Who is my equal?
“Who is my equal?” It’s the kind of
tough guy question we might expect to hear from the likes of Clint
Eastwood, Robert Deneiro or Arnold Schwarzenegger. “Go ahead, make
my day.” “You talking to me?” “I’ll be back.” Add to that group
the Lord God himself, suited up and ready for battle declaring for
all to year, “Alright you sorry saps, just who among you is like
me? I’ll give you one free shot and then I’ll show you,” the kind
of message that leaves everyone speechless and trembling in his or
her boots.
But this seemingly
tough guy question is not too far removed from the hopeful words
spoken at the beginning of Advent, words first spoken to a people in
exile. “Comfort, o comfort My people…Speak kindly to Jerusalem.”
Although some in the ultra conservative Christian community might
beg to differ, the image of a tough guy God doesn’t square with what
we know about God, particularly in the second part of the book of
Isaiah. “Who is my equal?” When you get right down to it, the
question is really posed as a kind of invitation, an invitation to
put God to the test, to compare God to all the other gods out there
no matter who they are, no matter what they look like, in effect
with God’s permission even to go right ahead and put God on trial.
From our vantage
point this morning, it’s a pretty safe thing to do. Among faithful
churchgoers like you and me, it’s a safe bet that things will turn
out okay for God. God is God and that is that, what more is there
to discuss? When I was at the University of Texas, there was a guy
who would show up on the west mall every now again who always
managed to attract a crowd. He was a preacher I guess, but the kind
who had all the answers and who seemed to take no small joy in
making others look foolish. People would throw out questions and
try to catch him off guard, but he always had a reply. In this
guy’s world where the line between faith and logic was seamless, God
always came out on top looking pretty so to speak, and anyone who
still had questions, well they were just misguided. For this guy
there was no hint of uncertainty, no moment of indecision and to be
perfectly honest, as much as I found his tactics disturbing, there
was something appealing about such certitude and conviction!
And yet, if we
live in world, really live in it for any length of time, we come
realize that there aren’t always easy answers, and there isn’t a
whole lot if anything that we can be absolutely certain about. So,
for God to open Himself up to scrutiny, for God to ask, “who is my
equal” is not only surprising, its downright risky, even dangerous
because “out there” in the real world we might well find other very
different answers to the question.
When Isaiah
proclaimed the word of the Lord some twenty five centuries ago,
God’s people were held captive in Babylon better known to you and me
as modern day Iraq and the ancient near east’s version of the global
superpower. Any person with half an ounce of sense could see that
not only had King Nebuchadnezzar put it to them, the great
Babylonian god Marduk had put it to their God. “Who is my equal?”
Well not just equal, but better I’m afraid. So maybe you ought to
be careful about asking questions like that, God when clearly there
are other possibilities out there!
But is it still a
relevant question today? Here at the dawn of the twenty first
century, who or what is equal to God? According to an online report
I read the other day, average church member giving as a percentage
of income is at an all time low at around 2.59%, this in a nation
where we spend well over $400 billion a year eating out and where
later on this afternoon big corporations will pay $2.5 million
dollars for thirty seconds of advertising during the Super Bowl. A
seminary professor of mine once mused that “if we’re going to have a
trial before an unbiased jury to determine who’s the actual god of
this culture, God is going to need an awfully good attorney.”
Not one to bend to
go on the defensive, God makes a rather interesting move. Of all
things, he says, “look up.” “Lift up your eyes on high and see:
Who created these? The One who brings out their host and numbers
them, calling them all by name; because He is great in strength,
mighty in power not one is missing.” Of course this isn’t just
another astronomy program on PBS, because to the Babylonians, the
stars were gods, the heavenly beings who were supremely in
charge. So, in a way, God, our God is calling their bluff.
It’s like He’s saying, “Okay, here are your gods, but you know
what? I made them. You can’t even begin to number them, but guess
what? I know every one of them by name!”
And you can be
sure that God’s move wouldn’t have set very well with the powers
that be in Babylon because they figured that since they had all the
cards so to speak, they were right and could call the shots. So,
for a pot shot pundit like Isaiah to suggest that they were all
wrong was, well to put it bluntly a complete outrage. But then
God’s Word has always had a way of calling the high and mighty to
task, in every time and in every place. And it’s no different
today.
So, the call to us
today is to begin to honestly name the gods to which we are
beholden, but gods that ultimately cannot save us. I suppose the
commercial breaks during the super bowl this afternoon might be a
good place to start. If we drink the right beer or soft drink, if
we sign up for the right cell phone plan or eat the right kind of
potato chip, then we’ve really something in this world. We’ve
managed to save ourselves from obscurity, surely a fate worse than
death itself. But then maybe we ought not stop there, because at
least on Super Bowl Sunday, it’s easy to be critical. A person
would have to be asleep at the wheel to miss the glorification of
excess. More than likely the best or worst place for us to
look is our own checkbook. What are our deepest priorities? In
what ways do we invest ourselves? How do we expend our lives? As
uncomfortable as they may be, the answers we find will cast light on
our own gods, in what we think will bring us happiness, fulfillment
and security and the manner in which we justify our behavior. And
I’m not speaking to you this morning and a person who in any way
presumes to have it together in this way.
The same can be
said of our priorities as a nation. What does it say about when
nearly half a trillion dollars a year goes to protect ourselves and
a mere fifteen billion to help poor people around the world? I’m
all for defending ourselves and fighting terrorism, but if we think
we can buy our ultimate security, if we think we can achieve what
only God can give, surely we’ve got another thing coming.
The most difficult
truth for us to reckon with may well be this, my friends—only god is
God. And for self made people like me and you, for the most
powerful nation in the world that may well be the worst kind of news
there is. If God is God, then there can be no trying to justify
ourselves before Him. If God is God, then we can’t make the stars.
If God is God, then we can’t buy security, or happiness or whatever
it is we’re looking for that we think will save us!
But if God is God,
then maybe there is good news for us after all. “The Lord is the
everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth. He does not
faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives
power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless.” While we aren’t
God, in Jesus God has become one of us, taking the form of a
servant, being born in human likeness and being found in human form,
he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even
death on a cross.” In Christ everything we need has been given to
us. In Him we are set free from all the other gods and demons that
would lay hold of our hearts so that we can give ourselves away in
loving service to our neighbor for the sake the one true God who
gives us our life and our breath.
If God really is
God, what might that mean for us as a congregation, as God’s people
here at Ascension Lutheran Church? Certainly we’re called to be
fiscally responsible and responsible stewards of what we’ve been
given. Please don’t misunderstand what I’m saying. But if God is
God, then we don’t have to spend our time worrying about how we’re
going to keep the doors open, how we’re going to manage to get by or
even how we’re going to survive. We’re free to think creatively, to
look outside the box, to focus on the assets among us and in our
community and not on what is lacking, to see the rich opportunities
before us in our new Sunday evening worship service, in an expanded
day school ministry and medical lending program, in the good
relationships we share with the community.
The one true God invites us, calls us
to life in Him. There is no other God. There is no other life
apart from Him. And the only thing left to do is to tell, to spread
the news and just see what the Spirit can do. Thanks be to God.
Amen.
