Why doesn’t God do something?
Romans 8:12 – 25; Matthew 13: 24 – 30, 36 – 43
Why doesn’t God do something? Possibly the most frequent question asked of religious leaders and teachers. The tragedies and sufferings of life generate such a question. Our sense of helplessness in the face of forces larger than life triggers the cry. Why doesn’t God do something?
There are answers to this question, but we are blind to God’s answers by our anxiety and pain and the overwhelming nature of evil forces. The only answer we want to hear is that God has ‘stopped’ whatever it is that is troubling us. When we can’t rescue ourselves we expect God to step in. But God doesn’t respond in the way we want. Why? Our readings give us some clues as to why? And they give us some clues as to what God is actually doing.
But first let us recognise that if God was going to rescue us from every suffering, tragedy and destructive force, God would also have to direct the rest of our lives. Then we would be puppets and lose our humanity. Humanity is defined by its freedom and choice. Humanity is characterised by responsibility and responsiveness.
Let us see how our texts can help us. Jesus’ parable of the wheat and weeds is simple to understand. Good things and bad things are mixed. Be wary of separating them before the time is right in case you destroy the good with the bad. I see something else here. The parables are all about waiting. We wait for the mustard seed to grow; the leaven to raise the dough; and, the farmers wait for the harvest. Waiting is not wasted time, but time in which we prepare ourselves. Waiting helps us grow strong and wise. Waiting is an active and positive character building exercise.
But we are impatient. We are far too quick to act. This parable is about letting the weeds grow with the wheat. We would wrench them out. We are like that. We have been far too ready to exercise judgement and condemnation on things. We’ve done well with doing that. We’ve decided the fate of women for centuries, have sent homosexuals to the gallows, we too quickly resort to arms and treat unwanted desperate refugees as enemies. Oh! You say I am exaggerating. Maybe so, but history speaks for itself. Jesus importantly tells us to wait. Let the judgement be God’s. Let the condemnation be God’s. Indeed why not? How can we compare our impaired judgment with God’s gracious judgment? ‘Let them mingle,’ says Jesus as the harvest is at the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, and they will throw them into the furnace of fire. [Mt 13: 39,41,42] It’s not the fiery furnace that is important here. It is that God will weed out sin, because God alone can identify sin. The phrase, all causes of sin and all evildoers, suggests that along with evildoers there are causes of sin. Jesus sees Sin as more than selfish and immoral people. Sin is a power. Sin causes us to sin. Sin is a power that God alone can deal with. Here is another piece of evidence that Christ died to break the power of sin and not to take our punishment. On the cross Christ destroyed sin’s power by confronting and combatting Sin with love and forgiveness. In the face of ultimate love and absolute forgiveness evil has no lasting power. Christ, for our sakes, confronted evil on the Cross and died to save us. This is the first thing God has already done for us. Sin’s power is broken. Surrender to Christ Jesus and you will experience freedom
If the parable reminds us that God’s kingdom is breaking out in the world, it also reminds us that sin is still present. However Sin’s power has been dealt a mortal blow by the Cross of Christ Jesus.
So how shall we live now? Paul tells us how to live responsibly in this time before God completes all things. Paul shows us how to live in this time of waiting for the harvest. Paul also recognises that the ‘weeds’ are growing amongst the ‘wheat’. He uses different images such as living in the Spirit and living according to Sin. Paul writes; So then, brothers and sisters, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh; for if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. [Rom 8:12,13]
In this passage from Romans chapter 8 we understand that we have an obligation to God; we are led by the Spirit; we are not slaves to Sin; we have assurance that we are God’s children; united with Creation; and, we will inherit God’s kingdom.
The Obligation we have is captured in that single image of being debtors. It is a powerful image. We all understand what debt is and what it means. Debt obligates us to honour the repayments. Our debts have a high priority in our lives. Paul is saying that we owe God. We’re in debt to God, doubly so. God created us giving us life and God has rescued us. Like the alcoholic and drug addict in recovery we need to be radically honest about our situation and radically dependent on the solution. We need to acknowledge who and whose we are. We need to lean on God to rise above the things that drag us down and away from the good things of life. The gravitational power of Sin is countered by the gracious love of God. God has given us a duty to fulfill and with it responsibility.
Spirit Led. We are faced with the choice of being pulled by Sin’s gravitational power or set free by the Spirit’s gracious leading. Paul speaks of being ‘led’ by the Spirit. Jesus spoke of the Spirit as a Comforter and Advocate. I find the promptings of the Spirit quite amazing in my life. I experience the inner voice of the Spirit prompting me to go here or there, or do this or that. Sometimes a verse of Scripture pops into my mind at the appropriate time giving me guidance. The Spirit’s prompting is life giving.
Not slaves we are, but people set free, writes Paul. How often do we not feel enslaved to this passion or another? How often do we not feel compelled to respond in a certain way? Life with Christ and life led by the Holy Spirit sets us free from slavishly following the way of the world.
Children of God. The Spirit not only sets us free, but assures us whose we are. We have become the children of God by ‘adoption’. Now adoption in Paul’s time was not about childless couples seeking to adopt a child. In this letter to the Romans we are told that we, as adults, have received a sprit of adoption. In Roman culture adoption was a significant thing. The Romans adopted because they wanted to have the best person to be their heir. For example, ten Roman emperors, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Nero, Trajan, Hadrian, Antonius Pius, Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, became emperors through adoption. They were adopted not because the former emperor had no sons, but because they were deemed to be fitter people to become emperor. God adopts us and equips us to be an inheritor.
Inheritors. Paul is using the images that people would understand and images that carried a grave significance for our relationship to God. We are adopted not because God is childless, but that God wants to give us an honourable task. We are adopted therefore will enjoy the inheritance of God. God adopts us so we can be better than we are.
Our studies of Romans and Revelation have uncovered some marvellous truths and insights into the nature of God and our relationship with God. I do love John of Patmos’ description of the Lord Jesus promising the martyred saints that they will reign with him. And the image used is that they will sit on the throne with Jesus. [Rev 3: 21 cf.7: 15,17] All this shows that we are not members of the Jesus club; we are adopted children and co-heirs with the Lord Jesus. All these images capture both the intimacy and the honour we have as Christians. That’s what Jesus was doing and Paul is saying.
United with Creation. But it doesn’t stop there. Our salvation, our elevation to being God’s children and heirs reconciles us to Creation. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. [Rom 8:19-23]
“Why doesn’t God do something?” That cry misses the fact that God has already done so much. God has broken the power of Sin, set us free in the Spirit and equipped us for great responsibility as adopted children and heirs. God raises us to adulthood and our full humanity. However, if God intervened every time we cried out we would become puppets and less than humans.
I encourage you to look at your life through this lens of being Spirit-led adopted children who are given an honourable work, and recognise that in our suffering we share in the suffering of Christ Jesus.
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Peter C Whitaker, Leighmoor UC: 23/07/2017
pgwhitaker@tpg.com.au
/ www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au
