Playing host to God

This Sunday we came to the portion of 1 Peter where Peter invokes the imagery of the OT temple as a metaphor for the church and the community that is called to newness of life within the church. 1 Peter: 2:4Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ". In this passage, Peter is continuing to develop themes that he has already introduced. For example, the theme of holiness comes into play again when we are taught that God's temple is now a spiritual building which you and I are being built into as God lives in and among each of us who follow Jesus in faith and repentance. We stagger when we hear that God lives in and among us in the new community that is called his church; but more than staggering we also stumble on the words. What could this possibly mean, that God lives in us and among us? What implications does it have on my mundane existence? Should this truth make me happy, or make me blush?

For many of us we think about God living in and among us and it makes us nervous. We know we are quite often doing things and thinking things that are disruptive of God's shalom. What is it like for him to live in and among us when we are consciously or unconsciously partaking in the very sort of sinful behavior that is opposed to God's gracious and peaceful rule. I suspect that many of us think that God would just as soon not be in and among us most of the time. I submit though that the gospel turns this notion on its head. We have already noted in our study of 1 Peter that one of the most important things we can know about what it means to be God's holy people is that it is the presence of God with us that sets us apart into the category of holiness; his holy presence in and among us is foundational. This is why we noted, along with many others, that before holiness is anything behaviorally, it is a gift. Rather than wanting to be somewhere else when we are revolting against God's ways for us, he simply wants even more passionately for us to be moved by his love away from those destructive acts and moved towards choices and patterns that will result in human flourishing.

We are hard pressed to find adequate metaphors to shed light on the mystery of God's presence in us, and how he means for his presence to change us. The one I offered for consideration in the homily is this: "I am always saddened when I realize that I have parented Palmer in a way that does not respect her dignity or demonstrate my love for her. I often think, wow, she should just leave and find a better parent. Of course this is silly talk in a way but those who are parents can relate to these feelings I am sure. Of course, she does not leave. In fact, she wants more of me in spite of my parenting foibles. All metaphors break down if you try to make them wooden representations of that which you are trying to illustrate and this one is no exception; but, what I want us to think about is that God does not want to leave us even when we "let him down". He is not going anywhere. He is not leaving. He is in and among us for the long haul. What he wants is for every ounce us to be fully engaged with his love in a positive way so that we might flourish instead of working against our human dignity and the dignity of others as we often still do. I submit that the way to get more of ourselves in communion with him in this redemptive way is not by being ashamed of the abode we provide him but rather to seek to respond to his love so that we become more hospitable hosts to him.

This is how my friend, Chuck DeGroat talks about this topic:

"I was introducing a candidate for ministry several years ago among a group of Calvinist pastors. When I introduced a young guy I had gotten to know, I said, “Josh is a good man.” Very quickly, a typically outspoken pastor leaped up from his seat and said, “Can we say that any man is good?” This pastor’s brand of Calvinism reminds me of the words of an old elder at my childhood church who’d often say to me, “Don’t forget Chuck, there are none righteous, no not one.”

But this kind of wormology misses the reality that God takes up residence in human beings. It points continually to our screw-ups and ignores the unfathomable reality that in Christ, we are a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). It’s actual. It’s present. It’s the re-Edening of your once-inhospitable soul. The tomb becomes a womb, bursting with life. And this mysterious growing reality within causes us to say, “It is longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me!” (Gal. 2:19).


What’s more, this means that you can relax. Attempts at cosmetic spirituality can be dropped. External rituals can be stopped. What defines you is within. Martin Smith writes, “Unless we come to acknowledge and believe in this true center, we will continue to imagine that our public personalities or our image of ourselves is the whole truth of who we are.” Our false selves can begin to wither and die. Our cheap imitations of spiritual heroes can give way to authentic and unique expressions of God’s image-bearing art in each extraordinary soul. Death to life metanoia takes place, and the Self among the competing selves breaks free

The re-Edening of our once-inhospitable souls is such a wonderful way of talking about our life with God because the focus is on seeing our lack of love, our lack of faith, our lack of obedience to the truth of God's ways as a tragedy rather than looking at ourselves as tragic figures.....(Chuck from his blog, http://drchuckdegroat.wordpress.com/2010/03/05/the-tomb-becomes-a-womb/)".

1. Have you ever thought long and hard about what God thinks of you when he is with you in a situation when you are clearly working against him? I don't mean do you think about what you are doing as wrong because you know it is against one of God's moral precepts; I mean, do you ever stop and think, what is God feeling right now towards me as I think this wicked thought or do this thing that hurts this other person? Is it useful to ask yourself this sort of question? Why or why not?

2. Do you think you "do wormology" towards yourself and/or others? How does this hurt you when you go down that "I am a worm" road?

3. Is the distinction that Chuck makes between seeing our lack of obedience as tragedy rather than ourselves as tragic figures a helpful one? How does this approach free us from "cosmetic spirituality"? Discuss.