The
Exorbitant, Eccentric Love of God
This
sermon had its origin in my being diagnosed with acute myeloid
leukemia on November 29, 2011. I was taken from Dover, NH, by
ambulance and admitted to Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston
(part of same complex as Dana-Farber Cancer Institute) that
afternoon. I received chemotherapy off and on through early January
2012 before being sent home for a period of rest. 2 more rounds of
chemo; another rest; more chemo and then a stem cell transplant in
early April, 2012.
What was going
on during those weeks of confinement and chemo? You’ve heard of
the challenges of chemo. I’ll tell of only two – loss of
appetite when needing to keep up strength. The only food I wanted --
applesauce which Betsy prepared and brought from home – was banned
because of the oncology teams [exaggerated?] fear of microbes. I had
hand and foot syndrome; almost unable to close hands and fingers
enough to hold fork or toothbrush even assuming that I wanted to eat.
Also going on:
Daily reading Tabletalk and Grace Gems (online resource of
Puritan devotionals). Daily prayer – especially morning and
evening. Delightful, unhurried times of prayer. Careful, reflective
reading of Ann Voskamp’s One Thousand Gifts for 2nd
or 3rd time.
And walking the
halls. Endlessly walking halls, tethered to “tree of life.”
I instinctively
knew that some form of exercise would aid recovery. While walking, I
sang songs in my head. Whistled. Prayed some more. I never really
asked the “Why me?” question but one day I did ask –
and, as far as I knew then and can recall now, the inquiry was
similar in tone and purpose to a request at the dinner table that
Betsy pass the salt and pepper: I wanted information (not urgently –
even trivial information) and I asked the only Person who could
provide it – “Why have you given me leukemia?”
I have never
heard the audible voice of God. In my late 20’s while driving home
from a governance meeting of the church in which I had grown up, I
had felt profoundly sad and asked God why I felt that way. The
distinct response the Spirit impressed on my soul was “Because I am
asking you to leave the church of your youth.” I had come to
realize it was an apostate church, and God moved Betsy and me into
the pews of a church where the scriptures were faithfully preached
every Lord’s Day.
So while
walking my mile one day (24 laps around the central core of the
hospital building), the Spirit for the second time in my life
distinctly impressed specific words on my heart and mind. The
question – remember – had been “Why have you given me
leukemia?” The answer? “Because I love you.”
Leave story for
a minute or two. How are we to think about that dialogue?
Epistemology –
How do we know? What counts as knowledge? Culture says it doesn’t
count as knowledge if it can’t be quantified. Simple example: A
person is 65% oxygen, 18% carbon, 10% hydrogen, etc. Bible
describes another way of knowing. From that perspective, personhood
could be described this way: “God created man male and female,
after His own image, in knowledge, righteousness and holiness,
with dominion over the creatures.”
Culture’s
way is materialistic reductionism. Fancy phrase for breaking
everything down into atoms and thereby depriving everything of
relationship and of meaning. By the grace of God, we “know” in a
different way – principally because our “knowing” is grounded
in the knowledge of God. That’s how we were created.
Paul writes of
this kind of knowing – spiritual knowing – in 1 Cor. 2.6:
6 Yet
among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of
this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away.
7 But
we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before
the ages for our glory. 8 None
of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they
would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 But,
as it is written,
“What
no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
nor
the heart of man imagined,
what
God has prepared for those who love him”—
10 these
things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit
searches everything, even the depths of God. 11 For
who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which
is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the
Spirit of God. 12 Now
we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is
from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.
13 And
we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the
Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.
14 The
natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for
they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because
they are spiritually discerned. 15 The
spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no
one. 16
“For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct
him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
The
Spirit searches the mind of God for our sake – not for His own
sake; He’s god, after all – He searches the mind of God for us so
that the gospel will be intelligible to us. (I first wrote “make
sense to us” but gospel doesn’t “make sense” in the ordinary
way.) May I say it again? The Holy Spirit searches the mind of God
for our sake so that the gospel will be intelligible to us.
Back to the
story, and I want you to be with me here: Picture me wearing a big,
bulky sweatshirt with right sleeve cut off so nurse can get at PICC
line; sweat pants; sneakers; one hand pushing pole; red stocking cap
because hairless in winter.
Replay: “Why
have you given me leukemia?” “Because I love you.” The answer
was stunning. The moment is forever impressed on my memory. I had
just rounded the first corner of the central corridor and was looking
down the long straightaway of the next leg. “Because I love you.”
This answer was fully intelligible to me.
The answer was
also fully and immediately convincing. I didn’t even stop walking.
God met and answered me along the very path in life He had
prescribed for me, and I just kept walking that path. It was the
natural thing to do.
