Texts: Hosea 2:14-20; 2 Corinthians 3:1-6; Mark 2:13-22
Last week I talked about the difficulty we face in finding a proper balance between a due reverence for the past and an openness to the future. How do we uphold and treasure our traditions while at the same time remaining willing to change when the need arises? How do we worship and follow the God who has revealed himself in particular ways, and indeed in a particular person, in history, and yet is revealed to us as a God who makes all things new?
Today’s reasdings raise an equally challenging question of balance, that between exclusiveness and inclusiveness. How can we become a community of believers worshipping God as revealed to us in Jesus Christ through the work of the Holy Spirit without becoming a closed society hostile to those who do not share our basic beliefs? On the other hand, how can we become open and respectful to those who hold different beliefs from our own without becoming unfaithful to the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit?
Such questions are not something we can safely leave to the theologians and the academics. They are of vital urgency in today’s world where we face the rise of militant Islam and of militant Christianity. The temptations are many. We are tempted to pretend that there are no fundamental differences between us – to insist that we are all worshipping the same God under different names, and so on. We are tempted to resort to relativism – to insist that everyone’s truth is equally valid. My faith is my faith, your faith is your faith, and everything’s cool. We are tempted to insist that faith is a private matter and shouldn’t be talked about in public at all.
Quite how all that fits with basic Christian teaching, including today’s readings, is anyone’s guess; but here’s a little story that gives us something of a clue to the Anglican approach. A bishop was visiting a church school and decided to see what these young Christian students knew. So in one class he asked if anyone could tell him what word we use for those people who do not believe in God. What do we call people who believe there is no God? There was a pause before one young lass put up her hand. “Bishop, I think the word is ‘atheist’”, she said.
The Bishop beamed at her. “Well done”, he said. “You are quite right. Atheists believe there is no God. Now, who can tell me what word we use for people who don’t know whether there is a God or not – people who aren’t sure what to believe?” Again, no one moved until the same young lass put up her hand. “Yes”, said the Bishop, beaming again. “Tell me, my dear, what do we call people who don’t know what to believe?” “I think the word is ‘Anglican’, Bishop’, said the knowledgeable little lass.
Most of us can chuckle at that story and acknowledge that it has a certain amount of truth in it. Where we might differ among ourselves is on the question of whether it points up one of our virtues or one of our failings. Are we a broad church with an enviable record of tolerating a wide range of beliefs and practices, eschewing all forms of fundamentalism and respecting all points of view? Or are we a hopelessly confused bunch of woolly-headed liberals who don’t really believe in anything?
It is time to seek guidance from our Scriptures. And we begin today with the saddest of all the prophets, Hosea. His calling was to lead a life that showed Israel how awful infidelity is. Hosea was called to marry an adulterous wife – a prostitute, actually – to raise a family with her and to give their children dreadful names that brought home to the people just how displeased God is with infidelity. What was going on here was a sort of lived out parable. Israel was in a covenantal relationship with God, and the analogy used in this book is that of marriage. God was Israel ’s husband, but Israel had turned away from God to worship other gods, especially the Canaanite fertility gods. So Israel is like an unfaithful wife, carrying on adulterous affairs with other lovers.
Today’s passage shows how the relationship should be. God is going to woo his unfaithful wife, Israel , back to himself; and we notice how loving the language now becomes. God is going to allure Israel , lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her; God is going to give her back her possessions, and she will sing with happiness. Israel will recognise God as her husband, and they will live together happily ever after. Peace will break out, not only in the land of Israel , but throughout all creation. God will make a covenant with the beasts of the field and the birds of the air, and the creatures that move along the ground.
What does all this tell us? It tells us that the first requirement for the people of God is faithfulness to God. For them – for us – there can be no compromise on that. Baal is not just another word for God – the worship of Baal is not just as good as the worship of God – their truth is not as valid as our truth. For the people of God – for those who have been called into a covenantal relationship with God – absolute fidelity to God is required. Any dallying with other gods, other religions, other ‘truths’, is spiritual adultery and brings condemnation and disaster to the people.
But that message is directed to Israel . Nothing is said about other people – Gentiles – or the Canaanites who are worshipping Baal. They are not the ones who are under condemnation, because they have not been called into that special relationship with God. They are, as it were, the outsiders – the third party with whom the adultery is committed – rather than insiders, the spouse guilty of infidelity.
For Christians the position is clear. We, too, are people of the covenant, the new covenant, as the Bible calls it. We have been called into a personal relationship with God, and we need to be very clear who this God is who calls us into this relationship. This is the God who raised Jesus from the dead. This is the God who has chosen to reveal himself as Trinity – Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is the only God – the Living God – the Holy God – The God who is love. For Christians, there is no other. That is non-negotiable.
What then of people who are of other faiths or of none? All people are made in the image and likeness of God, and are therefore entitled to the same dignity, honour, respect, and, indeed, love as Christians. It is not for us to judge or condemn them. They are our neighbours, and so we must love them as ourselves. We must do all in our power to live at peace with them – but we do so as Christians, believing in and worshipping the God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. If our neighbours find that offensive, then offended they must be.
Like the prophet, Hosea, St Paul is addressing the insiders, those who believe that they are the people of God. But here the problem has been reversed. Far from being unfaithful to the covenant and in need of correction by the prophet, the Corinthians are wondering who St Paul thinks he is to criticise them. They have challenged his credentials, and perhaps have insisted that they are faithfully complying with the Law of God. Who is St Paul to point the finger at them?
St Paul is very clear who he is. He is a minister of the new covenant, not of the letter of the Law but of the Spirit. Whatever competence he may have for the task comes from God, not from himself. His ministry is all God’s doing. God is doing a new thing among his people. And here again is the challenge of finding the balance that we talked about last week, as well as this week’s challenge. How do we hold onto the past while recognising when God is doing something new?&n
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