Mom
- Brian Ballinger
- May 9, 2010
- Series: God... Unexpected
God... Unexpected: Mom
Reconnect – May 9, 2010
Text: Psalm 27:1-10; 131:1-3; Genesis 1:26-31
Key Thought: The way that God cares for His children embodies all the best qualities of a mother’s love.
My heart has heard you say, “Come and talk with me.” And my heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.” Do not turn your back on me. Do not reject your servant in anger. You have always been my helper. Don’t leave me now; don’t abandon me, O God of my salvation! Even if my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will hold me close. Psalm 27:1-10, NLT
Pre-Intro: Psalm 27:1-10
Intro: Stereotypes (series intro, too)
- Talk to me about stereotypes:
Q: What’s a stereotype? Give me an example... What’s wrong with stereotypes?
- they lock us into ways of thinking that keep us from seeing the truth that is in front of us
- we accept the thoughts and impressions and experiences of others, instead of going through those processes ourselves
- that’s why this series – “God... Unexpected” – because for people who think they have a handle on God, the Bible loves to throw out surprising metaphors for God to shake things up
Stereotypes: differences between men and women
- Are men from Mars and women from Venus?
Q: Let’s talk stereotypes – give me some characteristics of men vs. women – differences between the two
Stereotyping God?
- Even though He identifies Himself as spirit, God is primarily identified in the Bible using the male pronoun
- Our mental images are further reinforced from pictures we’ve seen and filed away in our minds – like this one (the Creation of Man) – that God, even if He isn’t really a man in the sky, probably on some level is actually an old man with a beard
- Plus, referring to God as Father – unfortunately, we bring all of our associations with that powerful term, that incredibly important relationship, into our understanding of God – and too often today, with the breakdown of family in society combined with media stereotypes, that connotation can be a negative one – God is distant, angry, frustrated, powerful, absent, out of touch, benign, powerless – contradictory ideas held in tension or a lack of it
- But in all of this, sometimes we leave some things out – and that’s what today is all about
- While the Bible’s predominant metaphor for God, in terms of gender, is male, there is more to the story than that – so I wanted to take a few moments today on Mother’s Day and try to perhaps fill out the way the Bible describes God – the way He describes Himself – He’s not a cosmic single parent, heroic as many of them are – He’s more than that
God is bigger than gender – Genesis 1:26-31
- One of the first ways the Bible gives us to understand God is on its first page – when God creates humanity, he gives us a clue as to what we are and why we are this way:
Then God said, “Let us make people in our image, to be like ourselves. They will be masters over all life – the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, and all the livestock, wild animals, and small animals.” So God created people in his own image; God patterned them after himself; male and female he created them. God blessed them and told them, “Multiply and fill the earth and subdue it. Be masters over the fish and birds and all the animals.”... Then God looked over all he had made, and he saw that it was excellent in every way.”
- We are created in God’s image – and that image is somehow only complete with male and female – what we consider to be our differences are patterned what is complete in God Himself
- The best parts of women or men are found in God, because they were based on God – He’s the one who put them into the mix – God may refer to himself in the masculine, but he embodies both male and female in Himself – after all, God created moms, too
Mom imagery in the Bible
- Deuteronomy 32:18 and Isaiah 42:14 liken God to a mother giving birth to Israel; Psalm 131:2, Isaiah 49:15 and 66:13 compare Him to a mother caring for her child
- Scholars figure that there’s not much feminine imagery of God in the Bible because so often the worship of the true God was competing with goddess worship – which snared God’s people again and again with fertility rites and sexual rituals, and the temptation to not rely on God
- But one of the most powerful images for me in the life of Jesus, is when after three and a half years of crisscrossing the countryside, speaking to everyone he can, helping everyone he can, he finally comes to the end of his journey, to the capital city of Jerusalem, that has never accepted him as anything more than a novelty or the latest thing to see and talk about – and that breaks his heart
- In Luke’s biography of Jesus we read this:
“A few minutes later some Pharisees said to Jesus, “Get out of here if you want to live, because Herod Antipas wants to kill you!” Jesus replied, “Go tell that fox that I will keep on casting out demons and doing miracles of healing today and tomorrow; and the third day I will accomplish my purpose. Yes, today, tomorrow, and the next day I must proceed on my way. Fro it wouldn’t do for a prophet of God to be killed except in Jerusalem! O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones God’s messengers! How often I have wanted to gather your children together as a hen protects her chicks beneath her wings, but you wouldn’t let me. And now look, your house is left to you empty. And you will never see me again until you say, ‘Bless the one who comes in the name of the Lord!’” Luke 13:31-35, NLT
G-o-d vs. M-o-m?