My inner
response was, “Of course!” – not “Huh?” or “What?” or
“Excuse me?” Neither God nor I had misunderstood the other. (He
couldn’t have misunderstood me, of course; I often have
misunderstood Him.) And remember that my question was “Why have
you given me leukemia?” What I had received had come from
God as a gift.
As often as I
have mentally replayed the tape of that day in my mind, I have never
doubted what took place.
I have,
however, been reluctant to share this story in public, mostly
because, until recent weeks, it has been “free floating,”
unattached to a specific passage from scripture. Telling the story
felt too much like “Look what God did for me!”
Only when asked to speak to you did I realize that this experience
was a demonstration of “God is love” and only then did I feel
free to present it to you.
In Romans
8:16-17, Paul confirms that Christ-followers are children of God and
explains how that fact is “proven” to us spiritually. This
passage tells me that a personal testimony is really reliable only
when it confirms or illustrates a specific scripture.
16 The
Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of
God, 17 and
if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ,
provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified
with him.
HOW
IT WORKS (building on the passage from 1 Corinthians 2): God the
Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we belong to Him as
His children. So there is an internal testimony within the hearts of
believers that assures us of God’s fatherhood and preservation of
us as His sons and daughters – beloved
sons and daughters.
But
the Spirit does not give testimony apart from His Word. Before our
spirits can “speak,” as it were, Paul must first tell us that we
are children of God. In just this way, the Lord has always given an
objective Word to His people through the prophets. The
Spirit takes this external Word and confirms it internally.
He provides subjective assurance that God’s objective Word applies
to us when we believe. In short, experience can illuminate – but
not determine – theology. [The author is indebted to the editors
of Tabletalk
magazine for the ideas in this paragraph.]
So
now we have a context. My story is God’s story – writ large by
and through Christ – in the pages of scripture, which we now
proceed to consider a bit more closely – more as a meditation
or devotional
reflection rather than an exegesis.
My
goal is not to send you away with a tidy, three-point outline of the
passage (though I enthusiastically subscribe to the usefulness of
that approach) but to deepen your soul’s thirst for God, for the
living God, Ps.
42.2
who is
love, and to insinuate that you love me and I love you to the same
extent that God loves each of His children – which is to say, to
the fullest extent we are able, the Holy Spirit being our Helper.
I
used the word “insinuate” rather than “demonstrate” because
the latter is far too clinical and fails to convey the wisdom God
displayed in creating us to be lovers like He is.
Latin insinuare
“to
wind one’s way into,” from in- “in”
+ sinuare
“to wind, bend, curve.” Chemotherapy requires a port,
which staff insinuate
into the patient’s chest.
Here’s
the point of this meditation: The exorbitant, explosive, expensive,
extemporaneous, extravagant – yes, even exhibitionistic
[think Northern Lights] love of God is
our love for one another. [v. 17: as
he is so also are we in this world.]
First
reality: Love is from God.v.
7
Love is from God.
Imagine
holding that love out in front of you – perhaps as if on a pedestal
and on display in a museum. We’re trying to step back a bit and
examine it as objectively as we can. Don’t want to confuse it with
the love – or lack of it – from an earthly parent or romantic
love we may have enjoyed in this life or even with a fraternal love.
What
can we say of “love from God”?
“It
must be ‘special’” doesn’t say much.
“Wow!”
is really just . . . a sound. We’re trying to find some words here
to describe love from God. The probably should be large words.
How
about “exorbitant”? Legal term from 600 years ago – means
“deviating from rule or principle.” Comes from Latin exorbitare
– deviate or go out of the track. Ex
orbita
OFF THE RAILS.
Second
reality: Whoever
loves
has been born of God and knows
God.
Whatever else it is, this love is not “isolated.” The lover
described here has been born of God . . . but the “action”
doesn’t end there. This lover also knows God. I don’t want to
minimize being born of God, but emphasis is on knowing Him. Intimate
knowing is not possible without conversation.
That
word entered our language 600+ years ago – “living together,
having dealings with others;” from Latin conversationem
“act of living with.” A noun
of action
from
conversari
“to live with, keep company with.” It’s more than the mere
exchange of words.
Do
you want to know God? Conversation is required.
Third
reality: He has sent His only Son into the world so that we might
live through Him (v. 9) and has given us of His Spirit (v. 13b). How
do we respond to a gift? With thanks – even for the humblest gift
one mortal might offer another. “In everything give thanks . . .”
Fourth
(vv. 15 & 16) – confession (“Whoever confesses . . .”)
leads to communion (“God abides in him and he in God”) leads to
conviction (“. . . we have come to know. . .”) leads to
confidence (“. . . and to believe the love that God has for us”)
in the powerful, perpetual, purposeful presence of God (“. . .
whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” –
vv. 15, 16). Maybe the “P” words aren’t all there in the text,
but my use of them is certainly justified by the rest of scripture.
