Ephesians 1.1-10
“WRESTLING WITH THE WILL OF GOD”
“How was it that you were called to ministry?” That’s the one question strangers are most curious about as they learn of my calling, whether they are people of faith or not. Right on the heels of that, the next comment follows. “You probably knew you were going to be a pastor ever since you were a little boy, didn’t you?”
In my case, as a boy, I thought I would patrol center field for the Detroit Tigers or become an attorney like Perry Mason. As a late teen, I thought I might become a professor or go to work for Chrysler Corporation, since they were courting me. It wasn’t until I was 22 that I realized God wanted me as local church pastor. Then I for one could hardly believe it. When I returned for my 20th high school reunion, I wasn’t exactly voted the least likely to be ordained. But I wasn’t so far off either.
When people hear that story, sitting next to me at the counter of some diner, they frown. They frown because they like to believe that, unlike them, some people—as in we clergy—are experts at God’s will; that for us it comes early and easily, effortlessly and obviously. That, unlike them, we quickly have razor sharp surety about what God wills. As I preach today on God’s will, I won’t puncture all of those balloons. After all, I have learned a lot on discerning God’s will as opposed to projecting our human will on a set of circumstances. But it is never easy. It is never without effort. It always requires testing. It will always make me tremble.
God’s will. The sound of the two words ring out like a chisel and sledgehammer carving letters into tablets of stone, don’t they? God’s will. It has an intimidating ring of authority for most of us. So maybe the first thing I want to do is to soften that impression a bit. When we look at God’s will unfold through the Bible, for example, God is no haughty, commanding Oz bellowing from smoke and flames. God is more of a poem, a story or an encounter. God’s love is intensely personal, perhaps breaking our hearts, but then thrilling our soul before everything shakes out. God’s love brings us to our knees, yes, but it’s not distant or remote. His love is solid, personal, strong, courageous, sorrowful, hopeful, joyful, always enduring.
As we think of our routine, God’s will seems shrouded in mystery. God is elusive. Isaiah said God’s ways are not our ways said in a loud voice. But when we read closely the story of God with
Would you like a glimpse into God’s motives from the very beginning? Here I like the African-American poet James Weldon Johnson and his rendering of creation.
And God stepped out on space,
And he looked around and said:
I’m lonely—
I’ll make me a world.
And as far as the eye of God could see
Darkness covered everything,
Blacker than a hundred midnights
Down in a cypress swamp.
Then God smiled.
And light broke,
And the darkness rolled up on one side
And the light stood shining on the other,
And God said, That’s good!
Then God reached out and took the light in his hands,
And God rolled the light around in his hands
Until he made the sun;
And he set that sun a-blazing in the heavens.
And the light that was left from making the sun
God gathered it up in a shining ball
And flung it against the darkness,
Spangling the night with moon and stars.
Then down between
The darkness and the light
He hurled the world;
And God said: That’s good.
The poem helps us realize there was a time when God asked, “What kind of God am I going to be?” God has wishes. God makes choices. God delights. God grieves. God is pleased and displeased. God makes promises and keeps them. And God’s first primeval urge to make something was the beginning of God’s will.
But here’s the essential part so far as you and I go: God wants to be in personal relationship with us. And loving us as God does—more than we love ourselves-- our being separated from God pains God deeply apart from how much it hurts us.
We all know that as we love another, we have desires for the good of that other. You desire the best for the one you love. You desire love from the one you love. You long for excellence in the other. Friends, the origin of God’s will is like this.
It pierces my heart how often I lose track of God’s motives and purposes in the hurley-burley of everyday living. Details and pressures intrude on us and distort things, don’t they? Before we know it, we begin asking: is God really in control? Frankly, this is not a great question. It is too mechanistic for the mystery of God. Humankind has only asked if “God is in control” since the Industrial Revolution, when we built trains and trolleys, and projected on God a role over creation like a giant stationmaster. My faithful grandparents on their farm—with drought over their tender seedlings and heavy storms at harvest time—never asked “is God in control?” But because we ask it so much I will try to answer the question anyway.
I wasn’t crazy about the movie Forrest Gump, but there was one scene that spoke to me. Forrest wonders aloud over the grave of his young wife and muses, “Jenny, I don’t know if momma was right, or if it’s Lieutenant Dan. I don’t know if we each have a destiny, or if we’re all just floatin’ around accidental-like on a breeze, but I think it’s maybe both. Maybe both is happening at the same time.”
You know, love can do many things. But when love becomes too controlling, it ceases to be love. Paul wrote that love does not insist on its own way. Is God in control? Certainly I believe in the big picture, yes. God is in control when we it comes to our destiny. Ultimately, God will receive and comfort us. God is strong like this. But is God in control of nitty-gritty details day in and day out? Was God in control last night when I rose at 3:47 am, trudged to the bathroom, buried my little toe into the bedpost and almost broke it? No! Or at least I certainly hope not.
We cannot say whatever happens equals God’s will. At times I do God’s will, at times I don’t, and you don’t either. God chooses not to determine everything. Otherwise, we’d all become criminally insane every time a child dies. But God is far from uninvolved. Our God cares how things will turn out more than we do.
God gazes upon us like the smitten parent watching his daughter at her ballet re-cital as she sashays among the two-dozen ballerinas encircling after an echappe. Of course, there a lots of little girls on that stage, but the parent sees just one--my daughter, the love of my life, my precious, my beloved. Except God is able to pull this off for almost seven billion people simultaneously, not to mention the spider on the windowsill and that pesky dog barking away in the distance. His eye is on the sparrow, as the stellar old hymn has it, and I know he watches me.
Before I close, let me say that over the next Thursday evenings at 6:30 pm I will lead a class on The Will of God, based on the book of the same name written by James C Howell. Pastor Howell’s reflections provoked much of my sermon today. If these questions stir your heart, I invite you to join me the next eight Thursdays.
We usually begin to ask about the will of God around one of two questions. One, what does God want me to do with my life? Two, why do bad things happen? Jesus is the answer to both of the questions. The Jesus who didn’t explain evil, but triumphed over it in a hidden way. The Jesus who didn’t crush and eradicate evil, but who bore our sin on himself. The Jesus who freely offered his life despite our ingratitude and worse. The Jesus who said not-my-will-be-done-but-thine-be-done. Notice I say “he is the answer”, not “he developed and gave the answer.”
St. Francis of
Most high,
glorious God
enlighten the darkness of my heart.
and give me, Lord
correct faith,
certain hope,
perfect charity,
wisdom and perception,
that I may do
what is truly your most holy will.
Amen.