Q: But let’s get in deeper – since it is Mother’s Day, talk to me about the characteristics of the ideal mom – what is she like?
- (Protecting, caring, nurturing, comforting, graceful/beautiful, providing for needs, advising, providing security, forgiving/loving unconditionally, looking to the future)
- *protection, care, beauty, safety, comfort, nurture, communication, intimacy, forgiving, enduring
- This is what I see in Psalm 27:1-10, the section that was read just before I started – the writer, King David, is so secure in God’s love
- If you were a psychologist, you’d have a field day with David’s life – he grows up the youngest of seven brothers, and there seems to be some reluctance on his father’s part to even call him his son, bringing into question whether or not he had the same mother as the seven
- But somehow, out of all this insecurity in his family life, look at this description of how he relates to God and the needs in his life that are met through that relationship
1 The Lord is my light and my salvation — so why should I be afraid?
The Lord is my fortress, protecting me from danger, so why should I tremble?
2 When evil people come to devour me, when my enemies and foes attack me, they will stumble and fall.
3 Though a mighty army surrounds me, my heart will not be afraid.
Even if I am attacked, I will remain confident.
The one thing I ask of the Lord — the thing I seek most—
is to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life,
delighting in the Lord’s perfections and meditating in his Temple.
5 For he will conceal me there when troubles come; he will hide me in his sanctuary.
He will place me out of reach on a high rock.
6 Then I will hold my head high above my enemies who surround me.
At his sanctuary I will offer sacrifices with shouts of joy, singing and praising the Lord with music.
Hear me as I pray, O Lord. Be merciful and answer me!
8 My heart has heard you say, “Come and talk with me.” And my heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.”
9 Do not turn your back on me. Do not reject your servant in anger.
You have always been my helper.
Don’t leave me now; don’t abandon me, O God of my salvation!
10 Even if my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will hold me close.
Psalm 27:1-10, NLT
Shaking things up: The Shack and more
- The impact of the Shack – breaking stereotypes of God – a mother instead of a father – breaking the stereotypes to get people to actually think about God – God portraying Himself to a man with father issues – as an African-American lady – as Mack opens the door...
“...the door flew open, and he was looking directly into the face of a large beaming African-American woman. Instinctively he jumped back, but he was to slow. With speed that belied her size, she crossed the distance between them and engulfed him in her arms, lifting him clear off his feet and spinning him around like a little child. And all thewhile she was shouting his name-“Mackenzie Allen Phillips”- with the ardour of
someone seeing a long-lost and deeply-loved relative. She finally put him back on earth and, with her hands on his shoulders, pushed him back as if to get a good look at him." (p.82)
"Mack was speechless. In a few seconds this woman had breached pretty much every social propriety behind which he had so safely entrenched himself. But something in the way that she looked at him and yelled his name made him equally delighted to see her too, even though he didn’t have a clue who she was." (p.83)
And as they talk, he asks her why she looks to him the way she does...