There’s
much to be made from the word “abide” in these verses. 3 uses
here; 6 altogether in the whole text. It’s a word which, in its
origin, strongly implies a covenant relationship.
Illustration
from experience: I confessed Christ in 1970. Won’t track all fits
and starts of Christian walk (short in the telling, long and painful
in the living). Came to point of conviction of and confidence in
God’s love maybe 15-20 years ago.
Head
knowledge only. What does that mean? Not
animating.
Might has well have been a rock. Real but lifeless. I had
semi-consciously excluded myself from the number of those whom God
really
loves.
The
discovery that God loved me enough to give me leukemia (Is. 45:7) was
like an explosion – a really good
explosion. It exploded that mythical rock that barred me from God’s
heart.
It
exploded idols I had erected to “help” me through each hour of
each day of my then-69 years. It blew the cobwebs of complacency and
disbelief out of my mind. The love of God exploded into my life.
(Have
I rebuilt idols or neglected newly formed cobwebs? Of course. Our
humanity
is not changed by experiences of delight or despair; our voice
is.)
The
explosion was extemporaneous – that is, it was outside of time (ex
tempore)
– more appropriately here: It was off
schedule.
I did not specifically prepare for it. It just “dropped” on me
at God’s appointed time. Like redeemed sinners in general, I did
not seek God’s love; that love “found” me.
It’s
hard to come up with a formula from all of this. I would love to be
able to tell Al and Lorraine Bailey, Bill and Beth Spead, Steve
Coutts – and you
– to read certain verses and certain books or to pray in a certain
way when you are in a crisis of whatever sort and you, too, would be
embraced in God’s love.
But
maybe there’s at least a behavioral guideline in Westminster
Shorter Catechism 88: Q: What are the outward means whereby Christ
communicates to us the benefits of redemption?
A:
The outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicates to us the
benefits of redemption are, his ordinances, especially the word,
sacraments, and prayer; all of which are made effectual to the elect
for salvation.
Conversation
is called for here.
*
* * * *
I
heard a report recently about an ATV accident involving a woman who
had won Olympic gold medals in swimming. She severed her spine and
faces the possibility of never walking again. She’s 41. Her
family reported that she was “thinking positively” after the
surgery.
What
I am talking about this morning is not a subjective reality, not just
“positive thinking” – trying from a human standpoint to find
something good in a difficult situation – but a recognition of the
eccentric
nature of God’s love. [“Eccentric” is a term from Ptolemaic
astronomy, which located the earth at the center of the universe. An
eccentric was a circle
or orbit not having the Earth precisely at its center. The word
comes through Middle French and directly from Medieval Latin
eccentricus,
from Greek ekkentros
“out of the center.”] God’s love is eccentric
in that it takes us out of ourselves – our “natural” center.
That “natural center” leads us to ask “What in this difficult
situation – this potentially permanent paralysis – looks good to
me?”
Well,
I
am eccentric with respect to the way God has created His universe. I
am not at the center, and my perspective on what’s “positive”
is perverted.
In
place of positive thinking, consider, instead, Paul’s admonition to
the Philippians (4:8):
Finally,
brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just,
whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if
there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think
about these things.
Paul
is telling us to fill our minds with realities which will inspire
worship of God – realities which are constant in the face of peace
and conflict, prosperity and poverty, sickness and health, happiness
and heartache. Each of us is bound to experience both sides of those
pairs, and each side can be seen as a gift because of the God who
sends both.
And
here is a reality which meets all of Paul’s criteria – true,
honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, praiseworthy:
God’s love. Thinking about God’s love connects us with objective
reality. As I continued down the hospital corridor after “hearing”
that I had leukemia because God loves me, I worshipped Him because of
the objective reality of that love.
No
– this is not an appeal to think positively in the midst of trial.
It is an appeal to you to invite God to surprise you with His love .
. . to “pick it up,” as it were, and look at it from many
different angles . . . to be willing to be stunned when you find Him
in unexpected ways and places.
To
the unsaved: The gospel is that, at the same time, you are more
wicked and flawed than you ever dared believe, and that you are more
loved and accepted than you ever dared to hope. Such love is
stunning.
As
I’ve said, I’m trying to influence your perspective –
particularly if, for you as it had been for me, God’s love is
somehow inanimate
or maybe just sickly sweet in a “hearts and flowers” kind of way.
“Mother
Bickerdyke” was a Civl War nurse who is memoralized on the Knox
County courthouse law in Galesburg, Illinois, just off the campus of
Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois, to which Betsy and I
matriculated in 1960. Her dormitory was Whiting Hall; mine was on
the opposite side of campus. When I was newly in love with Betsy and
leaving Whiting Hall after saying good-night to her, I would pass
Mother Bickerdyke – giddy; “the pavement always stayed beneath my
feet before.” I’m sure she smiled at me.
