Life is a Metaphor

Literally.


Everything has more than one meaning.

Does one of the pictures say something in particular to you?

Metaphors, Prayer and the Proper Name of God

There was a heated conversation over at an on-line Clergy Group the other day over a benediction suggested in our denomination's resources for Lent.  The wording including "May God our Father bless you and shield you/May Christ our mother shelter you and carry you....".  As you can imagine, several people were against the new wording, and for many reasons.  Others defended the benediction.  Others liked it, just not in a benediction, which has implications for the name of the Trinity.  Some were practical and simply wouldn't use it because it seemed sort of pastorally insensitive to throw words out at people without talking about them.

I'm pretty sure that those who wrote this benediction, as well as the other prayers for this season, were considering the imagery in the different scripture texts we are using, including the gospel reading for this Sunday, when Jesus laments over Jerusalem and compares himself to a mother hen who longs to gather her chicks under her wings in times of danger.  It's poignant and also a little jarring -- and not just because of the 'Jesus as mother hen' imagery.  I find myself haunted by the whole idea of Jesus saying, "I would have liked to.... but you were not willing."  How's that for power?

Interesting that we didn't talk about that in the Clergy Group.

As for me, I'm all for a multiplicity of images for God, because there are a multiplicity of images for God in the Bible.  Some of them are comforting, some of them are familiar, some of them are jarring, and some of them are poignant.  All of them point to a God is is more than we can imagine.  Rock is a rock, but God is not a rock.  God is a father, but God is not a father.  Words are not adequate, but we need them anyway.  God is a mother hen, a fortress, a parent with a rebellious child.   ("It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them.  I led them with cords of human kindness, with bands of love.  I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks.  I bent down to them and fed them." Hosea 11:3-4)

One of the arguments against using mother for God is that the Trinity is not simply a metaphor that we use to describe God; it is the Proper name of God.  Well.  I will admit that I believe that there is something irreplaceable about "Father, Son and Holy Spirit", but I still won't go so far as to call it God's proper name.  It's not as much about a proper name as it is about naming a relationship.  And it is more important to know that God is related to us than it is to know God's proper name.  Lots of people call me on the phone.  They all seem to know my proper name (although they don't all pronounce it right).  I often hang up on them.  But if one of my sons calls me, I do not hang up.

When we pray, we use words and images (and names) given to us in the scriptures.  They are all inadequate in some sense, but they are all gifts given by a God who promises to come to us, to hear us, to gather us.  They name a relationship, comforting and jarring and poignant, that God has initiated.

So bring on mother hen, who longs to gather us under her wings.  God who is Father Son and Holy Spirit is like a mother hen, who longs to gather us under her wings.

If only we were willing.

Reading the Bible in 90 Days, Day 76: John 6 through 15

Yes, I've been in the New Testament for about a week now.  It's been a whirlwind tour of the gospels, and today is no exception.

This is familiar territory for many of us, and these chapters contain many stories and famous sayings.  There are the mountaintop stories:  the feeding of the 5,000 in John 6, the healing in the man born blind in John 9, the raising of Lazarus in John 11, the footwashing and new commandment in John 13.  There are also so many images -- Jesus as the Bread of Life, Jesus as the Good Shepherd, Jesus as the Vine, Jesus as the Light of the World. 

It occurs to me that 90% of my funeral sermon material comes from John.  This can't be an accident. 

In the other gospels, Jesus is a healer who teaches.  In John, Jesus is a teacher who sometimes heals.  It feels like every healing in John has a Point, is a sort of Object Lesson, not simply to relieve suffering, but to illustrate a great truth.   And every healing in John is also like a huge spot light, or a strobe light.

One verse stuck out for me in "the Message"; among all the "familiar quotations" in John, I heard it a little differently this time:

Judas (not Iscariot) said, "Master, why is it that you are about to make yourself plain to us but not the world?" 
"Because a loveless world," said Jesus, "is a sightless world.  If anyone loves me he will carefully keep my word and my Father will love him -- we'll move right into the neighborhood."  (John 14:22-23.)

A loveless world is a sightless world.

Still true today.  To see Jesus is to learn to love the world that he loves, in all its pain and waywardness.