"She picked up the wooden spoon again, dripping with some sort of batter. 'Mackenzie, I am neither male nor female, even though both genders are derived from my nature. If I choose to appear to you as a man or
a woman, it’s because I love you. For me to appear to you as a woman and suggest that you call me Papa is simple to mix metaphors, to help you keep from falling so easily back into your religious conditioning.” She leaned forward as if to share a secret. “To reveal myself to you as a very large, white grandfather figure with flowing beard, like Gandalf, would simply reinforce your religious stereotypes, and this weekend is not about reinforcing your religious stereotypes.” Mack almost laughed out loud and wanted to say, “You think? I’m over here barely believing that I’m not stark raving mad!” Instead, he focused on what she had just said and regained his composure. He believed, in his head at least, in God the Spirit, neither male nor female, but in spite of that, he was embarrassed to admit to himself that all his visuals for God were very white and very male." (p.93)
- God understands a mother’s heart – He agonized along with Hannah, desperate for a child, and was thrilled to be able to give her Samuel as an answer to her prayers
- God wants us to have a deep relationship with Him – an intimate relationship with Him – for us to have the security of the foundation of His love in our lives
- Maybe you’ve had a problem relating to God as Father – maybe you’ve been hurt (1 out of 4 women, statistically, are a victim of some kind of abuse), maybe you haven’t had the role models on the male side – but God is bigger than male or female – He longs for you to know His great love and care and comfort
- Good experience with Mom or complicated with Mom or a negative experience with your mom – doesn’t matter – you can relate to God this way
- Moms – when you’re being a mom to your children, when you’re at your best, when you’re protecting them and nurturing them and disciplining them and caring for them and kissing it better – you are imitating God, and it pleases Him very much – and you do it in His strength and His wisdom, which He is more than willing, which He REALLY wants you to have
To My Mother
by Wendell Berry
I was your rebellious son,
do you remember? Sometimes
I wonder if you do remember,
so complete has your forgiveness been.
So complete has your forgiveness been
I wonder sometimes if it did not
precede my wrong, and I erred,
safe found, within your love,
prepared ahead of me, the way home,
or my bed at night, so that almost
I should forgive you, who perhaps
foresaw the worst that I might do,
and forgave before I could act,
causing me to smile now, looking back,
to see how paltry was my worst,
compared to your forgiveness of it
already given. And this, then,
is the vision of that Heaven of which
we have heard, where those who love
each other have forgiven each other,
where, for that, the leaves are green,
the light a music in the air,
and all is unentangled,
and all is undismayed.
“To My Mother” by Wendell Berry, from Entries. © Pantheon Books, 1994.
Key Thought:
The way that God cares for His children embodies all the best qualities of a mother’s love.
Lord, my heart is not proud; my eyes are not haughty.
I don’t concern myself with matters too great or awesome for me.
But I have stilled and quieted myself,
Just as a small child is quiet with its mother.
Yes, like a small child is my soul within me.
O Israel, put your hope in the Lord – now and always.
Psalm 131:1-3
Conclusion: “love you forever”
- One of the most moving children’s stories ever, by our very own Canadian children’s author Robert Munsch
- Even featured on a Friends episode
- The kicker in the story is how the cycle of devoted love repeats itself – that love is stronger than age, stronger than choice, stronger than even our minds or our feelings – that it doesn’t let anything get in its way
- “I’ll love you forever, I’ll like you for always, As long as I’m living, My baby you’ll be”
- Everyone who reads it invariably cries – why? Because it connects us, briefly, to something bigger than ourselves – something that is part of God’s domain – a love that goes on and on, a love that really does last forever, a love that we could never earn or deserve but that is joyfully and sacrificially given – a love that meant that God would go to the cross for us and die so that we could live – “love you forever”
- And not only that, but that it would be explicitly, expressly for you – for me – love YOU forever, not in the abstract, not in a theological puzzle sort of way, but in an intensely personal, “i have always known you and loved you, yes you” way
- Maybe you’ve never felt that you had a connection with God – maybe you’ve never felt that you had that connection with anyone who was supposed to care for you – maybe you hear that story and your heart aches for all the wrong reasons, not all the right ones
- But God wants to be your foundation today – your security – the one who cares for you and protects you and leads you and guides you – if you will put your life into His hands – if you will let Him love you forever
Response: (prayer)
