upset of something that, in all likelihood, as about as important as chair covers.

Fortunately he is a patient God. Most fortunately indeed.

Go to: Isaiah 63-64

Isaiah 60-61: It is Good to be (with the) King: 42/365

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Arise. This might seem like an usual word to begin a chapter with, but in context it makes perfect sense.

Arise! This word makes me think of King Arthur, the coolest of the fictional Kings. A blade balances carefully over each shoulder before your liege pronounces these words, “Arise”. The man (or woman) who stands is now vested with authority and affiliation with their King, they are a knight and a representative of the monarchy.

Arise… what follows these words are pretty impressive:

Shine, for the light has come and the glory of the Lord shines on you.

Now this light isn’t the Vanessa Amarossi version of “everybody’s gonna see you, gonna know it – shine” type of shine. Blegh. No, this is shine – for you are reflecting the glory of God. Like the moon shines only by virtue of its relationship to the Sun, so too we now shine by virtue of our relationship to God.

It could be easy to get caught up in the euphoria of the next two chapters. The picture sounds pretty impressively nice. Foreigners will work for me (remember, Israel have long experienced the tougher side of slavery). Wealth and respect will be given to us. Indeed, I’ll even be clothed well in

garments of salvation and… in a robe of righteousness… as a bride adorns herself with jewels.

Now incase you don’t live in an ancient middle-eastern culture (I know I don’t) it is important to remember just how much they adhered to the cliche of ‘clothes maketh the man’. Clothes are considered a symbol of status and position. Much more than the momentary fashion statement that we like to turn them into! Indeed, even in Shakespeare’s time it was a criminal offense for actors to wear their costumes outside of the stage! We couldn’t have people mistaking lowly actors for nobility now, could we?

What impresses me most in these chapters is not the beauty of the promises made by God. None of the aforementioned stuff like clothes and comfort, although they are all rather cool. Rather, what gets me most is context in which they are promised. Namely, we are instructed to ‘arise’ immediately after the chapter where we are informed of the full weight of our sinful nature. We are told to arise and enjoy God’s splendor directly after reading how “they hatch viper’s eggs… whoever eats their eggs will die” and that we “weave spider’s webs… (that) cannot become clothing, and they cannot cover themselves with their works”.

How clear is the implication that this is a gift? This is given us by God by virtue of his love and generosity. There is no sense of entitlement as I cannot even cover myself in my spidery web, much less garner garments of salvation that sparkle like wedding jewels. It isn’t as though God is looking through the realm for the most dashing, most classically attractive, most intelligent to be his representative. No, he is taking us out of the mire and muck and redeeming us to be his own.

I think these chapters offer a beautiful depiction of the hope of the Christian faith. Now be careful not to take that comment out of context. It is not the wealth, nor the comfort, nor the reversal of status that I am referring to here. Rather, it is our opportunity to arise, affiliated with god; and to shine his glory.

I love this as often I feel as though I’m not overly reflective. I am like a mirror made of viper’s eggs (to extend the simile boldly where no simile has gone before!), the sun’s rays hit me and I absorb them quickly. I hold them to myself. This is a strong reminder of my purpose and calling. It is a reminder that it is selfishness to keep this knowledge and hope to myself. I have been called to arise, and shine.

Go to: Isaiah 62

Isaiah 54-55: Wedding Vows: 38/365

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I think once people get that the Christian faith is relational then a lot of queries start to fall into place. I understand that this is a difficult thing to get one’s head around. As is my want to do, I think part of this difficult is cultural. Namely, I have found that whilst we regularly purport to value relationships it is difficult to quantify and – consequently – it can be easy to undervalue.

One such example of this came up in a discussion I was having with my best mate from High School, Aidan. We were talking about how it is weird that we accept relationships as the most important thing in our lives – I’m sure you’ve all heard the cliche of when you are at your death bed you wish to be surrounded by people and not trophies – yet paradoxically, outside of the aforementioned memento mori, we seldom consider the impact of major life decisions on our relationships.

Take the following as a case in point: You get offered a promotion at work. Now the quantifiable elements are easy to consider. It is easy to work out how much more you are getting paid and if that makes financial sense. It is relatively easy to work out what extra hours in the office are expected of you, if there are weekends or on-call requirements etc. Stress is a little more difficult to work out, we generally guesstimate that and reassess once were up to our neck in it. Most difficult of all though, and most seldom fully considered, is the impact that this new role will have on your family and other relationships. We may consider the extra traveling time, but not so much the impact on our psyche when we return to our loved ones.

Consequently, and unfortunately, the easily quantifiable tends to trump the important and valuable in our decision making process. We self-rationalise that “I don’t know how much more stress I’ll have, but at least I’ll be able to afford to go skiing or overseas for a holiday this yeah!” This makes it easier to take the job based on money and sort out the relational impact on the fly.

Perhaps this is why we find the Christian faith tricky to follow, it revels in these unquantifiable qualities like relationships. Perhaps this is why my students get frustrated when I am reticent to give a list of ‘can’ and ‘can’t’ dos in the Christian Faith, as bar a few notable exceptions a lot of it is Christian liberty. If, however, you are still not convinced of the Christian faith being primarily relational; then I think you’d benefit from considering the following verses:

Indeed, your husband is your Maker – His name is Yahweh of Hosts… For the Lord has called you like a wife deserted and wounded in spirit… “My love will not be removed from you and My covenant of peace will not be shaken,” says your compassionate Lord.

I adore the simile of a married couple here. To consider the church, and by extension me, married to God conjures a vast array of consequences and assurances in my mind. I am a flawed human and I’ll protect and nurture my marriage to Jo with all of my strength and will – I wonder how God enviously protects his marriage? The connotations of trust, openness and love are profound.

Given this context, I like to see Isaiah 55 in a manner akin to wedding vows. These are promises made, in public, so that both parties may feel assured in their proclamation and expectations of each other. And what promises they are! We have a promise of access when Isaiah writes:

Seek the Lord while he may be found; call to Him while he is near… Let him return to the Lord, so he may have compassion on him.

We have the promise of guidance and provision:

For as heaven is higher than earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts are higher than your thoughts. For just as rain and snow fall from heaven and do not return there without saturating the earth and making it germinate and sprout and providing seed to sow and food to eat,

And we also have the promise of direct communication:

so My word that comes from My mouth will not return to Me empty.

Now considering the power of God’s word, which has been explored elsewhere, this is a pretty huge promise. Yet it is not the last promise in this chapter, there is also a promise of joy and peace:

You will indeed go out with joy and be peacefully guided; the mountains and the hills will break into singing before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands

Now a promise like this would be egotistical if made by an ordinary human. I can promise to try and make my wife happy, but being limited in power I cannot outright promise happiness. God, however, can; and does!

It is all about the relationship here. All about enjoying the personage and company of each other. The actions, the behaviours: these are derived out of the context of our close relationship to God. Most definitely not the other way around.

Go to: Isaiah 56