The Sermon I Need to Hear Today

"...the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom."
---Koheleth

Why am I so stupid? Probably because I haven't traveled very far down the path of wisdom. In fact, it's safe to say that I usually take a couple initial steps down the path, and then I turn back and follow more comfortable paths: the path of reason, the path of self-reliance, the path of pleasure, the path of despair, really, any path but the one that will actually get me somewhere that I want to be.

It's not that the path is hidden. God Almighty has spoken His Word, incarnated His Word, and sent His Spirit. Humility. "Islam" means submission, which would be a great name for a religion. Submitting humbly to the Creator and Ruler of the Universe, the One whose holiness judges you and whose love redeems you. Sounds easy. Why do I always flee from that path?

Because it's not so easy, at least not for me. Humble submission means accepting that God is God. Easy enough under a clear blue sky on a gentle spring day. Trickier under the smoking ruins of a 9/11 or the muddy, bloody aftermath of a tsunami or a Katrina. God is God Almighty. He could prevent these things. In His wisdom, He doesn't.

But I usually can't accept that. So I backtrack off the path of the fear of the LORD and head down the path of reason. I invent explanations for why bad things happen (or, more often, seek the arguments of others). God allows free will, so bad things happen. God does not know free future events, so bad things can happen and surprise Him. He can change His mind in response to changing events. (Ah, the open theists help make this line of reasoning so much easier...)

Or, perhaps, God has already predestined the good from the bad, and everything is working out as it should for the best possible way. This might sound like humility, but I think that this kind of Calvinism is also a form of the path of reason. We argue that God has a plan, if only we could see it. And this plan involves some people dying in horrible ways and other people going through fates worse than death.

Or we argue that God does not cause the bad things, nor allow them for His master plan, but they happen because we live in a fallen universe. And God, whose will cannot be thwarted, finds a way to make all things right. He draws straight with crooked lines, as Chesterton once quipped.

But... the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom. God is God. God Almighty. Whatever happens happens by His divine allowance. And that is good and right, for He is God. Why does He allow evil? Because He is limited, because He is cruel, because it fits into a Master Plan? Maybe the answer is to trust in God. He laid the foundations of creation at the beginning of time. He has promised a final consummation of history with a new heaven and a new earth.

Who am I to ask why some small moment in history occurs the way it did? I, who know there is a Creator, but live too often like there is not. I, who spit in the face of redemption by wallowing once more in the mud of sin. I do not live out fully the answers and callings He has put before me in His Word, why should I expect to understand those things He has kept hidden? Like Job, I am ashamed of my arrogance. The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, but it is only the beginning. How much closer to being a saint would I be if only I could stay on that path?

Instead, I too often answer His question to Job like a good modern: "I am a human being. And yet, if I could, I would spare people the loss of their loved ones, I would spare their innocence from the touch of the predator. If I was in charge of all nature, then all disaster would be unnatural, for I would end hurricanes and floods and earthquakes. Why can I be so good, so compassionate, so caring for these strangers I've never met, and You, their Perfect Creator, let all of this happen to them?"

The path of arrogance. Why, if I were even Superman, let alone God, I would do more than Yahweh seems to want to do. The path of arrogance, the exact opposite of the path of wisdom.

And it's not just the question of evil. Why demand faith in an invisible, inaudible, undetectable, unverifiable deity? If I were God, people would know it. I would not hide from them. If I expected them to be in awe before me, I would give them undeniable evidence that I am awe-worthy. Not just for 30 years to a small rural backwater of the Roman empire, but always. Why does He hide?

And, of course, there are theological answers. The path of reason steps up to the plate. We step in as God's lawyers, defending Him to His critics. God needs a lawyer? Is the path of reason a side street leading to the path of arrogance?

The fear of the LORD. I distract myself from that. There are issues to discuss, to address. Even ministries to do, time is short, I gotta get moving... for Jesus, of course. My Friend, My Redeemer, My Co-pilot. Co-pilot? Can I even fly the plane at all? Do I look to that still small voice and experience fear: awe, reverence, humble submission, trust? Sometimes. But, sadly, usually not. God calls for my effort, my best... like an athlete, I got to step it up a notch to reach for the prize (hey, even Paul said something like this, right?)

Martha, He said, Mary has chosen the one needful thing.

Is there no place for thinking, for reasoning, for activity, for serving? Of course there is. We are called to be the living body of the Word in this time and place. But not the living body of our will, not the living body of our plans. His body, His will, His plans. Everything we do must be done in the context of the road we're on. And there is only one road that leads where we say we want to go, the road of Mary, of reverent attention and humble submission to our God.

God, help me to bend my knee before you. Break my heart, my will, knock me off the way of pride and help me to begin---and remain--on the path of wisdom. In Christ's name I ask...