Why
would you not be giddy today in the face of God’s extravagant love?
Extravagant
– from Latin word meaning “wander outside the boundaries”
The
late Dallas Willard wrote: “Until our thoughts of God have found
every visible thing and event glorious with his presence, the word of
Jesus has not fully seized us.” If it hasn’t – if you’re not
giddy – maybe there’s no real conversation taking place.
Final
“ex-” word: Expensive. “In this the love of God was made
manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so
that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we
have loved God but that he loved us and sent
his Son
to be the propitiation for our sins.” [vv. 9 & 10]
Our
salvation – and God’s love – are expensive.
If we had time, I would show you how the picture of Christ hanging
on the cross is at the very heart of the word “expensive.”
(Think “pendant.”)
Word
of caution: Avoid thinking along the lines of “God loves me and so
He will [FILL IN THE BLANK WITH YOUR DESIRED OUTCOME.]” If you
belong to Him, “God loves me” is a first principle. Nothing is
required to complete the thought/sentence. However, His nature as
love exists right alongside His attributes of wisdom, holiness,
mercy, omnipotence and so forth. Since we know that this divine love
is executed by a wise, merciful, altogether good and omnipotent
Father, we do not need to make our receipt and enjoyment of that love
dependent on His “arranging” any particular outcome we desire.
Are
you willing to be loved by the God revealed in creation and in His
Word – by a God who would send cancer, I might say, as evidence of
His love? Sounds “screwy,” but if your name is written in the
Lamb’s Book of Life – if God has already claimed you as His own
and you simply haven’t acknowledged that fact – you will
understand. If you don’t, seek out an elder for real conversation.
Now
into the home stretch: “As he is so also are we in this world. . .
.We love because he first loved us.” v.19
As a result of being redeemed, we are now present
. . . wherever we are . . . in love – first and foremost for God,
but “so also” for our brothers and sisters and for the unsaved.
It is God’s love which gives us confidence both to love and to face
the day of judgment.
I
don’t know what “troubles” lie ahead for you or for me before
that day. I know that my instinct is to shrink from the dire
diagnosis, from family friction, from financial failure – yes,
especially from death.
I
WANT TO SAY THAT THE LOVE OF GOD AND THE LOVE OF MY CHRISTIAN FAMILY
ENCOURAGES ME TO EMBRACE THESE REALITIES RATHERTHAN SHRINK FROM THEM.
I
can say that from up here behind the pulpit. There’s space between
us – both physical and “psychic.” But what about afterward
over coffee and snacks? Sometimes I feel like I am one of the exiles
in Ezekiel 33, treating prophetic words I hear from this pulpit as
mere entertainment. Is it really so hard to talk with one another
about eternal matters – as compared, say, to the latest shenanigans
in Washington or the latest sports results? It can be – for me
anyway.
One
last personal experience – which can also serve to illustrate the
exhibitionistic nature of God’s love: Years ago I saw a crushingly
beautiful harvest moon on corn stalks. It was just overwhelmingly
beautiful. This was around 1973. It was 25
years
before
I knew that anyone else in all of human history had ever been crushed
by beauty.
In
1998, I read aloud to Betsy a memoir entitled A
Severe Mercy,
by Sheldon Vanauken. It’s the story of his meeting, courting and
marrying his wife, “Davey,” who contracted an incurable disease
not long after they were married. Vanauken nursed Davey through her
final months, during which he corresponded extensively with C. S.
Lewis about the experience. Lewis’ wife died shortly after Davey
died.
Vanauken
had also been crushed by beauty. In writing about why it is so
difficult for him (and me) to talk about such experiences, he
observed, “It is, I think, that we are all so alone in what lies
deepest in our souls, so unable to find the words, and perhaps the
courage to speak with unlocked hearts, that we don't know at all that
it is the same with others.”
I
thought I had been alone – just as Vanauken wrote. It did not
occur to me that anyone else could be crushed by beauty. I thought
of my experience as not merely unique but aberrational.
My
experience with cancer is similar. How in the world can I explain to
anyone that the best thing God has ever done for me (apart from
saving me in Christ) was to give me leukemia? That makes no sense.
Neither did it make sense for Sheldon Vanauken to describe Davey’s
death as God’s severe mercy toward him. But he wrote, “That
death, so full of suffering for us both, suffering that still
overwhelmed my life, was yet a severe mercy. A mercy as severe as
death, a severity as merciful as love.”
God
is
love. This love was made manifest in His sending His son so that we
might live through Him. All Christ-followers know that these
statements are true. Now let your imagination soar through all of
those realms in which that exorbitant, eccentric love might possibly
be displayed; live with unlocked hearts . . . and be amazed.
